Our January, In Brief (WARNING CHEERLEADERS INCLUDED)

I have already blogged about some of our biggest activities this winter...namely, the addition of Coco to our family, and the big anniversary cruise Nathan and I took in February. But there was a lot of other stuff going on as well; some of it awesome, some of it not awesome, and some of it involving cheerleading. I'm still trying to decide where cheerleading fits on the aforementioned spectrum.

First, I should probably talk a bit about the non-awesome stuff...like how almost every single kitchen appliance broke down in the month of January. Our month of appliance misadventures actually started in the waning hours of 2016, when our dishwasher stopped working on New Year's Eve. We were frustrated but not panicked; we were busy celebrating the New Year, after all. But after a few days had passed, the dishwasher still not turning on and hand-washing gradually losing its novelty, we summoned a repairman, who informed us the control panel was dead...and repairing it would cost 2/3 the cost of a brand-new dishwasher. So off to Lowe's I went, to purchase a brand-new dishwasher and to set up a payment plan.

Literally the same week we had the new dishwasher put in, our microwave suddenly stopped working. The light and the fan would turn on, but the food inside wouldn't heat up. I was amazed that they both died within such a short window. Both the microwave and the dishwasher were the original appliances that came with the house...coincidence?? It must have been their time to die. Not having any more spare cash, we scoured Craigslist until we found an old, similarly sized microwave for sale. I drove up to Tucson to get it, and Nathan and his home teacher installed it. It is much noisier than our old model, but at least our food heats up! (and at least our wifi doesn't go on the fritz every time the microwave is running! That happened a lot with our old microwave). Hopefully this microwave will last us for another couple of years, until we have the cash to buy a brand-new model.

But our appliance woes weren't done yet! Our clothes washer had been leaking for many months now, and since I figured we were already neck-deep in repairs, I should ask our repairman what was to be done with it. He fixed not only the leak, but the loud "clacking" noise the washer made every time it was in the spin cycle. That was another $250 down the drain. And just a couple of days after that, our oven stopped heating things up. Its control panel was also dead, and the gas interface inside the oven needed some fine-tuning. By this point, we were on a first-name basis with this sweet old handyman that had spent literally hours at our house (his name was Jim, and he actually turned out to be a member of our church!). I'm thinking about sending him a gift basket. Anyway, a couple hundred more dollars later, the oven was finally repaired as well.

Ouch...to think all of that happened in January alone! The refrigerator was the only kitchen appliance to stay fully functional this winter (knock on wood). Having all these repairs hit us immediately after Christmas was tough; having to pay for them while knowing an expensive cruise was on the horizon felt even worse for Nathan and I. And there was quite a lot more housework to come later in the spring, too...but that might be a story for another time.

On a lighter note, here are a few more cheerful events from our January:

--I did a lot of post-holiday cooking...including this Thanksgiving-style feast! True, we already had one Thanksgiving feast last winter...on actual Thanksgiving, with my sister and her family in Utah. But I am a turkey junkie; I love to cook them and all the food that goes with them. So when the birds were on sale in November, I bought an additional, smaller bird to be consumed at a later date.

Was it a lot of work? Of course. Was it delicious? You betcha!

On another occasion, I had fun using one of my Christmas gifts (a homemade pasta maker!) to make our family some homemade spaghetti. It tasted surprisingly light and fresh. It is kind of hard to use a pasta maker, but the flavor was so delicious that I hope to use it again soon.

--We also continued to use up our Christmas money!! A surprising amount of people sent us Christmas money or gift cards this year...more than we are used to. So we put those funds to use in a variety of ways. A lot of those funds went towards buying lots of new books and DVDs (always favorite gifts in our house). Some of that money went towards getting new clothes. And one gift card in particular got us very excited: we went and had dessert at The Melting Pot, a delicious fondue restaurant.

We had done this same family date a few years ago, but it was fun to come back for another go-around. This time, we ordered two different fondue flavors...a chocolate peanut-butter flavor, and a berry-based fondue. It was fun to try out both flavors!

--In other dining-out news, Aurora had a fun dinner out with some of her best buddies to celebrate her seventh birthday. Aurora being the thrill seeker she is, she wanted a fun party night out at Peter Piper Pizza! We made sure to go to the restaurant that had a mini roller coaster in it :)

Some days, it is hard for me to remember that my "tiny little baby girl" is seven years old. I remember thinking Lorelai was huge by the time she was seven, and Aurora doesn't seem that big; she still seems so young to me

 But I can definitely tell she has grown in wisdom, strength, and cuteness; she really has a good heart and a lot of love for life and for her family.

Working on one of her birthday gifts; a "jewel dig"

I hope her great spirit will continue to bless others for a long long time to come.

--Lorelai had a big night in January, too...she attended her first Young Women's New Beginnings event!

Even though she is not a part of our church's Young Women's program yet (she will enter the organization when she turns 12 in August), part of the New Beginnings night is welcoming all the girls who will be entering the program during that calendar year. There are several 11-year-old girls in that age group; they were welcomed beauty-queen style, with a crown, sash, and rose! Lorelai decided to react to these gifts in true beauty-queen fashion:

 

 

 

She had a fun night hanging with her friends, learning more about what to expect in the Young Women's program, and preparing herself for this big step in her life. At this point, Lorelai is really tired of being in Primary; she feels she has learned all she is going to learn there, and she wants to try something else different. Well, she will grow up and advance soon enough, whether she (and I) are ready or not!

--Even though she doesn't enjoy Primary on Sundays, Lorelai and Celeste both still enjoy Activity Days on Wednesday nights. In January, there was a special Activity Days that everyone was really excited about; the Pinewood Derby (Girl's Edition!).

Normally, the Pinewood Derby is an activity for the Cub Scouts in our stake. But our stake Primary presidency has added a derby for the Activity Day girls as well, and they love to participate. Lorelai was out of town for the derby last year, but Celeste participated and had a great time. This year, both girls were able to create cars and race them against those of other girls in the stake.

As you can see, we are not a family or artists or engineers. Our girls' cars weren't the prettiest, and they weren't the fastest (they finished up somewhere in the middle of the pack on both counts)

 But they had a lot of fun decorating the cars anyway, and enjoyed designing and racing them on their own. I sure hope they are still holding the girl's Pinewood Derby by the time Aurora is in the program!

--Coco's "red-letter day" in January was a medical milestone; she got fixed! Hooray; now I don't have to worry about her having an unexpected litter of puppies. I was a little worried about how she would handle being left at the vet's office, but she handled everything like a champ. She was just a little tired out the following day...

...as was her "big sister." Aurora, being our wildest child, is most comfortable snuggling with Coco and this day was no exception. Coco is usually happy to oblige her cuddles! Just a day or so later, she was back to being her usual energetic, hyper self.

--Last but not least, January marked the beginning of Celeste's first-ever season as a cheerleader!

I have long said that no daughter of mine would ever become a cheerleader. I admit to being biased, and having a bad opinion of cheerleaders based on the ones in my own high school many years ago. I am sorry to say that most of the cheerleaders at my high school were very snooty, slutty, and crass...they fit all the bad stereotypes of cheerleaders everywhere. I was terrified for my girls to adopt those sorts of behaviors, and fervently hoped that they wouldn't ever express interest in cheer-leading.

I should not have been surprised that it was Celeste who got really excited about cheer-leading. She enjoys dancing and performing in front of others; and she always wears her heart on her sleeve, and is very demonstrative with her enthusiasm. She had participated in Sahuarita Dance classes for a few years, but told me last spring that she was not as interested in it any more. She was drawn to cheer-leading because it had lots of the same elements (dance/tumbling and performance), while getting to cheer out loud and encourage noisy crowds at the same time.

I decided to let Celeste try a season of cheer-leading for a couple of reasons. First, my friend and neighbor Kellie was a coach affiliated with a local flag football league (her daughter Mercedes, a friend of Celeste's, was another member of the squad). Kellie (who was a cheerleader for many years in her youth) was a tough, no-nonsense coach, who loved the sport but despised some of the behaviors that sprang from it. She tolerated no attitude from her squad members, and encouraged them to be good examples, be on their best behavior, and always work hard as a team. I thought it would be a good environment for Celeste to cheer in. Second, Celeste is not as "sporty" as our other two daughters (and that is saying something, because none of them are hard-core athletes!). She is more sedentary, and so any activity that encouraged her to exercise and burn calories was okay by me (cheer-leading, for all its other trappings, definitely has a big athletic component).

Last (but not least), the team Celeste would be cheering for was called the Broncos! Yes, named for my beloved Denver Broncos...same color scheme and everything. I figured it wouldn't be too bad for Celeste to be a cheerleader, so long as she was a Broncos cheerleader. 

So in January, we started driving Celeste down to Quail Creek Park (about a 15-minute drive) two nights a week for Celeste to get her cheers on.

Some of those nights were pretty chilly and we had to bundle up quite a bit! The girls managed to move around just enough that they didn't freeze up.

Sadly, the football team for which the girls cheered struggled with many injuries and other setbacks; they lost more games than they won. But the cheerleaders' enthusiasm stayed strong, and they were pretty inspiring to both the team members and their parents.

I was pretty impressed with Celeste that season. It was a large time commitment for her (she was already involved in the school play and one additional club, plus Activity Days at church), but she was fully committed to it. She took practices very seriously, practiced her cheers at home (both in her bedroom and in the living room), and remained focused and attentive at each and every football game. Quite a change from when I watched football games at home; she would always lose interest a few minutes in! I liked that she was so determined to be the best cheerleader she could be.

It's true that Celeste has no gymnastics training; she didn't have the flexibility or the athletic ability of some of the girls (she couldn't do any of the fancy flips or tumbles, for example). But she worked diligently throughout the season to stretch her joints & muscles, to try her best to improve her performance, and become able to perform stunts.

Celeste was a great little cheerleader; she made me mentally swallow some of the snide remarks about cheerleaders that I'd carried around for so many years. If she wants to do another season of cheering, I will encourage her to do so.

Plus, she looks absolutely adorable in her uniform! All the cheerleaders do! I suppose that is also a plus.

The cheer-leading season went though early March. At the end of the season, the girls prepared a longer dance number, choreographed to music so as to wow the crowd. It was really cute and the girls did a nice job.

At that point, we opted to take a break from cheer-leading for a little while (the school play tends to take up a lot of time in the spring, so we try not to over-schedule). But if Celeste wants to do another season of cheer-leading, I will happily sign her up. She proved to me this winter that she was committed, and that she would work hard. How my outlook has changed!

January (believe it or not) was the least busy month of the year so far. But it still had a lot going on! But March was another animal altogether, as I hope to explain in some upcoming blog posts.