Monthly Archives: March 2007

31 March 2007

The Spring Road Trip Season Begins

By Nicki

For the past ten years or so, my spring road trip season has focused around soccer. Vacations were planned and other items done by the soccer schedule. Now that the soccer player is in college, that is the fall road trip season.

This year, my road trip season started yesterday. I took a day trip to the Niagara Falls region. My 20 year old daughter attends Niagara University and was inducted into Delta Sigma Epsilon – a national scholastic honor society for students, faculty, and alumni of colleges and universities with a Catholic tradition. Since Niagara is a Vincentian university, it qualifies to have students who are juniors and seniors inducted into Delta Sigma Epsilon. This is particularly an honor for my daughter as she is truly only a sophomore but she has junior credits due to taking college courses during high school and taking AP courses during high school.

The induction ceremony was a wonderful time. It was held in the main gallery of the Castellani Art Museum on campus. The campus of Niagara University is on the Niagara River in Lewsiton, NY and is a beautiful setting all in itself, but to sit in the main gallery and watch almost 70 juniors and seniors be honored was wonderful.

What a great way to start the spring road trip season!

Leave a comment   |  tags: , , | posted in Family, Just my Thoughts

28 March 2007

Raising Independent Children

By Nicki

While I sometimes curse that my 18 year old is too independent, I think it is important for parents to raise children who know how to live and move without their parents around to tell them how. To that end, the oldest five of my six children – the youngest to some extent also, have been allowed to travel with church and school and sport groups whenever the trip is financially feasible for the family and the child wants to go. Forcing a child to go on a trip does not make a responsible nor an independent traveler.

My oldest went to St Louis for the National Catholic Youth Conference and then to Indianapolis two years later for the same event. He has also been to various week programs but the only “out of the country” event was to World Youth Day in Toronto in 2002.

The twins also went to Indianapolis for NCYC. They both went to World Youth Day in Toronto. He has also traveled to both Denver and Chicago to the national TSA convention.

Number four is the only one to have gone to Europe. Most of her travel has been due to soccer. The European trip was a week in Paris and London to play soccer. She has also traveled, both with and without me, up and down the east coast playing soccer and went to Toronto to World Youth Day in 2002.

The next one upis now just 16. He has been to weekend trips for competitions in science. He has done a five day trip to Bloomington, Indiana for National Science Olympiad competition. He attended NCYC in Atlanta two years ago and is planning on attending the one in Columbus this fall. He leave on Friday, rather early in the morning, for a three day competitive band trip to Williamsburg, Virginia. There are approximately 80 student-musicians travelling with the group. Three different performance groups will compete in an adjudication. To make the trip a bit more attractive to the student-musicians, they have chartered a tall ship for two hours on Friday in Norfolk. They will do a candlelit tour of historic Williamsburg after that. They will spend Saturday, after adjudication, at Busch Gardens. They will have a three hour stop at the National Mall in Washington, DC on the way home.

Basically, my thought is that we have to give our children wings while they are still with us so as to test and be sure they can fly.

Leave a comment   |  tags: , , , , | posted in Family, Just my Thoughts

27 March 2007

Do I dare tempt fate?

By Nicki

Do I dare tempt fate? I have managed to clear a space in the laundry room – no small feat – and want to bring in from storage the boxes with spring/summer clothing in them and swap out the winter items.

What happens when I do this? Unfortunately, history has proven that I end up with a snow storm the minute I do this. I mean, in the fall/winter, when I go to change out the spring/summer clothing, Indian summer ultimately shows up. So I am sure if I do this now, I will be to blame for the snow that will follow.

Unfortunately for me, the timing of this wardrobe switch is out of my hands. My 12 year old is playing school tennis. When his summer clothing went away, I only left him one pair of shorts to wear and he needs more than one pair. Maybe I should be honest. I need him to have more than one pair as I hate doing laundry!

Fate – here I come!

Leave a comment   |  tags: , , | posted in Family, Just my Thoughts, School Sports

26 March 2007

My Favorite Concert of the Year

By Nicki

I swear, even if I didn’t have high school students in the music program, I would still go to the annual Prism concert.

Our high school music program is rather good. It is the culmination of a long history of good music programs. In a school district with a student population of approximately 2700, the music program in grades 3 through 12 has approximately 1100 students in it. Third grade is where string lessons begin and chorus can be begun also.

Tonight, as will be explained at the start, the pieces of the various high school music groups will be spotlighted. As a glass prism refracts the various colors of light, the high school prism concert will refract the individual and small ensembles that make up the larger whole.

Every area of the auditorium will be used. Small ensembles or individuals will be on the stage, in the back, along the aisles. There will be no clapping between performances. Music will go from one to the next to the next group. The performers, whether coming directly from a sports practice or driver education class, will wear all black so as not to distract the audience as they move in the dark from one area of the auditorium to the next.

Leave a comment   |  tags: , | posted in Family, Just my Thoughts

24 March 2007

Spring Planting

By Nicki

I laugh as I listen to the Weather Channel and their planting forecast. Of course, being based in Atlanta, they probably have had their last freeze of the season. Living in the northeast, I know better than to plant anything prior to Memorial Day.

I have spent the morning look for information about a local farm. I tend to kill growing things – particularly plants. So I recall reading about a farm that sold shares of their crops last year. I was interested, this year, in possibly purchasing a share or two. There will only be four of us home for most of the summer. This will make it a normal family size. The idea of fresh vegetables makes me happy.

If anyone lives in the greater Binghamton, New York area and knows the farm or farms I am speaking of, please let me know.

Leave a comment   |  tags: , , | posted in Just my Thoughts

22 March 2007

Background Noise

By Nicki

Yesterday, I admitted to leaving the television on as background noise throughout the day as I work. I even listed what I tend to listen to as noise.

My oldest is home today and missing a class on films. He was told he was going to miss the viewing of Taxi Driver. This has never been my favorite film. Anyway, Taxi Driver is my background noise today. YUCK!

Leave a comment | posted in Family, Just my Thoughts

21 March 2007

Another Side of Me

By Nicki

Okay, blogging about this is going to keep me from blogging about the latest White House scandal. This is probably a good thing at the moment.

I always have the television on quietly in the background as I work. I work from home and the computer and the television are in the same room. The background noise just helps me to concentrate a bit, I guess.

Today, I was listening to my normal fare – local morning news program on a CBS affiliate, The Early Show, Dr. Phil (I have to be sure I am not doing phone calls during this as it makes me laugh a lot of the time), Rachael Ray. I am stopping there as something on the Rachael Ray show peaked my interest. I am a devoted fan of her Food Network shows and also of her 30 minute meal cookbooks.

Today I heard that Rachael is running a 10 ingredient contest. You have to come up with a dish or a menu that uses the following ten ingredients: beef, rosemary, green beans, bacon, mushrooms, puff pastry, blueberrys, ricotta cheese,dried apricots and mint.

I immediately went to RachaelRay.com to see the rules. I thought – yum – beef with rosemary, green beans cooked in bacon renderings with mushrooms and bacon, puff pastry with blueberrys, ricotta cheese,dried apricots and mint. Then, I thought – yum – a chutney from the blueberries, apricots and mint, the beef and bacon braised with rosemary, and the green beans and mushrooms inside the puff pastry. I would just need to figure out where to use the ricotta in this menu.

Anyway, the gist of this all is I think I may enter a cooking contest. Definitely a side of me you didn’t see coming, right?

Leave a comment   |  tags: , , , | posted in Just my Thoughts

21 March 2007

Your Vote DOES Matter

By Nicki

Have you ever thought that your vote doesn’t matter? I really thought that the US public got over that in 2000 – after the chad debacle but I was so wrong.

My local school district put two proposals in front of the voters yesterday. The presentation of these proposals was flawed from the beginning but that is not what brought out record numbers of voters. People were really either definitely for or definitely against this vote.

Proposition one, which was for major renovations to the middle school and high school – two buildings that haven’t had upgrades since being built in the mid-60s, passed by over 400 votes. Proposition two, which was for a new swimming pool – a necessity for PE instruction according to state education law, was a tie. 1252 yes votes, 1252 no votes. No majority. No passage.

Regardless of my opinion on the proposition, one vote would have given the Board of Education and the district administration a clear direction to go in. Your vote would have mattered!

Leave a comment   |  tags: , , | posted in Just my Thoughts

19 March 2007

On the Fourth Anniversary…

By Nicki

While I live within a mile of a dual Iraqi-US citizen who felt that getting rid of Saddam Hussein was a good thing, I still speak my thoughts on the matter.

After four years, the US still does not understand that you cannot force your form of government on other countries. Not all countries are meant to be democracies. Not all democracies will run the way ours does.

Four years into the Iraq invasion has brought thousands of US deaths and tens of thousands of US injuries. Four years into the Iraq invasion has brought tens of thousands of Iraqi deaths and hundreds of thousand Iraqi injuries.

The biggest question is has the four years the US has spent in Iraq brough Iraq any closer to a stable government. Has the four years made the Middle East any more stable. The answer to both is no and, to the best of my knowledge, there is no plan that is being presented that will help in either of these areas.

While the majority of US citizens still support the troops, it is time to find a way out. We do not, as a country, need this to become another Vietnam. We do not need the tide turning in public opinion towards those who are simply doing their jobs fighting over there.

Leave a comment   |  tags: , , | posted in Just my Thoughts, Politics

19 March 2007

Spring is coming

By Nicki

Spring is coming. At least, that is what the calendar is telling me. The vernal equinox is on the calendar as being this Wednesday, March 21. The big question is will it actually come to the northeast.

My daughter was home on spring break last week. She was taking pictures on Sunday – the second consecutive day of having to clean at least five inches of snow off the car and probably more. She called it her Christmas snow as we had no snow over her Christmas break. It was 60 and warmer at some point during that break.

I love snow. The snow Friday into Saturday was wonderful. The snow Saturday into Sunday was a skier’s delight. It was airy and fluffy. I would have loved it if it weren’t that the daughter had to be taken back to school. Her ride back called at 7 am. They were going to be about an hour late. They did make it but it was a longer ride than they originally thought.

Here’s to spring, soon … I hope.

Leave a comment   |  tags: , , | posted in Just my Thoughts

Follow

Get every new post delivered to your Inbox.

Join 1,840 other followers