End of Year Academic Awards

I'm as pleased as punch with my kids' academic awards this year! They've blown me away! Mark earned outstanding mathematics student in his class. Mikayla earned outstanding language arts student in her class.

Juliet earned high honor roll and language arts student of the year.

Jack earned high honor roll.

Maxine cleaned house this year at the HHS awards night. So did all of her friends!

Maxine earned a silver H award, student of the year in US Government, AP Chemistry, Painting, AP Literature, Sterling Scholar General Scholarship, 4.0 as a senior, consecutive 4.0,  and named the school's Salutatorian. She just kept getting up on stage again and again!

 

I'm proud of how hard everyone worked this year! It was a weird covid year with masks at school and they did it with very little complaining. Awesome job!

Robotics Banquet

There was an end of the year robotics banquet! Maxine said it was fun to see all of her friends again! She got some sweet gifts from next years' captains. Mr. Vick made her cry, a lot. 

Initially Maxine didn't even know what robotics was, but Vick said he wanted her in and she trusted him. Maxine has said that finding robotics has been the most rewarding part of her high school experience. All the skills she's learned and friends she's made will help her for the rest of her life. These are her favorite people!

 

80s Dance Party

Jenny Chamberlain, who organizes the book discussion group I go to, invited me and the whole family to an 80s dance party. Merril was gone and I could only convince Mikayla to come. Juliet did my makeup, I received several compliments!

Not quite sure why Mikayla is pulling this face.

The Chamberlains have a tortoise. It's not an endangered desert tortoise but some other variety and it was large. Mikayla thought it was the coolest thing ever and kept feeding it weeds. It was fun for me because even though I never was a dancer, I do like to dance.

 

Fathers and Sons

 Just a quick post that the boys and Merril went to Fathers and Sons up at Lambs Knoll.

The boys took their mountain bikes and built some jumps. They had a good time and ate some good food.

Lake Day!

We bought some paddleboards and Merril and I had taken them out for a day date while the kids were in school. Later that week, I asked if any of the kids wanted to head out to the lake and try out the boards. Merril was gone to band practice and Jack didn't feel like going because he had been at work that day. The beach did not disappoint! It's everything I remember!

There is something so wonderful about the lake! 

We hardly went to the lake last year because we sold our boat but I've missed it. I was a little worried that the lake would be packed on a weeknight because people have swamped the lake since COVID but weeknights are the secret sauce! John Q. Public just likes to come on the weekends. I'm hoping with the paddleboards, and hopefully some kayaks soon, we'll be back to the lake more this summer! 

Field Trip with Mark

I was able to go on a field trip with Mark and his class to Staheli Farms. They teach kids about how much work it takes to grow food so we shouldn't waste it. Then the kids get to look at all the farm animals. Liam was there too.

Petting a baby chick.

I swear we had a good time but it's not really reflected in the pictures.

I told the kids about Mark's field trip and Maxine was convinced that I never attended any of her field trips. I was a little confounded because I felt like I had. Then I researched on my blog for just a second and found this picture:

Her class went ice skating and I went with. Ha! I totally went on a field trip with her! It's not the first time I've used my blog to figure something out! I'm glad I was able to take her ice skating with her class. February 2010. 

Love His Face!

I still love this face! And the feel of his face and his crinkly eyes.

Maxine got the Vaccine

I didn't say a word to her. She just came home one day and said she had gotten the covid vaccine. She had a sore arm but didn't feel bad. Sounds good!

 

El Mirage

Merril and his buddies went down to El Mirage, a dry lake bed in California, to see how fast they could go on some of their fast bikes. Merril took a red Ducati that he bought to flip.

There's Shawn.

Ryan was down there too. They took dirt bikes too because they went to Dumont Dunes as well. 

That place is gorgeous in the Spring but SOOOOOO hot in the summer. 

 

Black Sabbatical Concert on a Rooftop

Merril and his band, Black Sabbatical, played on the rooftop of a new building at the university. The concert raised money for the Dove Center in St. George. They were staring straight into the sun but it was fun after the sun went down. 

Merril had Maxine play a few songs as an opener. Jack sang a song at the end of the night but his voice is a little unpredictable still. Half way through the song, it started cracking a lot. Oh well, still a fun way to spend Merril's birthday! He's 43!

 

Senior Prom 2021!

Maxine was asked to Senior Prom and we had to find a dress! We went to Suzy's Closet to look for dresses to rent. We ended up purchasing one of the dresses on clearance. It needed sleeves, I wish I had an actual before picture. This one already has the sleeves on. Maxine showed me pictures of what she envisioned the dress the look like and I was skeptical that it would look good. I didn't have the vision.

Maxine was able to cut parts of the flowers and applique them to the sleeves. It helped the sleeves seem like they were part of the dress and tie it together. I washed and air dried it. It looked ghostly.

And Maxine asked if I would take pictures. That makes me nervous but they turned out. I really do love pictures.

Maxine's date was a new kid in robotics named Jacob Arnold.

The kids were cute and fun and Maxine got a ton of compliments on her sleeves. Yay! I'm glad she had the vision and the gumption to pull it off.

We Got Some Butterflies!

I asked Mark if the class was hatching butterflies this spring and he they didn't have any in his classroom! Shocked, I asked Mikayla if she remembered the butterflies in first grade. She said she didn't have butterflies in first grade either. WHAT?! Jill Foy, Valerie Scott's Mom, was a teacher at Coral Canyon before she passed away and the first grade team had a butterfly unit. They learned about caterpillars and butterflies and then purchased caterpillars and watched them change and released them as butterflies.

Since Coral Canyon wasn't doing this anymore, I decided that we should purchase them as a family and watch them change. They were cooler than I thought they'd be! Most have formed a chrysalis. They were so small when they came in the mail.

We moved them to the butterfly cage when they were all cocoons. Then it was time to wait until they started to emerge as butterflies.

It was pretty cool!

Mikayla liked how they let you hold them. She said it's super cool!