First Concert of the Year

 Austin and Kade are now in the same orchestra class at the high school. It's the concert orchestra, though Austin has his eyes on the symphony and might try out for next year. Even still, I think the concert orchestra performed better than they have in 3 or 4 years at this first concert for this school year. It was a combined concert with the choir who I also thought was better than they have been for a few years. I made the connection that a few years ago was before the covid pandemic and it has taken this long for all the kids to start reaching their potential in these areas. The concert orchestra finally had a comparable size to the symphony and enough violinists to balance out the seating arrangements. Jason and I enjoyed watching Kade and Austin share their musical talents with this group of musicians. 

Kade on the viola.

Austin on the cello.

Another Soccer Season

 This soccer season flew by! I feel like we barely started and we already had our last game yesterday. Granted, there were two games last weekend and no games were postponed due to weather, so we just consistently held games from the beginning of September until yesterday and now we're done. 

It was a little bit of a different season since we were pushed up an age group, as I previously explained, and had some new players. One of the new players lives near us and needed a carpool, so another parent and I volunteered which turned out so well! I definitely needed the help myself with all the things going on at our house and I was happy to help another family out. We learned that the other family who volunteered to help lives in our very neighborhood, so that didn't complicate the carpool at all. Their son has only been on the team a couple seasons and is a grade above Erik, plus attends a different school, which is why we never knew he lives 2 minutes away from us. 

We played 8 games this season. We lost the first 2, they were small losses, like by only a few points, then blew the next 5 out of the water, like beating them by 8-12 points! We lost our last game by 3 points. However, all of our losses were still great games and I think the boys learned a lot from them. Yesterday, it was unfortunate that we only had 1 sub, and then two boys actually had to leave early at the very end of the game, so we had no subs! The refs played both teams down though, so we didn't have one less player than the other team. They were a tough team yesterday and definitely one of the older ones. 

At this stage of soccer, it seems most of the really serious kids move on to travel teams, so it's hit or miss what kind of team you'll play. We noticed that most of the teams aren't great and some of those games got downright boring because we were beating them so badly. Then there are a few teams that were really good and more serious like our team is and the games were exciting. I'm interested to see what the spring season will bring. Go Sharks!

All my pics are of him on D, none in the goal. Most of the games didn't have much action for the goalies since 5 of the teams didn't score on us. Some of them didn't even cross over midfield!

Erik's cross country training helped with his endurance.

He's not afraid to get in there and intercept the ball.

And at one of his games last weekend, he got hit by the ball in the face and got a bloody nose. As soon as he was done bleeding, he was back in the game! (He also got shoved down by an opposing player, which was kind of funny because it didn't even phase him!)

A Fall Break

 My dad and Mary Lou made their annual visit to our home recently. I must admit that I was a little nervous about having company so close to Kade returning home and adjusting to our new normal. He missed at least one day of school a week since getting back, due to not feeling well, and every time I felt anxious about it. The day before they arrived, Kade missed school, however, the entire week they were here Kade missed no school and still has not. That's been nice to not have to worry about. Plus, usually when company is here I try not to schedule too many extra things, besides the usual driving kids to their various destinations, so I had some free time to visit with my dad and Mary Lou after work and while driving kids around. I felt more relaxed than I have in a while, just talking about random things and enjoying the fall weather through the eyes of Californians. 

Relaxing outside

Erik's soccer game, where they won 8-0.

My dad and I got to go to Toledo for the marching band's regional competition and see Kade perform. They took 8th place. (Though yesterday, they took 2nd place at Novi, so we've made some improvements in just the last week.)

We made some good Mexican food. Jason taught Austin and Mary Lou how to make Mexican Street Corn and we had a paper airplane flying contest for our Sunday family activity. 

What's a fall visit to Michigan without a visit to the cider mill?

Tractor driving

Animals

They treated us to lunch one day after I returned from work. 

And we got to go to cross country meets.

I love fall and enjoyed our visit!

Finding the Flow

 Life has started to resume more normally around here. I appreciate everyone's support and will continue to keep my blog posts about the activities and events my kids are doing. I will update about Kade's situation as needed.

Austin started freshman year and hit the ground running, pun intended. He's enjoying cross country and has a newfound love of keeping himself in good shape by getting good sleep, eating nutritious foods, and exercising. While we miss Victoria at times, we do not miss going to bed late with her due to all those late-night dance classes! Since Austin gets up, on his own, at 5 am every morning to make his egg sandwich and get ready for seminary, he goes to bed at 9 and the rest of us aren't far behind. It's great! Jason and I take turns driving him and will be starting a carpool with another family so we'll have even less driving to do, but we will still get up early. Going to bed early is extremely helpful for me! 

1st meet of the season and he made a PR- 19:54! Our JV rocked this meet and won by a long shot.

He's always fun to watch when he finishes. He kicks it into gear to make a big push at the end.

Yesterday's meet. It was much hotter and Austin has discovered that he runs better when it's cooler., but he still got his third-best time yesterday- 21:01!

Erik has adjusted well to getting up earlier for middle school and is also doing cross country, along with soccer, so he's pretty busy. Luckily, we have a carpool for his soccer practices. His xc practices and meets aren't as long or far away as Austin's, so they take up less time. It's good training for him to help with his soccer endurance. He's my one child who didn't want to take piano lessons, which Austin's still doing, nor be in the orchestra, which Austin and Kade are still involved in. Erik did, however, choose to play the trombone in the band and seems to enjoy that. His soccer team this season has moved up. In order to accommodate some players who needed a team, and to keep the members of our original team together, our coach decided to have us play at the U14-15 level. That means the boys are all older and bigger, and then there's Erik, whose birthday is at the end of the year, and is still 11, but he is a force to be reckoned with and can hold his own. Those boys, some of whom are taller than Jason, don't phase him one bit!

New uniforms this season.

He's on the left and he owns the ball in this pic.

He played tough D against those boys.

I love this pic of his first meet. Our friend Anna, just behind him, was determined to beat him, but she didn't!

Kade finally got back into full color guard rehearsals and even made it to the game on Friday and the competition yesterday. I volunteered for the pre-game pizza and t-shirt handout for the 8th-grade band students to join the high school marching band for the evening at band night on Friday. They performed Shake it Off. We didn't feel like going to the game on Friday, especially since our school wasn't playing and I would be volunteering the next day at the marching band competition hosted at our school, but I got to watch a few hours of their rehearsal and the run-through for the evening.

Kade is in the middle looking up at the flag.

Swinging 'round with a partner.

Since we were the host of the competition, we didn't receive a score last night, but the band performed really well and I think the performance is better this year than last year. It's going to be a great competition season! The performance is called Neo-Chroma. (I'll post a video after the season ends, as I am not allowed to yet.)

Kade starts off on the far-right platform where the Mona Lisa is. 

Victoria is living the college dream life. She goes to bed late because she hangs out with friends doing all sorts of fun activities, she makes it to all of her classes and even manages time to study for them, and she made a dance team to perform in November, some dances that she had to try out for each one individually. She's cooking and is really good at cleaning (sounds like one of the only ones who does in her apartment) and learning the life skills of living on her own. BYU I has been a great place for her!

Can you find her in this crowd?