Where has the past week gone?! I meant to post sooner, but the days seemed to vanish quickly. I sure appreciated having my desk cleared and my calendar updated, as I had an onslaught of forms to complete, dates to record, and cheques to write. 'Tis the season!
The girls started school on Wednesday, September 1. Neil attended assembly while I went to work. (I would have preferred to go to school, but it wasn't a good day for me to do that.) Sophia and Madeline insisted that Neil not call and tell me who their teachers were, so they could tell me themselves, in person. I was curious, but it was worth the wait. They were so excited to tell me the name of their teacher and which of their friends were assigned to the same classroom. All in all, the girls are very happy. Most of their closest friends are in their classes and they're both thrilled with their teacher. A great start to the school year!
Wednesday evening, Neil took the girls to an open house for new students at the dance studio. Sophia, Madeline, and Bronwyn danced for two hours off and on to give newcomers an idea of what to expect. Meanwhile, I attended the AGM for Georgia's preschool. I was (and am) very aware that this will be the last year I'll have a child attending preschool. (They each had two years of preschool, so this is the sixth year for us.) Eager to get some time in the classroom with Georgia, I snapped up a couple of my Fridays off on the parent-helper sign-up sheets.
After work on Thursday, Madeline and I attended her second piano lesson of the season (her 2nd year). We started August 26, which seemed awfully early! Well, I guess it's good to have a staggered start to all the activities. Madeline's music classes are an hour long and I have to be in the class with her. Sophia also started piano lessons this week (Saturday morning). She was considering bagpipe lessons, but decided on piano. The bagpipe lessons would have been a little more convenient for us, and easier on the ol' pocket book, but I think piano was a good decision anyway. She is taking private lessons with the same teacher that Madeline has. I sat in on her first class to find out what her lesson was like and what she needed to do at home, but will not do so in the future. I look forward to reading for 30 minutes!
Irish dance starts this week. I am taking dance again (my 4th year), but I think it'll be my last year since Georgia will start next year. All I want to do this year is get my four beginner soft-shoe dances down pat, maybe one or both of the more advanced soft-shoe dances I started learning last year, and the two hard-shoe dances I've worked on. I am not interested in learning any new solo dances, but I will participate in all the ceili (group) dances. Sophia and Madeline are starting their 6th and 4th years, respectively.
So, how about that third activity we agreed the girls could do? They are not doing Girl Guides again because they want to try other things. Honestly, I feel a tiny bit of regret over that decision because it is a good program, and very inexpensive, but they had to choose. I do support their choices, though, especially since they are both physical activities. Madeline is planning to take Taekwondo this year. She had mentioned it several times over the past six months, so I inquired about the program through the South Zone Club. The days and times work for us and the location is convenient. There are five time slots (four of which work with our schedule) and she should attend two per week. It starts October 1st.
Sophia and her cousin Bronwyn are planning to play ringette this year. This will be a very new experience for them as it's not like anything they've done before. Other than the time involved and the cost of equipment, I'm pretty excited that they're doing this! I played ringette for several years when I was a kid and I loved it. Like Sophia, I was nine when I started (but I had a lot more skating experience before that). They're registered for a Come Try Ringette event on the 18th, and the season (or evaluations) begins in October. I'm glad we have a few more weeks to round up the equipment she needs! All we have are elbow pads, and maybe pants. Anyone around here have used ringette/hockey equipment for sale that would fit a 9 or 10 year old (I think she needs 12" shin pads)? Size 4 hockey skates? If so, please let me know!
Sophia also started cross-country (long-distance running) on Friday. She has two practices and one meet every week in September. This is always right before and after school, so it does not affect our evenings and weekends. For the meet this week, she has to be able to run for four minutes straight. This is not a problem for Sophia!
In other, non-extracurricular-activity news...
Friday evening, Neil and the girls went to the first of four U of R Rams football games at Mosaic stadium. Neil won season tickets and he can take up to four children to each game for free. It sounds like the girls really enjoyed it -- especially watching the cheerleaders and the mascot, Rampage! They had their picture taken with Rampage and the cheerleaders hoisted each one of them up in the air. I'm so glad I sent the camera with Neil!
Saturday morning, we all attended the annual pancake breakfast for Science Centre members. The girls showed me some of the newer stuff inside the Science Centre before Sophia and I had to leave for her piano lesson. Neil takes them quite often, but I rarely get there. We definitely get our money's worth from our annual membership.
Neil attended the 'Labour Day Classic' Rider game on Sunday. I'm glad the Riders won, and even more happy that Avonlea won the title of Riderville! It's awesome that the smallest community garnered the most votes. They deserved it!
P.S. How could I forget? We had a lot of rain on Sunday evening (I heard 70mm on the radio) and water ran into our basement in three places. Basically, it came in around three of the four windows -- near the stairs, in the bathroom, and in the toy storage room. Fortunately, after having water in the toy room in late June, we kept that part of the room free of stuff, so it was easy to pull off the baseboard and pull up the carpet again. Neil sucked up a bunch of water with the Shop Vac and put down towels in all three places to keep the water from advancing overnight as it continued to rain all night. Prior to this, we had a large dehumidifier running for two months straight (nearly 24/7) and it was still collecting water. I guess we'll have it on for at least another two months.
