Cross Country Season

One thing we were really excited about staying somewhat normal, was cross country season. Minnie and Goofy were able to have a full season and their school was even able to get set up for some competitive meets. Bucko started off the season at the high school, but during his annual sports physical, we discovered he has Hashimoto's disease (hypothyroidism) and something going on with his heart. We are still figuring those things out, but he was unable to continue with cross country. (His heart rate is low, and he has arrhythmia. He gets light headed all the time and often blacks out.)

But Minnie had competitions at Peyton and Widefield, plus two "home" meets. Goofy was only able to compete at the home meets, since the others were high school only. 

They ended the season with a lovely sports banquet. They catered Olive Garden and recognized all the kids' hard work. It was great to see, and I'm so happy they pushed through and had a great season.

 

Serve One Another

We had the amazing opportunity to help out a member of our Church from the Limon branch. She runs this ranch all on her own, and we were able to go out and help with several friends/fellow members to help her prepare for winter. She is the sweetest lady, and we felt so good helping out with some good manual labor. We helped reinforce fences, winterize her home and chicken coop, and even help out with some daily chores of feeding the animals. Minnie even got to ride the horse a bit. Nana and Papa watched the little girls for us and then had a yummy dinner for us when we got home. It was a beautiful day and felt so rewarding to help out someone who really needed the help.

 

I'm a Teacher?!

 Today, I started working as the 7th grade English teacher at my kids' school. I'm still trying to wrap my head around it all, but I'm so excited (and exhausted). A couple weeks ago, I mentioned to the vice-principal that I am all registered to substitute teach for the school district. She tried to convince me to come work as a Teacher Assistant there full time, but I told her I just couldn't do Tuesdays and Thursdays with my schedule. She messaged me that evening saying that if I wanted to work just Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, they would hire me because they really needed the help. So the next morning, I went in for an official "interview" where they told me I would be working with Upper School and helping out the teachers. I was a bit shocked how it all fell together and during my interview, the principal noticed on my resume that I have a minor in English. She asked if I had ever considered teaching English, and I said something like, "Well, yeah, a little. It would kind of be like a fun dream job." Then she asked what grades I would like to teach, and I told her how much I enjoy middle school age students. She looked at the vice-principal with a look like, "Are you kidding me?" and then told me they might have something opening up soon. I was confused because I knew they had already hired all their teachers for the school year. The next week, I started working on Monday as a T.A. The head English teacher asked if I could sub her class that Thursday afternoon. I checked with the VP to make sure that was okay since I wasn't planning on working Thursdays, but that I actually could work in the afternoons. About an hour or so later, the principal came to find me and offer me a teaching job to teach two seventh grade English classes. The current teacher needed to cut back and was asking for someone to take over those two classes. I really couldn't believe it! The principal and I both felt like the Lord had prepared and placed me where I needed to be, but I told her I would discuss it with PC and pray about it. Of course, I just couldn't deny the feeling that this was what I should be doing. It felt like the Lord had wrapped up a present with a little bow and said, "Here you go. This is what you need to do." So I jumped in and took the position. 

This was the sunrise this morning:

I thought it very fitting to remember the dawn of a new adventure for me.

However, this is an accurate portrayal of how I felt at the end of the first day. 

Edit: I've now been teaching for three months, and I really do love it! The stress of figuring things out and feeling like I have no idea what I am doing have been overwhelming at times. I often feel like I've taken on more than I should. But I love being at the school with my four younger kids. I love having 56 "other" kids. They are amazing, and I'm learning so much. I absolutely love teaching them English and working with the other English teachers at the school. They are inspiring and a wonderful support system. I love the mission of the school, to teach the values of our Founding Fathers and instill those values in our students. It is wonderful to be a part of it all (and pretty cool that we are one of the only schools still doing in person learning through all this COVID-19 mess).

Backpack Trip

 I look forward to this backpacking trip with my friends every year. I had been fighting a migraine all week and was tempted to back out. I decided at the last minute that I would be too sad if I missed it, so I gathered everything the night before. It was, of course, so much fun! The fires in Colorado have been really bad, though, so there were major fire bans. This was the first year we couldn't have a fire. That was disappointing, but we did find a little waterfall to slide down and have fun in so that kind of made up for it. 

Back to School

 We all know 2020 has been a crazy year, but the kids were so excited to go back to some kind of normalcy in the form of school. Luckily, for my four youngest kids, they were able to do that. Charter schools are able to make their own decisions on certain things, so they started as scheduled, with masks, of course.

Rosie sitting at her desk when I dropped her off!

Had to get a mask picture right before they went inside.

Rosie's first day of kindergarten!

Shortcake is all ready for 2nd grade!

Goofy is officially in "Upper School" in 7th grade.

Minnie is a freshman in high school! 9th grade look out!

Bucko, however, kept getting his school changed over and over. All summer they did polls and the response was an overwhelming decision to go back five days a week with certain changes, like keeping kids in the same groups, one way hallways, masks, etc. But just a few days before they were supposed to start, they pushed the start date back to weeks. Then a week before the new start date, they decided to go to e-learning. The elementary kids are supposed to start going after Labor Day, but they haven't given any mention of secondary schools going in person at all yet. So we will see.

Bucko, however, decided to do a construction program through the schools, so he gets to go in to the big building on Monday and Wednesday mornings. 

Welcome to "Nubraska"

We just got back from a wonderful weekend at PC's brother's house in Nebraska. The kids have missed having these cousins living in Colorado and it isn't too long of a drive that we decided it was time for a visit. We drove down on Thursday and their kids had drawn pictures with sidewalk chalk to welcome us. It was so cute, and they had written out "Welcome to Nubraska" instead of spelling it like "Nebraska".

The older kids LOVED driving the four-wheeler and minibike around!

We had a great time playing games, catching lightning bugs, and spending time together!

Projects

We are having the Coleman reunion here in Colorado, so we've been spending some time planning that. We went out to a friend's house to scope out their reservoir for canoeing/kayaking. The kids loved seeing all their animals on the farm! Rosie especially loved making all the turkeys talk to her!

We video chat with my sister a lot. One day, we noticed her baby has a similar shirt to one we had, so the girls had to match!

Unauthorized dogpile!

PC finished the lockers for our den! I love them!

Santa Minnie (it's funnier if you put in her real name)