Sam's morning report.....

Maggie suddenly appeared behind me as I was cutting vegetables, wearing exactly the same shirt she wore yesterday.
"Hi Maggie. Go back upstairs and change your shirt."
"Unnnhhhh!!" *tromp**tromp**tromp*.....
-::a little while later::--
"Very good. Oh. Where's your socks?"
"Unnnhhhh!!" *tromp**tromp**tromp*.....
--::and still later::--
"Nice. Are you wearing underwear?"
"Yes."
"Let me see."
"Unnnhhhh!!" *tromp**tromp**tromp*.....
--::much later::--
"Right. Did you flush the toilet and put your dirty clothes in the basket?"
"Unnnhhhh!!" *tromp**tromp**tromp*.....
She finally did get to eat around 7:45. Then, after finding her shoes:
"Did you clean your teeth?"
"Yes."
"Let me see."
"Unnnhhhh!!" *tromp**tromp**tromp*.....
"Ben? What about you?"
"Unnnhhhh!!" *tromp**tromp**tromp*.....
Some mornings the entertainment value of the kids is priceless.

Santa's elves

Last night, Ben & Maggie were having a conversation about Santa.  Maggie asked him how Santa knows what you have been doing and Ben told her that his elves are watching all the time.  He said "Maggie, the elves are everywhere, there are trillions of them watching you RIGHT NOW.  There are 7 of them this close to your face".  Her eyes were wide and you could see her thinking "WHAT????!!!"  I told her not to worry and not listen to Ben, that was just a story.....

You can never have a swimming pool that is too small!!!!

My children can prove that even if there is no time to go to the pool, you can still have a lot of fun with water. Ben decided to get a couple of totes out of the basement and make his own pool.  Of course, there had to be 2 "pools"-a regular pool & a kiddie pool

There was a lifeguard (Ben, of course) who would put you in "time out" for any transgressions (by Maggie, of course)

It's amazing that there was enough room in the "pool" to do handstands

and roll over.......

Big plus-you don't usually see many rubber ducks at the regular pool
There is no limit to Ben's imagination!!!!

Zucchini!!!!!

We inspected the school garden and found this mammoth zucchini down amongst the undergrowth!!!  Ben was so excited and declared that he doesn't care if we get anything else after this!!!!

Crossfit Valley Park fundraiser

Sam signed me up to run in the 5K run at the Crossfit Valley Park fundraiser-they are raising money to support their team to compete in the National games. I'd say it was my first "real" 5K run because the last one that I did with Anna was pretty much done at her pace and I would have run more than I did if I had been on my own. Sam ran it in 24:09, I did it in 36:01 (got to get rid of that 1 second next time!!). I had to walk some of the way, I really think the heat gets to me even though a lot of the run was in the shade.

After the run, they had a weight lifting competition that Sam entered (video uploaded separately!!). His shins were bleeding at the end because he keeps that bar so close to his body-I guess this is a sign of commitment!!!!

We were there for a long time in the heat and humidity and the kids did really well. Well, Maggie pretty much sat and watched movies while sucking her fingers, but she did appear in time to watch Sam compete. Ben was in the middle of everything and watched the whole competition. He even waited for me at the end of the run and ran out to finish with me.
So that we did something for the kids, we took them to the pool at night for the "Flick n Float" event. They can mess around in the pool in the dark and watch a movie. They were showing Gnomeo and Juliet-I told Sam they might as well show an adult movie because the kids paid no attention to it at all and the parents all sat and watched the movie.

We accomplished a lot yesterday

Fun at the garden

I know I have posted several pictures of our garden plot at the school, but the last time we were there, I took some of the surrounding garden and the prairie garden that Ben's 4th grade teacher has started. Ben is particularly proud of the prairie garden because his class did a lot of it over the school year.

These are some of the flowers growing around the outside of the garden plots. I usually cut some to take home and they easily last a week in water. I particularly like the zinnias at this time of year.

I am so jealous of the sunflowers that are growing there-they just self-seed and grow in the mulch. I can never get sunflowers to grow. I planted 3 packets of seed this year and got nothing out of them. I pulled up a bunch of the small plants and planted them at home and I have 6 plants growing, but still not doing that well. Aren't these beautiful?

Grace

For some reason, all Crossfit workouts have girl's names. Sam did "Grace" yesterday at the Valley Park fundraiser and lifted 135 lbs 30 times in 5 mins 50 sec!!! It was really impressive and the kids loved it, they were cheering him on the whole time.....

Another classic

Ben:  Maggie, do you want to make a wish?
Maggie: Sure
Ben:  OK, make a wish now
Maggie:  I wish you weren't even here!!!!

General stuff

I'm surprised that I haven't had any interesting conversations to report recently.  I guess Ben & Maggie haven't come out with anything priceless in  a while.  We have had a few things going on, but nothing worth being a whole blog entry, so I thought that I'd do a quick general update.....
Ben:
Has been going to the orthodontist clinic at SLU for almost a year now.  He's almost done with phase 1 of his treatment which is designed to make time in braces shorter.  They have straightened his teeth out quite a bit and corrected his bite so it is much better
Has been doing his own growth hormone shots for a couple of months.  They changed the delivery system and made the pen shorter so that kids with smaller hands can do their own if they want to.  He is doing amazingly well, he never forgets he needs to do it & never bothers about it at all.  It's so much easier for me too....
Is doing well at school and gymnastics.  Still enthusiastic about both
Maggie:
Still wants to be a tomboy and flatly refuses to acknowledge she's a girl

Got new shoes yesterday that came from the girl section at Target.  They are a size 2 and not really big for her.  Her last pair of shoes were a size 12, so her feet have grown significantly and she jumped 3 sizes!!!!  Yes, there's a little bit of pink on them....

No idea how she did in Summer school because she lost her report card!!!!
Still very entertaining, challenging and adorable.  Her teacher told me Maggie was one of her favourites!!!!
Sam:
Has a new job at work.  Of course, I still have no clear idea of what it is, but he is really excited about it, is hiring new people and is very busy
Still Crossfitting, bicycling, running, etc.....
Me:
Looking forward to the last Harry Potter movie on Friday.....

Ben's new toy!!!

Ben has been wanting a phone for ages. We have been telling him that he doesn't need one. Of course, we are battling the fact that several of his friends have phones, iphones and ipads, etc. Ben says there is even a boy in kindergarten that has a phone!!!
Well, there have been some times in the past year when it would have been useful to get a hold of him and so we had considered it. I told him that if he did well in Summer School that we would think about it. So, for the past 5 weeks he has been obsessing about his report and getting a phone.
Well, his Summer School report was the best he has ever had. He scored "Developing" (which means he is meeting grade level expectations) on almost every criterion and they had checked "Progress Evident" for everything. The written report was so glowing that I could hardly believe it was written about Ben!!!!
In the face of that evidence, we couldn't say no to him getting a phone, so Sam took him to look at them yesterday morning. Fortunately for Ben, it was cheaper to add him to our phone plan and so now he has unlimited calls & texting. He is so excited about it. I can't help wondering how long it will be before it's lost or taken away from him, but I'll hope for the best!!!!
I told him "doesn't it feel good to get such a great report and know you can do it if you try?" He said "yes, can I get a phone?"

4th of July parade

Ben's gymnastics center was in the Webster Groves parade for the first time this year & we thought it would be a fun thing to do. Unfortunately, when we got up, it was pouring with rain!!! Luckily, it cleared up by the time we left to go there. We had to get there an hour before the parade started so that we could get organized. They had to tape every child's hands so that they wouldn't get injured on the road. Then, there was a lot of waiting involved.

You can tell that Maggie wasn't too impressed by the whole deal!!!!

Still, there was an opportunity to take a group photo. This is a pretty good representation of the boy/girl ratio at the gym, there is definitely a large excess of girls that do gymnastics!!!!

While we were waiting for the parade to start, it decided to rain again, really hard. We were soaked by the end of it, despite sheltering on a front porch of a stranger's house!!!

When we turned onto Lockwood to start the parade, the number of people that were there watching was unbelievable. Who would have thought the parade was that popular?We had a lot of stopping and starting and it took us over an house to walk 2 miles. I think all the kids really enjoyed it though

The kids did a lot of walking on their hands, cartwheels, etc. Ben reckoned he did 21 handstands 17 cartwheels and 31 round-offs. I suspect that he just made the numbers up though!!! I managed to get one picture of him in action....

The gymnastics were definitely a crowd pleaser and we seemed to get a lot of interest in the gym.

The kids were absolutely exhausted at the end of the parade, they were all soaked from the heat and humidity. I was worn out from just walking!!!!

We went to the Bread Co to eat afterwards and a family told us how much they were impressed by the gymnastics....

Presidential Service Award

We got a surprise in the mail, the President's Volunteer Service Award and a letter from the President. This was in recognition for our work done with American Councils and for hosting Dasha this past year. How cool!!!!

The day of the triffids

I thought the garden had grown a lot before, but we went back 3 days after the last post & it looks like everything has doubled in size!!!! I'm beginning to think that (as usual) I have planted too much in such a small space!!!

Perfect growing weather!!!!

Our school garden is growing like crazy. This is what it looked like when we planted it.
This is two weeks worth of growing

This is at 3 weeks. The plants are almost growing as you watch them!!!