Busy Busy Kids Update

Ella's Reading Olympics team "The Readers from the Black Lagoon" not only won their middle school competition, then went on to win regionals! Some very proficient and excited readers in that group, answering trivia questions from 40+ assigned texts!

Olivia and her Destination Imagination team the "Lightning Tigers" did a wonderful presentation, so much so that they won their category and have been invited to go to the state event!

Hannah learned a lot in her first year with Destination Imagination, her team built structures that had to support weight and deliver golf balls. They wrote a play about structures, with characters named "Joint Man" and "Bracer". Hannah was a tree named "Archie".

When it snows around here, you have to run outside before it melts!

Amy gave all the Primary kids extensive and hilarious "CTR Superhero Training" one Saturday. I don't think I will ever get the "Eye of the Tiger" theme music out of my head from that day, nor the memory of the Primary Presidency - all dressed up as superheros - dancing to it to get the kids excited.

Olivia continues to thrive in her dance class, and loves showing us her moves when she gets home.

Hannah broke her arm in January, slipping off a full-stretch-swing between monkey bars at school, and landing hard on the ground. Well, we didn't find out she actually broke her arm until the next afternoon. The day of the break she said it didn't hurt, but couldn't raise her arm above mid-chest-level. We told her to stop moaning and sent her to bed with some ibuprofen. Waking up the next morning, she was still without pain, but still couldn't move her arm. Amy sent her to school anyway. Amy called the doctor, and the doctor insisted on seeing our stoic child. Clean break across the upper humorous, as you can see with the attached photo. 6 hours of doctoring. It think it's clear that Hannah is "hockey-tough" with all those Canadian DNA, cuz anybody with mostly Gaskin genes would have been screaming like a little girl since the moment of the fall, whether it hurt or not (and speed-dialing a lawyer). Good thing it was the left arm, as she has school tests and needs to write with ol' righty! Get tough or die, that's the motto around here!

Ella turned 12 in January and we had approx 4 million of her closest friends over for a crazy scavenger hunt-themed birthday party, where each team had to take photos of the different items. It was a lot of fun, though I still don't understand how little Ella is now 12; the math doesn't seem to add up there.

Hannah doing some rocketry.

Kids reading in Sawyer's dino tent, with the dog.

Sawyer prepping for a medical career on the patient cat.