McGlamery Madness: July 2013

Tuesday, July 30, 2013

Sarah's first sleepover

For Sarah's 8th birthday, we let her have a friend spend the night for the first time ever. I realize that may seem strange to some people--having a first sleepover at 8 yrs old. But we've just never done that sort of thing with anyone other than family.

Sarah invited her best friend, Valerie.

Valerie's a great friend for a lot of reasons:

* She just turned 8 in July as well so they're both the youngest in their class.

* She's a sweet little girl, very respectful. In fact she called me "Mrs. McGlamery" the entire time. I'm pretty sure no one's called me that since I was a teacher.

* She's loyal to Sarah, which is important because you know how girls can be... even at this age.

When she came over to spend the night, she brought Sarah a big bag of stuff as her birthday present...

To me, this is also what makes Valerie so sweet. It was a bear that Sarah can draw on because, according to Valerie, "I know you like stuffed animals and art." There was a picture frame that Valerie decorated and put a pic of the two of them in it. The rolled-up, scroll-like thing is a banner that Valerie made that said "HAPPY BIRTHDAY SARAH" in block letters. Her idea was that they could color it together. (And they did later that night.)

Those are thoughtful gifts, not expensive gifts. I love that! When Sarah opened them, she said, "Thanks, Valerie, I love them." And Valerie said, "I love you, Sarah."

Awwww. Sweetest, cheesiest moment ever.

Flash forward a few hours-- Valerie had a little meltdown due to homesickness and went home around midnight. I don't blame her. It was her first sleepover too.

I ended up spending the night with Sarah to finish out her first sleepover. (Although I'm pretty sure I'm a poor substitute for her best friend.)

Then we picked V up again the next morning to have donuts and swim.

So technically the only part of the sleepover that Valerie missed was the sleeping over part. Everything else she did with us. :)

It was a fun night anyway!

FINALLY...

We have been having fun in our pool...

because FINALLY we have kids who are comfortable in the water. We can always work on form later; we just wanted them to have fun in the pool. :)
Thank you, Mrs. Margaret!

Monday, July 29, 2013

Wanted: A Counseling Mentor

I've gone back and forth about whether or not to blog about this. I've decided to blog about it for 2 reasons:

1. I don't want to upload pics from Sarah's birthday and blog about that just yet. That sounds like a hassle at the moment.

2. I'll use no names in this post. Although for a couple of you, it won't be hard to figure out the person involved.

...................

A year from now I'll need to do an internship for grad school. It's kinda like a student teaching semester, except I'll learn how to do counseling things-- meet with groups, teach in classrooms, administrative work, etc etc.

I need to get 200 hours completed under the guidance of a school counselor.

Immediately a certain counselor came to mind. I never thought I'd learn much from her, but I knew she'd keep me laughing. She's a little nutty. Harmless but nutty.

She's also pretty scatterbrained. So scatterbrained that I know I could just tell her how many hours I've done. She wouldn't argue with me; she would just sign some piece of paper saying that I did the work. I wouldn't do that, of course, but I know that the question of ethics and honesty in that situation wouldn't bother her. She has that way about her. I can't really explain it.

Last week I got a text from my friend telling me that I'll have to find a new mentor.

This counselor has been fired from the school following her fourth arrest for theft.

Three things--

1. I'm such a good judge of character. She would have totally lied for me. ;)

2. I'm so glad she got busted before I wrote her down as a reference. Yikes! Can you imagine a prospective employer calling for her, only to find out that she can't come to the phone right now because she's incarcerated?

3. While I know I'll get a much better education from someone else, I can't help but wonder all of the things I could've learned from her. However, considering this was her FOURTH arrest, I can only assume "How to Be Sneaky" would not be on the list.

Thursday, July 25, 2013

swim, baby, swim

Today was Caroline's last day of swim lessons. Two weeks ago she was a wearer of floaties and had gone underwater once... I think.

Today, she swam.

Waiting for class to start...

She's the one directly behind the pole with her face in the water. I'm constantly amazed by my outstanding photography.

Practicing her arms...

About to jump in....

Splash!

After she jumped in, she swam all the way to Mrs. Margaret...

And then to the steps...

This was her "jump in, swim at least 6 feet and climb out by herself on the other side of the pool" trick...

There she goes....

When we found out she was going to go off the diving board, Jason and I looked at each other and simultaneously said, "No way!"....

She wasn't sure about it. But what's great about these swim lessons is the fact that if you don't want to jump, they drop you in.

I'm not a "drop her in anyway" kind of mom. But I'm more than willing to pay someone else to show some tough love. And Caroline did just fine!

Watching her friends freak out on the diving board....

Water slide time...

I was so busy watching her that I failed to get her face in the shot. But there's her body... :)

"Now let's float as flat as a pancake..."

"Hands on your tummy. And relax....."

"Relax, Caroline. All the way flat..."

"But it's so bright, Ms. Sarah. I can't relax..."

"There. That's better. Thanks!"

Swim back to the steps...

I have a little swimmer. Hooray!

Now if she refuses to do this in our pool, I've got photographic evidence that she CAN do this!!

Tuesday, July 23, 2013

A picture of my dad

By Caroline...

I asked her who it was and she said, "It's Papalu. See how he only has hair on the sides?"

Tetris

Twenty years later and I still struggle to get past level 9. ;)

Tomorrow I think I'll tackle Super Marioland 2. A classic from 1992.

I gotta say--- there's something to be said for electronic devices that take 4 AA batteries. None of these cables and chargers that change with each new model.

As long as there are AA batteries in the world, there will be working Game Boys. And that makes me happy.

Friday, July 19, 2013

Picture dump

Rather than making several small posts, I'm uploading pictures from unrelated events in one post.

......................

So that Rachel doesn't think Aunt Julie forgot all about her...

Pizza and cake for Rachel's 9th birthday

.................

So Jack doesn't think I forgot all about him...

The poor kid lost tooth #3 weeks ago. I've posted every time Sarah's lost one but totally forgot to document Jack's.

Sorry, buddy. This was a pic I took while we were waiting for Caroline to finish swim lessons. Not great but it counts!

............................

Clearly I must've forgotten all about Caroline and (once again) didn't realize she was tired. I found her like this a couple of days ago.

Even worse--- I took her picture and left her sleeping there. But I did uncover her head to make sure she could breathe.

Yep, I go the extra mile to be the best mom I can possibly be.

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So Sarah would know that I love her....

Sarah's been in a Weird Science camp at church this week, and she came to me with this...

... and said, "Mom, you wanna try one of my gummies?"

"What are those??? Gummies? Like gummy bears?"

"Yeah, I made them in Weird Science camp. Try one!"

"Have YOU tried one?"

"No, but I bet it's good."

"Ok." And I ate the gummy. Because I love her.

This was like when Ross was about to drink the fat for Rachel. Only Rachel stopped Ross before he actually drank the fat.

Sarah didn't stop me.

I can't really describe the taste or texture to you. But I would use neither the words "gummy" nor "good" as descriptors.

...........................

So we'll always be able to remember today...

Mom took the girls with July birthdays to Sweet and Sassy today. They got their nails done.

And I told Sarah that if she wanted to get her ears pierced, for her upcoming 8th birthday, she could. She's had a big year of increased responsibility and she's really grown up a lot. She's a HUGE help to me, and this was something she wanted to do to show that she had grown up.

So here's my newly ear-pierced, soon-to-be-8-yr-old.