Closer to Fine

Well, this month has flown by and we are looking forward to April. Tricia nursed her young ones back to health....it was a month filled with visits to the pediatrician and even Tricia ended up going to her PCP. Ted was sick earlier in the month. Sophia had a terrible stomach bug and Matt ended up with a bad cold followed by a terrible earache that left him tired and sleepy all the time. Thankfully, Alex did not catch anything. Between Sophia and Matt, there were about 10 days of school absences. Tricia missed so much work this month that her father was beginning to think that she didn't like working for him anymore.

Sophia's swim season has finally come to an end. She really enjoyed being on the YMCA swim team. Her strokes and times have improved tremendously. She is looking forward to taking a break from swimming.

Soccer is in full swing and both the boys are playing again. Thankfully, the weather is warming up which makes it enjoyable to watch an outdoor soccer game. Tricia, as one good friend puts it, got "suckered in" to being an Asst. Coach for Matthew's soccer team. Matt plays for the YMCA. The good news is that Matt's schedule is pretty consistent, the bad news is that the YMCA program is terribly unorganized. The soccer league Matt played for in the fall was organized but the schedule was awful. We still haven't found that happy medium. Alex is playing for the same soccer league as he did in the fall. He has a much better coach this time around.

Matt turned 6 years old today. The boy is growing like a weed. Tricia treated him out to Dairy Queen after school today....and as our family tradition, Matt got to pick where he wanted to eat for his birthday......and he chose Mexican.....hmmmm, he takes after his father.

Tricia is thoroughly enjoying her kickboxing class. She got a new pair of red boxing gloves to use in class. The teacher has been picking on her in class a lot lately to be the first to do jabbing/punching exercises with him.....yeah....she feels like the star student, but is pretty sure it has a lot to do with the fact that she is probably the most consistent as far as attending class.
Ted is glad our schedules will be a little easier with the end of swim season. Of course, now Ted will have to get his fat butt to the pool without any prodding from Sophie. It was easy being motivated to swim fast with a bunch of 12-year-olds swimming faster than him. It is much harder at 6am when all alone.

Being Committee Chairman for Alex's scout troop isn't much more work than being Assistant Scoutmaster. Well, maybe it isn't much more time, but sometimes it is more demanding. Our troop only conducts Boards of Review (if you don't know, ask a scout :)) at our monthly campouts. Ted goes to roughly half of the campouts, but this past weekend, he could not attend because of Sophia's last swim meet. There were insufficient committee members to run the two boards that were scheduled, so Ted and another father had to drive up to the campsite at 8pm on Saturday night. Ted got home after 11pm. Who said scouting only takes ~1 hour per week?

Ted has some OPINIONS - and here they are in no particular order. Some are based on years of experience, and some are found in the US Constitution:
1- children under the age of 9 should NOT swim breaststroke or butterfly in swim meets (unless they are exceptional swimmers)
2- The federal, state and local governments CANNOT dictate pay scales to any private companies or their employees
3 - Said governments also do not have the authority to take over private corporations. That is fine in Venezuela, Cuba or North Korea, but not the USA
4- Parents who are not willing to disqualify their cute little sons and daughters should not judge swim meets - we always need timers
5- Health care is not a "right"
6- the economy will fix itself if everyone just gets out of the way

On another note, we are looking forward to April and visiting friends up in NY. And we are happy to say that we are all feeling closer to fine.