Soccer 2021!

 After a 2 year wait, we are back to soccer season!  I took 169 pictures (which sounds insane, but my camera has a SPORTS feature, where it takes a bunch of pictures in a row....action shots, so you are taking one picture and get 10 quickly)

Unfortunately we were far up in the stands and I haven't yet learned the tricks of our larger lens.  Plus it was getting dark.....sigh - here are the 2 best photos.  The rest were trash!  Hopefully some of the games will have a set up closer to the action.  I also will wander down, lower in the stands, to get a little closer.  Plus it will stay lighter later as the days get longer.  But mainly I hope to figure out how to use our really nice camera that I mostly use like a point and click!

Anyway....Go JOEL!  Go Jaguars!  Joel's team won 4 to 0!

  

Easter weekend

 We went to the Easter Vigil in hopes of being un-crowded in church.  It was lovely (and uncrowded).  We had 2 adults join our church and one baby (daughter of one of the newly baptized adults) baptized.  (no photo)

Earlier in the day we made cookies.  We made the mistake of making a double batch because we wanted to send some cookies home with Patrick.  That meant that there were plenty for me to eat and I would rather have felt that I should only have 1!

Matthew always wants to do something creative, so he made the blue and green marbled cookies above.

Anna and I were more traditional!  But man on man, the cookies were delicious!

We had Easter dinner around 2 and were joined by Carolyn's boyfriend, Patrick.  He brought us flowers and a plate of fruit for the meal.  It was a great day, everyone helped make part of the meal.

That evening Matthew worked on a project for school and so I made Anna leave the table where he was working (because she wanted to play a video game right there!).  It was so sweet, Carolyn said, "let's go upstairs" and I could hear them talking for a long time.  Makes my heart happy!

4/07/21 Before and after

 

I did tell Matthew that it would be a lovely Easter gift if he would get a haircut!  Note that Joel's "before" is shorter than Matthew's "after".  Joel was wise to get a short cut given his soccer and umping duties!  He will be much cooler (and see better :0)

Also we now know that Anna isn't the only curly haired child in our family!!!

Pogo stick!

 The other day we watched a talent show on TV and there was a champion Pogo - stick jumper!

Anyway it brought back memories of my pogo-stick days.  So when I saw this at the store, I bought it.  I am sure its use will be limited compared to 5-10 years ago. 

Matthew also was a willing jumper, but I didn't get the camera out soon enough.

Faith in Action

Joel spent the first 1/2 of his Spring Break at Catholic Youth camp and the surrounding area doing service.  Matthew and Carolyn had the same opportunity in high school (except last year when it was cancelled 2 days before it was to begin)  They had a fraction of the normal number of kids, partially by design.  They kept the kids in their small groups for eating and sleeping to minimize contact.  Joel is pictured to the left with the other 4 guys in his crew.  (3 of the others go to our church and 2 of those three are in the Youth Group Core leadership with him.)  Proud mom!  (He is on the left in this photo.)

 Here are Randy and Erin, our Youth Ministers.  They had the music people in the back away from the kids.  I think they did a great job keeping the kids safe while allowing them this wonderful opportunity.

3/31/2021 Ken received his 1st vaccine!

Ken drove to Albia Iowa, about 1 hour and 20 minutes from our home to get his first vaccine.  A lovely man in Iowa made a website to share with people where vaccines were available.  (Brian Finley:  twitter: Iowa VaccineAlerts)

Excellent Job Brian, it is amazing that a guy with some free time can do something that the State of Iowa was unwilling to do!  Without this, you just need to randomly search every place that might have a vaccine in your area.

There were 19 vaccines available for 3/31/21 at the Albia HyVee and ZERO available in the entire Des Moines metro area...Something is a little wonky here! (and they might be a little anti-vaxer-ish in Albia.....we went to Albia once during the pandemic and they were definitely anti-maskers) 

I told Ken, don't even take a sip of water while you are in that town (because of the need to lower his mask to take a drink!).

Anyway - yeah vaccines!  He will go back to Albia 3 weeks and 2 days from his first vaccine.  That way he can relax all day Saturday and Sunday!

XKCD comic:

 Immune Response

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3/20/2021

 Ken, Joel, Anna and I went to see my Dad!!! Yeah for vaccines.  It was nice to see my Dad and Uncle Joe.  

Of course the crazy timing is that Anna then had a cold starting on the following Monday!  Can you imagine my horror had we gone any other time than when my Dad had been vaccinated?  Luckily, it was just a cold, and she had a negative Covid and Strep test.  To be honest, except for taking the photo, I still didn't let the kids get too close!!!