February

It is hard to believe that the month of February has past.  I am sure that Katie would have had several posts written for the month.  It is not that nothing didn't happen last month, but I did not feel like writing much.  I suppose we all have those times.  I will do a break down of what we have been up to.

We ended January with Jeffrey and Brandon being involved with band.  They played for the boys' and girls' basketball teams during their district tournaments on several different nights.  Both teams qualified for state but they did not go with the girls.  They did get to go play for the boys this last week, leaving on Thursday.  The boys won their first two games and so they got to play for the state championship.  They ended up losing to Fruitland.  Jeffrey has gone to state the last four years to play and this was the first for Brandon.  They did get to play in the Idaho Center in Nampa which was fun.  They got back late last night.  They are now getting ready for the high school band concert this week. 

The kids continue to take piano lessons and at times it is a fight for practice times for some more than others.  It is hard to help Brandon remember to practice piano before drums.  Camille on the other hand is playing anytime she can and when she is not playing the piano, she is reading a book.  Alexa is doing well also in practicing.  Jeffrey is trying to prepare for the Crawford cup.  Now with pep band over, it should free up more time for that.

Our other activities include Jeffrey starting track this past week, the scout banquet where they had the offical and unoffical pine wood derby (I forgot my camera to get pictures of the unoffical races), young men basketball which is almost over, and other mutual activities which some had to be missed because of pep band. 

Everyone is surviving school.  We are 2/3 done for the year.  Jeffrey and Brandon have finals this week.  Camille, Alexa, and Drew are all doing well.  Drew is pretty good at doing his work as long as there are not too many distractions until I can help him.  Mary is enjoying daycare and pre-school.  It is hard to believe that she will be in kindergarten next year. 

This past month we were able to go spend some time during President's Day weekend with Grandpa Hansen and Uncle John.  We also got together at David and Julianna's with Grandpa and Grandma Porter and Joseph and Kelsie for a video party.

As for me, I continue to survive.  It has been a harder school year with trimesters.  I like trimesters, but we tend to have kids moving from one class or teacher to another.  Sometimes that can be good and other times it can be bad with certain combinations of kids.  The 2nd trimester which just finished a week ago was a hard one.  I had some bad combinations of kids and that led to more discipline problems and laziness.  I had several kids fail and now will have to make up the credit on their own before they can go onto high school.  I am glad that we are finally able to hold them accountable, but still hate to see them fail because they do not care.  I wish our state legislators could come and just see what these kids do and do not do week after week before they change laws based upon a business model of performance.  I am glad for a new trimester and new combination of kids.  The 3rd trimester changes have been much better this time for kid combinations, and I hope that continues to be so. 

We look forward to more spring like weather.  We can't complain about this past winter unless it is a lack of snow.  We had a little storm go through Wednesday and I finally got out some of the winter clothes.  The snow is mostly gone again.

My mind has hit a blank spot, so it must be time to quit.  Hopefully I will have more to report on soon.