Baseball

Baseball has been keeping us really busy so far this summer. Max has been playing Super League with the Orangemen and city league with the Braves. He has organized baseball six nights a week and then spends hours with his dad playing and practicing. He is also taking pitching lessons on top of everything else. Max has had a great year and with all of his hard work, continues to improve. His best week was going 4 for 4, even after nearly getting his nose broken. He has really enjoyed playing on the Braves team and has had some amazing plays. He is playing "up"so the boys are 9-10 years old. He also had one night of playing in a Major League game with a team that was short players. There he was playing with boys who are 11-12. He looked so tiny out there but was not intimidated at all. He loves pitching on the Braves team and I have been really impressed with his focus and composure on the mound. I don't know if I like the stress of watching him pitch but he seems unfazed by the pressure. He has three more city games and then the Tournament of Champions with the Orangemen. At the end of August the fall league will start back up. We love baseball!

PS- I am desperately missing my "big" camera and need to make an investment soon in that department...

Baby Thoughts

The countdown is on! Only a few more weeks until we have a new baby boy in the house. I feel panicked and excited all at once. I am just not ready. I am so busy with my other three kids that I hardly have time to think about getting things done. I am extremely uncomfortable so it will be nice to be done with that feeling and it has been a pretty hot summer so far. 

I got to see him at an ultrasound last week. He kept his face tucked in pretty well so we didn't get to see much but the ultra sound tech did say that he had a lot of hair and is measuring about two weeks ahead of schedule. Unfortunately, the doctor won't move the due date up. 

I gave away all my boy clothes a few years ago and have had to start stocking up again. Of course, it seems like there is nothing cute for a boy but everything for girls is adorable. 

I have made the same mistake during my last three pregnancies... I did not really buy any maternity clothes. At this point, nothing fits and everything is uncomfortable. I always think that during the summer I don't need much to wear because I am not working but every time I regret not getting anything maternity. There is just so much regular clothes can cover. 

We are still not 100% sure on names. Max now likes the name Cash. Jason and I like that name but are still not completely sure. Klein comes up with some interesting choices like "College" for example. Preslee doesn't know what is going on but must have a sense that things are going to change. She constantly follows me around wanting to be held and crying. Things could get tricky for a while. 

Jason has been working in the basement every spare minute and I have had my sewing machine out trying to catch up on projects. We can't wait to meet this little guy!

I wonder who he will look like... 

Here are my three babes as newborns... 

Max

Klein 

 Preslee

School is OUT!

I am thrilled to be out of school for the summer! I love my job and I love teaching but I really love being at home with my kids for the summer. The summer after Max was born, I made a huge to do list and was really disappointed when I didn't get much accomplished. Since then I have thrown out any expectations and focused on having fun with my kids and relaxing. 

Pretty much this post is about random things that have been happening over the past month. Klein finished a great year of preschool. She can write her name and knows all of her letters, numbers, colors, and shapes. She is a great little student and loves school. Here is a picture of her on one of her last days. She is not really into just smiling for the camera but thinks up crazy poses every time. 

Here she is hanging out at the park during baseball. Her hair is down to her waist and she loves it long but hates having it combed or styled. I am not sure what to do with it.

Preslee at the park pulling a cheesy grin. She is growing up... notice her little pony tail.

Max has two more weeks of Super League. They have only lost two games in league play this season. He was thrilled when his cousin Jake came to watch him play.

Klein at gymnastics... she loves it and will keep doing it through the summer.

The Orangemen played in the Memorial Day tournament. They won just enough to make it to play on Monday but lost to the eventual champions. I was lucky to leave the girls with their grandmas. It was nice not to have to chase them around the park and the weather wasn't too good which would have made it worse. I am also having some pretty serious contractions and keep thinking this boy is determined to arrive early. I have 8 weeks to go and am feeling pretty anxious... there is a lot to do still!

We stayed at the Hampton Inn in Orem and Max had his dad throw the football to him as he dived in. He loves the water. I no longer have a big camera... mine died due to a misplaced super powered magnet and I need to get a new one. I hate not having a good camera to take pictures with. I have taken most of these pictures with my new iPhone... yes, now I am cool. I do love Apple products and love everything that they can do. I love that also have my Kindle on my phone so I can always have my book with me. It was nice to retire my $30 Walmart phone.

Max had six baseball games in six days last week, along with team practices and practices with Dad. Every night Max begs his dad to work with him... sometimes even after hours of playing a game or practicing. Max is a hard worker and wants to improve.

Thanks Shauna for this great picture of Max! 

Max is playing Minor League this year for city ball. He plays on the Braves team and has been able to try many new positions. He pitched two innings and had four strike outs at this game. He has played 1st, 2nd, and 3rd base. One of the games went extra innings and Max caught a line drive at third base which he was pretty proud of. In this league he is playing against boys who are as old at 10. 

Most days we spend hours outside. I am glad school is out because now it won't be so important to try to get the kids into bed at a specific time.

Preslee loves the sandbox and the trampoline. She has also learned how to drive the Jeep. Yesterday we spent three hours at InstaCare because something was wrong with her leg. She would collapse into tears when she was trying to walk. It started on Friday night and continued Saturday morning so I took her in. The wait was forever and she was still in pain and crawling around. After two and a half hours of sitting and X-rays, she started walking just fine. It was really strange and I am sure it will prove to be really expensive... 

I love this picture of the kids. Notice they are holding Zeppe's cups... our newest addiction. Some weeks we have been there three times. It has definitely been my pregnancy craving. Some of my students work there and brought some for me on the last day of school. Something about icy sugar water that I just can't get enough of.

It has been a great school year and I usually start planning for the next year right after the AP test. I had about 130 kids take the AP English test this year. I hope to have at least a 60% pass rate. The crazy thing is that next year 190 kids signed up to take AP English which means I can't be the only one teaching the class. It makes me a bit anxious but I know things will be okay. I started teaching AP in 2005 and had a class of 20 students and still can't believe how much the class has grown.

Okay, enough rambling...

Big News, Easter, and Lately

Most of the few remaining readers of my blog are probably also my Facebook friends or family and already know the news. We are expecting baby number 4 on August 16. We are having a boy which will nicely even out the numbers around here. This baby has spurred us to finish the basement, although he may be the only one sleeping down there. Max is determined to name this baby "Bo" and Klein really wants "Boston" (after her favorite boy at preschool). I have no ideas at this point so maybe Max will get his way (Klein will not because of the anti- Boston Red Sox vibe around this house). I am feeling quite anxious about having four kids but also very excited. I tease Jason that this boy will be turning 8 when Max is 16 so Jason will be able to start fresh with Super League at that time.

Here are a few Easter pictures. We had a great weekend and a wonderful spring break. It was really hard to go back to school.

Max participated in his first Pinewood Derby last week. He took second place overall. He and Jason and Uncle Jeff worked really hard on his "General Lee." It was a fun night. Max has been so busy with baseball and scouts and school. It is hard to get everything done in a night. The Orangemen played in a tournament at Bear River and took first. Max had some monster hits. He also participated in a "spring training" camp at Mountain Crest. They officially start Super League this Saturday. Max practices twice a week with the Orangemen and will start practicing for city league this week. We have lots of baseball on the schedule!.

I love the nice spring weather but we spend nearly every minute after school playing outside. It is hard to get the kids inside to go to bed or even eat dinner. The kids roam between the trampoline, the sandbox, and the driveway on their bikes. Preslee fell of the tramp the other day which is why she looks so rough. She landed on the cement. Not good... but it didn't scare her enough to keep her off. She is so full of energy but at an age where I can't let her just play outside on her own which means I also get to spend hours outside after school. Not much housework is getting done and very little cooking has been happening around here. Oh well...

March...

So much for staying caught up but here is the past few weeks in a nutshell...

I took Klein to see Disney on Ice with her cousins and grandma. She loved it and spent two hours waving to the characters with a huge smile. There were expensive cheap toys everywhere and some very amateur skating (the Saturday morning show featured some skaters who may have been hung over or they just didn't really know how to ice skate). But it was fun to get out with just Klein for a day and do something that she loved.

We headed to the March Madness baseball tournament in St. George last week. The weather was gorgeous. We explored Snow Canyon before Max's first game and the kids were fascinated with the red rocks and fine sand.

I didn't get too many baseball pictures because my big camera is broken which was very frustrating. When I got home I figured out that storing Max's large magnets right next to it in the cupboard was not a good thing but at least I just need a new CF card and that should fix things.

On the first day Max played at 4:00 and 8:00 but the games were behind so the second game didn't start until around 9:30 and finished near midnight. Late night for a kid that goes to bed at 8:30. I was lucky that DeeAnne was willing to keep Klein and Pres at the condo. Preslee was actually fighting some kind of virus and was miserable off and on throughout the whole trip. The kids were out of school on Monday and just the teachers had meetings; on Tuesday I left early to take Preslee to the doctor because of a high fever, and we left on Wednesday so I basically had a week off which made it even harder to come back the following Monday (the snowy weather that welcomed us back didn't help either).

Max's team went 1-3 but it was a good start to the season. The teams they played have probably been playing outside since January so they had a bit of an advantage. The Orangemen will be playing in a tournament this weekend and then start Super League in April. Max is also going to be playing minor league with Providence city.

We rented a condo with Jason's parents and Jeff and Steph. Jake was playing with Logan High the same weekend and it worked out perfectly. The kids always love having cousins to play with. Klein spent Friday with Klaire and loved every minute of it. Steph bought them matching outfits and spoiled Klein. The kids were able to swim. Max and Klaire even swam during the crazy wind storm on Saturday night.

We went to Las Vegas on Saturday to go to the outlets. The wind was terrible all the way there and back and there wasn't much to find at the stores. Preslee stayed with grandma and grandpa. Max and Klein were anxious to get back to play. On Sunday morning we woke up to extra chilly weather in St. George and came back to snow. Preslee did not sleep the entire ride home, until we go to Wellsville, of course.

We are definitely loving the sunny weather. The kids just want to be outside every minute. I doubt I am going to get much done from here on out...

These pictures were part of Max's science project. He was trying to figure out which pitching method is better... the windup or the stretch. Pretty good form...

Cute and growing Preslee. I took her for her 18 month well check. She has grown five inches in six months and finally joined here sister in the 99% for height. She started going to nursery and is getting so big. She is such a sweet girl and a handful. I have an amazing babysitter who always does my girls' hair and makes us cookies- thank you Melanie!

Here is Max proudly displaying his science project. He diligently worked on the "experiment" part of the project but as "project manager" I got to do most of the detail work :) I love that he was excited to learn something new.

We finished up another year at Beaver Mountain. The weather was warm and gorgeous, just the way I like it. Max was tearing it up all day and I couldn't even keep up. His final run of the year was the South Face which Jason documented with the video camera. Klein came up for the day too and while she claims to love skiing, her favorite part is when Jason puts her on his shoulders. I love Beaver Mountain and I love that Jason is part of the ski patrol there but I am always glad when the season comes to an end and our Saturdays become free again (until baseball starts that is...)

Life is good!

Valentine's Day

I have not posted forever and have a few things I need to catch up on...

Here is a glimpse of Valentine's Day and my three cuties. Getting the three of them to pose together is impossible and lately getting Max to smile is tough too. One day I will really embarrass him with all of his best poses...

Max had baseball practice outside on Valentine's Day... a tribute to the very mild winter we have had.

Preslee is in the stage where everything is better out of its place. She loves the fridge and making messes.