April
April was a whirlwind month. Lots of the usual: school, baseball, ballet, cub/girl scouts and the like. As a cub den leader I get to help plan pack meetings. Traditionally the Blue and Gold banquet (probably the biggest cub meeting of the year) is held in February. We weren't able to secure our church building's gym for either February or March so it got pushed to April. We opted for a picnic theme and had each of the families bring their own 'picnic' dinner. I was assigned decorations and refreshments with another woman. Turns out that woman actually had to be somewhere else that evening and was quite swamped with other responsibilities herself. I ended up making 90 cupcakes and these cute little chocolate fleur de lis symbols to go on top, as well as come up with decor. I asked her to help me put it up the night before and thankfully she could do that. The evening went off without a hitch. There were games and lots of awards. Alex earned his Wolf and an additional Super Nova science award. We were very proud of him.
This is what ten year old grape juice looks like. Don't drink it, or you might die...
Me putting together each of the kids Galilean telescopes. They got to personalize them with stickers.
Learning about various galaxy types. They each got to make their own irregular galaxies.
Eating some homemade greek souvlaki for dinner. Yum.
Alex earning his Wolf!
Alex showing off his awards
We put checker tables clothes up and big ants
The following morning (after having been doing scout stuff for three days) I hopped on an airplane to go to Utah to help my mom prepare her house to sell. The weather was cold and sleeting! I've gotten used to Texas... I picked up my mom from her new apartment and we drove to the condo. We had 2 hours to get everything off/out of furniture for the moving guys to come and move furniture and other heavy items to the garage. It was hard keeping my mom on task as she would get confused with what we were doing. We had two polynesian guys, Leki and Latu, come and move everything. They did a fantastic job. They even moved all of my mom's food storage from the basement (SO MUCH STUFF). My mom and I did a fair amount of laughing as well. Our family used to put up grape juice every year at our old house (our yard was surrounded by concord grapes) and my mom still had some bottles from 2008. They looked horrible and brown. We kept debating whether they had turned into wine or even vinegar. We didn't dare taste them. The rest of day was spent moving light stuff (bedding, etc) to the living room on the ground floor.
The half loaded garage. We sold all the stuff on the shelves too. Someone even bought the peg board off the walls. Go figure.
My sister Libby arrived the following day. We spent the day going through important papers, running errands and making signs for the estate sale the next day. We went to crown burger that night per my mom's request but ironically no one got burgers. We all got gyros and they were good! We laughed and laughed til we couldn't breathe. I love spending time with my mom and sister. In fact, I'm pretty sure at one point my mom just started laughing in the car and we couldn't get it out of her why she was laughing, and pretty sure we were all laughing so hard. I was driving and could hardly see because I was cry laughing. *sigh*
The next day, Saturday, was the big day. My sister and got up at 5:45am to be out the door and putting up signs on Highland Drive (a major street by my mom's) and start pulling out furniture. It was so cold that our tape wasn't sticking to the poles! We went back to my mom's and found fluorescent orange duct tape (bless you dad) and thankfully that stuck AND drew more attention to our signs. LOL. Libby advertised on KSL a week prior and said our sale was from 8a-12p. We had crazies show up at 7:30am! Those people were apparently on the search for gold, jewelry and valuables... We only had furniture and household goods. Anyway, I used my hard earned bargaining skills I learned in Virginia while being a poor law student's wife to good use! My sister mostly brought stuff out and I sold it. I got one lady to buy all the food storage! I was sure that was all going to the dump as it was old, but she bought it. LOL. Even better was the time when a cop showed up and said that they had received a '911 phone call from this residence' I told them no one called and that the owner was my mom. I then proceeded to ask if he wanted to buy something and persuaded him to buy a mattress (also something we didn't think we could sell as we had 4, but we sold all of them)! All in all, we had over 200 people come and go and we made our mom $1100 dollars. It was a huge, huge blessing. I've never seen a garage sale so well attended. It was really hard when people would ask for a price on certain items (the coffee table that was always in the living room as a kid, or certain lamps or decor that held memories) because they were priceless to me. I couldn't believe the thing I got choked up over was my dad's hammer. It had a leather handle and was covered in paint but I remember him always using it. I asked the guy who bought it if I could take a quick picture before he left. I cried when I told my mom and she cried too.
My dad's hammer
We actually asked that my mom not be there the morning of the sale as we felt it would be hard for her to see her life being sold away. We put out a 'free' sign at 12:30 and grabbed lunch. When we came back, almost everything was gone. We took one car load to the DI and the rest fit in the trash. We were totally done by 3:30p. I couldn't believe it. The day could have gone so differently, but we were blessed and we knew it. Libby and I had a dinner date with some of her friends at 6:30 so we dropped off my mom. The rest of the evening was spent with them and chatting. Sunday we went to my mom's and cleaned until 3p. Windows, bathrooms, baseboards, the works. When I finished my assigned jobs, I, unknowingly, fell asleep sitting on the stairs. We then went back to her apartment and made a yummy salmon dinner and then I went to catch my flight back home. Libby stayed a extra day to wrap up other affairs. It was a packed trip but I was so glad I could go and help. I came home and took 2 days to recover because I was so exhausted.
In school we've been doing an astronomy unit. We spent a day or two learning about various astronomers (galileo, copernicus, etc) and made telescopes. The rest of the time has been moving through various celestial bodies (galaxies, nebulae, planets, etc). The kids and I have loved it.
Other things in April: Lily got all her prizes from girl scouts for selling between 400 and 500 cookies! (That was really stressful people) She loved her swag and patches.
We had a few tornado warnings and one 'take shelter' warning. Thankfully we were safe.
Alex played a few more baseball games and hit another homer and earned the game ball!
It's been very fun to watch Alex play this season as he really understands the game now. He's a fantastic hitter and has a good arm and great aim! Once he can consistently catch the ball, he will be a real asset to any team he's on. He frequently plays third base or shortstop. He had an awesome play recently where he quickly got the ball at third, threw it right to the first baseman which assisted in getting the runner out. It was fun to watch.
How could we forget this fireball-cutie of a kid? He turned 5 at the end of the month! Elliott is always making us laugh. His genuine enthusiasm and willingness to help or be a friend makes him just so lovable. His reading has gotten so much better. There have been a few times when he can read his morning scripture unassisted. He's also able to read with me for longer stretches of time without getting frustrated. He's also blasting through the early math section of khan academy and loves it. He's been begging me to put him on a baseball team for the fall. Hilariously he got recruited at the baseball field playground by a guy in our neighborhood. We aren't playing fall ball as Sachse league plays games on Sundays in the fall, but our neighbor said he could just come to practices and 'get his feet under him'. He would then play with the same team in the spring when they play weekday and Saturday games.We thought that was a great happy medium.
Elliott is so sensitive and caring and rather mature for his age. He's been a blessing since the day he was born.
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