.:Meet the Ritchies:.

Tonight we went to watch Claire perform a fall music concert at her school, with her music elective class.  The teacher explained that he has taught them how to play the songs on the recorder, and then from there the students branch out with the same songs on different instruments such as xylophone, triangle, bass drum, conga drum and keyboard.  It was a lot of fun and way too short, here are some pictures from the evening…

Claire on the recorder...

...and on the xylophone, pretending not to notice I am taking her picture...

...and here she is on the triangle, she does it all!

Claire's fan club: Lacye, Auntie Andi, and Grandma Trudie (Mark ducked out before I took the picture, but he was there really)

My lovely sister with some sweet glasses

** loves **

One of the murals on the wall of Claire's school...

..and another...

and of course we had to end the evening with a milkshake from Burgerville! and some pretty exciting ketchup, apparently!

Have a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday if I don’t post again until after that.  May your plates be filled with yummy food!

xoxo

Phew!  “I can’t wait for the weekend”, I exclaimed on Sunday evening after Claire had gone to bed… Oh wait, we just had one… It was a very busy weekend indeed for us, starting Saturday with volleyball.  Claire’s team played hard and won their game, which was good because they were so excited and it was fun to watch!  But bad because it meant we had to drive back out to Hillsboro the next day and do it all over again.  Yes, as bad as it sounds I was hoping for a loss on that afternoon, so that we could just get it all over with!  Tsk tsk…there goes my Mother of The Year award (

Here are some pics from the game, Claire had quite a fan club which she loves, thank you to everyone who made the drive to see her!  especially her Vancouver and Arlington family!

Claire with her Aunt Justine (who was a baby in diapers when I first met her, she has grown up to be quite an impressive young woman, and also an amazing volleyball player - it's clear to see where Claire gets her inspiration!)

This is Claire's little brother, Ryder, who loves his big sister! You should see his eyes light up and his dimples break out as soon as he sees her!

Then the rest of our Saturday afternoon was spent enjoying an end-of-season party for Mark’s soccer team.  It was a great evening of yummy homemade lasagna by Joshy, a nice warm fire that made the house a comfortable 80 degrees, beautiful pregnant ladies and adorable children.   We fell asleep with a happy buzz from the day, only to wake up in the middle of the night to the worst windstorm we’ve experienced since we moved in our new house last summer.  It’s the first time I can say that I was afraid, as an adult anyway.  We were all up for a few hours that night, well all of us except Veda because she could sleep through a herd of buffalo running through the living room with tap shoes on.  And apparently mother nature had other plans for the shed Mark was building, because this is what she did to it with her strong winds:

Looks like we'll be having a Shed Raising Party in the spring.. stay tuned for those details...

Claire’s team played again on Sunday and then we went to an end-of-season party for her.  It was such a fun season and her teammates were so gracious and sweet, along with their parents I really couldn’t have asked for a better experience for Claire’s first time out.  Thank you CYO!  Special thanks to Coach Lisa and her enviable patience and positive attitude, Claire is very excited for next year!

Finally,  a few pictures of our little Rudy, since he is so photogenic…

showing his dominance already? or just playing a rousing game of King of the ... Claire?

that's his tough man stance...cause he means business... or he just did his business and he's dang proud!

xoxo

Claire’s team fought a good fight tonight, but sadly did not walk away with a win.  So their next game is tomorrow night at 6pm at St. John the Baptist.

Wish her luck!  Oh, and her music concert got rescheduled to next week so she will be playing in Thursday’s game!

xoxo

Claire with her Auntie Andi (photo courtesy of Matt)

Claire has her last hoorah for the ’09 Volleyball season this week. For those of you who are able to make it, I am sure she would enjoy the love and cheers from the stands! She usually has a pretty good showing of fans at her games, I would like to thank all of you who were able to come and support her as she tried out this new endeavor! I believe she had a great time and will be doing more of it in her future. Although, she’s at the age where she changes her mind often – so I guess I’ll just have to keep you posted on that!

Here is the schedule for her 5 day end-of-season tournament, as much as we know at this point anyway:

Wednesday, November 18th at 7:15pm at St. Agatha in Sellwood (7960 SE 15th Ave, Portland).

Thursday, November 19th – TBA (she also has a music concert at her school so I will update the blog and let you know which one she’s choosing to attend!)

Friday – NEW MOON PREMIERES!!!!! (Oh wait, that’s MEEEEEEE going to that!)

Saturday – Game TBA

Sunday – Game TBA

I’ll update with information after the outcome of each game! Wish the girls luck!

xoxo

P.S. check out the above picture, yes they are both standing on the same level!! haha!! sorry Andi, I couldn’t help it! okay, to even it out I’ll post the fat-faced picture of myself from that day… have you ever not noticed you were getting chubby until you saw a picture of yourself and about DIED of embarassment!! *sigh* I’ve really gotta find where i put my self discipline, I misplaced it years ago!

as my Grandma would say, "eeeeeeeek!"

A week and a half ago we made the difficult decision to find a new home for Linus the beagle.  This was something we thought about over a few months, as he got older and bigger and was showing signs of needing more from us than we could give right now.  He loves to play, and run, and bark, and be a happy funny dog.  And our home and neighborhood and life schedule was just not working to his favor.  Linus is a great dog who has so much love for anyone who is nice to him.  We knew it wouldn’t be hard for him to adjust to a new family, but we were sad that we had let him down as owners.  I found a couple that I work with who were excited to bring him into their cat/dog/human family and so now Linus is thriving, on a farm, in Tillamook, near a creek, with many doggie friends including a Goldendoodle named Daisy Mae and a cat named Krusty.  He gets walks daily and plays for hours with his new mates.  And we can check in with him any time we want to.  It’s a good ending for his life with us and a promising beginning for his new life with a wonderful family.  Live long and prosper Linus!

But where does that leave us?  We were still determined to find a second dog, one that was smaller and needed less room to run and play.  One that could fit well with Charlie and the cats and wouldn’t outgrow the doggy door (Linus was getting close!).  A dog that would stay smaller than Charlie so he could still be the “top dog” of the house, because he is.  Claire and I had fallen in love with a little Yorkie dog that we pass by on Sandy, she sits in a window of a business and teases us almost everyday.  I started to search for a Yorkie mix, feeling like that would be the perfect dog to pair with Charlie, since he himself is a Terrier mix – they would have things in common!

And here, is what I found.  His name is Rudy Fernandez Ritchie, he is an 8 week old Chorkie (chihuahua mixed with a Yorkie), he probably won’t get any bigger than 7-8 pounds.  Welcome our new baby, isn’t he a doll!

xoxo

my sincerest apologies for being away so long, I will be back on the blog train very soon – in the meantime, here’s a little ear candy for your listening pleasure, my new favorite song…

I and Love and You

xoxo