White Christmas

We have had a fairly mild and dry late fall, early winter so far.  Today we woke up to this:

Henry was running a fever, so it was good that we didn't have any big plans.  Last night we hunkered down and watched A Christmas Story:



Today we stayed home and hung out.  Jay made a yummy dinner and Henry took a two hour nap, as he was still feverish.  He seems to be on the mend, however, and is currently engaging in a Madden Tournament with Jay and William while Tessa and I stay clear upstairs.


We didn't do a ton of gifts this year but everyone got something that they had asked for and enjoys.  We were able to spend the day together with a minimum of arguing.  We had good food and plenty of treats.  It was nice.

Merry Christmas!

Summit School Happenings

We absolutely love the elementary school that William and Tessa attend.  The teachers and staff are amazing and we have had so many good experiences at Summit.  Both William and Tessa have had fun activities this month.

William is in the Gifted and Talented program at Summit and had to do a research project on a subject of his choice.  This year his topic was the French Revolution.  He did a lot of research and wrote a two page paper on the subject.  The culmination was a presenting a PowerPoint presentation on the subject to his 5th grade class.  He did a great job!

Tessa's 3rd Grade teacher has spent a bit of time during December teaching the kids about The Nutcracker.  They wrote reports, learned about dance and music and decorated their classroom with a nutcracker theme.  Today they performed a version of the story.  They all had parts with costumes.  Tessa was Marie/Clara and she did a great job!

We are so lucky to attend Summit Elementary!

William's 11th Birthday

Today is William's 11th Birthday.  To commemorate the occasion I decided to write down a few things about William as he turns 11.

• He is the most curious kid I know.  He is interested in so many things and takes the time to learn about them on his own time.  His interests are diverse and include sports, video games, astronomy, history and coin collecting.  
• He has been dying for his own electronic device and received an iPod touch for his birthday.  So far he loves it, although I hope it doesn't get too crazy.  This morning I called him upstairs to get ready for school and he texted me that he was coming.  Sigh.
• He is funny.  And not just funny as in "ha, ha" funny.  He is clever and creative when it comes to his sense of humor.  Anyone who knows William at all can attest to that.
• He is looking forward to going to middle school next year.  I'm not looking forward to having three kids at three different schools, but William is excited.

William is such a great kid.  He never wants a birthday party - he just wants to go out to dinner with our family.  This year he chose Buffalo Wild Wings.  Tonight we are having a cheesecake for his birthday dessert - no regular birthday cake for William!  

I kind of feel bad that he almost always has school on his birthday so it makes it hard to fit everything in on his actual birthday.  But he seems to like having his birthday dinner the weekend before, opening his gifts the night before (so he doesn't have to wait until the night of his birthday) and having cake (or cheesecake) after dinner on his actual birthday.  It kind of turns into William's birthday week of celebrating, which is fun.  

Happy birthday, William.  We love you!

Store Bought Mom

Hey, look at that.  I took pictures at Halloween.  Notice that the only costumed Wright this year was Tessa (as Hermione from the Harry Potter books).  The Wright kids are getting older, I guess.

I was able to help with Tessa's class party this year.  When Henry was little class parties stressed me out but at this point I'm pretty chill about it.  Lots of moms are willing to help so all I had to do was organize and buy treats.  I went with pumpkin shaped sugar cookies and frosting from a local store.  The kids were able to decorate their cookies and eat or take them home.  It was fun.

One of the kids asked me if I made the frosting for the cookies.  Before I could answer, Tessa piped up and said, "no.  She's more of a store-bought mom."

Yep.  That's me.  But at least I bring cookies from the store.

High Roller

William likes to take online quizzes.  I have to be really careful about the websites, though, because well, you know - the internet.  But he will take random quizzes about which animal he would be or which state he should live in.  You see links all the time on Facebook and lots of people take them, but since William doesn't have a FB account I'm not sure where he discovered all these quizzes. I never take quizzes like that, mainly because I'm not on Facebook that often but also because I am quite sure I won't like the results.  I took one.  Once.  I wanted to know what state I should be living in, according to the internet.  I got Wyoming,  I wasn't impressed.

Anyway.

The other day he took one that supposedly matches you with the country you should be living in.  According to the quiz, William should be living in Monaco.

Seriously?  Because his almost 11 year old responses indicate a propensity for martinis and gambling?  What kind of quiz is this?  He took it again and got Dubai.  William is apparently quite the cosmopolitan man of the world.

I really want to take this quiz.  I want the internet to tell me that I should be living in France so I don't feel bad when I peruse Paris Real Estate websites, looking for the perfect apartment in the 6th Arrondissement.

I won't give in, though.  I have a bad feeling my answer wouldn't be anything nearly as fun as France.  Or even Monaco or Dubai.

I think I'm probably a Canada.  At least according to the internet.

Fall Pictures

My friend Melissa does a great job taking pictures of my kids.  They will listen to her and we generally get some good shots.  Here are some from last week:

17

Today is our 17th wedding anniversary.  I wish I could say that we did something to fun to commemorate the occasion.  But, you know, stuff gets in the way.

Henry had a campout with the scouts last night and since Jay hasn't been able to go to many of them this year he wanted to at least camp out with them.  Unfortunately he had to work late and had to drive up Green Canyon in the dark, looking for the group.  The boys did a 10 mile hike today and Jay helped shuttle cars to the finish point so he didn't make it home until early afternoon.  By the time he got some yard stuff done around here, it was almost 3 and Henry was home.  Off the boys went to the USU Homecoming Tailgate Party, where Jay runs a booth for USU Student Services Marketing.  They will come home about 8 and I'm sure head right to bed after last night's campout.

Tessa abhors anything to do with football and although I think it would be fun, I would end up entertaining her so we stayed home.  She wanted Wendys for dinner.  Yum.

This is where Jay and I were 2 years ago today, celebrating our 15th anniversary:

C'est la vie.  

Back to Reality

Well, September has certainly gone by fast.  With school back in session, you would think that I would have all the time in the world to recount our days, but no.  Really no.

Back to school was a little rough this year but things have smoothed out.  Henry started a new school and other than the bus ride to and from seems to like it.  William and Tessa have gotten back in the swing of things, finally.  It took a while but we seem to be settling in for the school year.

September is always busy.  Between the big school PTA fundraiser and the Primary program, there is a lot to do.  But as September winds down and those things are over, I am finding time to clean and reorganize and get things done that probably should have been done over the summer but weren't, because, you know, summer!  It's much more fun to take the kids swimming than to clean out my closets.  Plus I find I can get a lot done in a much shorter period of time if the kids are occupied at school.

Now we are gearing up for fall.  Bring it on!

School Days!

Today was the first day of school.  Other than Tessa throwing up (she has developed a really nervous stomach, bless her heart), things seemed to go well and everyone got to school.  It's only 9:30 am as I type this so hopefully things are OK.  I'm excited for the kids.  I'm really happy with William and Tessa's teachers and I anticipate them having a good school year.  Henry is at a new school this year - North Cache 8-9 Center - which I know nothing about but he's excited to go.  He's less excited about riding the bus again after two years at a school down the street but that's life.

William (5th Grade) and Tessa (3rd Grade)

Henry (8th Grade)

See Ya Later

This summer we were sad to say goodbye to some good friends the Nells.  William and Kyron are the same age and have been in the same school classes, Primary classes and Cub Scout groups for years.   Tessa and Kambree were born just a few weeks apart.  They were baptized on the same day and have been in the same Primary class since Nursery.  We will miss them as they head on their new adventure on the East Coast.  

We went with some friends to the splash pad in North Logan to play in the water:

 I'm not sure why I'm not smiling but everyone else looks wonderful!

 Cute girls!

William is already asking for an iPod touch for a joint birthday/Christmas present so he can text and Facetime with Kyron.  And Tessa is eager for a pen pal in Massachusetts.  We hope to stay in touch with them!

Olive Cart

Today in the car we were talking about back to school.  I was telling Henry that he should plan to eat lunch at school this year, at least for the first little bit.  For the past two years he has barely eaten lunch at school.  The lines are long, he doesn't like the food, he'd rather play basketball or whatever during lunch, and he got home so early (before 2:30 most days) that he could just eat a quick snack during the day to hold him over.  Whatever.  I wasn't going to force him to buy a lunch that he wouldn't eat so I dutifully sent peanut butter crackers in his backpack and figured he was old enough to not starve himself.

Anyway, he told me that he was, indeed, planning to eat at school because they had an olive cart.

Huh?

He meant, of course, that they have ala carte dining at his new school, where they can pick and choose from different offerings.  He is thinking that the lines will be shorter and he will have more choices.  But "olive cart"?  Seriously?  When I stopped laughing I asked him why he thought an olive cart would be good, since he doesn't like olives anyway.  He had heard me talk about ala carte options and just misunderstood the term, obviously.

William, aka Mr. Vocabulary, was quick to point out the correct term.

Jay, on the other hand, would love a lunch offering from the olive cart.  He'd be thrilled.

Henry, not so much.  I'm hoping to just get something more than peanut butter crackers in him during the day.  If he gets it from an olive cart, who am I to complain?

Shop Til You Drop

This past weekend Tessa and I attended what my sister-in-law Laura terms Estrogen Fest.  It is a fun weekend where all the ladies in the Wright family get together for food, fun and shopping.  We missed it last year because we were on our way home from Disneyland, but this year the stars aligned and we made the trip to Salt Lake City for some fun.

We shopped at City Creek Center.

 Went met Swoop at the Farmer's Market.

 We shopped til we dropped!

 We tried to go to see Music and the Spoken word, but settled for watching it in the Theater next to the main hall of the Conference Center since you had to be eight to be admitted to the live broadcast.

 We did go see the Mormon Tabernacle Choir sing their last song after the live broadcast was over.

It was a fun weekend, except for Elizabeth's tooth infection that sent her home early Saturday morning.  We are anticipating more fun with the Wright clan next summer.

While Tessa and I were gone, Jay took the boys over to Bear Lake for a day of boating with his boss.  They had a blast.  William got to drive the boat and only complained a little bit about "almost drowning" when the tube they were riding on flipped over on top of him.  Jay left his phone in the car so no pictures, unfortunately.  Oh well.

Teenage Dream

So Henry's a teenager.  I know conventional wisdom says we are supposed to dread the teenage years and he's been an official teenager for less than a day but I have a good feeling about teenage Henry.  He is really a good kid.  I know the next few years will bring a lot of changes to his life but I'm not worried about it now.  He is, generally speaking, a kind and responsible young man who doesn't seem to be on the road to rebellion.  At least not yet.

To celebrate I took Henry and a few of his friends to the Logan Aquatic Center today.  That is what is so great about a summer birthday - the weather is typically perfect for outdoor activities like swimming.  We spent the afternoon at the pool with pizza and snow cones.  He picked out an ice cream cake for tonight.  Easy-peasy.

His gift from us was a phone.  Not just an old phone that he can use as a glorified iPod.  A real, activated phone.  With his own number.  Jay was surprisingly resistant to the idea but eventually gave in.  There are lots of ground rules that he has to follow and heaven help him if he gets it taken away for breaking his school's cell phone policy.  He seems happy, though.

The birthday quote of the day goes to Tessa:  "Now that you are 13, Henry, I hope you don't turn into a punk."

Amen, sister.

Happy Birthday, Henry.  We love you!

Undefeated

William's Little League team played in the Cache Valley North Division Championship game last night.  They were undefeated leading into the game and William was nervous.  Heading into last season's playoffs they were undefeated as well and lost in the playoffs.  This year, they made it to the big game.  It was played in North Logan and the Hyde Park Rays played the Smithfield Reds.  It was a good game but the Rays prevailed, making them the champions!

The game made the local paper - here is a link:

http://news.hjnews.com/allaccess/hyde-park-rays-go-undefeated/article_543be518-13bf-11e4-93a1-0019bb2963f4.html

William had a good game.  He made it on base twice (he was hit by a pitch and walked) and stole home both times.  On his last at bat he hit a line drive that the first baseman jumped up to catch in a nice play.  He made two nice defensive plays as well - he chased a ball out from center field and held the runner at 2nd base with a nice throw to the shortstop and while he was playing shortstop he fielded a ground ball and threw the runner out at 2nd base.  

William loves playing baseball.  He really improved his hitting this year and was comfortable at several different defensive positions.  His coaches really worked hard with the kids and they all improved over the course of the year.  

Congratulations to the Hyde Park Rays!  

Safety First

I hate fireworks.  I don't think it makes me a bad person.  I just don't like them.  My friend Lara said that, to her, you might as well light a $20 bill on fire and watch it burn in the middle of the road.  I knew there was a reason we were friends.

Once a year, however, I cave and we do fireworks.  I make Jay buy them because I just can't.  We join our neighbors in the center of the cul-de-sac for 30 minutes of loud, smoky fireworks.  We have our system down and use our wheelbarrow to clean up the mess and it's all over and everyone is in bed by 10:30.

On July 5th, we awoke to this:

See that yellow stick with the charred ends?  It's our push broom!  Apparently something was still actively burning when Jay shoveled it into the wheelbarrow and caught our broom, the remaining fireworks and possibly the wheelbarrow on fire.  We didn't notice a thing until the next morning.  Thank heavens it wasn't windy - I keep picturing a roaring fire out in our front yard that very easily could have turned into a grass/house fire.

Next year, everything gets doused with water, if we even do fireworks at all.  Fireworks and me - we're not friends.  After his I don't think we ever will be.

Separate Lives

The Wright Family split along gender lines during the second week of June.  The boys went to Seattle, the girls stayed home.

It isn't as inequitable as it sounds.  Before Jay's surgery we were planning a big family vacation to Seattle.  We were going to see a friend of Jay's, catch a Yankees game, sight-see in Seattle and take the ferry over to Victoria Island (or is it Vancouver Island?   I don't know) for a day or so.  Plans changed after Jay didn't have quite as much time off as he thought and we didn't have quite as much disposable income as we thought.  But Jay's good friend Scott was able to get tickets to the Yankees/Mariners so Jay took the boys to see the sights and watch some baseball.  They were actually able to see two games, see some sights in Seattle and meet one of their favorite players in the whole world.

Henry on the field during batting practice:

The boys on the Space Needle:

A signed ball by Derek Jeter.  

Here is a picture of Derek Jeter signing their balls.  The lady in the striped skirt noticed Henry, William and Scott's two sons and brought Jeter over to give them autographs after he finished batting practice.  They were thrilled:

Since Tessa has little to no patience for baseball - she can barely make it through a little league game - we decided to stay home.  We took a little trip to Salt Lake City for an overnight trip and had some fun of our own:

We went to the planetarium.  Foucault's Pendulum kept Tessa occupied for a while:

While at the planetarium we saw the IMAX movie - Madagascar: Island of Lemurs.  It was fun.

The best stop of the day - Build A Bear Workshop so Tessa could pick out a new friend with some money from her birthday.  Meet Jade the Panda!

All in all everyone had a good time on their respective adventures.  Tessa would not have been happy spending 6 hours at the ballpark on two consecutive days.  William and Henry would not have been happy spending over an hour in Build a Bear while Tessa shopped for her new stuffed animal.  Everyone's a winner!

Summertime

The end of the school year is so crazy!  Lots of projects that I help on at the elementary school come to a head and culminate all at once.  There are programs and parties and carnivals.  It is crazy busy.  But then it's over.  And school is out!

William and his awesome 4th grade teacher Mr. Lish:

 Henry helped at the Summit Carnival.  He was a huge help and worked hard all day, at least until he had to go to school for a Utah History test:

Tessa and her wonderful 2nd grade teacher Mrs. Adams

 First shaved ice of the summer from our favorite place - Pinks:

Utah!

If you have never been to a 4th Grade Utah! program, you really need to make an effort.  They are really quite something.

I wasn't prepared when Henry was in 4th grade.  I just knew that they had a school program so I went.  I'm embarrassed to say that I laughed quite a bit.  I wasn't prepared for all the songs - I mean, seriously, who makes up all these songs about Utah history?  And the actions to go along with them.  I was expecting maybe a song and each kid saying a part about the state of Utah.  But what I got was something way more.

This year I was prepared.  And I got it on video.

Here is part of the main song.  It's pretty catchy and I found myself singing it quite a bit during the day, which is pretty annoying:

Here is a song about the railroad.  I had to get at least one song that had actions to go with it.  I wish I had gotten the one about the Spanish explorers but here is the railroad:

Finally, here is William's part.  It had a lot of numbers to memorize and he was pretty nervous.  Jay told him to just make up a number if he forgot them.  Who was going to question the number of chickens who entered the Salt Lake Valley with the first pioneers?  He did great, however:

It was a great program and the 4th graders at Summit Elementary did great!  I can't wait until Tessa's Utah program.

Surf's Up

The LaShar's Year End Dance Review, featuring Tessa's class doing songs from Teen Beach Movie, was last weekend.  Once again we all enjoyed the show!

As you can see, her class had an adorable costume that fit perfectly with the theme.  I'm terrible with doing cute hairstyles and normally Tessa doesn't even care but on dance recital day she really wants something more special.  We took her to Cookie Cutters and they did an adorable braid that weaved around her flower headband.

The boys were good and told her how good she danced.  Nana Bunny and Cameron came to Logan to see the show!  It was another fun year at dance.  Thanks Mrs. Jenny for being such a good teacher for the past four years.

Galileo

William is involved in a class at school called SEM.  It provides enrichment opportunities for kids in the form of special projects and activities.  In 4th grade, they participate in an activity called Images of Greatness, where they do a research project on a historically significant person who has made a positive contribution to society.  William's choice - Galileo Galilei.

I was fine with this.  He has been really into astronomy for a while so I knew he would enjoy researching Galileo.  But I forgot that part of the final project is to participate in an Evening of Excellence where they have to dress up as their person.  I'm terrible at costumes.  Really bad.  The solution - an internet search for Galileo Costume for Kids.  This brought me to a company that sold a costume billed as a Galileo/Nostradamus costume.  A few clicks and $30 later it was headed my way.  Lazy?  You bet.  But it saved both me and William a lot of grief.  We saved that for the Sunday afternoon when we spent hours putting together his display, especially since he had left a good bit of the work he had already completed at school.  Sigh.  Still, we persevered and William became Galileo for an evening in May:

He and all his SEM buddies did a great job with their projects.  There were some interesting people profiled and I thought it was a great introduction to research for William.

Still, the irony of William's costume being billed as a Galileo/Nostradamus hybrid costume doesn't escape me.  Science/Speculation?  I guess they all dressed alike, even in the 17th century.