Our Side of the Tracks: August 2020: the whole thing

Settle in, grab a snack, we're doing allll of August in one go-round:

Trolls 2 at the dollar movie in Boise. Had the entire theater to ourselves. Alas, didn't live up to Trolls 1, but that's okay.

Chocolate ice cream in the front yard?

Carma and I are, it turns out, pretty cute!

Jackers getting in some quality time with Clark before their family moved.

Instagram caption: Sibling trust exercises 👀🤷🏻‍♀️😅

Clyde getting that work in.

5:55am drop off for football practice:

Later that day, an adventurous drive with my mama:

We saw some sights, found a car, stumbled upon this handsome gent:

Five hour road trip where you stay within an hour of where you live? Make sure you have a good buddy along!

Instagram caption: Swimming continues to be Will’s fave athletic pursuit (like, favorite by a large margin and also by default. Then biking. Then another large gap. Then anything else sport-related ;) ). This summer he’s put in the time and effort by going to the gym to swim laps with Chuck (and now me too! I have a gym membership! I modify every swimming stroke so my face doesn’t have to go in the water!) and this pretty awesome 12 year old checked off his goal of passing level four in swimming lessons. Will’s honesty continues to make me laugh (“yeah, I like swimming with dad better. But if he has to work, I guess I’ll go with you Mom”) and I’m hecka proud of him for stretching beyond his natural comfort zone and preferences to take good care of his body and thereby forcing me to attempt the same ;).

Sure love my Willy boy.

Lots more progress on the ol' office:

I don't have any remembrance or context for this picture but it's adorable.

Covid church vibes:

This girl though!

Lol:

New hair, new shoes.

Instagram caption: Chuck put a mirror on my office door and I had a random vision for what I wanted to write around the mirror and ZERO confidence that I could make it happen in any kind of cute way. Cue @joyfully.jules to the rescue: she created and applied this incredible lettering and I loooove it. So grateful for talented and generous co-workers/friends! 🤩🤩🤩

Clearly the makings of a good girls' night... minus the absence of Kara and Nicole.

Another New Plymouth evening:

Ohhh Carma!

Grandma Pam came over on her birthday and it was lovely! We played Ticket to Ride and Chuck made us delicious food.

We told Will he had to have fruit on his shortcake. EWWWW haha.

Checkup for this little girl and her bestie, aka Dad:

The matching masks tho.

Swam some laps.

One last Clark bday party - super fun lego activity:

This is my freaking hill of parenting I will die on. Be a safe place for your kids to go. Don't react to mistakes or confessions with so much anger and punishments that your kids are scared to talk to you. PLEASE AND THANK YOU.

Chuck loves it. And me. Mostly ;).

Yeppp.

Cutest work laptop.

Cutest kids.

There's a chance Will enjoys being around us more when he can't hear us as well!

Some more enneagram screenshots:

Sched for the week yo:

High school stuff!

One last hurrah in New Plymouth:

The Jacks.

Instagram caption: Y’all know I love a good photo recreation and I still can’t believe how perfectly this one came out. August 2017 vs August 2020 😍 This summer was a bust in a few ways, but games nights with this crowd were the best. As crucial as girls nights WiTHOUT kids are, mixing in nights where families tag along too is seriously so fun. My favorite was when it was time to leave, watching all the kids mill around to give hugs goodbye as cars loaded up (it’s fine, New Plymouth has moved on, ‘Rona isn’t a thing out there 😎😅). These 23 (plus the five... almost seven... not pictured) are dolls and warm my heart and someday I’ll come up with a better term for their collective relationship than my current go-to, ‘half cousins’ 👀😬😂

Um yes we made them line up in the exact order of the previous photo. IT JUST BRINGS ME SO MUCH JOY OKAY.

Literally no context for this either but I love it.

Ohhh Facebook.

Super fun Facebook post - Chuck's hs/college bestie Will and his wife Kari were in Boise and posted this:

Will and Kari were the best friends to Chuck (and then me!) and we just love them!

Sam and Terri and co. came to town and we enjoyed all sorts of fun with them:

I sincerely hope Carma asked permission before letting loose on girl cousins with makeup... but let's be honest, she probably didn't ;).

Some sort of skit/play:

Looked thrilling!

Carma was SO happy with girl cousins!!!

Chuck and I sat down and went through all of Clyde's classes and various log in info and schedule stuff and he LOVED this time bonding with us:

After church photoshoot:

Instagram caption: Happy First Day of School Eve 💻📝📒🍎🙌🏼. Online school dress code is Sunday best... or maybe I took these before church this morning 🤷🏻‍♀️. Clyde is in 9th aka high school, Will’s in 7th and at middle school with me, and Jack and Carma round out the bunch in 3rd and 1st in elementary. I sat down with each kid to go through their schedule and device and learning platforms and teacher emails and Chuck gave us all blessings and I picked up chocolate covered gummy bears last night at Winco so we are prepared as we can be 😅. Let’s do this thing 🤪👍🏼💃🏻🤗

I thought maybe wearing masks (inhibiting smell and taste) would sharpen their other senses (maybe sight?) but it doesn't work because they still can't just look my direction for a quick picture haha.

Love this:

Sunday brunch:

with cousins!!

Yeppp:

Quick trip over to Boise to pick up a mini fridge off Facebook marketplace and it was basically around the corner from Les Bois Junior High, aka my old stomping grounds. Took a quick picture. Crazy that life comes full circle and I work at a middle school now!

Three of them, yo:

Ohhh man. Getting Carma all dialed in. My amazing school district partnered with the Boys and Girls Club for kiddos of staff, and by allll things divine East Valley was one of the physical locations. Every morning I went to school, sent the three younger kids to Boys and Girls Club, and picked them up at the end of the day. BGC staff worked with the kids to get logged in and their school work done. Amazing.

Clyde decided he had aged out of such a program, so he found random desks and office and classrooms around school to set up camp and do his classes:

All of this led to everyone taking a picture outside East Valley on the first morning, not just Will the actual East Valley student:

The Boys and Girls club classroom was a little much for Willy boy at times, so he came to my office on occasion:

Carma liked to wander in for visits too haha.

Work! During online learning, I did a lot of student/parent contact and tech support to make sure kids were able to log into their class meetings. As school went along, I did a lot of virtual tutoring sessions to help students get assignments done. I also found projects to keep busy, including this craft and decor attempt:

Alllll too soon it was time to say goodbye to the Curtis family and IT WAS ROUGH. Jason and Grace bought a house a block away from us when they were pregnant with Clark and these two have spent the last eight years being the best of neighborhood friends.

I took a video of them doing their secret handshake but obviously I'm forbidden from posting it.

Carma and Andy's friendship was pretty dang cute as well:

We were seriously so spoiled having Curtises right around the block for so long. COUNTLESS playdates and running back and forth and entertainment.

One last hug kills me. I don't know why Grace and I didn't take a picture, but we should have! Grace is incredible - such a good hype friend. Always up for anything, always willing to serve and befriend and love and entertain and laugh. So glad that she gets to be close to her side of the family again but SO sad that means alll the way in Arkansas!

In other news, I will always be okay being compared to Gus-Gus.

Instagram caption: School update: touch and go. Ups and downs. My kids are tiiiiired. I’ve outsourced the younger two and it has saved my life. Or theirs 👀. In exciting news I did some spray painting out by the portables and didn’t get caught 😅🤘🏼🚨