M&S Harris Family: May 2013

I went almost a whole school year without posts and now I've done three in a row - yahoo! May is off to a great start, well already more than half way over...All the end of the school year events are rolling by. Zelle and Abby finished their soccer seasons, and Zelle's team won their whole league, which was exciting and fun for her. She played great and was an awesome defender. Abby's team finished fourth, which she wasn't too happy about. She does NOT like to lose...She gives it her all on the field, which is what's fun to watch about her, but then it takes her a little while to shift gears back down to regular speed :). Cute Abs. They also had their piano recital this past week, where they both played pieces they've been working on for the past few weeks/months. They both did really well and I was proud of their hard work! Claire also played beautifully, and we got to see her there with Bec. To celebrate our hard-working musicians, we went to frozen yogurt after the recital. So fun. Last weekend, these two musicians also had a strings concert, which is always fun.

One morning I woke up to find these cute readers upstairs...Susie is in the other chair, but you can't see her. Lishey

Goose hydrating at her game

Number one, oh yeah! Loves her new cleats in a big way

Abby and Zelle after their strings concert

Eating lunch en route to drop Suse back off at school after piano. This girl logs some serious miles in the car (the "ban" as she says, can't quite say van)

Frozen yogurt with Claire after Zelle, Abby and Claire's piano recital.

Goose feeding Geese at Wheeler Farm

Goose getting lots of "kisses" from baby lambs at the Country Fair. I think they were licking the cotton candy off her face...

Pony ride!

Loving the train ride...

Playing vet upstairs

Finally, after two years, Amelia's marker is installed

Zelle and her soccer team after winning the championship!

Lu with her completed castle made out of pizza boxes and Pringles cans

Goosie in her dance costume

Lu and her friend with their creation "Gummybear Mania" that took their whole play date

In other news, Lu turned in her castle for the beloved 4th grade castle project. She worked hard on this over the past few weeks, and it was completely her project. I just took her to buy a few supplies at the craft store and did the spray painting. Other than that, she planned it all and built it all. I love the way she puts things together and has such attention to detail. It's fun to know that anything she makes will be great. She also got to play soccer with Abby's team today right after her game, since Abby's team was low on players. She loved that and hung really well, except that she got stepped on by a girl twice her size...ouch!

Susie and Goose absolutely loved the Waterford Country Fair carnival yesterday after school. They played games, rode the train, pet animals at the petting zoo, ate tons of junk, and had a great time. They were in heaven. I also got to go on Goosie's field trip to Wheeler Farm yesterday morning. What a cute age! She has a darling preschool class, and I love her teachers. It's been a great year for her, and she loves school.

Suse scored a goal in her freezing cold, wet soccer game today. I had a moment today where I thought back to Susie as an infant when I had just been assigned a case worker from the "Blind Babies Foundation," and thought if I could have seen her chasing a ball around today, and doing all the things she loves to do, I wouldn't have believed it - lots to be grateful for! Goose was all "suited up" and ready for her soccer game today when it got cancelled due to rain. She was SO disappointed and let us know about it for about 20 minutes. Tonight, Zelle and Abby both have separate babysitting jobs. They like but don't love babysitting, which I totally remember feeling that way :).

As for me, I'm pooped this week. 5 of 7 of us came down with the stomach flu this past week. So between being sick myself (on the same day as Mark, that's never good...) and cleaning up after other sick people, I'm tired. Then Mark had a two day golf tournament with his brother down in Provo, so above-mentioned games and carnivals were Mom going solo. I remember a distant conversation about moving to Utah where I said something about him playing golf with his family a lot if we moved here....naaah, that'd never happen.

I love the beautiful spring rain we've been having. I have so much to be grateful for. xoxo!

We love the beginning of spring here in Utah. It feels like a celebration when you see the tulips coming out and the blossoms on trees after the long winters. One of Natty's favorite things to do in all our car time together :) is to look for the tulips and blossoms. She screams out "tulips!" or "a blossom tree!" even when they're every few feet - pretty fun.

This also means we've been getting outside more, some of the time for soccer games. With Zelle and Abs playing Waterford soccer, we've taken the younger girls with us to their games where they do homework and play on school playgrounds while we watch the games together. It's been really fun. It also means there are fewer weekend games, which makes it all more manageable. Natalie has even been playing on a little neighborhood team with a bunch of 3 and 4 year olds. It's hilarious. I keep meaning to get a picture of all 5 of our girls in their uniforms...I'll send it when I do.

In other Natalie news, she chopped her hair super short in the very front on...school picture day. She must be my 5th child because I thought it was hilarious. I don't let her know this, of course. I gave her the serious talk about not cutting your hair, but the timing and everything was just too funny. She is becoming quite the social butterfly, always wanting playdates and saying "who can I play with today?"

Suse is plugging along loving soccer, gymnastics, reading the Twits by Roald Dahl and giving me grief with practicing :)...highlight of my day. She is testing me with boundaries and my commitment to everything from chores, to wearing her eyepatch, getting her hw done, practicing. I'm sure I'll look back on this and think why did it wear me out so much, but that is the reality right now!

Lu just finished her first school play. She was Rip Van Winkle's daughter, Judith, in the play "Rip Van Winkle." It was very cute and well done, and she had a great time doing it. She's told me a few times this week how she misses play practice. She is becoming a wiry little athlete, too. I don't know about other people's mile times as kids, but I never ran it under 7 min and she ran it in 6:50 or something as a 4th grade girl. Maybe that's not that fast, but that's way faster than I ever did it. And in soccer, it's really fun to watch her. She doesn't hold her position at all - just runs all over the field - but she takes the ball up the field whenever she can, dribbles around a couple of girls and shoots several times a game. She's been the only scorer in the past couple of games, and scores a few each game. She loves it and plays soccer with the boys every day at recess. For medieval day, she wanted to be a jester. I think she was the only one in her class, and said there were maybe 2 others in the grade. All the other girls want to be princesses (of course), so it's fun to watch her personality unfold. I'm seeing more tomboy sportiness and she loves to do her own thing and be her own person.

Abby is loving soccer, babysitting, and friends. She's become a pretty social butterfly, too, which you could always tell was in her personality even as a baby. She had a great time babysitting with a friend last night, and went to a "spa" birthday party the night before. She is determined and self-motivated, which is really helpful as a mom. Sometimes that translates into getting on her sisters' cases about what they're not doing or should be doing, but as a mom, it's great to have a child who tells you what they need for a project the week before it's due, and who you know when you ask her to get something done, she will.

Zelle continues to love soccer, is making good friends this year, and works hard in school and piano (at times). She has made some cute friends this year, and we had 7-8 of them home with us after school last weekend so they could hang out and get ready for the middle school dance later that night...yikes, dances. Anyway, they're a loud, giggly, cute group of girls. She made a timeline of events in ancient world history that blew me away. She continues to learn and love learning in a way that's impressive to me. She also has been very cute with her latest piano piece. It's a really hard Brahms piece, "Hungarian Dance." After kind of stinking it up in her last recital, she's decided she wants to nail this one, so I hope she does in a couple of weeks. In any case, she's worked hard on it.

We celebrated Mark's birthday last weekend and had his parents and Mea over for dinner. He's a great husband and Dad. He had the YM over this week for swimming and games at our house, and does a lot of great things with the boys. He's also working on a 45 minute talk (which he keeps reminding me how long that is! :) ) that he's giving tomorrow morning for the seminary kids at Olympus High.

I'm loving my life. I always hope I'm prioritizing well and putting the things that matter most first. I struggle daily with that, and fitting in all the things I would like to, as all adults do. I'm also constantly struggling with that fine balance between motivating (read nagging) the girls to get the things done they need to, and being a mom who's available, loving, patient and occasionally fun. It's a great journey, though. We feel grateful every day for the amazing lives we have.

Natty's self haircut...lovely (and you can see she feels a lot of remorse)