H.O.V.

Here it is, and I'm sure you probably knew it all along. H.O.V. stands for High-Occupancy Vehicles. I'm not really sure why we had so much trouble coming up with that. It did make every trip up and down that stretch of road full of very funny attempts at figuring it out. Did I mention that I laughed a lot??

The End of Kindergarten

Many of you know that I am fond of, rather protective and a smidge-bit sappy when it comes to my children. That being said, yesterday was Jacob's last day as a kindergartner. I was pretty OK with him going off to kindergarten this past fall. I drove him there myself. I didn't even cry (although my eyes misted when Ethan begged me to go back down the hallway to get Jacob because Jacob was crying and didn't want to be there), I was a rock (almost). But, I have been really sappy about him finishing kindergarten. Why?? I have been wondering the same thing.


It's not as if he is about to meet the girl of his dreams and run off to get married tomorrow. It's not as if he is going to pack his bags and move across the country to college tomorrow. It's not as if he is never going to come home or give me a hug or ask for a couple of chapters in his favorite book. It isn't as if I will never hear him torture his little brother or burp way to loud in a quiet little restaurant or say toot or poop just because he knows I can't stand it.

It is just something about finishing kindergarten and moving up to a real grade (like First Grade) that is too close to him growing up. Where did the time go?? Have I missed anything?? Forgotten anything??

I need to admit to you that although I am feeling very sappy right now, I was very close to stringing Jacob up by his toenails this afternoon when he wouldn't leave his little brother alone. But, right now he is soundly sleeping in his bed and looking like he was sent by the angels.....

Dear Mrs. Brail,

I am not sure that I have the right or enough words to express my thanks to you for all you have done for Jacob (and me) this year.

The first day of school was not only an adjustment for Jacob, but also for me. He was nervous about doing something (anything) new, not knowing his teacher and not knowing the kids that he would be spending his days with. But, Jacob quickly (more quickly than I ever imagined) grew to love school. He came home everyday excited about what he learned, eager to sing the songs, share the letter sounds and write his numbers. He found great pleasure in being able to teach all he had learned to his younger brother. He was able to enjoy gym and music class. He learned that he could do things without Mom or Dad watching him. He became more independent and willing to try new things (even foods like broccoli, which he likes!). This was because of YOU!!

I had never left my child with anyone other than Grandma. I didn’t want to. He is my firstborn and sometimes it seems like time isn’t passing a second, minute, hour or day at a time. Instead it travels at light speed and if I blink, I miss something wonderful. I want Jacob to grow and become independent. I want him to learn about this wonderful world that God created. I want him to grow into the man God wants him to be. I want him to soar. As these changes happen I have to let go. Sometimes letting go comes in little bits and sometimes in great big chunks (I much prefer the little bits). You helped me let go a little bit each day. You let me come into the class so that I didn’t feel like I was missing out on his life. You encouraged me to guide him into independence. Because of the way you show your love for your class, your students, my Jacob, I was able to trust that he would be OK without me. This was because of YOU!!

Of all the teachers I had throughout elementary school, middle school, high school and college, the one I remember most and with the fondest memories is my Kindergarten teacher. Thank you for being Jacob’s. Thank you for teaching Him. Thank you for guiding him. Thank you for loving him. Thank you for helping him Soar.

The Michigan Song

Jacob's class was learning all about our great state of Michigan during the month of May and of course being a kindergarten class, they learned a song. When I got home from work a few weeks ago he sang the song for me. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to post the video. I reshot him singing the song outside today and here it (finally) is. I hope that you enjoy this as much as I do.

I think I have fallen in love with Michigan all over again. Or, maybe for the first time. I don't recall having loved Michigan before (especially in February) but, now I do!! How could I not?? What, with all the red cherries, apple blossoms and sweet faced boys singing its praises.

The Rest of Nascar Weekend (part 2)

OK, so do any of you know what HOV is?? No, well I do. We saw these HOV signs all over the highway in Charlotte and couldn't figure out what they were about. You had to have a HOV vehicle to drive in a certain lane and if you didn't, well then, you were fined. We were afraid that we weren't part of that HOV group so we didn't drive in that "special" lane. Our best guess as to what HOV meant was "Hatians on Vicodin". Although that was the best we could come up with we were pretty certain (and definately hopeful) that we were wrong. It wasn't until a few days after coming home that Rachel looked it up online and was able to tell me what it meant. Do you have any guesses?? I will give the answer next time I post (whenever that may be).

Anyway, onto Sunday of the Nascar Vacation Saga....

We had planned to meet with Chad and Rachel in the hallway of our hotel at 9:45am. Curt woke me up at 6:40am. I tried to get him to go back to sleep, but he was pacing at the foot of the bed and was just plain too full of excitement to sit still one more minute. I did my best to settle him down, but it was race day and it just wasn't going to happen. It turned out OK because Chad and Rachel were ready early too. After a fabulous and leasurely breakfast (I might be joking here) we left the hotel and headed for the track.

I think we got there about 10:00 and started looking at all the trailers. I can't say that I enjoyed the trailers that were just selling stuff, but there were a lot of trailers that had stuff for us to do. We played plinko, we did a race simulation (and although Chad was listed ahead of me if you look closely at our printout it shows that my time was the fastest, but I'm not competitive at all so it really doesn't matter :->), the guys got to work a impact drill, and we got some free potato chips and Heluva Good dip. After doing all the play stuff we went back to the van and had some lunch.

Then, it was off to the races.

I need to be clear with all of you reading this. I love Nascar. I love the smell, I love the noise (for about 2 laps and then I have to cover my ears), I love having fun with my husband and sharing this time with him, I love seeing him so happy and excited, I love the competition, I just love it.

So, here is a little video of the start of the race. It gets a little shaky because they were going faster and faster and I was having a hard time keeping up. Enjoy!!

If you want to see more of our adventure you can check out Rachel's blog and here you can see the boys on go-carts and here you can learn about Nascar style people watching and here you can see the last little bit of our saga. She has a lot of pictures posted (most of the ones of me are really goofy)!!

The Rest of Nascar Weekend

So, I am sure that you have been hanging by the seat of your pants wondering what was so wonderful about our Nascar weekend. Well, here is the thing.... everything was wonderful about the weekend. I loved it. I had so much fun with our friends and I did a lot of laughing.


Saturday morning we got up and headed out to visit all of the race shops. We started at Penske and although the store wasn't loaded with goods we were able to get into the garage (via a upper level walkway) so we could see what goes on very well. The only draw back to visiting these places on Saturday before race day is that not much was going on. I was really amazed at how clean it was. When I think of garages and working on cars, I think oil, grease, not very clean. This place sparkled.

After Penske we went to Joe Gibbs racing (home of Tony Stewart, Kyle Busch, Denny Hamlin and Joey Logano) then on to Hendrick Motorsports (home of Jimmie Johnson, Jeff Gordon, Dale Earnhart Jr. and Casey Mears). Hendrick was part Nascar superstore and part museum. I loved visiting all the shops, but Hendrick was definately the better shop to visit.

We were able to squeeze ourselves into a racing seat (those guys obviously don't have any thighs).

As I said before the Hendrick store had a bit of a museum running through it. We saw lots of stuff including....

Jimmie Johnson's Daytona winning car. I love that it still has the confetti stuck to the paint. Very authentic!!

And, "The Claw" that is used to make sure all the new cars are built to the same specifications. Altering the shape of the car can influence the speed by causing downforce or more aerodynamics. This is used to keep everyone on an even playing field (when it comes to the building of the car anyway).

We also had a quick (and very funny) pitstop at Sonic for some lunch. I must say I had the biggest burger I've ever had at a fast food restaurant. Thank you Rachel for suggesting it.

After all the garage fun we decided to go off to a movie. We saw Indiana Jones and the Crystal Skull. I loved it. I am a big fan of the funny action adventure with a little romance thrown in kind of movies. I thought that it kept well with Harrison Ford's age and didn't try to turn him into another over the hill action star. I laughed out loud several times.

After the movie we were still trying to kill time (we really didn't want to spend any more time than we had to at our hotel) so we went into a Bass Pro Shops for a little while. I found a hat that I really liked and I should have bought, but didn't. Then we noticed that the Bass Pro Shop was attached to a HUGE mall. We went for a short walk around the mall and I ended up buying two pair of shoes, the guys went go-cart racing and we had a late dinner at Chili's. 5 1/2 hours later we practically ran back to our car so that we wouldn't be locked in. There was a lot of laughing over that too. I did a lot of laughing.

What a Weekend!!!

I know that the story of the Nascar Weekend is going to take several posts to get through. I hope that you don't get too bored by it, but it was sooo much fun. I don't even know where to begin with the story. I guess I will start by saying it was 4 of the best days I have ever had. I missed my boys, but didn't worry about them. I called to talk to them and Ethan would chatter away, but all I heard from Jacob was "I DON'T WANT TO TALK ON THE PHONE". Anyway, I don't think I have ever laughed so hard, except for maybe when we went to see Tim Hawkins, but that was 2 hours worth of laughing and this was 4 days. My abs should be rock hard now. The drive was looonnggg, but we made it (barely -- twice we narrowly escaped being involved in multicar accidents. That we weren't is testimony of God's grace and goodness. That no one else actually collided was an absolute Miracle). I have determined that I am not going to be traveling to California in a minivan at any time during my life. So, if Curt ever wants to go to the California race, he is going to be splurging on airline tickets. However, it was beautiful when we reached the mountains in West Virginia.

This picture was taken out my window somewhere in West Virginia.

When we got to the hotel on Friday night I think I was too tired to really notice how bad it was, but I noticed on Saturday morning (I almost wore my flip-flops in the shower). Curt went down to get a "Continental" breakfast and came back with a rotten and smooshed banana and 2 Oatmeal Creme Pies. I am glad that we brought bagels and cereal. We pretty much stayed out of the hotel unless we were there to sleep. Rachel has also posted about the state of the hotel and she even has a very clever picture if you'd like to check it out. In my defense, when booking the hotel my primary objective was the affordability. In that respect, I did succeed!!