ODM

Paige performed her solo for the first time last weekend at an ODM convention/competition. Her lyrical solo was so beautiful and looked amazing! She was given a high gold for it. After the kids performed they took four hours of scholarship classes for which Paige received first place in the ballet portion! Then after a long night they started back up again at 8am on Sunday for four more classes before we were able to head home!

Miley and Paige ready to perform

Paige, Liv, Emma

Paige and her choreographer, Erika

First place in ballet!

Goofing around with some extra time

We stopped at Grandpa's Cheesebarn on the way home and the girls got a bag of wax bottles to try!

 

School Pictures

The kids school pictures came! We were waiting on Paige's for awhile but once we got it we laid out all the years for the kids to compare how they'd changed. 

Preschool and 6th grade

Kindergarten and 9th grade

 

Grade III

It's been two years since Paige has tested for a Cecchetti exam so she was due! She had been studying grade III for a long time and put in a lot of extra practices to prepare. The height of the studying and practices led to Paige having a reason to be at the studio for 27 days in a row...it was a lot to deal with! But she studied and worked hard and passed with a commended rating! So proud of her!

A few of Paige's friends tested right before her and told her all about how it went

A little nervous but I got a smile!

Paige's test group-Olivia, Maeve, Ava and Paige

Finished!

The whole group with their Cecchetti teacher, Mrs. Barr

 

18 Years!

Pat and I celebrated our 18th year of marriage this month! We kept it pretty lowkey as usual. Two days before the actual day, we went out to eat at Firebird and the food was good but it didn't feel quite fancy enough for a celebration. Then the day before we took the kids for ice cream as is our tradition (I still miss our old tradition of going to Mason's Creamery!) but this year we went to Mitchell's. By the time our anniversary rolled around on Monday we had already done so much celebrating but the kids surprised us with cards and we ended the night by playing a game together!

Running Update

My mileage has fallen steeply since I finished the marathon but I'm ok with that! Mentally I needed a break from actual training and needed to just enjoy running. And the good news is that I have found out that I miss it when I don't get out so I didn't get burned out. Pat and I have been working on speed on the weekends and I'm now that I'm a month out from the race I'm ready to up my mileage a bit. 

Here are some pictures from the last two runs I've been on! It's beautiful out there!!

 

Potatoes Au Gratin

Paige had to make a slideshow about a country for her social studies class and she chose France! The kids could also make a recipe at home for extra credit and Paige decided on Potatoes Au Gratin. It was fun making it together, Pat was there too, and she learned a couple new things in the process like how to use a mandoline (safely!) to slice potatoes. We had a funny moment too when we were about to add the third layer of potatoes and realized we had never added the cheese! I don't think the recipe would have been quite as successful without it...Luckily we were able to sneak it in and everyone enjoyed the food. Owen said the meal was in his top 5 meals ever! I also bought some roast beef au jus to go with it.

 

Halloween!

Halloween started early because we thought Owen had soccer tryouts at 9am. Luckily, Paige was up already and I ran out to get donuts. We ate our doughnuts and drank our cider and Pat and Owen left...only to find out the email we got was incorrect and tryouts were actually at 10am! Before Owen got home I had to get Paige to nutcracker practice and then afterwards she went straight home to her friend Zoey's house with Miley to hang out before trick or treating. Paige was originally going to go with a different group but her friend got Covid and Miley and Zoey asked if she wanted to go with them! So nice!

Owen headed over to his friend's house around 5 so Pat and I were home to hand out candy for the first time ever! We didn't get a ton of people but it was fun chatting with kids and seeing the costumes. The kids were disappointed that Halloween was on a Sunday but they still had time to eat plenty of candy and compare what they got. They both got a lot of full-size candy bars this year!

Spudnuts!

New spiderweb placemats this year!

Griffin was happy to be sushi but Binx didn't want to wear anything. We finally got the bowtie on him and he tolerated it long enough for a picture.

Owen went as a Chelsea fan again!

The cats kept us company while we handed out candy!

We had chili and cornbread

LJ, Jalen, TJ, Luca and Owen

Zoey, Miley and Paige

Another one of the girls

Paige's haul

Owen's haul

We managed to get one picture of the kids together but forgot to take our annual Halloween selfie!

 

Extras

The three of us coincidentally were all dressed in black this day so we got the kittens in on a group picture!

This was an official race photo from the marathon. This was right before the finish line and I wasn't feeling great but this picture makes it look like I was having a blast:)

Binx sat down and watched some of the soccer game with us

We stopped by at my mom's work on a day the kids didn't have school!

She got them giant candy necklaces:)

 

Freshman Soccer!

Owen's first year of high school soccer is done! He had such a great season and loved the whole experience. For JV he was a starter and played most of every game. He was also a swing player who got to dress for Varsity and occasionally got in the games where he definitely held his own! He grew a lot as a player this year and worked so hard! 

The team after their first playoff game-they won!

Owen waiting to sub in for the last varsity game of the season.