Oh What a Week

This week was busy. 

It started with Monday rosary as it usually does. 

Tuesday, this made me laugh. 

Wednesday was exhausting as 51 second graders painted their chalices. Well, 50 second graders and our priest. 

Thursday brought a busy day with work, straight to voice lessons, straight to rehearsal. 

The show really seems to be coming together and it sounds lovely from the lobby. C is rocking it! We are so proud! 

Friday. Today. 

My friend J had her naturalization ceremony and is now a US Citizen! 

It was such a lovely time to see the whole ceremony, and I love those little boys of hers so much! 

And in another act of friendship, I met some friends of mine at the hospital. We prayed a Divine Mercy Chaplet, our other friend's favorite. 

And while we were in the hospital chapel praying, our sweet friend's dad was passing from this world. What Holy Spirit timing. I am so glad we were there to pray and give her a hug in person when she was ready. 

Life is really something. Joys and sorrows co-exsisting. 

Much like this Holy Week we are about to embark on. 

Back At It

So, because the weather couldn't make up its mind, we started Spring Break with an actual Blizzard warning and ended it with a record high 83-degree day on Saturday. (Yes, Sunday was still a break... but since it was a school night, I am not counting it.) 

We made the best of it by having a bonfire, roasting hot dogs and marshmallows for dinner. 

Truly... I took no other pictures of Spring Break. 

I had to work Thursday and Friday. M went to camp at the museum with Husband. C stayed home and ate a lot of Girl Scout Cookies didn't do much. 

Saturday we sort've tried to redeem the break a tiny bit. We went to Hobby Lobby to get a needle and thread, so Husband could hem a jumper for M. 

**M only has one quarter left of wearing jumpers as they switch to skirts in middle school. But her current jumpers are too small both in the waist AND length, and there was no way they were going to make it to May. So I bought a big jumper because I have friends who turn jumpers into skirts, and that works great. Only M lost her mind because the jumper was "too big," which means long. So we hemmed it. And she's going to live in the one jumper for a quarter because I sure as heck wasn't buying more than one.**

We got the hemming supplies quickly but stayed to browse until it started getting too crowded for my liking and giving me a rash. 

Too many people do that to me sometimes. 

Then we went next door to Dick's House of Sport to get M some new shorts. Nike shorts are the BIGGEST racket. And we were browsing there until a whole bunch of kids in uniforms started showing up from their fields, and then that also gave me a rash. 

Also at checkout, Dick's asked me if I wanted to "Round Up for Youth Sports" and I have literally never wanted to give money to something less. It's a $40 billion industry. They don't need my extra 17 cents. 

To be clear: I am all about sports in terms of teamwork, sportsmanship, and being healthy. I am less interested in sports in terms of competitions, travel games, $$$ equipment, and matching bags/shoes/hats/jackets. 

Then we went to lunch where Husband noticed a business called YinzBinz nearby. 

Apparently, it is a warehouse full of bins (hence the name) of people's random Amazon returns. So it's like a treasure hunt. 

On Saturday, it's restock day, and all items are $9, and the price goes down daily to 99 cents on Friday. 

Here's how I describe it: 

• 45% horrifying
• 45% facinating
• 5% thrill of the hunt
• 5% gross 

We had no idea what we were doing. We needed an app just to walk in. There were so many random things. One could score a really good deal there, though. And the re-seller people were loading like actual wagons full of stuff out of there. We got one item for Husband at work that he was truly going to be buying anyway because $9 was cheaper by a lot. And then they gave me a bonus $5 for using the app for the first time so it was actually $4. 

Anyway... that was Saturday. (Followed by the bonfire at night of course.) 

It was a less-than-remarkable Spring Break on many levels. Ah well. That happens. 

And here we are back at it! 

Like a Phoenix...

On Friday night, after the show, we went to the opening of the Kalidescope Exhibit. 

And by Saturday in the wee hours of the morning, the 5th-grade tummy bug finally caught up with us. 

Sunday came in with a new victim falling. 

Monday, the remaining two were taken down. And we got a blizzard. So that's cool. 

Here's the thing: Husband was meant to be on a business trip this week. And then they decided not to go because of the blizzard. Did we get an extra few days of fun? No. Because we were dying. 

But we are rising from the ashes as better people with a lot of clean laundry and a very clean bathroom, so... there's that. Has it been the LAMEST spring break on record? 

Yes. Yes it has. I was meant to take 3 days off to do fun things with the kids. Ha. Well... good thing it's Spring Break anyway, and we didn't miss school or even work. Convenient. 

Anyway... that's been our start to the week! 

A Full Week!

It has been a long and busy week. Last Friday night, we went to see the High School production of Grease, the School Edition. Which means it's shorter and the lyrics have all been Kids Bop-ped. 

It was fun! And I am glad for that! 

Saturday morning brought the piano festival, and we made it just fine. God and his little sense of humor, however, my car dinged at like exactly the same spot on the road. It was the "It's cold outside, so drive carefully" warning. But I think all of our hearts stopped for a second. 

This is M in the warm up room. She had consistently played worse all week. 

She earned a Superior rating, which I was honestly a little shocked by, and I am now convinced that they just give everyone a Superior rating. Admittedly, it is a good moral boost for small pianists. So... there's that. 

Saturday also brought news of the new Nuncio. Not a surprise but it was kind of weird to get the news on a Saturday. 

C sang at Mass. 

Look, since this is the blog I look back on for memories, I am going to write the unedited version here. C was in full, horrible teenager mode all afternoon. 

We, me and him, got into an argument as we were going to leave the house. It escalated in church, and then C couldn't stop crying. He sort of got it together as he was rehearsing in the basement rehearsal room, but when he came back up he was worse. 

At the same time, M, who I fully believe was all worked up all week about her piano festival, finally had the adrenaline crash and didn't feel great. She kept saying she was going to throw up. So I sent her to the car. 

I stayed long enough to hear C sing. He did okay. Not great and definitely not what he was capable of. And then he came back to the pew and got mad at me again. Luckily, I had an out by taking "sick" M home. And then I went back to get the boys after Mass, and we were all grumpy with each other for the rest of the day. 

M and I went back to Mass on Sunday morning. She was not sick. 

Everything seemed better in the morning. But it was a rough afternoon and evening. 

Sunday, Husband and I went to see a show with some friends. Before they arrived we watched these two ladies park. If you look closely you can see how poorly they did. 

What you can't see from this picture is that BOTH ladies pulled through the spots, then reversed and corrected themselves several times, opening the door to see where they were in the lines. AND then decided this was good enough. In fact, they almost hit each other doing this at one point. 

It was bad. And SO funny. Like I was crying laughing. 

We also got C's headshot for his show. 

Monday, I got a lot of work done. Especially for our Wednesday night Family Formation activity. Stations in a Sack: A Touch and Pray Stations of the Cross Kit!

Tuesday, during the day, I made all the kits. 

I spent some time in prayer before school Mass. 

And we had severe weather, and it hailed during dinner. Luckily no damage!

Wednesday was a long and busy day. We had our event. 

It was a small but mighty group, and truly, I enjoyed it. There really was something to praying in a kid-friendly way, with hands on items to meditate on. 

Had some flashbacks to 6 years ago too. 

Yesterday was the kids' show Madagascar Jr. 

My kids and all the cast were lovely. The directors did a nice job. And the actual material and script are boring. I kinda don't want to go back and watch it again today. I will because I am supportive, and I am taking the money at the show. But I am not that excited about it, except for seeing my kids. That is fun. 

So kind of them to put the kids right next to each other for the finale. 

And the best part is that if we make it to 3:00 PM today... and even though it's crazy crazy windy right now I cannot imagine the world will end before then, we will have made it to Spring Break! And we are READY FOR IT! 

Friday!

Well, we made it to Friday! 

One of the highlights of the week was that I got to hang out with some of my favorites. 

Hanging with littles is so good for my soul. (So is bringing them back to their mothers.) 

C has survived his crazy week. He has literally gone from school to Madagascar rehearsal to Secret Garden rehearsal all week. 

On Monday, I had to get him early from Madagascar to get him to choir before Secret Garden. 

Yesterday, I had to get him early from Madagascar to get him to voice lessons before Secret Garden. It paid off, though, because he earned another Outstanding Lesson! 

And actually, he ended up leaving the school choir (his last period) early to rehearse in the church because he is going to sing the prelude before Mass tomorrow. Lucky you... I recorded the rehearsal. 

This is "Pie Jesu" from Faure's Requiem. Admittedly, it sounded better after his lesson. They tweaked a few things. But you can get the feel of it. 

C is not the only kid in Madagascar. M is a very cute Lemur. 

She has just had less going on than C. But never fear, she still has her piano festival tomorrow. If you read this, please say a prayer. She's really in her head about it, and she knows her pieces, so I am just hoping she is going to do okay. 

I have a little PTSD too because last year on the way to the festival my car died. Husband rightly points out that our new-to-us car still has a warranty, so even if something were to happen, we'd be okay. But... it still makes me nervous. 

It was super stormy last night, and we lost power at 4:45. Everyone woke up, Husband distributed the emergency white noise machines, and we all drifted back to bed. It came back on just before 7:00, thank you, Jesus. We've been in such a drought that there's standing water everywhere. Nothing like extremes. 

Tonight, after Madagascar Rehearsal, we are going to have dinner at Long John Silver's before going over to the high school production of Grease. (The school version.) 

And that is what's been going on with us. Mostly just work/school/rehearsals. 

March Came In Like A...

I really don't know. It was cold but not snowy. Gray but not miserable. Is it a lamb when it's freezing? Is that a lion? 

The good news is that I took some pictures! Because on Sunday afternoon we went to a hockey game. We had vouchers for two seats, so we had to go to the box office. I was very nice and chill with the lady and was rewarded with excellent seats right on the red line. 

Full transparency: this is a most common M face these days. 

You can hear the "Moooooom" of the internal monologue, can't you? She did take a nice picture for me too.

Then after the game we went out for "prinner" or pre-dinner and got ice cream. Because I had a coupon for a free scoop that was expiring that day! And who throws away a free scoop?! 

In more photographic proof that I am not the meanest parent, I present to you the chocolate fudge brownie ice cream cone instead of a dish. (Cones are so messy! And I am the slowest ice cream eater.) 

And now it is Tuesday already.  But good news... the daffodils are peeking ever so slightly out of the ground. There is hope. 

Praise God!! Did you wake up early to look at the lunar eclipse? We did not. We were soundly asleep and happy to be that way. 

Hope your March is off to a fabulous start!