Locker clean-out

L emptied her school locker this afternoon - onto my living room floor. Who knew a locker could hold so much stuff? She must have squirreled away at least four jackets. And she brought home a picture she made in art class. I'm guessing since it's a winter scene, it's been in the locker for a long time.

Awards Day

This morning was the annual awards presentation for the fourth-grade class. L received awards for academic achievement, citizenship, Oregon Trail participation, chorus participation, Irving lunchtime basketball program, band participation and Academic Fair participation. Kind of surprising how tall L looks next to her principal, Mr. H. Her teacher, Ms. P., one of two Irving teachers who have had all three of our kids in her class, is at the podium.

Each child was asked to write about how they wanted to be remembered in fourth grade. Ms. P read their responses during the awards ceremony as she introduced each student. L said she wanted to be remembered for being "fairly funny and working hard."

Early B-day

Irving's principal read off the names of those with July birthdays during today's school announcements. That meant that L celebrated her 10th birthday today at school. She took in little cups of "birthday cake" ice cream for her classmates and came home with this nifty sticker.

Tabula

E came home with her yearbook, the Tabula, today. She had a few friends sign it during her Environmental Club meeting. It's a big one - 276 pages. If I were designing it I would have done a lot of things differently (of course!), but I do like how they listed the stats of the school on the back page: enrollment 3,212; address, etc. I might have to use that next year on the Irving book. E was complaining a little about how the sports team photos are really tiny and not used on the actual sports pages. I suggested that if she had better ideas, she should try to join the yearbook staff next year. She said it seems like a lot of work. I can't argue with that.

Memorial Day

Chicago posted its hottest Memorial Day on record - 95 degrees. It was 97 yesterday, also a record.

Acting like tourists

Mom and Cindy came up last night for the weekend. Today they took E to see "Jersey Boys." While they were in the show, Andy, L, B and I went to Millennium Park, walked around downtown Chicago, spent a little time in Andy's office, and people-watched at Daley Plaza. The kids had a good time climbing on the Picasso and playing in the fountains.

After the show, they wanted to have dinner at Rainforest Cafe so we walked up there. L had a meltdown when we told her she was not going to order the $9 slushie so Andy hauled her out of the restaurant and walked her for two blocks before adjusting her attitude and letting her return for her dinner.

Yeah, B!

This morning was the Tribute to Excellence at Julian. B received a medal and certificate for his team's second place national finish for a Virtual Classroom project about bullying. It was a competition where he competed with classes all over the planet. B surprised me during the ceremony when he volunteered to stand up, speak into a microphone and tell everyone about the project!

Messy Math

Irving hosted its annual Family Math Night tonight. This year's theme was messy math. L and I went and took our secret weapon - B - who solved all the problems in record time without even writing them down. We were done within 15 minutes.

Tonight's challenge was to solve the math problems to determine the right amount of ingredients. For example: You need 12/16+7/8-3/9 cups of sugar. B immediately answered 1 1/4 cups. Hmmm. It went on like that throughout the entire ingredient list. 9x1/4 c. of flour? Oh, that's 2 1/4 cups. Grr. After solving all the ingredients amounts, you went to a table to measure the ingredients into a plastic storage bag so you can make the recipe at home. Interestingly, they only had 1/4 measuring cups on the table. And for the teaspoon amounts, you had to use only 1/8 t. measure.

All the while B was solving the math problems and figuring out the ingerdients at the table, L was nursing a blister. She wanted me to make more doughnuts for her class' Breakfast with a Book tomorrow morning and accidently touched the doughnut maker. We were halfway to the school when I noticed she had her hand still wrapped in a dish towel.

Our prize for finishing was to make a dirt cup - smashed Oreos on top of a Snak-Pak pudding with a couple of gummy worms. Yummy.

Thanks from Irving

A couple of the Irving students who are on the Student Council dropped by today to give us a gift for being the school's neighbor. This is a really sweet tradition. We got a nice card and flower seeds which L immediately planted in the back yard.

Outstanding freshman

Tonight we went to the high school for the annual awards ceremony. E received one of two "Outstanding Freshman in Physical Education" awards. The program said, "This award honors a student in each grade who has exhibited leadership, scholarship, sportsmanship, cooperation, love of play, enthusiasm, exceptional ability and fitness through class participation." Way to go, E!

Shiny and new

We've been having some issues with our garage door for a while. It's been hard to open, comes down kind of funny, etc. Last weekend the top buckled in. Andy had been pulling my car out every morning in case I needed it during the day. The door had to shut manually and it's a heavy door. On Thursday, we had a repairman come out who said we essentially needed a new door. We've never replaced the garage door since we moved in so I guess it was time. The guy came back today and installed our brand new, shiny garage door. He claims it's lighter (helpful when the power decides to go off) and should be balanced for at least six years. Let's hope so.

Confirmation Day

Today was B's Confirmation Day. After a year of classes, he finally made it. He was thrilled that Grandma B and Aunt A were able to join us. I just love this picture of him and grandma in church:

Here he is with his friend and fellow confirmand, A, who have been going to Sunday School together since they were probably 3 years old. They're quite the pair: they're both smart, both hate to do craft and neither has ever been too excited about going to Sunday School. They've put more than a few Sunday School teachers to the test.

Here's B cutting the confirmation cake during the fellowship hour after worship.

And here he is with Aunt A while we were having lunch at Giordano's.

It's tradition in our church that each of the ministries give the confirmands small gifts to tell them a bit about their ministry and to welcome them into the church family. B got a compass, three bookmarks, a bracelet, a T-shirt, a book and a game. Not a religious gift, but Andy and I gave him a Super Mario Party 9 Wii game that he'd been asking for. Grandma and Allison gave him cards. I think he got some money, but he didn't share that info with me.

The market is open

Today was the opening day of Oak Park's Farmers Market and Andy was there sometime in the middle of the night to start the first doughnut shift. He came home complaining that the group making doughnuts didn't start arriving until after 4 a.m. Still, it's a beautiful day and I'm sure they'll be selling a lot of doughnuts. And, as usual, he brought a few home for the family.

Art Fest

Tonight was the Art Fest at L's school. Each student had at least one piece of art hanging on the school's walls. This was the one chosen for L:

She also performed as part of the fourth- and fifth-grade chorus. The auditorium is a horrible place to take a photo. And we were back pretty far.

Here's L in her chorus shirt:

Another treasure?

B loves to have his friends over and you just never know what treasures I'm going to find after they leave. They leave their Nintendo DS systems here, backpacks, books, video games, keys, etc. This one of the oddest things I've found in a long time - it's his friend IR's middle school ID (chewed on the corner - eww!) hanging on one cord and wrapped with three others. Makes me wonder.

Bloomin'

It's going to be a warm week and everything seems to be coming in bloom. Here's a peak at the flowers around our house.

Aquaponics

After months of planning, E presented her aquaponics project to the church today. She gave the mission moment, speaking about how she is growing lettuce in a water tank for the Sunday School. If all goes well, she plans to make a salad for fellowship hour sometime this summer.

During the mission moment, E invited the congregants to visit the Sunday School library and see the aquaponics project. About 10 people stopped by and she explained how it works. The kids enjoyed seeing the goldfish in the tank that will produce the, um, fertilizer, for the lettuce.

E started the aquaponics project to complete her "Sow What" journey in Girl Scouts. When she learned that the Sunday School was talking about food sources in the fall, she thought it was the perfect tie-in and the Sunday School director agreed. Now that her journey is done, E can start planning for her Gold Award.

And more gifts

Today we went on a little shopping trip for my Mother's Day presents. I found a set of luggage on sale at Macy's. It's not top-of-the-line luggage, but it should last through a few plane rides. My old purple bag has been sufficiently busted up by airline handlers. The inside plastic was cracking and last year's trips to Boston and then Jamaica did it in for sure. Of course, while we were there I had to pick up some Frango mints. Yum.

Andy did a grocery run this afternoon and brought me back a dozen beautiful red roses. Aww!

We finally replaced the office chair we've had on the back porch. It's been looking a little worse for wear the last few months and I saw on Craig's List that the Oak Park Conservatory was selling its office furniture because it had ordered new furniture. I got this fancy new chair for a measley $25. Quite a deal, I think. E says it's so comfortable she hates to get out of it.

After shopping this afternoon, L called Grandma B to wish her a happy Mother's Day and to ask for (another) sleepover. Here she is getting ready to leave. The kids got a nice card for grandma and this mum. L was also taking a card over that Andy bought for his mom. Really, he bought it himself!

Early Mother's Day

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L flew in through the front door after school today asking, "Where's the most beautiful, wonderful mom in the world?" Uh, me? Gave me a big hug and presented me with a bunch of flowers she bought at school. I know she took $2 from B's water bottle full of change. Not sure where she got the rest. I think I'll have to check my wallet. Still, it was a nice thought.

Concerts

Last night was E's last band concert of the year, and likely of her high school career. In order to take more elective classes, we've decided she can quit band at the end of the year.

L, though, has a few years to go. She played in a concert with the other three schools that will feed into Julian at the middle school tonight. She was sitting in the front row so it was impossible to get a picture of her with the conductor and the band stands in the way.

Bottom braces

B had an early afternoon orthodontist appointment. I picked him up from school at about 1:30 p.m. so he didn't miss too many classes. The orthodontist put on B's bottom braces. He's only had top brackets until now. He opted for red and teal bands. He now has a mouth full of color.

CROP Walk

This afternoon was Oak Park's annual CROP Walk to raise money for the hungry. As part of our church group, Andy, B and L had been planning to do the walk for months (L, though, rode her scooter). B and his friends, IR and IB, managed to persuade us into hosting a sleepover for them last night after promising to contain themselves to the basement. L was at Grandma B's for the night so we only had a net gain of one kid.

We wanted the kids to go home at 10 a.m., but they hatched a plan that they wanted to go to church with us then join B on the CROP Walk. Andy took them to church and picked up L from Grandma's afterward. E and I did a little shopping because she had to be at a Girl Scout meeting at 2:30 - a half hour into the CROP Walk. After I dropped E off for her meeting, I saw B and IB on the CROP Walk. At this point it was lightning a bit and the sky was overcast. As I'm driving home, Andy called me saying L was scared of the lightning and wanted to go home. I turned out to go pick her up at a church on Austin Boulevard and it started raining, then hailing. I picked up her and Andy and we drove around (being pelted the entire time by hailstones and driving on flooded streets) to find B and his friends. At one point, I could hardly see out the window so I had to pull over.

All three of the boys have cell phones and only one, IR - whose number I didn't have - had his phone on him. Andy called IR's home and learned that he was in a car with a teacher from the middle school. He had no idea where B and IB were. We decided to head back to the church where the walk was scheduled to end. Pretty soon, I got a call from a number I didn't recognize. It was B - he and IB were in some woman's car and she was bringing them to the church. Apparently, she's a counselor at the high school. While B was talking to me on her phone, she got on the line and told me that she's not a crazy person, just a mom (doesn't that make her a bit crazy?) She brought them safely to the church. They were soaked.

We soon found out the other woman took IR home. So much for stranger danger.

Daddy-daughter day

Andy and E went to Wheaton's Cantigny Golf Course today for a parent-child golf tournament with the Illinois Junior Golf Association. They had a nice day for golf and said it was a lot of fun. I think E was most impressed with the club sandwich she had for lunch in the clubhouse. They didn't win, but they didn't come in last! And the team paired with them (a dad and a girl the same age as E) tied with them, scoring 99.

Before the tournament, Andy and I made 75-plus little pancakes to take over the Irving sleepover. When L got home at 8 a.m. she went outside to find friends to play with. They asked her to come back at 9:30 a.m. (Still pretty early.) L came home and went downstairs, turned on the TV, covered herself in a blanket and slept for a good three hours. I think that's a sign of a successful sleepover ... with little sleeping, of course.

Irving sleepover

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This is one of L's favorite nights of the year - the annual Irving sleepover. Students arrived at the school at 7 p.m. to check-in, played on the playground for about an hour then went inside for various activities. And E was at her friend A's sleepover party. B tried to get us to host a sleepover with two of his friends, but that leaves us with as many kids as we started with, so we said not this weekend.