Not-so-quick Update

Okay, I can't compete with the pictures already put up on my lovely wife's blog so I'll just show the back of some crazy guy with a video camera and his youngest child watching a swim meet! Fortunately, I have (somehow) managed to get some of that video and might be able to post some of it later.
DD had her first swim meet yesterday and she swam very, very well for, well, a 6-year-old. She REALLY enjoyed getting a blue ribbon (for her heat) in the 25 M freestyle and 25 M backstroke. Honestly, she swam MUCH better than I have seen her do in practice. I am proud of how she swam.

I am also proud of how DS#1 swam. He isn't there to win ribbons or awards, but to have fun and participate with some of his neighborhood friends. Unfortunately for him, he gets to swim in the 13-14 age group for events (he is 13) and the 18 and under age group for relays (um, yeah, ouch!). In any case, they both had fun swimming while DS#2 had a blast running around the park with his friends.
Saturday was all about DD it seems. She had a piano recital where she not only played, but also got to stand up and receive some awards. One of her awards was the "Rookie of the Year" award which she seemed particularly proud of. She proudly told DS#1 about it after we got home (he spent the afternoon with some friends). She also wore one of the pins she received to church, and even wore it this morning!

My lovely wife spends so much time "gritting her teeth and bearing it" while helping DD practice that she certainly deserves an award too. When we aren't dealing with the constant aversion to practice, we get a bit of a kick out of the fact that DD is happy to perform, but not quite so happy to practice. When playing with neighborhood friends, she will gladly sit down at someone elses piano and play, yet tortures us when we ask her to practice.

DS#2 has absolutely no desire to play in a recital (or so he says) but gladly practices guitar on his own without any interference or encouragement from us. I wonder what he really thinks sometimes though, because he sat and listened to the entire recital. *I* had to step out several times with DS#3 because DS#2 was so insistent about hearing the entire recital. The highlight was the end when DD's teacher played. Alas, I don't have that one on tape, but let me just say it was very, very impressive.

I thought I would close on an awkward note. I mentioned in a post below that DS#1 made the soccer team after tryouts and that some of his teammates clearly couldn't have due to the number of new players. Well, a parent of another player emailed me this afternoon asking if I knew the results of the tryouts (I received it this evening). Now, this is a parent that I like and respect but I am not allowed to say whether or not DS#1 made it yet, the coach wants to talk to all of the people that were at tryouts on his own. Well, the coach was due to be out of town all weekend for a championship tournament. In the end, I just emailed asking if he had heard a response and told him that I thought the coach was due to be out of town all weekend. I didn't say anything about whether or not I heard about results for DS#1. My lovely wife said that he'd read between the lines and know, but at least I answered. I owe this particular parent that much.

I suppose I could have lied and said I didn't know anything, but I just can't do that, even in an email. This boy's dad knows that I'll be home on a Sunday night getting ready for the week and that I check email in the evenings. I had to answer, but I feel like I "danced the question" a bit and feel bad about it.

Tryout Results (part II)

Whoops, hit the return key early there.

DS#1 did make the team, sounds like he made it pretty comfortably. DS#1 had very good tryouts (in my opinion) and played very solid soccer. I was worried for a bit because things worked out much differently for DS#2 than I expected. There were a number of new players on the field at tryouts for the first time and 5 of those will be on the team (presuming they accept the offer). This means that some of DS#1's teammates did not make the team for next year. Obviously, a number of the "new" boys at tryouts didn't make it either but I guess there weren't enough to form another team.

In closet news, it looks like some crucial parts are back-ordered until June 8th. This means we are without a closet for a while longer. The new Elfa system will be very nice though and I think it will be worth the wait.

Closet News

Well, the shelving collapse this week has certainly thrown off every other plan I had. The first two pictures here show you some of the, er, "stuff" we had in the closet. I finished painting this morning and looked at some Elfa shelving. I have looked at some other shelving but I am going to go with the Elfa as it will be easier on my time and is more flexible than some of the shelves I was thinking about before.

My lovely wife is on-call tonight and due to leave fairly soon. I plan to go back to the Container Store with my measurements tomorrow to make an order. They claim that they'll have most of what I will need in stock. Now, with DS#2's play tomorrow morning, planned volunteering at the school for Field Day in the afternoon, a swim meet Saturday morning, and a piano recital Saturday afternoon, I don't know WHEN I will have time to put the shelves in. Honestly though, I didn't know when I'd find time to paint the closet this week and I was able to get that done.

Oh yeah, almost forgot, DS#1 has been having soccer tryouts this week. It looks like there are more kids than slots available so I am hoping he makes the team again this year. It is just another one of those things parents get to stress over and worry about.

Ouch!

Well, a while ago I posted a quick picture with a caption. This is the picture, a complete collapse of some of the shelving in the master closet.

I teased my lovely wife that she had enough clothes and made (somewhat slow) plans to redo the entire closet. Well, today while I was trying to clear out one side of the closet, the shelf to the opposite collapsed too--I just realized that I forgot to take a picture of it, sorry honey...

This means that in addition to all of the little things we have to do this week as we head toward the last day of school on June 4, I have no choice but to speed up my plans and do the entire closet at once instead of one half and then the other. I planned to do it in halves so we would still be able to use the closet. Today's collapse makes that pretty much impossible. DS#3 and I have some plans in a little while but I am hoping I can get everything out and start plastering over holes in a little while. I don't foresee being able to paint today, but I'll give it a shot.

Sigh.

Rick Riordan

[Quick edit: here is a link showing the crowd and Rick Riordan's thoughts on the night.] Wednesdays are normally our easy days, but lately they seem to fill up too. Now DD and DS#1 have swim practice every day of the week that they don't have something else. Today there was also a meeting for volunteering dads at the elementary school involving pizza that I had to skip. Why? Well, Rick Riordan, author of the Percy Jackson and the Olympians series of books was speaking and signing books at a Barnes and Noble nearby. This series is DS#2's new favorite and he was VERY excited about it.

This meant that my lovely wife had to watch DS#3 at the park while DD had swim practice. DS#1 has practice right after DD so she had to bring the little ones home and get them all ready for bed.

DS#2 and I arrived just before 6:00 when Rick Riordan was supposed to speak. There was a line out the door for people getting a "letter" for the signing later on. My first thought as we walked up was, "Damn! I hate crowds! Why am I doing this again?" Our first letter was I1, which meant we'd be there a LONG time. I did get the 4th and 5th books in the series for DS#2 to get signed.

Mr. Riordan is a good speaker and his brief talk was very entertaining. I guess the first book in this series is slated to be a movie due out in February 2010. He also mentioned some of his plans for additional books (that I couldn't hear as well).

Eventually we moved up to "W" when people left early, etc. We still didn't get home until 9:00. The signing at the table went so fast that someone stepped in front of me and I completely missed seeing DS#2 at the table, let alone getting a picture of him. Whoops!

Despite the length of time we were there, and his short moment at the table getting his books signed, DS#2 was absolutely THRILLED. I guess that makes the entire evening worth it. --I still hate crowds though...

Quick Video

This is a quick video of DS#3 being silly with his cousin's "Backpack." Yes, he loves Dora and Diego, and he LOVES this backpack toy, as well as several others that have shown up in our house lately. His silly laughter is somewhat fake, somewhat, well, just like him. He is very much like DS#2, when he is happy he is usually VERY happy, when he is sad, well, you get the idea.

In other news, DD has been swimming pretty well at swim practice so I think she'll make it all the way across the pool without stopping at the first swim meet (if she really wants to that is). I shaved some of the dark fuzz off DS#1's face on Sunday night. Honestly, I didn't even THINK of taking pictures before or during. Whoops! My wife thought she had me trained! I have to admit, while taking that fuzz off I couldn't help but realize how tall he is now. I tease my "height challenged" mother that she held me back. I guess now I can use DS#1 as proof. In a few short years DS#2 will join him up there. Such a scary thought.

Friday Pictures

Okay, not an exciting title, but there you have it. Friday was a long day for me. It started with trying to take DS#3 to Gymboree Art and then Gymboree Play, well, I never was that interested in the "Art" anyway as the parent does most of the work and DS#3 wanted nothing to do with it. They got me to sign up with that to use up the money they overbilled me for (long story). Let's just say I am going in on Tuesday with some paperwork and demanding they simply refund the money.

The Art class was a complete bust, and we couldn't simply stay and wait for the "Play" class so we went to the park. DS#3 loves playing at the park. Climbing, sliding, hanging on things, all those 2 year-old activities. The one thing he still hates (though he did try it again yesterday) is swinging on the swings.



My other activities on Friday involved napping with DS#3. Hey, I had to make SURE he napped, didn't I? I got a good 30 minute nap in myself and needed it. In the evening I stopped by the swim practice for DD, just the beginning, my lovely wife stayed at the pool with her, and then DS#2 and I went off to a team meeting for his new soccer team. I think he is adjusting to the idea of his new team and I personally think this coach is going to be very good for him. The coach is very big on technical work, including learning to make fast decisions with the ball. In addition, DS#2 is going to be one of the main players of the team meaning he is going to be encouraged to step into a leadership role (something he isn't all that fond of but that I think he can do.

We left that team meeting early to head to a special field trip for the GT 4th graders at his school. We went to the Witte Museum for an overnight field trip. We left at 10:30 or so because DS#2 wanted to sleep in his own bed. After the overnight we did at the Zoo last year, I could only agree with him.

The first picture from the field trip shows DS#2 desperately trying to move out of the picture and his teacher laughing about it. His teacher commented to me later about the fact that he hates to be in the spotlight. We did a number of activities focused on the latest major exhibit about the Human Genome. Projects included a discussion about Eco-systems and being able to pet such wonderful animals as snakes, rats, and cockroaches (okay, and turtles, but that isn't so exciting is it?), making a DNA helix out of candy, extracting DNA from onions, and even extracting some of their own DNA and putting it into a charm.

When DS#2 first heard about this field trip he wasn't very impressed because he had already been to the exhibit before and done some activities when we went to the opening of the exhibit. Once we got there and started, he had a blast. I am thrilled about how he as been doing in school and about how much he loves his teachers, particularly his GT (Gifted-Talented) teacher.

I guess that should be it for now. It is a rainy, dreary day today so the kids are inside. My lovely wife and I have a "date night" tonight so I guess we'll have to figure out where we want to go sometime soon.

Whew

Well, this day has been psychologically exhausting for me. I believe I have helped build back up DS#2's confidence so that he isn't quite so shattered. He was VERY upset when I first broke the news but we talked about it quite a while and I took him out to eat (along with a milkshake) and then made a trip with him to the game store (Boardgames, Role-Playing Games, card games, and the like).

He is still upset but calmed down now and ready to play for his team next fall. His initial reaction was even worse than I expected, but that finally passed. He wasn't able to go to guitar lessons today though, he was still too upset at that time.

Tryout Results

Well, I got a call today for DS#2 and I know that he is going to be VERY disappointed. He didn't even make what I was calling the "C" team. Both the C and D teams are DII (Division II) teams but C has some of his friends from his prior team on it and he is on the "D" team (actually called "Black" --the teams are named by year, and go year, year blue, year white, year black).

I am disappointed too, and I think a large part of the placement came on Tuesday night when he was grouped with kids of a lower skill level, unfortunately, he played sluggish and down to their skill level. It is also related to how they split the teams up, DS#2 has already specialized himself as a defender as it is where he is most comfortable, his 3 friends are all mostly defenders too, a team can't have just defenders.

My goal is to stay positive and encouraging. I will offer to help coach him and train him during the summer and to be his team manager so that he knows he has my support and help during the season. I guess the other positive element is that I know he will be one of the strongest players on the team and, therefore, get much more playtime than if he was placed on a higher team. DS#2 lacks self-confidence and aggression on the ball and maybe playing with people of a lower level will help build confidence and allow him to be more aggressive. DS#2 hasn't been one of the "studs" on his team for several years, now he will be again. He didn't used to respond to me well as his coach. Now that he is a bit older, he might listen more when I try to teach him things in the backyard or at the park.

I am going to use this an excuse to spend more time with him and "hang out" a bit. Maybe we won't drive each other crazy.

Well, it is almost time for me to go pick up DD for her National Piano Guild Audition. I have to pull her out of school early so she can change and go play before the judges. Then I need to get home and break the news to DS#2 and hope that I can spin it so he stays positive about himself and his new team. Then DS#2 has guitar lessons. After that DS#1 has soccer practice. I am thinking about taking DS#2 out to eat or get ice cream during DS#1's practice. Fortunately, my in-laws are here so I can be a bit more relaxed about some of the various activities the next few days.

Tryouts and Stuff

(Sorry CB, lots of text and no pictures this time, more pictures later, I promise)
Well, DS#2 is going through his first tryouts to make a competitive team for next year. Monday night he played very well and looked very, very good. There were a lot of boys there with very high skill levels, but he was playing at least even with most of them and had a very good night. What was most important to me was the fact that he "had a blast" at tryouts that night. At the end of those tryouts I was pretty certain he was going to be on the "B" team with a slight chance at the "A" team.

I was a little surprised by the skill level presented by some of the boys at the tryouts. There were a number of boys who "played up" last year that had to tryout again at this level. The club allows a boy to "play up" one year at the U11 (under 11) level of play, but they have to stay U11 the next year.

Last night was a bit different, DS#2 looked pretty sluggish most of the time, with some bursts of energy here and there. Unfortunately, he was grouped with kids that were not some of the best players so he wasn't really pushing himself the way he would against better players. He said he still had a blast last night so that was good. All the same, my assessment now is that he is down to the "C" team or possibly even the "D" team--there are enough boys at tryouts to make 4 teams. Realistically, I would say DS#2 plays at the "Super II" level but I don't know what team or division he'll play with.

The good thing so far is that he is still having fun and, possibly more important, the better boys in his group last night included two of his former teammates that he likes and gets along with. It is hard to know what to say to DS#2 sometimes. I always try to stay positive or say nothing. I encouraged him to play hard no matter what group he is with, etc. We'll see how tonight goes. I know he wants to make the top level team but I think that is pretty unlikely at this point. I am sure he CAN play at the level of the "B" team but I don't know what the coaches will decide. While he has the ability, he often isn't aggressive enough on the ball which is definitely one of the things the coaches look at.

In other news ...
DS#1 had an induction ceremony into the Junior National Honor Society. I missed it due to the tryouts. I felt that missing the tryouts would have really hurt DS#2's confidence and I know that DS#1 understands this. I guess my lovely wife saw the girl that takes up a majority of DS#1's text messages --I had to up his plan recently, he now has to pay $10 a month for his extra messaging. She said that DS#1 has "good taste" so I guess she is a good looking girl. Being the vice president of the JNHS chapter at the school probably didn't hurt my wife's opinion either.

DS#1's soccer season is now officially over. The Western District called off his game in Austin this weekend. It wouldn't have changed the standings and I am under the impression they couldn't find a field/time acceptable to everyone. This is probably due to all of the other make-up games being scheduled. He now has three practices left before his tryouts in two weeks.

In still more news ...
DD has a National Piano Guild audition tomorrow (Thursday) afternoon. I will actually have to pull her out of school early for it.

Okay, I have to go now, DS#3 desperately wants apple sauce and his actually saying please --okay, now he is just fussing...

Mother's Day

Sunday was a busy day but we DID go out for brunch Sunday morning. This is a picture of my lovely wife and wonderful children at brunch. I think she was getting frustrated with how many pictures I took but there were some kids running around in the background and DS#3 was, well, refusing to smile, etc. DD had a few gifts for her mom that she made at school and DS#2 made some "coupons" for things like a massage (shoulder rub) and smiling for a picture. Yes, he loathes pictures enough that getting him to smile requires outright bribery, or "coupons." Then again, I suppose outright threats would work too.

Tonight DS#2 starts his Try-Outs for next year's U11 soccer teams. They will run Monday through Wednesday. We should know his new team on Thursday evening sometime (if we are home! Ha!) and have a team meeting with the new team on Friday. This is the first time he has had real "try-outs" but he doesn't seem nervous about it. He might be nervous this evening though. I always provide simple encouragement, "just do your best and have fun" and let them know that it is all about getting on a team that they'll enjoy playing on. He has a very real opportunity to make it on the "A" team and play DI (Division I) soccer. In one sense, I hope he does, in another I know that some of the kids he doesn't like much will be on that team. I guess we'll just have to wait and see how the try-outs go.

The only thing certain about the try-outs is that the humidity is very high here and it is already over 90 degrees. He will sleep well tonight.

DS#3 is waking up so I suppose it is time to get him out of bed and ready to meet the bus.

Tiring Weekend

Well, DS#1 did NOT play, which was a good thing. My dear wife had a rough call night Friday and spent much of Saturday napping when she had a chance.

DS#2's team did not do as well at the tournament as they would have liked but they had some very good games. Unfortunately, they did lose two games and placed 3rd in the tournament. The first game Saturday was fairly poor but the rest were very well-played. Today's game ended in a loss to a team from our own club that has been our major competition for a long time now. The boys on that team are actually younger than ours, BUT they have played together as a team for longer and have some pretty fantastic players. It didn't help that our main "striker" didn't play today (rumor has it he hurt his groin--OUCH, try-outs start tomorrow!). When we played them a few weeks ago we won, but we have been trading games throughout the friendly rivalry (one night a week both teams practice together!).

Anyway, I wanted to post this series of three pictures where DS#2 and another defender at midfield stop a potential drive dead and that stop actually leads to a goal for us (game 2 Saturday). In the first picture DS#2 kicks the ball on the move, the second shows the ball going past the driving striker and the third shows how it split through several players on the team (a third player isn't in the picture). That pass back forward was passed again to the other side of the goal resulting in a shot into the back of the net.

Of course, trying to complement that #25 defender tends to end in frustration. He really hates to get complements sometimes, sigh.

Tomorrow my lovely wife is on "late-call," DD has gymnastics right after school, and DS#2 has try-outs from 6-8:00 with registration at 5:30. This pretty much means that DS#2 will have to make a sandwich to take and eat during gymnastics and that DS#1 gets to babysit DD and DS#3 for a little while tomorrow evening (he'll miss swim practice for the neighborhood swim team but didn't seem that disappointed.

Well, this was going to be a "quick" post but ended up much longer than I expected. I'll talk more about our actual "Mother's Day" events later.

Bit of Cuteness

Well, I just thought I would post this picture of my lovely wife getting some happy hugs and lov'n from DS#3. Yes, she was trying to read on the sofa this morning when DS#3 decided he wanted some cozy time with Mama.

Mama is "on-call" tonight so we won't see her again until tomorrow morning. Then DS#2 has 3 games spread out during the day for a local tournament. His final game for the tournament is Sunday AFTERNOON (I read the first schedule wrong-oops!) so after canceling reservations I made a couple weeks ago I just called and made new reservations for 10:00 AM. Wait, it won't be a surprise now that I posted it will it?

Then, after playing through the weekend, DS#2 has try-outs Monday through Wednesday night(s). After THAT I think he actually gets a break, maybe a practice or two with the new team but then time off. DS#1 doesn't get a break until the end of May.

In other news, we STILL don't know if DS#1 has to go to Killeen, TX for a soccer game tomorrow. A large fraction of his team can't make it due to the fact that families looked at this weekend as being after our season ended and made some vacation and/or other plans--trust me, people do that when most of their weekends are taken up. Add in the fact that our trainer can't make it either and it looks like this game will either a) be moved or b) we'll get charged with a forfeit. The alternative is c) play with what kids can make it. I think certain parents will nix that because they won't want to drive 5 hours round trip to watch us play iron man soccer in 90+ degree weather. I know that DS#1 would prefer to play but we'll just have to wait and see.

I could rant again about the flu scare here, but I suppose I should just leave it at that. Look for more pictures (and maybe even a video) during or after this weekend.

Track Meet

Today there was a 4th and 5th grade track meet at one of the high school tracks. DS#2 has been excited about this for a while because he likes running. Each kid had to "try out" for track but only one event per child. DS#2 ran the 200 and was both excited and nervous. Ribbons were based on times-ie. if you are faster than time X you get ribbon Y. He knew going in that the time to beat to get a blue ribbon was over 1 1/2 seconds faster than his fastest time so far. Well, he got the blue ribbon. In fact, the top 3 boys in his heat got blue ribbons because they all ran very fast. After the race he told me that he knew he wouldn't have gone as fast if the people he was running with weren't fast too. I told him that this is the reason to compete with other people because they can help bring out the best in you.
I had to include this picture too. It not only shows his blue ribbon, but clearly shows how much he LOATHES having his picture taken. Poor kid.


We have a partial soccer schedule for the weekend. DS#2's tournament has him playing 4 games, 3 Saturday and 1 Sunday (Happy Mother's Day!). DS#1 has a game in Killeen (about 2 1/2 hours away) on Saturday, we don't know the time yet. His other make-up game will be next week Saturday in Austin. Then he has try-outs for next year at the end of the month. DS#2 has try-outs next week.

Fortunately, my lovely wife is used to the idea of her kids messing up Mother's Day and is content because she bought herself a new portrait lens. Happy Mother's Day Dear!

Picture Overlap

Well, this is going to be another one of those posts where the pictures I picked overlap with my lovely wife's blog, but hey, that's life.

Sunday we went out to Fiesta Texas to get pictures for our season passes (yes, we have season passes, it's less than 10 minutes away and we DO get our money's worth ;)) and to play around a bit. While DS#1 was a champ and rode with DS#3 on several rides (boy, does he looked cramped!) I walked down with DS#2 so he could go on the "Gully Washer" and, well, get soaking wet. When he came off the first time he was basically drenched and told me all about how he rode alone and caught all of the major water sprayers and the waterfall on his trip down. The rest arrived right as he finished and DD wanted to ride so I went ahead and rode with both DD and DS#2. DS#2 caught the waterfall again and not a bit of him was dry at the end of the ride (DD and I got pretty wet too!).

We went ahead and picked up a couple of funnel cakes (who says we don't give our kids healthy food?) on the way out and then headed home so DS#3 could get a nap. While he napped I carted the kids off to the swimming pool for an hour or so before their Uncle JB came back from his Cinco de Mayo soccer tournament. It was actually a pretty busy Sunday but a lot of fun.

This week is going to be pretty busy. Wednesday is normally our "night off" from soccer practice and we "only" have dance for DD from 4-5:00. This week is different, DS#2 has a school district 4th and 5th grade track meet from 4:00-6:00 and DD's piano lesson was moved to 7:00 PM Wednesday evening. In addition, she and DS#1 are SUPPOSED to have swim practice. HA!

Quick Post

Well, my lovely wife just took the kids off to get some ice cream and Baskin Robins so I have a few minutes to myself. This means I did a quick job with some video she took of DS#3 dancing at the mall on Friday when I was at DD's field trip. She was there to get some 2 year-old pictures taken, you can hear a voice in the background talking about how cute he is doing this, and well, who are we to argue with random passersby at the mall?


I wanted to pop up a couple of pictures she took later that evening when DS#3 was playing with DD. They really do have TONS of fun together. DD will smother him with so much affection that he screams to have her go away, and then promptly follows her a few minutes later.

In other news, I can't remember if I mentioned that both big boys had their soccer games canceled this weekend due to the foolish over-reaction to the swine flu. DS#2 had his 3v3 tournament canceled and DS#1 had his away game doublenightmare, uh, double-header canceled (morning game in Austin, afternoon game in Killeen, let's just say 5+ hours of driving for Papa). DS#2's tournament should be May 16 now. DS#1 HAS to have his two games done before May 15 as the 16-17th is the tournament for the conference championship and they need to have the standings by then. My dear wife is on-call May 8th (Friday). I am thinking that we are looking at her dealing with the younger kids while I go away that Saturday for DS#1's games. This wouldn't be so bad if it weren't for the fact that DS#2 has a tournament that weekend too (here in SA).

Basically, the virus scare closing schools has been very, very overblown. This is from someone that participated in discussions about how to deal with "outbreaks" back in the early 90's. As I told some people, yes, closing schools is one of the first things on the list to help prevent a virus from spreading, but that wasn't called for until you saw a MUCH higher infection rate than has been seen right now. Forth Worth put 80,000 kids out of school due to ONE student. I am sorry, but that is simply an overreaction.

Okay, the family is back from getting ice cream so this rant is over.

Field Trip

Being home with DS#3 full-time makes it difficult to go along on field trips with the older kids. Next year that will be a bit different because he will be old enough to do a Mother's Day out or some sort of pre-school a few days a week so that he can play more with other children and get used to a bit more structure in his day.

Today my lovely wife had off due to being on-call last Saturday. This meant she could watch DS#3 and I had the opportunity to go with DD on her field trip to the San Antonio Botanical Gardens. I tried to take pictures (have to keep my lovely wife happy) but really, it was mostly kids running around looking at plants ;). This is one of the pictures that is just DD. Most of the others include some of her classmates so I thought I would stick with this one.

I enjoyed the field trip, and particularly enjoyed how excited DD was to have me going on it. It turns out she already told teacher all about how her mama had off and moved her hair appointment so that I could go on the field trip. I found that VERY funny.