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Category Archives: family
Happy Birthday!
Stuff and Things
So, The Little Kid has started back to school (last week). It’s all very middle-of-the-summer for school, but the rest of the families around here seem to be following the same freaky schedule. 
Last night was Meet the Band Director and Talk to Him About an Instrument Night. TLK is going to be playing a euphonium this year, although I’m not sure if it’s base or tenor yet. The point is that the school has some on-hand and she was lucky enough to receive one of them for $90/school year. This is a big savings off the price of the music store rental, which was $60 a month.
I can stop trying to convince her that a really small instrument (no matter what it is) would be better to play than her humongous euphonium.
We are back in the land of homework, where there are spellings lists and stories to read, and questions to get through. Last year seemed to be full of math. This year seems to be full of reading (not a bad idea).
The interesting part was having her do safety patrol (blocking traffic so that kids can cross the street safely, for those of you in the UK, who I hear do not put your children in the midst of the street for this purpose). The school parking lot can be crazy, and she’s in the middle of it, but not every day. I said, “Really? You’re in the middle of the lot? Are you looking both ways before you block the traffic?”
“Mom.. the principal tells me when to go.”
Good deal.
Birthday Things
Wednesday was my birthday. It was the first birthday where Ian’s been in the same country (and even in the same house) with me on my birthday. It was nice to be able to celebrate with him and The Little Kid.
I got some nice presents, including a Cuttlebug that I can use with my cardmaking. TLK and I had fun making cut-out butterflies and frogs, and playing with embossing, which I must say… using a machine to emboss is much easier than hand-embossing… more dramatic and less painful.
The people at work bought me an ice cream cake and my friend put a banner on my cubicle so everyone knew. I received flowers from my family in Texas and the funniest card from my family in Kansas. I put a call into my parents via Skype, but had to leave a message. Not sure if they’ll hear the voice mail. My dad says he can’t get through the Italian prompts.. but maybe he can by now.
We went to Applebees for dinner, which was nice. They have good steaks and something wonderful called “Peach Sangria” Yum
Oh, and everyone I knew on FB said, “Happy Birthday”, which was fun. 
Overall, a really good day. It is good to be 23 again. “Mommy counts backwards now”. LOL.
Weekend
It was a good weekend. We spent Saturday going to the Heartland of America Park. I like to go there because I love birds, and there are always plenty of them around. It was a good chance to interact with nature. The geese we saw were relatively ok with having people around. When we sat still, or stood still, they would walk around as if we weren’t there.
It’s funny to watch them. At one point, one walked near the water, started honking loudly and jumped into the water, still honking. Once it swam around for a bit, it quieted down. I’m not sure what it’s concern was, if it had one. Maybe it just felt like honking.
Sunday, there was shopping (something I’m not entirely fond of for long periods of time) and the World Cup finals, which was really exciting. No, I didn’t cry for Spain. Do you believe me? I felt bad for Netherland, and although there is always “next time”, some of those people won’t be playing soccer next time. They all played their best, it seemed, and were well-matched in the end.
Ian seems to have recovered from a severe bout of sinus issues. Nothing tea, marmite toast and lots of meds couldn’t resolve, thankfully. And TLK has lost another tooth, which is good, because her teeth were beginning to get a bit crowded. She’s always a year or two ahead of where she should be with teeth.
She was a little miffed when she thought the tooth fairy only left her a quarter.. but actually, it was $3.25 (still not the $20 she was hoping for). I mean, I know about inflation, but one tooth? $20? lol
I think that’s about it. Is it Monday already?
Fully Upgraded
to WordPress 3.0! I got more features when I replaced my old wp-config.php with the sample one, all doctored up and renamed. So now I can have multiple user blogs if I want. I may try that out over my holiday vacation (at home) whilst sitting by the sparkling pool.
Or, I may have an expedition in bento making.
Sunday is Father’s Day. Happy Father’s Day to all the dads, step-dads, grandpa’s and people who are technically not dads, but elected to take on the role anyway. Go you!