Yes! I'm updating the much neglected blog! Tell your friends!
Since school started, life has maintained its usual level of insanity. And, to those of you left reading - my true hard core fans - I will fill you in, all short and sweet like, or at least as short as I can make it. So, here goes.
If you'll remember, last year on the 2nd day of school, we ended up in the ER with Alli, who, later down the road, had surgery. This year on the 2nd day of school, Drew made the middle school softball team (who thought she wouldn't?!)...
...and 3 games in, running to catch a fly ball, she fractured her ankle! We like to keep things exciting around here, and we're also on a mission to single-handedly fund the local ER. This now makes both wrists and 1 ankle - just one more extremity to go, right? She was in a walking boot for 3 weeks, and then played out the rest of the season in a brace. I didn't manage to get a picture of the boot, although it would be pretty easy to stage - those things are SO much better than a cast since you can take them on and off to sleep and shower.
Here she is, super disappointed, at her first game without the boot, the day she got the boot off. If you look closely, you can see the brace, but the doctor didn't want her jumping right back into softball on the first day. On a happy note, she played left field this year, and she got 2 individual awards - the Most Spirited Award, for "always having enough energy for the whole team," and the Grass Stain Award, for "making the most diving plays." I was pretty proud of her for that!
...and 3 games in, running to catch a fly ball, she fractured her ankle! We like to keep things exciting around here, and we're also on a mission to single-handedly fund the local ER. This now makes both wrists and 1 ankle - just one more extremity to go, right? She was in a walking boot for 3 weeks, and then played out the rest of the season in a brace. I didn't manage to get a picture of the boot, although it would be pretty easy to stage - those things are SO much better than a cast since you can take them on and off to sleep and shower.Here she is, super disappointed, at her first game without the boot, the day she got the boot off. If you look closely, you can see the brace, but the doctor didn't want her jumping right back into softball on the first day. On a happy note, she played left field this year, and she got 2 individual awards - the Most Spirited Award, for "always having enough energy for the whole team," and the Grass Stain Award, for "making the most diving plays." I was pretty proud of her for that! So, as much as I love to brag on my child and her athletic abilities, softball season couldn't end soon enough for me. The beginning of the school year is absolutely enough to fill anyone's life with busy-ness (to differentiate from "business"), teacher or not. The shock of homework every night, regular bath and bedtimes, and the demand of clean laundry is plenty, especially if both parents work all day. Toss in there softball practice EVERY afternoon until 5:30, except for game days, which always ran later than that, and driving all over the county for ballgames, plus the unbelievable amount of work that 6th graders in today's time of high competition and technology face (bragging again - being in the gifted program in 6th grade means all advanced classes and crazy projects, the kind I was doing in high school!). So she had projects, including power points and dioramas and essays - ugh! Too much!!! In between ball games and practices, we were fitting in as much fun and relaxation as we could:
Mom & Dad's birthday at the park,
A UGA football game as a family, one against Coastal Carolina University (who???) that Georgia won 59-0 - boring for us grown-ups, but awesome from the kids' perspective.
And a wonderfully relaxing 4-day weekend at Myrtle Beach. We went with Andy's cousin and his wife and their little boy, who just turned 4, and it was such a laid-back trip. Since it's October, it was a little chilly in the morning and evening, but all day Saturday, the weather was really nice. We spent most of the day laying around on the beach, and then after lunch moved up to the pool area. Sunday, it was REALLY windy and a storm was coming in, so we spent the day doing all the touristy stuff. We went to this area called Broadway (I think). The kids got to do this ropes course thing, which they were feeling super confident from the ground, but changed their minds about once they really felt how high it was. Here's Alli waaaay up on the top of the course.
There was a little river filled with fish and little gum-ball machines (for lack of a better word) filled with fish food. The fish are so used to people feeding them that it became sort of disgusting to see the fish come to the surface for food. I just kept imagining a nasty scene from a horror film where some poor sap falls into the river and gets devoured by fish.
Andy and his cousin also decided to go against each other in bull riding - I didn't get a good picture of the 2 of them, but here's Andy hanging on for dear life.
And here's one last picture of the kids standing on the bridge near the nasty fish. We're all fairly rested and in the swing of school, and I have a student teacher, so she's doing a lot of my usual work, while I sit and watch. Maybe I'll update my blog a little more often...I'm not making any promises!
