Somehow I have been hurled head first into the world of High School.  I’d like to crawl back into my minivan with carseats and playdates.  But, if I have to face this, I guess being the driver for Homecoming is not so bad.  In fact, I had a blast!  I don’t know how they expect us to cope with all this right at the start of school…Homecoming already!?

I can’t believe all the planning that goes into this.  Once you take a sigh of relief that your child has been asked to the dance then you have to buy tickets, get a dress, shoes, hair, nails & makeup appointments, order a boutonniere, accessories and hope and pray they don’t change their minds about wanting to go.  I spent more on accessories than I did on the dress!  Thankfully Aunt Shauna had a pair of shoes in her closet that were absolutely perfect.  Score!  There was only one purse that Morgan liked and it’s essential to have a place to put your phone and lip gloss.  Turns out her dress had pockets!  Therefore, a purse really wasn’t necessary, but we didn’t discover the pockets until the day of homecoming.  Good thing we stressed about that.Moms worry about absolutely EVERYTHING…teaching manners,  getting dinner reservations, will they know how to tip, who pays, will they sit with their dates or ditch them to hang with friends, is there an after-party and will any parents be home, should we call the dates’ parents, what’s an appropriate curfew, and do they even know how to dance?  It’s an endless list really and I’m pretty sure I’m not the only one that has slept very little this past week.  Give me a break – this is my first time doing this as a parent!

Since Morgan’s date, Alex, doesn’t go to her school he had to fill out this super scary form and have it signed by an administrator.  We realized he forgot to sign the bottom and we were too embarrassed to give it back to him to sign so we called in Jake to sign.  He was practicing his best “Alex Dandy” signature and going through every pen in the house to find one with the same color blue ink.  The pressure got to him so Brian stepped in to illegally sign.  Kids, I don’t ever recommend forging signatures!  But in this case, we figured this was not a life or death situation.Morgan’s group of friends had a ‘group chat’ going to work through all the details of the night.  We planned to go to Lake Quivira for pictures because the setting is beautiful and we knew that all the other hot spots would be packed.  There was a slight hiccup when we realized all of these parents that were bringing their kids out to the lake did not get on the guest list successfully at the guard station…oops!  We had to take a pit stop at the gate for awhile while we worked through that.  It was pretty embarrassing for these 14 year olds with nerves skyrocketing but we finally made it in and took some beautiful pictures.  Don’t these kids look stunning!?

We met Alex’s parents who were delightful and he said goodbye to his dad who was being deployed overseas for 9 months.  Ugh – that’s a tough one to handle and everyone was really hoping Alex would enjoy his night despite that distraction and the fact that he was going with a group of kids he didn’t know.  What a trooper!  Aren’t they a gorgeous hoco couple!?

After pictures we crammed three couples in Stacey’s van and dropped them off at SPIN pizza for dinner.  The boys were holding the door open for the girls which was a great sign that their parents had spent some time coaching them on going on a date.  Our fear of them sitting at the table on their phones and not talking was put to rest as we walked through quickly to use the restroom and spied for a second.  They looked to be having a wonderful time!  Most of them ordered kids meals…too funny!

After their dinner was complete, we got back in Stacey’s freshly detailed and cleaned minivan to drop them at the dance.  Somehow they were not embarrassed that we pulled up front and center to let them out.

There was a big white tent entrance with decorations, candy tables, cotton candy, shaved ice, photo booth, DJ, and lots of dancing…none of them slow danced though!  Too embarrassing and awkward I guess!?  Stacey and I went back to our house to eat some dinner and discuss every little detail of the night thus far.  Then we stopped by another friends house to check out her post-hoco party preparations.  Before we knew it, it was already 11PM and we were back at the school watching all the kids come out of the dance.  It’s the best entertainment!By 11:30 we were in the driveway of Will Brock’s house nearby where they were having an after party.  The girls changed into their tank tops and nike running shorts and ditched the heels to go play pool and ping pong in his basement.  We sent them with snacks and prayed they didn’t do anything stupid.  By 1am, after Stacey and I had roamed every neighborhood passing time and cracking up, we were back to pick them up and get the full low-down.  From all accounts it seemed like Homecoming 2017 was a success!About 4 hours later our alarms were going off to get out the door for 7:30 a.m. soccer games – ugh what an unfortunate game time after a very late night!

Needless to say, Morgan and I both took a nap later in the day.  Word of advice to all High School soccer coaches…don’t enter into a tournament on the weekend of homecoming!  Much to her dismay, Morgan missed the hoco football game Friday night to play soccer and then had to skip her soccer game Saturday night for the dance.  It was well worth the skip.  These kids are great fun and awesome memories were created.  Thumbs up for Homecoming 2017!

Whew!  So happy I made it through my first Homecoming!

 

 

We are already at the end of cross country season.  It’s short!  Jake ended up loving it and doing really well.  There were a total of 3 meets and he finished 2nd, 1st, & 3rd.  I’d call that a success!

Yesterday was the final meet of the season – the All City Meet at Johnson County Community College first thing in the morning.  This includes runners from all 9 Olathe Area Middle Schools and that is a whole lot of kids!This is very close to the start of the race and Jake is in the orange shoes again…Here he is at the finish and pushes past his good buddy, Jake Robinson, to come in 3rd place out of 140 runners!We are so very proud of you Jake!  We love that you tried something new and had such success in the process!

Right after this incredible effort,  he invited himself to breakfast with Nanny & Papa and then competed in an intense soccer tourney game.  I don’t know how these kiddos have all this energy!  Maybe it’s the smoothies and pancakes!?Not so successful in the soccer arena this weekend.  Boo.  We had 3 kids playing in the CSI soccer tourney, 9 games, and 9 losses.  Whew…I’m glad that’s over!  Better luck next time!

Somehow we managed to get Morgan to her high school golf team tryout on a whim.  We figured it couldn’t hurt.  She’s a beginner and might prefer to drive the golf cart than play, but if nothing else she would make some friends and look adorable in golf gear!It’s very difficult to show up at a golf course with perfect strangers that play high school golf and try to fit in to the pack.  Who knows, some could be heading to college on a golf scholarship and some could be Freshman like Morgan trying to see how they stack up.  In either case, it’s completely nerve-wracking and I couldn’t be more proud of her for handling it with ease.  I think I’ve said this before, but if I haven’t, I’m saying it again…I’m totally envious of Morgan’s ability to adapt in high-anxiety situations!As it turns out, everybody made the team!  YAY!  There are several upper-classman that will be moving on after this season, so the coach needs to get her team staffed up.  I’ll take it…anytime I don’t have to agonize over a sports tryout, I’m in!

This is Morgan walking to my car from the tryout…apparently in disbelief that she just made the high school golf team!

So here we are one month into Morgan’s Freshman year and she’s been at golf practice every day after school and two days a week, going from golf to soccer.  None of this includes driving a golf cart and she’s still hanging in there!We are learning as we go along here that there are Varsity and JV tournaments each week and you have to qualify to participate.  We didn’t have any expectations of Morgan making a tournament but low and behold, she did!

All of the information about this golf team is posted through an app on our phones of course.  When I saw her name posted at 11pm Monday night this past week,  I immediately ran into her room to wake her up to tell her!  Who am I kidding, she wasn’t sleeping…she was secretly watching Netflix in her bed.

Both of us were in a state of disbelief and her nerves really kicked in.  Keep in mind, this is also the week of Homecoming and this tournament will require her to miss an entire day of school.  We weren’t sure how she would get dismissed, where to go, how to get her clubs, etc.  I don’t think it’s common to hop on the school bus with a set of golf clubs and where would she put them once she got to school!?  She’s the only Freshman playing, so these little details are not things we are familiar with yet!  Her nerves were so bad, she wasn’t even sure she wanted to play!  Yikes!

Obviously she came to her senses and ended up having a great day on the course. She and her partner played in the Alternate Shot division, which is one of the hardest formats to play, and turned up in 5th place!   The ONW JV team (6 girls in total) ended in 4th Place and ONW Varsity & JV combined got 3rd place out of 24 schools!  That’s pretty awesome!

She really looked like she was having fun out there.  I love it!

Morgan, you really impressed us!!  I loved every single minute watching you play!  And seriously, could you be any cuter!?  Congratulations on qualifying for and competing in your first high school JV golf tournament!  WE LOVE YOU!

Nanny and Papa joined us to watch as well.  Anything that involves golf and these two come running…

Those are really good results out of all those golfers!!  Look at all of them…

 

 

While I’m on the subject of golf, I should not gloss over that Jake and Drew played in the Lake Quivira Club Championship and took 1st and 2nd place!  Job well done guys!Jake was chosen to play on the LQ All Star team for the 2nd year in a row!  It came down to the wire in the final round with a playoff hole and chip off which would have allowed them the opportunity to go to Oklahoma for the finals.  It was so exciting…all the parents and siblings were a ball of nerves!  I can’t even imagine what the players were feeling.  We were almost headed to OK!  What a fun season!And just a few weeks before he made $330 cleaning clubs at the LQ Member Guest Tournament.  Now that’s just awesome!  For Jake, that’s about 2 pairs of tennis shoes 😉 

Last year I remember being much better at keeping everyone up to date on the OP golf tournament the boys compete in each summer, I think I even gave a daily report.  This time, all of the details I was excited to share have left my brain and it’s only been a month since the event!  oops!

At the age of 11 you can choose to compete in the Par 3 division or play in the 9-hole division.  Of course Jake wanted to bump up to the 9-hole course and he would hop right on the PGA tour if he could.  A kid can dream, can’t he!?  There are several phenomenal players that come out for these tournaments and I’m so proud to report that Jake was sticking right in there with them.  He made it into the championship flight and was thrilled to be teeing off with the best of the bunch.  Even though it is hard to clinch in close to their scores, he handled the pressure with ease and was just so happy to be a part of it.

The bad news is, you cannot watch them!  That’s right, no spectators on the 9 and 18 hole division competitors.  This had my dad in a frenzy and he couldn’t help himself by voicing his opinion to the head pro.  I’m just hoping we aren’t blacklisted for next year.  I’m certain they’ve flagged the Conley boys for having an outspoken Papa. Here are the few photos I did capture from afar…

Drew had a rough first day on the Par 3 course which put him in the flight below the championship.  He takes it extraordinarily hard, so it was a brutal few hours post-round. Here are a few shots from day 1…

He was ready to make up for it the next two days though and played his little heart out, earning himself a 1st place trophy.  You rock Drew!!

On the final day, he was certain a cheeseburger for breakfast would give him all the energy needed to pull off a great round…His final score put him in 6th place overall.  There were a lot of 9 year old players!  That’s something to be very proud of Drewy!Of course, Nanny and Papa joined us all three days to support their little golfers and the weather was much more enjoyable this year.  We always have so much fun!

I love this sign, it is certainly very true and I’m so proud of both of you!

This little gal wants to do EVERYTHING!  In addition to her love of gymnastics, soccer, basketball, golf, snow skiing, swimming, running, bike riding, dancing, singing, and at one time convinced she wanted to do volleyball…she would also love to be a cheerleader!She has a lot of little 2nd grade friends that do cheer and is sad that she doesn’t have the time to do it.  So, I put her in a week-long camp over the summer to satisfy her somewhat.  There are only so many hobbies you can have, right!?  Next she’ll be knitting, bowling, playing piano, softball and ping pong.  KIDDING!  There’s absolutely no time for anything else, but I can certainly appreciate her willingness to try.  I love that about my kids!  Reece adored this summer camp and at the end of the week, they performed at the T-Bones baseball game.  She was in heaven strutting her stuff!Her favorite part was the ‘sassy dancing’ she really got into it with the facial expressions!

We stayed for part of the baseball game and then we had to get home because we were leaving on our family cruise the next morning!  What an exciting week!

 

 

I know everyone is waiting for us to pick up another sport/activity…so here we go…Jake runs cross country!  In 6th grade you are eligible to participate in the XC program at his middle school.  This basically means another pick up after school for me 4 days a week.  I’ve already forgotten to pick him up once!   I’m not even that embarrassed about it because I don’t see how anyone can keep all of this straight and I’m actually extremely organized!After making arrangements to get all my kids to their activities, I showed up to my first XC meet at Mission Trail Middle School.  I had no idea what to expect but I was really excited and I spotted this cutie sporting a new hair cut right away.  He certainly looks the part!My mom had been to a few of my nephew’s meets last year so she was helping me out on where to be and what to do.  I rarely miss a day at the gym, but I am not a runner so I have a lot of learning to do!

Nanny is such a superfan!  You can spot her at many of her grand kids’ activities.  We have a lot of family support – so much that my school friends tease me about it!  We take up too many chairs I think… 🙂  I love it!

This was a combined event with 3 schools, 6th, 7th, and 8th grade girls & boys.  They run a mile on a very hilly course.  Yikes!  I swear I think I’d rather do mountain climbers for 6 minutes straight than put on that outfit and run in a heard of people!  Jake, on the other hand, absolutely LOVED every minute of this experience!  His favorite part was the older teammates cheering them on throughout the course…

After I caught this picture at the beginning, then I made my way to the finish.  I was peeking around other spectators trying to see (I’m very short so this is not easy!) and I look up to see Jake running in with no one on his tail.  My mom staked out a different spot nearby and we both looked at each other in disbelief…did he just come in 2nd place!?  Well he sure did!  Who knew he was such a good runner?  His time was 6 minutes.  His friend, Sam, came in first place with a time of 5min 30sec.  Holy cow that’s fast!  Way to go XC kids…you guys are awesome!

Jake we are so proud of you!  I really didn’t have any doubt that you would do great especially with all the soccer you play, but I never imagined you would stroll in at the front of the pack.  And hey – you said you wanted to at least come in 13th which was the number pinned to your uniform.  You did it!  Way to go, bud!

He was so pumped after the run that he wanted to stay to support his older friends that had cheered him on earlier.  I think it’s safe to say that he is LOVING this and is already asking when the next meet is!

 

I’m super happy to report that we managed to get our our annual back to school breakfast on the books with the Lonergan family!  Generally we don’t have margaritas at breakfast so it was actually a dinner.  Last year I think we ended up having lunch and next year it will end up being a midnight snack–just wait!  It’s so incredibly hard to get two busy families together!  We’ve literally been doing this for years so I was not giving up.  You guys know me, I’m very determined.  We are supposed to do this before school actually starts, but I gave myself until October 1st to get this accomplished and it’s only September 10th…woo hoo!  Success!

This is a flashback from our first year doing this in 2009…Our good friend and sorority sister, Jenny, used to join us but she lives in TX now so we are down three kids.  But we did gain Reece in 2010 (she could count as 3, ha!)  Miss you Doherty’s!

My kids have been so excited for this occasion and we always have fun no matter if it’s breakfast, lunch, or dinner.  There’s never a dull moment with this crew.  Somehow Drew’s flip flops managed to get thrown on the roof of the restaurant and they were too expensive to part with.  This is Brian hoisting Jake on the roof to retrieve them.What is it with this family and things getting chucked on roofs!?  Remember this from our 2016 Arizona trip?I can’t believe how grown up all of these kids are now.  We have 2 in High School, 2 in Middle School, and 3 in elementary school.  Sadly, no more preschoolers or babies 😦

Happy Back to School!

 

Now that Reece has entered her 2nd grade year, she has bridged from Daisy’s into Brownies.  Now she gets to wear this fancy brown sash and earn patches for her good deeds.  These patches don’t magically appear.  In fact, I had to call my mom in for support to get the patches on last weekend for her first meeting this week.  The patches are iron-on….yes you read that right…the patches require no sewing what-so-ever but I still called my mom over for moral support.  I was deathly afraid of putting them in the wrong spot or ironing a hole in the sash.  This is important stuff you know!  One wrong move on that sash and I would have a 7 year old in tears!At our first meeting we learned about eating good nutritious foods and each girl made their own cute little person out of the food.Then we made flyers to use to collect donations for Harvesters food bank!Reece collected lots of donations by going to the neighbors and asking family for help.  Great job Reece!!This evening we dropped all of our donations off at the Harvesters truck and caught a few pictures of her Brownie troop…aren’t they adorable!?Way to go Troop 394, you girls did a great job helping the community!

The official commemorative day for Grandparents Day is the Sunday after Labor Day.  I’d like to think we celebrate grandparents every day!  We certainly rely on their help about that often it seems!  Just ask my mom and dad, whom I call frequently to get advice, help with shuttling kids or just keeping them up to date on our busy family life.  Soon they will stop answering my calls.  I can’t say that I blame them!

Each year, our elementary school invites grandparents to come to school, check out the classroom, eat lunch with their grandkids, and if you’re lucky, they will stay and hang out at recess for a little bit!  This may seem like a small deal, but I’m here to tell you, these kiddos absolutely love this day and look so forward to it!  Drew and Reece have had their food orders ready and counting down the days for this occasion!  Can’t you tell by the expressions…

Meet Drew…the WORLDS WORST PICTURE TAKER!!  It’s like you are literally torturing him!!  If I was that stinkin’ cute, I would be taking advantage of all picture taking opportunities!Grandma is the designated person to get the food for the kids – double cheeseburger plain from Freddy’s for Drew.  Can you believe this little guy eats double cheeseburgers?  A growth spurt has to be coming any minute!

  Thank you grandparents for being so incredibly awesome, we love you!!

P.S. Jake is wondering why no one is bringing him lunch this week…he’s feeling a little left out!  Sorry Jake, you are a big middle schooler now – no more grandparent lunch!  I promise I will drop off a yummy lunch for you sometime soon!