What's Going On

Halloween

Very tired.. more tomorrow..

Lion's club basketball

Chris and Derek are both playing Lions club basketball.  They are on two different teams.  They play games every Wednesday night.  Today was the first night of games and they played each other!  Well, their teams played each other but they were not on the court at the same time other than warm-ups.  The younger kids play the first and 3rd quarters, the older kids play the 2nd and 4th quarters.  They both did really well and seemed to have fun.  These pictures are really bad, but here they are...

This is Derek (that is not Chris guarding him)

 

Chris..

 

Derek, #3

 

Derek on the left

 

Chris with the ball

 

Denis and Margaret have BIG news...

Here is what Denis had to say..

 

"Please let everybody know that Marg and I are expecting.......

 

 

 

 

 

 

our new member of the family.......

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

to be delievered (flying in from Arkansas)....

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

around Nov 10th........

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

no name yet.....................

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Say it isn't so...

Chris informed me today that a friend of his, said that her little brother told her (important detail there), that Cookie Monster is no long on Sesame Street.  Something about being unhealthy and setting a bad example.. He's been replaced by some "Veggie-mon"!   I'm sure there is someone out there in blog-reader land who can confirm or deny this rumor...  

Chris had before school math club this morning.  I got to the gym and finally did some very much needed grocery shopping.  Then I met the other 3 brownie camping moms to plan for our big camping trip in two weeks.

Did anyone see this 2008 Gymnastics Superstars special on TV?  It was SO BAD!!!!!!!!  I wish I had not told Steph I taped it...   it was really bad.  They made these olypics stars look like fools.

I'll leave you with some pics..

 

Ready for a shave...

 

I said I didn't do it and I'm sticking to my story...

 

Look at my sweet, sweet new brother Connor...  I love him so much

 

Now remember, I'm the big brother, I can do what I want, when I want... and don't touch my stuff..

 

The beautiful new house!

Sunday night

Hello and Happy Sunday night.  Hope everyone had a good weekend.

We had an early start this morning, Chris was altar server at 8am Mass this morning.

Steph had an All Saints Day party at religion at 8:45 this morning.  I stayed to help.  All the kids dressed as saints.  Some costumes were elaborate!  (like the religion teacher's son!), come were clever (like the little girl with a gold colored paper plate that was tied in a way that it stood up behind her head like a halo).  I learned early in Christopher's religion career, that if I invested in two large pieces of cloth, one black and one brown and cut a hole for a head  and tied a rope around the waist, it works as any saint we might dream up!  Steph was the black clothed saint who carried a basket of flowers and called herself St. Rosalita (who hid bread crumbs under flowers).

The gym was made into heaven with lots of silver hanging stremer thingys and they played a bunch of fun saint related games.  One of them had something to do  with hitting a ball through two cone type hthings with a big spoon.  I got to man the snack station.  Then when it was all over, they did a few laps around the gym singing "when the saints come marching  in".  Then we headed over to Mass and there was a saints procession at the start of Mass.

Chris and Jeff headed off to Chris's game in the Brewster area... I hear they played very, very well, but lost 2 - 1.

Steph and I headed out ot the Cornwall area and Steph's team didn't lose for the first time!!  They TIED 2-2!!!  And guess who scored the 2 goals.  Yep, she did it again.  Steph played center defense for the first half.  the second half she started on offense and scored to very nice goals.  the whole team played fantastic.  Especially the defense and goalies.. the girls were very happy campers after the game.  Maybe they'll get a win soon!!

This picture is from last season when Steph played on the boys team..

It's tough to take pics when I'm helping to coach, but next Sunday the game times and locations are such that we can probalby all go to both games (yes, a whole entire day of soccer!).. so maybe Jeff can take some pics of Steph's game and I can get some of Chris' game!

Well, back to Desperate Housewives...

Have a great Monday!

Fall Festival

Today was fall festival.

But before fall festival began, Chris was up at the crack of dawn as usual, playing in the basement and watching SNY to get the latest sports updates.  Steph was up pretty early, which was good because she had a surprise morning birthday party to go to.  That's right a surprise morning birthday party.  But it was the guests who were surprised, not the birthday girl.  so the birthday girl and her mom and sister went to surprise/pick up the other two guests, then they came here.  I told Steph she had to get dressed because there was a surprise coming, but she didn't kown what it was.  Well the mom and birthday girl and sister had on really funny wigs and jumped out of the van and yelled surprise, Steph thought it wsa very cool.  they went ot the bday girls house and had some breakfast and danced and acted crazy!  That was from 8:15 amd - 9:15 am!

At 9:15 I picked Steph up and took her to the school for the "fun run" that was right before Fall Festival.  Chris decided to skip the fun run.  The phys ed teacher ran it and each grade went separately.  AND it was supposed to be a FUN run.. not a race.  The teacher said over and over, "THIS IS NOT A RACE".  Sure, right, whatever Mr. H... not a race, yep, we got it.    

It turned into a race.

Here is Steph's group begining the non-race (these are the 3rd graders.. it was threatening rain so not a huge turnout):

 

Note Steph started out in "it's not a race" mode... that quickly changed..

 

Here she is coming in second place behind her friend (a boy) from her prior soccer team:

 

Derek ran with the 4th graders.  Here he is at the starting gate and taking an early lead:

 

   

And making a strong finish..

 

Then it was inside to play and hand out...

 

Steph was in the talent show (she did ballet and tap, we had about 2 minutes after ballet to get her into her tap costume, which includes taping her pleather boots to her tap shoes.  There were 3 of us mom's (Stephanie's pit crew) working on her change.  We didn't do very well, she blew a gasket (white boot popped off of the black tap shoe) half way through the dance.. but luckily she found it amusing.  I only took a picture of ballet, you've seen hundreds of pics of her doing the tap dance (you know the very very short dress that looks kind of like a pink and black version of the Partidge family bus).

 

 

Jeff and Chris came to fall festival shortly after it began.  They got to see Steph dance and Chris played lots of games and won lots of tickets and lots of prizes.  Steph got a fake cast on her arm and we all bought some lunch. 

At this point it was drizzling and looking like it was going to pour.  And the wind was picking up.  Jeff and Chris had a baseball game at 3:30.  Coach Jeff had to decide if it was cancelled.  And about 1/2 of both baseball teams were at fall festival asking if the game was on or not.  Well, Jeff checked the radar and the field and decided to give it a go.  It worked out well.  They were able to play almost the whole game before the skies opened up and the winds blew sheets of water over all the players and the field.  They  quickly jumped into cars and headed home.  It was a good game, good one to end the season on.  It would have been sad to end it on a rainout!

Well, that's about it for today.. it's still POURING outside, the wind is blowing, it's been thundering and lightning... and the lights just blinked so I better end this quickly. 

Oh, Steph got her face painted today too, isn't she lovely?

 

 

All saints party and soccer games tomorrow... talk to you then.  Have a great Sunday!!

Elle the Elephant

Today was the day... Chris was Elle the Elephant today.

Tomorrow is Fall Festival at the Elementary School.  Our PTA puts on a big festival with games, food, Doctom Dimento (who puts fake casts on the kids), a talent show and lots of other things.  One of the attractions is Elle the Elephant.  In order to get the kids excited about Fall Festival, Chris was the voice and trunk behind Elle the Elephants as the kids got off the buses and came into school today.  Chris had a GREAT time being Elle.  His friends were peeking in saying "Is that Cassens in there?" and the little kids were wide-eyed and amazed that there was an Elephant greeting them in the hallway at school.

You can't see Chris in these pics, he was in the principals office behind the elephant, but you get the idea..

 

 

So in preparation for Fall Festival, about 8 other women and I unloaded a few hundred boxes from a truck.  Tomorrow at Fall Festival, everyone is supposed to come pick up their Sally Foster giftwrap orders. 

Steph had gymnastics tonight, but had to leave early in order to get to rehearsal for the talent show.

Fun run starts at 9:30 am, Steph is going to run, Chris is going to skip it.  When the festival begins,  Chris will come hang out, play games and watch the talent show.  Steph of course will be dancing in the talent show, ballet and tap.  They will miss Dilynn this year, she is usually the MC of the talent show!

Chris and Derek started basketball last week.  They have gone twice so far (on Wednesday nights).  They are not on the same team, but are both enjoying playing

Chris's CYO basketball team started practice tonight, his Wed night coach (Lion's club) is the same coach as his CYO team.  The coach tried to get all of his CYO kids who alsp play Lion's club, on his Lion's club team so they can play together as much as possible.  Chris is one of the older kids on both teams this year, I think he's enjoying that.

Well, that's all for tonight... Steph actually has to go to a birthday breakfast tomorrow morning at 8:15 am before the fun run at fall festival.  More about that tomorrow!  But I"m tired just thinking about tomorrow...

Hope everyone has a great weekend!

Hello again..

Today I made it to the gym.. after a weekend of bad eating I needed it!! (there is more than Sheep and Wool at the Sheep and Wool festival.. there is kettle corn, fudge, blooming onions, fried dough.. and lots of other goodies!)

Mom and Chrisie and I went out to lunch to one of our favorite luch places today (for salads!).

Steph had ballet after school and Chris had soccer.  Dilynn had a "quiz bowl" competition.  Nana went along to watch.  I think a bunch of middle school quiz bowl teams meet in Poughkeepsie every week or so and have a quiz bowl.  Dilynn loves it and Derek finds watching it pretty interesting.  I will report back about how it went tomorrow.

I had a PTSO meeting tonight (PTA).  Fun fun fun.  I'm now in charge of our PTSO web page, that's what I get for being a blogging geek.

Dad is coming up tomorow to spend a few days.  Chris was very excited to hear Papa was coming to visit!

Let's see if I can find a good picture here..   OH, I got this in my email today...

Tough Love vs. Spanking - Good Argument Most of the American populace thinks it improper to spank children, so I have tried other methods to control kids when they have one of 'those moments.' One that I found effective is for me to just take the child for a car ride and talk. Some say it's the vibration from the car, others say it's the time away from any distractions such as TV, Video Games, Computer, IPod, etc. Either way, my kids usually calm down and stop misbehaving after our car ride together.  Eye to eye contact helps a lot too.  I've included a photo below of one of my sessions with my nephew, in case you would like to use the technique..    This works with grandchildren, nieces, and nephews as well.  So beware Dilynn!

 

 

Bad Blogger..

Yes, I've been very bad about blogging this past week.

Sunday mom, Aunt Elaine and Aunt Edie came to visit.  We went to the sheep and wool festival.  yes, that made Jeff laugh too.

Aunt Edie and Aunt Elaine left yesterday (Monday), mom is still here and dad's coming up tomorrow maybe...

I will blog more tonight after my PTSO meeting!  Promise.

Birthday party

We had Steph's birthday party today.  She had her party along with a friend who is on her soccer team who's birtday is around the same time.  There were 23 girls !!!!  We all survived and had a great time.  I will sleep well tonight.  We rented a parish hall for the event.  A very nice space with room upstairs for eating and downstairs for playing.

 

They painted pumpkins:

 

Got their faces painted:

 

Did the limbo

 

In very strange ways:

 

They ate pizza:

 

 

 

The went on a scavanger hunt:

 

 

They ate donuts off of strings that their partner was holding:

 

They hit a pinata:

 

 

They did the Macarena:

 

They did "bop the balloon with your head"  races:

 

 

Balance the pizza box on your head races:

 

Conga line:

 

And cake and "Happy Birthday":

 

 

They did a few other things along the way.  I think the limbo was by far the girls' favorite event!

Everyone had fun, especially the birthday girls   !