Spring/Summer Lacrosse 2018

Well, it's official, all Zappia offspring can claim they play "acrosse."  Our gummy bear, Coco hit the recruiting circuit early.  She was asked to play on the pre-school, intro-to-lacrosse, boys team this spring.   She loves playing with her best friend, Jordana and always reports to us how many goals she scores.  Nevermind that the goals she scores are on on unmanned goal during shooting drills.  Her favorite part is playing on the playground after practice and she also really enjoys the water breaks.  

For her part, Adrienne tends to control the field when she's playing in games.  She scores many goals and is Queen of the ground ball.  She towers above many of the other kids at this point, which helps, but she also appears to have some natural ability.  All of the time spent battling her brother in the yard has been phenomenal training for her.  She's headed off to Nazareth Girls Lacrosse camp this summer as well as Brighton's Sharp Shooters camp.  She is very excited to move up the the 3/4 division next year.

Our lacrosse glutton, Luke seems to take advantage of as much time on the playing field as possible.  He plays winter box lacrosse, spring town team lacrosse, Flyers travel team lacrosse, and a 3D travel team lacrosse.  Currently he is schedule to practice or play in games every.single.day of the week including both weekend days.  He plays a different position for each team so that means we travel with a ton of lacrosse equipment.  We'll be headed all over upstate NY as well as Maryland for the current season's games.  

And because of all this, we've turned into "those" people who eat on the run - often in the car, travel with a spare set clothes for every weather condition and are regularly pulling a wagon with folding sports chairs and random other junk.  

Eleven

We celebrated Luke's 11th birthday by taking him and 3 friends to Dave and Busters to play arcade games.  It was an interesting experience for me, a fabulous experience for Luke.  Four, eleven year old boys rocking out to rap music (clean versions, of course) in my car was enough of a party for me but that was just on the way to D & Bs.  We got there, I loaded their cards up and off they went. I opted to sit in the restaurant and people watch.  About an hour and half later they came back with their winnings and were rabid with hunger.  We ate and headed home.  On our way back, I heard lots of whooping cushions, pre-teen humor, and even some singing.  A success on all fronts.

Luke was generously gifted  money, gift cards, and other gifts.  He bought an ipad on which he could finally play fortnight without begging for my phone.  Just one more birthday left without a "teen" in it  - eek!!!!!!!

Spring Break 2018

Spring break was a necessity this year.  One can only take so much winter before one starts thinking 30 degrees is "actually quite decent."Just the regular crazy talk we start doing in March every year.  This year we traveled to Isle of Palms, South Carolina which is just outside Charleston.  We joined three other Brighton families for a total of 12 children and 9 adults.  Of those 12 children, 10 were girls, so we were quite surprised at the lack of drama.  Most days were sunny and warm with 2 days that weren't really "beach weather."  The kids still managed to do plenty of swimming in the chilly 60 degree Atlantic water.  There was lots of hermit crab herding, boogie board riding, drip castle dripping, and sand dollar searching.  I have never seen so many sand dollars and definitely had never seen a live one.  For the adults, there was lots of eating and drinking.  Need I say more?  And food in the south is heavy - ugg.  I was feeling sloth-like by the end of the week.  Apart from the beach, our adventures included a trip into the city of Charleston and a touring of the USS Yorktown, an old aircraft carrier-turned-museum.  We all really enjoyed the aircraft carrier and it certainly peaked the kids interest in history.   The city of Charleston had really unique and interesting architecture but I can't say that I really loved the city.   The kids liked the candy store in the city best.

Our bronzed bodies are back now and we are re-adjusting to regular life.  We did happen to bring a few items of interest back from the south with us in the form of really ugly crawly friends known to most as hermit crabs.   Adrienne is the most impressive salesperson of hermit crabs ever! Those poor hermit crabs took a few wild turns in the car on the way home and are subject to daily dealings by three very eager handlers.

Did you know that hermit crabs are night creatures? In fact, if you have to sleep in the same room with their cage, then you hear what appears to be hermit crab line dancing in the the middle of the night!  And no, their cage is not in my room but a certain youngest child keeps recruiting me into her bed in the middle of the night.  I just hope that none of our new friends come up missing.  They are really ugly.

Piano Recital 2018

This year we switched to a new piano teacher, and although we loved our old one, the kids have learned so much more this year.  Our new teacher, Miss Kate, not once, but twice, was able to get Luke and Adrienne to successfully play a duet!  In this recent recital, they played "Hot Popcorn."  The timing was tricky on this one so it seemed to cause a lot of tension between the two.  Someone was always playing too fast, the other, too slow, etc.  BUT, they finally got it together and played quite well in the recital.  I was sweating the whole time and maybe also holding my breath.

It's really amazing how well each of them can play when they practice.  And I have to admit, sometimes we all forget about practicing piano all together - but the kids are inspired and next year, I think we'll see a whole lot more practice time.  Sometimes I even muse about reteaching myself so that they can play duets with me!  If only one could somehow discover how to add more hours in a day.

Chubs

The cat has been getting a lot of attention lately, mostly in the form of torture.  He's consistently the main attraction during play dates and he even has become Coco's friend (non - animal-loving thing that she is).    He really enjoys that I get up at 5:00 am everyday so that I can feed him nice and early.  He's even trying to get me up that early on weekends - the nerve!  This year he's 12 but he seems just as spry as ever.  Our favorite (and only) pet:

Winter

Winter happenings

Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year's - check!

January and February have been dragging on as usual but we insert a little fun where we can.  Here's the local roundup:

We've had swim meets

We've gone ice skating

We've done baking projects

We've gone out for ice cream

We've  played in lacrosse leagues

We've played thousands of rounds of the match game

We've gut rehabbed a bathroom

We've visited Salt Lake City

We've had lots of living room gymnastics

We picked up snowboarding

And now we're looking forward to spring break in just 4.5 more weeks!

Montessori

I finally got to see what Coco does at Montessori School...that's what she calls it instead of something easy to say like "Trinity."  I did a little Monday morning observation and I was not disappointed.  I watched her stare at me while the class was doing "circle" time.  Then I got to watch her survey the snacks for the morning.  She wasn't impressed.  I observed her giving other kids the side eye while telling them that I was her mommy, not theirs. And finally I got to watch her do some "works."  We sifted tiny alphabet letters out of sand and poured them in  a special jar.  We made snap-together necklaces and bracelets and we did a whole mess of puzzles.  And at the end of the observation period, I even  got some crocodile tears because I wasn't taking her with me.  Now all of this might make you think that she doesn't really like her school but I assure you, these little behaviors only occurred for my benefit.  She normally comes home telling me that she had the "best day ever!" and that her teacher is "soooo nice, she can't take it."  She has a best friend in Jordana and they are inseparable (that is, until the teacher actually separates them).  Sometimes she even asks me why she "wasn't put in this school sooner?"

Next up is holiday sing a long!

Coco turns 4

It turns out that 4 happens to by favorite little kid age.  At four, they are starting to think rationally on occasion, they can REALLY talk, their opinions are becoming stronger and so are their personalities.  The questions they come up with and the timing of them are quite suspect and they leave you, literally, stunned.   They ask very many questions about life and death.   They ask why ice cubes don’t count as dinner. They ask how babies come out of your belly, but thankfully, not how they get in.  They ask why you don’t sleep in their bed with them every night.  They ask why they can’t go to the water park in December.  Lots and lots of questions.   I make up lots and lots of answers. 

Coco absolutely has 3^rd kid syndrome.  She’s learned lots of things from her older, more experienced siblings and the leash is undoubtedly a lot looser for her. She wows the parents of other kids her age (who happen to be the oldest in their families) with her conversations, her physical tricks and her boldness.  When you’re the 3^rd kid in a family of talkative extroverts, you figure out ways to get your voice heard over the chaos. 

Another favorite part of the magical age of 4 is playing games.  They now have the understanding of winning AND of losing AND cheating.  This is a tough one because you have to recognize that they are getting smarter when they figure out how to cheat.  And it’s even really hard not to laugh when their sore loser antics come out.  This is one such exchange with our gummy bear, Coco:

Me:  Coco, I’m not going to play the game anymore if you cheat like that.

Coco:  Well, you don’t have to play anymore BECAUSE. I. QUIT! (foot stomp, arms crossed, bottom lick sticking out)

Her anguish is as fleeting as her attention span and after a few moments, she’ll “need a huggy.”  She is extremely affectionate.  She must be the world record holder for most hugs in one day.  When we are home together, just the two of us, she doesn’t let me out of her sight.  Should I move rooms without her, she’ll yell “Mommy!  Where ARE you?”  She’ll follow me to the laundry room, the kids’ rooms and of course, the bathroom.  Then she’ll tell me that she missed me.  I guess it has already been decided that we’ll be going to college together in 14 years.   You can see why 4 is my favorite age.