Hope in Tragedy

             I feel I would be remiss to not mention the events that surrounded the Chiefs. For the last month, the whole area has been engulfed in red. The kids at school have been wearing red for the two weeks before the Super Bowl. My kids don’t have any Chief’s gear, but plenty of red. Mostly U of W, which I found hilarious. I was hearing about Taylor Swift and the Chiefs the minute they came home from school every day.

              When the Chiefs won in that landmark game, our area went mad! There were fireworks and celebrating and I was astounded at the fierceness of it all. The schools and most of the businesses closed down to celebrate the triumphant return. I never for a moment thought of going to the parade, but I knew many who went. I heard about the shooting almost as soon as it happened. I was so grateful that we didn’t go. In America, a shooting is almost an inevitability.  A total of 754 people were killed and 2,443 other people were injured in 604 shootings last year alone in mass shootings. That doesn’t even touch the domestic disturbances or smaller incidents.  That said, I never want my kids to feel that there is a gun at every corner. So, I was so glad that they heard of this incident from more of a distance. They have been around plenty of sad and disturbing things, but I hope to shield them from the worst if I can.

              The Sunday following the tragedy, our youth speaker attended the parade and rally with her sister. They had entered Union Station and felt inspired to leave. As they were heading out of the building, they heard the shots and the panic. They got out fast, and she testified of the reality of the Holy Spirit and Heavenly Father’s care. It was a somber meeting. The week before we had the funeral of a young man who died suddenly. That Sunday was a repeat funeral. He had meant a lot to the ward. This month has been hard for them.

              I don’t have a nice way to tie this up, it was a horrible event with no real resolution. I am so heartbroken for the families affected. 

February Fun

     Daniel was able to take all three kids to the temple for baptisms. I was sad to miss Devon's first time, and more sad that Daniel didn't get a picture! But I went later that day so I got a pic of the temple.

Teddy found a cozy place to hide.

The elementary had a family night that was so fun.

 

Lizzy took 3rd at Queen of the North.

Emily had a blast at a Valentine's party.

Henry went to Fun Run for a birthday party and had a blast.

He didn't want to leave.

Took the kids to the dentist.

We went to the high school's production of Cinderella

Devon had to calculate the Chief's winnings. Everyone here is in Chief fever!  

He also got to go to the WWII museum.

Lizzy had a playdate at Wood's Park and we tagged along.

President's Day

 On President's Day, we went to a space park! It was a little cold still, but sunny so we braved the chill.

We ate favorite foods of our presidents including this Vermont Spice cake.

    It was fun to research the various presidents' favorite foods, two had squirrel stew! Even though we have an abundance of squirrels here, I didn't attempt that. Next year I hope to do more, we did about 12 presidents, but I'd like to highlight more of them. It helps that a few are repeats. I think the kids enjoyed it. They loved the ice cream!

Valentine's Day

 This year I did my traditional chocolates and balloons for the kids. 

Some of the balloons died that day and some are still hanging in there.

    The stake held a Valentine's dance for the youth. You needed to wear red or pink and if you danced with 4 people you got a prize. So of course I had a wild hair to make Charles a red vest for the dance. As always I was making it the day before and realized I didn't have my buttonhole foot! I searched everywhere but to no avail. Lizzy came with me to JoAnn's in search of one. They don't sell them but pointed me towards a sewing store. They had one I thought would work, but it wouldn't so in the end I had to handsew the buttonholes. I decided to go with a contrast belt in the back.

   It was too loud and Charles got sick overeating fruit. They ended up playing games in another room. Charles even went to play the piano for a bit. So they were not holding up the Bartholomew name very well, but they had fun.

    Daniel and I went to our Stake Adult Valentine's dance. It was advertised as a swing and jazz but it was really just Michel Bluble on repeat. We had a fun time though and since it was well attended, they decided to do another one in Nov.

Districts and State

 Lizzy has been doing so well this year in wrestling. She took second at districts. 

We were so excited to watch Lizzy perform at State! It was held at Mizzu in Columbia, MO

Lizzy and Greg were our only competitors for state, which astounded me as they had over 70 wrestlers this year. As it was near enough we all went. I took the kids out of school and we drove to the Universary. 

Warm ups.

The line up.

It was awsome to have a few of the Blacks support her!

She lost her first match, won her second and lost her third which meant she was out, but it was exciting to watch. 

  We had dinner with the Blacks and the kids loved being able to run around after spending the day in their seats. It was nice to catch up too. Later we went to our hotel and it was under construction so that was interesting. I promised the kids we could swim there and that was the highlight for them. They had been telling evryone for the last week that they were going to a hotel with a pool! So after breakfast I took the kids to the pool. Charles was feeling awful the day before, he was fevering and I had to kick myself because when I was at the store on Thursday I bought some children's Motrin and had the thought that I should bring it on our trip. I, of course, dismissed this thought. Later when I was talking with Daniel he said that he thought that I had packed some, so clearly the Spirit was trying to help us, but we were not listening. We got him some medicine and he slept it off. He spent the morning in the hot tub and felt much better.

    We left right after getting cleaned up. I had promised Devon to get frozen custard when he had seen it at the arena, but I was not excited to pay those prices. So when after we settled in at home and got our chores finished we headed to Andy's.

It was an exciting weekend and we are so proud of all of Lizzy's hard work.