but with the closure of one year brings some reflection. on our way home tonight i thought about our highlights. here are the top three for each of us, in random order.
susanna
- teeth: after months and months of rockin' in its socket, susanna finally lost her first tooth. and a few weeks later, she lost her second. she corresponded with the tooth fairy herself, and is now sporting an attractive gap on her bottom row .
- the pageant: surprising all who know her well, she took on the role of mary in the christmas pageant like a broadway star. no insecurity or uncertainty like we all expected; she just accepted the role with excitement and smiled her sweet little smile the entire time she was in front of an audience of 500. and it occurred to me that the next time she'll be walking down the aisle of st. michael's in a veil will be on her wedding day. (and when that happens, let's just hope that there will be no baby involved.)
- kindergarten: she was a teary mess the afternoon i picked her up from her evaluation day (when they meet the new kindergartners in smaller groups), but after she was assigned a teacher and learned that she already knew half of her classmates, she perked right up. she loves her class, absolutely adores her teachers, and enjoys the bus ride home in the afternoons. and with a big brother to walk her to her classroom each morning, how could her introduction to elementary school be anything but stellar?
liam
- school: we had a rocky start to the school year with a new principal who tried to dismantle the plan we had in place for liam this year, but after a transition period, i'm happy to say that he's getting what he needs. he has exceptional teachers who understand him and challenge him and motivate him. and as long as he's happy and continues to love school, that's all we'll ever ask.(below is his first-ever project, a study on sunrise and sunset times for december.)
- sports: i thank God every day that sports were invented. for if not, i'm not sure what liam would do with 95% of his time. this year he's played baseball, winter soccer, spring soccer, fall soccer, tennis, golf, swimming, and basketball. and if that weren't enough, he received a football and a (street) hockey goal for christmas and has spent the past week out in the cul-de-sac playing those. if you ask him his favorite, his answer is always whatever sport is in season; he loves them all. and you want to know what he likes to do just about as much as playing sports? watch them. he's been to hockey games, college basketball games, PGA golf tournaments, soccer tournaments, high school basketball tournaments, college baseball games, and professional hockey games (and i'm sure others that i'm forgetting). and you want to know what he likes to do just about as much as playing and watching sports? read about them. the very first thing he does every single morning is run to the end of the driveway to pick up the newspaper so he can devour the sports section over breakfast. the boy is obsessed. (because i will never let him play organized football, i decided to indulge him a bit and chose a football picture to include in this post. the boy can throw a perfect spiral ... too bad it's the most dangerous sport in this country and his overprotective momma won't let him play it for real.)
- Y guides: raleigh's Y guides program (the Y stands for YMCA) is the largest in the country, bringing together a dozen first grade boys and their fathers in a tribe that meets once a month and plans amazing outings. different tasks and activities earn them patches that they put on their vests, and each of them have their own Y guides name. (chris's is The Artful Dodger, in reference to his love for the los angeles baseball team. liam's is Wee Sports Fan, in reference to his love of Wii Sports.)
sara
- the renovation: i have a kitchen i can cook in! and an office i can work in! and a breakfast room we can eat in! sure, the renovation process took twice as long as it was supposed to, required way more money than we'd anticipated, and necessitated us moving out for the majority of the summer, but all the pain was worth it. i still walk into my house and smile at what i see (and marvel at how we survived the house in its previous state for all those years.)
- work: i took on an additional online teaching job in august, increasing my hours to an almost-full time schedule. so i still synchronously teach local seventh graders who have been expelled, but now am asynchronously teaching special education high schoolers from all over the state as well. it's been a huge adjustment for me but now that i'm four months into it, i think i'm finally getting the hang of time management. (i've never been a quick study.)
- an empty nest: i'm not sure i'll ever get the hang of having the house to myself from 8:00 in the morning to 3:30 in the afternoon. most of those hours are spent on work, but i also spend a lot of time volunteering at the kids' school, being involved in activities at church, and playing tennis. i love the flexibility i have now that both kids are in "real" school, but my favorite part of day is at 3:25 every afternoon, when super and i walk to the end of the cul-de-sac to meet the bus. does seeing your children's smiling faces as they bound down the steps, eager to regale you with stories of their day, ever get old? i hope not.
- a new car: my poor husband had been driving around a car with 150,000 miles and a peeling sorority sticker on it for eight years. it was way past time to get a new set of wheels, and he finally did this fall.
- vestry: chris was elected at st. michael's and will serve a three-year term. a huge honor, a lot of work, and it couldn't be suited to anyone better. (in my humble opinion.)
- the shed: so i get a new kitchen, and chris gets a new shed. seems fair. but this shed is nice! it has plenty of space to store all the outside crap and tools and toys and miscellaneous items that would otherwise have no place to go since our previous storage room is now our breakfast room. and to make it even more spectacular, he received a solar panel for christmas that he's attached to the shed's roof and can now generate power. how cool is that? (okay. it's not as cool as the kitchen. but still.)
- a baby!: my little brother, ben, and his wife, laura, are expecting! they shared their happy news with us over the phone the night we came home from the state fair -- already on a sugar high from our funnel cakes, this just propelled us into another realm of joy. each night as we say our bedtime prayers, we thank God for "the baby in aunt laura's belly". and to make it even more special, the due date for my first nephew or niece (and the kids' first cousin) is actually may 18 -- susanna's birthday.
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| since we obviously don't have a picture of the baby, i thought i'd share one of us at the fair less than an hour before we learned the big news |
- a ring!: my little sister, leslie, is engaged! and the story behind how she shared the news is a good one ... on christmas eve, there were ten of us seated around our dining room table for dinner: the four of us, my parents, chris's parents, and leslie and richard (her longtime boyfriend.) the conversation was pleasant until liam decided to use his best seven-year old tactics to bring out the awkward. "so, aunt leslie, why aren't you and richard married yet?" but instead of an uncomfortable silence, leslie simply smiled and held up her left hand for us all to see. richard had proposed the day before in minnesota, and she hadn't breathed a word of her big news! (thank goodness for awkward seven-year olds, right?) we're now looking forward to flying out to california for the wedding sometime in 2012.
- disneyworld: and speaking of trips, the highlight for the four of us this year was our venture to disneyworld in february. it took a lot of planning, a lot of driving, and a lot of $$$, but it will surely go down in the books as one of the best vacations we'll ever have. (and that's why, kids, we likely won't be going back any time soon. why mess with success?)
i say this every year as i sign off ... but our true highlights are the health and love and happiness and faith we continue to be blessed with. we strive each day to show our gratitude for all that we've been given.
and as the kids have been saying to everyone they've seen today ... "see you next year!"
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