You'll never guess what I've got!

Never before seen in our family, this is what a 4th grader looks like:















And this is certainly the cutest 1st grader that I've seen in awhile (never mind the tattoo on his forehead, it was a weak mothering moment and he's due a shower):

And finally, a little brotherly love (let's take bets on how long this lasts):

P.S. Don't my roses look fabulous? =)

I know it's still early

but I was just on the baseball organization's website and happened to notice that they rank the teams in the minor league. I'm so not used to there being winners and losers and everything, so that surprised me. Apparently they even have playoffs. Which I suppose is cool, except that means we could be playing baseball into July. Ugh.

Anywho, I haven't yet updated about our most recent games. I mentioned the first game here, the second game we had to miss due to an Orchestra concert (our team won), the third game was rained out and is rescheduled, and the fourth game was this past weekend. Saturday's game was a great one. Malcolm's team ended up winning 18 to 9. That's phenomenal. Malcolm's first time at bat, he had a great, really solid hit which would have been a double, except that the second baseman on the other team happened to make a terrific catch. As disappointing as that was, it is hard to begrudge this other kid such a nice catch. His second at bat was a single and one runner scored, plus he stole 2nd and 3rd during subsequent batters. His last at bat was a strikeout. Bummer, but still, he had 1 rbi, 1 run scored and 2 steals. Not a bad game. The next game is this Thursday.

So back to my story. I was on the organization's website tonight and saw that they have rankings. Guess who's team is currently ranked #1??? I know! Pretty cool, right? We're the only team that is 3-0 so far. Of course the season is still young, but it's still pretty exciting!
Go Pirates.

How does your garden grow?

Lincoln and the two girls from across the street are planting for me. They've taken seeds that we saved from a melon and planted them, then theys tarted planting the grapes that were their snack. Very clever children, they're splitting the grapes open figuring that the "seed" inside it will grow better if it's open. I don't have the heart to tell them that I only buy seedless grapes.

At least the peach pits that have been buried in the yard in years past will have company.

Who's looking out for me?

Lincoln is upstairs watching TV for a little bit, I'm down in the kitchen puttering. He calls down to me: "Hey mom! You have to get Lasik. Cuz then you won't need any more glasses. Hold on. I'll give you the number." Then he proceeded to call the number down to me that was displayed on the TV.

Funny little dude.

Opening day for minor league baseball

was yesterday. It was Malcolm's first game in the minors. We were a little apprehensive since nearly half of their practices have been rained out this month. We were even a little afraid that the game would be rained out, but the storms passed quickly and we had enough dry hours to squeeze in the game. Lincoln and I had to leave halfway through the 3rd inning to go to his soccer game, but when we left, the Pirates were doing pretty well. Malcolm was on third base and had sucessfully stolen two bases in his 2 times at bat. We learned later that the Pirates won, 7-5. Best of all, get this....Malcolm was the one who put them over the top. In his last at bat, he hit a double and had 2 RBIs which counted as runs 6 and 7 (aka the winning runs!). Nice way to start the season.

No no no, thank YOU.

Today was the school's "Volunteer Appreciation Day" which I've never attended before. Maybe I'm modest (pshaw!) but it seemed weird to walk into the school with the intention of being thanked for what I do. But last year I talked to people who thought the same thing and went anyway and were glad they did.

Now count me in with that group. I went and boy was it worth it. First of all, when you walk in the door, they have 5th graders ready to escort the volunteers to the teacher's lounge where coffee and breakfast was waiting. We sat and chatted amongst ourselves for a bit until we were led down to the community room. On our way into the room, each volunteer was handed a long stem rose (thorns clipped, water tube attached). In the community room, all of the kids were seated on the floor and they were clapping and cheering as we walked in. Some members of the band and orchestra were playing music, though it was hard to hear over the clapping.

We were seated and the principal said a few words. Then a group of 5th graders sang part of "What a wonderful world" and several subsets of the band and orchestra played a variety of songs. Then we were escorted out to more clapping and cheering. What a cool way to spend the morning.

The crazy is catching

When I asked Lincoln what he wanted for snack today, he requested the same thing he had yesterday. When Malcolm heard that Lincoln wanted lettuce for snack he declared "That sounds good. I want lettuce mixed with carrots. And maybe some ranch!" I had already made his snack (bananas and strawberries mixed thankyouverymuch) so I said he could have it tomorrow. Shall we take bets on if he still wants it come tomorrow morning?

This kid is a little odd

I was preparing Lincoln's snack this morning and asked him what he wanted. His teacher only allows fresh fruits or vegetables (no fruit cups or crap like that), so he usually takes something of the fruit variety. He went for months only eating apples. Then it was grapes for awhile, then bananas. Once he asked me if he could take a vegetable (I think the attendance question of the day was asking if they brought a fruit or a veggie) so he took frozen peas (complete with freezer packs to keep them frozen).

Anywho, today I asked him what he wanted and he asked me if we had any lettuce. Ummm, yea, I have some lettuce. "I want some lettuce in a baggie" he tells me. What? This is the kid that never touches salad and has never in his 5 3/4 years expressed any interest in lettuce whatsoever. So I asked if he was sure. He said he wanted to taste it. So he came to the sink and devoured a leaf of romaine. He proclaimed it delicious and we negotiated how many leaves he could have (settled on 4). I can't wait to see if he's ravenously hungry after school!

Bizarre little child.

Little boy kisses

Lincoln and I have developed this routine of goodnight kisses. He goes first. He kisses one cheek, then the other. Then he kisses my chin, nose, forehead, hair, then lips. Then it's my turn and I do the same. It's so incredibly sweet and he's very strict about the order. If I forget to start on his cheek, I have to start over. I'll take it while I can get it.

Sports sports sports

Malcolm's basketball season just wrapped up this weekend with two games on Saturday and an end of season party on Sunday. We are all so disappointed that it's over. He loved playing, we loved watching. For the most part, his team was the same as last year. They added two boys, one of whom is a friend of his, and the coaches were the same as well. His coach scheduled additional practices which helped immensely and the boys really came together as a team. Every kid (even Skippy, the kid who skipped up and down the court last year) improved greatly and played really well, especially by the end of the season. They ended up going 7 and 3 for the season, but it should have been 8 and 2. Apparently in the one game I missed, our team went up by such a large margin that the ref stopped counting our baskets AND started calling violations a lot harder on our boys. As a result, our team lost by one point in overtime. The coach and parents were very upset, the ref even apologized to our coach, we should have won that game.[1] But it was a good lesson for the kids...life isn't always fair. Furthermore, in each of their subsequent games, our team went up by over 15 points so they stopped counting our baskets until the opponents caught up a little.

All in all, it was a great season. Malcolm made huge progress in his game and finally got used to being the big guy (or the "Tower of Power" as coach calls him). In the last two games, he scored over 6 points and had at least 5 rebounds in each game. Now that's what I'm talking about! We had a lot of conversations about the role each person plays on the court and worked with him on understanding the value he adds when he stands in the middle, a head above everyone else. It was great fun to watch.

In other sporting news, one of the dad's we know asked Malcolm if he would be interested in playing baseball this year. The last time he played was last spring and he decided not to continue at the end of the season. I was all for that decision, since, I believe I've mentioned...I hate baseball. It's never ending and outside. Meaning it could be 90 and humid, or 40 and raining. Ugh.

So Malcolm wants to play. Since he's 9, it's time to move up to the minors...all player pitch, 4 balls, 3 strikes, stealing bases is legal and umpires are used. This is more like real baseball. I'm thrilled that he was asked to play, the coach said he needs a power hitter. And there's one thing Malcolm is good at in baseball and that's knocking the hell out of the ball. A couple of his basketball buddies are on the team, so I will have company as I brave the elements I suppose. And there will be a lot of elements....3 practices per week (2 hours each!) and at least a game per weekend, maybe more. Combine this with Lincoln starting soccer with one practice and one game per week and we are talking A LOT of fresh air this spring.

As long as the boys love it, I'm there. Just cross your fingers that it's not a rainy spring.

[1] Make no mistake, I have no problem with the slaughter rule. This is third grade basketball, the goal is to learn how to play, not to humiliate the other team. BUT don't tie the kid's hands either. Let them play as best as they can and have the people running the scoreboard worry about the score.

And so it begins again

It seems that I've gotten used to not having a whole lot going on. I mean sure, there's the usual, school, scouts, PTO stuff, CCD and basketball. But nothing we can't handle. In fact, basketball just ended this past weekend (more on that in a seperate post). But here we go (again). Lincoln will be playing soccer for the first time this spring, practice starts tonight before CCD. Malcolm was asked to play baseball this spring (more later), the first player clinic is this weekend. I just sent in the registration for Malcolm to take tennis lessons, he's been asking for months. Last weekend I signed them both up for swimming this summer, as many sessions as possible since we've been out of it for a few years. I feel like I'm working on a puzzle, trying to fit all the pieces in place and making sure we will be able to get each kid where they need to be, when they need to be there. But it's all good I suppose...it's all things that they're excited about doing (except for CCD, but that's not negotiable), so I'm happy to do it. But I still like to complain.

The gift that suddenly stopped giving

Let's step into our way back machine and visit Christmas 2004. KC, generous technoweenie that she is, clued me into the joys of blogging. Clued me into, guilted me into, tomato, tomahto. The resulting Christmas gift to me was a blog subscription on typepad. I jumped into it with gusto. Finally, I had a chance to assuage the guilt I felt over not journaling for Lincoln as I had for Malcolm!

Now come back to the present with me and imagine my surprise in early January (yes, 4 YEARS later) when it comes to my attention that the credit card on my typepad account had expired and wouldn't I please update it? Ummm, sorry, what's that now? Credit card? Payment? Huh? Yes, yes, call me moronic, but I had no idea that KC had (apparently) continued to gift me with my blog year after year. Come to think of it, I wonder if KC knew? Surprise hehehe.

So the way I sees it, nowadays there are plenty o' blogging services that don't charge, and lord knows I am not technical enough to use the advanced features that I probably had. So that brings me to this....my new and improved blog. Hopefully anyway. I will aim to continue to bore you with stories of my darling angels. There's a reason I've called it "more than you wanted to know!" At the very least, this should put me back in the running for Mother of the Year.