FYI

New posts up at Everead and A Stewart Family Chronicle. The latter has video. :)

Joy shines on stage

I made Mermaid costumes for Joy and Sariah. They sang and danced in Peter Pan.

Her ballet skills improve. She danced to "Jolly Holliday" from Mary Poppins in this fun tutu with about 12 other dancers. And she had me take these photos over several times to get her arms and feet the way she wanted them.

Abe tries his talents

Swimming














Acting (as "Noodler" a pirate in Peter Pan).

He's always been good at this game!

And a recently developed skill, multiple hoola hoops.

He did great at his piano recital, but I wasn't able to attend and this is what I got from our photographer, who shall remain anonymous.

So Talented (and you haven't even seen his cooking or biking or dribbling or math skills)!

Take a bow Abe.

Lydia gets a drivers permit

While accepting a certificate for her participation in Track, Lydia decides she has been on foot long enough.









She is now 16, and has a learners permit. This celebratory birthday breakfast proves it.

Watch out world! Here she comes.

Jarom Graduates

He finally shook the hand of some school board member in the gymnasium (it rained that day) while his parents looked on with a telephoto lens whose flash just didn't quite get that far.

It all happened so fast! A Graduate (and his family) go through so many ups and downs. "I just feel so many emotions!"

Surprise! It really did happen. Or does it really matter, does anybody care about High School Graduation, anyway?

Yes, He is truley a learned fellow, now. We'll call him Professor for short.

No. No. That is too much, it is all just part of life, isn't it?

"Rico Suave" is off to college now.

This was Baccalaureate. It was held at the EAC fine arts center auditorium on a Sunday evening. It was a nice program. The final speaker was Dr. David Lunt, a former music teacher.

This is Seminary Graduation. It was held on a Wednesday evening in the EAC Institute chapel. Jarom is shaking the hand of Tom Pursley, counselor in the Pima Stake Presidency.

stratagies

here is a tip for (in my opinion) more modern games (like yu gi oh and magic)

READ THE CARDS

obviosly

Tidbit

So right now I'm reading a book called Raising Cain: Protecting the Emotional Life of Boys by Kindlon and Thompson. Some sisters in my ward recommended it -- they did it for book club a while back, I guess. It's pretty interesting so far. The tidbit that I like the best so far is this:

The most important thing to remember, the guiding principle, is to try to keep your son's self-esteem intact while he is in school. That is the real risk to his success and to his mental health. Once he's out of school, the world will be different. He'll find a niche where the fact that he can't spell well, or didn't read until he was eight, won't matter. But if he starts to hate himself because he istn' good at schoolwork, he'll fall into a hole that he'll be digging himself out of for the rest of his life.

I think that's pretty true, you know? It's really important for us to love one another.

poetry edition: haiku: nature

walking in nature

grass, trees, animals, sky, wind

peaceful, calming day

poetry edition: sword fighting

fighting fighting

swords coliding

slash cut stab

end

Famous Family Quotes

Alysa (age4): "Draw the bathwater deep, Mom, I'm goin' deep sea divin'!"

Variations on the Theme

Abe (age 10): "Hold your breath, Joy, we're goin' to 'Davie Jones locker' !"

The Wee Free Men

Six of us had great fun listening to the audio version of "The Wee Free Men" by Terry Prachett and read by Stephen Briggs. The irish accents set the scene. The names of the Nac Mac Feegle pictsies were memorable: especially Rob Anybody, and Not As Big As Medium Sized Jock But Bigger Than Wee Jock Jock. We all liked the lawyer-toad bits. And laughing was much more fun on a 12 hour road trip than whining.

More introductory thoughts

So, Mom and I were kind of thinking that we could have all sorts of fun stuff on here. Not just random life updates (although those are cool) because we all keep in pretty good touch anyway.

No, we want to take it to the next level. The creative level. So we're hoping to have some family book club books and do responses to those, and some prompts that everyone can respond to, and maybe some longer pieces contributed by . . . interested parties . . . as you can see, our plans are so grand they become abstract.

Anyway, let's start off by having everyone say one thing that they think would be cool to have on this blog. This will serve to help us get a "blog vision" and also make sure that everyone knows how to sign on and leave comments.

Welcome to the J. O. Smith Family Blog

The title pretty much says it all.