Memories

I was reading on the web late last night that Harvey Korman had died at 81. For those of you my age or older, you'll remember him from the Carol Burnett show, one of the favorites in my house. It made me so sad to hear the news because I loved to watch that show when I was growing up.

And since my dad's been gone for nearly 23 years now, there aren't a whole lot of memories I can still grasp with real clarity about the time he was here. But I can remember watching Carol Burnett with him. He used to love one of the Tim Conway skits, the one where he was Mr. Tudball and he had the secretary, Mrs. Wiggins. His impression of Tim Conway saying, "Uh, Mrs. DeWiggins," is crystal clear in my memory bank. It still makes me laugh to think about it today.

Here is a clip of Tim Conway and Harvey Korman from the Carol Burnett Show. I put this up here because I used to love it when they would make each other laugh and Harvey Korman is cracking up in this one. Good times...



~Peace

Sounds of Summer

Just a little something I'm loving right now. Sounds a little like an oldie, doesn't it?

Video Links

All That Jazz


Tap, tap, tappin'!

Hey guys!

This one is going to be short and sweet. I've got tons of taxi-driving to do today to Jefferson County, to pick up newly-groomed canines, to West Knoxville for ball practice and then back to Jefferson County tonight. Just wanted to say Sydney B. did great in her dance recital last night. She was all sparkly in hot pink and silver. Not the least bit nervous, she shook what her momma gave her!

We hot-rolled her hair before the performance, put on body glitter, mascara and lots of pink lip-gloss. She sat patiently with us during the first half of the show watching her friends and her instructors do performance after performance. Then at intermission, we raced backstage and got her lined up and ready to go. I took my seat and got my camera ready. Her dad was in charge of the video. Since it was his first time working our new hard-drive video camera, please do not judge too harshly if the video is not perfect. I will attest to the fact that the lighting at the facility is HORRIBLE! In two years, I have never had one picture that I didn't have to tweak a bit afterwards -- and that includes pictures from dress rehearsal where the lights are actually on. Everything is just a lovely orange-yellow in there, so bear with us on that.

Anyway, for her efforts, Syd received not one, but TWO bouquets of flowers. Since getting flowers is just about her favorite thing in the world, Sydney was in heaven last night. We finished up the night with some chicken fingers, sweet potato fries and Orange Julius drinks at Wishbones and then headed home. It was a great, great night.

Congratulations, Syd!

Here is a link to Sydney's first dance -- tap:
Tap Recital
Here is the link to her second dance -- jazz:
Jazz

Just a little FYI: The girls seemed to know the jazz routine better than the tap, so make sure to check out the jazz video even if you've already looked at the tap. The booty shakes alone are worth it!

Now that school's out, I should be posting more, so I hope to see you soon!

~Peace

Pictures

Joe and his new friend at the Aquarium
Hot tub time!
Just hangin' with the girls!
Mr. Peacock, I presume!
One Spring Day
Check out her shirt!
Play Ball!

Here are some pictures I promised of the last few months' activities. No video on Vimeo yet, folks. I promise I'm working on it!

Enjoy!

Correction

Thanks to Tracy Lee for correcting me about my Brady Bunch reference in the earlier post. She feels the episode I am thinking of has Cindy on a televized quiz show freezing up every time she looks into the camera. I will defer to her memory on this, as she is the *queen* when it comes to remembering the details of all cheesy '70s TV shows! (As most of you probably already know if you've ever played any kind of pop culture game against her!) At my advanced age, they all run together!!

~Peace

Long Time Gone!

Has it really been almost a MONTH since I've updated? Geez, guys, it's not for lack of activity around here -- That's for sure. I've got oodles of pictures stored up and I'm going to update those later this weekend, but I'm just saying a quick hello before I head out for a softball tourney this weekend. I just thought if I didn't update while I had all this junk in my head it might be another month before I got around to it. So let's get started!

First, Joey's high school baseball season has mercifully ended. He ended up getting in at least an inning a game for most of the remainder of the season. A small victory, but a victory all the same. So summer season has started and life is back to normal. We're gearing up for trips to Mt. Juliet, Kingsport, East Cobb and Charleston with his team this summer. Then we've got our annual Daytona family trip coming up. We're storing up our dough for a trip to the Daytona Beach Kennel Club. "Give me the straight trifecta, 7-1-4, please, ma'am!"

The girls have a week and a half of school left and we're preparing for end of the year luau parties, final report cards and fun day at school. It's hard to believe we're moving to 4th and 2nd grades next year. Little Syd is not so little anymore and Kelsey has grown so much this year she's wearing women's size shoes and junior-sized clothing. Time marches on.

They both did great grade-wise this year, no Bs on either report card. They tested great on their standardized tests (not that I have any love for those things -- I could write a book about the loathing I have for them.), with Kelsey testing at Post-high school in several subjects and Sydney testing at a sixth grade level in a couple of things. Whether that's truly accurate or not, who knows, but I do know that they are learning and progressing tremendously in their studies. I'm glad I'm able to have a hand in that actually. Watching their academic progress has been one of the greatest experiences I've ever had.

In other news, Kelsey had her first pitching outing last month and did pretty well. She got out of the first inning with no runs, walking the first two batters. Batter #1 got thrown out trying to steal second and Batter #2 got called out for leaving the base too early (a little help from Blue, thank you very much). Then she was down in the count 3-0 on Batter #3, but came back and fired 3 right down the middle! Inning over! Woohoo! Now, in the second inning, things didn't run quite as smoothly, but it was exciting nonetheless. Let's see. With control issues, she threw a few behind the batters' backs and hit one in the head. Her dad brought in another pitcher soon after, but all-in-all, for a first time ever outing, she did great. I'm hoping to post some video on Vimeo later in the week, so I'll let you know when I get around to that.

Sydney had her spring musical May 1 at the co-op. I usually dread the spring musical simply because it's the typical, boring, school program. It's hot in the auditorium, crowded and you can't hear anything for all the babies fussing and crying all around the room. Kel missed out on this production because she had a softball game. (As is custom, I let her decide which event she preferred to attend, and she (BIG SHOCKER) chose to play ball.) Anyhoo, Syd had two songs in this production, one with the 1st and 2nd grade classes and one during the big finale with the entire school on stage. It was such a great little show this year! It was very upbeat and the music was contemporary Christian, so the kids danced and did sign language and it was beautiful. It was a very simplistic performance with minimal set design. The kids were dressed in khaki bottoms and spring colors on top, so it looked like a bunch of Easter eggs up on stage!

I have to say it was very enjoyable and Syd also came out of her shell this year and actually did the hand motions. For those of you in attendance last year, you will remember it was a little like the episode of the Brady Bunch where they went on the TV show as the group, "The Silver Platters", to perform a song and one of them froze up -- Was it Jan? (If you know the answer to this one, please leave it in the comment section below!) Anyway, Syd was kinda like that last year, but this year she was loosey-goosey and really enjoyed herself. I'm hoping to upload that on Vimeo this week, too.

We also took a quick trip to Pigeon Forge for our annual cabin vacation. It was tons of fun (even though it was Rod Run weekend and driving on the main drag was IMPOSSIBLE!). The cabin had a hot tub, two video game machines, foosball, air hockey, pinball, a jukebox and a pool table. So the kids -- Dad included -- had a ball! We visited the Gatlinburg Aquarium on Friday and then we invited the fam up on Saturday for a cookout. The girls got in the hot tub with their cousins after we ate burgers and horsed around for about an hour. Then after the family was leaving, we were stalked by a peacock for the remainder of our trip. It was beautiful, but kinda creepy, too. Evidently it was mating season for the little guy and he spent most of Saturday night squawking right outside the cabin -- Joe was thrilled, let me tell 'ya! Then on Sunday morning as we were getting up and getting ready to come home, Mr. Peacock was sitting perched on our front porch! AAAHHH! Anybody who knows me knows how much I fear birds, so it was not a big treat for me. Neither was the big pile of hmmm, how can I put this delicately, bird stuff he left on the front porch! I've got pics of all the festivities and I will upload those to the blog later this week.

Well, kids, I think that's all for now -- I know you're thanking the Good Lord that the babbling is ending! Kel's got three games today and it's time to get ponytails pulled up, Under Armour donned and cleats laced. If any of you have a 9 year old, you know this is not a quick process. So I gotta run. I hope everybody is healthy, allergy-free and in a good place. I'm hoping once school is out I'll be more attentive to the blog. There are lots of things coming up!

Finally, tomorrow is Mother's Day. I don't have a whole lot to say about that except I am thankful I still have a mother, two grandmothers, a mother-in-law and two sweet aunts (not to mention many friends) who are still around to share this experience with me. We will gather tomorrow at Mom's house as we always do, having sub sandwiches and chips and cookies and we will laugh and poke fun and enjoy the day. While I always say my idea of the perfect Mom's Day is laying in my comfy PJs all day watching movies and napping, I have to say I am so fortunate to still have so many mothers (this phrase is open to interpretation!!) to spend my day with tomorrow. Being a mom has been the greatest challenge of my life, but also the greatest privilege. I never regret for a single moment making the choice to be one. I am richer for having done so. So for all the moms reading this, Happy, Happy Mother's Day!

~Peace

Updates

Hard to believe it has been over two weeks since I have been here, but it has. So what's new? Well, Sydney had Round 2 with the stomach virus one week after Kelsey battled through Round 1, causing her to miss the last day of SATs at school (the standardized tests most of you are familiar with). Sydney was sicker, though, and her tiredness and lack of appetite lasted much of that weekend. We, again, had to cancel our little cabin vacation in Pigeon Forge for the second time. Let me tell ya', people, the folks at Cabin Fever Vacations really were understanding about the whole ordeal we were experiencing. Usually you can't get ANY kind of refund if you bail on your reservation -- I mean no exchanges, no refunds, no loss of deposit, no nuttin' -- but after explaining AGAIN that we had pukeheads at our house for the second weekend in a row, they allowed us to transfer our reservation to this weekend. So, fingers and toes crossed, we are all going to get a little R & R this weekend.

Last weekend, Kelsey played in her first kid-pitch tournament of the season (The two prior were called due to inclement weather). Her little team did so much better than I expected (and most who had seen them play before expected, I dare say). They came in second place in a little 5-team tourney at Willow Creek. Next week she will start league play and then we'll be on an every other weekend schedule of tournaments, so ball season has officially begun at the Birchfield house!

Yesterday I accompanied Sydney on a field trip to the Women's Basketball Hall of Fame. That is such a cool place, even if you're not a basketball fanatic. They have talking exhibits, collegiate jerseys in every color and all kinds of basketball artifacts from many, many different decades. The kids, being only 7 and 8, couldn't really appreciate many of the exhibits, but they thoroughly enjoyed shooting hoops on the interactive courts. It was cold and rainy yesterday, so it was a really good day for an indoor field trip.

That's it for the catch-up, I think. If something else of note has happened in the last couple of weeks and I haven't mentioned it, well, we'll chalk that up to being on puke patrol too long or just the normal sleep deprivation I exhibit on a daily basis. I hopefully will have pictures and lots of interesting stories to relate after we get back from Pigeon Forge this weekend!

~Peace

Tummy Bugs

This past weekend, Kelsey's softball team had a tournament scheduled in Pigeon Forge. As we like to do a couple of times a year, Joe and I reserved a cabin in a Pigeon Forge resort for the weekend since we were going to be up there anyway. The kids love this little vacation and so does Mom because it's close to home and there's not TOO much packing that has to be done for all of us for just the weekend.

So we are preparing to start packing the car up Friday morning, having taken the dogs to the kennel, Joey back to Jefferson County, etc., when Kelsey informs me we just MAY not be able to go to the cabin this weekend. When I ask her why, she tells me she just threw up. Matter of fact, no moaning, no whining, just, "Hey, guess what, I'm sick," kinda thing. At first I thought she was kidding, but as I got closer to her, that kinda pale yellow color on her face told me she was not. She said she felt fine now and thought it might just be because her nose had been stuffy this morning and all the gunk had made her tummy upset. So after an hour passed and she was screaming for food, I thought she might have been right. I fixed her a piece of toast and kept on preparing for the trip.

Two hours later, we're all still fine. By the third hour, Joe had started toward the bathroom to clean (Those who know him understand) when Kelsey came and stood in the doorway. I could tell she no longer felt fine just by the look on her face. So I shoved Joe out of the bathroom and helped Kelsey make it inside. There was no doubt now -- She had a stomach virus.

Needless to say, our trip was cancelled. The cabin facility very graciously agreed to let us postpone our trip after Joe and I grovelled for half an hour or so. Sydney was in tears for an hour because she had so been looking forward to the weekend. Kelsey, ever the tender-hearted girl, was telling me (as she was hovering over the toilet) she was so sorry for ruining the weekend. It was pitiful. But Joe promised Sydney they would do something, just the two of them and he took her out for lunch and to run errands later in the day, even letting her have an ice cream cone at Chik-Fil-A. He said Sydney told him that was BETTER than going to the cabin. And I stayed home and took care of Kel Bell while she battled her insides.

So here we are three days later and everything is pretty much back to normal. Kelsey was sick for about eight hours and then started feeling a bit better. Her fever spiked to 103.8 Friday night, which scared her poor mother to death. Thank the Good Lord for Motrin, I say. By Saturday morning, though, the fever was pretty much gone and Kelsey was ready for Popsicles, Jell-O and chicken brother galore. Kelsey says getting sick isn't so bad really because at the end you get to have all the Popsicles you want. A kid's perspective, I guess!

I'm sure if you're reading this you're thinking how much my weekend must have sucked, but it really was okay. On Saturday afternoon while Joe was waiting out a rain delay in Pigeon Forge with the softball team, I decided to decontaminate Kelsey's bathroom and her bedroom while she took a shower. So I stripped her bed, Lysoled everything I could find (I literally had to open a window afterward), cleaned the bathroom with Scrubbing Bubbles, Clorox Wipes and then another coat of Lysol and then I washed all the mats, sheets, etc., in a cauldron of scalding water. While I was wiping down the faucets in her bathroom, Kelsey came in and said, "Thanks, Mom." I said, "For what?" She said, "For taking care of me and making me better." No prompting, no bribery, just an on-her-own Thank You, Mom.

Sometimes when you're wiping snotty noses, holding hair back while your kids upchuck, taking temperatures, sitting in a steamed up bathroom at 3 a.m. trying to get rid of that croupy cough, doling out meds or just worrying yourself into panic attacks over your kids' health, you wonder if they'll ever know or understand just how much you put yourself through being a parent. You think one day when they've got little ones they'll get it and they'll appreciate all your efforts. But sometimes they surprise you when you're standing in the bathroom, up to your elbows in germs, all umcombed, still in your PJs at noon, desperately needing a shower yourself and they'll say, "Thanks, Mom", just like that. Nothing fancy. And that's when you know they're worth all the yuckiness and worry and loss of sleep the world can throw at ya'!

~Peace

Spring Break

Well, we're on Spring Break in the Birchfield household this week, but it sure hasn't felt like much of a *break*!! Kelsey played in a one-day tournament in Morristown Saturday (which turned into a one-game tournament due to pretty heavy rain arriving just as Game 2 started). J. has been playing high school ball all week. Well, not playing really. This is a tough year for J., dealing with the politics of high school athletics.

Last year, J. played about half-time as a freshman and did pretty well for himself in his first year of high school ball. He got along well with his coach and was even receiving praise from the varsity coaches every now and again. This year, there's a new coach (the basketball coach) and, boy, is the environment different. If you're not a basketball player, you're pretty much screwed this year. There are about 20 kids on the JV this year and about 10 of them are playing regularly. J. has played 4 innings in the first five games. Could be worse, I guess. He's got friends who didn't even sniff playing time until Game 5.

But it is frustrating as a parent to see how down J. has become about it all, even talking about hanging it up after this year. I hope he doesn't, but I can't blame him if he decides to do just that. He's been to every workout since the fall, every practice, sold everything the booster club has thrown at him to sell to raise money, and he just doesn't understand why all that doesn't matter. It's hard to explain to a 15-year-old the politics that go into high school athletics, the kid whose parents donated the most money, the kid whose dad is the teacher, the kid whose mom is *extra* helpful, the coach who favors his basketball players, etc. It's hard to explain why 110% doesn't always bring reward, especially when giving 110% has been drilled into his brain since he started playing sports.

I pray for J. a lot these days, not so much for his playing time -- although I do sneak that in every now and again. But I more oftentimes pray for him to find the grace to deal with this situation. At first I thought his quitting at the end of the year was not necessarily a bad thing, but now I think it will show more character to stick it out. I told him at dinner tonight he has to decide if it is playing time that is more important or just his love of playing and being on the team. Playing time is important for him, for every kid on the team, I know. But I wonder if he wouldn't feel worse if he had no team at all. He so loves baseball.

I also think by staying he may just make a statement about his determination and his ability to deal with adversity. I don't know what the right decision is here. J. has never had to deal with failure and it's causing him great stress and pretty dark moods because he feels he has no recourse, no way to right the ship. But because this is not failure to perform on his part, but failure to be given any opportunity to perform on the part of his coach, I cautioned him away from hanging up his cleats next year because the coaches will be different. It will be interesting to see what decision he makes.

In other news, the girls have talked their dad and me into getting a tropical freshwater aquarium. We now have two fancy male guppies, a dalmation molly and some kind of orange Mickey Mouse platy (the real name escapes me). We thought we were getting a tank full of male fishies, but we believe now our molly is a female and probably the platy, too. Because almost all female mollies and platies come pregnant from the fish store, they are going back tomorrow. The girls are not thrilled about it, but we do NOT want hundreds of babies roaming around our little 20-gallon tank, not to mention we also do NOT want to watch the mommies munching on said babies after they're birthed. So to avoid any kind of scene like that, we are trading in these two for males bright and early in the morning. These are just starter fish, so they may all bite the dust in the next week or so anyway, but I want to take no chances. I will post some pictures of our swimmers in the coming week.

Finally, this Sunday is Easter. So early this year. My daffodils are not blooming yet, but they're wanting to. They're budding, but I feel certain the predicted snowfall on Monday will take care of that. Never fails. Everything JUST starts blooming and then BAM!, the old freezer turns on again. I was so thrilled with our week of 60+ weather that I packed up all of Sydney's warm clothes while I was cleaning out her room (another story for another day) and stored them securely under her bed this week, just daring Mother Nature to send any more cold weather our way. I'm over it. If it's cold, then it should snow. If it can't snow, well, then forget it and let's get on with it already. Just my opinion...

I hope everyone reading this has a happy Easter, full of hugs and lots of chocolate! We're having the usual family get-together at the house, complete with egg hunt and Honey-Baked ham. Good times, people. Good times...

Oh, and just in case you're living in a monastery or a cave somewhere, the Big Orange is competing in the NCAA basketball tourney this weekend. After today's exhibition, I am not holding my breath on an overly-extended season, but ya' never know. 20 (TWENTY) years ago I was a freshman at the ol' UT and I can promise you basketball season was nothing to cheer about, but I still loved going to the games, sitting (standing) in the student section in the arena, hoping I would catch an orange and white shaker before game time. I still love watching them, just now from the comfort of my living room!

Happy Easter Everybody!

~Peace

Spelling Bee News

Kelsey participated in the Southeastern Regional Spelling Bee on March 8. We weren't sure if the bee was going to go forward because it started to snow about 7:45 that morning and just kept right on falling up until time to leave for the competition. But the message on the coordinator's voicemail said they were going to go on with it and just to be careful getting there!

So we got to UT about 12:15, 15 minutes before check-in time. We got in a fairly long line to register. There were people, people, people everywhere! Lots of bored-looking kids, lots of kids being fed spelling words by their parents, lots of people. When registration began at 12:30, Kelsey received a t-shirt, a certificate, a program, a copy of the rules and a big #3 necklacke to hang around her neck.

We waited in the auditorium until 1:15, kidding around and joking with family until the little lady told us we would be starting early because everyone was there. They called all the participants to the stage and Kelsey took her place on the front row, suddenly very serious and focused. She looked small compared to the other kids up there.

In the practice round, Kelsey spelled macaroni without hesitation. She then sat quietly while the other 38 kids went through their words. Then the REAL DEAL began. The first girl in the first round fumbled on "regime" and tearfully went off the stage and up the aisle. I was secretly pleased that Kelsey would not be the first one to go, a fear she had expressed so many times while studying. Her first round word was "Capricorn." I knew she knew this one and she spelled it without hesitation as well, even remembering to capitalize the C. She took her seat and on the round went. I think there were probably about 10 kids out by the end of the first round. They were dropping pretty fast all around her.

In the second round, the #2 girl spelled her word correctly and then Kelsey got up. The announcer asked her to spell "macrame." My heart fell because I knew this was not one of the words we had gone over. We had covered 600 of the 800+ words, but this was one she stumbled on very early in the studying and we pushed on, meaning to return to it. We just never did. She made it through the first part of the word just fine, but added an "a" at the end instead of an "e". The little bell sounded signalling an incorrect spelling and Kelsey walked off the stage, picked up her complimentary dictionary and plopped down in the seats in front of us. We stayed until the end of the round and then we headed out.

There were several members of the family with us, so we all headed off to a little celebratory lunch at Red Lobster. Kelsey was pretty frustrated on the way to lunch, but seemed to perk up once we were there. When we returned home, she set up camp on the couch for a little while and kept saying how poorly she had done. I just decided to let her work it out for herself instead of continually barraging her with the "I'm so proud of your effort" talk. Sometimes you just gotta get through it in your own mind.

That night, around 7:00, Mom called to tell us a 14-year-old girl had won it. It was her third time in this bee. The other four finalists were all 13. I think that helped Kelsey realize how big a deal even just showing up really was. She was the only third grader in the competition, the youngest speller there. She stood with no fear in front of the big auditorium and gave it her best shot. Her success came not in winning it all, but just in TRYING, in making the all-important effort. When we were leaving the bee that afternoon, some woman we did not even know came up to her and told her how close she had come to spelling her word correctly and how good she had done, obviously noticing in the program how young she was. It seemed to make Kelsey feel better.

So it was a good experience overall for her. She got lots of e-mails from her teachers and her principal expressing great pride at how she represented CFC and how they knew she would be back (not holding my breath on that one!) next year. Things are pretty much back to normal now. This week is Spirit Week at school, so our focus is now back on Crazy Hair Day, Mismatch Day and Support Your Favorite Team Day at school. Thursday is the last day before Spring Break and the weather here is getting warmer. Our first softball tournament is this weekend and Joey is playing his first high school double-header as we speak. Sydney is now wanting to take tennis lessons. Life moves on for us all, I guess!

For everybody who sent Kelsey well wishes, who came to support her Saturday, who called, e-mailed and prayed for her success, we thank you a million times over. For Kelsey, who never ceases to amaze her mom and dad with her ability to get the most out of life, you are truly AMAZING!! XOXOXOX