Flames in the kitchen and other records of the week

1.  I am proud to say that I made it 18 years of marriage without catching the kitchen on fire.

2.  Also proud that the first flames in the kitchen were small, caused no damage, and that I hadn't left the room.  Otherwise I would be posting something different.

3.  David's truck wins the record of still plugging along, after many resucitations along the way.  Unfortunately, that streak is about to end, this weekend.  That call came not long after I put out the flames.

4.  There is probably no computer that has been in the shop more often than ours.  Seriously.  It crashed again early this week, after only having it home for a week. 

5.  Our laptop is on its last leg as well.  The rugged built laptop, made to endure drops on rocks, weather, etc has not been able to withstand the use of our children.  The computer guy says they have never had one of those break.  My kids broke their record.  Currently, we put masking tape on the screen to hold it together while we are using it.  Not kidding.

(See, we are on a roll of a record breaking week around here.)

6.  While that was going on we were figuring out how best to handle the wildlife that has taken residence in our attic.  It has been approximately,  6 or 7 years since this has happened.

7.  $$$ = the amount of money it will take to get rid of such critters, as we need to do house repairs, etc first.   It was on the list to do anyway, but we were waiting until we caught up on our budget after the summer.  Umm....

8.  The dishwasher has been resucitated  many times as well.  I believe it is also giving up the ghost.  We are still using it, and just rewashing those items that don't get clean.  I believe, as the mom, I will be handwashing dishes for a while, leading another section of home economics to my children as they learn to appreciate a dishwasher while handwashing dishes.

9.  My ankles pronate (roll in).  Always have.  Two of my children inherited this trait.  Only assuming one had, I took this child to the doctor who then delcared those feet the worst of the week in their office.  Yay.  Later that evening we looked at all of our lovely children's feet, and discovered one other has it too.  If not worse than the other.  Yay. So, now we are looking at high dollar shoes and inserts for these kiddos feet.

(I mean, really - computers, feet, trucks, fires, wildlife- in 5 days????)

10.  The horse dog finally finished off the rose bush.  One less thing for me think about.

11.  $$$$$$$$$$ - amount it will cost us to deal with all of these award winning, record breaking accomplishments.

We have joked, and said to ourselves, "really??",  "seriously??" many, many times to ourselves and each other this week.  The kids are now frantic, and keep asking if we will be poor and broke.  We respond,  "We won't be broke, but we will need to watching our spending very closely and only do and get those things which are necessities. " "Yes, we will." :) 

Then we tell them, but we have each other.  We are still here to pray for our friends who are dealing with much much worse.  We are dealing with earthly things.  Things that won't go with us after we are gone.  We aren't battling cancer, marital issues, hurricanes (well maybe on that one - Sara Beth is headed to the coast tomorrow for a week long sea lab field trip and Isaac is on its way).

And God knows.  And for that we are very, very thankful.

July = Swim, swim, and more swim

Well, it appears that we are officially a swim family.  July was spent at more swim meets than I care to remember, but all resulted in great swims for the kids.  Between that and the olympics, our kids are  more determined and motivated than ever to give it their all. 

So, July was one swim meet after another.  Thursday nights were our fun summer league team, weekends were our competitive team.  

First our fun league.  It's what started all this to begin with anyway.  We have been swimming with this team every summer since '05, with the exception of one year when we took a break.  It culminates with a big city championship meet at the end of July.  For all of those summers, my kids have watched other kids (mostly year round swimmers) receive one of the coveted high point winner trophies.  We just weren't in that league yet, although they each would place well in separate individual events and come home with ribbons and medals.  This year, after a year of long hard work, it finally paid off.  Sara Beth came home with 2nd runner up and Jake came home with 5th runner up.  So proud of these kids and their persistence.   Katie came home with 4 medals (which are awarded 1st-7th place, 8th-16th get ribbons), sad she didn't get any ribbons and suprisingly sad she didn't get a trophy.  We told her if she kept working, it would pay off, and that her siblings didn't get one when they were 8 either.  It doesn't help that the competition is broader at that age as well.  She was none the less happy for Jake and Sara Beth and has her eye already on next summer.

For our competitve league, the long course season (50 meter length pool) culminates with a regional championship in July.  There are qualifying times required to go, so it gives the kids a goal to work towards, besides just bettering their time.  Well throughout long course season, we could see that this was in reach for Sara Beth and Jake.  (Katie is a little young yet).  Jake was so determined, that at the end of June he made a cut for his 100 breast.  He was so excited.  Problems came in when the championship meet was the same week as our church youth group mission trip and he had been looking forward to this trip for several years.  The meet was also a big trip with plenty of expenses.  A tough decision.  He decided that if he could make another cut or if Sara Beth made a cut that he wanted to go.  We were fine with that.  At a meet in early July, he made his cut in the 50 breast.   Whoo, whoo- championship meet here we come.  Sara Beth,  not to be out done by Jake, started working so hard, pushing herself.  The Friday before the championship meet, she had one more chance.  And she did it- she made a cut in the 100 breast.  (For me watching it, was so terribly nerve wracking.  David said it looked like I was about to throw up).   And as a special bonus, the coaches put together a cute little relay team of 8 yr old girls (siblings of some of the older swimmers) so Katie also got to swim in the championship meet. 

Fun facts:

- Our team is made up of great kids and parents.

- Out of town meets are a blast (and also expensive :) )
- Our kids got really motivated to come home and work harder

- They got to swim in the same pool where the Olympians were training a week earlier - way cool
- We are glad that we are on break at the moment. :)

Sara Beth in third lane from the top

Jake coming in with his backstroke in the relay

Katie warming up