Wednesday

This year our elementary school decided against the obvious dress up day for Wednesday- "Wacky Wednesday."  Instead we had a day to go to school in our pjs.  I decided to get into the spirit of Dr. Seuss week today, and left the house to volunteer wearing yoga pants, an FFA t-shirt, and a hoodie.  The girls thought it was great.  I did brush my hair before leaving the house.  Looking at some of the kids at school- I'm not sure everyone did.

Elizabeth's outfit is the bomb, with horizontal and vertical stripes.  Who needs matching pajamas?

 Later on in the day I had Emma collect the chicken eggs.  We dubbed the big one a "screamer."  If I had been that bird, I would have demanded an epidural and several days recovery time.  Our egg production has gone up significantly with the weather warming up.  It's nice to feed the chickens and actually get something in return again.

I fixed an early dinner, before running off to drop Elizabeth off at Activity Days.  I meant to run right back home to pick up the rest of the family for the 6 pm Science Fair awards, but I was stuck at the church longer than I intended.  Elizabeth and I pulled into the church parking lot right on time, and I walked her into the church building.  The scouts were there, but no leaders for the girls.  More girls showed up, dropped off at the door by their parents, but I seemed to be the only adult waiting for the Activity Days leader.  Yes, there had been a group text saying we were a "go" for the evening, but still.  I don't think that makes me an over-protective parent just to make sure there's going to be an adult there to supervise my child, does it?  In any case, at 5:40 I told Ryan that he had better just bring the other three kids in his truck and I would meet him at Emma's school.  So, the girls and I talked about school, and dress up days, and a kid who was arrested at the other middle school.  Apparently he tried to run away while wearing handcuffs.  A real bright kid, sounds like.

Eventually I was discharged from my self-imposed babysitting duty, and drove over to Emma's school.  The awards "ceremony" was held in the teacher's classroom.  Here's Emma holding her participation award and giving a short explanation of her experiment.  All the kids did that part.

 And then here are the kids who got awards.  Emma got an honorable mention.  We are pleased for her.  We didn't really help Emma at all with her experiment or presentation board this time around.  We wanted her to take charge of it, and we would help after we were asked.

 The Science Club officers at the high school came, and were in charge of a couple of little science experiments to show off after the awards were given.  Annie and Maddie got to help with the Alka Seltzer explosions.

Then Emma and I ran home for her Personal Progress book (even though SOMEONE had been reminded to bring it before we left home) while Ryan went to the church to check in.  The Beehive presidency is being reorganized and he needed to extend some callings.  Well, the Beehives were actually just now leaving to pick up the newest member of the Beehives, and so he couldn't do his job, but he couldn't just go home because I had Maddie with me because I was supposed to meet Ryan at church...  So instead of driving to the church, I met the rest of the Beehives at the house of the newest Beehive, left Emma with them to drive back to church in Sis. Weaver's giant van (no minivans for them!), took Maddie home, waited for Dad and Annie to show up, and ran back down to the church.  (Is anyone else tired yet?  I am.  And hungry.  That one waffle and one egg I ate for dinner wasn't cutting it anymore.)  Then at about 8 pm, we piled all those 12 and 13 year old girls into our two vans (I had 5 of them) and we drove to McDonald's for ice cream cones.  The girls in my car were the ones who generally go with Ryan for the temple trips, and started requesting songs to sing to while we drove.  We did some great belting out of Adele's "Hello."

After all that, it was the waiting on parents to show up and pick up their progeny that left me feeling grumpy.  I just wanted to go home and eat, and I had an exercise in patience instead.  Not the loving kind, but more like mean diatribes in my head- "If they don't come soon, I'm just taking the girls home with me and the parents can drive all the way out to my house, dang it!  How hard is it to show up on time?!?!"

Deep breaths, Danae.  It's going to be ok.  Breathe.  Be nice.  Aren't you always telling your kids to be nice and kind?

I can't be too nice when I'm hungry, I guess.