School picnics

Awards for Reese

Reese was celebrated for honor roll: all A’s! What?! She worked her guts out for this, including standing up for herself in a class with a teacher who repeatedly refused to follow her 504 plan. I commend her for her grit and for refusing to be shamed when she reminded her teacher she gets extra time during testing. She was not given the accommodations in her 504 even after we went back to the vice principal regarding this class. She just studied and studied and retook tests until she got the grades she felt reflected her effort. 

As a parent, her extra effort infuriated me. I want her to be a kid. 

But I’m also so dang proud of her for realizing something was not going to go the way it should, abd gor jusy working harder.  Reese exhibits meekness and her countenance shines because of it. The consequence to this divine characteristic is that I worry she will be taken advantage of and her gentle spirit be abused as a weaknesss. I don’t like seeing her get walked on.  Reese learned to be her own advocate, this year. I backed her up in a couple of situations that required a mother bear (like when a little punk was sexually harassing her with photographs he took of her, altered with inappropriate images, and then redistributed), But SHE learned to speak up and tell me when things were not right. To tell the vice principal, and her teacher when her rights as a student were violated. One if my favorite lines from her this year was, “so we have to spend all this time memorizing facts and writing papers about the wage gap and gender inequality, and then I tell this teacher that he isn’t respecting my 504, and he rolls his eyes at me and tells me I don’t need the study guide or to have the test read to me, or time abd a half, because I’ll do well enough if I study hard. And the articles he’s making me read are all about how women who work as hard as men aren’t being treated equally.  Why waste all this time forcing us to “understand inequality” if he only cares about one example of it?  I’m working harder than other students just to read the class material. Ironic?”  

Ba-BAM. This kid studied gender inequality all year long as course curriculum, while her learning disability was ignored. She could have gotten an F in that class and I would have stood to applaud her, because I know how much time she put in studying and retaking tests and rewriting essay question answers. Her teacher declined an invitation to the 504 meeting and I will decline having another Willardson be enrolled in this class. Thank goodness for you, Reese. You’re a guinea pig for your siblings and you pave a path of peace and dignity. She would be bold and tell me things that were  not happening (that should be), but never whined or complained about the injustice. I would have justified her tears, but instead, she just got tougher. Some might look at the situation and decide the system won, but we decided that the way she handled her load this year proves that Reese wins. 

Reese received awards for outstanding effort in English (her favorite class) and in Science, this year. She also got an award for doing the most Dreambox lessons in her Math class. Reese’s Math and English teachers this year were phenomenal. So thankful for them and for helping her to love school, and for the encouragement and support they gave to Reese to shoot for academic excellence. 

Here she is with her friend, Simon, who received the Wildcat award for good character. 

Garden Harvest 2018: Strawberries

It’s been so hot. Spring went from winter to hot summer overnight. My squash was gorgeous and now it looks like it’s dead. Luckily, we got a few pics like the one shown in before things started to shrivel up. I hope we’ll still yield a good harvest of veggies, but it’s suddenly so hot and buggy, we don’t  have a ton of blossoms out there! I might break down and use sevin dust or fertilizer on the plants, this year, just to help them survive!  

But how gorgeous are those berries? I’ll call that a sweet success. 

Memorial Day

Not a single photo of Aaron or I, but Sloanie’s face above sums up how we feel about summer! 

Our tradition that’s not really a tradition but kinda is tradition for Memorial Day is to gather spur of the moment with Davis’ and Chandlers on a lake somewhere and then grill somewhere.  It has been enough years it had worked its way back around to our place and we were happy to host. Each year, a few different families join the fun, so our last minute gathering had over 40 people here at fort Willy to grill and chat. The kids scattered and played mini hoops and foosball and others took their plates to the porch. The youngest ones jumped on the mattress that is still on my living room floor. I didn’t clean up for anyone, I arrived off the lake almost 20 minutes after most of the guests arrived, and we ate from paper plates.  It was just the best kind of gathering. Really good food, no fuss, and good conversation. Shaws, Chandlers, Willies, Davises, Lawrence’s, Lanshes, Blakes, and Aases were all represented. Ice cream cobes, watermelon,  HalBQ ribs, salads, and the kids’ first experience with flaming hot takkis chips. 




Earlier in the day, I took the big kids to play on the Lanshe’s lake. Ken and Julie were so nice to let us come take over their backyard. We kayaked abd paddleboated abd swam and floated and I even let a wet dog. Corbin went tubing on Julie’s boat and flipped several times, but kept climbing back on for more. Julie said he’s a good sport and he’s tough! Corbin loved it. 







Quincy and Delaney kayaking. 

Reese and Finley kayaking.

Soren played Ben hur and told Aaron and Sully to pedal faster! 

The chandlers brought a giant island thing that my kids were in heaven playing on and jumping off of. 

Reese, Quincy, Finley, and Delaney took a paddle boat out abd got attacked by spiders. I swam out to meet them and they threw me a rope and said in a Napoleon Dynamite voice, “it would be real nice if you could pull me into town”. Actually they said “ahhhhh! Spiders! Are they on me?! I feel like it’s still on me!” Followed by more screaming. 




I am thankful for this day and the many freedoms we are privileged to enjoy. 

Satur-dates with the Willies

Family Date: We went out for donuts and then checked at a home on 14 acres, this morning. 

It’s not “the one”, but the drive was fun, it was good to be together as a family, and good to eat an apple fritter. Bonus, this property also had a fishing pond and a picturesque 800 sqft log cabin guest home on it, that were just....the coolest. Forget the main house...who doesn’t love a log cabin with a wrap around porch and a swing?  And now “but does it come with a tiny log cabin?” is a legitimate question we can ask as we continue our years-long ridiculous scrutiny of properties. I’m confident that, like the search for our current home, the search will drag on for years, but I will know right away when I find the right one.  

Kid date: Corbin jumped at the chance for a little one on one time abd we rode bikes from the Amazeum through the north forest trail down the fly’s eye. Corbin’s favorite part was taking our bikes on the elevator with us. 

 To get back up, we started along a trail head at cub and A, but a pedestrian coming down warned us that the trail no longer connects all the way through to the crystal bridges trail system anymore. So we had to ride back down that hill, and then up up up the Compton gardens hills to lawrence plaza. Corbin wanted his picture taken with every sculpture. We took a pit stop and shared an ice cream at Spark, where Corbin said, “Thanks Mom, this date has been really so much fun.” and I melted. He talked and talked and talked non stop for two hours straight. I love these opportunities to just have extended one on one time with Corbin. He unloads  absolutely every thought in his head into words. We covered a lot of material!  I’m sure he’ll reach an age where he clams up and doesn’t want to share everything he’s been thinking about for the past 24 hours, but I’m so thankful for now, when he is still so open and happy to share. 

 

Couple Date: Jim Gaffigan

I bought these tickets for Aaron for Christmas, abd almost forgot about them!  Aaron will forever be my favorite person to belly laugh with. 

Walmart Shareholder Concert: Collective Soul

Quincy Cooks Dinner

In preparation to turn 12 and join the Young Women and Personal Progress Program, Quincy is finishing up her Faith in God booklet. Her December birthday has her as the only girl in her primary class not attending Girls Camp, and a lone girl for the primary program in the fall. She has protested her feelings about this quite loudly, but readiness and age are not always perfectly in sync. So I advised her to just prepare for young women and make sure she’s gaining everything she can from primary by finishing up the requirements for her Faith in God Award.  Serving her family has been a good focus area for her. We found a new recipe in the Food Nanny Cookbook and she was head chef for dinner last night. She made a wonderful meal! 

Penne with red potatoes, Italian sausage, and green beans.  I’ve never paired pasta with potatoes before and was hesitant to try, but as it turns out, starch and starch make a really great couple. Dinner was delicious and everyone requested to have it again. Quincy was fun to have with me in the kitchen. She followed the recipe well and did a wonderful job. She loved the praise and gratitude from her siblings, and was thrilled when they eagerly ate the dishsgr worked hard to prepare for them.