Day 120: Opening Day

 Calen already had his first game of the season, but the opening ceremonies hadn't quite kicked off yet. Until today!

Today was his last Opening Day ceremony of his Little League career. 

Man does time fly. 

He didn't have a game today, so this was short lived. All 250 Little Leaguers (from t-ball to Juniors) stood with their teams at the high school/Juniors field (Calen's field) and did the National Anthem, introduction to teams etc. Then the oldest and youngest player in the league runs the bases and that's it, Calen's team headed home while the other two Juniors teams battled it out. 

Later this evening, we were invited to a little day-late Cinco De Mayo celebration with some fellow 12U hockey parent friends. Calen wasn't too interested in hanging out with all of Camden's hockey buddies, so we allowed him to stay home while Brad, Cam and I headed to our friends house. It was a super fun night of amazing Mexican food (all homemade!), great conversation and some fun games too, while the kids played all sorts of roller hockey, baseketball, bike riding and video games. 

Super fun today, nice to do something totally different. 

Day 119: Revenge of the Fifth

 Friday, May 5th 2023

The best part about May the Fourth is that it's basically an entire week long celebration, there being so many movies and all. 

Today was a movie marathon. First we watched Rogue One, my favorite non-original trilogy Star Wars movie. Seriously, whoever directed this movie should direct every Star Wars movie for the rest of time. It. Is. SO GOOD. And the intense last six minutes of the movie that ties in with the first six minutes of A New Hope is enough to give you goosebumps and make you itchy to get that Rebel Alliance tattoo. 

Maybe that's just me on that last part. 

"Well done. You're a Rebel now!"

P.S. We are about 3/4 of the way through the Andor series on Disney+, the episode series of the story of Cassian Andor leading up to the events of Rogue One. 

After Rogue One we immediately jumped into my actual favorite Star Wars movie: The Empire Strikes Back! 

Hoth, Han Solo, Boba Fett, the battle between Luke and Darth Vader, what's actually better? Also ten points for every time Solo says "Your worshipfulness". 

Laugh it up, fuzzball!

Really that's all we did today. That's all we needed to do, and it was still the best day. 

Day 118: May The Fourth

 Thursday, May 4th

It's a National holiday around here! It's May the 4th, also known as Star Wars Day! And in this house, this is a major holiday second only to Christmas. 

The day started early, because we had a lot of cooking to do! Calen requested a Star Wars snackboard and we took advantage of their two new Star Wars cookbooks to make some delicious treats. 

But first of course, they brought down as many Star Wars Lego sets as they could to fill the dining room table, which is like half of what they own. 

Of course we were all dressed in our best, including me

Camden chose to make "Chewy Bars" (Chewbacca Bars), a type of cake with roasted coconut that obviously impersonates our favorite wookie. 

Calen chose to make "Jawa Egg Rolls", which are balls of rice wrapped in egg roll paper with seaweed that loosely resembles jawas. 

My contribution to the snack board was peanut butter banana muffins that I added frosting to to make little Ewoks, and hard boiled eggs sliced in half for "Grogu's eggs". It was a pretty good spread and a combined effort. 

Naturally, we watched episodes 3 and 4 of Star Wars today (we watched episode 1 two days ago and 2 yesterday) back to back. Brad came home early for dinner and was in charge of making dinner. 

It's NOT May the 4th if Death Star waffles aren't involved. 

I think we succeeded in a perfect Star Wars Day!

May the Fourth Be With You!

Day 117: The First Game of His Last Season

 Wednesday, May 3rd

After nine years of playing Little League, it's here. Calen's first game of his last Little League season. 

No, it's not the LAST season of baseball for him, assuming he makes at least the high school JV team. 

But it's the last of "youth" baseball. 


How did we go from this:

His first day of Little League in Cape May, 2014

To THIS:

Who is this MAN CHILD

Nine years in the blink of an eye. Time is a thief. 

It's not officially opening day yet, but it was their first game tonight. Calen started at catcher (a surprise to me as he's not necessarily #1 catcher on the team), and performed extremely well, having no runners scoring on passed balls. On his second at bat he smashed a two run double (a troublesome hopper to 3rd base which was overthrown to first that brought in the extra run) and a spectacular headfirst slide to second. I was so proud. 

The return of his old number and his nickname embroidered on his hat 

It was cold and rainy which gave both pitchers a lot of trouble, and in the end Calen's team gave up their 7-2 lead and lost in the last half of the last inning, 10-9. 

Can't win them all. 

So good to see him back on the field!

Day 116: Roasting Pinecones (a Failure) and Noodles (a Success)

 Tuesday, May 2nd

We are knee deep into our Botany unit study this spring (if you can call it spring, it is still quite cold here), and today we learned how different types of seeds spread to reproduce. 

One thing I didn't know was that pine cones (which is just an armor casing for seeds) split in half when exposed to high heat, releasing the seeds. This is why forest fires can actually be beneficial to the reproduction of old growth forests. 

So I thought, shoot, let's do an experiment!

I sent the boys out to the woods to collect some pine cones of various sizes. Then we filled out a "Scientific Method" sheet of the experiment, what we are doing, what we hypothosize will happen, and the results. 

So, according to the internet, you put the pine cones on a baking sheet at 250 degrees for however long and they split open. I knew that the pine cones were wet and it would take a while, but five hours later they were dry, not splitting, and only as warm as if they were sitting in the sun on a moderately warm day. 

Still waiting five hours later....

This experiment was a bust. 

Meanwhile, Camden was in charge of dinner tonight. On the menu is a sausage and rotini dish with peas and white sauce. The sauce called for two cups of heavy cream, but we only had one cup, so we improvised with milk, sour cream, and cream cheese (to thicken it up). 

That experiment was a runaway success. The pasta dish was so rich and creamy and flavorful. I could eat it every day. It's definitely going on the regular rotation. 

So good. SO good. 

I was reminded that May the Fourth is coming up and we had no time to lose! So we watched the Phantom Menace with dinner, with the plan of watching Episodes 2 and 3 tomorrow to catch up and Episode 4 on May 4th, of course. 

We take our Star Wars holidays seriously. 

Day 115: Recovery

 Monday, May 1st 

I. Am. Exhausted. 

This weekend was an absolute marathon of Bruin Burger making (both for KHL and at home) and I am absolutely wrecked. 

So today was a recovery day. 

I laid on the couch all day. We did a half day of school. I could barely function as an adult. 

Better get used to it kid, because I have twenty moveout cleans lined up in the next three months which have similar hours. 

Also I drank a LOT of coffee. 

Day 114: There's Flour Everywhere

 Sunday, April 30th

The Bruin Burger marathon continues today. 

The boys were gone most of the weekend for Boy Scout campout weekend, so I didn't feel bad about working to do Bruin Burger prep all. weekend. long. 

I mean, I'd rather be on the sofa in my leggings watching TV, but you know. 

The day was literally all Bruin Burger prep. Dough making. Cheese. Meat. Folding. More dough. More meat. More cheese. For hours. And hours, and hours. 

We had much less help today than yesterday, so it was a much slower day as far as production goes. We finished the very last of the Bruin Burgers at 4pm, and Iron dogs (polish dog with American cheese and rolled in dough) by 6pm. 

And then the worst part, the cleanup. 

There was flour in every inch of that gymnasium. Flour on the walls. Flour in the corners. Flour on the floor. Flour in the sink, the counters, the mixers. My face, my clothes, my shoes. Literally everywhere. 

We finished cleaning by 8:30pm. That's an 11 hour day, in case you didn't know. 

But once again, I was going home with dough. Like three times the amount of dough as yesterday. This time however, I had backup. 

Brad and I stayed up until midnight making ten teriyaki Bruins (as I've now dubbed them) and a dozen pizza Bruins (sauce, cheese, pepperoni). 

I think I'll sleep for a year. 

Day 113: The Puppetmaster

 Saturday, April 29

It's quite possibly the longest day of the year. 

It's that dreaded weekend where Bruin Burgers, the stuffed cheeseburgers that Kodiak Hockey League sells at Crabfest ever Memorial Day weekend, are made and prepped. 

It's the biggest fundraiser of the year, and as a board member, I'm required to basically put in as many hours as is possible. 

So, I put on my most comfortable sneakers, grabbed a couple energy drinks, kidnapped enticed my children to join me and headed to St Mary's Catholic School, where we commandeered the gym for massive burger prep. 

Today was literally a circus and I was the puppet master. First, both boys and I dawned our aprons and spent two hours of hard, fast paced Bruin Burger prep. Calen was old enough to make dough in the kitchen, I made the burgers and Cam was a runner: bringing cheese and dough to the prep tables and whatnot. We started at 9:30am. 

My baker for the morning. Cam was too busy being a runner to get a photo

At 11:30, Brad came and picked up Camden, because it's a Boy Scout campout weekend (because of course it is). So they took off to set up camp while Calen and I worked for one more hour, then at 12:30 we had to leave to head to the baseball field because of course Calen had baseball practice. 

So Calen went to practice and I downed a footlong sub and then walked three miles on the track. The sunshine was brilliant today so it was nice to get outside for a bit. 

At 2:30, practice ended and Calen changed into his third outfit of the day and I dropped him off at the campground to rejoin his Boy Scout troop. 

But the day isn't done! Oh no it isn't!

I immediately headed back to St Mary's and completed an additional five hours of burger prep. 

The count at the end of the day was 4100 Bruin Burgers made (with 6,000 being the final goal). 

That's a LOT of burgers. 

But the day isn't done!

At the end of the night there was a ton of extra dough leftover, which will not be any good to use tomorrow. It is good, high quality dough, and I didn't want to see it thrown out, so I took AN 8 pound dough baby home. To use tonight. Tonight, after a 12 hour day on my feet. 

I'll sleep when I'm dead. 

Sooooo I immediately cooked up some rice and some ground beef and added Kung Pao seasoning packet to it, and built my own "teriyaki Bruin Burgers". And once that ran out, I made another pound of ground beef and turned those into Sloppy Joe Bruins. 

It was a very long day, but great community service for both boys and myself, and we ended up with meal prep for five family dinners in the process. 

Day 112: Love is Nerds

 Friday, April 28

It was baseball practice today. 

Baseball practice with a fourteen year old is a lot different than when he was five. Instead of watching, babysitting, I daresay, it's more of a dump and go. Baseball practice is boring compared to say, hockey practice. There isn't a whole lot to see. 

So, for the past couple seasons I drop Calen off at the high school baseball field (Baranof), and then put my headphones in and walk the high school track, literally right next door for two hours, walking a bit slower when I round the eastern corner of the track to watch practice through the chain link fence that separates the track from left field. 

It's a nice arrangement. 

On the drive home, Calen was sitting in the front seat munching on a movie theater sized box of Nerds that he won during chalk talk at the end of practice. 

"Mom, I'm not sharing these with Camden. But I will share them with you. But only the BIGGEST ones I can find because you deserve it."

If that's not love, I don't know what is. 

Day 111: Overzealous Meat Sauce

 Thursday, April 27th 

I rarely make lasagna. Like in the history of my life, I've probably made it three times. 

Especially when we used to live close to Costco, which had those premade ready to cook gigantic lasagnas in the freezer section that were like $15 and required no prep. 

I'm pretty sure the we ate Costco lasagna the first week of both the boys' lives. 

But at a recent moveout clean I had acquired a box of lasagna noodles, and the other day I got a little overzealous with the amount of spaghetti meat sauce I had made. So I thought, well shoot, maybe I'll actually make lasagna today. 

And by me I mean my kids, because life lessons, you know. 

I mean the meat sauce was already made so this was easy. Calen was off doing the paper route so I commandeered Camden and had him help me layer the lasagna and toss it in the oven. 

Honestly it was a lot easier than I remember it, but I'm sure that's because of that overzealous meat sauce I made three days ago. 

See? I was planning ahead. 

And Camden learned how to make lasagna. 

Win-win. 

Layers!

More layers!

Delicious!