Jog-A-Thon

I know it's the beginning of the school year -

because the school is holding a bazillion fund raisers.

And now that I have two kids in school...

Dave may have to get a second job.

But, for my small donation, I was thoroughly entertained today.

The annual Jog-A-Thon basically consists of 60 kids (by grade level)

running around barriers in a field. 

They have to run for an allotted amount of time

and each time they pass "GO,"  they collect a Popsicle stick from their teacher.

At the end they count up the sticks and the parents fork out the cash

based on the number of laps the child completes.

Sounds simple enough, right?

You know, like simply non-competitive?

Well, uh, someone forgot to inform Jack.

Was that supposed to be my job?

Here's a recap in pictures.

Jack walks out of his classroom beaming. 

He's seriously bouncing around like a little jumping bean. 

Then just before the race, he flashes me a wink. 

You know, the wink that secretly communicates,

"I've got this race in the bag!"

They line up at the finish line and say "Go!"

And, as I predicted, my slightly competitive son darts out in front of the pack.

This is around the first bend.

As I was watching him I thought to myself,

"Self:  you probably couldn't keep up that pace for 10 minutes."

Maybe I should work on that...

After the race he came strutting over to me saying what else but,

"Mom, I won!" 

"I was the fastest kid!" 

"And I got 9 Popsicle sticks!"

"And nobody got 10!"

And believe it or not, he's been repeating those phrases all day.

I was very proud of him for his hard work, and it was so fun to watch him,

but I'm trying to figure out how to tame that ego.

Even though I am sure the teachers love him bragging about his sweet skills.

You know, the sweet skills that he obviously got from his mother.

Speaking of his mother, here's a strangely crooked shot of his sister running in her own Jog-A-Thon.

She's being all sweet and lovely and non-competitive.

Just like her mother.

A Kid: Week ?

Oh man, this kid makes me smile.

The Falconer

Aubrey is definitely a special child.

She's positively adorable, sweet, funny, love able, and LOUD.

At first I found this loudness problem to be a bit irritating.

I mean, I know we all love a very high and loud shrill to accompany our dinner,

but one can only take so much.

But as it turns out, I think her "skill" may turn out to work wonders for our self reliance.

We were at a friends house a couple of months back and our friend says,

"Wow - she sounds like a real life falconer!"

I have thought a lot about that comment over the last couple of months and thought to myself,

"I think he's right!  Let's test it!"

Lucky for me, I just happened to have a pile of mice guts

and a pair of bird handling gloves just lying around.

Who doesn't?

I took Aubrey out in the front yard, slipped on a glove, handed her some mice guts

(and of course told her not to eat them) and watched her waddle a few steps away.

She immediately lifted her left arm, belted out one of her annoying impressive shrieks

and wouldn't you know it...

a massive falcon swooped in for a landing, nibbled away on the mouse entrails

and then stopped to pose for a picture.

Which I thought was nice of him -

not just any one-year-old can manage to call in a carnivorous bird.

A mother must document such a milestone.

We'll never starve, I tell you.

Aubrey will call one in and we'll roast it up.

In the meantime, I hope all you mothers out there with your own falconer's

can handle the hours of "bird calling practice."

It just might pay off someday.

*Parts of this story may or may not be fictional.