"A Wink and a Smile"

I can hardly believe that it is already March 7th.   Where has the year gone already?   My only excuse for not comprehending the time, is that I have spent weekend after weekend at the pool watching my girls SWIM.  I had a brief rendezvous with the husband to MEXICO (I may share that soon) in January, but every other weekend in January, February, and up until now has been spent breathing in chlorinated air. This weekend, while it will be my first one spent at home, it will be yet ANOTHER swim meet for the daughter in the photos above.   She is attending a traveling sectional meet with other swimmers from the team.  For the first time she will get to swim the maximum # of entries allowed.  She has worked incredibly hard this season and her times in the pool show for it.  I am one proud mama! While the 15 year old will be swimming her heart out, I will be glued to the MEET MOBILE app allowing me to view the results of the swimming live....

TO SWIM a lot! 5 swimmers in the family = many, many practices between USA swimming and high school swimming.  No lazy people living in my house. It's always an exciting time to watch my girls practice hard and see the fruits of all their efforts in those swim meets ... those very long swim meets. I'm not sure many people understand the life of a swimmer.  Practices are daily with some 2-a-days.  This equates to about 18+ hours of practice time for my 15 year old, 9 hours for my 12 year old, 7-8 hrs for my 10 year old, and 2 hours for my 7 year old.   Practices are not at the same location nor time for these girls. My afternoon(s) as a "swim mom" means that I pick up kids from school and spend hours driving to and from pools with some wait time. It's nearly December and I expect the really busy days to last through mid March when things will ease up a lot.   A swimmer is never done though.   There usually is a few weeks off in the year, but to mai...

I'm trying my best to get caught up, but things are busy with school, work, swim team, and trying to register for middle school/high school next year. In the mix of that we had some snow days that really shut our town down (5 day weekend). The girls were home from school, the husband even spent part of the week working from the dining room, I still had to homeschool as well as do a little bit of work from home, doctor appointment was cancelled, and a shadow day at our local Catholic school NOW needs to be re-scheduled. It's nice to have snow days, but they honestly can wreak havoc on LIFE. Some things that did take place (eventually) ... Fun in the SNOW I turned the big 4-0 ! My dear hubby took me to a fine restaurant and we enjoyed every minute of it . There was yet ANOTHER swim meet ... our last one until STATE championships in early March. The girls did so, so ... not enough practice the week before with all the snow days and certainly too much in the way of junk foods ;) ...

Who am I kidding? It's ALWAYS that time of the year ...

*{k}'s row of townhomes. Not a project, but some crafty session . *{b} and her animal project of a forest animal . *{m} and her 3D SLOTH for her animal rainforest project . It really felt like the longest week E V A H !!!! Lots of projects happening. Lots of rainy, icky weather. Lots of moody behaviors in this house. Looking forward to ... An afternoon production at the elementary school The 1st short course swim meet of the season ... Friday eve/Saturday Oldest daughter's 1st boy/girl "Sadie Hawkins" dance

Swimming is great for the shoulders ...

GO!!!!! Getting ready for a long weekend at the pool It's that time of the year ... LONG COURSE CHAMPIONSHIPS

Each day I wake up to take 3 girls to practice by 9am. This is where they swim ... Then we come home for lunch ... spend a few hours taking a break with cleaning, reading, playtime before heading back here again ... Of course this is just playtime for the littlest one. 2x a week the oldest 3 will do a second afternoon practice and daughter #4 also does her swim practice. By this time of the day it is HOT. The pool feels like a BATH, but that doesn't seem to have any sort of ill effects for the little one. She still likes the pool just fine ... *EXCUSE the way I said her name ... it came off my tongue rather funny. Not sure why I asked her name either ... I guess I just like hearing HER say it.

The scene ... big swimming pool filled with many children The scenario ... little girls want to play with some super soakers (hydro liquidators) in the water. The problem ... soakers are not our own, but belong to a few 4-7 year old little boys. Little boy (really politely says) ... "Your girls might not want to play with us because we are playing a game where we shoot girls. Also, we like to shoot in the EYES." ME ... "Thanks. That's good to know."