Science Fair

Awana Grand Prix

This was the first year NONE of the Wenigers won a trophy in the AWANA Grand Prix! Maybe I colored the judges' opinion of us when I offered them a bribe. Who knows. Jud just saw me typing this and added, "You did too?" No wonder. Those crooked Wenigers. It's like they've formed a union or something.

Trying out the new blog....ah, the learning curve

Ok. I've been avoiding it long enough. I'm such a creature of habit, that once I get used to something, I hate to change. I had the same purse for 3 years and only got rid of it because the strap was being held on by a safety pin. I had the same tennis shoes for six years and only bought new ones because there was absolutely no padding left in the old ones. My husband bought me new boots. I think he was embarrassed to be seen with my ancient ones. :)

So, you can imagine my angst every time Judson gets me a new phone or like now, when I have to learn to use a new blogger. Ugh.

But my fear of falling behind in my scrapbook is worse than my fear of new things, so I'm doing it.

To catch up:

November: We took Mackenzie to Uruguay for her missions trip. I've already done a whole book on that, so no need to say more here.

December: After Missouri in August, Florida in September and Uruguay in November, we decided to stay home for Christmas. Missed seeing my folks, but just did not want to go anywhere else for awhile. We did not do our annual trip out to cut our own Christmas tree. The weather got bad fast after Thanksgiving, and we ended up getting one from a local Boy Scout troop. Not as cool, but it was just too cold to go out into the wilderness.

We went to the Wenigers for Christmas Eve, enjoyed Christmas morning at home, and then went back to the Wenigers in the evening for leftovers. Had a very relaxing time.

January: I turned 42 with very little fanfare. The Wenigers invited us over to celebrate, so I brought along my scrapbooks and made them play a treasure hunt with them. Not sure about them, but I had a blast!

January was busy for the Weniger family. Jud's grandma died, so the immediate family flew out to California for a whirlwind week of packing up her house and her memories and having a funeral. They learned of her death the same day Jared and Meghan had their first baby, Brody Maxwell. The labor went agonizingly long, so he had to be taken by C-section. Also, Carson had a seizure, which is still unexplained.

School is frustrating this year. The girls' specialist schedule covers the morning and afternoon, leaving very little options for field trips. I'm afraid we're not even going to come close to our record-breaking 30 trips last year. Sigh. The extra curricular schedule looks something like this: Monday, piano lessons; Tuesday, gymnastics; Wednesday, MIT and Awana; Thursday, violin lessons. Just wait till sports kick in again.

Duncan is doing well at Paideia. Made the gold and silver honor rolls so far. Complains all the time though about not having any best friends.

February: Mackenzie turns 11! She had such a great time at her swimming party last year, she wanted to do it again. Fine with me. It's the easiest birthday party in the world. No cooking, no cleaning, no games to plan. They just come, swim, eat cake and go home. She had a few girls stay overnight in the hotel, but they didn't stay up too late, on account of all that vigorous swimming! Her cake had frogs on lilly pads this year. Too cute!



March Madness: It's the time of year when Science Fair, Easter dress making and Awana Grand Prix all collide. Mackenzie made a Hair Hygrometer to measure the humidity in the air and Lauren is working on a foxhole radio. The radio is NOT WORKING yet and Jud is pulling out his hair trying to figure out why. Just one week left! Thanks to some extra snowy weather (we've had, what, three blizzards this year!) we were stuck at home on a weekend and managed to get the girls' Easter dresses almost done. We were so ahead of schedule, what with Easter being the very last Sunday in April, I decided to make one for myself! Very psyched about that.

School

Duncan ended his homeschooling days this year and started sixth grade at a public charter high school called Paideia Academy. It was the closest thing to a private school we could find that was also free. The only drawback is that the school is open year-round. That means poor Duncan had to start in August and will go through the middle of June. Spending the few nice days of MN summer in school does not sound too appealing. However, it was the best educational choice in our budget.

He seems to have adapted fine. Had some tough times remembering everything and taking tests/ grades seriously (since I did not keep grades in elementary school). He still hasn't found that great friend he's been looking for since he found one in Mason, his MI bud. I'm afraid Mason set a rather high standard for best friends.

The girls and I continued homeschooling, and, no, we did not start in August. We started in September, but I had a hard time focusing on it knowing our FL vacation was coming up. The FL trip was something of a huge field trip. They saw mangrove swamps, coral reefs, tidal pools, estuaries, marshes and swamps. Not to mention seeing the American tourist in its natural habitat.

Florida, Sept. 2010

Not gonna say too much about our FL vacay, since I spent a good deal of time putting it all down in a photo book. But to sum up, I will say my favorite part was the day we went on a sunset cruise on a catamaran off of Key West. The boat ride, the reggae music, the ocean, not being even remotely cold, and of course the sunset was absolutely amazing. I did notice that I truly came out of my cocoon in FL. Didn't realize how many layers I'd put on in the north. Layers of denial, determination, grit, and good old-fashioned MN survival toughness. Layers, like sweaters, that keep you warm, but make you feel stiff and suffocated. As we drove south and the weather turned hot and humid and the smell of the ocean permeated the senses, the layers melted away and what emerged was a FL girl in a tie dyed sarong and jeweled sandals. My true self. I tied the bandanna around my hair, opened the windows and let the tropical breeze blow in. I buried my face in a huge juicy mango and dug my toes into the warm sand. I tasted the salt water and marveled at how the clouds seem to touch the ocean. I felt every muscle relax and dreams squelched by the necessities of reality, came ebbing back like high tide. Such a wonderful, casual feeling of freedom.

Every once in awhile I have a moment that is so amazing, so orgasmic it's as if time stands still and gives you a chance to look carefully at each detail. When that happens, I do my best to take a mental picture with all of my senses. What am I feeling? What does it smell like?; what does it look like?; what sounds am I hearing? I took one of those mental pictures on the boat that day. Now that I'm back in MN, and I'm walking my daughter home and the north wind is biting into me, making me tug my layers closer and tighter, I pull out that picture and relive the moment. The layers don't seem so stifling when you've got reggae music blaring in your ears and moist, salty air glistening on your face.

I love my husband! (hacked)

My husband is soooooo wonderful for switching my MSN Spaces blog to Blogger. MSN decided they were going to close down their blogging program and switch over to Wordpress. Needless to say, the switchover wasn't as smooth as MSN said it would be, and to add insult to injury, Wordpress doesn't like pictures. I like pictures.
So, my wonderful husband is setting me up with a new Blogging program.
Enjoy!

(unhacked version) The blog I've had for six years went kaput and then made it nearly impossible to transfer anything. It's like losing your diary and photo album at the same time. Luckily I printed each blog at the end of the year, but my pics are now all 0ut of order and not dated properly. I feel like my past is unraveling!

Lauren’s 7th birthday

Lauren's seventh birthday party had a CandyLand theme, and boy did my theme dreamer go crazy. How fun to have not only an overall theme, but individual characters, all with their own costumes and stories. It was a theme dreamer's dream come true!

I roped in all the family. The Meadows even came in from Missouri. This was going to be big and I wanted everyone to be there. And while they were there, they all got to be a character in CandyLand.

What a blast! Watch the slideshow to get the whole story.