Yearly Archives: 2010

Tonight, Zachary, Kirstyn, and I went to the Kane County Cougars baseball game.  Tonight was one of the “Ozzie Reading Club” nights where school kids can get free tickets, free hot dogs and drinks, and free t-shirts for reading a certain number of books!  🙂  When we got there, we found our seats, which were about 3 rows up from the field on the right field line!  We’ve never had seats that good before!  We then went and walked in the parade around the field with Ozzie, the Cougar’s mascot.  The kids loved being down on the field with all the crowd cheering for them!  🙂

We then went and got the free food for the kids (I had to spend about $12 for my stuff) and their t-shirts.  The line was long and the stadium was crowded!  The game was great and we had a wonderful time!  The Cougars won by a large margin which made the kids happy! 

What they liked even more, however, was the fireworks show after the game (first one of the season)!  Every Friday night they do this and it’s quite the popular thing!

Tonight, our family held its 6th annual Teacher Appreciation Dinner.  It’s getting more and more difficult to coordinate now that we have 4 kids in school!  🙂  All the kids invite 1 or 2 teachers they feel have impacted their lives in a good way during the year and we invite them over for a dinner in their honor.  This year, Zach invited Miss Kalvaitis and Mrs. Lent.  Kirstyn invited Mr. DiNatale, Brittany invited Mrs. Pakkebier, and Sarah invited Mr. Devany.  Unfortunately, there were other teachers invited who could not come, and that was sad for the kids.  🙁

We had dinner, and then held a “version” of family home evening with the teachers.  We had opening and closing songs and prayers (it was weird for just our family to be singing with 4 music teachers there 🙂 – because we didn’t have enough books), and the kids provided the entertainment.  Zach sang a song and read a poems that he wrote for his teachers.  Kirstyn played her clarinet and also read a poem she wrote for her teacher.  Brittany played the violin and read her teacher a letter she wrote to her.  Last but not least, Sarah played her flute and read a poem she wrote for her teacher.

Zach and Miss Kalvaitis

Kirstyn and Mr. DiNatale

Brittany and Mrs. Pakkebier (and family)

Sarah and Mr. Devany (and family)

After the entertainment, we all had ice cream sundaes and took pictures (we missed Mrs. Lent because she had to sneak out early).  When it came time for the teachers to go, we gave them all hanging flower baskets as an additional “thank you” for being our kids teachers.  We love doing this as we know it’s important to recognize those people in your life that make a difference.

Thanks teachers!

Today was quite the busy day for the family!  Angela got up early and went shopping with some friends.  It turns out that there is a new craze around coupon shopping and getting a TON of stuff for pretty cheap!  Some call it “black belt couponing.”  It takes some time to figure things out (where the coupons are, what stores are having the major sales on what you want, etc.) but once you do that, you can cash in big!  Today, they went to Jewel and Angela came home with 44 boxes of various Kelloggs cereal, 12 bottles of Lawry’s marinade, and 4 boxes of Pop Tarts!  She got all that (over $200 in groceries) for just over $40!  That’s huge!

What you do I guess, is print out coupons for stuff that is on sale.  You then go through and use a coupon or two, then get the “catalinas” that spit out of the register with your receipt.  You then use those to go back through the line and purchase additional “stuff” with coupons AND your catalinas.  You keep doing this and the more you buy, the cheaper it gets.  If you’re interested, you can go to http://www.jillcataldo.com to see how this works.  It’s pretty cool!  We could save enough money in 1 month to cover Sarah’s car insurance!  🙂  We have a friend that told use she used to spend around $800 in groceries every month.  She now spends around $200 for her family of 5!

When Angela got home, we went over to Zach’s soccer practice/scrimmage.  He loves his team and loves playing!  We love it because it’s fun to watch the pack of little kids running around in a big bunch kicking each other and occasionally the ball!  🙂  Plus, it wears Zach out and he comes home pretty tired.

After getting some work done around the house and yard (trimming edges, mowing, raking, vacuuming, dishes, etc.), Angela, Sarah, Kirstyn and I went to Waubonsie High School and watched their production of Les Miserables.  What a FANTASTIC show!  They had a rotating stage, just like the production on Broadway, and the voices and acting were amazing!  It’s no wonder our school district gets Grammy Gold status every year at one of it’s high schools!  Angela and I have both seen Les Miserables on Broadway and we both think that, with a few small exceptions, this was very close to Broadway quality!  🙂  What’s even more amazing is that the strongest voice we liked the most came from a Sophomore!  Sarah knows him well and they went to school together for years.  There was a young man from our ward in it, as well as a couple from other wards.  Sarah knew many of them from high school last year.  It was also amazing how many of the kids with major parts came from Still Middle School (where our kids go)!  🙂

Even though it was the school edition, it was still about 2 1/2 hours long and the music and singing never stopped the entire time (except during intermission, of course).  Kirstyn was kind of confused at times about what was going on because she was not familiar with the book, so I talked her through the series of events and answered her questions.  She even thoroughly enjoyed it!