Hello!
After writing this email on a relatively weekly basis since August 2007...almost 17 years, I have decided to embrace the direction I am clearly already headed, and scale this back to a monthly email. Sigh. I am clearly not excelling at documenting every week, and I can't come up with a good way to make it happen that I am actually sticking to, so I have made the intentional choice to get an email out monthly and we will see how that goes. So, with that, I present, drumroll please...April in the Leake home! Should be a good re-cap. :)
To start, April is the month I found myself so preoccupied, stressed, and spread so thin that I 1) completely dropped the ball on a couple of really important things 2) went grocery shopping and then 100% forgot to bring the groceries inside the house and realized this nine hours later, and 3) wore two different earrings for at least four maybe five days straight. Haha! Winning! So, clearly April was a month jam packed...we will see how I handle May! Haha! But in reality, April was filled with many good things, here they are...
*The conclusion of the spring dance competition season! I could shout from the rooftops how happy I am about this! Having two girls on competitive dance teams, and two different levels of teams has been next level. Rachel had four competitions, Gretchen had three competitions, and they were never at the same competition-haha! So, this meant seven weekends were completely consumed by dance for me and one of these girls. Obviously, the perk is that I just get to focus on whoever is dancing, and that is a whole lot of fun. Rachel's team wrapped things up two weekends ago at a highly competitive competition and convention in Provo. It was three days and we got a hotel in Provo for two nights and very much enjoyed ourselves in the mornings and evenings and in between was all dance. Rachel got a lot of good time in with her dance friends that weekend, for Saturday breakfast we met up with Sara and her mom and had a fantastic breakfast at Station 22 on Center Street in Provo-very good! And while the girls danced their little hearts out in master classes on Saturday, Meri and I went to the BYU Museum of Art and saw an exhibit featuring Brian Kershisnik, it was absolutely amazing, and we both left with a couple of prints, and then we went out to lunch by both reliving our college days, when we did not know each other, but both had an immense love for the Pita Pit, which is still there! This has been a big dance year for Rachel, and it is not over yet because nationals is in June, but it has been nice to get a little breather. Rachel has progressed a lot this year, and that has been fun to see. As always, super proud of her. Gretchen wrapped up her first competition season just this last weekend and her little team went out on a very high note! One of their dances, Shake Shake got a diamond ranking, took first, and won a judges choice award! Super proud of them! This dance is so fast, and they did such a good job! Their other dance, Girls, got a ruby ranking and took third, and Gretchen was able to go up and accept that award. Super proud of this darling Mini team. They are a mix of ages and skill levels, but they are the sweetest girls with each other and always have a great time when they are together. Gretchen has improved tons this year, and it has been fun to have a first row seat to that. She's got the longest legs! She is fully in on another year of competition dance. One other fun thing from this last weekend of dance is Hannah Irion was also at the same competition. I was able to visit with Katie for a bit and see one of Hannah's dances and Katie saw one of Gretchen's-so that was a real treat! And last dance thing, we also just wrapped up two days straight of dance pictures! Haha! These are no joke. Group pictures for every single dance, which means lots of costume changes, and girls wanting to take individual pictures in just about every single costume. And gone are the days of "stand in first position and smile" it's more like-let's see the most amazing thing you can do and we will give you 50 tries! Haha! This is an exaggeration, but still. Rachel and I were at the studio for four hours on Monday evening and thankfully, Gretchen's only took 90 minutes on Tuesday. But, despite all of this, I cannot wait to get their pictures back. Proud mama. :)
*BYU Cruise for Richard! That's right, Richard joined in on the first ever BYU cruise. Seven days and nights of living the dream. :) We got an email months and months ago from BYU about this, but the timing of it just was not good for our family, plus we had already booked our Disney cruise that we did at the beginning of this year, so we decided not to go. But, every couple of months, we would get another email with another list of all the famous BYU people who would be on the ship. By about the third email, Richard was dying to go. I told him to call his parents, convince them, and they should all go together. And that is exactly what happened! They flew to LA on April 10, and boarded the ship on April 11th. They made stops in Ensenada, Cabo San Lucas, and Puerto Vallarta. They visited Holdman Studios and did a walking food tour in Ensenada. Holdman Studios is the company the Church uses for the stained glass windows in the temples. They all loved it. And Richard was so kind and had a Holdman Studios replica of the stained glass windows in the Bountiful Temple shipped to me and my parents. It is beautiful. In Cabo, Bob and Becky did a whale watching excursion and had complete success and saw a lot! I was so happy for them. Richard, given his history with this type of thing, passed and just stayed on land in Cabo and did souvenir shopping. :) In Puerto Vallarta, they rented bikes and explored and ate some delicious tacos at Dona Engracia. So three fantastic ports, but their time also on the ship was amazing, and unlike any other cruise. BYU Family Feud, a Sunday morning devotional, sessions with athletes, amazing performances, a Cougarette concert, and even though this didn't apply to the Leake traveling party, BYU athletes past and present were running sports camps on the ship for kids-so cool! It was such a unique experience, and I am so glad it worked out for Richard to go and also spend all that time with his parents. Rumor has it, BYU is going to try and pull this off again with Royal Carribean in 2027 and we are so hopeful that all of us will be able to go.
*First ever Fun Run at Reading Elementary! Our lovely little elementary school in Wauwatosa did a Fun Run every fall as their one and only fundraiser. It was so fun and I am so glad we were able to participate in it for three years. When we moved, I vowed that I would one day organize something similar. Well, it only took nine years, but I have finally done it! Haha! My friend, Meri, roped me into joining the PTA for this current school year, so I told her I could do fundraising if I was allowed to do a fun run. She told me I was crazy, but to have at it! Ha! It did take last summer to get the principal and PTA on board, but we set a date for the fall, but then I broke my ankle, so we postponed it to the spring. April 16th was the day! I had a committee of three other women who helped me and we started working on it in January. Their help was invaluable! I was both nervous and excited on the morning of the 16th. I had high hopes, but I could also tell not everyone, parents and teachers, had not quite caught the vision I was hoping for. But, I am so happy, just so thrilled to report, that it went so well! We ran mostly on time, just had a few small little problems come up, but overall, it went 90% smoothly! The kids had a blast and ran awesome, which I totally knew they would, but I had some parents who really doubted me. So happy that they were proven wrong! And admitted it! And the teachers also loved it. Some were a little upset beforehand because of the conflict with end of year testing, but after all was said and done, I have not heard one complaint from a single teacher, but only positive things! Even my own girls ended up loving it. They were very skeptical leading up to it, especially Rachel, who did not love the idea of running/walking for 20 minutes-ha! But, she had a blast and asked me to do a fun run for the junior high next year. :) We just closed the donation page on Thursday evening and added up all the money. We were able to raise over $8,500!!! I am thrilled!
*Second grade fun. Grizz has had a fun month at school. The darling second graders tye dyed shirts, prepared for their Earth Day program, performed their program at two nursing homes and then again at the school for the parents. I was able to go and see Gretchen sing her cute little heart out at the school and she loved it. She is our little performer, and I love watching her. Then, just this last week, she got to wear her tye dyed shirt again for a field trip to the zoo. And I even joined in on this fun. Field trips are not my favorite, but I was with a great group of moms and the kids were awesome and it ended up being a very fun excursion. Gretchen was so happy I was there and she had so many of her friends in our group. We saw the most darling baby monkey, oh my, it was the cutest thing. We also saw the baby giraffe. And some incredibly active sea lions-they were a riot! Oh, also the red panda was highly entertaining! I am glad Gretchen wanted me to go, and I am very glad that I could! When not counting heads, I loved chatting with the moms, and the kids really were so well behaved.
*Prom for Marshall! Parenting teenagers is not for the faint of heart, and Prom weekend proved no different. Marshall was in a fantastic group of 12 for prom and those kids had a great time. I give a whole lot of credit to these six 15 and 16 year old boys who had to figure out their day activity, dinner plans, corsages, a photographer, buy tickets, and plan the after party, but they sure did a great job! They did their day activity a week and a half before prom. They went hiking in the hills of Centerville and then did Subway and Snelgroves for dinner and dessert. They had a great time. On the day of the dance, they started picking up their dates around 4:30 and then they all met up at Farmington Pond and someone's aunt took pictures. :) After pictures, they drove all the way up to Eden to have dinner at his friend's cabin. Oh my. When I heard this plan about a month ago I about lost my mind. The thought of Marshall and his friend Slater driving their group up to Eden and back down to Ogden about did me in. The boys had talked about renting a 15 passenger van, and having an adult drive, but none of them wanted to pay for it. When I heard this, I begged Marshall to let us rent a van and pay for all of it, and have Richard drive, but by that point, he could not be swayed! I even begged him the morning before prom, but to no avail. So, instead, I said a whole lot of prayers, and tracked his phone like a hawk as they made their way up and down those canyons. Thankfully, all went well for all the driving they had to do! Anyway, they had a great dinner served by Slater's parents and I am very grateful to them. After dinner they drove down to Ogden to The Monarch, the venue for prom this year. It was only 8:00 pm-10:00 pm and our house was the location for the after-party. I cannot tell you how relieved I was to have those 12 kids walk in our house at about 10:50 pm. They were laughing and talking and I was just so happy they were all in one piece! We had a bunch of food and drinks for them, and per our promise to Marshall, we made ourselves scarce! It was so fun to listen to them from upstairs and kids were playing the piano almost the entire time! And it was beautiful! They eventually made their way down to the movie room and couples started to leave between 12:00 and 12:30. When Marshall walked in the door at the end of the night I gave that handsome boy the biggest hug, and he even let me hug him.
*Track, track, and more track. Bridget is doing track with the junior high and rocking the hurdles! She has been able to do the hurdles in all three meets and has improved her time with each meet. She is so brave and focused and clears every hurdle with ease. I am so proud of her! The way the junior high track season works is everyone gets to run in 3 meets, and from those meets you qualify to go to the south end meet, and then you qualify for the district meet. Brdiget has been in the top 3 or 4 hurdlers this spring and because they get to take the top 5 to the south end meet, that is where she is headed this coming Tuesday! We sure are proud of our Tinies! Marshall has had a frustrating track season, muddled with PR's and then really challenging races. He has been doing a lot of racing though, despite his extreme frustrations and his current lack of any competitive feeling. Richard was able to go to his first meet of the spring and I was able to finally make it to one on Thursday. He ran the 1600 (not a PR), the 800 (got a PR) and the 4x400, and just had fun with that one. His current PR is 5:04 in the mile and it would do that boy a world of good to get under 5:00 before the season ends. Bless him. Our minds are powerful, and Marshall is a complex soul, but we sure are proud of him for sticking with it.
*Plunj! I have now been converted to the idea of cold plunging. I have been wanting to try this for months and in March Stacie, Audrey and I went to a fairly new location in Kaysville that has you alternate between the sauna and the cold plunge. We all loved it so much that we immediately found a day in April to go. We talked Lisa into joining us and the four of us had the best time! Seriously contemplating some sort of membership there. My left ankle is always swollen by the end of the day, to some degree, which my surgeon told me is normal and it will probably always be that way, but those days of the cold plunge do make a substantial difference! I have yet to convince Richard to experience the life-changing effects of Plunj, but if you are interested, let me know!
*Lagoon for Rachel! On the topic of courage and doing hard things, Rachel is now the owner of a Lagoon pass because of peer pressure. :) We had Lagoon passes for a couple of years, but we haven't had them for the last two and Rachel never got up enough courage to do anything more adventurous than the little Puff the Dragon roller coaster. :) Well, pretty much the entire 6th grade has Lagoon passes and Rachel spent many a night crying about this. She didn't want to be left out of Lagoon, and if she got a pass, she didn't want to feel left out because she hardly wants to ride any rides! But, this girl has been brave and we are so proud of her! We bought her a pass and she has now done two Saturdays at Lagoon with friends. The first day was opening day and it was cold and rainy, so she really wasn't there very long. She didn't do any new rides, but her sweet friend, Sara, stayed off any rides Rachel didn't want to do. Bless that sweet girl. However, Rachel spent hours there last Saturday and did ride the wooden roller coaster and did Rocket two times! She told me she might have passed out at the top of Rocket (ha!) but I am so proud of her for doing it. It will be fun to see what she is riding by the end of the summer!
*6th grade dance! Rachel had her 6th grade dance on Friday. She was beyond excited on Friday morning. She has been anticipating this day literally all year and in January she started dress shopping. :) We finally found a dress she loved a few weeks ago and she looked absolutely darling. The teachers have been teaching kids the line and partner dances every week since probably January and then the teachers created the dance cards and made dance partner assignments. Rachel got to dance with Beckham, her current crush/boyfriend of her 6th grade year, so she was super happy about that. :) I cannot believe she is almost done with elementary school.
*And last, but not least, Easter! I really appreciate the emphasis the leaders of the Church have asked us to put on Easter in very recent years-and they have also made it so easy for us! The week leading up to Easter was when Richard was on the cruise, but the kids and I had great Easter discussions each night and watched so many different Easter videos and the Church has put out through the years. We always do our Easter Bunny things on Saturday, but we did have to change that this year because Rachel and I were in Provo all day Saturday for dance. We had an amazing sacrament meeting on Easter Sunday. All of our kids participated in some way. Each young woman had spent weeks memorizing a small portion of The Living Christ and on Easter Sunday they recited the entire thing, each saying their own part. They also sang This Is the Christ, the young men sang Beautiful Savior and the cute primary sang Gethesmane. The rest of the meeting was other beautiful music and two perfect talks by primary children. We definitely enjoyed the rest of the day as a family and continued to focus on Jesus Christ and all He has done for us.
Okay, by golly, I think that is it. I recognize details are definitely getting left out with these "new" monthly emails, but writing something is definitely better than writing nothing! The kids are itching to be done with school. They are all trying to spend as much time with friends as possible. Richard and I are exhausted, but happy, and we are pretty darn good at getting everyone where they need and want to be. :) Sure love each of you!
Love,
Richard, Jenny, Marshall, Bridget, Rachel and Gretchen :)
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