Jr. high band takes a trip to Six Flags

Every year the jr. high band takes a trip to Six Flags for a band competition (the competition is actually held at a school in that area, not at Six Flags), and a day of fun in the park. This year, the band won four of the highest honors at the competition. The concert band (which is the one Austin is in) received a Superior Rating, and was selected as the Outstanding Band of the Jr. High/Middle School division. The combined cadet and concert bands also received the Excellence Rating, and both were also given the Espirit De Corps award for their excellence in performance, discipline, behavior, and sportsmanship. It is the first time Clinton Jr. High has ever received that honor!!

Track season begins!

Track season has gotten off to a pretty good start. This year Austin is doing the 800, the 1600, and the long jump (a surprising event for someone who is only 5'4", but what do I know?). So far, he has beaten his best time in both the 800 and 1600--this is his first year for long jump, so every jump is a personal best :) . At the second meet of the season, in Rochester (Monday, April 20), he scored 1 point in the 1600 (which means he placed 5th), and 3 points in the 800 (3rd place) which was his personal best in this event. His next meet was at home, and the one where he got his personal best time in the 1600 and earned 3 more points for his team. So only three meets in, he's already scored more team points than he did the whole season last year. Not a bad way to kick off the season! Warming up

Long jump

Easter at the Martin's

Once again...I am going to attempt to get my blog caught up. (Hopefully, successfully this time!) Easter's been over for a couple weeks now, so I'll be back-tracking again.

We spent Easter at Bryan's mom's. She always makes a fabulous dinner and then Bryan and his sister's husband, Josh, goes outside to hide Easter eggs for the kids to find. As you can imagine out here in the country there are absolutely TONS of places to hide eggs, so this can take quite awhile sometimes...especially when the kids who are looking for them are only 4, 6, and 7. But, of course, Austin is there, too, to kind of guide them as he looks for his own. He may be 14 now, but he knows there is good stuff hidden inside of those eggs so he isn't about to miss out. I think he ended up with about $30 and more chocolate than the child will ever eat (since he doesn't like chocolate! Clearly it was just the money he was after!).

Austin, Kloe, Kolby, Kole, and (my sister-in-law) Brooke sitting in the kitchen floor opening their eggs to see what they got.

Austin looking at what he got from Brenda.

Kloe and Kolby showing off their new sandals I got them for Easter.

Last jr. high honors assembly...

Again, I've let myself get a little behind on updating my blog so I'm going to be back-tracking a couple of weeks.

The last day of school before Easter break (Wednesday, April 8) was the last jr. high honors assembly Austin will ever have. An honors assembly is held after each 9 weeks (except for the last 9 weeks, of course) to recognize students making the honor roll. In his three years of jr. high Austin has made the honor roll every single time, and as a jr. high staff member, I have had the opportunity most parents don't have of watching him receive his award each time. I was going to take a picture of him accepting his last award for jr. high, but decided to save him the embarrassment. Grades have always been important to Austin and he works very hard to keep them above average. Over the last 3 years his GPA has not fallen below a 3.5, and that was during an exceptionally tough 9-week period for him, but was still high enough for him to receive an award. For this last awards ceremony he had received one 'B' and the rest 'A's--which is typical for him. Needless to say, I am very proud of him and his hard work!

Reception the Country Club and some quality family time

My aunt recently got remarried (a destination wedding in Florida) and celebrated with an open house reception at the Country Club two weeks after her nuptials. An event like this is a perfect photo opportunity so, of course, we took a bunch! I'm only going to post a very few.

Me and Debbie (acting like we like each other! haha!!)

This is also the type of event that gives out of state relatives the perfect excuse to visit! I ALWAYS love, love, love it when my cousins from Omaha come back to visit!! I just don't see them nearly enough more. They came back this time with all kinds of news, so we had plenty of catching up to do. I had them over for lunch Sunday afternoon for a little 'quality' time.

Erica with Cameron and Matthew