Color of the month

is Blue.  Tyler had his exam today for his next belt level.  He moved from green stripe to blue.  He doesn't have anything new to learn for this belt...but he is required to show that he knows everything that he's learned so far before he can advance to blue stripe.  That's 7 belts worth of information and 10 months worth of time.  They do a good job of reviewing as they move thru the levels so I'm not expecting Ty to have any problems with this.

Start of exam

Showing off kicks

Ms Candice with Ty in a bear hug

Ty escaping out of bear hug.

Receiving new belt

Showing off new belt.

Level Up

Ty had one more stripe to go before he could move to the next belt when he went to class tonight and for once he was actually willing to ask if he could test.  He sometimes gets in moods where even though he knows the material, he refuses to ask if he can test for it.  Tonight was different.  And they were more than willing to honor his request by throwing the best of the class at him.  He ended up sparring 6 upper belts, one after the other, ending with the highest ranked belt.  He was pretty tired by the time he was done but he did an awesome job.  Was able to score some good points and got some pointers on how not to get scored on.  In the end, he earned his stripe which enables him to move up to the next belt level at the end of the month.  This new belt will officially mark the halfway point to black belt.  Way to go, Ty!

Eye Appts

Nothing exciting with the appts today. Tay needed new glasses, my change was minimal so could have gotten away without and update but I haven't gotten new glasses in probably 5 yrs so figured it was time. Ty had a slight change but since he absolutely refuses to wear his glasses, I wasn't about to get him a new pair.

On the way home, we stopped so I could get my hair cut. Then I worked more hours than I had planned but what else is new there.

I can tell that Keari still isn't feel well because she wasn't her normal cheerful self when I got home. Usually she is bouncing up and down when she sees me and yells at the top of her lungs "YOU'RE HOME"! I got nothing when I got home...no bouncing, no yelling. Nothing. Poor thing.

Tyler had his sparring karate class tonight. Afterwards I couldn't get him to come home. Some of the kids went to an instructors meeting, but everyone else could stay and practice if they wanted...so he wanted. Which was fine with me. He practiced his new green stripe techniques, practiced some of his rolls of which his worst one is the forward roll, go figure. He got one of the instructors to help with his self defense. Interesting to see Ty get out of a headlock, full nelson and bear hug from a guy that is much bigger than him. He did have some trouble with the full shoulder pin on the floor so he'll have to work on that one.

Monday Already

And for once, I'm okay with that. Today was Keari's follow up appt with her pediatrician which I was anxious for. We talked about how 60% of lyme cases never see a tick or have a rash. He was pleased with her range of motion in her knees...she has full range so should not have any after affects from the Lyme Arthritis. He emphasized us keeping an eye out for the pain returning, complaints from her regarding other joints or change in fatigue level. If that starts to occur...her meds might need changing. She running a low grade fever which he says is normal. Her knees are still slightly swollen and I'll be interested in what the orthopedic dr has to say when she sees him on Wednesday.

Tomorrow I'll be back in the office for the first time in a week. Of course, I still don't have my computer fixed so not quite sure what I'll be working on there. Guess I'll find out when I get there.

Tonight was a busy night...Ty had karate, Bekah and Tay had dance.

Mystery Ouchie

I woke up at 3am to Adam crying ouch, ouch, ouch. Not really what you want to hear that early in the morning. I debated whether to check on him or not...he gets disturbed really easily by the opening of his door...so if there was nothing wrong, then I'd end up waking up by checking on him...and if there was something wrong...well, I opted to check on him as I was afraid he'd gotten his leg caught in the side of his crib. I found him lying in the middle of his crib with his head buried in his mattress repeating ouch over and over. So my initial thinking of a caught leg was incorrect but I was right in that I did disturb him by walking into his room. When he heard me by his crib, he popped his little head up. My second though was a stinky diaper...that also turned out to be false. I took him to the living room to lay for a bit but he was so restless that I finally ended up putting him back in his crib with some music on and laying on the floor for bit with my hand in his crib so he'd know I was still there. Anyone ever do that? I knew it was time to leave when he started playing games with my hand and giggling...whatever had caused him to wake up was obviously no longer there so I headed back to bed to get a couple more hours of sleep before I had to get up for work. Needless to say I was very tired this morning but was thankful for having taken a shower last night as that gave me a few extra shuteye minutes this morning.

Andy and the kids had a good day today...spent most of it at the marina catching fish. Everyone loves fishing and the younger girls appear to be naturals at it. A good number of fish were brought home to eat for tonights dinner.

Tyler had karate class tonight and earned another stripe. I believe this is the last one he needed before he could petition to the next belt level so hopefully by next month he'll be an orange stripe belt. He really likes karate and I hope it continues for a long time to come.

Buckets

That's what it was raining this morning. I knew I was going to be in trouble getting to work this morning as I was listening to the tv while getting dressed. They were talking about massive thunderstorms coming thru the area with large downpours and tons of lightening strikes. I hurried up and ran out the door hoping that maybe I would get lucky and at least most of the way to work before it hit. I should have known better as soon as I stepped outside...it was only 6pm and the heat and humidity were awful already so no such luck...I hit the deluge about 10 minutes into my drive...rain so hard that you could barely see. I drove out of it about 15 minutes later and then was good until I was about 10 minutes from work. I hit another huge down pour, it was coming down so hard and fast that even having the wipers on the highest setting couldn't keep all the water off the windshield. I thought about pulling off to the side of the road, as many other people had done, but was worried about somebody running into me there because visibility really was terrible. I opted to keep going, albeiting slowly, and by keeping the car lights in front of me visible I was able to get to work safely. The poor drains outside our garage looked liked a boiling pot...it was a bubbling mass of angry water. I was very thankful that we have a covered garage at work so I didn't actually have to get out in that mess...would have been soaked in 2 secs. I also said a few prayers as I was driving in it, one that I could arrive safely, and two, I thanked God that Alex didn't have to be driving anywhere right then. No way would I have wanted a 17 yr old, newish driver to out on the roads during that storm. The storm moved through our area in about an hour so thankfully the drive home was uneventful.

Tyler had another Karate class tonight. It was a good thing he went (this was an extra class for him to see which nights of the week he liked better) as only one other kid showed up. They were able to get lots of individual attention although I think both kids were getting a little punchy...this was their 4th day of 3 hr Karate camp in the morning.

No progress

Today was a very unproductive today where I actually thought I was making headway but in reality didn't make any progress at all. I'm hoping that they are able to fix all the issues by tomorrow so that I actually have some work to do...I hate driving all that way and then not be able to do anything. Well, there is stuff I can do but the important stuff that have a deadline of Weds and Fri, I'm unable to work on at the moment. And they've been trying to fix the issue since 8/1 so I'm not optimistic at the moment.

And Andy's day was just as bad in a different sense...he spent the entire day running kiddos all over the place. Ty had to be at Karate camp at 9, then it was back to the house to pick Tay up for a drs appt...and hour later, it's back to the house only to turn around and pick Ty up from camp. Then it was time to take Connor, Kenzie and Taylor to piano...which took an extremely long time today...which I think is good because they must have been going over a lot of things today but I thing at that point hubby would have liked a short lesson so he could get back home for awhile. Somewhere in there my sister arrived to help Alex do so pt on his shoulder...my mom also showed up. Soon after getting back from piano, Ty needed to head back for his regular Karate class...I took him so hubby could have some home time. After class, we headed home for dinner, then Andy, Keari, Adam and I took a walk along the river. It was a gorgeous evening..not hot and muggy like it has been but I'm thinking this is only temporary as they are talking about temps in the upper 90's for the next 2 days.

The kids are constantly complaining about being bored but something sure tired them out today, at least the girls, because within 5 minutes of them laying down all 3 were asleep. I should really head that way myself....

Crazy Week

Whew, finally time to take a breath. This has definitely been a crazy week. After getting back from the beach last week, I spent Monday and Tuesday in full day training at work, then Wednesday, Thursday and Saturday driving back and forth to Virginia to watch Kenzie play in a softball tournament and Friday I did a full day of work and then watched Tyler test for his orange belt. The drive to the games in Virginia ordinarily wouldn't have been that bad except we were having to do it in rush hour traffic...both ways. Ugh! Andy did the drive on Friday and the 1 1/2hr trip took him 3 hrs. No fun. During the first game of the tournament, we ended up in a rain delay for a couple of hours. It started raining during the first inning and by the second inning it was pouring. People were scurrying everywhere to get the equipment bags and such off the ground and under cover. I would have loved to have gotten a picture of what our canopy looked like...all the bags, chairs, people that were underneath it but my bag was buried underneath the pile. The rain finally slacked off some so we made a break for the car. Kenzie and I jumped in only to have me jump back out again. The reason for me vacating the car so quickly was because I'd looked down to see a yellow jacket walking down my shorts onto my leg. Thankfully it didn't sting me. We went back to the hotel, grabbed a quick bite to eat and an hour or so later were back at the field to resume the game. Amazing enough, the fields weren't in bad shape...which was totally surprising given that there were rivers running down them during the downpour. The girls ended up losing that game and Kenzie got hurt on the last out of the game. The first baseman really whacked her as Kenzie ran by trying to get on first. She was hit so hard she ended up flying over first base without ever touching it. Thankfully she wasn't seriously hurt but she did end up with a hurt wrist which kept her out of their second game until one of her teammates popped her shoulder out while batting. Kenzie ended up going in to replace her. Nothing like a hurt player replacing a hurt player. LOL She did great...ended up getting on base and then did a great job on first base which is a tough spot to be playing with a hurt wrist, which happened to be her glove hand. They ended the day Thursday with 1 win and 1 loss.

Andy went to the game Friday, which they won. Yay! He left after that game so he could make it home in time to watch Tyler test for his next belt. You'd think leaving at 2:30 for an hour and a half drive would give you plenty of time to make it home for a 6:30 exam. Ha! It took him over 3 hrs to get home but thankfully he did make it home in time to see the exam. It was our first time watching a belt exam...it was very cool! Ty ended up getting his new belt. Way to go!!

I went back to Virginia on Saturday...the girls needed to win 4 games in a row to make it to Sunday to have a chance to play in the championship game. They ended up winning their first game but lost their second. The girls had a good season, won 41 games overall which is a huge improvement over last year. They now get the month of August off and then it will be back to practicing starting in Septemer.

Back to Work

The first day back to work is never easy but I guess today could have been harder. I was in training from 11 - 4 today so really only had to work for a few hours this morning. I'm in training again tomorrow, then off for two days, then work from home on Friday. Guess I'm kind of easing myself back into the work world. LOL

I could have done without the traffic on the way home. I was already running late because the training let out later than I normally leave...then I ran into wire repairs on one of roads that was left over from the storm that came thru yesterday...then hit a big backup at the bridge. I'm not sure what caused it but it tied me up for almost 40 minutes. I just missed getting Tyler to karate class but I did go over to watch after Andy dropped him off so he could come home to make dinner. Tyler got his first invitation to test for his next belt this Friday...should be fun to watch.

Stripes

Tyler has been taking a karate camp this week, and has been taking actual classes for a couple of weeks now. Through the camp, he was able to earn 4 stripes on his white belt. He has one more to go before he can move up to the next level. I'm very proud of him, he really seems to have a knack for this, which is good cause I told Andy that he wasn't allowed in the house today after camp if he hadn't earned at least one stripe. He blew me away with 4. Way to go Ty!

We're heading to the beach for a week. I took off work today so that I could get all the packing done. It took me all day but I finally got all the clothes washed and packed. The only thing left to do is get everything packed into the vehicles which we'll do after Kenzie's softball tournament tomorrow. This is her last regular one of the season...all that left after tomorrow is Nationals which are 7/28 -8/1 in Virginia.

Can tell already...

that it's not going to be a good day. I woke up with the same headache that I went to bed with last night. :( I also didn't sleep well, partly because we had a big thunderstorm come through in the middle of the night that woke me up. Walked outside at 6am to leave for work and could already feel the humidity...blech, I so hate that! I'm still having to take medicine that is making me feel sick...nothing like a constant reminder of a bad thing. :( Thankfully I will take my last dose tomorrow morning.

Tyler is participating in a karate camp all week. He seemed to enjoy his first day yesterday and loved his class last night. He could have tested for his first stripe but I think he's still a little shy and nervous about things. I think wants he gets the first one under his belt, he should be okay.

The kids are certainly enjoying the pool...Bekah is like a little fish and you literally have to drag her out at the end of the day to get her to go to bed. Keari is also enjoying it more now that the water has warmed up...she loves to show me her pruny fingers and toes when she gets out now. LOL