A year in the Life of McDonell

Happy December! This is it. The holiday card and letter. It’s an All-In-One this year. Saving the earth (and postage!) one tree at a time. Really, if you want to print it out, feel free! Frame it! Enlarge it... or just delete it!

A Christmas miracle occurred in late August. All three children began attending school ALL DAY! Toby and I had visions of excessive free time, long lunches, coffee dates, just TIME which always seems in short supply. Now, three months into this new schedule, we still have not had one lunch, coffee date or any time to sit on the couch and talk for more than five minutes at a time and are not quite sure where all this extra time is going!

Bailey endured the rest of last year with his mother as his history teacher and has now moved on to Blach Junior High which is apparently “WAY cooler” than Loyola. He loves the social aspect (surprise!), and it really is a tragedy that there are no grades given for “witty sarcasm” and “custom skateboard construction”. I am desperately trying to see how these skills might transfer into some sort of viable career someday. He still loves lacrosse but has also developed an affinity for using a wood burner for his board designs as well as a bow and arrow. I am fearful that our brief respite from the Emergency Room visits will be coming to a close rather soon....

Riley has moved on to fourth grade and also loves to go to school, not really for the learning but for the giant gang of boys that he runs around with. When he has what he refers to a “group play dates”, the lot of them descend on the kitchen like locusts, and I am left at the end of the afternoon with nary a crumb of food! I’m thinking stock in Costco might be a good investment. He still OWNS the moniker “Random Riley” and I often am not sure whether to burst out laughing at what he is saying or cringe and pray that he doesn’t say things like that in front of people who don’t already know and “appreciate” his sense of humor. Soccer is still his sport of choice and he is considering taking an archery class, which we are pretty sure is a wise defensive move on his part!

Jensen is in first grade and loves going to school every day. His favorite subject is advanced physics... oh sorry, wrong family for THAT! What I meant to say was he is obsessed with sock-out and thinks that school is primarily a vehicle for scheduling play dates. If any actual learning occurs, that is just a side-effect. Really, the shirt he is wearing says it all... and he wears it like a medal of honor! He may the tiniest McDonell but he has learned from the best and can give just as good as he gets. If he can’t make his brothers cry or scream in frustration, he just bites them or screams loud enough to make their ears bleed so EVERYONE in a three block radius feels his pain.

 

Toby is still a captain with Palo Alto Fire and has dreams of retiring so he can stay home and cater to his wife’s every whim... wait, that’s MY dream. In reality, Toby is perpetually creating projects for himself to prevent him from, God forbid, relaxing. He has designed the most amazing kitchen, and we are simply awaiting that big lottery win so it can become a reality. Until then, he is replacing the kitchen piece by piece as it LITERALLY falls apart.

As for me, well I am still loving my job and teaching ancient history to the sixth graders. They continue to be the perfect audience to appreciate my particular brand of sarcastic humor. Much to my children’s dismay, I started a blog last year called “Parenting Team Testosterone” where I enjoy chronicling (some might say mocking) the highly entertaining things the boys do that leave me slack-jawed and utterly speechless. Now when they do something, and I look at them a certain way they ask, “Mom! No! Are you going to blog about this?” Why, yes. Yes I am! Stop doing this ridiculous stuff if you don’t want me to write about it! Just in case you are interested..... http://parentingteamtestosterone.blogspot.com/
Hopefully this letter finds you as happy and entertained as we are... although perhaps your world is a bit more peaceful and quiet!

In my mind, they are all quietly discussing how lucky they are to have such wonderful parents....