Weekend Wrap Up

It was a busy weekend after a busy week, but that is the usual around here.  Brent was out of town for business last week. Don't feel too sorry for him...The business trip landed him in Cancun eating seafood and drinking beer while laying on a beautiful beach with topaz water.  But he did send me a picture of his view from lunch one day....

I think the least he could have done was included a "wish you were here" with the pic.  Or maybe he didn't! ha ha ha!


Friday night, Nina and I took the boys to see Wreck It, Ralph! in 3D.  It got a two thumbs up review from all of our mini movie critics.

 

Will reaching out to catch the special effects.

After the movie, we went to a local pizza joint for pizza and wings.  On the way home, Jack was wearing his 3D glasses and commented that he could see really well while wearing them.  My antenna immediately went up.  I have terrible eyesight.  I mean legally blind, TERRIBLE eyesight.  And I started wearing glasses in the 3rd grade, so while Jack's comment did catch me by surprise (he passed a eye screening just this summer at his well checkup), it surely wasn't unexpected.  So I asked him if he had trouble seeing the board at school.  "A little bit.  It doesn't look blurry, but it looks kinda foggy."

Saturday morning, we were in the optometrist's office at 11am for an exam.  This was Jack's first eye exam and he handled it like a champ!  There was some discussion about whether or not to do the glaucoma test (where they shoot a puff of air into your eye), because some kids (and even some adults) freak out when it's done.  They decided to give it a try and Jack hardly flinched.  He had a surprised/stunned look on his face because how can you really prepare for something like that?  You just have to experience it.  But the technician was proud of him, and told Jack that from now on she was going to tell all of her patients that a 9 year old handled the test with no problems.  So the bottom line is Jack has healthy eyes, but needs a mild prescription for distance.

  Doesn't he look cute?!?!  I told Jack he was one of the lucky ones...he looks just as cute with or without glasses!  Poor thing, see how dilated his eyes were.  All afternoon, he kept asking me to check to see if his eyes were "still radiated." 

The rest of the afternoon was spent watching all of the teams that we love lose their games in the final minute.  Brent arrived home after the end of the Bama loss and I feel sure that he immediately wished he was back in Cancun.  My family kept a wide berth away from me for the rest of the night.  They are intuitive like that!

Sunday was the big rivalry game between the Saints and the Falcons.  As we were getting dressed for church, Brent said that when he was growing up, Honey would let him wear his Saints jersey to Mass on the Sundays that the Saints played the Falcons.  He asked the boys if they wanted to wear their jerseys to church. Yes! Yes, they did!

Your eyes do not deceive you.  In a family of Saints fans, Will, the little contrarian that he is, is our only Dirty Bird!  Jack has been hoping for years that Honey would excommunicate Will from the family for this transgression.  It was the talk at Mass.  Brent and I had several people make House Divided comments and that they would pray there wouldn't be too many tears shed that afternoon.  

It was a great win for 3/4 of our family.  A few tears were shed by our little bird, but it wasn't nearly the drama Jack and Brent would have displayed if the Saints had lost.  We had a big shrimp pasta dinner with a round of our favorite dinner time game "Question Minute to Win It."  Mama had about a half a bottle of wine which helped to take the edge of the loss, that and my parents' call to talk me down off the ledge.

Hey, what can I say.  Around here, we take our football seriously!

Soccer: Will's Fall Sport

Game Ready!  Those eyes, the mischievous little grin, and that cleft chin just slay me!

This was Will's third season to play Fall soccer.  He loves it and will happily play every minute of the game if needed.

The league that Will plays in is organized through our church and most of the boys on his team were also in his kindergarten class.  He loved all the socializing with his new friends!

The boys named themselves the Cheetahs.  Our head coach (the one in the green jersey) was amazing and did a fantastic job of herding cats coaching the boys.  He started out the season coaching solo, which is not for the faint of heart with eight 5 year old boys, but after the second game, another father took pity and joined him in the ranks of crowd control coaching.  What impressed me most about the coach was that he was so positive, so encouraging, so skilled at teaching, and was great at pointing out to each boy how they were improving in their play.

Will played both offense and defense, but his favorite position was defense, specifically goalie.  It was the thrill of stopping the other team from scoring!

 Setting up for a pass.

 Please don't be jealous of my awesome photography skills.  It would have been a really cool shot if I had backed off the zoom just a bit!

Will wasn't the most aggressive guy on the team, but he also wasn't afraid to get in the middle of the pack, hold his ground, and kick the ball out of there, either!

 Score!  The celebration right after Will scored a goal to help his team on their come-from-behind victory!  Besides the joy on Will's face, what I love about this picture is that the coach is hurrying over to give Will a high five...he was always so excited for each player!

My happy boy!  Love his laugh and his smile!

This picture just makes me laugh because it so captures his funny personality!  I have no idea what he is doing, but in the background I'm hearing "just bust a move!"

It was a great season!  We won some, we lost some, we scored some goals along the way, but most of all the Cheetahs had fun!

Blessed John Paul II

There are several events that highlight the third grade year:  the Chocolate Party, Battle of the Books, the Living Museum, and the All Saints Mass.

Back in September, Jack was given a list of Saints and he was to chose the top 3 that he was interested in studying.  Jack's top 3 choices were 1) Blessed John Paul II (not a Saint yet, but on his way), 2) St. John the Baptist, and 3) St. Jude.  Jack was so excited when he was selected to portray Blessed John Paul II.

The Saint project took us the entire month of October to get ready for because Jack had to first research and write a report on Blessed John Paul II, then we had to dress a paper doll to be representative of his Saint.

This is Jack's Blessed John Paul II doll before he added the facial features.

The third part of the project was to dress as your Saint.  I had borrowed a John Paul II costume from a friend, but it was the white robe, capelet, and beanie that Pope John Paul II wore.

Jack was more interested in the ceremonial dress that Pope John Paul II would wear, so we used this picture as our inspiration when planning his costume.

And this is what we came up with...

He was so proud and we thought he looked fantastic!

On November 1, the school had an All Saints Mass and the third graders came dressed as their Saints and participated in the celebration of the Mass.

The Saints processed in to the congregation singing "When the Saints Go Marching In."

 St. Joseph, Blessed John Paul II, and St. Jude

 As the Saints processed in, they lined up across the altar.  I thought all of the costumes were wonderful!

Jack led the Responsorial Psalm.

A picture with Monsignor after the Mass.

Don't they all look so sweet and holy?

St. Pius X and Blessed John Paul II appear to be good buddies.

This is the outtake!  Blessed John Paul II and St. Pius X boxing while being cheered on by St. Joseph and St. Michael the Archangel.  Do you think this really happens in Heaven?

After Mass, the Saints returned to their classroom and each child gave a presentation about the life of his or her Saint.  

It was a lot of work, but in the end, it was a fun project!  And I've already put the bug in Jack's teacher's ear that Will would love to be Blessed John Paul II in a few years.  Afterall, we already have the costume!

Halloween 2012

Halloween 2012 was a success!  Or as Will proclaimed, "The BEST day of my LIFE!"  I'll just add in the "to date" for him, because if not, it's all downhill from here.  And he's only 5!

At the boys' school, the kindergartners are the only ones allowed to wear their costumes to school.  AND they have a parade throughout the entire school to show off their costume fabulousness!  You can imagine what a big deal this is!

 Here is our Ice Wolf Ninja (self-named) in full costume minus his ninja weapons

I was volunteering at the school's book fair that morning, so I got to enjoy the Halloween parade.

Will's teacher (left) and teacher's assistant (right) dressed up as nerds!

They were all so cute!

That afternoon, Jack and Will had their class parties!  I helped with Jack's party and it was an afternoon filled with yummy treats and lots of fun games.

Posing with the Skeleton!

One of the games was Dress the Teachers.  There was a huge box filled with costumes, wigs, and masks, and the kids took turns in teams dressing up the teachers.

I love this picture!  After the teacher was turned into a monster, she started attacking the children.  They loved it!  Well, maybe not the boy on the right, but everyone else thought it was hilarious!

Another fun game was the eyeball relay race.  I think the chocolate eyeball might have just fallen off Jack's spoon.

While Jack's class was having fun, I snuck outside to see how Will's Halloween party was going.

Will was at the pumpkin painting station, and was very serious about decorating his pumpkin.

We came home from school and rested up before it was time to go out into the neighborhood and score some candy!

The Ninja and the Scream monster (villian?).

This year, Jack was most interested in what kind of "fright factor" his costume would have.  The Scream villian won out due to the cool blood that he could make run down his face.  Jack was quite pleased that at one point during the night, he had scared a girl so much that he had to remove his mask so she could see his real face!

Our trick or treat crew.  The pumpkin monster is one of our good friends.  He LOVES Halloween!  Every year, he decorates his garage like a haunted house with all things spooky.  The kids love it!  They also host a Post Trick or Treat party which is a fun way to end the night!

Jack and Will came home with loaded down buckets.  Their favorite treat this year were the mini soda cans (Coke, Fanta Orange, Dr. Pepper) that one neighbor was giving out!  We are still working hard on eating up all the loot!

I have a blog?!?! Really?!?!

Well, let me dust off the cobwebs on the ole blog and see if anyone is still stopping by my little neck of the Internet.

So where have I been?  Here, just busy.  In the Spring, I took over the neighborhood swim team which ended up feeling like a full time job (or maybe I just turned it into one), and I fell behind in blogging.  And the further I fell behind, the more overwhelmed the perfectionist in me became at the thought of trying to bring the blog up to date.  And in the meantime, I haven't been as diligent about taking pictures or writing down all of the funny stuff my boys have said and done, and that makes me sad.

So, I'm extending myself a bit of grace (or blogging amnesty) and I'm just going to jump in and start recording the memories of our little family again.  And hopefully along the way, I'll go back and try to fill in the 6 month gap of missing posts, but if not, then lesson learned about making time to do the small things (which turn out to be the really important things) even when I'm too tired, too busy, too stressed, too etc.

I'm off to wade through a whole slew of pictures, so check back tomorrow for our Halloween 2012 recap.

But in the meantime, I leave you with an

Out of the Mouth of Will: The Mickey Mouse Edition

Yo, lady!  Don't speak ill of the Mouse!

Several weeks ago (or maybe several months ago, who knows at this point), our family was driving in the car and reminiscing about our trip to Disney World.  We were discussing all our favorite rides, which was the best roller coaster, our favorite Disney characters, etc., when Will asked why Mickey Mouse was so small in the movies and TV shows, but was so big at Disney World.  Well, not thinking anything about it, I answered that the Mickey in the movies was the cartoon character but the Mickey at the park was someone dressed up in a costume.  

Jack jumps in to stop my conversation by frantically saying, "Don't listen to Mommy, Will!  It's not true!  Mickey Mouse is real!" 

Will looks at me all doe-eyed and sad and said, "Mommy!  Why did you tell me that?  You have broken my spirit!"

Wow!  BROKEN. MY. SPIRIT.  How's that for some Mother's Guilt?!?!?

Step aside, Ladies....Mother of the Year 2012 is all mine!    

Wordless Wednesday

~Wack-tacular Mustache~

Happy Easter

We have had a wonderful Easter Sunday.  The boys woke up delighted that their Easter baskets were filled with treats.  I forgot to take pictures before the baskets were dismantled, but both baskets were filled with books (as always) and candy (of course).  In addition, Jack's basket had the DVD The Muppets, NFL trading cards, MLB trading cards, and a collection of miniature batting helmets of all the MLB teams.  Will's basket also included the DVD Hop, and 3 new Skylanders.  Brent was surprised with candy, a book, and a new basketball.  But Will quickly pointed out that since the basketball was between his basket and Daddy's basket that meant that he and Daddy were supposed to share the basketball!  I got some sour jelly beans and a Amazon gift card.  I think I'll save it for my vacation beach books.


We made it to church EARLY today!  Thank you, Lord, for a smooth morning! I was so happy because we didn't have to fight for a seat on our favorite pew.  We sang my most favorite Easter hymn "Jesus Christ is Risen Today" complete with the trumpet.  I can't sing that song without chills...just love it!  After church, we saw Jack's teacher and Will ran up to her and said "Happy Easter, Mrs. Gentile!"  She said that it just made her day for Jack's little brother to greet her like that.  We had a nice chat with her in between Masses and Brent and I walked away commenting for the umpteenth time how blessed we are that Jack is in her class.

We just got back from Spring Break last night, so the cupboards were bare.  We decide that this year we would be eating out for Easter lunch, but without reservations, we knew we would be rolling the dice as to where we would eat.  We struck out on two of our favorite spots (they were closed!) but did find that one of our ole' reliable favorites was ready and waiting for us.  While we were on our restaurant search, Brent kept reminding me that Waffle House is always open!  Nothin' says Easter like "Scattered, Smothered, and Covered!"

We spent the rest of the afternoon hanging out as a family.  Playing in the yard, playing with our Easter treats, reading books, and strolling through the neighborhood.  Brent and Jack did a little fishing at our neighborhood "lake" and caught a LARGE bass.  Brent hooked 'em and Jack reeled him in.  A neighbor across the lake was watching from his back patio and yelled out, "I've lived here 3 years and have never seen a fish that big pulled out of this water.  Wait right there while I go get my wife!"

It was a wonderful day of joy and hope in our risen Lord!  Jesus Christ is risen today, ALLELUIA!

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who in his great mercy gave us a new birth to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead...

1 Peter 1:3