Some Kids are Just Plain Awesome

All my kids are awesome, but today I wanna say how awesome Rhett is.  He has lots of times he's not awesome, but MOSTLY he is!!  He's taken a lot of flak lately about all the places he falls short.  And I don't really blame them.  People only see the circle they are in, which is fair, but it would be nice if they could take a peek into someone else's circle.  So I'm going to show you his circle.

Rhett gets up almost every morning (he's missed his alarm here and there) at 4:50  am to read scriptures and get off to XC.  We don't wake him up.. ever.  He does it on his own.  Then he goes straight to school where he takes several AP classes.  Rhett has been able to keep his grades up all year.  That's not an easy task.  He attends seminary, where he was the 4th fastest scripture mastery "memorizer".

Evenings are not relaxed for Rhett.  Mondays, he has piano lessons (that he wanted to start less than a year ago and is really good at) and then FHE.  Tuesdays he often works, but if not...a night off!  Wednesdays he has mutual till 8:30 and every other Wednesday he has ballroom practice from 8-10 pm.  Thursdays he goes to rehearsal at the PAC where he is currently participating in High School Musical 2.  Friday nights he works till 10:30 or 11...every Friday!  Saturday mornings he heads back to rehearsal to which he sometimes runs the 6+ miles to get his long run in.  After rehearsal he has about 2 hours till he reports to work till 10 - 10:30 pm....every Saturday!  Sundays he is up and at church by 8 am....every Sunday!

You'll notice there's really no time for a social life in there, a little bit of family and not much sleep.  This doesn't include any of his required school concerts, XC meets, or church activities.  Have you ever met Rhett?  If you have, you've probably noticed he pretty much has a smile on his face.  He doesn't make all the right choices and is definitely over scheduled right now, no question.  But his "fall short" isn't usually because he's irresponsible or careless.... he's just a 16 year old kid with tons of talents and a desire to pursue them all.

So maybe next time you are frustrated with someone or think they don't "care", try taking a peek into the REST of their lives.  You might find they are pretty freaking awesome.  My kid is!!

Switch it Change it

It's not a secret I get bored easily.  Because a new house was on the horizon, I had no interest in doing anything much with my current home.  Notice I said "was".  Ok, so it still is, but it's looking like a distant horizon.  So I decided if I'm going to be here a while, I'm going to do something with it.  So I started gathering all the pieces I had collected for the new house and started fitting them together.  It's not exactly right yet, but it's something.  I still need a loveseat.  Once I get that the front living room will be mostly what I want.  Other than the color of the walls, but I'm too lazy to paint so it stays!!  And the white chair in the family room isn't good, but it's practical for now. ♥

Car Love

Where's the car fairy?  Our cars are absolute beaters.  But they're paid for!!  The kids have beat the heck out of our cars so we have put very little money into fixing them up.  Chelsey got this car stuck on a burm with all four tires off the ground, rear ended someone and hit a big rock during a storm one night poking a hole in the door.  Whitley ripped the mirror off going through a construction site.  Stephen did MANY things to my van, which is largely held together with duct tape right now.  Nick really got to drive, so he is innocent in this one.  Rhett his a large dirt mound and this is the result.  The pan that is under that has something to do with the transmission gave and all the fluid ended up on the floor.  That same week, my van had a headlamp go out and the transmission started slipping and Glade's truck needs a taillight.  Nothing major, just a pain in the petuty.  

In my dreams, I'd be driving this right now:

I'm so done driving my 11 mi/gal duct tape van!!  But....it is not yet to be.  

Fall Sports

Flag Football

Dalin has been playing flag football this year.  He loves it!  Well, sort of.  He loves playing, but unfortunately he hasn't seen a ton of play time.  It's been really sad actually.  I even had a word with the coach one game when out of 22 players, three never went in.  Just three!  Of course, Dalin cried and I had nothing good to say to make it better.  We never quit, but I totally would have understood if he wanted to.  They decided to not do any cuts last  minute.  That meant they kept almost 25 kids.  They let them know that they may not get a lot of playing time, but never mentioned none.  We each payed our sports fee (which is probably why they didn't cut) and showed up to every practice.  Dalin gives his all to whatever he is doing, so to see him try so hard and then get benched was sad. But he still wanted to go do it.  Two games a week makes for a rough family life, but luckily Katy and Bo liked to come along and Mom was always there to keep me company, or drive when I couldn't.  Dalin proved to be very admirable in how he handled this yucky situation.

Cross Country

I love Cross Country season....usually.  Rhett has been a stinker this year.  From the beginning whining about how much he hates running and I've "always made him do it", to him coming around and actually being a little bit competitive back to whining about every work out.  I'm honestly done pushing this kid.  He's so talented, but unless he wants it, there's really not a lot I can do.  And it's quite exhausting trying to stay on top of it.  He's slower than he was last year even.  BUT, the other day, he was chatting away about next year's season.  This after I conceded that if he would commit to the rest of this year and be all in, he wouldn't have to do it next year id he didn't want to.  Who knows.