On Friday I helped in the library, even though Declan's class was not coming in. They had a field trip for most of the day, which I wasn't able to attend since I was on-call for work. About 5 minutes after I got home from the library, I got the dreaded call that I had to go in. Luckily it ended up just being for a couple hours, but it was kind of a bummer. After I picked up the kids from school, we went to the library, picked up some popcorn and pizza on the way home, and had a movie night. They watched Spiderwick Chronicles, even though they have seen it before. It was nice to know that we didn't have any soccer going the next morning, and I didn't have orchestra like I usually do on the first Sat. of the month.

Saturday I went to a step class in the morning, and then after lunch I took the kids to Elitch's to get our passes activated. I wasn't expecting it to be very crowded, but there were tons of buses in the parking lot from Wyoming, so it was some kind of band/choir outing from a bunch of schools up there. It ended up being really hot, but luckily we couldn't stay more than a few hours. We were meeting some friends there that also bought a pass, and I kept expecting her to call when they go there, and then I finally called and she said she had called a few times. I was irritated with my phone until I got home and there were a bunch of messages from her on our home machine. She had been calling the wrong number all along. Scot was doing some computer work for a friend, but we had planned to go out to dinner for his birthday/Mother's Day and use our Gordon Biersch gift card from Christmas. We fed the kids here and then dropped them off at KT for a couple hours while we had a relaxing dinner. I got my favorite hummus goat cheese salad (which is huge!) and Scot and I split some garlic fries for an appetizer. I also had a yummy pomegranate margarita. I had gotten The Walking Dead from Netflix, so I watched a couple episodes. It is a pretty good show, although very gory. For some reason, Netflix started sending me 3 discs at a time, even though I changed to 2 out at a time awhile ago. I keep checking and they are still charging me for 2, so maybe it's some kind of glitch. I won't complain!



Here is a shot of me with my Mother's Day goodies. I slept until around 10 a.m., which is hard since I have woken up with crippling back and hip pain for the last couple months. I realized everyone was gone, but the kids had left me written clues to find my gifts. Owen made a penguin sculpture out of clay, and Declan made a card at school. Scot got some flowers and an iTunes gift card. I took the kids out for donuts, and then ended up doing some cleaning in the bedroom while watching a movie. Catfish was pretty interesting. It's a documentary about this guy meeting a family through FB. Things are not as he thought, of course. I picked out some Thai food for dinner, so Scot picked that up for dinner. It was a good day.



The flowers are still alive today, no thanks to me. I am really not good with plants. We have some cabbage starters that can probably go in the garden soon. I think we are done with frosts now, I hope. I had to work today, and then it was home for a little while until I had to take Declan to soccer practice. Scot and Owen went to scout appreciation night at the army surplus store and got some goodies for camping, including a hammmock.

Someone is coming to see Dottie on Wednesday. I hope it works out. I warned him that she doesn't really make a good first impression because of her shyness, but he seems o.k. with that. He has an 8-year-old lab and they are looking for a friend for him. If Dottie can get along with Tobey AKA Mr. Bossy, she can get along with any dog!

May snuck up on me, and boy it is a doozy. I think this is our last quiet weekend before we are on activity overload! Monday I was at work during the day and then soccer practice for Declan while Owen went to a scout meeting with Scot. Tuesday I went to an exercise class, and then after I came home I started to get worried that I was waiting too long to finally commit to a pop-up rental since 4th of July tends to book up fast, so I got that all squared away. It looks like the only issue may be not having the correct electrical hook-up, so I need to see what we have and find out about getting it replaced. We are just getting a small one, with a queen bed on one side and a double on the other. There is a table inside and a stove that can be used inside or outside, plus it comes with an awning. I'm picking it up the day before we leave so I can get it packed up and practice driving with it a little. It weighs much less than we can actually tow, so hopefully it won't be too big of a deal. I am excited about the long camping trip now, more than I would be if I had to spend 6 days in a tent!



Wednesday morning I went to another exercise class, and then I had to take Dottie to the MaxFund clinic vet to get her ears checked out. After we got back from our trip, I noticed she had some scabs on her ears that I didn't see before. I waited to see if they would get better, and then a cyst-type thing developed, also on her ear, so I figured I better take her in. They are not sure what might be wrong, so she is getting antibiotics and I have to put a cream on the scabs once a day. After the antibiotics are gone, I have to take her back. One thing that they might have to check for is skin cancer, which I didn't realize was a problem for dogs. I am hoping that's not what it is!



Today was actually pretty warm, in the low 70's, so I decided to make some iced coffee after I got back from my exercise class (3 days in a row. Yay me!) It was a little weak, but I'm out of practice since it's been so cold this spring. I went to the library to help and then on to Owen's class to help with the Native American beading project they were doing. They strung beads across squares of plastic canvas based on designs that had made earlier in the week. I had to help kids count out the beads in the colors they needed, and then walk around and help whoever needed it. I am going back in a few weeks to help with the moccasins, which I guess are more of an ordeal. Tonight Scot took Owen to soccer practice while I took Declan to his scout meeting. They talked about their belt loops, and then made sopapillas in honor of Cinco de Mayo. They turned out pretty yummy, so I got the recipe to try here sometime. They tasted like the pie crust pieces that my mom used to make with cinammon and sugar, but they put honey and cinammon on theirs. Tomorrow Declan's class is going on a field trip, and then next Friday Owen's class has a field trip downtown, which I will be going on. The Friday after that is Field Day, and then the last Friday of school is the field trip to the zoo for Declan's class, which I am also helping with. We also have the book fair next week, the Carnival next Friday night, and Run with Rocky on the Sunday that I will be up in Estes Park with my mom for a workshop. We still have soccer for another week, and I am hosting bunco this month. Declan's soccer team has signed up for a tournament on Memorial Weekend, so it is shaping up to be quite a busy month!

Yesterday I pulled out the flyer for Teacher Appreciation Week, another school thing to keep track of! It really is relentless at this time of year. Declan has his short testing appt. first thing in the morning, at the same time I had to drop Owen off for his 2 1/2 hour school day, so it worked out well. After we picked Owen up, we went out to lunch at Panera. Then we stopped at the library since I had a couple of books that were due. Owen had been invited on a sleepover, but we weren't sure what time he was leaving. He got picked up in the middle of the afternoon, so Declan and I proceeded to get sucked into Lego Harry Potter. I was the only one who had played it before but Declan finally got interested and we are working our way through the levels. I find it more confusing to navigate than the other Lego games we have, but we are figuring it out.



Owen got dropped off around 9:30 a.m. since we thought he had a soccer game, but it ended up getting cancelled. The other team didn't have enough players, and the weather was quite windy and cold. Owen said he got up at 5 a.m. anyway, so not sure he would have been in top form! I was worried about him staying up too late, but forgot that this family is used to getting up early. Declan's game was still on, so we watched that one out in the cold. They ended in a tie after a bad beginning.

Scot and I decided to go see a movie, so we saw Hanna. There is nothing that exciting playing right now, but it was a fun action movie. I'm almost done reading Body Double, which has been good so far. I got the movie Hereafter from Netflix, but haven't watched it yet.

They can't really be seen in the photo, but Hurricane is on the right and Flame is on the left. Luckily they survived the night, so they are already working out better than the goldfish! Flame still cracks me up with all his posturing with his gills while Hurricane doesn't react to him at all.

Today I went right to the Apex after dropping the kids off at school. It seems to work better. I walked for 2 miles uphill on the treadmill, and then spent some time on the exercise bike. They got new ones that are really comfortable. I got a book recommendation from a fellow 3rd grade mom that I saw there, and I was lucky enough to be able to check it out as an ebook, even though the regular book had a bunch of holds on it. It's a mystery series with an 11-year-old as the sleuth. I think he is on book 3 now.

I had a little time at home before I had to run to the store and get some carrot sticks to bring to Declan's Nursery Rhyme Picnic at school. Everyone brought theme food, like Humpty Dumpty Deviled Eggs. The carrots were Old Mother Hubbard's Bones. The kids all recited a nursery rhyme before we ate. It ended right when my library time usually starts, so I went over and shelved books and helped Owen's class find books. I won't be going tomorrow since it's a testing day. Declan has a 15-minute time slot in the morning, and Owen will be there until 11:30, then we are free for the rest of the day. Owen will be going on a sleepover, so hopefully he won't stay up too late since he has a soccer game on Saturday in the late morning (unless it gets snowed/rained out!). This boy is used to getting up really early, so I'm guessing he will not be staying up even if he wants to.

We stayed and played after school for awhile, and then came home to take care of chores and piano practice in time to have an early dinner for Owen's soccer practice. They had their group photo taken, so luckily everyone remembered to wear their uniforms!

No coffee today since I figured I wouldn't be able to taste it anyway. I had some Throat Coat tea instead. The coffee is from yesterday, along with one of the many flyers I have to deal with right now from school. There are field trips, special lunches, Field Day, Carnival, Run with Rocky, testing day, special Native American crafts days, etc. I'm sure I'm forgetting something, but it's all getting a little overwhelming trying to keep track!

I didn't have to do much today apart from getting a birthday present for the party after school that the kids were invited to. I forgot to have them make a card, and since it was right after school, there wasn't any way they could, so I used one of my homemade cards. I walked down after school to help walk with all the kids who were going to the party. It was at the rec center not too far away from school, most of the kids walked in a group. I offered to help with that part of it before I got sick, but it was probably good for me to be out in the fresh air! Yesterday I had yet another dentist appointment, which I had scheduled 6 months ago and forgotten about. Luckily I won't have to go back until Nov., and there is nothing pending to get worked on. I am really tired of dental stuff by now! Declan also told me Monday night that if I wrote a permission note, he might be able to bring home one of the goldfish they have been observing at school for a science unit. He was so excited to actually get one, and it was alive when I went to bed last night. However, we woke up to this:



So I went out to Petsmart and got a small betta tank and a couple betta fish. They are supposedly easier to take care of than goldfish, although they don't live as long. I am hoping they make it through the night, but I'm wondering if I should have gotten the little heater unit, since it does cool off in the house at night right now. There is a red one and a blue one, and they have been named Hurricane and Flame. Flame is rather feisty, showing his gills to Hurricane, who just ignores him and swims away. There is a removable partition in the tank to keep them separated, and if one dies, the other can take over the whole tank!

I finished a book by a new to me auther, Beverly Connor. She writes about a foresic anthropologist, and it was pretty good. One of the ebooks I had on hold came through, so I checked that out and got started on it at soccer practice. It's book 4 of the Rizzoli and Isles series. I will have 1 1/2 hours tomorrow night at Owen's practice, so I should be able to get a lot read, although I should probably spend some of that time walking on the nice track they have around the practice field. It has been so windy for every practice, I don't even want to get out of the car, but surely it has to be nice one of these times!

This picture is from yesterday. I was out and about today, and ended up with Starbucks. My first coffee tasted really bad, so I actually went back and exchanged it for another one, which was better.

Monday I had to work during the day, and then it was our usual routine of getting homework/chore/piano practice out the way before having an early dinner so we would be ready for soccer practice at 6 p.m. This is how it goes M-Th., with the added bonus of a piano lesson thrown in on Wednesday after school, and an occasional scout meeting. Tuesday I had an orchestra board meeting, so I was gone all morning and part of the afternoon. Today I took the van in for an oil change and also to find out whether it has a tow package installed. It does, and we can pull up to 3,500 pounds, so now I just need to decide on a pop-up rental for the 4th of July camping trip. Unfortunately, due to recent changes in the on-call schedule, Scot may or may not be able to accompany us. I'm hoping he'll be able to switch with someone, or the new guy will be added into the rotation soon so his week gets pushed ahead by one. The on-call thing is such a pain when it changes all the time due to people quitting and being added in. It would be nice to know for the year so we can plan trips around it, but it's hard to trust it for very long. The kids are looking forward to the camping trip, and we have the site reserved for almost a week, so I will still go, and I knew Scot wouldn't be there the whole time, but I was assuming he would be there Fri. night through Mon. night. It is still early, so hopefully something will work out. I am excited to try the pop-up, but a little nervous to drive with it, especially over the pass. Scot did sign up for the scout overnight camping trip, so he will be able to take the kids on that, even if his on-call shifts by a week. We don't have any other camping trips planned yet, but I hope we are able to fit in at least one more sometime during the summer.

Tomorrow I need to get some Easter goodies and a dye kit. The kids haven't really mentioned Easter much, but I'll at least hide some plastic eggs and have them decorate some hard boiled eggs. I don't really want to get small, annoying toys that they won't play with, so I need to figure out one bigger gift for each, I guess. I have some books that I haven't given out from the Scholastic sale at Christmas, so maybe I will do that for part of it. Declan needs a new soccer ball, since his gets flat every day, so then I just have to think of something for Owen.

I have been taking photos, even though I have not taken the time to actually upload them and write something!

We had a fun trip to Portland, even though Scot was sick most of it. He is hardly ever ill, so it was bad timing for that! We had a late Friday night flight into Portland, and then we drove to Sun River on Saturday morning. We got caught in quite a snowstorm going over the pass, so it took longer than it usually does, but we finally arrived Saturday afternoon. It was a nice rental house, and we were lucky enough to get the master suite. We decided to go skiing Sunday afternoon. It started out nice, but then got pretty windy with low visibility towards the end. The kids stuck it out and seemed to have fun, so we decided to go for a full day on Monday since it looked like the weather was going to warm up later in the week. It ended up being really nice and the kids got a lot of good practice on their skis. Tuesday we went into Bend to watch the new Diary of a Wimpy Kid movie, which we all enjoyed. Wednesday Scot and I went into Bend alone for lunch and walked around downtown while Mom took the kids to the Desert Museum. Thursday it was time to pack up and head back to Portland while Mom headed south for her cruise. No rest for the retired! Thursday night we got to see my dad, who happened to be in Portland at the time. He had to leave the next morning since his MIL had died, but he was able to come over to my brother's house for dinner before he left. Friday we spent all day at the OMSI Museum. We took a tour of the submarine there, and then the rest of time we just explored all the cool hands-on exhibits. We also saw an IMAX movie about Alaska. We had pizza that night. Owen and Declan were very enamored of my brother's house, especially because they could run all around the outside of it. I think it felt exotic to them because it was at the top of a steep hill and there were a bunch of green plants and trees around, unlike the climate here! They wanted to eat outside on the porch for most of the dinners. Saturday we went to a big mall and went ice skating for a little while, but I guess the ice wasn't very good. Then we ended up going to forestry museum, which was really nice. There was hardly anyone there, so we got to do all the hands-on stuff without having to wait. The kids did a scavenger hunt paper and got a prize at the end. My brother took us to the airport on Sunday morning and our flight left without incident, although we ended up flying into a little snowstorm here. It wouldn't have been so bad except that I had to drive almost an hour in it to pick up Dottie from the foster volunteers that were watching her while we were gone. The kids still have Monday off from school, so we went roller skating with one of their friends, and then they played with some other friends at the park. Tuesday it was back to a normal schedule with school again.

The weekend after getting back were our two orchestra concerts, so I was busy with those. I got to see Declan's soccer game but not Owen's. Luckily I got to see Owen play today, finally. I have been helping in the school library during time when 1st and 3rd grades come in to check out books, so Owen's teacher came up to me and said he was working on an email but hadn't finished it yet, so I was worried that there was some problem, but it turns out he just wanted to explain that Owen and a few others from his class were working on some 4th grade math, so it was actually good news. He used to really hate math, but I guess that has changed!