Sunday, March 20, 2016

The Madness Is All Up in My March, and I'm Thankful, Week One forty-something or other

Ya'll. Seriously. Not only did I not write a single post this week, I didn't even READ one! I barely had time to flip through Facebook on my phone while I waited for one kid or another to finish one activity or another before collapsing into bed early each night.

Bryan has been out of town since 5:40 am (Yes, capital A capital M. aka in the morning, before the sun and normal people should be up) on Wednesday. It's his annual guys' trip to Vegas for the start of March Madness. (For you non-'Muricans, that's the college basketball championship in which 64 teams are whittled down to one over the course of 3 weeks. Non-stop basketball from Thursday afternoon until Sunday night this first week. (Which makes one wonder why Bryan left so early on Wednesday morning, doesn't it? (It does.))) I'm glad he takes some time to do guy things with his guy friends. He has been working way too much lately, and he needed this break before his brain exploded. I don't begrudge him one minute. (OK, so maybe I begrudge him a few minutes (which add up to a couple of hours) on Wednesday morning, but other than that, not one minute of begrudging.)

And here I am, screaming in at the last minute to let you know I am thankful...

1. for a Monday night get-together with my Bible study. Sadly, one of our group has to move to Michigan in two weeks, and we wanted to get together before her husband had to start the new job this week. Everything has happened so fast, this was our first chance to actually sit down with her to get the details. Bonus thankful, one of our group had a ridiculously hilarious incident immediately before we met, thus giving us a reason to laugh our full heads off instead of crying the entire time.

2. for my dad's continuing recovery from a nasty bit of surgery. He has been in pretty good spirits through it all, even making jokes about there being a sad face in one of the wounds. If you could, we'd appreciate some prayers that everything heals up nicely and quickly so he can get back to golfing.

3. that spring is officially here!



4. for a fun indoor soccer season for Giant. For a variety of reasons, this is the first time we've let one of our kids do indoor soccer in 8 years. For a variety of other reasons, we did let Giant this year. They were in the championship game on Tuesday night, and they won quite handily.

5. for the start of track and field season. For 5 years, Star has been debating running on a track team instead of playing soccer in the spring season. Each year, we decided that if he wanted to play soccer in high school, he should choose soccer. Soccer has skills that need to be learned, but anyone can jump into track at any time. This year is the year. He finally gets to run in high school. The first meet was on Wednesday night. First off, it was so much fun to watch one of my kids actually doing a sport that was such an integral part of my life for so many years. More fun, though, was to see how much Star is enjoying it and how well he is doing. It's going to be a fun couple of months.

6. that high school volleyball games started this week, too. I didn't know until Phoenix started playing 2 years ago that volleyball is a great spectator sport. We were able to see his team play and win two matches this week.

7. that Cuckoo is finally, FINALLY, getting old enough and mature enough and patient enough to sit through a volleyball game or track meet and actually show some interest in such things. Bryan and I used to rock/paper/scissors to see who had to take Cuckoo to whichever game we were going. The boy couldn't make it through 10 minutes of any game. (As opposed to Turken, who loved to watch every minute of any game since the day he was 7 days old.) This week he was put to the test, and he passed with flying colors.

8. for March Madness. I'd explain why it's so much more exciting than regular season games, but I'm in a hurry and I've already spent 10 minutes trying to write this one paragraph.

(That's Giant, the Keeper of the Brackets. This is his absolute favorite time of year.)

9. we (and everyone we invited) had a free Saturday to have Turken's birthday party. The poor kid has a terrible time for a birthday. It's always either over Spring Break or Easter. This year, it falls squarely on Good Friday. Yup, poor kid has his birthday on the day we fast and focus on the day Jesus died. We took a gander at the calendar and discovered that we had one completely open day (except for Bryan, who was still in Vegas) just 6 days before his birthday. To make it even better, all he wanted was to have some kids over to play football. And to top off the awesomeness of this party, Turken just happens to have 2 teenage brothers who were happy to go outside and play football with 9 little kids. All I had to do was make lemonade and bake brownies for the brownie sundaes the boys gobbled up after the game.


10. Bryan made it home safely.

Bonus thankful!! For my fabulous blogging friends. Within 10 minutes of publishing this, two friends I met through this blog were texting me to let me know I had accidentally used one of the kids' real names. You all are wonderful.

Well, it's not likely that anyone will be finishing a post after me, but just in case, here's the linky if you have one!

Have a lovely day!




Ten Things of Thankful


 Your hosts


21 comments:

  1. And a crazy March Madness it has been (so far!) :-)

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  2. Aww, Kristi nabbed "frist"!
    Indoor soccer is a wicked game! Or it is at our Downtown Y, where the gym is very small and the ball is played off walls like racquet ball. Kyle played it one season and was done.
    Green grass on your football field for the birthday party is pretty awesome! Even though we didn't have a bad winter, I'm SOOOOO glad to have spring here.

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    1. She was on the ball. You were both reading at the same time, and you both texted me within a minute of each other. :)
      Ha! I would't say it's that bad here. Yes, the wall is used strategically, but it's not quite racquetball-esque.
      It is getting green around here. I actually need to mow it!

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  3. Love that shot of the kids romping on the lawn. Doesn't happen enough these days.
    My daughter and husband have a bracket competition going with a group at church. So much fun. I am not the least bit sporty, but am getting a kick out of this. Have not seen a single play of any games, but I can rattle off the top five people in the church brackets!

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    1. I do enjoy hearing a group of kids playing outside.
      Ha! You haven't watched any of the games?? That's funny. And yet, doing the brackets is still fun. March Madness is contagious. :)

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  4. yay that was me linking right after you...
    I want my family to be enthusiastic about March madness....but no!
    Track - I think it's great he made the decision and is having fun with it ...
    The birthday party sounded so fun and easy for you too.
    I can relate i was born on Holy Thursday oh many many years ago.
    enjoy the week ahead :)

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    1. I saw. There were a few of you! :)
      Darn shame. Fortunately, you all do plenty of other fun things together.
      He's having a blast. They had their first real meet last night. A learning experience for him, for sure.
      It was simple, simple, simple and fun, fun, fun. My favorite kind of party.
      You were?! Yup, you know all about it.
      Have a wonderful Easter!

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  5. Prayers and wishes here that your dad makes a good recovery from the surgery and soon gets back to playing golf.

    A big HAPPY BIRTHDAY to Turken. Having a birthday on another important or religious day can really take the shine off things - I'm glad he had a great day even though it was early.

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    1. Thank you!

      Having a birthday on a holiday isn't the best situation, for sure, but at least all other holidays we have are happy celebrations. This is the only one that consists of fasting and sadness. At least the date changes so he doesn't have to do this every year!

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  6. I love your thankful posts. You're the one that made me think of doing a thankful Thursday. Thank you for that.

    Happy Birthday to the birthday boy.

    Have a fabulous day. ☺

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    1. You are welcome. I'm glad you decided to jump into the thankful lists. It is a great activity, isn't it?

      I'll pass along the message!

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  7. Heheh looks like there were three in after you! Congrats on not being last!

    Prayers for your dad, for definite. Recovering from surgery is NOT fun at all and I hope he gets better really quickly.

    Glad Bryan had such a good time, and Turken (and what a wonderful birthday party!), and all the kids at their sport things. SO impressed by how they (and mostly you) keep up with so many different things, but they seem to be loving it and thriving on it, so hooray :)

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    1. I saw that! They were REALLY late. :)

      Thank you.

      They do love it. And I love watching them participate. But boy does they keep us busy!

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  8. Wow. I was tired just reading this post.
    :-)
    I must say, I don't care much for basketball, but its great to read how much sports play an important part in the lives of your family: golf, track, soccer, football, basketball.

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    1. Ha! Me, too. :)

      Normally, basketball is one of my least favorite sports, but these March Madness games really are a lot more fun to watch. We are a sports family through and through, that is for sure.

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  9. Sooooooo....Bryan's March Madness sounds a lot "funner" (yes...that's a word) than our March Madness weekend. ;) Seriously...glad we both had a great weekend of basketball although I need about 5 days to recover. How many days does Bryan need??? :P

    Sending positive thoughts to your dad.

    Looking forward to hearing about Star's Track & Field adventures. :D

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    1. Ha! Yes, they are very different, but both exciting! :) Bryan would have liked at least one day to recover, but alas, it wasn't to be. Two hours after getting off the plane, we were leading a Confirmation prep meeting of 9 freshmen boys.

      Thank you!

      He had his first real meet last night. The whole family (except Phoenix) went to watch. It lasted 4 hours. At hour 3 Bryan turned to me and said, "I think you can be the track parent." I'm fine with that! I had a blast! Oh, and so did Star. It was a learning experience for him, to be sure. We'll see what he's learned when they run again next week. :)

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  10. I love a TToT on the run, it means good things are happening in your busy lives! I'm glad that Bryan was able to escape for a few days too, I am a firm believer that all adults, especially with kids still at home, need a little time now and then to just be themselves! Definitely prayers for your Dad, and for the tired mama that managed to keep up with this all. I seriously don't know how you do it, but I love you for it! :-)

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    1. Glad to hear it, 'cause it will be another one this week. ;)

      I'm with you 100%. Parents definitely need to keep in touch with their adult likes and relationships. The kids won't be little for long, and you need to be ready for that empty nest.
      Thank you for the prayers.
      I don't do it alone. That's the key. :)

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