The Routine.

A couple of my friends keep telling me I need to blog. One of them to remain nameless (Stephani) said I had better blog soon because Ken’s parents are going to think I killed him or something. lol I can testify that he is doing great. He is alive and well.

Sorry for having such a long time between blogs. I have this thing about routine. I need to have one. I am a big routine person. I don’t like making plans on weekday evenings because it messes up my routine. I am a little OCD when it comes to messing up my routine. So with the kids starting school and me starting a new job it is taking a while to get into a new routine. I also get home an hour and a half later then I did from my last job. I would get home about 5:45. Then I would try and figure out what to cook for dinner. Then to prepare it and clean up by the time all that was done it was bedtime. Needless to say I was too tired to even think about blogging. One night Marty cooked dinner and it was ready to eat when I got home. After dinner I had more energy. Jordan and I cleaned her room. I did a little laundry and packed our lunches for the next day. I could not believe how much I had gotten done. I was able to sit down and relax a little bit that night. Having Marty cook that night gave me an idea. You see David gets home about 4pm so I thought why couldn’t he get dinner cooked and ready to eat when I get home. Then I would clean up after dinner. When I talked to David about it here is what he said. “You plan it and I will cook it.” That is what we did all last week. It was so nice to come home and have dinner already done and ready to eat. We all sit down at the table and eat dinner together every night. It is really nice. I love eating as a family at the dinner table. It really keeps up connected and together.

Now the next part of my routine I need to work on is computer time. I think I went three days before I check my email. I usually check my emails several times a day. You see I am still in training at work. The training they have at Regence is fabulous. They really invest a lot of time in making sure their employees are well trained. We are in a small windowless classroom for 13 weeks. The nice thing that Regence realizes is that they are filling our brains with a lot of information so they try to make it as fun as possible. When they told me I would be tired at the end of each day I thought they were a little nuts. How could I get exhausted just sitting in the room looking at a computer? They were so correct. There are some days that I could just go home and fall into bed as soon as I walk in the door. Filling your brain with A LOT of new information can be exhausting. Needless to say sitting down at the computer is the last thing I want to do when I get home. I am going to try and put into my routine is maybe a little computer time once a week and then on the weekends. That should be reasonable. So thank you to everyone for your patience while I try to get my routine back in control.

Now let me catch you up on everyone else in the family.

David
David is getting back into shooting high school football games. I usually plan on him being gone on Friday nights. He follows Lynden High around to all their games. He has been doing this every year for I would say at least five years maybe more. The parents have gotten to know him and I think they count on him being at the games. The high school it self now uses him for pictures for their programs, yearbook and more. His favorite thing to do is shoot sports. He has gotten a better camera for shooting sports events. I will be putting a link to his web site on my blog for people to check out his photos.

Andy and Marty
Andy and Marty are still here. They are planning on leaving around the beginning of October to head back to Yuma. It is starting to get cold here. We haven’t had to turn our heat on yet, but I am sure it will be soon. Poor Marty gets cold really easy. The Yuma heat is in her blood. Andy has been doing a lot of work on our yard this summer. He has saved us thousands of dollars in labor fees with all the work he did on our yard. I think Andy was about the only person happy to see the rain this morning. We have little blades of grass coming up here and there. He says that if the weather continues like this he just might have to mow before he leaves. As for Marty I think she would like the sun to come back. Lol

Jordan
Jordan is doing well with school. She joined the school orchestra last week. She was very excited to get the class started. It is one of the privileges of being a 5th grader. We got the letter on a Thursday telling us that if our student wanted to join the orchestra that they needed have their instrument and books by the following Monday. Needless to say as a working mom I was not happy with the short notice. They also said that one of the classes was going to be on Monday’s before school. After a little stressing out on my part we got it worked out. David was able to work things out with his job. He would go into to work a little later so that he could drop Jordan and one of her friends off in time to get to orchestra lessons. Once we had that worked out we needed to work on getting the instrument. They had a choice of playing a violin, viola or cello. Jordan chose to play the violin. I was planning on running around on Saturday to get it done. A big THANK you to my dad he did all the legwork for me. He called around and found the cheapest place to rent. Then we meet on Saturday to go to the music store. He insisted on paying for it. He and Karla talked about it and decided that it would be a good investment to buy the violin for her. If she decides to stick with it after this year great, if not we will give it back to my dad. They will either keep it for Samantha or sell it. Right now Jordan’s plan is to join the band when she gets into middle school. But she knows that if she really likes playing the violin she can continue that instead. So far she loves violin classes and enjoys practicing when she gets home. But I know that the novelty might wear off soon. I will keep you posted.

Ken
Ken has gotten settled into the school life. He has gotten his class schedule how he wants it. We still don’t know if he will be able to graduate, but we do have him in the classes he needs to graduate. He seems to like most of his classes. He does say that history is boring. lol But what kid hasn’t said that before. One of the things he needs to do is pass the WASL this spring. It is required that all Washington State students pass it. He also has a senior project that needs to be done. He has chosen photography as his project. David will be his mentor. He has a few steps he needs to take to graduate, but he is doing it and we will try our best to get that diploma for him to take home.
He appears to have adjusted to us and life here. His English is getting better and better. I was a little worried that he hasn’t done anything outside of school with his friends. I thought that maybe he wasn’t making any. Since David was shooting the Squalicum football game we told Ken he needed to go with David to the game. We suggested that he meet one of his friends at the game to hang out with while David did his thing. When they got home that night I asked Ken if he liked the game he said yes and that he wanted to go next week. YEAH!!!! I was so happy to hear that he enjoyed it and has made plans to go again. He also tells me he wants to go to homecoming. He is just trying to find a date. That will be a whole other blog.

Ken and Jordan seem to be bonding a little too. They run around the house chasing after each other. Jordan loves that fact that Ken will play games with her. They will sit in Ken’s room playing a game listening to music together. It is cute and sweet to see. Ken is very patient with Jordan.

Once again sorry about the long time between blogs, I will try my best to blog once mid week and once on the weekends. Once the routine gets into place it will go like clock work……as long as no one throws a wrench into my clock. lol