Off to World Finals again!

Well, they have done it again!!


Samantha's Odyssey of the Mind team is off to the world finals for the second year in a row. They are an incredible group of kids!! Whats really interesting to me is some of them would never choose to voluntarily spend time together on a regular day yet they are able to come together as a team and do brilliant work. A good lesson for adults who think it cannot be done ;)

For more information on the team, their doings and information on how you can support them, click on the OM World Finals link at the right.

Congratulations Samantha!!!

PANIC!

There is nothing on the planet that strikes fear into my heart faster than the idea of one of my children being hurt or lost.


Today Mandi's school sent me an email to let me know she had been marked absent for the day. While I appreciate how technology lets schools communicate with parents so easily, I do NOT appreciate being told my daughter has been marked absent when just a few hours ago I watched her walk through the school door, turn around and wave goodbye with a big grin on her face. She was particularly excited today as her class is taking a field trip to the Smithsonian.
With that image in my head I immediately began imagining the worst possible case scenarios.... she wandered back outside and was kidnapped by men with candy and a big white van/ she sneaked over to the playground, fell off the monkey bars and was laying unconscious on the ground/ someone locked her in the janitors closet and she will be scarred for life.... I know I am extremely paranoid about these things, especially while pregnant and for a year or two after giving birth. At least I have hormones to blame it on for now ;)
I immediately said a prayer for Mandi's safety and for my own sanity - reassuring myself it was surely just a clerical error then called the school. After talking with the secretary she told me she would check into it. I reminded her that Mandi's class was on field trip which made things a bit tricky. There was discussion among the people in the office (they probably didn't realize the interpreter would be signing all this) about how so and so didn't see Mandi boarding the bus that morning etc etc. (more PANIC) They came back and asked me if I had dropped Mandi off late (no, in fact she was early.) More discussion in the background. Finally they were able to call Mandi's teacher's cell and he confirmed she was with them. Whew.. big sigh of relief!! They were very very apologetic for the mistake. At first I felt rather annoyed about the mistake. Now, I am thankful because it was such a strong reminder to me how much I love and value Mandi. I do thank Heavenly Father daily for each of the wonderful children he has entrusted in my care. Sometimes, however, it is good to have a "slap in the face"/"pay attention" moment to help me keep my priorities straight and remember just how precious my children are to me.

THE BIRDS

We had a bizarre occurrence at our house the other day.... Looking out the window we noticed a bunch of birds. Now, this was nothing new as we have a bird feeder out there. Billy filled the feeder up before the storms hit. With all the snow the birds have been very gathering in our backyard and swapping tales between spitting sunflower seeds. I imagine they chirruped about how long it took to shovel out their nests, how they had 18 freaking inches covering the entryway and to complain about the fact that all the bird feeders in the neighborhood are either snowed in or plum out of food and how marvelous it is that Mrs. Kendrick risked life and limb to tromp through knee high snow up her giant hill (hey, it IS giant to a wee bird so phhhtt) to clear the bird feeder for her fine feathered friends.... Thus it was not unusual to have several birds out there at any given time. However after a few glances we started realizing this was not several... this was like the bird party of the year out there... not our usual mix of cardinals, blue jays, swallows and such either... ROBINS... every single one of them. I have never seen so many robins in one place in my life. They say robins are the harbingers of spring (bring it on baby!) but man... they were REALLY making a statement. They were hanging out in our maple and our birch, flitting about at the bird feeder, leaving wee birdie prints in the snow and making quick work of EVERY SINGLE red berry on our holly tree. In less than an hour they had finished it off... no small feat mind you... We have a big holly tree with a LOT of berries. While I miss the cheerful red, at least I don't have to worry about Lizzie poisoning herself with them this year. Billy went out and caught a bit of the action at the holly tree on camera. The pictures don't really do their numbers (or their beauty) justice but I think he got some great shots.

Base of the holly tree:

I really like this shot
Hanging out digestin'....

It was really fun to watch them all morning. I admit I did have a wee uh oh moment when I went outside to throw some trash out. Usually you step outside and have a few seconds before the slam of the screen door sends all wildlife fleeing for dear life. With these folks they fluttered their wings then a large group in the nearest tree just turned their heads to look at me. After several moments of being stared at by hundreds of beady black eyes, 2 things happened. 1) I noticed these were not poor skinny half starved birds meekly trying to get a scrap. These were fat healthy fluffy proud "how dare you interrupt our meal" birds. I slowly started seeing black leather jackets over bright red t-shirts and wondered where their Harleys were parked. 2) I silently cursed Alfred Hitchcock for instilling deep in my subconscious a fear that they were getting ready to launch themselves from the tree branches and beak me to death. I slowly backed up ready at a moments notice to duck and protect my head... fumbled for the door, found the handle and let out a sigh of relief until I realized I had inadvertently locked myself out. Crud.

SNOWMAGEDDON!

Yeah... I scoffed too when I heard Obama's label for this storm... however this really was a big snowstorm for the area, in fact the biggest in D.C.'s history. DC, VA and MD simply are not prepared budget wise or physically to handle this kind of snow. We had already used up most of our budget for plowing etc. in the aftermath of the December storm which dumped about 18 inches. We have had a great deal of fun finally having a "real" winter this year.... however with schools closing for nearly two weeks the fun started to wear off. Our biggest irk is how much people whine around here about snow and the lack of plowing. I want to grab a shovel, put it in their hands and shove them out the door and tell them to stop their whining and do something about it!!!! Today, 2 weeks after the storm, most of our street STILL has not even bothered to shovel their sidewalks and of course snowplows just don't come to areas like this. The day after the storm Billy and I cleared our walks and halfway across the street in front of our house.. Billy rallied up our immediate neighbors and we got a good amount cleared away. If everyone would have just spent an couple hours outside with a shovel, things would have been smooth sailing right at the get go.. ah well. Are we turning into a nation of whiners? Do you think the majority of people expect too much to be done for them? I am grateful my church places such strong emphasis on provident living and being self-sufficient. In the meantime, it looks like either we are going to have to shovel the walks in the rest of the neighborhood so our kids have a safe route to school or we are going to have to keep driving them or walking with them as the only snow free areas for most of the way are in the middle of the road. We did have a lot of melting happening today with the temps up to 44 degrees so it may not be an issue for too much longer. Anyhow.. jumping off my soapbox now and on with the pics!

DIG IN! This is after the first storm which dumped about 24 inches on us.


Good thing our Audi is black or we wouldn't have been able to find it!

Other side of the Audi...
Now THAT'S what I call snow!
Billy piled all the snow from the front of our house, our sidewalks and the neighbors driveway onto the side of our front lawn with visions of giant snow caves dancing in his head. Emma caught the vision and here she is day 2 helping Dad dig out.
The neighborhood kids all thought our cave was awesome! We had lots of visitors coming to hang out in it.

I couldn't convince Emma to leave the cave she worked so hard to help build... so I sent her lunch out to her.. here she is enjoying her food and visiting with friends.

Dad and Emma decided to give the cave the ultimate test by sleeping in it! Temp was 16 degrees outside that night but they weathered it pretty well. Both said their feet were cold but otherwise they enjoyed it. We have learned since that for future caves we should make the entrance lower than the floor of the cave to help keep heat in. We also need to make the walls a bit more smooth so the water runs down the sides instead of dripping on unsuspecting campers. Here are Emma and Dad ready to head out.
Billy is such a great Dad.. he really loves his girls and was even willing to watch "The tales of Peter Rabbit" on the laptop with Emma. Here they are all snuggled up and sort of warm.

The next night Mandi wanted to give the cave a shot..... Billy graciously complied and of course Emma jumped right in for round two. Here is Mandi getting settled in.


We had a blizzard hit overnight that night... it ended up dumping about 10 more inches on us. Billy and the girls were oblivious to the strong winds and the rain/snow. They said it was super quiet and comfortable in the cave. Sadly I did not get a picture of the cave the next morning or of the brave threesome emerging from their hideout... I panicked slightly when I woke up and peered outside. The blizzard was still in progress and there was no evidence there was a snow cave. With all the new snow, there was no path, no outline of an entrance or anything. It just looked like a large mound. and I started to worry that all the new snow might have plugged up all their sources for fresh air and ran downstairs on the VP to call Billy - dragged the poor tired guy out of his peaceful slumber to make sure everyone was still breathing and that there were no Mandi or Emma popsicles. I was very tempted to camp out there one night but I didn't think my little Xander would be too appreciative of the experience. Here's hoping we can get some good snow next year so I can give it a shot!

Xander!

I am long long overdue in posting pictures and information about Xander. This post will be all about our cute little guy from his speedy entrance last August until now.
I was actually at Gallaudet teaching a childbirth class when I went into labor. I mentioned to my class that I was having strong and consistent contractions (it was pretty hard to miss my enormous belly tensing and relaxing) and that it was a good example of "false labor (har har)." I was very determined to finish that series of childbirth classes, get our upstairs bathroom remodel finished and of course get my parents and sister here before the baby was born. Between my genes and Billy's genes, its not a suprise Xander had his own agenda. Once I finished class I had to walk across campus to get to my car. I passed a woman sitting on a bench, a large grandmotherly looking African-American. She took one look at me and said "Girly, you are having that baby tonight!" I laughed and said "Oh no, not tonight, I have far too much to do!" I was supposed to stop at the store and go over to a friends house to pick up a book on the way home. The contractions were working so hard, driving was a challenge. I dropped both errands and went straight home, hoping that if I ate and took a nap and prayed hard enough, the contractions would go away. The woman's statement really bugged at me... what would she know... someone who never met me and knew nothing of my life anyhow? After laying down for 2 hours, I got up... accepted that the contractions were not going to go away and we called my mom hoping that perhaps since our efforts failed, that she might be able to pull some strings up above and get this process put off a little longer. One thing we must all come to accept is that once that baby makes up his mind, there is nothing else you can do.
We had already informed our midwife that I was in labor. Billy suggested that perhaps we should have her come over and I scoffed at him... no way! I am just getting started here. Fortunately he is a very experienced childbirth coach. He read the signs and knew the baby was coming soon. With Emma's birth experience foremost in his head, he went ahead and called the midwife and birth assistant. They arrived just 45 minutes before Xander did. The girls were all asleep, we talked about maybe waking them up but decided to wait a bit longer which turned out to be a big mistake. Transition hit super hard and super fast. I told Billy to hurry and go upstairs to get the girls. Next thing I knew Xander was pushing himself down. This birth is the only time I actually could feel the baby pushing himself out. I yelled for Billy to forget it and get back down. Only Sam woke up enough to come down and see the birth. Our friend who was supposed to videotape the birth also arrived too late.. ah well. Billy caught the baby, we had a moment of worry as Xander took his time to start breathing but with with a bit of rubbing and a "Come on baby!" he coughed, let out a nice cry and pinked right up. He weighed 7lbs 5 oz. With Mandi and Lizzie weighing both weighing well over 8 lbs, its no wonder he popped right out.

Here he is checking out planet Earth right after his birth. He was very clean and didn't even need to be washed off.

Daddy holding his son for the first time. Xander has had to have his hands in his mouth constantly from the moment he was born.

Lizzie meets her little brother.

Mandi is delighted to have a boy in the house. She looks pretty good for it being 3am.

Emma LOVES holding babies. With both Lizzie and Xander she would sit for an hour, no problem and just hold them and give them lots of sisterly love.

Sam giving Xander a kiss. She took all of these pictures right after the birth which is why she isn't in very many of them.

Lizzie back for more...

And more... she couldn't get enough of that cute baby.

FEET! The boy really has a set of feet on him.. I have been used to tiny dainty feet... his are BIG but still very yummy!

My midwife Lisa, I really enjoyed having her. She was content to sit back and let us do our thing until she was needed. She was a good fit for us. This is 2 days post-partum.
My mom took the next flight out after his birth to come and help out. My Dad and sister followed soon after. It was so great to have them here. They are always a blast to have around and I dont know what I would have done without them! I know we have some great pics of everyone while they were here but I haven't been able to find the file... they will come later.

In October Xander took his first trip to CA. Billy's Gramma Emma was having a 90th birthday bash and the whole family was getting together. We decided it would be a great time for Xander and Lizzie to meet Gramma and for all of us to enjoy time with Billy's family. Here he is with Grandpa Kendrick

We had his blessing immediately following Gramma's birthday open house. Here we are all clean and spiffy.

Man of the hour.


It was wonderful to be able to have so many family members present at his blessing! Here he is with all the wonderful men who stood in the circle.

With Gramma and Daddy right after the open house/blessing. He adores Gramma... the minute he gets into her arms he either goes right to sleep or he laughs and talks like nobodies business.
Of course being in CA, we had to have some FUN! Here he is during his first visit to the beach. It was pretty chilly and very windy so I kept him snug and safe in the sling.

We also went to Disneyland! Here he is on his very first ride...Peter Pan.
Before flying home we nabbed the opportunity to see Gramma one last time. As usually Xander was totally enthralled.

Back on the plane heading home!

Hanging out with Lizzie. You can see he is pretty horrified to be plopped into a pink princess chair and trying to figure out which body part would get him out of there the fastest.
Monkeying around at the zoo...
Hmm Mom needs a haircut and a good shave ;)

The day he discovered his toes. Of course they went straight into the gaping hole we call his mouth... just like everything else. As you can see he is quite serious about those toes. He got really mad when I tried to get his clothes on again after the diaper change and thus was allowed to nibble his piggies for an extended period.

We caught him being very photogenic one day and got in some great shots... He is 4 months old here.

Stay tuned... more to come!

Metal Mouth

Emma got braces last week. We went in for a routine check-up as she has had an expander for a few months. Dr. Hughes looked at me and said, "Well, she is ready for braces, let's get them on." Emma and I both gaped at him.... right now? They run a really smooth operation over there at Hughes Orthodontics...We especially like Dr. Hughes magic tricks. They had her outfitted in 15 minutes flat. Emma was sooo excited to get them on and to see everyone's reactions. She chose Mediterranean blue for her bands. She enjoys using all the little tools and gadgets they have given her to make sure her teeth stay sparkling and clean. She has made this whole process very fun. I am glad she is not feeling self conscious or embarrassed about it.. in fact she has made braces downright COOL.

I'M BAAACCKK!

After Xander's birth I took a nice extended break from most computer related stuff except for email and an occasional peek at facebook. Life is busy with 5! Xander is a high needs baby very much like Samantha and Emma were so I am rarely able to sit down for more than a few minutes while he is awake. Between him and little Lizzie I am lucky to even get to the bathroom or get a bite in these days hee hee. I am gonna try and get back to blogging as I enjoy it so much and have missed my time doing it, plus it should motivate me to get back into taking pictures! I have been terrible about picking up the camera lately.

I am gonna start with our recent Halloween festivities. Halloween was a crazy crazy day for us! Sam had tennis, Emma had her soccer game, we had a branch activity and then stayed after to help clean the church. We had some friends over for Halloween dinner and then met up with the neighborhood families to go trick or treating. I had to chauffer Sam down to a neighborhood closer to her school so she could go trick or treating with her friends. It was very busy but very fun day!
Carving fun. The girls all created their own designs, I thought they did a great job!

Helping Mandi with a tricky spot.

Mandi's poor jack o' lantern ate something disagreeable with his tummy, he threw up all over our table. UGH!

Dad and Emma hard at work.

Lizzie was more interested in coloring and eating candy than playing with pumpkin guts.

Finished products. Sam's pumpkin is a house with ghosts peeking out the windows and around the doors... the picture doesn't do it justice. There are so many little details right down to little eyes. I don't think I could create such a good design on my own.. way to go Sam! Emma's has a ghost, a bat, a sliver of a moon and a BOO (picture also doesnt do hers much justice.) Mandi's is a spooky face saying BOO!


The dessert I entered in the branch dessert contest... it won first place. Fortunately it tasted much better than it looked!

Playing games at the church....

Our delicious halloween feast consisted of ground up goblin guts in toadstool caps, fried ogre skins, bloody brains, witches fingernails and dragon scales with vampire brew to wash it all down.

I didn't make it outside to get a group shot of everyone taking off to go trick or treating. They had a really good time this year going with all their neighborhood friends.

Lizzie was a wee witch. Originally she wanted to be a lion but it was 72 degrees outside on Halloween and much too hot so this was a nice back up costume that I made for Mandi when she was 3.

Mandi was a ghost. I made a hood to go with this costume but she lost it during her school parade.


Sam and Emma were both Vampires. Emma wanted to dye her hair black. Wow did she look different! She really liked it until it was time to wash it out... it took us almost a half hour to get it out of her fine blonde hair and off her body. While drying off she looked up and me and said "Mom, that was really fun.... I NEVER want to do it again!"

Sam looked beautiful and glamorous when she headed out with her perfect hair, pale skin, lovely long lashes and stylish boots. She was a "twilight" vampire thus the lack of fangs and black hair. I wasn't able to get a shot of her before we ran her down to her friends house. It rained and drizzled and was quite windy during trick or treating so she doesn't look quite as polished in this "after" pic.

I never got a group shot of everyone but I know a friend did so I will have to poke her about it and see if I can get a copy. It was a delightful and spooky night. We LOVE Halloween... BOO!