Monday was Lincoln Night at Pizza Hut so we took the kids out to dinner and have the teachers serve us. Friday night Beth went to the rehearsal dinner for Katie's wedding and stayed to decorate, so she was gone until late late while I led the small group by myself (she's better at that than I am). I missed a reunion of sorts, Ray and Toni formerly from work were both in town and the entire vitamin E team had a celebration dinner to recognize our patent. Yes, I am an inventor and patent holder now. Well, co-inventor, as something like 6 of us are named on the patent. It finally went through recently after 5 years in review. Anyway, Katie's wedding was Saturday, and it was very beautiful. Beth sang, but the audio wasn't very good, so nobody could tell that she messed up some words (wouldn't have been able to tell anyway) because you couldn't hear her at all. But overall it was very nice. That's 3 of our old babysitters now married. Beth stayed late to help with cleanup after the reception/dinner...few people did...so she was out really late again while I took the kids home to get them to bed. It was such a late night we missed church this morning. Oh yeah, and the trampoline was delivered this week and I have gotten it assembled. The kids are pretty excited about it.

I do not feel good.
It was a good enough week leading up to this, with Alex's birthday on Monday (and the big reveal that we're getting the kids a trampoline), playing kickball (they always drive me crazy when we play kickball) with the Cub Scouts, taking the afternoon off on Thursday to go geocaching up near North Webster (bushwacking through Epworth Forest...perfect day...no bugs, no humidity, not too hot, no undergrowth. I found myself on the wrong side of the water twice, but a long hike got me there eventually. 2 finds.), then lunch on Friday did NOT agree with me. I assume, anyway. By the time I went home I could only crawl into bed because I was so nauseous. The carnival at the kids' school was Friday night, but I stayed home throwing up. The barfing lasted pretty much all night. When lunch was gone, I dry heaved or threw up water. Beth took the kids to swimming Saturday morning and on some errands and to a friend's birthday party while I recovered enough to eat some chicken noodle soup and Gatorade. I never got chills or fever, so I'm pretty sure it was something I ate, and I did make it back to church Sunday, which was good since Alex's birthday party was today at Science Central in Fort Wayne. We took 6 kids to FW (Missy was with her friend Abby O all day instead of going) in the afternoon and got the party room for an hour after they ran around for a while. They got to make baking soda volcanoes and had cupcakes, but I think their favorite part was playing Pokemon on Alex's DS in the truck on the way over. Anyway, I was glad to get it over with and I still don't feel great.

NCAA tournament time! My annual swag at the final four: champion Kentucky, Florida State, Kansas, and (1-seed, yay) Michigan State.

It has been a week largely about Cub Scouts. Monday night I was over at the church helping to set up the pinewood derby track. The weather has been so nice lately that Tuesday when we met we just went outside to play, which seemed fine with them all. Wednesday was another skate night with Kids Klub, and the kids did fine this time, no falls or anything. Friday was Scout night with the Komets; it was a late game (8:00) but several people came out for it. We were supposed to have small group at our house that night so Beth stayed home to lead it, and I took the kids to a hockey game. The Komets played dead vs. Evansville and were down 0-3 after the 1st, but tied it up by the end of the 2nd, and wound up going to overtime and a shootout, but lost. Missy ate too much ice cream (it wasn't very good stuff) at the Coliseum and we missed most of the shootout heading out to get her and her tummy ache home. We got home around midnight. I had been hoping not to go to overtime for just that reason. Anyway, the next morning was swimming lessons but Alex was too tired and we left him home (Missy enjoys it too much to skip it). After getting home, I headed out again to help get the pinewood derby track finished up and set with the computer and electronic timer. I forgot to bring my car of death that I've been trying to get to work for 2 years but Beth went and grabbed it. Unlike last year, Alex had great success with his car (Silver Streak) and took second place overall in the pack. And I learned a few tricks to use next year. Today, Beth and I took him to Wal-Mart to do some shopping for his birthday tomorrow. Nine years old...how did that happen? Anyway, we got him some Lego Ninjago stuff, Pokemon stuff, Mario stuff...the usual.

Missy had her G/T test this morning. She started getting nervous about it yesterday, and by this morning she was in tears by the time we left. Alex had swim lessons so I was at the Y with him but when I picked her up, the teacher (same as Alex's) came out with the kids and told me that she calmed right down when things started and she was fine. Either outcome will be fine with us, and with her as well, really...she will have friends in whichever class she winds up in. I'm not sure how we're going to deal with 2 kids in the G/T class...one is hard enough...kidding...sorta. This past week feels like we've just been swamped. I had no idea what to do with the Cub Scouts until Monday evening (we practiced the flag ceremony, which they all needed to do badly), and I for some reason agreed to do a science-y demonstration for the kids in Kids Klub Wednesday evening (I built a trebuchet and got some liquid nitrogen, and was going to do the Diet-Coke-and-Mentos thing but we ran out of time. I was with an elder who is also a chemist...he did some demonstrations on density and miscibility of different liquids...a bit dry, but mine had more gee-whiz factor to make up for it. And I've been working on Alex's and my pinewood derby cars for that coming up next weekend: I'm making another attempt at the car of death (that didn't quite work in 2010) and sanding Alex's car.