Find Joy in the Journey: October 2019

Sunday, October 27, 2019

Fall continued

When I looked at the weather for this past week I noticed that Wednesday morning was going to be freezing. The low was 36 degrees so instead of making a time consuming apple pie which neither Lydia or myself really enjoy, I decided to make fresh apple cider with the apples we picked. Jared and Lydia helped me prepare it Tuesday night and then when we woke up Wednesday morning we had warm cider for a cold fall morning. Jared was a huge fan. He drank the most.

Friday we attended our ward Halloween party. I have gotten so much better at ward parties as Jared and Lydia have gotten older. I still don't love them but my level of annoyance at them has lowered significantly. Jared was very happy with his ninja costume and Lydia's ghost costume was adorable. I was so happy when she picked it. I was also very surprised. Looking back over the years though, she has often picked very what I call "Classic" costumes. She has been a witch, black cat, ballerina, bumble bee and a pirate. There are so many costume choices these days so I find it interesting that she has stuck with these traditional costumes.

They had fun playing games and trunk or treating. Jared has some friends who do not eat food dyes so after they were done collecting candy they went into a small classroom and traded candy. Jared ended up with 27 packages of starburst and 26 packages of Skittles. They got a lot of chocolate from him! I am glad they did this together. Not only to be good friends but now there is significantly less candy of his that I want to eat. I had fun decorating our trunk and the next morning we counted and sorted their candy. Jared had 179 pieces and Lydia had 103. He got quite a bit from his friends since they could not a good portion of the selection.

I grabbed this stuff Friday afternoon before we went to the party and

was really pleased with how it came out.

I also made some fun cupcakes for the cake walk. Turns out I really like piping frosting on cupcakes. I typically just spread frosting on cupcakes like butter, just flat but this time I got out some decorating tips (I own four) and attempted to follow a tutorial and enjoyed doing it. I made cupcakes with a brownie bottom and white cake dyed orange on top. The brownie was a fun twist. I have been watching a Halloween Baking show on Food Network and love it so much. I must have been inspired by it.

Saturday afternoon we went on a beautiful Fall drive. Every year I go back and forth about whether or not I want to go. I do not enjoy long car rides but I love seeing the colors so much. And it's so tricky to get it at the peak. But this year we totally did! I asked a guy at work who has lived here forever where we should go and he suggested McDowell and West Augusta. McDowell is about 1.5 hours away so I wasn't sure we would go that far but we did and it was worth it. Pictures do not do the colors justice but I could not resist taking them. It turned out to be a beautiful Fall. The colors around town are beautiful. It has been so fun to drive around and watch them change. It makes me so very happy.

Driving out of town was really pretty too. We made it to a look out point near West Augusta and were treated to a perfect hike. There as a half mile hike that even tied into some Civil War History. We weren't looking for any Civil War history but when you live in VA its not hard to find. This area was once a Confederate fort and supposedly you could see part of the Confederates defense lines. We didn't actually see the breastworks but loved the hike and colors. It was a perfect little loop. Not too long and easy enough that Lydia and Jared could run ahead as they liked. They came up with a game where she was a panther named Shadow and he was a guinea pig named Aaron. What they were doing out in the woods and together I didn't catch but they loved our stop. I was so happy there was such a great simple hike there. We had no idea! It was such a happy surprise. The colors did not disappoint at all. I think it has been one of the best Falls we have experienced here. It took forever for Summer to leave and the leaves to change but it has been magical.

There was so much color on the mountains.

"Aaron and Shadows"

Homemade Maple Cinnamon Buns from McDowell, VA

And we drove by the most perfect Fall Inn/Buffet. I love their flags, porch, and pumpkins. I made Mark turn around so I could take a picture of it. Or 10. Picture Perfect.

Perfection.

And today we carved our pumpkins. We are heading out of town Thursday (Halloween) and Mark works Monday and Tuesday so we did it lightning quick when Mark got home from church. It is awesome how much faster we can carve pumpkins now that Jared and Lydia are older. Jared knew what he wanted to carve right away and Lydia quickly picked hers and we got it done! They turned out great. Lydia said this was her best and favorite pumpkin. I am not sure she remembers all her previous ones but am glad she loves it. It was fun. After a really rainy morning we were given a beautiful if slightly warm afternoon.

An Owl and The United States of America. No need to say which belonged to which child.

Oh how I love this magical month.

End of 2019 Soccer Season

Saturday was the last soccer game of the season! Jared had a great season. Lydia and Mark did not. After the game ended she came to me and burst into tears. Through her tears she told me that she "was useless at soccer" and all soccer was was the ball going out of bounds. It was a very sad moment. I really hope she does not ask to play next year. I will buy her special snacks to avoid this. Snacks are a big reason why she wanted to play. It would be one thing if she really tried hard and was involved but she really wasn't. It drove Mark crazy.

She is not aggressive enough to go after the ball and complains that she is too hot and always gets injured. I am not sure how she always gets injured since she rarely touches the ball but somehow she does. In her defense lots of kids do often swarm the ball and it does go out of bounds a lot which doesn't seem that fun to me either. She had a lot of decent players on her team and they were undefeated but she did not really enjoy it. Mark did not have fun coaching her. They needed help and he was willing to help but he would have been better off coaching Jared's team.

Jared was one of the strongest players on the team (this is not intense high level soccer) and enjoyed soccer very much but still has a ways to go on his sportsmanship. I had a hard time watching him. He is not awful by any means but I would have loved to see him encourage his teammates and the other team and listen to what his coaches tried to teach him. If he did not agree with a coaches call (like a corner kick instead of goal kick) he was a stinker about it so that was hard. And his coach was really nice and encouraging. I just don't think Jared was that teachable which was hard for me. He also didn't try very hard to get to know his teammates so team unity was not a focus for him. There were lots of really nice kids too. This was not super surprising as he is a very independent person. So I spent most of my time visiting with friends and watching them play sporadically. I am glad it's over but still glad they participated. Even if I am not competitive or care about sports I like Jared and Lydia to try these things.

After the game there was a fun breakfast and each team had an individual trophy ceremony. It really is fun to meet up with people we don't see many other times and the League itself is really family friendly which is great. One more year...

"Best Bowmasters"

There were 5 members from 2 wards on his team. So more than half.

"Jaguars"

Parent Teacher Conferences

Wednesday we had our parent teacher conferences. Jared was first and it was really good. His teacher had no concerns and only good things to say. She uses way less technology than his teachers last year and is way more structured than they were so it has been an adjustment for him. He misses the technology aspect but is happy in his class. About half his class was in that class last year so the teacher has had to slowly get them used to a more structured day. She mentioned that he is her strongest student in the class, or performing at the highest level which surprised me. His reading comprehension and level is above grade level and he is a good writer. To help challenge him and help him not be stagnant she is going to have him work on the class science lessons ahead of the class and then be a leader/assistant in class. Science is his least favorite subject and probably his weakest so I am not sure how he will feel about that but I appreciate that she is aware of him and making a plan to stay on top of it. He brought home a permission slip for Student Council which surprised and excited me. They all have to write a 30 second speech and then the teacher will read them to the class and have the class vote. Only one student will be selected from the class so its steep competition. I hope it is a good experience for him. I will admit that I also hope he wins. It's the kind of school activity I think would be good for him. Throughout this soccer season various parents have talked about his leadership qualities. I hope he can develop them. She mentioned he has a nice group of friends and is doing great.

Lydia is also doing great in her class. Her teacher mentioned how grateful she is to have Lydia in her class. She talked about how helpful she is and that she is a rule follower. She is reading well above grade level and writing very well. She actually did better on her last Science test than on her latest Social Studies unit which surprised me. I don't think that means prefers science to Social Studies but it is really different than Jared, Mark or I who have always preferred Social Studies. It sounds like her teacher is having a much better year than last year which is great. There still seems to be some friend issues but she has been playing with two friends from last year, Kitty and Reagan more and seems to be enjoying being with them. Both Mrs. Shafran (Jared's teacher last year) and Mrs. Peterson (Assistant Principal) talked about how friendly she is and that she is always giving them hugs. Probably more than necessary but they are kind about it. It surprises me because she is typically fairly reserved with adults. Even family friends we have known for a good while she will not do that with or spend a lot of time interacting with them but she loves those two and Ms. Borman. Lydia is sweet, loving and fun.

Tuesday I attended that information session about the rebranded gifted and talent development program. I'm glad I went but also not really sure what they are doing at Baker-Butler specifically. From what I understood, the district people commented that there should be 1 gifted teacher for every 300 kids. There are 642 kids at Baker Butler and only Mrs. Shafran filling that position. The idea is to be more inclusive especially for minorities which have long been under represented. Instead of a gifted program there is gifted and talent development services. I think Mrs. Shafran is trying really hard to do but this but is already stretched out thin since we have such a large school. As far as testing goes Jared was about 2% away from the "required scores" so he is not in that "group" but I am glad he can do some different things and really glad that he can do well in his regular class.

Saturday, October 19, 2019

A week of Fall

This past week was the most beautiful week. I went running three mornings, wore sweaters comfortably, and marveled at the changing leaves on trees throughout Charlottesville. After such a long hot, dry September I was concerned that the leaves would just die and fall off but no, they are beautiful and it makes me so happy.

To take in all the amazing weather we went on a few evening adventures.

Tuesday: evening bike ride. Because we basically live in the woods, we rarely see the sunset. Occasionally I see a friend here in Charlottesville post a beautiful sunset picture and am sad that I missed it and so many others. Tuesday night we were awarded with a beautiful sunset. I also managed to get our bike rack attached to our car and both Jared and Lydia's bikes on it. The rack is actually super easy, I just had never done it myself before. Getting their bikes on was really hard, especially Lydia's but I persisted and got it on, twice. They did not ride as much as I would have liked given the effort I put into getting the bikes on but I said "yes" and we all benefitted from it.

Wednesday we had a night off from soccer and an evening Mark was home so we went out kayaking. It was a super windy night which made kayaking a little harder and a little more of an adventure than it usually is. Lydia tried her very best and really made some good progress against the wind but an adult kayak is still quite large for an almost 8 year old.

Friday Lydia and I went on a date while Jared attended a birthday party. After dropping Jared off we headed to 7-11 for a quick ice cream treat and then stopped at the Earlysville Exchange, a cute little second hand store near the party. We found a few books for Lydia and Thanksgiving plates and cups for me. Following that we stopped by the elementary school in Earlysville and enjoyed the perfect weather. I really like their playground, it's one of my favorites. Lydia told me that it was her favorite as well because she had a special connection to it. She then told me how it was the playground where she learned to pump on a swing by herself while I swung next to her showing her and encouraging her. She's the best.

Friday evening we headed down to UVA to watch the mens soccer team lose to Pittsburgh. While it was sad they lost, we had a fun time at the game. Not only did 3 family friends meet us there but shortly after half time I looked behind me to talk to someone and saw Jim Ryan, President of UVA sitting right behind us. I really like President Ryan. His community outreach and attempts to connect with students have been really fun to watch. Exhibits 1, 2, 3 and 4.

Move in Day 2019 Cookies and Puppies

Running for Teachers

Move in Day 2018 Minute 1:36 hahaha

Student and Community Runs He thought three people would show up!

So I was pretty starstruck. No one else really cared but I loved it. Jared hung out with us for all of 30 seconds, but he had a blast running around with friends and occasionally watching the game. Lydia watched even less of the game and did not enjoy my attempt of a family picture moment. She was so upset when the game was over, she wanted it to last longer so this picture does not relate to how she felt about being at the game. It got pretty chilly at the end but we came prepared and are glad we got a game in.

Right behind my shoulder in the khakis and baseball hat. He is sitting by his wife and son.

We took a little walk up to the top of the stands to check out the view from up there.

It was way colder up there are the top!

Saturday we attended our second to last soccer game. It was frigid this morning, like 38 degrees! But it warmed up nicely by 10:00. Lydia was late to her game because we could not find her shinguards anywhere. I know they are important but Lydia pretty much never goes near the ball when everyone else is "swarming" around it so I wasn't really that concerned. She has a had a really good team. Nice kids who are really pretty good at soccer. Jared's team has not won many games and they play against the same team each week but he scored his teams only 2 goals and while I missed those I did see some really well done defending by him which was nice. He has loved playing. Today Lydia told me she wants to play again next year but we will see if this holds true when we get the emails next August.

After soccer we hurried home to change and then went to a family friends baptism. It was a really nice service, one of my favorites that I have attended. It was great to support them and visit with others. We got home and did a solid hour of yard work which greatly improved how it looked. It is still overgrown and overwhelming but the area inside our fence looks so much better now.

We had planned to go on a hike up in Shenandoah National Park, we really want to take advantage of Jared's 4th grade free park pass this year but the website would not work today so I could not print off his pass. Hopefully I can do it this week and we can make it up there. So instead of a hike we headed to Carter Mountain with a good part of Charlottesville's population to pick apples and enjoy cider donuts. Often they end up running out of parking space and have to close until enough people leave, which is crazy because they have a lot of space, but we lucked out and 10 minutes before we arrived the reopened the lot and we got in. It was a great day to be there. We picked a new to us breed of apples (Stayman) and I will attempt to make an apple pie tomorrow. It was nice to be up there even with the crowds. Sometimes it's nice to be at a place like that with people doing similar things it makes you feel part of a community. We had never picked apples there as a family. Peaches, yes and I took my preschool class there but we had not done it in the Fall together and it is such a quintessential Fall thing to do. It was a great outing.

I'm so grateful for Autumn.

Monday, October 14, 2019

Happy 10th Birthday Jared!

T E N.

When I think of the number 10 is does not mean that much to me but when I think of Jared being 10 the number takes on a lot more significance. That means I have been parenting for 10 years. It then means he is solidly in his tween years. (Prompting me to read ~~scary~~ informative tween articles and think of how to best connect with Jared.) He has only more year of elementary school. He is getting older and life is going to become much more serious very soon.

In the meantime I hope to help him have as much innocent fun as he can. To go outside and play in the woods and to snuggle in bed with his much beloved blanket of the past ten years and read to his hearts content. To ask me to play catch with him and for me to say "yes" realizing this is my best chance to really get Jared to talk to me and to connect with him. Even if I don't want to play frisbee, catch a football or baseball to say "yes." And to keep praying that he will choose good friends and have confidence in himself. That he will make the best, often not as fun choices.

On Saturday, after soccer, we took him to the zip-line and ropes course Mark and I visited over the Summer. We had him pick a friend to invite and were correct in assuming Jared would love everything about it. Sadly the friend he invited did not and was terrified the whole time. We felt awful. Jared was happy as can be, joking about how high they were and telling Marcus to imagine the platform falling or the zip-line snapping. I looked back at Marcus at one point (I was first with Lydia behind me so I could help her when she got to the next platform) and the look on his face made me feel horrible. Mark caught up to them on one platform and quickly realized how Marcus was doing and firmly and subtlety told Jared to knock it off! That was a bummer. Perfect activity for Jared, wrong friend to invite. Lydia did not love it but she did like it and have fun. So that did not quite go as we envisioned it but at least we know Jared well. We finished the course and Marcus and I sat down on a bench and he was much happier. The three of them (Jared, Mark and Lydia) did another course together and loved it so I think it was a win?

On our way back to Charlottesville we stopped for ice cream. Between the parking lot and order window are some red barriers. Jared successfully jumped over one the first time and successfully face planted the second time. That did not go as he planned. This is real life though. You plan, you try and then you see what the results are. His cut is nicely visible in his birthday pictures.

This was the second time on this course. She did not look this way the first time through. She was so scared and I was so proud of her for overcoming her fears. I don't know how many times I told her "remember, you can not fall!" Here she is demonstrating that it was true, she could not fall with her no hands skills. Some courses were mostly zip-lines others had zip-lines and these obstacles. On our last course we got stuck behind people who had to be rescued. It took forever! It was taking so long we ended up turning around and not finishing the course. Luckily no one else was starting the course so we could get off.

We got home around 6:45 and Mark looked at Jared and said, "wanna go kayaking?" Jared was really surprised and excited to go and to get to go at night was especially awesome. They paddled around in the mostly dark for 30 minutes or so and said it was really cool so now I need to go and try it. Mark said it was really cool to watch the moon rise on the lake. Fall is the best time to go out.

Sunday night I made crepes for his birthday breakfast. I was not willing to get up that early Monday morning but wanted to make his request. It worked great. I also baked and frosted his cake while Mark made a template for the continents that were to be placed on the cake. That took a long time. Then Mark rolled out the fondant and made a fantastic world map cake. He did an awesome job. I'm so grateful for Mark. Not only for his help but for the example he is setting for Jared and Lydia. I made some little flags to mark where Jared has traveled. I think it fit his requested theme of a travel/map cake. We blew up balloons and wrote messages on them. Mark looked up Happy Birthday and the number 10 in multiple languages and I referenced our favorite Hamilton lyrics. Jared and Lydia love it as much as I do. It's funny to think about last year and how the balloon messages were all Harry Potter themed. Streamers were hung and eventually we made it to bed.

He also requested ice cream cups for his class birthday treat and I sadly forgot to buy them Saturday night when I went out to get his balloons. That was a sad realization. So at 6:00 am I was on my way to Harris Teeter for ice cream cups. They did not have ice cream cups but did have Italian Ice so I grabbed those. In the end he liked them better and they fit better with a travel theme. I do on occasion think some of the things I do are a bit more then needs to be done for occasions but at the same time I love making birthday requests come true. Celebrating my kids birthdays are kind of a big deal to me and its fun.

I met him for lunch with Chick-Fil-A which he was excited about. I had yet to go to lunch this school year and am glad it worked out. I left work at 11 instead of 12 and enjoyed eating with him, Lydia, Tyler and Marcus. If possible I would like to join them for lunch more. They have the dream schedule where their lunches overlap so I can easily eat with them both one after another.

After school Marcus and Tyler came home with us while Lydia rode the bus to our house with her friend Kitty. The boys played Legos downstairs, explored the woods with lightsabers, and played catch with Jared's new Quaffle, which Tyler got him. We ate cake and sang happy birthday and opened presents. The presents he got this year were spot on. Marcus got him a automatic Nerf gun which he loves and 200 bullets... Tyler got him a quaffle and an orca Lego set. We got him a classic creator Lego set and a Star Wars drone he spotted at Costco one day. When I went to Costco to get it they were out but I ended up finding the same drone, only the Special Collection edition online and it did not disappoint. As I read reviews online I noticed that a lot of people were talking about the box and the opening of the drone. Turns out that when you open the fancy box the drone lit up and Star Wars music began playing. Since I knew this I positioned myself according and got a pretty good look at Jared's reaction. It was fun.