Welcome to Month in Review: September 2007, documenting key events for our family history. This is a great way to catch up with the Clarks. Since my blogging was a bit sparse during the last month, there are quite a few new bits listed below.
- Chris took the kids up to his mom's house on Labor Day weekend. This is the third trip of this type that they have taken during the last year or so. I have been methodically tackling some major projects in my house, and finally have most of the nooks and crannies cleaned out and organized, with systems set up to (hopefully) keep them that way. This will (hopefully) reduce the necessity of these types of trips in the future. I have enjoyed the breaks, but I'm missing out on all the fun. What a great husband (see, he's really not as bad as he makes himself to be)!
- We have become addicted to Italian Sodas.
- Chris, his brother Tom, our little Tommy, and I went and saw Weird Al perform at the State Fair; This was a big deal, as we are huge fans of his music. Before the concert, Tommy predicted 5 songs that he thought we might hear, and he was thrilled that we heard 4 of them. He also loved seeing all 25+ costume changes--15 of which were all during one song! He was pretty tuckered out by the end of the concert, but managed to join in chanting "We Want Al" with the rest of the audience, begging for an encore. He was ecstatic that it worked. It was a great night!
- Chris's brother Phil and his family moved from New Jersey to Utah. Phil came out and stayed with us for a few weeks while he looked for a house and a job. He found a house in Lehi and a teaching job in Midvale, just a few days before he flew back to drive Karine and the kids out. We are so happy to have more family nearby, and have already had lots of fun with them. This means there are now far more Clarks in the West than there are in the East. When are the rest of you going to join us?
- We attended a wedding reception for Chris's cousin April, and her new husband, Jack. It was a very fun, beautiful night.
- David is now walking as his main mode of transportation, and has mastered the stairs--up and down--which calms my anxiety considerably. His cheeks are getting chubbier by the minute, which only makes his dimples more pronounced and more adorable. (I know, I know, I need to get better at getting photos and videos posted...)
- I attended a Girls Camp Pajama Party Reunion (remember a few months ago, when I was a bit nervous to go, but then I went and had a great time?). We finished up a service project we started at camp, watched a slideshow of all our camp photos (greasy hair and all), and had a little karaoke concert--an activity we intended to do at camp, but had to cancel due to running out of time.
- I re-launched my blog with a new title: "I'm Not Just a Mom," and a new address: imnotjustamom.com. I wanted to reflect the idea that motherhood is a major part of who I am, but not the only thing about me, or the only thing I write about.
- I finally managed to throw Tommy's Birthday Party (just a little over a month late). The big challenge was that at this age, he really is friends with everyone at school, and we felt like if we asked him to make a list of 5-10 friends to invite, we would have gotten a different list every day, based on whatever names came into his head first. So we opted to invite his entire school class and also his church class. We rented out a gymnasium and a few gymnastics coaches; it was a major hit. I just had to show up with cupcakes and party favors and got to come home to a nice, clean house.
- Michael continues to impress us with the way he quickly learns the letter sounds. We quiz him by giving him a word, and he tells us what letter it starts with. He can even identify that "chair" starts with C-H; "shirt" starts with S-H; and "three" starts with T-H !
- Chris decided that instead of torturing animals, he would torture himself by going on a vegan diet for a week!
- And last but not least, we got two tickets this month. The first one was for not having our car registered; this was especially annoying, since the day before we got the ticket we had gotten some work done on the car, and driven it straight over to be inspected and registered, only to be told that a light was out--not just any old light, but the exact light that had already failed inspection once--the one we had just had fixed. And of course it was at the end of the day, so we would have to bring it back after the weekend. We absentmindedly parked the car on the street the next day, while we were at the fair--prime spot for trigger-happy meter-reader, anxious to give out tickets. The other ticket was my fault: rolling through a stop sign. Fortunately, I was driving the van this day, because it happened after the car incident, but still before we had resolved the registration issues. We did finally get the car fixed and even registered, but guess what? Now the same light is already out again! And don't even get me started on the van's issues. The windshield had no less than 8 nicks and cracks, so we waited until the last minute and replaced it last month, right before it was up for inspection, only to find out that it didn't require an inspection this year! Yeah, I'd say our chances are pretty good that we'll be replacing that windshield again next year...
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