Wrestling

The short sweet wrestling season has already come and gone!  Eli still loves to wrestle- it's so fun to cheer him on!  Overall he did really well, ending up with 1 gold, 2 silvers and 1 bronze.  One of these seasons maybe I'll end up with a picture of him actually wrestling instead of just the start of the match!  It's just so intense once that starting whistle blows I forget =\

Math is Cool

Math is Cool time again!  Dallin was excited to participate again and all geared up for it well in advance =)

When we got there for the "college bowl" team portion of the competition, I saw a mom I recognized from our old school, Chester Elementary- she came over to me and told me that her daughter told me, "MOM!  That's Dallin, he used to go to my school and he is super good at math, they're totally going to beat us!"  Ha ha!  The kid makes an impression I guess!

His college bowl team:

 

Freeman won all of their rounds! 

Dallin took first place from Freeman again! 

This year the awards were done differently... They placed schools into groups based on how that school has done in the past, and then awarded the top 5 from each group- Freeman was placed in the highest placing group.  Dallin would have taken first place overall if Freeman had been in any of the other groups... he was kinda disappointed initially, but in the end was totally ok with it- he was happy with his individual performance =)

Pinewood Derby

Dallin and Eli both worked hard on their Pinewood Derby cars - with a little help from Dad.  Or maybe it was the other way around =\  Regardless, they had fun with the process and performed respectfully that night-

 

 

Hard to believe that next year, we'll only have one boy competing! 

Science Fair

 March is Science Fair time.  In elementary school, the kids do their projects at school *bless it* but for Bryson, we had to come up with a project and carry out the work at home.  He finally decided upon water electrolysis - it was actually pretty stinking awesome.  Who knew that you could split ionized water into hydrogen and oxygen atoms with a 9 volt battery?!?

All the kids were pretty impressed with it- I love that learning is 'culturally acceptable' in my house and that Bryson does such a great job of spreading his enthusiasm for math and science and learning to his siblings. 

  

The finished display:

He named it "The Water Inator" after all of our favorite {evil} scientist, Dr. Doofenschmirtz *grin* 

Eli's class did diorama's on Native Americans, his depicted the Plains Indians 

Dallin's class did Rube Goldberg Machines - complicated machines to perform a simple task- his group made an automatic dog feeder. 

Pace awards

 Each month a kid from each class gets award the "PACE" award for a specific character trait- Dallin and Eli were both recognized at the last assembly-

 

Dallin was awarded for Fairness 

Eli was awarded for Honesty 

So proud of my boys! 

Cutest Lil' Patient

 Another day, another set of tubes.

Jace was well informed about his "soo-joo-ee"- no problems not getting breakfast, I think he saw it as an adventure and he was downright excited!  In pre-op, he was such a character!

 

"Mom, is dis cweepy?" 

 

Ever since Dallin's 3rd eye surgery (when he woke up a belligerent BEAST), I'm always apprehensive about how my kids are going to be when they wake up from anesthesia.  But Jace just kinda blinked his eyes a few times and said, "Hi mom" like he was waking up from a sweet dream.  5  minutes later, he was his usual self!  Bless nasal fentanyl *wink*

Dr. Leavitt said the fluid in his ears was gelatinous.  Gross. There was no way that it would have drained out on it's own, so tubes were inevitable.  I'm glad it's done.

Pretty happy considering he's holding puke bag: 

 It's his new favorite toy *snort*  He really was pretty entertained with it the whole way home.  He begged to let me go to school that afternoon, but I just couldn't let him- even thought I'm pretty confident he'd be just fine.  I'm so thankful for modern medicine and good doctors and Jace's resilient little body.

Court of Honor

Bryson earned his Life Rank this month!  He is so motivated to advance in Scouting, which is lovely for me- I am so glad I don't have to push him!

 

I love Bryson's passion and enthusiasm, it is quite literally contagious with his siblings- and it's so fortunate that he gets excited about such things as scouting and music and academics!  He makes these things cool in our house and naturally his siblings want to be involved and learn the things he's interested in.

Jace's Escapades

So today, while I was waiting in my car to pick up the kids after school, Jace informed me that he had to go potty... I was in the pick up line in the middle of the pack with no where to park... It's kinda frowned upon to leave your car right there, so I tried to distract him.

No dice.

He soon was doing the full on potty dance.  He's familiar enough with the school (he DOES go to preschool there and spends plenty of time with me there when I'm helping the other kids classes) so I asked if he thought he could go potty by himself... He said he could.  School hadn't let out yet and I figured he'd have plenty of time to be back before the after-school chaos began (but even if he wasn't, no biggie, he knows what to do for parent pick up...)  

Because I didn't want him running through a busy parking lot, I gave him strict instructions to stay on the sidewalk and go the long way around rather than cutting straight through to the school.  "Ok mommy!"  And he did... he was a good little boy, walking very carefully, with a cute little hop in his step.  The pick up line does a half circle in front of the school, but just before he was about to disappear (on the sidewalk) behind the cars waiting in front of me, he turned and gave me a bug thumbs up.  It was adorbs.  

I was watching to see when he'd reappear on the other side of the cars once he reached the front doors of the school... But instead, he was suddenly back at my car!  "Jace, I thought you needed to go potty!?!"

"I did mom!" He exclaimed...

"What?  Where?"

"In the snow!"

Yup, my boy dropped his drawers and painted the snow yellow directly in front of the school for all to see.  I just about died.

Turns out, Heidi Folsom was a few cars in front of me... I texted her and asked if she'd seen anything and she immediately asked if he was peeing!  She texted back and said, "I couldn't quite see him totally but his body language and stance implied he was peeing!"

Awesome.