This year we were carving our pumpkins wearing T-shirts outside!! How crazy is that?:)) We have a nice deck, so it was the perfect place to get our messy project done. Katya and Robert looked like surgeons wearing the latex gloves;)))
I personally stay away from pumpkins. I hate the gross feeling of seeds slipping between my fingers and I don't have the patience with cute or scary designs. Thus, I just watch. But Robert likes it.
And then we forgot that we were in NC and left them outside for a week. Well....I guess it's too warm and just perfect to grow mold inside:)
This year we had a true "not-on-base" experience for Halloween. Robert and the kids met up with some friends in a different neighborhood and trick-or-treated for a couple of hours getting a ton of candy. They went dressed up as:
Mr. Popper and his penguin (it's mostly Mark wanting to be a penguin and Robert having to match him somehow...with a Drakula vest);
Katya, the "lost boy" wearing Robert's sweatshirt we bought at GAP 15 years ago when we first got married;
Alex aka Clark Kent, the real Super Man.
Oh yeah, and a few days before Halloween, we had a Trunk-or-Treat at church. It was a lot of fun and a lot of chili:) I did my "dark haired wig" look just once more (I can do that again next year as we'll be in a different ward-hahaha).
October was a very moody month for the weather in the Carolinas. Hurricane Matthew blew through our area full of wind and rain, but not bringing any significant damage. South Carolina, well, even just an hour south of us was not so lucky. They had a lot more flooding and structural damage to houses than we did here. About two weeks after the storm a volunteer project was organized through the Mormon Helping Hands to assist those in need of some tree removal and cleanup in the area where people were still working on recovery. Katya and Robert signed up to go help! They left around 5 am to drive down to the area near Florence, SC and spent the whole day there helping strangers.
There was a lot of work to be done, but many hands make light work.
Katya and her friends, Sophie and Hannah, were not afraid to get their hands dirty.
And this is not a picture of Robert, but just pretend it's Robert as he was wearing the same yellow T-shirt, probably sawing off some tree limbs as well.
Katya actually really enjoyed this project, despite having to wake up early and riding in the car for almost three hours each way. It's so good to see her strengthen her testimony about service by participating in something so needed herself.
We feel like we have fully immersed back into the American culture by signing the kids up for many sports activities. It's always tough, at first, when you move to figure out where is what and what level of commitment you actually desire for your family. We thought we took things slowly but somehow our life has become quite involved in sports practices and games.
Alex. He is in 6th grade so he is not allowed to play sports through school yet. We signed him up for a season through the YMCA that went from October to December. It is, unfortunately, the most expensive basketball around because we are not members, but it's also the only one that was going on in Cary when we finally decided to sign up. Alex really enjoyed it, although it took him a month or so to love it. That's Alex jumping up to steal the ball (#5).
Mark. After doing a week long tennis camp in August through the Cary Tennis Center, Mark was begging us to sign him up for tennis wanting to play every day. We live five minute drive from the Cary Tennis Center, so it actually wasn't too bad. He got evaluated and got into the Tennis Academy (TAD) and can go four times a week for an hour for instructions. On top of that he had matches on Fridays for about two months. And then once in a while we hire a tennis coach, Polina, to give him private lessons. Those are expensive, so we have to know our limits. Polina is wonderful. She is originally from Uzbekistan and was a junior pro during her younger days. We'll continue evaluate if we are able to do tennis this often and if Mark will be able to participate in the tournaments (lots of them are on Saturday and Sunday).
Katya. She was very fortunate to get into her school's soccer team this year! It was incredible luck with timing and us having all the necessary forms filled out by the doctor back in England. She had practices three times a week and games on Wednesdays. Katya started as a right wing and then became a left back (and realized she really liked to run as little as possible:)) and THEN she had to sub for their goalie when she was sick and loved it. So she was playing goalie for the last few games and now wants to try out to be a goalie in her high school next year.
Of course, we already know about her new of hobby for rowing. Here are just two beautiful shots from a Saturday morning in the fall.
And that was our busy fall season of sports. Mark is continuing to play tennis and Katya is still doing rowing.
If this is the way things roll (or row?:)) now around here, this blog has very little chance of survival!! But I need it:) My kids miss it and I miss it as it helps me keep good record of our happenings. So although it's February when I am writing it, I'll date it back to October because that's when this actually happened:)
The story began in August though. I was browsing the new Apex/Cary mom's group I'd joined and saw a post announcing that a local rowing team was looking for middle schoolers to help them with coxing. I had no idea what it meant. And I also didn't know what a COXSWAIN was. But I looked it up and will share it with you:))
From the official source of the online dictionary here is the definition. cox·swain
ˈkäks(ə)n/
noun
the steersman of a ship's boat, lifeboat, racing boat, or other boat.
I asked Katya if she wanted to find out what it all was about, she said "yes" and then went to the first meeting at Jordan Lake on a Saturday morning and we were hooked.
This Jordan Lake rowing team is a club, organized by a former professional rower from the UK Jim Walker (to be honest, we were just missing hearing British accent, that's why we joined-hehehe) and his wife Heidi who is American. Their daughter rows and so they decided to organize their own team to stay closer to home. They row year-round pretty much except when it's super cold or wet or during the holidays in the winter. Because it's North Carolina, when it gets warmer, they have to be at the lake by 7:30 am and then they row for a couple of hours (although they will increase the time soon). During darker months, they start at 8:30 am. Although the team rows on Friday afternoons after school, Saturday mornings and Sunday afternoons, Katya goes only on Fridays and Saturdays, but it works well because there are three coxswains who sort of make it work between themselves.
So on the first day of October, we had an opportunity to finally see Katya in action at Highpoint, NC. The day turned out to be just majestic! Our whole family traveled to the destination super early and set up our spectator spots. Katya was coxing the women's 8 boat.
One thing with regattas, you get to spend a lot of time outdoors waiting for your turn to race and watch your team race. The boys had books and things to do, but next time we'll bring more food.
Here are the hardworking girls. All are in high school except Katya.
We had a nice gazebo set up with snacks and drinks for the team. All around us, other teams had their "camps" set up, and out by the snack wagons and buses, lots of other rowers were stretching and warming up getting ready to race.
Finally it was our girls' turn.
This is when Katya helps a lot giving commands on when to lower the boat, turn, etc.
Almost ready!
Isn't it a beautiful view!!?
We waited for their boat with anticipation to appear from the other side of the lake. The route didn't allow us to see their whole race but only the beginning and then the very end. But it was enough! All boats departed in intervals, so they didn't race each other directly. We were expecting to see Katya's boat right after the third boat as that was the order in which they were racing. Instead, after seeing the first boat, we saw our Jordan Lake boat, passing the second one! So their boat caught up with the third and beat the second one to come in SECOND overall in their line up! It was super exciting!
At this point everyone was cheering them on.
And here is Katya cheering for her team!!! Well done!!
Finally, the results:)!
As we were leaving the regatta, we realized that Robert and I absolutely loved the whole atmosphere of the race, the outdoors with beautiful surroundings and the team spirit. We hope Katya continues with rowing (coxing) even if it requires one of us to get up before 7 am on Saturday mornings to drive her 20 minutes to the lake:)
