It's That Time Again

We have now begun the soccer season...the games were delayed the first week (and Christian's second one, too) because of the rain, but now the kids are back on the field.

Here are some shots of each of them in their first games this fall. 

Michaela is the one throwing the ball in. 

In past soccer seasons she has been a bit hesitant, but so far this time has seemed a little more comfortable going after the ball...

She's playing on a different team this fall so she'll be making new friends.  The rest of the girls all go to school together, but she doesn't seem to mind or feel like the odd one out.  She's so friendly and cheerful-it's good to see her meet new people with such ease.

Christian is playing on a team made up of boys from his school (except for one young man), but they are from different classes.  They did a great job tonight in their first game. 

A little warm-up...

Christian went in the 2nd and 4th quarters.  He played so well!  He got in the mix when he could, waited for the right opportunities, hung back, kicked the ball to other players...

And then he scored a goal!  You can see the ball rolling in...

That was so exciting.  I got pictures of him afterward, jumping and then hugging Mike, but they are all blurry-I'm sad about that.  I'm not sure what I did wrong.  I wish they had turned out, because the look on his face was so priceless. 

Look, I decided to put one on here anyway.  You can tell how happy he is (I also noticed that in this picture there is a man who was closer to me than Christian and he is perfectly in focus...I cropped him out.  But that would explain why all else was blurry.  Wah.)

I also managed to capture him in a moment that looks as though he had only one leg.  That would make it even trickier to score a goal, eh? 

There will be plenty more games, and I hope to do a better job photographing the next ones!  As far as the kids go, I'm sure they will keep up their good work! 

An Unlikely Snugglee

We had a visitor in our house today.

Meet Mr. Snaily.

Unlike most of his kind, he is soft and warm, very cozy and easy to snuggle.  A strange breed, certainly, but this one I prefer over the slimier garden variety.  There is no residual ooze on my couch, or my daughter.

Mr. Snaily liked kisses.  He just sat on Eliana's lap and let her love on him; and she had an unlimited supply of lovin'.

I cannot tell you how much joy this fluffy, white creature from the depths of Michaela's mind and the perfect softness of this blanket brought to our house today.

I do not know what inspired Mr. Snaily into being, but their imaginations inspire me every day.

Well Known...and Not So Much

This you have probably heard of:

The following, I would venture to guess, is much less well known. 

A Rabbit in Thyme

You just never know around here.

Forecast: Rainy With a Chance of Rain

It rained all day today.  And by all day, I mean ALL DAY.  From the time we got up this morning until now (although it has definitely tapered off).  The land has been quenched momentarily.  Christian kept saying throughout the day,"I wish it was like this in California."  They have been discussing the fires in his class as they talk about current events.

Since we were stuck inside and it was a Saturday so we had no place in particular to be anyway, I made a big, late breakfast.  We had bacon, eggs, and scones.  Except my dough was much too soft, so I made muffins.  We could call them scuffins.  While I was getting all the ingredients mixed together I noticed Eliana out of the corner of my eye; she was behaving oddly.  She was standing in a chair next to me at the kitchen counter.  I looked at her and realized she was making faces at herself in the mixer bowl.

She would lean in and then lean back out.  She smiled, and pulled her mouth back, and then made kissy lips.  She was so funny to watch...

And that was probably the highlight of the day.  I can't say that my kids love to be holed up in a house for an entire day with nothing to look at but one another, even though there are countless things to do here. 

We tried rearranging Michaela's bedroom, but it didn't work and everything ended up pretty much back where it was in the start.  Ending up exactly where you began always makes you feel like you got a lot done.

We did run one errand to the library, just to return books in the outdoor drop box, but other than that they were subjected to listening to the rain pour down on the roof and gush off the sides of the house for hours and hours.  I tried to clean up a little bit, but not with great success. 

I managed to get Mike's clothes for church ironed right after dinner...that is a major accomplishment.  Writing that sentence was also a major accomplishment considering I wrote "manj" and deleted it and wrote it again at least ten times in a row. 

I will now share with you some things that I learned today.

• Listening to the rain makes my kids want to eat.  Every single minute.
• Leaving your bacon grease to clean up later is not the easy way to go.
• Tired two-year-olds are very cross.  (I really already knew this, but got a good dose of a reminder today.)
• Putting Magic Shell on Breyers Mint Chocolate Chip ice cream is totally unnecessary. 

Some of this knowledge may be useful to you and some of it is utterly useless information.  Sorry.

It is now pouring again; late at night when all of my children are asleep in their beds I enjoy listening to the sound.  Maybe it will lull me to sleep in a little while.  First, I have some potties to clean.  These are the joys of housekeeping...

Lunchbox or Navy Seal?

This is a story about a lunchbox, a bunch of twits, and a smartypants. 

Meet Christian's lunchbox, bright and cheerful, stands out in a crowd, skilled in the art of carrying all manner of food items, hot or cold...

We've learned recently that it has secret skills, too.  Like secret agent, undercover, covert-ops  skills.

Christian's lunchbox has had a long summer.  Most of it was spent on a shelf in our kitchen; because Christian was having lunch at home all the time, lunchbox was not especially necessary.  There were two times when it got to put its excellent carrying skills to use:  when we went to the pool with all of our friends who stayed with us, and when we went to the Rangers baseball game with those same friends.  Lunchbox was so excited to be able to perform its duties; carrying food for someone is the fulfillment of its very purpose here on this earth.  Having to sit on the shelf the rest of the summer was about to drive lunchbox to the edge.

You can imagine how happy lunchbox has been since last Tuesday when lunches started at school.  It wasn't a full week, but three of the five days it was filled with Christian's lunch, so happy.  Hand-in-strap, together again.  In fact, lunchbox was so glad to be out of our kitchen that it sneakily stayed behind at school Tuesday and then again on Thursday .  We picked it up the first time the next day (Christian got out early, so no big deal; good thing for you, lunchbox!) so that it was ready for the following lunch day.  But Friday morning I was stuck with no lunchbox, and had to take Christian's lunch over mid-morning and just put it in his lunchbox which was sitting happily in the lunchbox line, amidst all the other lunchbox friends.  Totally unaware of the chaos it was causing in our house each of these mornings.

Friday Mike picked Christian up from school since Eliana was asleep and soon after they came inside I asked Christian where his lunchbox was.  It wasn't in his bag or next to the front door.  I checked on our porch, because Mike and Christian had been having a conversation out there before coming inside; I thought maybe he had put it down during their talk and then left it there.  Nope, just the front porch, the sidewalk, the grass.

Mike said,"You had it in your hand, buddy.  Did you put it down over there in the hallway before we left?"  He couldn't remember; he was convinced that he had brought it home.  I told them we would just walk over and check it out.  I didn't want to wait until Monday for a couple of reasons.  Obviously, I wanted to be able to pack his lunch on the first day of the week, especially since this morning I had gotten a call from another mom saying,"You might want to bring Christian's lunch over..."  He honestly thought Friday Pizza began right away.  I knew it didn't, but like I said, sneaky lunchbox had managed to stay at school Thursday night.  I also didn't want to leave it because Sunday morning the Sunday School classes met; I thought it would be best if lunchbox were just at home for the weekend and we didn't have to worry about the confusion of all the different people and possibly getting moved around or taken.

So once Eliana was awake we walked over to the school and looked in the hallway first thing.  No lunchbox.  We peeked in the classroom and no one was in there, although the door was still open.  I felt funny about going in there; I don't know why, but it just feels like I'm not supposed to do that.  I said,"Let's check the lost and found."  We went downstairs to the lost and found bin, and it wasn't there, either.  We ran into Christian's Spanish teacher twice; she smiled but I think she thought we looked a bit strange wandering the hallway after school hours like we were.  I tried to explain,"We've lost a lunchbox." 

She was very sympathetic.  Maybe it's happened to her, too.  She asked what it looked like, and Christian quickly replied,"It has cars all over it!"  Michaela added,"It also has car noises like 'Beep' and 'Vroom'!"  She nodded her head and said she would look out for it.

We went back upstairs since she had also encouraged us to go ahead and look inside the classroom; now that we had official permission I didn't feel so funny about going in.  We walked in the door and looked all around.  Christian walked the entire class, Michaela followed him, checking all around.  He looked inside his desk, over by the books, at the other door.  I looked on the counter right next to the door we entered, as well as to my right where a little table stood.

All the while I could hear Eliana in the background, chanting something.  She had been as quiet as a moonbeam up until now, so I turned to ask her what she was saying.  She had gotten up on her toes on the foot strap of her stroller and had her little arm and finger pointed straight up; she said again, as clear as a clean glass, "Christian's lunchbox!  There it is!  Christian's lunchbox!  There it is!"  I looked where she was pointing and right there beside my face, on the very counter I had looked at upon entering the room, sat Christian's lunchbox. 

It was laughing at me. 

I called the other kids, told them to come on, and showed them how Eliana had found the elusive lunchbox.  They laughed and laughed and we all told her what a good job she had done.  I still can't believe it; Michaela and I even had our glasses on! 

I might have to get one of those satellite trackers that you can implant.  Lunchbox, I've got my eye on you.  Actually, I've got Eliana's eyes on you.  Mine don't seem to work all that well.