Cale's birthday questions.

These kids are becoming harder to tie down to answer these simple questions.  Add to that, that we are busy folks here and I didn't have time to harass Cale every day about answering these questions.  But, finally, it's done.  And then, I took several weeks to get on the computer to post them.  Mostly for posterity at this point.  I think it's fun to look back at the answers.  Anyway, I'm glad I'm done.  Liam's birthday was a few days ago.  Time to start a new year of questions.

Cale, what is your favorite....

color?....orange

fruit?....apple

cereal?....frosted flakes

dessert?...anything

drink?....Sprite

thing to do outside?....trampoline

animal?....panda

book?....Book Thief

Ok, so maybe he didn't answer all the questions.  He's pretty surly and stubborn some days.  But, we sure do love him!

HHMS 7th/8th grade choir 5/22/18-"Journey to the Past"

Song number 2 for the choir Cale is in.  We sure did sit in the perfect spot to see him.  I'm sure Cale was thrilled.

HHMS 7th/8th grade choir 5/22/18-"Touch the Sky"

As worst family historian ever, I am excited to upload the songs Cale's choir did at his choir concert this week.  I love how involved he is in the arts, besides sports, and I hope this is a love he always carries with him.

Let's hear from Cale as a 13 year old!

Ha, success! I finally chased down the questions to have Cale fill out thus completing this tradition for another year.  These big kids, though, they don't like to answer all the questions, so we will just list what Cale has answered.

Cale, what is your....

favorite color?....blue

favorite toy?....the X-box

favorite stuffed animal?....panda

favorite thing to sleep with?....nothing

favorite fruit?....banana

favorite dessert?....cake

favorite drink?...root beer

favorite birthday dinner?....steak

favorite animal?....duck

favorite game?....Fortnite

favorite TV show?....Expedition Unknown

favorite movie?....The Greatest Showman

favorite thing to do outside?....play

So, there you go.  I love some of his answers.  We just saw The Greatest Showman on Sunday night and everyone loved it.  (Even Liam, who was begging to be left at home and Ewan, who I think was a little skeptical of the movie at first.) And, Expedition Unknown encourages that desire to explore and find in people.  We really like watching that show and seeing what crazy things the host is going to do every week.

To compare, here are Cale's answers as a 12 year old, a 11 year old,  and a 10 year old.

Back to school 2017!

If you follow us on social media, you will know that the kids, except Kinley, started school on Tuesday.  So far, so good.  I would say the biggest challenge is getting ourselves back into the school bedtime schedule.  Summer was great.  We stayed up late. We slept in lots.  Now, school reality has set in.

Cale and Marcus left first.  Cale is in 7th grade and is taking honors English, honors math and honors band-French horn.  Marcus is a freshman and his classes include AP World History, Spanish, Biology and band-trombone.

The second round of schoolers included Kella (1st grade, Mrs. Sears), Ewan (5th grade, Mr. St. Amand) and Liam (3rd grade, Mrs. Lodge).  They were ready to go and had all met their teachers the night before.  Ewan actually had his teacher back in 3rd grade for some of his classes.  Kella's teacher is new to the district and somehow, Liam's teacher has never had a Shaffer in her class and Liam is the 4 kids to go through the elementary school.  How is that even possible?  

Good news, everyone had a great day.  They loved their teachers and were happy to go back to school the next day.  The trend is holding and routine is getting easier to slip back into.

Here's to a great year!

HHMS 6th grade choir, Spring concert, 5/23/17

Choir concert happened a couple weeks ago.  Just one more thing to check off our last-of-school-stuff to-do list.  The choirs sounded great.  I love hearing the improvement in the choirs over the course of the year.  Good news, in this video, Cale is in the front row, on the end, so he's easy to see.

Cale's cool project

Check out the cool totem pole that Cale completed for a class project.  He had to make something that tied into a book he was reading for class.  When Cale mentioned totem pole, I envisioned a desk-top size one.  Cale had something bigger in mind.  It took about a week, with some help with learning a new skill-paper mache.  We think it turned out great.  Cale included an eagle, a ghost bear, a wolf and a lightening bolt.  All those symbols were important in the story.  This is probably one of my favorite projects Cale has done.  And, I'm not surprised at the scope of this project from my boy who likes to dream big. Now, it resides in his teacher's classroom.  For as long a she wants it.  Hopefully forever.  

instrumental solo/ensemble contest

More than a couple weeks ago, a week after Cale's vocal contest, our middle schoolers were back at the same place, this time for instrumental solo/ensemble contest.  Cale's first year and Marcus's third year-because they have a pushy momma who thinks it's a great idea to perform in front of other people. Cale did a solo and did an ensemble with the other 2 6th grade French horn players.  Marcus did a solo-he never did get around to finding some friends for an ensemble.  Once again, I had the privilege to accompany both of the boys' solos.   

Cale performed Surprise Symphony.  A nice, short, 2 page piece. I may have forced him to practice every night to make sure he could hit all the notes.

Cale's hard work paid off-gold rating for his first time out!  I know he was very relieved.

My dear Marcus picked a rondo by Mozart.  This piece was originally for French horn (maybe Cale will play the piece one day).  It was a fast piece that had eight! pages of accompaniment for me to sweat through.  And, I did. 

An attempt at an artful picture. 😄

Ah-brothers.

Marcus's hard work paid off, too-another gold rating!  I wish I could say his accompanist played as well as Marcus did-that would not be true.  Thankfully, the accompanist does not get scored although I did tell Marcus that if he picks a piece like that again, I will not play for him.   

And the 6th grade French horn ensemble.  They sounded great in warm-up, but had some challenges during performance that earned them a silver rating.  Can't say they were happy, but I think they were all glad to be done.

As was I-glad to be done with solo contest for the year.

Cale, the singer

Cale joined choir this year.  I'm not too sure exactly why, although I would guess it is because he likes to sing and be part of groups.  Anyway, the opportunity came up to participate in vocal solo/ensemble contest.  Of course I encouraged Cale to do this.  I think that performing in front of others is a great experience.  Cale picked a song called "Farewell" by Schubert.  I had the privilege of accompanying him on the piano.

  

Bright and early, for us, a few Saturdays ago.  Cale's performance time was 9:05 in the morning.  Yea for us, the contest site was about 15 minutes from our house at a local high school.  We went to the warm-up room first and then went to hear some of the performers in front of us.  When it was time for Cale's performance, there were no other kids in the room so he just had to sing for the judge, the judge's helper and me.  Lucky kid.

Cale got a gold!  He was pretty relieved when it was all over and happy to get his gold medal.  I think he'll do this again next year.😊

Basketball season draws to a close and I finally post some pictures

Basketball has eaten up a great portion of what used to be our "free time". 5 out of 6 Shaffers here are participating/are done participating in basketball this season.  Admittedly, I am sporadic with my picture taking and more sporadic with posting pics here, or anywhere else for that matter.  So, be prepared for the onslaught of pictures.

Here we go.  These may or may not be in some sort of order.

Ewan-looking spiffy in his travel jacket.  He loves this thing and wears it all the time.  Fun fact: Ewan, Marcus and Cale all picked the number 22 for their basketball number.  If I had my stuff together, I might have tried to force those three to take their picture together in their uniforms.  Didn't happen.

For fun-Ewan's team got to play a game at Banker's Life Fieldhouse-where the Indiana Pacers play (and, for more fun, they went to and actual Pacers game first-Andy took all our boys to that game).  I got to take Ewan and enjoyed watching him play.  He also scored 4 or 6 points.  I can't remember-but I know he was the highest scorer on his team that day. (Side story-I drove our big van and parked it in a tiny, old parking garage that we barely squeezed into.  When we left, I got one of the employees there to back the van out and bring it down to the first level for me.  I think they just wanted to get rid of me.)

On the court.

Passing the ball in.

Kella wanted to play basketball this year.  She is on one of 6 kindergarten teams.  She is probably the smallest person on any of the teams and definitely the most fancy dressed for practice.  

These 2 are random photos from one of Marcus's games.  Look for the 22.  He played on the "b" team this year and had a good time and a good season.  There are just 2 weeks left with one more tournament.  It's an "a" team tournament, but Marcus was asked to keep playing with a chance of maybe playing in the tourney.

These are all Cale.  They might have been playing the same school as Marcus was.  I don't know.  Look for the 22, red hair and orange, knee-high socks.  That's how I figured out which boy I was looking at.

We spend time taking selfies during the games. 

Some more of Cale.  This was his last game of the season.  The 6th grade season is shorter that the other grades.  Cale played on the "b" team, too, and did a great job.  Personally, I think he should have played on the "a" team.  But, I am not the coach.

Another selfie interlude.

These are of Marcus's last home game and last "b" game.  They are in a backwards order.  Just how I uploaded them.  I had the sense to get out my phone to get these pictures.  Potentially, one of the last games he plays in ever-if he doesn't make the freshman team next year.  

Ewan's travel team.  Their regular season is over.  The team finished the season with 1 win (in the last game).  They get a Sunday off and then the next one will be the start of the tournament.  At this point, I do expect them to not win and advance.  A totally different position than what they were in last year, when the team (made up of several different players) won the whole post-season tournament.  But, Ewan's had fun and it's been a good experience.

Rec league is still going strong and will for most of February.  Ewan, Liam and Kella are all playing in that league.  These games take up our Saturday mornings for now.  Hopefully, that means I will get a couple pictures to share here in the future.