Quick one!

We are mostly packed and ready to leave for the Magic Kingdom and its environs. The girls are SO excited (as are we!).

But, I had to post just to brag about how wonderfully Emmelia did at her recital this weekend. She played her first solo - a variation (Variation A, for Suzuki-ites out there) on "Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star). She did it perfectly! And she didn't seem nervous at all. I'm so proud of the progress she is making! There's a photo of her playing in my Flickr account (I can't get blogger to load images today, for some reason).

See you in November!

What I've been doing since last I blogged

Life just gets busy sometimes, you know? Here's what I've been up to since my October 5th post:

- The Deac and I became Godparents to little Abraham Joseph. The ceremony was lovely and he was very sweet and cuddly through most of it. The next day he was churched and I took him to Holy Communion for the first time. There are photos in my Flickr account if you'd like to go see. At the last minute, I decided to make little favors for the guests at the baptism out of tulle circles and Jordan almonds. They were closed with thin blue ribbon and a cross charm. I think they came out cute and were super easy to make!

- The girls played soccer. I coached Maura's team. The season is nearly done! Our last game is Saturday. It's actually been a lot of fun, but I don't think I'm going to sign up to coach in the spring. I might consider doing it again in the fall. The girls' soccer photos came out really cute.

- We played several games of Munchkin with our Munchkin-loving friends. We've also spent some fun non-Munchkin time with our non-Munchkin-loving friends.

- I attended a workshop for parents of Suzuki musicians. It was very helpful and encouraging and included loads of ideas for motivating kids to practice and develop a love for music.

- I played on Facebook some. It's fun to get in touch with friends and family I haven't seen or heard from in a while.

- I set up a plan for our evenings and mornings that is helping things get done in a less chaotic manner and we have a new routine that includes all the things we used to forget to do in the rush to get the kids either to bed or out the door in the morning. Now, they get a bath, brush teeth and hair, practice violin, clean up, pick out clothes for next day, get read to, say prayers, every night! And lunches get put together the night before so I'm not consistently late for work every morning.

- The Deac switched to his evening schedule. He now works from 2 pm to midnight 4 days a week. We are all still adjusting, but so far it doesn't seem too bad. He now drops the kids off at daycare in the mornings and gets to spend some time with them then.

- Maura's Godparents got back from their trip to Greece and brought her a cute wooden Pinocchio doll (complete with exchangeable noses!)

- We had our Parent-Teacher conference with Emmelia's kindergarten teacher. She is doing REALLY WELL in Kindergarten. The teacher evaluated each child for verbal ability and expected each one to score a 30 or less.... Emmelia scored a 76.

- Emmelia continued doing karate and got her yellow-striped belt. She's now learning the 20 forms, that has some long Japanese name I can't pronounce (but Emmelia can, at least she comes close).

- Both girls have continued in their Suzuki violin lessons. Maura is, unsurprisingly since she's been exposed at home for 2 years, picking things up really quickly. Emmelia is making strides now that we are practicing more regularly. She is playing her first solo - a variation on Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star - this weekend at a recital. Her arms are growing and I need to order her a 1/8-size violin.

- Emmelia went on a field trip to a pumpkin farm with her kindergarten class and and friend and I also took the girls to another pumpkin farm last weekend (photos in Flickr).

- My Mom had her annual Art Show at her studio. There are links in my sidebar, so please check them out!

- I had my annual physical for work and am generally healthy. Yeay!

- I volunteered in Emmelia's classroom and listened to kids read and helped with art projects.

- I helped organize and attended a meeting of the local chapter of the Health Physics Society. Tomorrow I'm going to a talk on a radiation incident that happened in Brazil 20 years ago up at CSU.

- I took the girls to the Fall Carnival at Emmelia's elementary school. They had a great time (photos in my Flickr account).

- It snowed, briefly, last weekend. But still, first snow! Maura wanted to make snow angels and was disappointed that she couldn't.

- I helped the girls decorate pumpkins with their "Potato Head" decorations (you guessed it, photos in Flickr account)

- I haven't scrapped much, but did make 3 layouts:
Simply FamilyGrape PickingDecorating Pumpkins (06)- My friend Amy (Doodleboogs at SOTB) decided to stop designing, so I guess I'm back down to 2 CTs. It has been a ton of fun working with Amy and now I'm looking forward to seeing some scrapping from her since she'll have more time on her hands!

- We are preparing for our Disney trip next week and getting really excited for it! I doubt I'll be blogging again until after we're back - so see you next month! Have a safe and happy Halloween!

Another busy week!

Wow, this week flew by! Emmelia had her belt test on Monday evening and she amazed us with how much she's learned and how focused she was. She earned her yellow-and-white striped belt and we are so proud of her for putting forth the effort!

Of course we had our usual hectic schedule including karate class, violin lesson and soccer practice. We also visited with friends a couple evenings this week. Suffice it to say that I'm looking forward to a quiet evening at home to rest, do some laundry, get the kids to bed at a decent hour, and watch Roomba clean my floors.

Last Saturday, while helping Emmelia warm up for her soccer game, I had to jog a little to catch the ball. I was pleasantly surprised to find that when I did this there was no ankle pain like I've had since my tendon release surgery! I was (and still am!) so excited about that discovery! And this week I started exercising again. I'm taking it slow, because my physical activity has been very limited since the surgery last December. But, I'm proud to say that I exercised every day this week - a big accomplishment for me! Every morning, I did a 10-minute segment of my Pilates DVD. On Monday, Wednesday and Friday, I walk/jogged along with a podcast of the Couch-to-5K running plan. On Tuesdays and Thursdays, I lifted weights. And... it's amazing how much better I feel. I've already noticed an increase in energy level and a decrease in appetite. Combining that with being very good about sticking to a low-carb diet, I've lost a few pounds already as well. So I'm very excited to keep this going and glad my ankle doesn't hurt anymore.

I didn't have a lot of time to scrap this week, but I did put together this LO of Maura that I took in August. I just love how the background paper goes with the photo. Here are the credits:
This week we managed to get all the stuff picked and ordered for the baptism next Saturday. After MUCH looking, we found the perfect baptismal outfit and baptismal cross for little Abe. The Deac and I also got him an icon of his patron saint, St. Joseph of Damascus. I'm really looking forward to becoming Abe's godmother!

Well, it's nearly time to go get the girls. Hope you all have a wonderful weekend! It's supposed to get cold here... I guess it's finally fall. I am hoping to get the supplies for a knitting project this weekend - seems like perfect knitting weather. Maybe I'll have some time to curl up and read a few more chapters of this month's book club book. I was hesitant about reading this book, but it turns out it's written by the author who wrote Everything Is Illuminated. I enjoyed that movie, and so far I'm enjoying the book, too (but I'm only a couple chapters into it).

Roomba, Hair, Violin... the times of our life

Wowzer, we had a busy weekend! On Friday, a new member of our family arrived.... actually, it's a new toy but it's so much fun and hard not to anthropomorphize. It's a Roomba vacuum - and I love it! Here's a photo of it's maiden voyage around our kitchen:
It is just so cute and fun! And it makes little happy noises... you'll understand when you have one. On the plastic covering the main unit, there was a little blurb about feeling free to modify the software of the Roomba - that it doesn't void the warranty. I thought this was odd, so looked around a bit online. Apparently there are people who don't think Roombas should be limited to vacuuming and they "hack" their units. Interesting.

We didn't get to play with it until Saturday because not only did it have to charge, but we had a lovely dinner with friends. They asked us if we would serve as Godparents for their month-old son. What an honor! I've never been asked to be a Godparent before. I am so excited and hope I make a good Godmother. The baptism will be in a couple of weeks. There's a lot to do before then! I need to get candles, a cross, a white towel... and a few other things including a christening outfit of some sort that the parents like. I would love to sew one for him, but I doubt I'll have the time in only 2 weeks. Oh, and we need to make sure we can recite the Nicene Creed by heart by then...

On Saturday, we had soccer, then went to get our hair cut at our regular Salon. We've been going to the same place for our entire marriage, and the Deac has had his hair cut by the same person for the past 21+ years! The two women who own the salon are splitting up their business and so this was our last time going there. Then we had dinner with friends and played a couple rounds of Munchkin. Love that game.

Sunday after church, Emmelia played in a recital put on by all the Suzuki String studios in our town. It was a beautiful day for an outdoor concert and was just lovely to sit around and listen to violins, violas and cellos being played by all different age groups for a couple of hours. The concert/recital was held in the yard of an old house in the middle of town that is now owned by the city and rented out for events such as this. We toured the house a bit and it was lovely. Both girls said they'd like to live there. Hee! I took a few photos of the kids around the grounds that are in my Flickr account if you want to take a look. I was doubly proud of Emmelia at the recital because as she got up to play, she realized her shoulder rest had fallen off her violin! It was *somewhere* on the grounds, but we didn't know where (we later found it under a chair). She soldiered on and played anyway and did a great job (but that's why her posture is a tad unnatural-looking)! Here's some photos of her and the pre-twinkler group:
And here's one of both girls on a bench after the recital. Unfortunately the light was turning into hard afternoon light by that time, otherwise it could've been a great photo. This is the last recital Maura won't be in, I think - even next time she'll at least get up with the group and move her bow to the rhythm.
And, last but not least, here are some scrap layouts I made last week. I am trying to finish scrapping our 2005 Disney trip before we leave for our next one at the end of this month! I've been using a lot of items by Christine Beasley from her series of freebies called "Dream Trip." You can still download them from her blog (check the archives). Click on the layout title to see credits.

Disney 2005:
Cinderella-bration:
Disney Snacks:
Life looks like it might slow to a reasonable rate this week (yeay!). Not much is going on besides Emmelia testing for her yellow-striped belt in karate tonight. Hope everyone has a great week!