Family, Family, Family

Sorry about the dearth of posts here Dear Reader, but with the end of the school year for the children and the beginning of The Other (Younger) Half's internship, it's been quite busy. I neglected to write something about The Madster and 'Nika's performances at Festival Latino at school. This was an all day event of performances, eating and kids running 'round doing anything but school work. Each grade worked up some kind of performance related to a Spanish speaking country. The 7th and 8th grade girls (sans KyKy) did some hoochie-koo dance to a Puerto Rican rap song. (Yawn. Although I did notice that the Middle School boys were paying close attention to this particular presentation. They quickly lost interest in the program when the second graders got up to do their thing.) I forget what country The Madster's class was representing, but they danced to a decidedly non-rap tune wearing white blouses and black gauchos. I took some crappy pictures with one of the kid's cameras. Their performance was outside, there were tons of people there and there was a tent-type thing set up in the parking lot to shade the youngsters while they sat watching the program. The pics are sitting on the laptop, just waiting to be viewed by you, as soon as I post them. I had a couple of hours between The Madster and 'Nika's performances, and since I had to move the car or get a parking ticket, I ran to the office to get the nice camera to take pics of 'Nika's play. They re-enacted a Spanish bullfight in all its bloody glory. The narrators described what was going on (in Spanish) and the kids acted it out. 'Nika was the front half of the bull and avoided serious injury by not falling off the stage or getting stabbed by the picadors. The skit was very instructive. The nice thing about it was that it wasn't cleaned up to not be offensive. This is what they do at bullfights: They poke at the bull with sharp things until it is exhausted, then they kill it. KyKy was not involved at all. She played hooky and went to the Science Museum with her cousin and grandpa. I skipped out on the rest of the day's work and brought the kids home early from school. I was relieved to show up to work the next day and find out the world of used test equipment had not collapsed in my absence.

That was Thursday. Friday, TOYH started her official internship on the floor at Abbott, 3pm to 11pm shifts. I biked from work to a bar in NE Minneapolis to go to a gathering of some of my old FedEx co-workers. From there I went home. All the kids were at a neighbor's birthday party, so I went there and we stayed until about 10pm. The younger two stayed overnight at said birthday boy's house with some of the other neighbor kids. KyKy and I went home. She went to bed and I stayed out on the porch with my friend Matthew to wait for TOYH to come home from work. She's taking the bus home, the infamous #5, even though we only live about 7 blocks from the hospital. Frankly, it's not the bus that makes me paranoid, it's her walk from the bus stop to home that has me worried. Two and a half blocks, but you never know. I've finally got her bike set up to ride to work, and I feel much better about her coming home late on her bike than I do about her waiting for and walking from the bus.

Saturday was the big trip up to Cambridge for my nephew's high school graduation open house. Our little Dando, High School Grad. All my sisters and their families were there, (including Jen all the way from Hot 'Lanta, GA), along with a couple of aunts and uncles that I wasn't expecting to see. Dando the absentee child, who the party was for, was even there. As the open house was winding down, Tracy, Jen and I took our families to Opa and Oma's for a couple of hours.

As much fun as it was to see everyone, there was a pall over the celebration. Daniel's aunt Cheryl had just found out that she has ovarian cancer and that it had spread over her abdomen. I'm getting sick and tired of all of this. Oma is still taking chemo for the cancer that they found in her, and the EG just found out she has a malignant tumor in her breast. While things are looking pretty good right now for Oma and the EG, the news of cancer, the waiting for test results, waiting for surgery/biopsy results, and everything else associated with this disease wears a person down.

Yesterday, TOYH, Madster and 'Nika all rode their bikes to church with a caravan of people. We live only about a mile and a half from church, and the other folks live a little bit farther. But if you add up the miles from 5 short round trips from 5 families, you're getting somewhere. In the afternoon, TOYH was off to the hospital again, and I took the kids up to EG and DM's so KyKy could work on tee-shirts she is going to present to her teachers as a thank you gift.

Tonight we are off to Russ and Jill's to meet up with Jen and Francis. Always a good time when the 3 families get together. Tomorrow is KyKy's 8th grade graduation. Will report on both and maybe try and post some pics.