Black Belt Testing

OK, I really feel quite well about how my black belt testing went....

I was a little nervous for last night's session, which was mostly focused on kata. I had been practicing 17 or 18 katas really intensely for the few days before that, and I was so worried that they would start to blend into one another and I wouldn't be able to keep them straight if I got a little nervous during the test.

But all said and done I performed 15 of them during the test (including one bo kata), and as far as I know, I did not switch over to Kosokun Dai in the middle of Bassai Dai... yay me!

We also did lots of basics (all Japanese terminology), three-step, endurance, a small show of bunkai, and a little taste of self defense.

Even though we knew tonight's session had a bit of everything, too..... bunkai, one-step, self-defense, free sparring, judging, and the reading of our thesis, I was surprisingly calm all of today, and really spent very little time focused on karate. The things we were covering in tonight's session weren't really things to physically prepare for.

And over all, it was really really fun!

I wasn't too worried about the bunkai, I think I could do that routine in my sleep. And if I may say, I'm really super proud of my thesis... I haven't written any kind of paper since at least Opt school, if not undergrad (Opt school thesis doesn't count since it was a group thing.... kind of). I was most nervous about free sparring, self-defense, and one-step.... in that order.

Except for a brief moment when I completely gave in to a hold of Mitchell's in self-defense (I got over it), I felt I gave {pretty much} the best I could. I say {pretty much} because sometimes it took me a little while to get really riled up enough to be fighting my hardest. When I was almost pinned to the floor in free sparring, I decided that THAT was not happening.... and now I know that I have enough fire in me to get out of a situation like that in real life. I actually can't even imagine how much more strength one would have in a real life or death situation. Crazy!

So overall I'm feeling pretty good.... although REALLY sore!

Have to present 2 katas next Thursday, with "more hips" (the story of my karate life!). And teach a class. And then I am done. (Hopefully). Phew.

Off to the tub again....

"Doing" Life

OK, so why the last blog post?

I hadn't blogged anything in forever, so why now?

I really felt, at the time, like finding those grays was gonna be life changing.

Life is passing by so quickly, and I feel like maybe I'm being too passive. I thought my recent 'find' might be a wake up call, to start happening to life, instead of letting life happen to me.

Maybe I was finally going to become the person I want to be.

But I just don't know.

I'm still really busy with 'busy' work.

And I'm tired. And I'm stressed. And I'm overwhelmed.

Life isn't stopping, or even slowing down, to let me start being the mom, wife, sister, daughter, friend, optometrist, photographer, homemaker, artist, etc.... that I want to be.

Hmmm, gonna have to find a way to 'do life' while life is happening I guess.

We'll see how it goes....

I'll keep you posted.

Or not.

Getting Older

For the first time in my life I feel old.

Last night, I found my first gray hair.

And my second. And my third.

There may be more lurking in the back, but if there is, my husband was being too kind to mention it.

OK, as I think about it, I don't actually feel old. At all.

But I feel like I must be getting old.

I mean I have *actual* gray hairs.

My reaction was surprising to both myself and C.B.

Because I definitely had a reaction.

I was really affected by this. I really can not believe it.

I kept searching my scalp, tilting my head to change the reflection of the lighting.... the grays were there, no doubt about it.

I didn't think I was the type to be bothered by this kind of thing.

And I'm probably not, really.

I'm just in awe that it's happening NOW.

I feel WAY too young to have gray hairs!!

So even though C.B. thought he was being funny this morning, don't call me Silver Fox just yet.....

I've plucked out all offenders.

I Have a Dream --by Luke L.

I have a dream that one day our earth will be clean and people would always recycle, and people would stop chewing tobacco and smoking, and I want there to be no gangs in the world.

I have a dream that people will keep recycling and those who don't will start. I want this earth to be clean so I want you to start picking up every piece of garbage you drop. I also want people to realize that our landfills can only hold so much so I want people to start recycling everything they can. Now I want to tell you our earth only lasts so long that we can't just leave our cars on for a quick trip in, we have to save our atmosphere so the best thing would be don't even ride a car, get on a bike if you can, or even better walk!

I want people to live longer so if you do anything involving tobacco stop! Smoking can kill you so if you know anybody who does, try to stop them. Now, stop chewing tobacco. I don't know if it can kill you or what, but I do know that it can be dangerous! This time it is the fact if you start it's hard to stop, and if you don't stop it could kill you, so don't start!

If you know a group of people who do bad stuff they're called gangs and you really don't want to be in or near one. First, gangs do graffiti which is vandalism. Next, gangs could really hurt you so watch out. Also, well just keep your eyes peeled because gangs can do some very bad things.

After you hear this I hope you recycle and don't do anything involving tobacco and keep out of and stay away from gangs. I hope you enjoyed my story about how I would like to change the world. The End.

-written by Luke

-MLKJr. Day (Jan. 18th), 2010

-4th grade writing assignment

(some spelling and a little punctuation was corrected for this entry, but the words are all Luke)

when has this ever happened....???

Today was the twins' 6th birthday party, and we decided to have it at Rodeo Lanes, the bowling alley here in town, since our lawn in the backyard is dead and the house is still not completely unpacked. (I'm quietly cursing all those who said to 'relax, it would take a year to move in'.... I have since slowed the unpacking process way down, almost to a complete halt...).

Anyway, back to the story....

Second game of bowling, girls (5 of them) on one side, and boys (4 of them) on the other lane. Caroline (Chelsea's cousin) bowls a strike, then Kelsey bowls a strike. Weird.

THEN....Reilly bowls a spare, then Callie bowls a spare.....and, yes, then Chelsea, bowls a SPARE!! Five little girls, all in a row. Yeah, I know....weird!!! We're talking 5 and 6 year olds here, with the exception of Caroline, but she can't be more than, like, 8!

Quick Comfort

Just a quick entry before I go to bed...

'cause, you know, I'm so good about blogging anyway.....

Tonight one of those great, warming parenting moments happened to me, and I really want to remember how awesome it felt....

Kelsey has been quite sick with a cold and congestion, and she definitely has the most trouble at night.  Tonight she was in and out of sleep while I was across from her room folding laundry.  At one point she got really worked up and was calling out, so I went into her room to see if I could comfort her.  I picked her up into my lap and snuggled a bit, and tried to ask what was bothering her, did she need a tissue or some medicine??  No response.....she was completely asleep, sitting up in my lap, hand resting on my chest.  That fast.  SO awesome.  I didn't want to put her back down, so I just held her for awhile and appreciated her.  Sometimes I feel with the twins that I rarely get special moments with just one of them.  Sometimes I feel that I don't really know each twin as an individual.  It was wonderful to connect with my little Kelse like that.  Gotta cherish these moments....

Isn't She Lovely?

I have wanted her for a long time now.  A laptop I can call my own, and not one of CB's hand-me-downs.

I decided to try a Mac.....and I am convinced (after 24 hrs) that I made the right decision.  I LOVE her!

I am excited to have a laptop that the battery won't fall out of and lose all my work.

I am excited to have a laptop that CB won't decide all of a sudden that it is the one that needs to be at the practice to support some function or another.

I am excited to have a computer where I can store all my photos and not have to worry about a kid downloading something onto it and glitching everything up.  A computer that doesn't just shut off or freeze for some unknown reason.  And a computer that will turn on again if it does get turned off!

She runs like butter and is so intuitive to use.

I LOVE her iPhoto!  And she's fast.

I hope I'm going to blog a lot more now....

All dressed up and nowhere to go.....

I have wanted to blog about these pics since I took them well over a month ago, but alas I have not made the time, as indicated by the date of my last entry. And I have been hearing about this from my 'blogger upline', so now I'm going to play a little catch up!!

On this particular day, the kids and I and Nana Ida (who was visiting from Corvallis), were all going to go for a little walk around our neighborhood to check out the new spring flowers. It seriously took us about a half an hour to get organized to leave. In that time, Miss Reilly got into the winter wear, found Luke's old Spiderman mitts and Canada flag hat, her winter boots, and her old back pack from Presby nursery school (they don't use them this year at Kids' Korner), complete with a snack or two packed inside. I don't know how long she thought this walk was going to take, but I guess long enough to need nourishment along the way.

Just as we stepped outside, it started to drizzle, and by the time we got down the length of sidewalk in front of our house, it was clear that the drizzle was turning into full-on rain. Since the rest of us were not dressed as smartly as Reilly, we decided to bag the walk for that day.

I couldn't resist snapping a couple (OK 12) photos though before we came in.

(PS - I think it's so funny that the junior-sized backpack is as big as her whole body! The twins may be small for their age, but they must be growing.....when they started at Presby at barely age 3, the backpacks went down to their knees!)

ooooohhh......I am going to have SO much fun with this.....

Make a slideshow - it's easy!

The End of the Innocence

Well, the proverbial cat is out of the bag. Luke had a sleepover at a friend's house this past weekend, and the topic of where babies come from arose between he and his friend. Friend knew the basics of the birds and the bees, and thought it was a good idea to let Luke in on the secret. C.B. happened to run a couple things over to Luke that evening just shortly after it had happened, and the other parents gave him a heads up. Then he came home and gave me the heads up.

I had all that evening and the next morning to worry and fret about it. What do you tell a very innocent 7 year old? What exactly does he know already (as of the last 12 hours)?

Yikes, I just think 7 is a little young. But from the reading I was able to do while anxiously waiting for the new, worldly Luke to come home, age 7 might be a little young, but not worlds away from when we should be having a talk about some of the basics.

Still, there's just something that changes when your kid knows about sex. He of course does not want to discuss it at all, and we left the conversation pretty much at what he'd learned the night before. I guess we just confirmed his newfound knowledge, since I don't think he necessarily believed his buddy. I hope we did the right thing. I don't think it would have been right to ignore it. And we certainly couldn't deny it. But still I wonder if we could have handled it differently. What is it about this parenting thing that always has you second guessing yourself?

One January Night at Dinner

You just gotta love kids. Sometimes I just have to laugh at the goings on in our household. If I don't write these things down as they happen, I won't remember them for long.

Heard at the dinner table tonight:

Kelsey - "These carrots are bad for me."

Reilly - "Can I take my pants off?"

Kelsey - "I don't like the jello part of the tomatoes, or the seeds. I just like the crust."

Just a few random musings from the end of our day.
I love it here....

Auntie Rop, aka Nee-Nee

Today my sister Robyn joins the ranks of the 30-somethings. What a milestone -- your 20s are over my dear. On this significant birthday, I have been thinking about my dear sister and some of the things that make our relationship unique.

*

Robyn is about the only person that I can talk to on the phone for more than 3 hours at a time, and still quite easily and quite possibly have another conversation with later that day. My husband stands in awe of this; he can't understand what two people could possibly have to talk about for that length of time. I couldn't tell you either, and probably neither could Robyn, but I do know that there is no silence on the line during that time, so we must be talking about something....

*

I remember during university, crashing on the living room floor with Robyn; no mattress, no blanket, just a jacket each to cover us overnight because she had come to the city to help me pack up my place and move yet again, just as she'd always done at the end of each school year (except that particular year we packed up the bed and the blankets by mistake...).

*

Or the time I had to drive to Tennessee for my 4-month internship, and she did not hesitate to make the 5-day trip across the country with me. (Of course it might not have been a 5-day trip if we didn't have to head due east toward the Great Lakes so SOMEONE could see Mt. Rushmore...).

*

Since I've had children, Auntie Robyn (affectionately known as Auntie Rop to Luke and Nee-Nee to the twins) has given of herself consistently in ways that are far beyond the duties of a kid sister.

*

When Luke's due date was approaching, and we thought he might be coming a little sooner than expected, who jumped in the car in Merritt, B.C. around 7 pm that evening and drove down to Corvallis, Oregon through the night, "just in case"? Yup, you guessed it.....Rop! (Turns out Luke was just trickin' us after all!).

*

Now as a sleep-deprived mother of 3, when Nee-Nee comes to visit, mama gets to sleep in! And we're not talking about just one or two mornings here. We're talkin' EVERY SINGLE MORNING that she's with us! And we're not talking kids that get up at the crack of 9 or 10. We're talkin' EARLY RISERS here! This alone is such a huge gift! I so can not wait to return that favor to her someday, so she can really understand how huge it is!

*

We are sad to live so far from Auntie Robyn now. Like a 9-hour drive wasn't far enough already. However, we do understand that the move up to the North Pole was definitely the right move to make for her at this point in her life. Thank goodness there's always those marathon phone sessions....

*

Happy 30th Robbie-Dob!!

Breakfast with Kelsey

This morning I got a rare treat....one on one time with one of my girls. I was up early to workout, and before I could sneak into the shower, Kelsey was up and around. We sat at the kitchen table and ate Cheerios together before anyone else was up. It was calm and peaceful, and I couldn't help appreciating her addition of her new pink fuzzy fedora from the dollar store to her pajama ensemble...

The blog.

What is a busy mom to do?


Three beautiful children,
creating moments and
memories every day.


A love of photos and preserving
those memories, but little time
at the end of the day to do so.




Enter blogging.


A blog.

My blog.

A place where this busy mom can tuck away
little snippets of everyday life that make up
our memories and define our family.

Little things like the snow in Meacham being taller than Kelsey.

Or Reilly falling asleep in her pillowcase.

It's a new year, and my resolution is to celebrate
these small pieces of life that define our family of 5.