Whirlwind of Tday Bliss Day 1

We managed to seriously squeeze in a lot over Thanksgiving this year. This post will cover our first day. After Spencer played some Turkey Bowl football, and I finished a beastly crossfit workout (my hands are still raw from so many dead lifts!), we headed to Olympia to visit Spencer's family. Even though it is only 2.5 hours away, we don't make it out there very often. This is particularly unfortunate b/c the kids absolutely ADORE their uncles and drive everyone a little crazy with the constant wrestling (though Matt and Nathan usually have their own style of wrestling that involves dogpile push ups, timing the kids to see how long they can stand on someone's back, or swinging, throwing or catapulting children in the air or middle of the room). The kids go crazy they are having so much fun, and the adults just try and talk over the mayhem.

Dishing up on the goods...

Benson and Devon...
Kiara and the cutest 2 year old EVER. Poor thing is bombarded by every aunt, uncle, and cousin in the room vying for her attention.

Some of the musically talented in the group serenaded us with music. The Adams family has some serious musical talent (and Spencer went and married me!!).

Me attempting a plate craft, that was decidedly done better by my more craftier girls.

A more or less failed attempt at a clever cousin group shot. No idea why Emma felt the need to cross her eyes, and poor Sula had had enough.

Almost succeeded with the boy only pyramid, Devon couldn't' resist the urge to burst off the top of the pyramid in every attempted pic.

Did I mention cutest baby ever???

Okay, so my baby is pretty cute too, and don't remind me...not a baby anymore. :( Too bad the only thing he ate on that plate was the roll, thus the devious grin.

Stay tuned...the next day we head to Ridgefield for more food, bowling, shooting range, and Leinenbach fun. Followed by Christmas tree acquisition (resulting in our largest tree ever), and a perfectly delightful Jon Schmidt piano concert. Might be the best weekend EVER!!

Cookie Backwash and Middle School Drama

Monday evening Levi came sheepishly downstairs, holding a poem he had written in class that day. He started his sad confessional with the words "the teacher put this poem in my file. She said my writing is unintelligent, a poor attempt at humor, and inappropriate". Apparently the boy who had to edit the poem found it offensive and brought it to the teacher's attention.

Naturally I panicked. What in the WORLD did he say in his poem that would have him put on "file" and caused his teacher to be this upset? I never should have allowed him to buy himself an xbox! Maybe b/c we let him watch Harry Potter movies and they were PG-13? Haven't we taught him anything? Immediately angry with him, I demanded to read the poem. He nervously and apologetically handed it over. I read it out loud for my husband to hear:

My Winter Poem

Winter tastes like cookies freshly baked. With eggnog to drink, leftover milk that Santa had not finished may not only taste like cookie backwash, but it might attract the reindeer.

Levi Adams (6th Grade Humanities)

I had to re-read it twice before the panic subsided. I asked if it was his reference to Santa that was offensive? No, it wasn't even THAT logical. This poem was put in his file b/c of the word BACKWASH.

Unfortunately, my panic, and fear turned immediately to RAGE. What teacher would tell a child his writing is unintelligent (ever) when he was cleverly (imo) describing eggnog? I spent the whole night drafting an email to send to the teacher. I could hardly sleep that night.

The best part is her placid and pathetic reply to my email. She claimed that she felt he was testing her to see how far he could go with inappropriate writing. She thought he was opening a door to push the limits. Not a single apology for her comments was made, but she did graciously remove the copy of the poem from his file and did also say (my favorite part) that she "may have" misinterpreted his intentions and that the fact he talked to me about it shows that he probably did not mean any 'harm or malice' in his remarks.

Two days later and my shaking rage is beginning to subside. Stripped of sarcasm, humor and creativity, his poem was finally acceptable to his classmates and teacher. Middle school in suburban America at its finest.