A Photo Catch-Up Post, In Reverse Chronological Order

So I still have 30 papers left to grade and I'm hoping to be finished by Friday night. Still, I can't just grade, grade, grade. Gotta take a break and blog. Plus I have some great photos to share, some of them extending all the way back to Thanksgiving, and before we know it Christmas will be upon us and I'll have a whole NEW slew of photos to share. So here we go -- starting with the most recent. Today! Wyatt's Kindergarten Christmas party. The whole entire Kindergarten celebrates together, and it was so much fun to watch these kids skipping and dancing down the halls. They even had a karaoke station. It was awesome.

Here's Wyatt with his quintessentially young/cute/blonde/sweet Kindergarten teacher:

Isn't that the best face painting job ever? (They had me on the coloring pages station. I think you had to audition to do the face painting.)

Elise also had the East Ridge choir/band/orchestra concert, and she's been having a great time singing with her women's carolers group too. So far they've hit a retirement home and Sam's Club (twice!), and they have a few more gigs still to come. She looks beautimous in her long black dress. That I haven't hemmed yet.

Wyatt's also spent a lot of time playing with the Red Solo Cups grandma turned from receptacles for drinking to toys for stacking when they were here for Thanksgiving. Here's one of his best creations, completed while I was upstairs on my elliptical machine before school started.

We've also had a little Christmas cheer. Like sugar cookies! I love sugar cookies, which is one reason it's problematic for me to make them. You know how the Pringles people say you can't eat just one? (Or is that the Lays people?) For me it's the sugar cookies; especially homemade ones. Here's Wyatt and Jonas showing off their frosting skillz:

It's a good thing that I took 30 of these bad boys to seminary tonight for our class Christmas party. They were devoured. One kid had five cookies on his plate and I said (semi-coercively), "Wow! That's a lot of cookies you have there!" And he said, "Yup," and proceeded to sit down and eat all of them.

By the way, I love my home study seminary class. Although I loved my early morning class too, it was a "you challenge me, and I love you because of it" kind of experience. They were all good kids, but the early hour, plus a few personalities, plus the every dayness of it contributed to help make a vibrant classroom experience pretty tough to pull off. My home study kids, though, actually listen and discuss and have restored my faith that it is in fact possible to have gospel discussions with teenagers. Anyway -- back to pictures!

I also have some WONDERFUL pictures of the musical that were taken by a professional photographer. (I bought the CD.) The only bad thing--sad sad SAD thing-- is that Elise missed ONE rehearsal, and it happened to be the one where they took these pictures. I can't believe it. So I have professional pictures of Ethan, but not Elise. At least I got a couple of shots of her afterward. Anyway, here are some great pictures of Ethan as Ralph Sheldrake, army buddy to Bob and Phil turned producer at the Ed Sullivan show.

Ethan delivered the first line of the show. (He also figured out how to hide his mic pack after this dress rehearsal.)

I love this picture. Who would have thought I'd ever see Ethan singing on stage??

Soldier-turned-producer, working the phones.

The whole cast in the finale

Ethan, taking his bow

Ethan, looking tall

Another shot of the cast. See that hole next to the two girls in the back? Elise should be standing there. Sigh.

Ethan ended up getting an award from the Spotlight Awards, a state-sponsored award given by a professional theater group in Minneapolis for all high school musicals. He got an honorable mention for "featured performance," which is awesome. Also, East Ridge was one of five high schools in the Twin Cities who scored high enough to perform during the Spotlight showcase  this spring. The whole cast was stoked.

Oh! And Ethan also got a 31 on his practice ACT. AND he scored in the 99th percentile on his PSAT, which will probably qualify him for National Merit Semifinalists status. It's been a good couple of weeks for Ethan.

Finally, here are a few pics all the way back from Thanksgiving that deserve a blog spot:

Wyatt, looking blue eyed and handsome with his homemade turkey

Grandma, showing off her ginormous Pepsi as we waited for The LIfe of Pi to start. (Grandma isn't one to drink ginormous Pepsis very often. Hence the picture.)

The Mall of America, Black Friday. Grandma loved the lights so much she made me take a picture.

Everybody but me at the James J. Hill House, a cool old mansion owned by a curmudgeonly industrialist at the turn of the 20th century. And I say "everybody but me" because I managed to get Forrest and Grandpa in the mirror.

Outside the James J. Hill House. It's so big you can really only get a shot of the entrance.

And now I'm caught up! Wyatt is beside me, snoring like an old man, and everybody else is waiting for me downstairs so we can pray and hit the sack. Next up: Christmas!

White Christmas

Today is the first big blizzard of the winter of 2012-2013. It's also the last day of the run of East Ridge High's production of White Christmas. It's been such a wonderful show; the best musical I've seen at East Ridge. In fact, it's one of the best high school productions I've ever seen. This isn't just my motherly opinion, either -- lots of people who've seen the show feel the same way. I think it's the combination of Christmas, patriotism, familiar music, and a bunch of really talented kids that do it. Both Ethan and Elise did a fantastic job. I'll be getting a CD with professional pictures of the show itself soon (we're not allowed to take pictures), but here are a few I shot after the show:

Elise looking lovely

Elise and her Dad. Think they're related?

Ethan and Elise post-show

Lookin good!

 I also got a few shots of Ethan with his friends. Elise had already scampered backstage to change.

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Ethan and Evan, a great kid in our ward who's also taking my class at Inver Hills.

I wish all of you could have seen the show!

In other news, we also sold the Mazda and bought car #3, the official "kid car." Forrest has always had a thing for Jeeps and we got a great deal on this one, a 2005 Liberty. It will be a nice safe car for the kids to tool around in.

And now the blizzard! It's snowing like crazy outside. So crazy that I guess the Weather Channel named it Winter Storm Caesar. (Seriously.) Of course Wyatt had to go outside immediately and sled down our backyard hill.

Dad is such a trooper, always willing to get the gear on and be the official sledding attendant.

And he's off!

See? White Christmas!

Forrest popped his head in the door and asked Jonas if he wanted to come out and sled too. He was happily curled up in front of the fire and asked me plaintively, "Do I have to? It's cold out there!" Since I vividly remember actively disliking sledding as a child (so cold! so wet! and a little scary, frankly!) I gave him a pass.  Besides, doesn't he look comfy?

And now I have to go make 2 dozen chocolate chip cookies for the cast party tonight. Next week is my last week of class and I have to get grades done before Dec. 23, not to mention all the other Christmas-related craziness that descends upon every family this time of year, but it's all good. It's been a fun holiday season so far. Hope you're all snuggly and warm and get to enjoy a little Christmas snow yourselves this year!

Good Times With Grandma and Grandpa

Grandma and Grandpa Sweat have been with us since Wednesday and it's been so much fun. Thanksgiving is so much better when you have extended family to share it with (and to help you make the food). We had a loverly spread on Thursday afternoon:

Before dinner, Grandma kept the kids busy making little turkeys out of walnuts, pipe cleaners, and googly eyes. Googly eyes are one of my favorite crafty adornments. What else can turn a walnut into a turkey?

After we wolfed down a dinner that took most of the day to prepare (I know I mention this every Thanksgiving, but it never ceases to amaze me how fast a family can tear through a turkey dinner), we indulged in some much-needed late-afternoon rest.

The menfolk resting.

Then we headed out to the movie theater to see Life of Pi. What a beautiful movie. Still thinking about it. It was a little over Wyatt's head, but he did a good job being patient and sat there like a big kid throughout. Just today he said, "I liked that movie about the guy and the tiger, but there was lots of talking." He was right: lots of talking about God and fate, interspersed with some pretty intense action sequences and absolutely gorgeous visuals. I never thought a field of meerkats could be so beautiful. Ethan came straight home and dug out my paperback version of the novel and has been reading it ever since.

Then yesterday I woke up early, but not CRAZY early, because all the crazy people got to the stores at 9 p.m. Thanksgiving night while I was happily watching Life of Pi with my family. It's actually kind of nice: there are still lots of great deals, but the crowds have mostly dispersed. I scored at Kohl's with my 15% off coupon AND $15 Kohl's cash for every $50 spent. That's almost 50% already low Black Friday prices! (Yeah, yeah, I sound like a Kohl's commercial, but JCPenney? Sorry -- folks like me enjoy the coupons.)

Later that morning Elise, Grandma and I headed out to the Mall of America which was also busy but not crazy, since the door had opened the night before at midnight. I got 40% everything in the store at American Eagle (woot!), the three of us roamed around the American Girl store without having to worry about menfolk impatiently wondering why anyone would want to roam around the American Girl store, and most memorable of all, an attractive Turkish guy at a kiosk selling hair straighteners saw Elise coming a mile away and, long story short, we are now the proud owners of a new Royale hair straightener. Baby blue. On the drive home Elise kept saying, "Mom, that guy was the nicest guy! Seriously!" with a flush of twitterpation in her cheeks. Yep -- that's a salesman. And, truth be told, the new straightener is really awesome. A little expensive, yes; and I wasn't intending to buy a new straightener since we already have one.  But such is the way of commerce.  The American dream for attractive Turkish sweet-talkers is alive and well.

And today Forrest is busy installing a garage door opener for our third bay, Grandma is teaching Wyatt how to play Heart & Soul on the piano, Jonas is unloading the dishwasher, Ethan and Elise are at rehearsal, Grandpa is reading up on the Jazz game he missed last night (Jimmer in Utah! Jazz win by 2!), and I'm finishing up this blog post before spending some time on the RS lesson I'm teaching tomorrow as a sub. It's about gratitude and the blessings of everyday life.

I'm blessed and I'm grateful. Hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving!

Halloween, Brand New Car, and Election 2012

I can't believe it's November already. Still warm enough that Wyatt can run around out back with the neighbors playing light sabers, but cold enough that he needs to wear gloves or else he'll come inside crying, like yesterday. Before we know it it'll be Thanksgiving (and Mom and Dad will be coming!) and then it'll be Christmas and then it'll be 2013. But you all know this. I'm just saying: time keeps marching.

Since it's now November, that means October just passed, and October means Halloween. Halloween is less stressful for me now that the kids are getting older; I don't feel all that costuming pressure and I don't have to attend legions of elementary school Halloween parties. (Is it terrible that I'm complaining about attending legions of elementary school Halloween parties? Actually, I don't really mind attending; it's coming up with the games that stresses me out.) ANYWAY, we had a fun Halloween this year. Here are some pics. First, our ward Halloween party:

Our little Devil

My terrifying husband

Ethan in his gorilla suit (a Christmas present last year -- bought it at 80% clearance after last Halloween) and Ethan's friend Josh. Josh has excellent hair. 

Wyatt the ninja. All my boys--all 3--have wanted to be ninjas, pretty much exclusively, from age 5 to age 8.

Jonas no longer wants to be a ninja. Obviously.

My terrifying husband overseeing the game he was responsible for as YM president: eat as many Sam's Clubs cheese puffs as you can with your arms behind your back. It was a winner. He thought it up all by himself.

Actual Halloween was a very nice day for Minnesota. Jacket and stretchy gloves weather, but no puffy coats or stocking caps required (hooray!). Our house somehow managed to be the meeting place for Jonas and his bevy of buddies. Here they are before they tore off around the neighborhood, roaming around sans parental supervision. (I remember how nervous I was the first time both Ethan and Elise went trick or treating without a grown up, but with Jonas I didn't even think twice. I'm either becoming a better parent or a worse one. You choose -- I'm undecided.)

The boyyzzz. And no, this isn't my front porch. It's much too well-decorated to be my front porch. It's our across the street neighbors. The boys had already taken off, but I managed to wrangle them all together for a picture before they were completely gonzo. 

Once all those boys got home, we escorted them down into the unfinished basement where they happily traded candy until their parents came and got them. Much to my dismay, Jonas traded a lot of his chocolate for (get this!) popcorn. Popcorn? C'mon now.

Our Wilkey pseudo-relatives and good friends in our ward, the Ponzcochs, came over to trick or treat with Wyatt. It's a win-win: Wyatt doesn't have kids his age in our family to trick or treat with, and the Ponzochs don't have a neighborhood that lends itself to trick or treating (more rural, big houses widely spaced, etc.) Wyatt had a great time running form house to house and only had to skip a few because their porch decorations were unacceptably terrifying.

How could anything terrify this kid? He even has a sword. (I ended up holding it all night, but still.)

So Halloween was fun.

In other news, we got a new car. Yep! A new car! In a nutshell: Forrest's new job means a lot more driving around the rural midwest. He gets mileage reimbursement, but the Tahoe is a ridiculous gas monster and the Mazda isn't very comfortable for him (or customers) to drive around in. Also, Ethan will someday (someday?) have his driver's license and it would be nice for me if he had a car. Ease the chauffeuring pressure and all that.  So, our solution: sell the Mazda (sniff! it's been a good car), and use what we make on it to pay off the rest we owe and buy a cheap Honda Civic or something like it for the kids' car. Then buy a new car that I'll drive the majority of the time, but that Forrest can take with him on the road. It needed to have good gas mileage, but be roomy and comfortable inside. I also wanted some good cargo space in the back. Anyway, after some searching, we found it. Here she is:

It's a Subaru Outback. Isn't it pretty? The color is unique (something something bronze?) but I really like it. The kids aren't so sure about the color, but I did not let their skepticism dull my enthusiasm. I think it's classy. And I've really liked driving it so far. Very comfy. And it gets even better gas mileage than the Mazda, so that's awesome. Sometimes the kids might have to touch each other if I drive all four of them somewhere--they've been spoiled by bucket seats all these years--but they can handle it. We'll just put Wyatt in the middle: Elise and Jonas don't mind being touched by Wyatt as much as they mind being touched by each other.

And, finally, now that it's November it means one more thing. The election is Tuesday. I'm excited/curious/a little worried. A couple of weeks ago I was convinced Romney would win: I thought his base was more energized, not necessarily from Romney-love but from Obama-hate, and I also felt that he convinced a lot of people during that first debate that he actually WASN'T Mr. Burns from the Simpsons, which made centrist voters more likely to support him.  And here's the thing: If Romney does win, a certain part of me will be excited. The part of me that likes to root for Mormons on So You Think You Can Dance. Also, the part of me that knows he's a good man (I do think he's a good man) and that he's not an extremist or an ideologue, but is instead more of a centrist pragmatist. I do worry a little what the ideologically-driven House will do with a Republican in the White House, but I have to have faith that Romney would try to keep them from doing anything too extreme. Hopefully. Maybe.

That said, I'm still voting for Obama. I also think he's a good man, just like Romney, but I align with Obama on issues about 85% of the time, and I align with Romney about 35%. (You can take a handy quiz if you like that sort of thing here. My students are using the site for a paper and I thought the quiz was a good one: all-encompassing enough to mean something.) I think Obama will probably win, now, too--I think he got some good press during Hurricane Sandy that might sway people, and the polls are tilting his direction in swing states. That said, it'll be close. It'll be interesting, no matter what happens. But come Wednesday, I might have to stay away from Facebook, no matter who wins. I have too many friends on both sides who think the other guy is Satan.

And now, on to grading. And more grading. So many vague pronouns to highlight! So many comma splices to correct! And every once in a while I get to give somebody an A. That's always fun too.

Getting Into a Rhythm

So it's Tuesday and Forrest is off driving around Iowa trying to sell chemicals at ethanol plants, the kids are all at school, and I'm supposed to be grading papers. I'm also sick: started feeling some gunk settling into my lungs yesterday afternoon and woke up this morning without much of a voice and a hacking cough. Luckily the ick descended at about 4:00 yesterday, because I had a classroom evaluation with my dean at noon. (Went well I think.) But now I'm feeling a little bit bedraggled. Hopefully I'll be on the upswing by tomorrow. After my horrible bout of pneumonia in 2009, I still get a little nervous when gunk settles in my lungs.

Things are going well at the Hallstrom house. Busy but good. Ethan and Elise are enjoying rehearsals for the musical, White Christmas.  Ethan just had his patriarchal blessing, which was a beautiful experience, and Elise is really enjoying choir at ERHS.  Jonas just finished soccer and got his First Class in Scouts. Everybody's grades are holding steady, which is always a relief for a slightly-too-involved mom like me, especially with Elise and Jonas learning to navigate new schools and expectations. Wyatt continues to adjust to Kindergarten and got a glowing report from his teacher at our first conference. We've been spending some time together learning to read and it's always so fun to see that ability blossom.

Forrest is enjoying the new job. There are always a few growing pains with anything new, but they have been relatively few and far between. As always, he's upbeat and excited most of the time about all the new challenges and opportunities. Speaking of Forrest, he ran another marathon last weekend with his friend Hector up in northern Wisconsin, and for the first time ever, we left the kids home OVERNIGHT. They did great. We even returned home to a relatively clean house!

Although the day of the race was grey and a little rainy, it was still beautiful to see all the fall leaves. I think Forrest and Hector enjoyed the cool misty rain: it helped keep them loose. Here are a few photos:

Forrest and Hector before the race

After Allison and I sent the boys on their way, we proceeded to drive around to find good cheering spots and suddenly noticed we were almost out of gas. The only gas station we could find without driving too far out of range of the race was this AWESOME dilapidated shanty of a gas station that was probably built in 1942 and hasn't been updated since. Although maybe they added the metal Green Bay guy in the 60s.

Allison and the metal Green Bay guy.

Me in front of a gas pump that was so old I was a little flummoxed about how to use it. 

This was the room where the 82-year-old owner with crazy eyebrows and a smoker's voice swiped our credit card after I told him how much I owed him for the gas. (He took my word for it.) Allison took this photo with her iPhone and we think some otherwordly intervention was at work, because the picture hanging on the wall next to the clock, obscured here by the glare, was of a buck naked lady with perfectly feathered 1973 bangs. 

Yes, the gas station was a highlight.

But the big news was Forrest's racing, of course. Every time Allison and I stopped, the guys seemed in control and ran like they were feeling good. That hasn't always been the case. It's a lot more fun to meet up with your husband at mile 22 and not have him look like he's ready to give up the ghost. Maybe it was the rain keeping them cool?

Now isn't that pretty?

Keeping up a nice stride

Coming in for the finish!

Forrest finished the race in 3:50 -- a great time. Both he and Hector were trying to get under 4 hours and they did it. So scratch that one off the bucket list.  Here they are with their half Cokes / half Diet Cokes, tired but happy after almost four hours of running:

And now I really have to get grading. I love teaching. Grading, not so much. Hence the avoidance blogging. Maybe next week I'll write something about the election. (I know you guys LOVE to hear what I have to say about politics! :-). Until then!

Another Big Transition

First, for those of you who enjoy a good photo, a picture of Jonas playing soccer. He's loving it and playing GREAT. He's gotten so much quicker and smarter since the last time he played.

Jonas on D

And now for the non-photographic, longwinded portion of the post. Although most people who read this blog already know this news, for posterity's sake (because all y'all know my great-great grandchildren will be poring over this blog on their data ports) and for the sake of my one reader in India, here's our other big news of late: Forrest has taken a new job with a brand new company.

Gasp!

In order to truly appreciate the enormity of this decision, we need to get a handle on my husband, who is as loyal as loyal gets. His favorite Mexican food restaurant? Chipotle, always and forever. Favorite fast food dessert? The McFlurry (can't go wrong). Favorite movie to watch the middle of on a Saturday afternoon whilst folding your laundry? Pirates of the Caribbean. I honestly think he could watch the middle of that movie 1,000 times and still be happy as a clam. And then, of course, there's the fact that he purports to still enjoy hanging out with a girl he met when he was 17 years old. His employment history supports this aspect of his personality as well: since returning home from his mission in 1992, he's worked for exactly TWO companies. Two. The LDS Church and HB Fuller.

And now it's three. Today he started his new job with Origination, a smallish company here in the Twin Cities that makes the chemical additives that go into animal feed. The company also has something to do with the organic fertilizer industry. And ice melting stuff. And a few other things. (It's very sexy. Almost as sexy as glue.) Although Forrest has recited the elevator speech explaining the genesis of this decision dozens of times, here's my take on it. Forrest has been very happy at Fuller for a long time. It's a good job; he gets paid well and treated well and his employers like him. A new boss recently came on board and a project he was working on recently ended, but he wasn't looking for anything new. And then a recruiter called and asked him if he might be interested in a position with a small business.

Forrest said no. Of course he said no. Why would he say yes? But the recruiter called him back and said, hey, just go talk to the owner and see what you think. It's a great opportunity, and the two of you can just sit down and talk for an hour or so. It was only about 20 minutes away from work, so Forrest decided, "What the heck." And the rest is history. From the minute he started talking with the owner he felt that this job was tailor made for him. Not only was it a great business opportunity with a stable, small company that's been around for years, but it allows him to use all his talents and experience in a way that's almost impossible in a big corporate setting. The truth is, Forrest has never been the stereotypical corporate guy: he spreads himself too thin, says yes to too many people, and doesn't look out for #1 as well as others might. I've always thought he would truly thrive in a smaller-business setting.

But it was scary to choose a big change like this. Frankly, I'm still a little nervous (since that's my job in this marriage, to be the Nervous Nelly to his Calm Cameron). But I can't deny the overwhelming spiritual confirmation that both of us had that this was right. Right, right, right. It was tough when Forrest told Fuller he was planning to leave. He has a lot of friends there and people who really value what he does, and that's truly meaningful to both Forrest and me. When the company came back with a counter offer it was even harder to go. But even with that, both Forrest and I were sure that now is the time, for whatever reason, to jump.

So . . . 1, 2, 3 . . .

Cowabunga!

We'll see how this all turns out. :-)