Day 41: Crocodiles in the mud

A fussy Betty kept us from a good night's sleep last night. I took her for about 2 hours, and she slept on me for some of that. Then, she proceeded to keep Jen up much of the night as well.

When the alarm went off, we were sleepy and grumpy, so it was a minor miracle that we were able to get all the stuff we needed packed in the car and get the kids to the soccer field by 8:20 AM for Sabrina's pictures.

Not too many kids on Sabrina's team showed up, so soccer pictures went really quick. I was busy filling out her form, so I didn't get to see (or sneak a team picture).

The soccer game was fun. It was Sabrina's first time running around post-surgery, so she played HALF a good game. The first half, she was on fire. She was running and kicking the ball and having fun (although asking to be subbed out all the time). The second half of the game, she was tired, and she mostly wandered around the field watching the ball go by, or sat long periods out.

Phew. recovery is hard work. 

We didn't have a lot of time between Sabrina's game and Edgar's, so we went to IHOP and had pancakes. Edgar and Sabrina were super well-behaved (so was Betty-- she was asleep)

We even made it slightly early to Edgar's pre-soccer pictures. (since we were early, I got LOTS of pictures. Sorry, Sabrina.)

 

Sabrina discovered a mud hole. Since her game was over, she'd changed into heavy boots, so I let her play. The other kids running around were waiting on pictures, and were very jealous as their moms and dads kept them spotless for their pictures.

 

That was fun, although we had to wait a long time for pictures. Just before Edgar's pictures, Sabrina started picking up handfuls of mud, and I kinda knew the fun was about to end...

uh oh.

Handsome dude.

Edgar is officially the tallest kid on his team.

 I returned from Edgar's team picture to find this:

uh oh indeed.

I'm a just little black rain cloud.

 

Just.... uhh.... don't touch.... anything. Or anybody.

So, with Jen and baby asleep in the car, and Edgar warming up for his soccer game, I had Sabrina roll around in the grass. It actually worked pretty well. She traded being super muddy for being kinda wet, kinda grassy, and kinda muddy. We had a towel in the car, and by the time Edgar's game started, we had her pretty well sorted out.

Edgar played pretty well in his game. The other team were called the Salem Attack Owls, which is pretty clever, if you've heard the story.

 

There were some pretty cute things going on on the sidelines, too.

 

In fact, when Edgar was on the bench, it was tough to keep his mind on the game:

 ...and, being fall in Oregon, the skies were full of Canada Geese migrating.

  

Here's a few shots of Edgar playing goalie:

It's tough for Edgar to ALWAYS pay attention to the game, but he sure tried hard.

Throwing himself on the ball, just like Coach says.

Another successful save.

...and another successful game.

After the game, we packed up and headed to the Crocodile...erm... Kroc center.

It was a birthday party for my nephew(in-law) Tom (30) and his son Thomas Rex (AKA T-Rex) (1). The crocodile center is a big salvation army community center in Salem, where we live. I'd been there for a few work meetings, but Jen and the kids had never been there, and we'd never been to the pool.

So, we signed in. Filling out the paperwork, next to my name, it asked "Relationship with Adult". I put "questionable". Next to Jen's, again it asked "Relationship with Adult". I put "tenuous". Maybe that should be "relationship with adultHOOD".

Anyways, after some red tape and the usual locker room hassle, we made it to the pool. The pool was really fun-- lots of modern stuff like a lazy river and splash pad features and stuff like that. After a while, though, it felt like we were swimming in each others' armpits. Either the pool was too small, or there were too many people to properly have fun.

The kids had fun, though. There was a waterslide. Surprisingly (given their personalities), Edgar took to it right away. After one time up where I went before him, and he was kinda nervous, he LOVED it. I think he rode the waterslide 20 or 30 times. Sabrina was very scared. She was right on the line of being tall enough, so when we remeasured her and she fell just under the 4 foot requirement, she was relieved.

Jen and Betty also came to the pool. I'm proud of Jen for braving the pool 5 weeks postpartum. Betty loved the water, but the pool temperature was a little too cold to be really comfortable.

After some miscommunications and changing plans 3 or 4 times, we left the pool and headed for a local pizza place for the birthday party proper.

There were a lot of Tom's family, and very little of mine, but that was okay. We just felt a bit like outsiders or distaff relations, but we got pizza and really good cake, so who's complaining? Greta has been branching out, not only into professional photography, but professional cake design and baking. Both her cakes were tremendous, and one was made specifically to be smashed:

hulk smash.

We got Tom and T-Rex a pair of light-up foam swords for swordfights. Perfect gifts (in my opinion) for a one-year-old and his dad.

We returned from the pizza place thoroughly exhausted with a fussy Betty. We had just enough time to watch some TV together as a family. Since we finished Star Wars Rebels the other night, we went back and watched a few Clone Wars episodes that feature one of our favorite characters.

sleepy baby

cute baby.

It was super hard to stay awake, though, because of the short night and long day. Also, Betty wouldn't stop crying. (again, after having Edgar, who either slept, ate, or cried until he was 10 months old, I can handle a few minutes of verbal abuse from an infant. I took her and started this blog, which took a long time to finish.
 
Jen eventually put the other kids to bed, and Betty fell asleep. Jen and Betty are now asleep (very early) in the recliner, and I'm going to follow suit.

...just as soon as I read what was going on five years ago, when Sabrina was this old...