Rival High Schools

Friday night Madsen's cross country team received their conference champions shirts during half time of the basketball game. He got in free and I thought it would be fun to go to a game, so it was date night.

Panther Creek, Madsen's school, was playing Apex, Sully's school.

There were a lot of Apex kids in the stands. It was kind of obnoxious to have to listen to all the rival banter back and forth. This did not happen at my high school games since no one traveled the 40 plus minutes to see games.

Unfortunately, Panther Creek lost, by a lot. Apex was a much better team.

I told Matt that next year we will have to go to all the games that are PC vs. Apex. That way OUR team wins no matter what. It will be interesting to have kids attending rival high schools.

Truthfully, I think I will have a hard time cheering for Apex. Except the soccer team if Sully makes it.

And, we brought home Panther Creek pom poms that were handed out at the game. Waverly loves them. What was I thinking?

Proximity with Choice

Yesterday was the first day of school choice selection here in Wake County. The process was simple, log in, find student, choose schools. No problem. Now I just have to wait 2 months to find out what schools my kids will go to next year. It will either be the easiest possible year with 4 kids in 4 schools or a complete nightmare.

I am hoping that Cannon will get into Baucom Elementary because it is 2 miles away from home, he can ride a bus to and from school that comes into the neighborhood. It is traditional calendar, same start/end time we are used to. A lot of our church friends go to that school.

I am really hoping Declan will get into Apex Middle. This is the school Madsen and Sully went to. It is not far from home, busing to and from. A huge majority of our church friends go to this school. He is currently assigned a school that is 25 minutes away from us on the other side of a different town that we do not live in. It also feeds into a high school that is 20 minutes away from home. Totally ridiculous. I also put as my second choice Salem Middle which is close to home, a really good school, but a year round calendar. So, if this is the school he gets in, we will have 3 traditional schools and 1 year round. Yikes! We would try a transfer for this coming year and then try again next year to get him into Apex Middle. This is my biggest worry.

Madsen is staying at Panther Creek. He has had such a great experience there with friends and teams and school that I am not messing with a good thing.

Sullivan will be going to Apex High. All his friends go there and it is closer to home. We will survive 2 high schools for 2 years. I really don't think this will make much of a difference.

Now it is out of my hands. Much faith and prayers going out that Declan will get into Apex, that is the most important. I just might have to light a candle, too.

2012 in a Word

Successful. That is the word I choose for my hopes for the new year.

I hope we are successful in selling our house and buying one I love.
I hope the boys have successful school years.
I hope Sully is successful in making the middle school soccer team in the spring and the high school team in the fall.
I hope Madsen successfully gets his drivers license.
I hope Matt is successful at work.
I hope we successfully change school assignments for Declan and Cannon.
I hope I am successful in my fitness goals.
I hope we as a nation successfully elect a new President.
I hope that whatever happens this year we will successfully choose to have positive attitudes and make the best of whatever circumstance we find ourselves in.

The End

The year wrapped up with not much excitement at our house. Madsen blamed me for not having any friends and I reminded him that no one had called and invited him any where for New Year's Eve either! Sully was at a friends house. We sent Declan and Cannon and Waverly to bed around 10:00 with a sparkling juice toast. Matt, Madsen and I stayed up watching silly shows until it was time to watch the ball and acorn drop. We toasted and picked Sully up and went to bed.

2011 was a year full of ups and downs like most years. Good things happened and bad things happened. The most frightening was Matt's potential job loss which ended up with a transfer. My van transmission died. Cannon had surgery. The water heater died. We survived.

The boys had successful sports seasons. Sully's soccer season was cut short with a broken thumb. Madsen had an excellent cross country season, receiving his first varsity letter.

Madsen and Sully had "the best summer ever!" spending nearly 5 weeks in Colorado with grandparents. They loved it. Sully was not ready to come home and I think would head out again any time. Madsen was ready to be home. Declan and Cannon enjoyed the time with out those brothers!

Sully got braces on in September. The teeth that were sticking out were down in a normal position after just a couple of days. He gets the set on his bottom teeth next month. Not much fun right now, but he will love the results!

Matt started a new job in November and so did I! His is much more important. We love that we get to stay in North Carolina. He loves that his commute is now only 20 minutes. I love that his new job is close to the high school so I don't have to go up there to get Madsen after practice. Mostly I love that it will enable us to FINALLY buy a new house.

All is well that ends well. And now for the adventure of a new year.

Testing out the new camera

 

 

 

 

Since the weather was so delightful over Christmas we took a walk around the duck lake to test out the new camera. Matt loves it. Hopefully he will take lots of great pictures of the kids to make it worthwhile!

Christmas 2011

 

 

 

 

Christmas did happen at our house despite the temperatures being in the 70's. I was not complaining! We took the kids to see the Santa House in the neighborhood by the church. We do this every year. There was a lovely red BMW convertible for sale at Santa's house. Madsen tried to convince me to buy it for him. I resisted.

Apparently I did a realy bad job documenting Christmas or Matt did not move pictures from my camera to the computer. Oh well. The kids rushed through gifts before church, ignoring me telling them to choose one and wait til later. Oh well! All the boys got NFL jerseys. They were excited about those. Waverly got the prettiest dress ever and Russian nesting dolls that are, yes, pink and sparkly. The big gift was a google tv that will eventually be in the bonus room of my new house. Currently it in Madsen and Sully's room waiting for the new house!

I finally gave in and bought Matt the digital SLR camera he has been wanting for years. It was on sale for a really good price. He did not know I did it so it was a fun surprise. I told him Merry Christmas, happy Father's Day and happy birthday 2012. I will re-wrap on those occasions to remind him.

We had a good Christmas season and enjoyed the traditions of donuts and clam chowder and raviolis and countdowns and Christmas stories and reflecting on the gift of the birth of our Savior.

The Girl Turns 3

 

She was very excited about her pink presents.

 

She will be starting a dancing class soon so she got her dancing clothes and shoes.

 

She plays with the dishes at "our job" so we got some of her own.

 

Her cake was made to order. She wanted a pink square cake. It was a strawberry cake with strawberry icing and pink candles. Can you guess what her favorite color is?

Waverly was very excited about her birthday and being big and turning 3. 3! How did that happen? Whenever we asked her what she would like for her birthday and Christmas her response was always "pink sparkly presents." That is it! She is easy to please. She is so funny with the dishes. She only plays with the pink things. All the blue and white ones stay in the bag. Her dance class starts next week. I am looking forward to it and kind of anxious. I have not spent much time with groups of moms of princesses. It might be a little overwhelming!

She had a good birthday and we were happy to celebrate her. She is a joy and delight. I adore her.