All about Cori

Cori's last basketball game was so much fun to watch. The score was so close with both teams going back and forth. Cori's team ended up getting beat by 2 points. One of their girls accidentally made a basket at the wrong goal and gave the other team 2 points, so technically I think it was a tie. Luckily, the girls will have another basketball season before school is out. Those games are the most fun to watch. Right now though Cori is geared up for track. They have their first meet in about a week and Cori is taking it seriously.

She also had a band concert last week. We love to see these different sides of her. To see her running around a basketball court getting aggressive when someone takes her ball and then to see her so calm, poised and beautiful playing flute is amazing. She is great at everything she does. Really! We are always so proud of her.

Cori took the ACT last week. That's right, the ACT in the 7th grade. It is part of Duke's TIP program and she was specially chosen based on her perfect scores on the Texas standardized exams. She was taking the ACT with high school students which made her so nervous. It was such a privilege for her to be able to take the same test that she will be taking in a few years and get a sneak peek. She says she think she did great on the English and Reading but not as well on Science and Math. Typical for girls unfortunately but she also always does better than she thinks. It will be so interesting to see how she compares with her peers around the nation as well as much older students.

Cori, my mom and I got out Saturday with just us girls. It was so nice! We left Bryson home with Aaron. Cori has done a 180 on us and she loves to shop now! She bought some jewelry this trip to "accessorize" which she has vowed to do more. We had a great day at some of our favorite places: Ikea, Lush, others and of course the Cheesecake Factory! Lush is Cori and I's absolute favorite. We love to smell all the handmade goodies and we went home and each had long baths on Sunday with heavenly smells! We are thankful they finally opened one in Texas!

Bry update

We are late on our weekly updates that we promised. We had a visit from my mom for over a week and now my laptop is on the fritz. Luckily, I have Aaron's laptop as a backup but no pictures for a little while until we fix mine. No huge news with Bryson. He liked eating cereal that first week and has shown no interest since then. We started him on rice and then switched to oatmeal to see if that would help. He is still not interested so today we added some apple babyfood to it and he made a sourpuss face. Saturday I left Bryson for most of the day with his daddy and he was not interested in taking a bottle at all, he would assume starve. So, uh-oh, we've made a few mistakes I guess. He will have to start getting accustomed more with different things. We are working on getting him to sleep in his crib but he's stubborn with that. He likes the comfort of mommy and daddy. Is anyone suprised he is spoiled? He likes to rub his feet together like a cricket and get his shoes and socks off. It's funny but not funny at the same time. He is trying so hard to sit up. He has the strength but not the balance to stay centered. He is spending a little time on his belly finally, he used to refuse. So hopefully he will be sitting up soon. I am not ready for him to grow up but it will be nice when he can sit up and play with his toys better. He is at a goofy stage. He acts just plain silly!

What I've learned this week

Bryson has taught me to wake up each morning with a nice stretch and a smile on my face. Cori and I are the grumpy ones in the morning while Aaron and Bryson are always in good moods. It is amazing to watch Bryson in the mornings when he wakes; he is just so happy to have a new day to experience and learn. I suppose we could all learn something from that.

Cori has taught me that even though your kids may act like they are not listening, they really are. When she thinks we are not looking we will catch her doing the things we have shown her and it makes us smile. Of course we never let her know.

We are so proud of both of them.

Baby toe musings

Bryson just received his first toenail trim. OK, so it doesn't sound like a big deal, but this is the first trim ever! I have to cut his fingernails every other day but never a toenail. It was a sad moment for me. It made me think of how big he is getting. Remember I just said not too long ago that his feet wouldn't touch the ground in his activity center? Well now he can pretty much stand up in it; and the second time in his Johnny Jump Up he was bouncing like crazy. Now it is his favorite toy, he wears himself out. So as I was holding him after his trim, I was thinking about how quickly time goes by and how Cori will be leaving us for college...it is a few years away but I am already dreading it. Then Bryson will be leaving me for kindergarten. I know, what an age gap! Cori has become such a teenager; they are both getting too big, too fast. I wish we had a pause button. All these thoughts just from trimming the nail on one big toe!

Comments

I had a few of you ask about leaving comments. I just looked at the settings and changed it so that now you can leave comments without having to sign up for a Google account. As I said before, we are still new at this. Enjoy!

Slam dunk!

Tonight was basketball game night again. Then onto dinner we went at "the hang-out" diner in town where Cori always runs into friends, especially after games. I don't know how many points Cori scored this evening; I couldn't keep up. But her team won 52 to 2. Her coach had to tell the girls to slow down and stop making so many baskets because they were making the other team look so horrible. Cori said after the game that she was really glad when the opponents scored the one basket; she did not want them to have 0 points. What a good sport! Cori didn't play as much as usual. Since her team was so far ahead, her coach decided to rest the starters and let the other players have more chances to play. Only one more basketball game this season; we are sure going to miss these. I plan on taking the camera to the next game. We are trying to encourage her to sign up for soccer and/or softball again outside of school but she is not interested at the moment. I think she likes to keep her after-school schedule open for her social life with friends. We'll keep working on her though. You know teenagers; they change their minds from one day to the next.