In like a Lion

It's official, the unofficial poll results are in, every Mom I have talked to this week have agreed - March is Crazy!   Madness even;)    

Spring sports registration has begun which means that my kids come from school each day with a new sign up sheet in hand, begging to be able to sign up.  Baseball, Soccer, Badminton tryouts, Spring League... they want to do it all!  My method of copying with this is to hide the registration sheets under a massively growing pile of letters from the school and hope that my kids forget about it entirely.  It's a plan that isn't working too well (these kids are relentless!) and I suspect we will spend our spring season down on town square.  

Abby has been a part of Drama club this year and this past week was performance week!  It was her first time in a play and really...her first time on stage.  She pretty much rocked it;)

The play was called "Once on this Island" and was entirely new to the community.  John would likely tell you that it didn't contain the most riveting plot line but it was really well done and I LOVED watching Abby work hard at it.  

Abby and Jessica also travelled to Calgary for the weekend to compete in Choralfest.  Jessica went up on Friday with the elementary school choir and Abby spent two days up there with Leslie's Girls Choir.   Both groups came home with a Platinum which is the highest ranking a group can be given!!  

Woot Woot!

Jessica melted my heart when she came to me on Thursday night (while packing her travel bag) and showed me the four thank you notes she had put together. One for her three teachers who help with choir and one for the random bus driver (who she had yet to meet) who was hired to charter the group up there.   What a cheery GRATEFUL little soul this kid is.  I just adore her!

The past two weeks have been all about Basketball in this town as our Varsity Girls and Boys competed in Zones and then this week Provincials!!!  The boys made it all the way to the final but sadly lost after a hard fight.   This town breathes basketball this time of year.  Its always fun to watch!

And what would March be without a Leprechaun Trap right?  

This year Nate, in a rare moment of compassion, decided not to build a trap at all but rather a Leprechaun HOTEL!   We aren't sure how many Leprechauns stayed the night but it was a GENIUS idea nonetheless;)   

Spring is definitely near.   (Actually, I think it is technically here?)   We still get the odd snow fall but we've got more puddles then we do snowdrifts now so I think we are winning.   

Bring on the gum boots!

Driving me Crazy

It has been an adventurous week for Abby as we've celebrate her 14 years of living.  

Last Friday she had a waffle party with some of her friends.   They made Belgian Waffles, Donut Waffles (glazed donuts pressed in a waffle iron) and Cookie Dough Waffles (same idea).   It's amazing how much noise a gaggle of girls can make when doped up on waffles and sugary toppings.

It also amazed me how attached youth this age are to their phones and how even when we declare this a Girls Only party, boys still manage to be present via Live Instagram feeds.   Ugh.   

I'm not ready for this!

Abby waited anxiously all weekend long for Monday to come, in hopes that I would let her take the test that would qualify her to get her "Learners Permit."  I hummed and hawed about this and threatened to never let her take it, and part of me was so serious.  I'm not ready for this!!  

In the end, she sent me a text from school and simply told me that she would meet me there after school.  

Um.....ok?

  

I complied, mostly because I had no solid reason not too, and we went down to the local registry office as soon as school got out.   I was half hoping she'd fail the test but in true Abby fashion - she passed with flying colors.   Abby was thrilled.   I wanted to cry.  

I've often heard stories of friends of mine who let their kids drive home for the first time right from the registry office.   For the life of me, I couldn't picture Abby maneuvering our busy downtown streets (sarcasm intended) and so I instead drove her to the largest parking lot that I know of in town and (after a quick rundown of everything she needed to know) I let her go.

She was doing fine.  Sure, she pretended to be freaking out and all, but really she was doing just fine.  She was happy as a lark and as I watched her peruse around the parking lot for a good 15 or 20 minutes, I thought to my naive self - "Sure...she's ready to drive us home.  No problem!" 

She took it nice and slow, I mean real slow, .... painfully slow!

She stopped miles ahead of each yield sign, drove 10km/hour through the school zone and once even stopped in the middle of a street because she saw kids playing on a front lawn.  To say this girl was being cautious would be an understatement.   

Which is what makes the next part of my story so darn confusing, because I still don't understand why (after all that painfully cautious driving) after driving all across town, and just as we were seconds away from being home, why she chose to make the last corner without even slowing down.  

But she did. 

As we turned the corner to approach our house I noticed that she was turning awfully fast and really wide.   I could sense that any minute we'd lose control and easily be in the oncoming lane.   I didn't panic or yell (though she might say I did;) as I calmly cautioned, "Abby Slow!  Sharp."

Well.

She apparently took "Sharp" to mean "FASTER!" and naturally she stepped on the gas, which sent us headed straight for a parked vehicle across the street.  At this point I did yell, "Abby!  BRAKE!!!!"   

Her response was to take both hands of the wheel and scream, "Ahhh!  I don't know where the break is, I don't know what to do!"   

All of this happened so fast and was over in mere seconds.   The runaway van we were trapped in simply jumped the curb and stopped abruptly, high centred on a giant mound of ice on a neighbors front lawn.  I turned to Abby and (CALMLY) asked, "What.the.heck.was.that?"  

Her response:  "Momit'snotmyfaultyousaidsharperandthatmeansfasterandyoushouldn'thaveletmedriveinthefirstplaceandI'mneverdrivingagain!"

So, here we were.  

Stuck in this awful, nasty, embarrassing, no good situation and all I could think was how John would be passing by any moment on his way home from work and he'd surely have to save the day and then all would know that John was the better parent then I.

Sigh.....

Luckily, the husband of one of my favorite former neighbors (it helps to move around a lot, you meet a lot of people;) passed by just at that moment.   It was obvious our van was not going anywhere with out being pulled away and luckily he had all the necessary gear to do that.   It took probably two minutes before we were pulled out and on our way again. 

Of course I made Abby get in the drivers seat and circle around to re do that very corner.  It gave her the chance to get back up on the proverbial horse and try again and it gave me a chance to stall a bit more before going home to face John.

In the end John was a champ about it (he always is) and didn't rub my nose in the fact that he would have done a better job at teaching Abby how to drive, than I.   Perhaps he just felt confident that some things don't need to be said out loud? 

At any rate, all is well that ends well, right?   

We've lived to tell the tale (and even laugh about it), there was no damage to the van (that we know of), and Abby has been able to just get her one and only driving mishap out of the way right, off the bat!

Have I mentioned I'm not ready for this?!

14 Candles

This darling friend turned 14 over the weekend which means that I spent many hours deep in existential thought wondering how to possibly parent a kid this old. It's a vulnerable feeling - this business of letting your child grow up and experience whatever it is they are meant to experience. If i could give her a fast pass right on by this stage of life, I'm sure I would. Abby, on the other hand, is all excitement and enthusiasm. (She's adorable like that;)

#whatidontknowscaresme

#practicingtrust

#rootsandwings