So, we’ve been keeping busy as always with Courtland’s music
class Thursday mornings, volleyball for me on Wednesday & Friday mornings
(and Thursday nights after all the boys are in bed), Kolby’s school chorus
after school most Wednesdays (after school, and before piano lessons), piano
lessons for the boys Wednesday afternoons (while I take the younger boys to the
library each week), the boys making all their school lunches for the week on
Saturdays (that’s quite the production!), Michael giving Isaac his piano
lessons on Sundays, institute for Courtland and I on Monday mornings, family night
on Monday evenings, Michael has just started a stake men’s basketball league at
church with games on Fridays & Saturdays, and helping the boys with their
homework.
And now Michael was asked to be the Webelos cub scout leader
and I was asked to be the Bear cub scout leader at church, so we have scouts 3
days a week – Kolby’s Bear scout group meets here at our place now on Monday
afternoons, Michael goes to the church for Webelos on Tuesday evenings, and
Lijah just started Wolf cub scouts on Friday afternoons. I guess we should have known that we’d be
spending a lot of time in scouting with the 5 boys. But I’m actually quite liking this new
calling with the Bear group so far. Last
week was my first time to teach the activity and we did the law enforcement achievement,
so I asked a woman from church who is a former police officer to come talk to
the boys, then we made a plaster of paris mold of a shoe print, and took the
boys’ fingerprints, then we talked about safety, filled out emergency contact
lists, and looked at the windows and doors in the house to check for safety
locks. I didn’t know if we’d fit that
all into the 1 hour time slot, but we did, and I think it went well, and Kolby
had fun.
A couple weeks ago I went to the meeting for Isaac to get
into the dual language program at Camden ’s
school for kindergarten next year. I can’t
believe it’s already been a year since I was there signing Camden up for kindergarten. I got all the paperwork turned in and Isaac
had his little interview (the interview isn’t to test the kids’ skills or
anything, it’s just to determine if the children are native English or Spanish
speakers). So, now we just need to wait
to hear back to see if he gets in, but I’m assuming it’s pretty likely that he
will, since kids with older siblings in the program get a higher precedence in
the admission process. So we’ll wait to hear about that. I’m pretty excited for Isaac and Courtland to
get in, because I think Camden
will use his Spanish more with them once they’ve started to learn it too. Camden
has really impressed me lately with his reading – he’s reading about as well in
Spanish as my older boys were in English at this age, and he’s starting to read
better in English too. (I don’t think
the comprehension is all there yet when he reads in Spanish, but that’s
improving too). I took a video the other
day of him reading, and I’ll have to post it later on. It’s just fun to see him really doing it – it makes
all this driving I’m doing worth it.
It was really fun a week or so ago because Erin, my best
friend from high school, came into town and we got to hang out and talk for a
few hours one night, and then we met at a restaurant in Old Town on a Saturday
afternoon for lunch, which was fun with Michael and all the boys and my Grandma
Faun. It was fun to hang out with Erin and catch up, and to remember things from high
school that I’d forgotten. Erin has
family in the San Diego
area, so it’ll be fun to be able to see her again when she comes to visit in
the future too.
Two Sundays ago I taught a class about RootsMagic, a
genealogy software program, here at our house. My mom is a ward missionary, and has also recently
been called as a family history consultant at church, and she has helped
organize monthly “Neighbor Nights” where we’ve invited a group of people from
church and any friends who want to come to learn about different genealogy
topics. I think it went well
overall. And the next one in February is
about “Family Tree,” the new format on the familysearch.org genealogy website
that will be replacing new.familysearch.org. I’ve learned a little about Family Tree and
from what I’ve learned it sounds like it will be even better than new
familysearch, so I’m excited to learn more about it in preparation for the
class. One cool new feature they’ve just
released is a photo site on family search where you can add family photos, tag
the individuals in each photo with names (so you know which people in the photo
are which), and then link those individually tagged people to the people in
your pedigree chart on family tree. I’ve
been playing around with it, and added a few photos so far, and it looks like
they’re still adding some more features, but I think it’s pretty cool. I did a little post with more details about
the photo site on my genealogy blog at http://www.stephsgenealogy.blogspot.com/2013/01/familysearchorg-family-tree-photos.html,
(in case you want to check it out).
Well, it’s almost time for institute, so I’d better run.
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