Unplanned Roasting of Marshmallows

This evening, while Kevin and I were upstairs debating the merits of the paint colors "Drizzle" and "Toasty Gray" for the bathroom reno, the kids were playing outside . We did see them hosing off the fire pit, but otherwise we were lost in our selection of what will no doubt be a terrible color choice, as our color spirit guides are unicorns that love Easter.  Meanwhile, the children relocated the (now) wet fire pit, surrounded it with chairs they found in the garage and brought out marshmallows and roasting sticks. How do you say no to that? And then, Stephanie adds, "Mom, why don't you bring out your camera?". Honestly, I didn't really feel like it, but I wasn't going to turn down the request, because I was happy she had made it.
It took the kids a little time to get the hang of roasting marshmallows vs setting them on fire, but they were pros by marshmallow #3 (at which point I cut them off). They also found a fun area to set up the fire pit- they might be on to a new yard addition.

 Look at me, playing with the focus- to moderate success even!

Obstacle Course- Complete with mud pit

Yesterday was the Annual 5K and obstacle course at Stephanie's school. We did it last year, and the weather was less than ideal (far too cold for kids to be outside and wet), but this year was much better. Gwen had a t-ball game at the same time. We let the kids pick which parent was going with which kid. I won't lie- I was like a nervous little kid waiting to get picked for the team I really wanted, fingers crossed that Stephanie would choose me because I knew there would be photo opportunities. She did not. So, I set the camera settings for Kevin, and sent him off on his own. I learned a few things from this experience. #1 There are other people in the world that can take fun pictures of my kids other than Alaina and myself. #2 I am willing to crop someone else's photos mercilessly. I think I don't as quickly see the cropping opportunities that exist with my own pictures. #3 I am also way less committed to order of photographs if I don't take them. Stephanie ran the course 4 times, three with classmate friends and once by herself until she ran into a neighbor to run with. In picking out photos, I had no qualms mixing and matching race parts to find the right pictures to tell a story since I had no real part of that story. 

Your teacher must love you to touch you after all this!

They had the fire trucks out to rinse the kids. It certainly helped, but her hair still ran mud out when I helped her clean up at home. And I had to Q-tip the mud out of her ears before church. 

T-ball Season

This year, Stephanie was too old for T-ball (ages 4-6) and had to choose between track and softball. She selected track (more on that at a later date), but I saw that T-ball was for children that were 4 as of April. Bingo! I have one of those! I know some parents get sick of their kids activities (and there are days that I do), but I love to have the kids participate in our local Parks and Rec. It is inexpensive, well run, and most nights it beats the pants off of crazy children wrecking the house. I was also super excited that Gwen FINALLY gets to do a sport. I have been dragging her to all of Stephanie's for years, and she was so happy to get signed up. And then I went to sign her up... Should have read more carefully- 4 by April 1st... so we missed that cutoff by 22 days. I know that the parks and rec are flexible when you sign up in person, so I took it upon myself to go ahead and adjust her birthday in the system, only the system wouldn't let me. So I did what any reasonably desperate mother would do not have to tell her baby that she couldn't play t-ball (or drive into town and deal with it in person-it isn't the 19th century, after all)- I started an account for Kevin and moved her birthday by 23 days to March 31st. And Voila! Now I have a little T-baller. I also convinced a mom friend that has a son in Stephanie's class to sign up for our team, but only one of her sons wanted to play- so now I have Gwen on a team, a mom I like to talk to and a play date for Stephanie twice a week at the ball park.

First Practice- See how happy she is!

Let's call the rest of the pictures as being from the first game (the first game that I successfully remembered both a camera and a memory card for said camera, in other words).

Here she is throwing her glove while in the field. I unfortunately missed the picture of her wearing it on her head. BUT she does all of this while mostly facing the batter, which is slightly better than Stephanie managed sometimes. 

Look who brought Buzzy Bee out to the field. 

That's Coach Pete. He is awesome. He coaches the high school boys at our county high school (his grandson is on the t-ball team), and recruited four high school boys to coach with him, so there is an army to manage these kids. I have grown to love high schoolers this year anyway, and I especially love that these boys give up one night a week and Saturday mornings for these little kids. 

I also should mention that at the actual first game, she was the kid that ran to third after hitting the ball. But she has mostly worked out the running to first since. This game (the second) she actually got her hands on the ball three times in the field and got it to where it needed to be. Her third game was today. She didn't get to field the ball, but she played third in the second inning. After the first batter hit the ball, she ran home and then headed to the dug-out. The high schooler that was in her area of the field did all the calling her back that he could have possibly have done, but she was not to be dissuaded from an opportunity to score. Fortunately, Coach Pete shooed her back to her position before she quite made it to the dugout. She is so little and cute and the total comic relief of the game.

And then, of course, there is Stephanie. I was testing some camera settings and asked Stephanie to run towards me. My camera settings didn't work as I had planned (need to check out my old friend YouTube to figure it out), but I still got some funny pictures.

The T-Ball adventures will continue into June. In addition to teaching them a little about baseball, Coach Pete has tried to instill two things in the kids- #1- The Cubs are the best and #2- have fun. She has #2 down perfectly!

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