Candi

We decided not to have a Superbowl party this year…mainly because the bulb in our projector burnt out. The refurbished bulb ($300!) is being shipped out this week. It would have been silly to have people over and then say…oh our big screen (100 inch) is not working, sorry! Anyways, we stayed home and hung out with the kiddos. Ken made one of those squares games for us to play with the kids. I am not sure what the technical term is called for this game, but it’s where the score determines who can win according to who has that particular square on this graph that you make. We decided to have a winner after each quarter. If you won the quarter, you pulled a piece of paper from a hat that had the prizes written on them. The way the prizes were won was so….weird…

I won the first quarter- Dinner to a restaurant of my choice.
Karli won the second quarter – No getting yelled at for 1 week no matter what.
Blake won the third quarter – $20 to spend on whatever he wants.
Chase won the fourth quarter – No chores for 1 week.

Now, I could go to a restaurant of my choice anytime I want. Karli gets yelled at the least of all the kids. Blake couldn’t even think of what he would want to buy, he has everything. Chase has no major chores other than picking up after himself. He often helps Blake with emptying the dishwasher. If only I could have won that prize! The kids were all so nervous that I would win the no chores prize…knowing that they would have to help Ken with everything. Why…why…couldn’t I have won! It was fun and it helped pass the time during the football game.

Andrew’s baseball team had a parent meeting on Friday and I was very happy afterward. Not only did I meet many of the parents who were all very nice and welcoming, but I met a mom that felt the same way as I did about the Myrtle Beach tournament. Originally the team was going to have the 3 coaches and 12 kids stay in two condos all together, not even in the same hotel as the families. As soon as I heard about this I was freaking out. I know Andrew is 13 and I am sure he is capable of taking care of himself and everything would have been fine…BUT I was not thrilled about the entire idea. Number one, I don’t even know any of these people yet, although I will know them very well by the time we are in Myrtle Beach. Number two, I couldn’t help but imagine all these things like Andrew missing socks, forgetting to brush his teeth, eating too much junk food before bed..etc. I know, I know…overprotective mother here. It is the way I am and Andrew is my oldest and I am learning every day how to give him more responsibility and to be less psychotic about things. He is at this place where he does everything himself, but I still have to remind him to do things at times. Anyways, I started talking to another mom and she felt the same way I did. We were both so happy to see that we were not alone in our feelings. I wonder how many other moms or parents maybe felt the same way? Maybe that is why the team decided to have the kids stay with their families instead?

I overpaid when I sent in our estimated taxes for 2008, so luckily we are getting a very nice sized refund. That will take care of our Myrtle Beach trip and then some! Double Hallelujah! I wish we could take the money and go to Cancun for Spring Break like we had previously planned, but we need to get more ahead financially this year. Time to be sensible, especially until we see what the economy is going to be like these next couple of years.

I love this huge clock my mom got me for Christmas. I know you can’t tell in the photo, but it is really big. It is about 18 inches wide. No problem seeing what time it is even if I don’t have my contacts in!
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Andrew had to create a Quadarama for his English class. You had to create scenes from 4 different time frames from any book that you have read that trimester. You had to make backgrounds, people (totally handmade), and flooring. Then on the bottom of the project were paragraphs describing what was happening in the scenes (not shown). Andrew made everything himself, I just helped with some of gluing. Crazy glue and the hot glue gun can be quite messy. Not one of us (Ken, Andrew, and I) are very artistic when it comes to drawing or making things, but I thought it turned out pretty nice. Now what this teaches them about English – I have no clue. Some of the stuff the school has these kids do is a waste of time. Not to mention the money that you have to spend on creating the projects. Andrew said his was a lot bigger than many of the ones that kids turned in. I wish I could have seen some more of them.

I was thinking about how I need to blog about my week all day today and never made the time. Now it’s late and time for bed. There is always tomorrow!
Oh…almost forgot! So my husband comes home from the store with this yummy ice cream after I have been so so good all week with watching what I eat. We went out to dinner and all I had was a salad – that’s how good. He made a bowl…and i had 1 bite. Am I good or what?
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Sometimes the best part of the day.
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