Week of May 6

I have a really hard time being consistent about whether I start these reports on Monday or Sunday. Deep dilemma.

Monday:

I took the kids on a great run out on Picnic Point and on the lakeshore path in the morning.

In the afternoon we went to the bookmobile and Cait met us at the park behind it where we played for a long time. Yummy tacos at night.

Tuesday:

Preschool for Atticus in the morning.

Lulah and I played up at one of the play structures near the community center. The whole family went to a park near the Mormon church in the afternoon where we met some friends to play.

I had my last patience class at night.

Wednesday:

Playgroup in the morning a a park on the way to the library.

Then I took Atticus and had a meeting with the community police officer, Officer Mike, about a project I'm working on as Assembly Chair to get carseats in the community center so that we can use them in the Community Cars that are available there for people to rent so that they don't have to get both kids and carseats up to the community center in order to use the cars. Anyway, complicated and kind of boring, but it seems cool to me that we can get something like that done.

In the afternoon we watched our friends the twins while their mom Allison was on a conference call.

That night we had a barbecue with our friends Nina and Juve, which was really nice.

Then I went and talked to some Spanish friends of ours in preparation for an interview I had the next day in Spanish for a job working in some random South American embassy.

Thursday:

I had my Spanish interview in the morning. It did not go as well as I hoped. A lack of professional vocabulary (I was asked to speak on illegal immigration and workers unions) combined with rusty Spanish made for an awkward twenty minutes. They let me know on Friday that I did not pass.

Atticus's preschool had a mother's day celebration the late morning, but Cait had class, so I went instead. It was fun being the only dad there.

We hosted story time that afternoon, but rainy weather kept a lot of people away. I ran to Whole Foods partway through story time to pick up the compact stroller we are taking to Europe/Morocco.

Here's a video of Atticus giving me his mother's day present. I was trying to hide so he would have to find me. Didn't work.

Lulah brushes hair at Atticus's school

Friday:

A big day. A speech therapist came over in the morning to talk about how Atticus's speech is coming along.

We went to the doctors office and got a bunch of vaccinations for the kids a little bit after that.

Then we went to FUS to help set up for Cabaret, the big yearly party/fundraiser that is apparently a really big deal. By volunteering (Cait setting up and greeting and me cleaning up after) we got in for free, rather than having to pay $40.

I had a meeting with my "reduce gun violence" chalice group (a chalice group is any FUS group that meets about a specific issue, whether social or spiritual) and we planned on setting up a film and lunch after the big gun violence sermon that is coming up on the 26th. It was great how responsive the representative of the staff was to our ideas and proposals.

That night we went to Cabaret, but that probably deserves its own post.

Saturday:

There was a big going away fundraiser for Atticus's preschool, and we were at that for 5 or so hours in the morning, but again, it's own post is needed.

After some naps, we went to FUS for a potluck, which was really good, as usual.

Then, after playing in the childcare room at FUS for a while, we walked up to our friends' Steel and Laurel's house, and then transferred to our friend Marci and Alan's house for a movie night. Atticus fell asleep on the way there and Lulah fell asleep halfway through the movie, after being cute for a while. It was nice that everyone was being interactive enough with the movie that she didn't seem disruptive. We watched I Wish, a Japanese film about family ties in a stagnantly modernizing Japan. It was really nice and we all walked home late at night satisfied and sleepy.

Sunday:

As usual, we were terrible at celebrating the official holiday of this day, Mother's Day. Cait did stir up the obligatory Facebook controversy by questioning society's true support of motherhood and if Mother's Day was just a front to conceal how little we really support our society's mothers the other 364 days of the year. I stayed out of it. I did try to make her an omelet, which is not one of my forte's and she got lots of time with the kids, which can be really nice for a working mother (Cait at least said it was for her). We called our mother's although we waited too long to Skype my mom and the University's internet was all clogged up. Sorry, Mother's Day. One day we might be great at celebrating holidays, but probably not.

Also this day, we went to FUS in the morning, where they had the "Coming of Age" ceremony where children ages 13 and 14 are given a meeting to talk about what they feel are the core principles of their life and faith, if they have any, and what really matters to them as the make the transition from "children" to "youth," which are different programs at FUS. There were some very interesting responses, although few got into any sort of cosmological beliefs about heaven or God, it was surprising to me how deep they could be and made me think about how flawed the idea is that we can only obtain wisdom in the late years of our lives. There was also a public pledge of support from the congregation and a pledge of continued exploration from the youth. It was nice.

Also this week: Lulah finally accepted her genetic inheritance as an upright mammal and is now walking all over the place. But again, that gets its own post. We also finalized some more Morocco trip details and will find out on Monday if we are able to sublet our apartment to the parents of students who want to stay here for the summer.

So yeah, not too many pictures either, but there should be a lot in some of the individual posts. Anyway, here's Boon's at the bottom of a slide and Early 90's Atticus.