Testosterone Overload

Yesterday Benjamin got his first taste of ballet.  I was watching a clip someone posted on Facebook of some Chinese ballet group performing Swan Lake.  It was quite amazing actually.  While I was watching it, Benjamin walked into the room and started watching over my shoulder.  After only a few seconds he said, "Whoa.  That is creepy."  I protested indignantly that it was NOT creepy, and after another second he asked, "What are they DOING?"  This boy can watch HOURS of men charging down a field after a funny-shaped ball and crashing into each other without blinking an eye or questioning what on earth they are DOING, yet he gets weirded out by a few seconds of ballet!  There is obviously an excess of testosterone in this house.

Great to Be Eight!

Eight years ago today Benjamin came into our lives and changed them forever!  I had no idea what I was doing back then, and I still feel that way fairly regularly even now, but he has always been sweet, kind, and forgiving as he has taught us how to be parents.  I couldn't ask for a better kid-- especially for a first one.  We love our Benjamin!

With his birthday falling on Sunday this year, Benjamin has really had an entire birthday weekend.  On Friday he took donuts to his class to celebrate.  On Saturday we started out with a family trip to IHOP for breakfast, and then we had a Dastrup family birthday party.  Benjamin made BYU shirts with his cousins, played an intense family football game, opened presents, watched the first BYU football game of the season (on our old TV thanks to Ty breaking Brigham's new 60 inch plasma with a projectile sippy cup -- watch out Jake Heaps, he's got his eye on your position!), and then did cake.  After our guests left, Benjamin and his dad stayed up late watching football and sports highlights.  It was a great day for a sports-loving lad like Benjamin.

Benjamin is growing up-- he chose a chocolate eclair cake over a themed birthday cake for the first time!  I did not protest!

 Today is Benjamin's actual birthday, and the Gronemans came over to celebrate with us.  We had the dinner of his choice (chicken pasta salad with Tuscan bread), and he spent time with Gramps putting together the Legos that he got from his cousins the day before.  He opened presents yet again and was very excited to get a real camera from Gramps and Grandma.  It was another good day.

After three days of party, you may think it's over, but oh no!  The party will continue in just 3 weeks when Benjamin gets baptized!  He is very excited about it.  (People who have children who are baptized are old.  That's been a standing rule that I may need to reconsider now.)

How fun to have so much family around to party with!

Manly Secrets

Tonight during dinner Brigham kept asking Benjamin about a certain girl-- someone I'd never heard of.  When I asked about her, Brigham said, "That's just between us-- right, Benjamin?" and winked.  I asked Benjamin if she is in his class at school, and he said she was.  There was more winking from Brigham.  I could see that I wasn't going to get any answers if I wasn't direct, so I finally asked, "Is she the cutest girl in your class?"  Benjamin answered in a very mater-of-fact, almost bored tone, "Yeah.  Dad is really into that sort of thing."

Back to School Night

Tonight was back to school night at Benjamin's new school.  My overwhelming impression of the school was, "Wow.  It's HOT!"  Believe it or not, Benjamin's school doesn't have air conditioning!  (Except the computer lab which has a window unit-- possibly sending subliminal messages to the children to embrace modern technology??)  Last I checked it was 2011.  So why doesn't his school have AC?  Spoiled Americans should NOT have to live like this!  It's outrageous!  What his class does have is this really big box fan that gets nice 'n loud if you turn it up enough to make a slight breeze.  I wouldn't say that it creates the best of learning atmospheres.

When I wasn't fantasizing about climbing into freezers or jumping into glacial lakes, I learned that Benjamin's teacher is going to skip 3rd grade math entirely and just teach the 4th grade curriculum.  She seems very sharp and on top of things, and frankly, a little intimidating.  She looks incredibly fit and tan (especially for a woman probably in her 50's) and has pictures of people (herself possibly?) doing martial arts all over one wall in the classroom.  I won't be surprised if I end up having nightmares about not getting my homework done for weeks! 

Despite the heat and the fact that he hasa teacher who could beat the tar out of all of us without breaking a sweat, I think Benjamin is in good hands at Peruvian Park and that he'll do well-- if he can keep up with all of the Asian kids in his class!

August Review

Ugh. It's official: I am bored of blogging. But it was my New Year's resolution, so I must press on! One blog a month is pathetic at best, I know. I'm going to TRY to do better in September. It seems that some improvements have been made to blogger since I blogged last, so maybe this will be easier now and I'll feel more inspired to blog more. We'll see...

We had some good times this month. First of all, at the beginning of the month, our good friends from Baltimore, the McBrides and the Harknesses, came for a visit while both were on vacation here in Utah.

It was so fun to catch up with these great friends and to see these kiddos who spent their babyhood together get reacquainted.

Next came a camping trip to the mountain property with Gramps and Grandma Groneman!  Grandma and Grandpa Dastrup were sweet enough to watch Jacob (our non-camper) so that Benjamin, Ty and I could stay the night (Daddy had to work).

We had so much fun!  Ty dug in the dirt with tractors that Gramps brought and rode down the hill on his toy ATV.  Benjamin practiced his archery and made "mountain buddies" out of rocks and googly eyes.  We all helped Gramps divert a stream and make stairs down to our "beach" by the stream, roasted hot dogs, and ate lots of s'mores!

Cousin Emmy came up for a little while, and she and Ty had a great time playing together.  Ty was really excited about sleeping in the trailer and kept asking to go to bed.  He went down happily, and although he was too excited to sleep for awhile, he was happy to stay in his bed in the trailer!

For me, the next exciting thing was Education Week.  Between my wonderful mother and mother-in-law offering their babysitting services, I was able to go for most of the week, and it was fabulous!  I went to a lot of parenting classes, and now I am busily trying to be a better mom!  What a great opportunity to refuel my mind and spirit and recharge after a LONG summer!  THANK YOU to both Moms!

August 22nd was the light at the end of my tunnel that finally arrived:  the first day of school!  I am ashamed to admit that I was quite giddy the night before-- it really did feel like Christmas Eve!  I know a lot of moms who were sad to send their kids back to school, but they definitely don't have the same situation that we do.  After being home all summer with 3 kids who can't really play together, and being stuck in our house for a good part of it because I can't take Ty and Jacob (who run-- or sprint, in Ty's case--in opposite directions) most places without help from another adult, and since Brigham works or sleeps most days of the week, it was a very long summer!  So anyway, school finally started last Monday!

Benjamin started 3rd grade at a new school where the gifted program is located.  Of course he was nervous about going to another new school (his 4th in 4 years, poor kid), but so far he has made a couple of friends and seems to be doing pretty well.

Jacob also started at a new school-- one exclusively for kids with disabilities.  His teacher is wonderful, and it sounds like he is having a good time there and learning some new things, too!

Of course the biggest event of the month was Jacob's sixth birthday last Friday.  He had school, but that evening we had a birthday party with both sets of grandparents.  He received all kinds of wonderful John Deere presents and a Mario blanket, too.  He was one happy boy.

Since Mario Kart is Jacob's new passion, I made him a Mario Kart cake and then we played Mario Kart for him.  He was thrilled to pieces!

We are so grateful to have this sweet boy in our family and for all the love and joy that he brings to us!

Fun on the Fourth

Our Independence Day this year started out with Benjamin's first official race: the Sandy Classic 5k. I had prepared myself mentally this time to be left in the dust by my boys like I was at Benjamin's Fun Run, and I was even looking forward to it. Unfortunately, it wasn't Benjamin's day. He'd been limping around the house for about a week after hurting his foot at the splash park, but I really thought he'd be better for the race. Be it his foot injury or staying up super-late at the Stadium of Fire with his Dastrup grandparents and cousins, we could tell from the very beginning that something wasn't right. Brigham and I had to coax him along almost the whole race. But he still took 6th place in his age division, so he was happy about the race even if it wasn't his best.

After the race we went down to Provo for the parade. Grandpa and Grandma Dastrup were heroes once again-- putting out chairs on the parade route super-early before coming up to watch us run the 5k. (I don't know where they get their energy!) Jacob did much better this year with it than he did last year, and to my surprise, Ty was the one asking to leave after an hour or so. We may not have seen the whole parade, but we saw the BYU float (making Benjamin happy), some tractors (making Jacob and Ty happy), and several city royalty floats (making Brigham happy), so it was a good time.

After visiting my Grandpa Haslem for awhile, we then went to a Dastrup gathering at Brigham's Uncle Neal's house, which is a dream come true for kids. They ran around with their cousins playing basketball, jumping on the tramp, chasing the dogs, and watering the plants with water from the cooler (Ty).

That evening we had a family movie night and then decided to save our fireworks for the 24th since Ty was exhausted and Benjamin had seen a great fireworks show at the Stadium of Fire.

It was a great day and so nice that Brigham had it off this year!

June Summary

Having been overcome by a combination of busyness and laziness, I failed to post anything in June, and for that I am ashamed. So here is my sorry attempt to keep the month of June from fading into the obscurity of our memories.

The annual Dastrup Family Reunion was this month, and it was great to reconnect with so many of our East Coast relatives. The best part was seeing all of the kids running around together like a pack of wolves. So much of my childhood revolved around my cousins that it makes me happy to see our kids bonding with theirs.

After the Family Olympics-- Benjamin was quite the competitor and won many races!

Ty's first Creamie. He was a BIG fan.

Benjamin and his cousin Caleb-- I love how they fell asleep facing each other!

We decided to take advantage of the abnormally cool weather and go to the zoo. Jacob wasn't a big zoo fan in ABQ, so I was a little nervous about how he'd do, but I didn't need to be-- he loved it! Especially the elephants-- he watched them for a long time. They have a "Zoorasic" theme going on right now, with dinosaur models that move, roar, and even squirt water, and they scared the pants off of Ty! Our fearless little boy would come running to me, saying, "Scary, scary!" and insist on being carried whenever we came across a dinosaur. It was actually quite helpful in keeping him corralled!

Brigham ran the Wasatch Back Relay again this year-- this time with friends from high school including Jake Martin, his brother Sam, Jess Brereton, and Todd Allen. They had a good time-- except when Brigham ran hard reached an exchange station and found no one from his team there. The other van was at the wrong exchange station!

Jacob getting comfortable with his computer from Gramps and Grandma Groneman. This is before he urinated on the monitor.

My sister Cambrie was visiting in the middle of her move, and we had lots of good times together, including a carnival in Pleasant Grove. Jacob liked watching the rides, but did NOT want to go on them. Benjamin had a good time, and Ty was in heaven. It was hard to keep him from running onto rides without a ticket!

Pudding painting-- a hit with both little boys!

On June 30, my handsome husband turned 32. He started the day with a round of golf with his parents and brother, Sam. Then most of the rest of his family came over for grilled pizza and his birthday cheesecake. We all went to see Cars 2 together, and it was definitely the best movie experience we've had as a family in a long time. Jacob was bouncing up and down on the seat and clapping madly, so I think that he liked it. Ty liked it too, although by the end of the movie he got a little restless and started running around the theater. That evening, Brigham and I left the party at our house and went out for dinner and Dirty Rotten Scoundrels at Hale Center Theater. It was a good day, and I'm happy that it looks like Brigham is only a year younger than I am once again.

I know that I've left out a lot of fun and wonderful June events, but hopefully I'll do better in July. (I wouldn't bet on it, though.) Blogger has been acting up for me and keeps shutting down in the middle of my post. If any of my computer nerd relatives have tips for me, I'd be happy to hear them!