Graduation, End of School Events, and Tornadoes

This week was a complete blur. Seriously. I have a huge list of things to get done before we leave on Thursday, and I’m not sure they will. At all. (I hope they will. I think I can, I think I can.) And this past week was a long series of running from one event to the next. Starting with Megan’s graduation on Monday. Thoughts: It was pretty efficient as far as graduations go, the speeches weren’t great but they weren’t terrible either, it was really quite proud-making (sorry, I know there’s a word for that, but my brain isn’t quite working today) to see Megan go across the stage to get her Valedictorian medal, and while I was very happy for her (I didn’t cry) I do wish she had done this with her friends. It would have been more meaningful, I think.

(I saved my tears for Friday, when Russell and I went to the wedding of one of his students. They read a little poem/letter of promise to the gathered audience – is that what they call them at weddings?? – and it just struck me how wonderfully idealistic and hopeful it all was, and I felt quite jaded after 20 years of marriage. I do hope they can retain that hopefulness and idealism. They’re good people, these kids, off on their grand adventure. Also: though it was at a Methodist church, the reception – aside from the barrista serving coffee – was very Mormon. Also: I think Megan’s leaving will be hardest on Caitlyn. Her best friend is leaving her behind, and it’s not an easy thing.)

Wednesday, I dragged Caitlyn and Alison (and Caitlyn’s friend Meagan) to the Eoin Colfer (he’s the Artemis Fowl guy) author event at the store. And was very glad we went. He is, beyond a doubt, the funniest author I’ve ever had the pleasure of seeing. He didn’t even talk about his book (except: “It’s blue. And shiny. That’s so the boys will be attracted to it and pick it up. We’ve done studies. Then they’ll lick it. At which point, the bookseller will swoop in and say, ‘You licked it, you bought it!’ Don’t worry. We put in a sedative. Fifteen minutes after licking it, they’ll be out.”) but just spent an hour keeping us in stitches with stories about his kids and his brothers. He did have an interesting exchange with Alison, but I already wrote about it here. You can go read it if you want to.

Thursday was Caitlyn’s choir concert. As always, she was wonderful, the 7th grade choir is full of self-conscious kids who don’t have nearly enough fun with the music, and we enjoyed ourselves.

Saturday, we were planning on spending the morning getting our garden in, but Karen called and hijacked our plans: she wanted to go see Star Trek Into Darkness and begged that we come along. So, we put off the garden and went to see the movie. Totally worthwhile. (At least in Megan’s and my opinion; Russell begs to differ, but you’ll have to see the movie before you hear his opinion.) Full of great one-liners, lots of action, and Benedict Cumberbatch (*eep*) was a great villain.

And today: we went to Sacrament meeting and then they sent us home because of a tornado watch. Which turned into a warning around 3 p.m. We hid in the basement, and a tornado passed by south of us (by about 10 miles, at the airport). Once again, the Native American legend about this side of the river holds. We got lucky (blessed, protected) once again.

I’ll probably not write next week, but maybe I will. It is a habit after all.

Megan Graduates!

And we were so proud. She's worked hard to get here.

We had to take requisite pre-ceremony photos, of course.

Tell us, Megan, what you really think of wearing yellow robes and a funny hat.

Her favorite picture:

And then, we drove across town to grab a quick bite to eat, and headed to Koch arena for the ceremony. We got pretty close, but even so, my camera's not good enough to get great pictures of the state. I think Grandpa Madsen got some good ones, but we don't have those yet.

Walking in (she's in the middle):

She was one of seven Valedictorians (those who've maintained a 4.0 their entire high school career. She doesn't like the word valedictorian, so she called it "valevictorian").

Which means she got to walk across the stage twice. Once for a shiny medal:

And once for her diploma. A note about this one. The gentleman in the background is one of her most challenging teachers (she had him for two classes), Mr. Davis. She loved him.

And then (after sitting through everyone else; she was one of the first!), we were done and ready for after pictures.

Congrats, Megan!

Next stop? India!

A Little Treat with Some Mid-Day Delights

(Or: what to do with a couple of long days: make a pretend bakery!)

Open for business.

The pastry counter.

Busy employees.

The Daily Special.

They were very sad when they had to clean this up. Good thing we took pictures.

What We Do When Grandparents Come to Visit

We talk a lot.
We swim.
(We forget to take photos.)
We play games.
Quelf:

And the Great Dalmuti hats:

We go to Botanica.
(We were a little late for the tulips and a little early for the roses. Bummer.)

We don't spend enough time with them, because it was a busy weekend. Good thing we're off to Michigan soon.

Even so, we loved having them here!

Caitlyn's Choir Concert

Caitlyn asked us to record this one. She's dark and blurry, but I think she did great.


Caitlyn's solo was 49 seconds long, but she killed it. I'm biased, I know.


She's dark and blurry in this one, too, but I think you can see her. The last two solos are worth sticking around for.

Kristen's Music Concert

Thursday was the Kindergarten-First Grade music concert which was very cute. They had a barnyard theme, and I'm not biased at all when I say that the chicks were the cutest thing. ever. She wanted me to record these four songs. They're adorable (if I do say so myself).

Grandparents and Awards

First: my parents are here for Megan’s graduation. They’ve been here since Friday night, and we’ve had a blast. (Well, not Megan. She’s been Busy.) There are times when I do like living without relatives nearby, but sometimes – like now – I realize how wonderful it’d be to have family close by. Oh, well. Enjoy it while you can, I guess.

 

We hung out yesterday, mostly. I had to go into work for the book groups I've started: one for third-fifth graders, where we had a couple of little girls show up in addition to Alison; and one for sixth-eighth graders which consisted of me and Caitlyn talking about why kids her age don’t read since no one else showed up. I’m a bit disappointed with the second one, but I’m not going to give up yet. I do want to make one work, but maybe I’ll have to be happy with the younger one. Either way, it’s a start. Kristen came along, too, as did Mom and Dad; they hung out at the store reading books and eating goodies and playing with yo-yos. Both Alison and Kristen talked me into buying them ones, and they’ve spent a good number of minutes practicing. It’s pretty impressive. We also went swimming and hung out at the hotel with Mom and Dad while Russell was at his graduation, which was enormous amounts of fun.

 

Today’s been a nice Mother’s Day. Russell was in charge of sacrament meeting, so NO guilt-inducing talks. YAY! And we got potted plants, so I can put them in the ground and it wont die. And they got me a food processor (which doesn’t work, but that’s not their fault), which is also a YAY. And my mom was here, so I have to say it was a lovely Mother’s Day.

 

As for the Awards, it’s been that sort of week for Megan. She skipped the senior awards banquet on Monday, and found out later that her name was called the most out of all the seniors. Whoops. And we got a thing in the mail saying that Megan was a Governor's Scholar. I’m not sure it means anything other than the fact that she’s one, but since there’s only 500 in the state, it must be a big deal. And then she went to both a band banquet and a student senate banquet and got all those certificates. Then she went to see Great Gatsby with a couple of her friends and walked out because they were killing the book. That’s my daughter.

 

The rest of the girls are dealing well with all this attention on the oldest daughter. Though, they’ve got a lot of stuff coming up in the next couple of weeks as school wraps up for the year.

 

And that’s about it for us. Megan graduates tomorrow. I didn’t think I was going to cry, but I just might. Maybe that means I’m human after all.

Trying to Figure Out Mother Nature

So, the weather this week was the big deal around here.

 

Monday and Tuesday it was gorgeous. Seriously: mid-80s, sunny. We threw open the windows, enjoyed the breezes, barbecued hot dogs and brats, and did our May Day celebrations. We tried dying our eggs with KoolAid this year, which was a bit of a bust. We just didn’t get the colors we really wanted to get. Russell hid all the eggs, and we’ve decided that he gets joy from hiding them in impossible to find places. (In fact, Caitlyn never did find all of hers!) It was lovely and we were happy.

 

Then Wednesday it got cold. Seriously. And not just spring time 50s cool. Cold. In the low 30s at night. Turn the heater on old. And we were all like WHAT THE HECK Mother Nature??? It’s MAY. In KANSAS. It’s supposed to be in the 80s. At least. We didn’t even get our garden planted – first time in 7 years! – this weekend. It was that cold.

 

So, we stayed inside and hid. And cried when it snowed on Thursday.

 

I know: we’ve lived in the south for way too long when we don’t understand May snow showers.

 

We did go pick up some herb plants that we’re going to try and get in the ground this week (assuming it warms up a bit), but our goal is to get our garden in before we leave for Michigan. Which may be pushing it.

 

Okay, enough weather whining.

 

In other news, both Megan and Russell are finishing up school. It’s a lot more stressful for Megan than it is for Russell; it’s been a tough semester this time around. But, in one week (from tomorrow), she will walk across the stage and get a diploma! It’s so hard to believe. And then, she needs to find a job and we’re still waiting on her family assignment. There’s a lot of waiting in this exchange business. The rest of the girls are just chugging along, trying to make it to the end of the school year. And, aside from being under the weather a bit this week, am just trying to keep a handle on everything.

 

(Sometimes, I feel like I’m just losing my mind!)

May Day!

Things we did different this year: 
We celebrated a day, mostly because we didn't have time, but it turned out for the best since it turned cold.
We used KoolAid as dye instead of the packaged stuff (it worked, but it was just meh).

Things I need to remember:
Even though she gets frustrated, Caitlyn's still part of the family and should get pictures taken of her hunting for eggs. (Those two are the only ones I took! Shame on me.)

We had a good May Day, though!