Catching Up

I'm not keeping up with blogging - guess it's because life is pretty mellow and not much is happening.  We did recently head in to Sears to the portrait studio for the annual photo that will end up on the Christmas card if I get my act together and design and order one! 

Kim is busy with basketball try-outs for the Cabrillo Middle School team - she's made the first cut and has the second round of try-outs on Friday.  We are looking forward to getting back into basketball!  She's doing well in school - all A's on the last report card except for algebra and that's improving now that we got her new glasses. 

Corey is also an all A student and is involved in choir and an activity called Destination Imagination.  She's also growing like a weed.

Alia is doing well in 2nd grade - she seems to have an affinity for math that we hope she will maintain.  A lot of girls that are good in math at this age seem to lose it later on in school.  She says she wants to be a doctor (I imagine her as one that doesn't take a lot of bedside manner skills because she is smart and beautiful but not terribly empathetic- perhaps a researcher.)

Eli is coming along- reading and also good in math.  He still attends speech therapy and has plateaued somewhat there.  His teacher this year is not as forgiving and flexible as his kindergarten teacher unfortunately so he is frequently in trouble for 'not sitting still'.  He says he is bored and I can believe it. He has very good fine motor skills and the best handwriting of any of the kids in his class.  But he does have problems sitting still.

CHAMPS!

Kim's team - the PUMAS- won the tournament and finished the season completely UNDEFEATED!!  I'm already missing basketball.

Kim will be moving to a new school for 8th grade - she decided mid-last year that the open classroom alternative school she has been attending wasn't as challenging as she would like.  Her new school will allow her to play basketball and continue to develop her artistic talent as well as hopefully prepare her for high school.  She entered 4 drawings in the local fair and received 1 First place ribbon and 3 Second place ribbons.  I'm very proud of her!

Season Champs!

Kim's basketball team, the Pumas, is 7-0 for the season (one more game to go) and since no other team will be able to catch us (all the other teams have lost at least 2 games) they were declared Season Champions at today's game.  They each got the coveted Champion T-shirt.  After Wednesday night's games it's on to the tournament with the first elimination round next Saturday.  We are hoping to have continued success!

Summer Basketball Begins

Today was the start of the Wildcats basketball and Kim's team, the Pumas (same team name and coach as last year, different team members with the exception of Kim and Becka) played the third game at 12:30. The team has been practicing a lot and while some of the players are relatively inexperienced they've been looking pretty strong. At the end of the first quarter it was Pumas 12, Panthers 1. At the end of the game it was Pumas 32, Panthers 12! Kim played almost the entire game (probably all but 5 minutes), made 7 points and multiple assists and rebounds. She's looking good! I wore my homemade "Fan of Pumas' #4" shirt to the game.

You can follow (if you are a dedicated fan, or just curious) the wildcats at : http://www.venturawildcats.com/ where current standings place the Pumas in the #1 spot and Kim as the #6 highest scorer in the league. A good start to the summer!

Kim's Artwork

Kim's pencil drawing, scanned into the computer and then she colored it with paint on the computer.  Can you tell she likes the Japanese Animee tradition?

Artists

Being artistic seems to run in the family, although perhaps skipping one or two of us.  My siblings are all successful artists so I'm glad it's something most of my kids share as well.  Here are some recent efforts -

Eli's pencil drawing of a truck pulling a travel trailer.

 Corey's ink drawing of a sea serpent. 

And Kim's "Mini-me" a self-portrait/avatar for the school yearbook.

Disney Day

Well - we went!  Took our free vouchers and fought California freeway traffic down to Disneyland and made a day of it.  Our friend Nickie joined us (nice to have another adult along) and everyone had a good time.  Eli didn't disapear behind scenes and pull any plugs, Alia kept her temper, I survived walking around the park for 8 hours and we all shrieked as we plunged down Splash Mountain. 

Here we are just before the big drop! Alia is wearing my jacket over her head in an attempt to keep dry.

Eli enjoyed Autotopia (he steered, I pushed on the gas pedal which he couldn't reach).

 
I think we managed 13 rides (if you count going on Astro Blasters twice) and avoided spending too much money on souveniers!  I would have spent more if I could have found a Grumpy sweatshirt to replace my old one :-)

It was a fun time and I hope will be a happy memory for the kids.

Disney!

We participated (yes, all 5 of us) in Disney's Give a Day, Get a Disney Day promotion! We were lucky enough to find a neat local opportunity that really used my experience and skills and was a lot of fun for all of us. We put on a workshop about archaeology at the Gull Wings Children's Museum here in Oxnard! While not as well attended as I'd hoped, the director was sufficiently impressed to ask if I'd be willing to come back again, and I was happy to say yes, and to offer advice on creating an interactive exhibit on local archaeology. The kids helped with the demonstrations and handing out information about local resources for kids who want to learn more about archaeology and history.


And as a result we all have a voucher to go to Disneyland for free! What fun! Eli has never been and is very excited about Autotopia, and Alia went once when she was 2 years old! We are going next week and roping in a friend to go with us (we really need 2 adults with this crew- especially with Eli who is likely to disappear and be found hours later in the bowels of some equipment after causing a power failure and shutting down the entire park).

Plus the 'big' kids would really like to go on some 'big kid' rides for once- they are bored with the teacups, and with 2 adults one of us can go with them and one can spin around with the little kids!

The Champs!

Corey's team, the Nuggets, handily won the division championship, ending the season with 13 wins, 0 losses!  We had a great coach and some fantastic players (including three that hadn't played before).

Now we are taking a basketball break for about 6 weeks - then the summer league starts!

Playoffs

Corey's team- the Nuggets -  are undefeated going in to the last game of the playoff!  Woo-hoo!  She's had a real good coach, he's taught her a lot, and at the end of the season is still enthusiastic about playing.

Kim had the reverse experience - poor coaching, inexperienced team.  They were eliminated in the first round of playoffs and she's taking a basketball break and concentrating on the school play for the next month. Summer league basketball begins in May.

Time Flys

Wow- it seems like school just started and now it's time to start planning summer camps!  The spring youth basketball season has ended- playoffs begin on Saturday.  Corey's team finished undefeated and we hope they'll continue that way through the playoffs.  Her strength has proven to be as a defensive player- she's small but tough and excels at stealing the ball.  Kim's team had only 3 experienced players and mediocre coaches and they ended the season with a 1-9 record.  They will probably be out after the first playoff game.  Oh well- you win some, you lose some! 

On the other hand report cards came out - Kim is the only one who gets 'real' grades, and she made all A's except in math and science.  In those subjects she got A+!  We weren't able to come up with the extra $2,000 for the middle school trip to Washington D.C.- a real disapointment as I remember what an impact my school trip made at that time (it was to Paris).  Money is just too tight right now.  On the other hand we are planning a family trip to Disneyland as soon as school is out!  That trip will be free (the entry fee for DL anyway) as we will have earned the tickets through the Disney promotion - Give a Day, Get a Disney Day! 

Kim is also in the school play again this year- one reason we are ready for Bball to end is the conflicting practice schedules.  Corey continues in the school choir.  Alia is catching on to reading and Eli is finally, at age 7, out of size 3T pants.  He's too tall for 3's but still awfully skinny for anything bigger.  We are looking forward to shorts season!

Someone Has A Birthday Soon

My darling, delightful, dramatic, difficult daughter- Alia- will be 7 on February 1st.

Catching Up

We had a nice Christmas- thank you to all who participated in making it so- and the kids were happy to go back to school after the break. Ventura Youth Basketball Association has started its season and both Kim and Corey are playing. Corey lucked out and got a great coach and a good team. They have won every game by a large margin. A nice introduction to the sport. Kim unfortunately got neither a good coach or team and is valiently trying to take her old coach's advice to heart - when you are on a less experienced team you get to be the star. Doesn't help much when they lose every game by 30 points! We are sticking with it but it isn’t fun to either play in or watch the games. Hopefully the summer league will be more rewarding.
After a fairly warm and benign winter we have finally begun getting some storms- nothing too dramatic as long as you are inside and don’t have to drive in them! The rain will be good for the water supply- a big issue here- but each winter I’m reminded how little California drivers know about driving in the rain!
Kim’s middle school class is planning a trip to Washington DC over spring break (April!) so we are busy fundraising for that. I wish I could go along but have no one to watch the rest of the family and suspect she will enjoy the time with her friends so I’ll just have to stay here and worry. She is doing well in school and her current career goal is to be an architect.