Ancestry, Back to School, Punching Faces, Cross Country, Single Momming, Youth Council

I thought things would calm down after school started...well I was wrong--haha!  Two nights before the official start of school was the Jr. High's back to school night.  Josh was excited to be starting 9th grade.  He is also excited for the Lumberjack Club (pancake club) to start up again.  He did his first live school video announcement for Lumberjack club yesterday and they had their first breakfast this morning.  Josh loves him some pancakes for sure!  

Last Tuesday was the elementary's back to school night.  Since my kids can't seem to miss a photo opportunity we HAD to stop to take pictures when they spotted the decorated chalkboard with the signs to hold in the hallway during back to school:

 The kids were all excited for their teachers and in meeting them they all were really nice so I hope we all have a good year.  An interesting side note is that all the 6th grade will be given their own individual laptop computers to use and take home every day to do their home on.  Of course they don't get to keep them, but being able to use them throughout the year is pretty cool.  I told Daniel multiple times to take care of the laptop because if anything happens to it we will be on the hook for $500.  So you can see why I have told Daniel how important it is to be gentle with his laptop!!

Daniel is still doing soccer, but let me just say the city recreation department is not very organized.  They assign the teams from all the kids that sign up, but they also assign coaches for the teams without ever asking if the people can coach or not.  So with Daniel's team one of the dads was assigned to be the coach without ever being asked and it turns out the poor guy couldn't coach this season which left Daniel's team without a coach.  The first week of practices an employee from the recreation department coached, but then told the parents that someone would need to step up and become the coach for the rest of the season.  All the parents hummed and hawed around so Aaron stepped up and coached the first practice telling everyone that he could only coach that one time since  he has never played soccer and really didn't feel comfortable trying to coach a team of 11-12 year olds who probably know how to play soccer more than Aaron.  Well no one stepped up for the next practice so Aaron unofficially got  volunteered (more like 'voluntold')  to be the coach whether he wanted to or not.   Lucky for the team they are pretty decent and have won all the games they have played so far.  Wahoo!  However, this week Aaron had to go on a business trip so he had to find some substitute coaches for two of the games while he was gone.  Even with the two different coaches this week their team still won their games.  Wahoo!  It is fun to watch them play because they are at the age where the kids really know how to play the game so it keeps things interesting.  It is fun to watch Daniel because of the past four games he has scored 10 of the goals.  That makes it more fun to watch when your own kid can kick a few goals.

Speaking of Aaron he left for a business trip this week.  It was crazy trying to juggle everything between all the kids by myself.  I think I may have spent more time in the car this week than at home...not really it just seemed that way.  Aaron got to go to California and was mean enough to text me his so called 'work' pictures of him on the beach:

 And eating a fish and chips lunch in a balmy 76 degrees at a restaurant next to the beach:

Don't get me wrong Aaron really did have to work on this trip.  He only sent the pictures to say he wished I was there with him since I love the beach and really love fish and chips, but it didn't make the ordinary leftovers we were all eating back in Utah taste any better, though--haha!

All the while I am dragging my kids around in 100 degree weather according to the van's thermometer:

Did I mention that my kids were not loving the 100 degree weather as they were melting while watching Daniel's soccer game:

Anyway, it was the first day of school last Wednesday.  Matthew's bus pick up time is super early so I didn't get a picture of all the kids together since the youngest three were still asleep when Matthew left for school.  Here's my cute boy Matthew on his first day back to school in high school:

 Here's Josh who is still in Jr. High:

 Daniel:

 Sarah:

 Noah:

 Aaron stayed home that morning to help out because getting everyone dressed, fed, supplies divided out, multiple forms signed makes for a hectic morning and some serious writers cramp--haha! To show a true clip of what it was like trying to get everyone ready was portrayed perfectly in this comic Aaron found:

Anyway, we walked the elementary kids to school and dropped them off at their classes.

 After dropping the kids off Aaron and I headed out to have our annual "The kids are back in school and we survived the summer" breakfast.

What a crazy morning!

The next day Daniel got to miss his first half day of school since he had to updose his cashew at the allergist's office.  He was messing around with my phone and was taking selfies while we were waiting to make sure he would tolerate the higher dose of cashew:

 Daniel's OIT (oral immunotherapy) program for cashew has been going great.  We hit our first hiccup this past week, though.  Ever since he has been eating the cashew nut instead of the cashew flour it has been upsetting his stomach.  Since it has been happening for the past two weeks they had to lower his dose from 1 1/2 cashew back down to 1 cashew daily to get his body to adjust for the next two weeks.  I am not excited about this since it extends the treatment by two weeks, but Daniel can't be feeling sick and icky either.  Hopefully things will resolve in the next two weeks and he will be back to regularly updosing without a problem.  Keeping my fingers crossed!

Last week I had my orientation for the flu shot clinic which I am doing again this year.  It is crazy that it is that time again.  This year has gone by pretty fast.  I am excited to start 'shooting' people again, though.  That's pretty fun--haha!

For Amazon Prime Day this year Aaron and I took advantage of the 23 and Me DNA kits.  We got our results back last week and found a few surprises.  I knew I was heavily European, but was surprised when Ashkenazi Jewish showed up as well.  What?!  Here's my ancestry breakdown:

Aaron was mostly European, but was surprised to find he had some Sub-Saharan African in his blood.  Here is his ancestry breakdown as well:

It was interesting to see what our ancestral DNA results.

In the past two weeks Josh has had two more Cross Country meets.  He has been enjoying running still which is a plus.  Here he is during a meet in Fruit Heights:

 Here is the starting line for the Junior Varsity teams from multiple schools this past week at a meet in Layton:

Josh did great there, too:

Things have been a bit hectic, but I think we are finally starting to settle into a routine.  However, the kids still keep things interesting.  Yesterday Noah came home from school and burst into tears when he walked in the front door.  Looking at him he had a swollen lip and blood all around his mouth.  I asked him what happened as I was cleaning his face off.  I guess during last recess a boy asked Noah to play with him and Noah didn't want to so the boy pushed Noah off the slide.  Noah hit his chin and mouth on the slide as he fell which gave him a nice bleeding fat lip.  It was still oozing blood 30 minutes after it happened the poor kid.  Here's what it looked like after I cleaned it up:

 He got a nice bruise on his chin as well--the poor kid.

 It looks pretty sore today, too:

Anyway, school can be hard sometimes.  However, let me say that there is balance in the world.  After Noah walked through the front door when school was over Sarah followed shortly after and had a guilty look on her face.  I asked her what was wrong when she burst into tears and told me she accidentally punched someone in the face.  What?!?  How can you accidentally punch someone in the face?!  Also if you know Sarah you know she is timid and quiet and this was so out of character for her!  She tried to explain what had happened, but she was having a hard time since she was crying about it.  Daniel then walked through the front door and told me the whole story.  Daniel had been walking home with a friend from our neighborhood who had been teasing Sarah.  I guess not really teasing, but more being annoying toward Sarah.  I guess Sarah had heard enough and punched the poor kid in the nose giving him a bloody nose and making him cry.  Daniel had walked the poor kid home to make sure he was ok while Sarah came to our house and told me what had happened.  I was in shock.  That is so out of character for Sarah!  She did feel really bad about what had happened though.  I texted the boys parents to make sure the kid was okay and he was.  He was probably more surprised at what happened, but don't get me wrong, I am sure it didn't feel very good either!  Just when you think you know your kids they go off and truly surprise you!  I did talk to Sarah about how that wasn't okay.  However, when Aaron got home late that night he was glad Sarah could stick up for herself and not take any flak from anybody.  It was pretty crazy.  Who knows maybe that's what growing up with 4 brothers will do for you?!

Josh had his first welcome meeting with all the Youth Council members new and old as well as the advisors last night.  He got recognized as being a new member as well as for his leadership position:

He is pretty excited to get started on all the projects for this year.  His first project will be in two weeks so it is coming quickly.  I am excited that he will be able to participate in such an awesome program this year and for the leaders that make programs like this possible!

 Aaron got back from his trip late last night.  I was counting down the hours since I had hit my parenting max on patience, but I had to dip into my reserves since his flight got delayed by almost two hours--ugh!!  By the time he got home it was almost midnight.  It was murder trying to get up to get the kids to early morning piano this morning.  In trying to look at things on the bright side, though, I got to see a beautiful sunrise.  I didn't realize how dirty my windshield was until after I posted this picture.  Oh well it didn't detract from seeing the sunrise, though.  However, I may be getting the car washed sooner than later, though--haha!

Here's to a crazy first week of school.  I hope we get settled into a good, steady routine soon with not too many surprises (like punching people in their face surprises--haha!)