Soccer!!

Tonight Danica had her first Tot Soccer practice. She LOVED it. It was dreary and rainy-so perfect soccer weather. There was about a bazillion kids so at times it was chaotic but I thought the "coaches"(a girl's soccer team) did a real good job managing the group. At first Danica was kinda whiney and didn't want to go out but it only took a moment before she was literally jumping up and down, shrieking, because she was so excited. They played simon says for a little bit. After messing up a few times Danica would look around at the group before doing whatever Simon said.

The kids also practiced dribbling around cones, shooting between flags and throwing the ball over their heads.

I apologize for the fuzzy pictures. I don't know how to work a camera.

Near the end a bunch of the kids were just rolling around in the ground or running free around the field so Danica worked with her coach one-on-one practicing headers(which I saw her succeed once and she was excited about later) and the girl had her try and steal the ball.

It was all fun to watch. Rob made fun of me because I was the only one taking pictures. What is with these other parents?! Sheesh...

Rob's first post

Yes, this will be my first post of really anything on this Internet doo-hickamuhbob. I managed to hold the line against temptation from the usual gossip breeding grounds such as myspace and facebook, but only to succumb to the yuppiest most self promoting machination of them all... a blog. My fingers quiver while contemplating what political lancet or haughty wisdom scraps I deign to chuck to my starved reading base... huh... oh no, yah I am... love you too... So umm yah melissa "isn't sure she trusts [me] to blog," -why? my guess is as good as yours. I guess this is a "family" blog, i.e. what I will call the flog.

Well, every flogging should begin with someone stealing something. In this case the culprit was Danica. She is the first to rise in our home and usually in the middle of some fantastic adventure or serious undertaking by the time her parents get up. Lately she has been getting up with a stuffed panda down her pants. My query: "Hey kiddo, why is there a panda in your PJs?" Response: "Because it's my baby, do want to hold him daddy?" I did, but I had to be very gentle with his head and blankie. A few minutes later "I stole some of mommy's cookies." She is apparently still sensitive to guilt and is referring to Mel's ginger snaps. they were too alluring for the 4 year old, but I respected her honesty and had a really good discussion on stealing that was of course immediately forgotten.

Lately Mel and I have had the honor to help out in nursery with her parents who are the nursery monitors/directors/leaders? I have had the time of my life since week one, and even Mel admits she likes being part of the excitement. Cuteness aside, it is a kick to help them learn to play nice with eachother, try to quiet them down for prayer, pop bubbles etc. My ace in the hole is pretending to eat plastic food, it just never gets old.

Today I had court. I am a Victim Advocate in the circuit court. I just passed my year mark a month ago so I have been upgraded to having my hand scanned. This is so I don't have to wait behind the hundred or so jurors that apparently always finish lunch when I arrive and have never been through a metal detector before. The secret is to take all the metal off your person and give it to security the first time or else you have to back and through again and again until you get it right while everyone waits. Luckily, since I am a part of the DA's office and am forbidden to so much as utter a word to them, the secret is safe with me. Also I got my first murder case. The only reason really is because I speak spanish (the victims are spanish speaking), actually it would just be attempted murder as everyone is alive... anyway I usually am a bit cavalier with these things so, on the topic of murder, Mel and I went to the Oregon v. Utah game.

It looks like she has already mentioned this with accompanying pictures (you'll find no such media from me). It has been a fun season despite the black clouds looming up from california for us later in the year, and not helped by the usual season killing injury count. It has been great watching our friends play since all three get to start this year, if you count special teams, and I do.

Danica 8/08

I have a 4 yr old. Isn't that weird?

GO DUCKS!!

Rob and I were very lucky and got to go to the game today.(Thanks Dan & Julie!!!) We kinda forgot to set an alarm and woke up 15 minutes before it started. Since we arrived late with general admission tickets to a sold out game we ended up standing. It was a good change from being in the stands. The last game I went to I was in front of a couple of REALLY drunk guys who seemed to have a vocabulary consisting of approximately three 4-letter words. I got bumped into a lot, knocked in the head and spit on....SO... standing was pleasant. The game was good. Utah state went home crying. Final score 66-24.

We got to see a couple of friends play. This is Bair. He can fly.And he can tackle...

America celebrates Rob's Birthday

And on another note... Monday was Rob's birthday. He is such an old man now, luckily he has a young hot wife who is simply days and days younger...10 to be exact ;) ...okay sidenote: my semi-colon key wasn't working so I got frustrated at it and tore it off- there was a grape stem hindering it. random. end sidenote: I feel guilty but I hate, hate, HATE planning things with a passion so his birthday was less than exciting. We woke up kinda late, in the afternoon, and decided we had to get out for his birthday. (I did make him brea.. err, lunch.) We went hiking around the Mt. Pisgah Arboretum. It was gorgeous out. Perfect weather for it. We skipped rocks for a little bit but soon learned the hazards of teaching a 4 year old to throw them. I almost got hit, then Rob did get hit and then we were done!

Grrrr!

I'd like to take a moment to vent at the world... (I worked today-thus the need to vent)
Please, please, PLEASE do not lie to your hygienist. It is not a little white lie to say you floss daily when you really ran out of floss 3 yrs ago. This is a grievous sin! And besides, hygienists know you're lying. If there is a solid wall of calculus across your teeth it's a pretty big hint to me that you are not able to fit floss between your teeth, EVER. I had someone today that I was tempted to tell him he must be one of the unlucky people who need to floss seven times a day because "flossing daily" just wasn't cutting it. =)

Meager beginnings

Okay so I have to admit that I hate writing with a passion and will probably fail miserably at keeping up with this but I have promised I would make attempts.

I'm fairly certain that the only thing I did this summer so far, despite me having ample amounts of free time since I've worked minimally, is go camping overnight and to the aquarium...back at the beginning of the summer. And, of course, I couldn't find any extra batteries to my camera and only got off a couple shots before it died.

Rob, Danica and I headed over to the coast to camp one night at Washburne State Park and then to the Newport aquarium. It was a good trip but it was SO cold. Danica never complained about the temperature but did seem to think I was silly for making her wear so much clothes. She kept telling me she was already wearing pajamas when I tried getting her to double up. We used one of the walk-in campsites. I was impressed. We had almost the first pick and chose a site where we couldn't see any other campsites. (I'd like to insert that Rob does not think camping in a site counts as camping...there must be no one within fifty miles and definitely no plumbing before he seems to deem it worthy to carry the name. haha) Rob and Danica got to work collecting wood. Danica loved helping. It was amusing to see her dragging pieces that were much longer than she is tall. In the meantime I was in charge of blowing up the airmattresses.(another non-"camping" piece of equipment) They did much better with their work since we all ended up on the ground by morning.

Danica and I made a quick trip to see the beach but it was super windy. I wasn't prepared for the wind and ended up layering us in clothes(meant for goodwill) that had been sitting in my trunk. Danica looked like a little hoodlum with a black du-rag to cover her head. I wished I had my camera for that. We searched for shells but most of them were just scattered pieces. Danica kept saying "look mommy I found a whole one!" We came home with a nice collection of -whole- rocks. =)

We went to the aquarium the next day. I'd never been. I was interested to see if it would be worth the $40 for us to go. I think we lasted an hour and a half and I liked it just fine. Danica looked at all the tanks and pointed out starfish. That was mostly all she cared about. She did point out when she saw fish that looked like Dory(finding Nemo) but mainly it was "look mommy, look daddy-it's a starfish!"x 571.