Knitpickity

Life is "Beastly"

Word of the weekend

Beastly

definition (Courtesy of Patrick) - adj.

1. Of or pertaining to the beast;

2. awesome in all ways of the manly imagination

This weekend was #2

Catherine made the Nutcracker cast this year.  She was not allowed to try out for any part other than the Polichenelle - we were very surprised and she was very happy to be cast as a Soldier!

Then we had Patrick's Paintball Party - 21 football players showed up and it was just a great party!

Here are some pictures:

Patrick picking his team:

Half The group before playing:

Clowning around:

Shots from some of the games:

The whole gang . . .

We went through 12000+ paintballs - it was fun and totally crazy!

Then today besides the laundry and housework, both kids had a project due this week - Catherine had the infamous leaf project and Patrick had the egg drop project - both are due Tue and both are done.

Whew!

Beastly - what else can I say! 

Quick updates but nothing noteworthy

Patrick had an awesome birthday and is officially a teenager . . .

   

He received tons of games and movies from his Dad and a new Razr2 from me and has a Paintball Party this coming weekend for the football team!!

Had a nice weekend, house and yard were still caught up so went to see Nanny Diaries with a girlfriend - the movie was pretty lame - but we had sushi and sake afterwards at anew neat place, Wasabi and that was a blast.

Went to a scrapbooking party on Saturday evening and realized that there is a new hobby that I am not motivated to start LOL  So I worked on picture collages of the kids from when they were very little and actually (drum roll and fanfare) knitted for a while.  Today was football (Ok the Dolphins are doing just awful but they are still my team) and grocery shopping and a blissful Mani/Pedi for me (and Pedi for Catherine - she is rather privileged LOL)

So nothing big here - just everything good!

So all is well here

On the tackle, #61 Patrick Stacey

Woo hoo

Woo Hoo

WOO HOO

OK this may seem silly but I am so excited.  Tonight Patrick made a tackle in a game.  The hilarious thing is that he did not even realize it.  He got popped hard the previous play and he had his eyes closed when the ball was snapped (he was playing defensive tackle) he lunged forward heard a pop and surprise surprise - the ball carrier was down.

Tomorrow is his 13th birthday - what a way to end his preteen years.

Here are some pictures from tonight's 36-0 victory!!!

 

Domestic Bliss

One of the things I have come to accept about being a single parent with two busy kids is that I am pretty much always going to be behind.  Always something not done, not up to the standards that I was used to, but it was a small sacrifice.

Well lately I have not been sleeping well - layoffs at work are stressing me, and the kids have been crazy busy between football and cheer and ballet and choir and one very special birthday coming up this week.  So I have been sleeping about 3-4 hours a night and spending the other 2 -3 hours going through my lists.

That was driving me crazy too, so to gain some sanity I decided that I would get decently caught up this weekend at home.  So here it is 8:47 on a Sunday night.

Everyone has clean sheets, clothes and towels

the whole house is vacuumed, dusted, all bathrooms and kitchen have been scrubbed, surfaces wiped, floors mopped

The yard has been mowed, edged, mostly weed whacked (ran out of line dangit), bushes trimmed and driveway blown clean

The car has gas and has been through the car wash

I went to the store and have food planned through Wed at least

If I don't sleep like a rock tonight I am not sure what it will take

So now I am going to go watch the Miami/Dallas game that I Tivo'd today

Catherine had Nutcracker tryouts today too - keep your fingers crossed for her!

receiving an email entitled "Patrick in Math Class Today"

When Patrick was around 4 years old, we were at church on Easter Sunday.  After the children's sermon every other child wandered obediently back down the aisle looking for his or her parents.  Patrick was curious about where the steps went and went wandering up to the choir loft before Ken could catch him.  I

I think I knew then that we were in for an interesting time of it as parents.

Over the past 8 years I have received numerous emails from teachers.  Actually his kindergarten teacher grabbed us most days after school with a "Do you know what your son did today . . ."  Ummm no but it was probably something not horrible but enough to drive you batty.

I have always carefully read the notes, contacted the teachers and disciplined appropriately. 

However today's note was something different.  As I write below please understand that I am not insensitive to the tragedies that have happened not only in this country, but world wide.  Please understand that I know the world is a different place and we need to be protective of our kids and of our teachers.  But this one stretched it a bit for me  . . .

The note started out that Patrick was doodling today - uh oh - no it was OK because it was during free time while they were doing some folder organizing and he was done.  So the doodling was not the problem.  It went on to state that the other boys around Patrick were watching and snickering.  Uh oh - but wait it was not naked pictures or pictures of the teacher . . .   I am only going to post a small portion of the very long and concerned email . . .

When he showed me his doodle due to my asking to see it, he spouted off all this science jargon about atomic bombs and his drawing was an incorrect graphic (like a chemical reaction chain) of an atomic bomb chemical structure/response.  I took up the doodle just so I could have a record of this.What concerned me most about this whole incident was that he said something to the effect to me and front of the other boys, “I am fascinated by explosions.”

Here is my response . . .

Patrick is very interested in nuclear physics.  He does not experiment at home and while he engineers mightily on paper, and I am very aware of his technical designs, he has never shown any interest in blowing up anything around the house.  While he has lit an occasional firework (supervised) he is somewhat nervous around matches.  He does not play with chemicals etc.  In this case, I can assure you that his interest is truly academic.  And unfortunately I believe it is very common for boys this age to love to blow up things, hence the proliferation of video games where there are explosions and bombs and guns and gore.  I limit those in my house as well - most of what he is allowed to play are historical role play games. 

Patrick loves to sound like he is an expert in several areas where he does know more than the average 8th grader, just enough to get him into trouble.  I am not surprised that his atomic bomb chemical response was not correct.  Hopefully if he does go into this field (which unless his grades improve is highly unlikely) he will better understand the chemical and physical reactions involved.

Thank you for bringing this to my attention - I have discussed it with him, and believe this was no different then designing a futuristic car, or a spaceship or other imaginative item.

He is enjoying your math class and doing so much better than the last couple of years.  Thanks for being such a great and conscientious teacher.

  I know teachers have to be very cautious in today's world.  And she reported him to the principal and vice principal, so she has done her duty.  But goodness gracious.

Part of me wanted to make one of two replies:

1.  Phew I am glad he still does not have the steps exactly right.  I have not yet finished paying off the damages from the last one.

2.  Ummm how do you know that the chain reaction steps are not right?

But I figured that would get me a bunch of phone calls and letters and possibly an evaluation from the state of TN so the polite answer was better.

It will be interesting to see what other emails the next 5 years bring

Crying over spilt milk and other figures of speech

I bought a gallon of milk tonight and the bag it was in slipped out of my hand onto the ceramic tile.  The plastic milk jug cracked (never drop anything onto Italian ceramic tile it has the hardness coefficient of a diamond) and milk started going everywhere.  It seemed like a disaster.

But I found a container and salvaged enough of the gallon to have breakfast in the morning and then slowly and methodically cleared up the spill and the mess.

There is another situation in my life similar to this right now and while I do not wish to go into the details I am trying to decide if I should salvage some of it and go forward or seek more drastic action.  A straw broke the camels back - do we wait and see, perform surgery or euthanize the animal.  No easy answers, no quick fixes.

I have spent quite a bit of the weekend reflecting on the situation and praying for guidance and wisdom.  This is not a race but a decision on which path to take.  I am going to seek professional advice and spiritual advice and then hopefully go the right way.

The last cliche is that the road to hell is paved with good intentions.  I want what is truly right not what I believe to be right for the wrong reasons.