4 Turtle Doves: Good Bye January

What a weird winter it has been. January is coming in for a close and no snow! I've asked Don if he has felt led to move, maybe he was being prompted, cause I'm not, but it would be great. I'd take Arizona or San Diego. At this point I'd like to live in a State that doesn't land in the Top 5 coldest places in the U.S. A winter that behaves like winter...with snow! Instead, its brown. Blustering wind throwing trash all over my yard. Cold that hurts your face and freezes your nostril hair. Then we get this bizarre Spring weather. Sixty degree day in between record lows. Days that confuse the toddlers and have Mother's hollering at their kids to go outside, because tomorrow it will be freezing!

Grant decided to not join a basketball team or play on the wrestling team this year. He has been spending a few nights a week at Millard West on the Dive team. This has been fun, but not the energy burning sport my very active boy needs. He comes home from school and bounces off the couch. He tells me "I can't just sit." Austin begs for the kids to go down and run very very fast with music. I make Grant go down for a bit just to get some of the pent up energy out! Poor kids can't even go outside for recess these days.

Handle Bar Piggy Tails!

Heidi's extracurricular activity this winter has been Dora the Explorer! She might have an addictive trait in her genes as she is obsessed! Brings me the remote in the bathroom and throws it at me. Puts her hands over her face and cries when I turn it on and it has an 'adult' themed commercial before the episode begins. She says Dora to everything. Did you sleep good? "Dora." Do you want to go bye-bye, "Dora." Let's go get dressed, "Dora." She does try and say Boots. And Swiper...well he gets no recognition. Silly fox is always trying to swipe their stuff so he must be too naughty or scary for her! She got the trio of dolls for Christmas and won't touch Swiper!

January Showcase

The end of January means Dance in our world. January Showcase happens at the studio and it means lots of hours of rehearsal for Molly and rhinestoning for Mom! It is a great break in the winter, getting to watch girls perform the art of dance. I was blown away this year by a few things:
1. How much the girls bodies change from 3rd to 4th grade
2. How much stronger they dance from 2nd grade to 3rd grade
3. How much effort from the dance teachers at ND goes into building the character of the girls as well as the body!

Number 3 is the reason I love Nebraska Dance.

Her sweet bestie... Holly!

Austin has moved into kindermusic with his parents to drop him off kindermusic. Ms. Ann gets thirty minutes of music time with Austin. Thank goodness the boy is better behaved when his parents aren't around! He's gone twice now and proclaims to all of us that "I go music all by myself." I'm not really sure if the boy will care one iota about anything musical. He shouts, "I no like music," when we are in the van. I'm thinking Grant will be my guitar strumming musician while Austin is memorizing Football plays... they are so different!!!!