Lego Star Wars - For the millionth time, i didn't make this

This is one of the boys favorites so I thought I would share it for any of you that have not already seen it 1000 times.

Aunt Olivia

Olivia is here again. It has been a fun first few days with her and we are so glad she was able to come this year. It is hard when we only get to see her once a year. She looks so grown up and today Lorenzo’s doctor asked where she was going to collage, we both laughed when we told him she was only going into high school. The boys have loved the extra attention and she is so good with them. We were reminiscing about a few years ago when Lorenzo and she would fight and every time she got near him he would scream “don’t look at me” he now follows her around everywhere and is her little shadow. It has been really good for him to have her here.

Ward Choristers

I have not sung in many choirs but have played in many bands, orchestras, groups etc and while playing I have never had a conductor take a repeat or section that is similar in cut time or change the tempo dramatically unless it was called for in the music. So why is it that choristers in church feel like they need to mess around with the tempo? This is one of my biggest pet peeves! I hate it when I am in church singing and enjoying the music and all of the sudden while singing Called to Serve the chorister decides to cut the tempo in half and half of the congregation is still singing it in the tempo we started and everyone is off not to mention it is almost painful to sing it that slow. Don’t get me wrong small tempo changes are fine and when it is appropriate but why cant people save their dramatic tempo changes for ward choir instead of while singing congregational hymns. It really takes away from the spirit of they hymns. Am I off in my thinking? Sorry but I had to get this off my chest thanks for letting me get up on my soapbox.

As summer has officially begun out here I have to say that while I thought it would bring more time at home and less running around all over town I WAS WRONG!!! Aside from our regular 2+ doc. appointments a week for Lorenzo everyone got this nasty virus and I have had some kind of doctor appointment 8 times in the last 10 days. While Monday’s was not planed and the nearly 5 and ½ hrs at the ER were not fun I only had Liam (who had a double ear infection) for most of it because Jeremy was able to come up and get the kids after he got home from biking to work. Funny he has been biking to work to try and save us in gas but a lot of the time he finds himself jumping in the car after his ride home to come and meet us at some appointment.

On the bright side I cancelled Lorenzo’s appointment yesterday as a good friend, Shelle Napier whom we met while in RI was here. We were able to go to lunch and here is the kicker, Lorenzo and Liam stayed with a babysitter… per their request! It was so nice to be able to just visit and enjoy Shelle’s contagious laugh and not have to worry about the kids wanting to go. It was so nice to see her, I hope our paths cross again!

Riley starts his summer class at the University of Hawaii tomorrow so I know that I should not even be complaining about running around town as that has not even started yet, but oh well, it is for a good cause. We are trying to work it so that Jeremy can drop him off in the a.m. before work so that I will not have to stay up there all day with the kids and wait. I do not now about you guys but gas here is 4.12 and that is for unleaded, we are trying to cut back on our needless driving although we do not do much of that. I guess we could stop violin lesson that are also down town but Lorenzo is really starting to love it and it seem times when that kid is happy are few and far between so we will press on!

Happy Boys Day

On this day Japanese families celebrate Tango-no-Sekku, the Boys' Festival. With its special customs and observances, it is Japan's way of celebrating the healthy growth and development of her young boys. We clebrate this holiday along with girls day now that we live in Hawaii. it is a big deal at their school and the boys came home with lots of traditional Japanese treats including kakai mochi and other things we have grown used to. So go love your boys today! As a side not when I first heard of this holiday I thought it was a joke. It was not untill I had all of these wonderful goodies and treats brought to me on March 3rd (Girls Day) that I realized there really was such a thing as Girls Day and Boys Day.

Surprise Visitor

We got a call a few nights ago from a man trying to find the home of Jeremy and Briana Ward well it turned out to be a friend of ours from Rhode Island, Don Loomis who’s ship had just pulled in and wanted to hitch a ride to church on Sunday. It was fun to see him and catch up on how his family is doing. It is amazing how fast time fly’s. I had his oldest daughter Lindsey for girl’s achievement and now she is 12. They gave us one of our first introductions to life in Hawaii when Lindsey brought in a picture of herself and sister picking up giant slugs with chopsticks.

Scholarship program

We got a phone call today to let us know that Riley has been selected for the Summer Learning Scholarship to attend UH's Summer Laboratory School. He had to write a short paper on why he wanted to attend and then his teachers had to rank the students on their GLO's (General Learner Outcomes) I told him not to get his hopes up as they were only selecting 2 students from the whole school and only one for the Laboratory School. We were very surprised to learn that he was chosen. He will be in either the marine biology or robotics class, we are not sure what one he is going to be placed in but he is really excited. Now all I have to do is worry about getting him up there every day during the 4 weeks that it runs, but we will figure it out!