Average: More or Less is Back- Again

17 Friday May 2013

Posted by in Miscellaneous

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A new post by her brilliant sister Ella over on Ella’s education blog BOOKSBUTTSANDBUSSES has brought the writer of Average: More or Less back to her own neglected blog over three months after her last post. The following is a true and correct transcript of an interview conducted by this writer, asking Average: More or Less to explain her long absence.

Me: Where you been?

AML: I’ve been busy.

Me: Doing what?

AML: Living life.

Me: … Could you please be more specific? That’s like when you ask your best friend in the whole world, who’s just returned from a potentially emotionally dangerous trip, how she is and she answers “good”. Just, “good”.

AML: Oh, wow! I know exactly what you’re saying. That very thing happened to me recently! Okay, well, we’ve been busy. First there was the Third Annual Girl’s Getaway, then Jack was gone to Dallas and Austin for 10 days. Granne and Kaley came for Spring Break and Easter just rushed by. There’ve been STAAR tests and doctor’s appointments, end-of-year school madness and VBS prep. Our new business is up and running and Jack had his gallbladder removed. Now there’s only two weeks of school left and somehow three months have passed without me posting one thing!

Me: O…kay. [end of interview]

So, Average: More or Less is back- again. She pledges to be more consistent in her posting and maybe a little less frantic while giving interviews.

Breaking In New Friends

11 Monday Feb 2013

Posted by in Family, Friends, Fun

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Due to her mother’s selfishness and callous disregard for Valentine’s Day and/or her actual birth date (the Third Annual Girls Getaway is this weekend. I leave in three days!) Liz had a birthday sleepover this past Friday night. The house was crowded with five extra 2nd grade girls, high on tie dye punch and togetherness. Emma helped me keep things moving and organized while Thomas kept them all laughing.

The night was not without incident. Past experience had taught me that there might be those that couldn’t make it through the night and might wish to go home. Sure enough, a couple of hours in –after hot dogs and cake, but before tie dying t-shirts- this one hurt that one’s feeling and that one and another (in a show of solidarity) wanted to go home. Now this ain’t my first rodeo folks; Liz is my youngest so we’ve survived like situations in the past. I called an official sleepover powwow and explained that they all had two options: be nice to each other or go to bed. I further explained that I’d be happy to call their mama’s if they wanted to go to bed in their own homes, but that bed is definitely where they were headed, one way or another.

A risky statement, since I don’t know the parents of most of these girls real well. I’ve gotten pretty spoiled by established relationships with the parents and friends of Thomas and Emma. I know I can tell Hyland to take out the trash and he’ll hop to –usually with less whining than Thomas.

I know that I can make Macie try brussel sprouts with the full support of her mama. I also know not to give Brooke red kool-ade or Carli candy of any kind. I did not know Zoe was allergic to cats or that Maryn had recently broken her wrist. I was not sure these girls wouldn’t go home and report to their parents that we were wicked or weird or just plain no fun.

I hate breaking in new friends.

Basketball

07 Thursday Feb 2013

Posted by in Fun

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images

I like basketball. I’ve liked basketball ever since I figured out basketball was THE sport in my little 1A school, or more specifically, that basketball is where the boys were.

I don’t play basketball. As I’ve mentioned before, I was the boys basketball team manager for many years.

My sister played basketball. In fact she was talented enough to have played all the way through college, which taught me not only to appreciate the game for itself and not just its proximity potential, but also to appreciate the finesse of woman’s basketball over the hyper-aggressiveness of men’s basketball.

Of course, watching basketball is much more fun if you know the players, something my sports hating sports ignorant husband is learning. Recently we’ve been attending the local high school basketball games because our girls are performing with PIPs during half-time of the games. Basketball is a lot of things to a lot of people: exercise, personal achievement, entertainment and even for some, social opportunity, but for me and Jack, the past few weeks of watching kids we know and love play ball has been an aerobic exercise. The burning energy of excitement, pride, joy, disappointment, frustration and camaraderie has negated every calorie of those mandatory game nachos.

Both the varsity boys and girls made the district playoffs this year and while I’m thrilled for the kids and will continue to follow their progress, I’m a little sad to see the regular season go just as we were getting into the swing of things.

Oh well, track is coming up and that’s a sport I can definitely get behind (you know, in a vehicle, coaching the runners down the road.) As Thomas’s cross country practice jersey says, “My sport is your sports punishment.”

A Weekend Worth Blogging About

04 Monday Feb 2013

Posted by in Family, Fun, Home & Garden

≈ 3 Comments

So February is calendaring out to be a pretty intentionally chaotic month in this Madcap Year. In amongst teeth cleanings and 4H project meetings, we have a birthday sleepover and an extended family meal planned, the Third Annual Girls Getaway scheduled, and the first commitment to our new business venture organized. Our weekend was a good example of mixing the madcap with the mundane. Here’s a brief recap:

  • Jack and I kicked things off with a Date Night. Jack was in charge of this one and he did a delicious job of presenting a steak dinner on a beautiful tablesetting created with the help of our girls. Unforgettable!
  • After a relaxing morning gathering supplies and the return of our children from a night at Aunt Sherans, Jack and Thomas finished building our new Christmas tree box. I’m so excited! The box is a permanent replacement for the completely ruined cardboard box the tree originally came in and will contain any tree we might buy in the future. It’s perfectly fitted to the storage space and has wheels for easy movement. So ingenious!
  • While the boys worked on the box, the girls and I cleared the front flower beds of winter debris. It’s so exciting to see all the green! We have daffodils, iris and day lilies pushing through and should have blooms in 6 weeks or so. This year we’re finally letting the front flower beds mature as-is and I’m excited to start filling a shade bed around the back patio. It’s gonna be so pretty!
  • We also managed to make it to church where I had a long overdue conversation with bff. I’ve got to get better at intentional interaction! Once again I’ve let my friendship flounder due to lack of communication. I feel that more so after reading Whimzie’s post on 5%. Bff is definitely part of my 5%.
  • Finally, we relaxed with a little Phineas and Ferb. What better way to end a weekend?

Another Step in the Right Direction

31 Thursday Jan 2013

Posted by in Family

≈ 1 Comment

dyslexia-t-shirt

NOTE: This post is about Thomas and dyslexia. If you’re curious about other posts I’ve written on the same subject, go to the upper right-hand of your computer screen and type ‘dyslexia’ in the search box.  

We have been struggling with Thomas’ dyslexia since the first time he went through the first grade. Despite his record of very good grades, nothing has ever come easy for Thomas. Each A, and B and even some C’s are the result of lots of extra work put in by Thomas, various heroic teachers and us here at home. We’ve had our ups and downs, but by far our biggest struggle has been lack of continuity from teacher to teacher, grade to grade because of an absence of a specific education plan for Thomas. This is why we were so please to have had our first official 504 meeting yesterday.

A 504 plan is a specific plan of instructional services to help keep Thomas and his various teachers on the same page, class to class, year to year. It provides for special instruction on dyslexia coping skills and allows Thomas certain classroom accommodations that utilize those skills. This plan will be evaluated and updated periodically, but will follow him throughout his educational career until deemed unnecessary. Voila, continuity!

We’re not asking for special treatment just because we want Thomas’ life (and by extension ours) to be easier, but because we want his life to be full. As I’ve said before, T is wicked smart and wonderfully imaginative. We want Thomas to have every chance to learn, to feed that voracious mind that wants to know EVERYTHING and to learn to cope in the real world after school. We want to give Thomas every tool available he can use to live up to his full potential. I think yesterday was another step in the right direction.

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