May Miscellaneous

May 4:  We had the craziest hailstorm EVER this afternoon.  I’ve never seen that much rain come down so quickly – the streets were flowing like rivers and water was pouring off the roofs. Crazy!  Abigail took this video and caught the flash of lighting and the roar of thunder.

May 5:  Starbucks half-price frappuccino happy hour started today.  I told the kids if they practiced piano today and tolerated their piano lessons without ANY complaint or negativity then I would treat them.  What a wonderfully peaceful Friday afternoon we had.  Not the norm when piano is concerned.

May 6:  While I was at Abigail’s final volleyball tournament Justin was home juggling Jason’s basketball game, Carly’s lacrosse game and the Pinewood Derby.  We are the WORST scouting parents – Jason will be a Webelo this summer and I don’t think he’s officially earned any of the prior rankings – wolf, bear, etc…  Justin isn’t a handy-man so participating in the Pinewood Derby isn’t something he looks forward to.  Jason enjoys it though and somehow they’ve managed to put together a car each year.  Jason went into it saying he wouldn’t win for speed, but had hopes that he would win for creativity.  I love his optimism.  I think he did some in second in one of the heats.  Jason won the award for “Most Scout Spirit” but was disappointed that our new ward doesn’t actually award any physical prizes (aka candy). 

PWD = Pine Wood Derby 

   

JGF = Jason Grant Fletcher

May 9:  Katie’s first grade concert was this evening.  Grandma and Grandpa were both able to come watch. 

We took a quick picture afterward and then we had to bee-line it to the pre-grand opening of Café Rio in nearby Issaquah to collect our free meal certificates.  We also had free meals for Thursday of this same week.  Pretty sure our family got 16 free meals during the week. Yum. Yum.

May 10:  Abigail finally picked up her permit this afternoon.  She’s been 15 since January but hasn’t been able to start drivers ed until now when it won’t conflict with any sports.  We went to the church parking lot where she got into the driver’s seat for the first time ever.  She was starting from the very basics – this is the gas pedal, here is the brake, etc…  We practiced starting and stopping, parking, and turns.  She did much better than I’d feared and she’s driven quite a bit since then.  Now (nearing the end of June) she’s already finished her drives with the instructor and has been on the freeway multiple times.

 

Jason’s scout troop (plus apparently a few siblings) hiked down to the base of Snoqualmie Falls tonight for their activity.

May 12:  Before skipping town (and country) with Justin for the weekend, I went to the Morning with Mom event at our elementary school with Jason and Katie.  Yum. Yum.

May 14:  Not even bribing Drew with cake could get him to smile for my annual Mother’s Day photo.

Jason and Katie presented me with a cards and gift that they had made in school.  I got a kick out of Katie’s card.

My Mom is really good at “sleeping”

My Mom is funny when “she burps”

My Mom always tells me “to do gobs” (aka jobs)

My Mom has taught me “noting” (aka Nothing!)

After church we headed over to the Baumgartner’s – we knew we were in trouble the moment we got on the freeway.  Apparently there was an accident at the Hwy 18/I90 interchange so we had to make our way through Issaquah to get there – taking nearly an hour instead of 20-25 minutes.  Waze had the accident cleared up by the time we were heading home that evening, but we ended up spending nearly an hour and a half to get home most of that time at a dead stop on the highway.  Not fun.

May 15:  I check on the boys tonight before heading to bed and found this cute scene.

Drew has started taking off his pajamas at some point during the nights. 

When did my baby get SO long? 

May 27:  Justin and Jason hiked to Twin Falls early this morning with Mike and Aubrey Gibbs.

These two have become good friends (both Justin & Mike and Jason & Aubrey) and we will miss having them in the neighborhood now that they've moved to Fall City.

We celebrated Drew’s birthday this afternoon (five days late) and then tonight Justin and I went to the Tim McGraw / Faith Hill concert in Tacoma.  Years ago Justin mentioned this would be the tippy top concert on his want-to-see concert list.  Back then we thought it would take a trip to Vegas or something to see them perform.  We saw they were coming to Seattle a few months ago, but with so much else going on this month that took us away from the kids we held off buying tickets until just days before.  So glad we did.  It was a good concert for even this typically non-country loving girl and I’m glad Justin was able to check this off his list.

They truly seem like such a power couple – it was fun to see them interact on stage together.

We got home close to midnight and saw on the neighborhood facebook page that someone had posted pictures of the northern lights from the top of our hill.  I had no idea that the northern lights were ever visible from Seattle so I insisted Justin get out of bed and go out with me to check them out.  Turns out it’s super hard to get a picture of them without a tripod, but it was really awesome to see!

May 28:  Morning snuggles with my two youngest

May 31:  Abigail had her very last band concert tonight.  She didn’t love band this year and in the fall having to play in the pep band conflicted with volleyball and made for a crazy busy schedule.  Justin attended her concert and taped as she played piano during one of the arrangements.  Once again, another end to an era for Abigail.