TCU cheer

Pure excitement was in the air. The kids were so joyful that Gramma & Grampa and Harley were coming that they decorated the sidewalk with chalk to welcome them.

 Daisy drew Harley. We all applauded her effort, but agreed that was a picture of a cat, not a dog.

 Shortly after they arrived, we whisked Gramma away to Daisy's cheer performance at the TCU women's basketball game.

Daddy and Zekers had a scout obligation and Grampa stayed behind with Harley.

 Daisy is one of the oldest on her squad, and she is a wonderful base.

 See that little Wildcat at the bottom of the picture? It just happened to be the TCU-KSU game. Bonus!

 This is after their performance. The TCU cheerleaders made a tunnel for the girls to walk through (you can see them at the right of the picture). Daisy loved that.

 Gramma and my purple was KSU purple, but Daisy's was TCU purple.

 So happy that Gramma was able to see Daisy in action.

 We were lucky enough to have both grandmas in attendance. Vivi brought along her childhood friend Jim.

 So blessed to have both of these ladies to love on us and make us feel special.

 Always the cheeky little monkey.

 We grabbed a couple cheerleaders after the game for a photo op.

This is Daisy's inspiration, Carlyle. She first met Carlyle at Kids Kamp at church when Daisy was 3 years old. Daisy instantly loved Carlyle as her favorite teacher at Kids Kamp and she has never been replaced, even after 7 years. When Carlyle became a TCU cheerleader Daisy was over the top excited to personally know a TCU cheerleader. Now Daisy's cheer teacher is her mom, so Carlyle popped in to watch this performance.

 After a long day, Daisy and Gramma enjoyed some snuggles.

Conquering Camp Carter

I'm so glad that my Daisy still wants me to go on field trips with her. We even get to sit together on the bus. 

I wish I could always walk around with this filter. Minus the bear ears and nose.

The Camp Carter field trip is reserved for 5th graders in FWISD. They started with a pre-test. 

They taught us about geology and fossils and then we searched for fossils. 

Then we did archery. 

After that it was lunch time.

Here are all 60 5th graders.

And here is my Daisy.

Then we went on a long hike.

Next we heard a legend about Grandmother Tree, a Native American tale about a boy who ends up in the tree, where the hump is. 

"If you listen, you can hear him." They all tried, but no one heard a ding dong thing.

Daisy was all about feeding the cute little goats.

All in all, a fun day with my Daiser.

The Dark Road

Zeke's Advanced Theatre  competed in the FWISD UIL One Act Play. There were A TON of after school practices, which ran from 4:30-6:00 and sometimes 6:30, plus many Saturdays.

 The play was called The Dark Road. It was a very dark, heavy show set during World War II. It is the story of two German sisters caught up in the events of WWII. One chooses evil, the other good. We learn the dark road to evil is not a short, immediate journey. It is one step at a time: one decision to ignore your conscience after another, until you believe that good is evil and evil is good.  The Dark Road is a true story of a female guard who is tried and convicted of war crimes. Pretty heavy stuff. 

These middle schoolers pulled it off magnificently.

As they say in the theatre, there are no small parts, just small actors. Zekers had just a few lines this time around, but he performed them superbly. He was the intern who was learning about the heinous treatment of Jewish prisoners in the infirmary.

 He begins unwrapping the wound and asking questions.

 We see the wound is gruesome.

 The doctor explains that they would inject the wounds with shards of glass and cow dung to see how the body would react.

 The intern felt the patient was burning up, and learned her temperature was 106.

 He showed some empathy, but the patient collapsed and died. 

He and the doctor then nonchalantly decided to go grab some lunch and left the deceased lying on the ground.

 The show ended with the evil sister being hung for war crimes.

The observant intern.

 We're so proud of our Zekers!

 They performed the show at ALA for the parents, then again at University Interscholastic League. UIL exists to provide educational extracurricular academic, athletic, and music contests. [Sidenote: For all the non-Texan readers, the UIL was created by the University of Texas at Austin in 1910 and has grown into the largest inter-school organization of its kind in the world.]  Like they say, everything's bigger in Texas. ;)

The first week there were 6 teams competing on Friday and 6 teams on Saturday. The top 3 were chosen each day to advance to finals the following Saturday. ALA earned 2nd, solidifying their spot in finals. At finals, they placed 2nd overall! So glad all that hard work paid off!

 I'm very proud of my Zekers. He sacrificed scouting trips and Stage Right lock-ins and lots of free time. What a valuable lesson to learn that hard work and perseverance is rewarded.

Lovin' On Our Little Loves, Improv Style

Carrying on our tradition, Abe and I celebrated our love for each other by treating the people who were created because of that love extra special.

They chose their favorite meal--spaghetti.

 We always go fancy and bust out actual glass dishes.

 These 2 boys have a special bond.

 Happy Valentine's Day to DanFam5.

 For theatre class, Zeke needed to go to see an improv act that night. Since start time was start close to Daddy, Daisy and Eli's bedtime, we had a mommy/son date.

 Since it was improv, they called people from the audience to go on stage to be part of the show. Zeke and I were called. We stood behind the guys and moved their arms for them. We didn't feel like we did a good job, but it was fun. My friend said afterward one of the guys in the show told her I did better arms than any other time they did that...if that was the best I'm thinking maybe they should cut that bit. Just sayin'.

Zeke and his buddy Jonah were the only 2 from his class there. They both got called to go on stage. This guy works for FWISD Advance Academics and periodically comes to their class to talk about improv. He is in the show, which is why the kids were invited. He happens to go to our church. There were several church friends there as well as Carlson friends, so that was fun.

 Zekers was a good Valentine's date.

I would also like to wish my brother a happy heavenly birthday on Valentine's Day. Maybe that's why I like to make Valentine's about family love since it is also Steve's day.