Meet Chewie.  We are boarding him for a neighbor who recently lost her husband.

He has a different name.  But since she hasn't checked on him in a month, and he's becoming more and more ours.  We've named

him Chewie.  You might guess why.

We have our horses pastured in our closer up yard as our big field needs growing time.  As a result they can come right up to our front step.  This hasn't been a problem until we met Chewie.

He chews plastic bags, shoes, hats, coats, Rob while Rob was doing some plumbing.  He chews everything.  I do mean everything.  *snicker*

He's a great little pony.  Four years old, and lets Samuel ride him all over the place without a bridle.  But umm  Chewie!!

This is our other family member.  His current name is Raja.  He replaces her kitty that went missing this winter.

And she's off.  Our beloved coach is moving to North Carolina, and gathering her grandchildren to her.  All of her family in the next couple months is hopefully moving as close as possible to where her and her husband will be.

They don't have a house...or a specific town that they will be living in yet.  Although they have a vacation rental for the next month that they'll be living in while they look.

She said with her mom and dad dead she realized the thing she wants more then anything is to be near family.  It makes sense to me.

This woman donated over 12 hours a week just in labor spent with the kids, nevermind the hours spent in costume shopping, music planning, advertising, the list goes on and on and on.  And all because she loves twirling and loves kids.

I'm 99% sure she will start a squad in North Carolina.  She's been at it for 50 years after all.  and if your in the area, and you see an advert.  Go for it.  Even if its 6 months its just amazed me how much it has changed my kids.  The self-confidence they've learned, just astounding. 

Good morning

I opened my mouth yesterday and created work for myself.  *eg*

We shall see today how big of a mistake it was.  *snicker*

I volunteered to keep the Port Angeles baton team going through the fair.  It made the coach's day.  It just hurt her something fierce that the kids weren't going to do it.

It seemed stupid to me to not let them do it.  They all know their routines, its just a matter of practicing once a week and keeping stuff in their heads.  So I will, but I'm NOT going into town twice a week.  I will let the moms pick Tuesday or Wednesday and go from there.

The group is smaller as people left with feelings hurt over the coach leaving.  *whine*

This will be a good dry run, as Rob and I are fully intent on starting a squad out here.  We have six kids intrested in joining my kids already.

Yeah I'm nuts.  But this sport is made for my children, and I refuse to abandon it just cause of no coach.

Good morning

Today is our first day with nothing planned.  *cheers*

Rob is off until Wednesday, and today we will start getting our life back into normal.

hahahahaha

Rob, Zeria, Kaylin and Jamari ran the fun run yesterday.  Its 3.2 miles with several hills.  Rob came in fourth this year.  He was a bit urked as he passed this kid at the bridge and he was far behind and just at the finished line the kid had a second gear.  Rob never has a second gear just a nice steady pace. 

Zeria sprained her foot on Tuesday of last week in her aunts pool.  She managed to do a dress rehearsal, a recital and a parade on it.  But was in tears at the end of each.  She has been planning for the fun run for months even trained with it for Rob.  So it was excrutiating for her when she realized she just wasn't going to be able to do it.  She was in tears within the first half mile due to pain in her foot.  She managed 2.5 miles before she decided to quit.  Jamari quit at the same time.  See you have to run past the finish line do a mile loop and come back.  When they got to the finish line they both stopped.  Jamari is ONLY seven, and didn't want to run on his own.  And Zeria was in pain.  So we encouraged them as best we could.

Kaylin however.  Oh my word.  She didn't train, she just really wanted to do it.  And did it she did!  She only stopped running for drink breaks.  She ran the whole 3.2 miles.  And smiled the whole stinking way!  Smiled.  We were very proud of her.

Which made Zeria mad.

Of course.

So we worked on our sportsmanship attitude, and she was able to tell Kaylin good job.

And then we had another wee-melt-down later that night.

The problem was is I was running support for all of them.  Zeria is going to be 11 on the 18th.  Kaylin is 8.  I saw that Zeria was *almost* to a drink station and doing well.  But I hadn't seen Kaylin in a good five minutes.  Which meant I had a 8 year old running by herself.  Jamari was with Zeria and I knew she'd watch for him.  So I made the choice to check on Kaylin.  When I got to the finish line I saw Rob had finished and told him Z and S were right behind me, so he said he'd go run with them.  (We'd discussed that he'd finish out with the kids after he ran his race.)  I then went and caught up with Kaylin and played support for her for the last mile.

Zeria felt that this showed favortism.

Ugh.

I think somewhere in the back of her mind she believes that she would have kept running if "I'd" been her support.  Although she never came out and said that.   But I can only split myself into so many pieces.  LOL

So we re-talked about favorites and sportsmanship and moved on.

Normally Kaylin and Zeria are VERY good friends.  But its a bit overwhelming to recognize your 8 year old sister just whomped your butt.  When Zeria quit Kaylin was over 3/4's of a mile ahead of her.  Jamari was lagging behind her.    But Zeria had a very sore foot.  And pushed herself through tears for almost 2.5 miles.  That to me is amazing.  I don't do pain.  I don't like it, and I don't get high on it.  Unlike Rob.  So we praised her, and we move on.

Parenting is hard work huh?

We're home.  The recital went well.  We have our baton parade this morning, and this afternoon I'm volunteering at one of the booths and then tomorrow is the Sekiu Fun Run, and then we can *finally* breathe.

pant pant pant.

I haven't even decided what pictures I might show.  But that one above made me grin.  Do you see how serious that kid is??

This is my FAVORITE picture from vacation.  These cousins love each other so much.  Rob and I have schemed and schemed as to how we could live closer to them just for that.  Nothing makes sense though, so I guess we'll cherish the visits we can.

This one's probably my second favorite vacation picture.  We stopped alongside the top of loup loup pass to pick pine cones.  We don't have them here, and KK wanted them for crafting.  Rainee got sidetracked by the beautiful flowers.  I stood in one place and counted 10 different species.

Two very lazy cousins.  Equally close as the girls, though more likely to have a sword fight then to hug each other.

And Zeria and Samuel in there duet costumes.

Anyhow I'll sort through later and see what else I want to share.  Have a good day.

Happy Fourth of July!

I'm headed to Omak Saturday, spending the night at my  moms tomorrow.  We won't be back until Thursday night, but Friday is my kids last recital with the Port Angeles baton team, and Saturday is our Clallam Bay parade, so it might be awhile til I get back here.

Keep the web a flying, and all prayers are appreciated.

On other news.  My dad is out of jail.  He will be required to do several years of counselling, random urine analysis checks (sop in this kind of situation) and several other things that I'm not too sure of.  We can't see him until we meet with a doc officer and are "told" about my dads issues, and fill out some paper work.

It will be several weeks before this can be done.  I'm okay with it...I've kind of enjoyed the break from the drama.  I can see him, just my kids can't, and since we're a group package...LOL

Its official.

I hereby believe Rainee Grace was switched at birth.  She absolutely can NOT be my child.

She just turned down homemade peanut butter cookies for.

an apple.

An apple

She can't be my child.  I don't have a healthy eating habit left.

And she chose an apple over a cookie.

I told her she could have a cookie.

She went and looked in the fridge and informed me that there was ONE apple left, and she'd rather have that.

Such a strange child.