Sometime back in November or December, Sarah told me she was going to get to be in the school spelling bee. It is a funny story how she got to go to the school spelling bee. The classes all have their own "bee"s to pick the students who will get to do the school bee. Sarah actually missed a word in the class bee and was eliminated towards the end, until the final person missed the word. Her teacher asked if anyone in the class knew how to spell the word. The word was 'whittle'. Sarah laughed to herself and raised her hand and spelled it perfectly. When she came home to tell me she was laughing while she was telling me and I didn't understand why. Then she reminded me of our Deep Thoughts book we love to read, including this one: "I remember how my great-uncle Jerry would sit on the porch and whittle all day long. Once he whittled me a toy boat out of a larger toy boat I had. It was almost as good as the first one, except now it had bumpy whittle marks all over it. And no paint, because he had whittled off the paint." We laughed so hard when we realized that Deep Thoughts helped further Sarah's education and offered her a chance to be in the school spelling bee! Thank you Jack Handy! Ha!
We got a list of the possible words - I think it was around 400 words, I don't remember. We studied every one and made cards for the ones she didn't know. On the last row there were words I had to look up because I hadn't even heard of them. Some of them were:
xanthic,
orthographize, incendiary, virulently, nebulosity,
doughtily, euphonious, etc. Then there were ones I had heard of, but would need spell check to help me with, like: froufrou, grotesqueness, lackadaisical, elucidate, silhouette, roux, etc. There were funny ones too like:
zigzaggedness, uvula, yahoo, crepuscular, ululate,
flammeous, etc. As I studied for hours with Sarah (using small piece of dark chocolate as a treat every time we
practiced 20 words), I realized that she really has a talent for retaining knowledge. (**funny side note: I always spell check my posts and five of the words above, my spell check doesn't even recognize.) She's always done very well at spelling, but just learns things very quickly and remembers them. I do not have this skill - I have to work harder to remember things. As we started studying, my goal was to help Sarah be familiar enough to make it through the first couple rounds so she could have a positive experience. As we studied, I realized that if we had started sooner, she probably could have had every word spelling memorized. We still worked very hard and she knew probably 85% of the words solid. We had fun spending that extra time together - looking up words and talking about meanings to help her remember and be familiar with them. We came up with some tricks to remember certain words and had some good bonding over practicing these words. I hope she will remember it as a fun time, though it was hard work too. I went to watch and support her that day and couldn't believe how nervous I was. I just wanted her to make it through the first two rounds. I sat by another nervous mom and we laughed at ourselves. I
texted Bobby* constantly since he couldn't be there and was nervous too. Sarah was on the last row, so it was a while before her turn came. It was so fun to make eye contact with her frequently as we heard all the familiar words read aloud. So many of them we had inside jokes with our silly ways to remember spellings. It made it fun and we laughed to ourselves when we looked at each other. Finally her first turn came. Her word was "feud" and she spelled it without a hitch. I was so glad she wouldn't have to be sad about getting out the first round. Most of the kids did. Second round, Sarah's word was "counterclockwise" by far one of the hardest of the second round in terms of length. It was an easy one to mess up because of nerves and the number of letters. She kept calm and spelled it just right. I was so happy and relaxed quite a bit after that. She could be proud of making it through two rounds. The third round was brutal. A third of the kids missed their words. Sarah's word was "
kanji" - not a hard one if you practiced. This was the round where it really showed who studied and worked hard. I was thrilled as I
texted Bobby* that she had sailed through the third round. I also had to text my friend Kim. Her daughter, one of Sarah's very best friends, won the DISTRICT spelling bee in Texas. I knew she'd understand the nerves and excitement of a spelling bee. (o: The next round was a strange one. There were about 10 kids left and every single one missed their word! Sarah missed "chaperonage". But they all got a second chance - lucky for Sarah. Only she and one other girl spelled their next words right. Sarah's word was "phalanx". She was in the final two with a sixth grader. And funny thing - the other girl's mom was the one sitting right next to me! Unfortunately, Sarah missed her next word "virulently" and the other girl got her word right, so that was that. Sarah was second place! I couldn't believe how far she went!
She secretly told me she would be so excited if the other girl got sick and couldn't go to the district bee. (o: But she was very excited to have done so well and wasn't too disappointed to take second. The neat thing for her was that now she was getting to be known in the school, not as the new girl from Oregon, but as the second place winner of the spelling bee! Her class cheered for her when she got back to class and her teacher was so excited for her. For a few days, she was a celebrity at school and kids in several grades would say, "hey you're the one came in 2
nd place at the spelling bee". She can't wait to go for it next year! Way to go Sarah!! We are so proud of you!!
We get to do fun things in Utah, like celebrate family birthdays now! My nephew, Danny, turned five this year and we had a fun time at Trafalga with the family. It had a cool glow in the dark mini golf course. 
The kids and Harvey* also got to play some arcades and hit the jackpot at one of the games. They won hundreds of tickets and bought some silly crayon banks with their winnings. I was not thrilled - I hate those dumb cheap toys, but the girls were so excited. 
Cute Danny - this kid is going to follow in his daddy's footsteps. We have so many "Andy" stories of when my brother was growing up. He almost killed himself, burned the house down, did major damage to things so many times. They make for great stories now and we laugh our heads off. Now Andy is a police officer. (o: Who knew? Ha! Danny is very bright and has more energy than any kid I've ever known. "No fear" is his motto. Or maybe "140%" I can't wait to see where he ends up. General authority in the church, lawyer, rocket scientist . . . I love this cute kid. Life would be a bore without him in our family. 
And little Sammy - he's the quiet one, for now. Isn't he adorable?
My new calling in our ward is to be the 10 year old Activity Day leader. We have lots of girls in our ward so there is a group of girls for every age between 8 and 11. I was excited to get to be with Sarah's age group. This picture was taken at my first activity with the girls. They are spunky and definitely not boring! Natalie is our honorary member until she turns 8 this spring and gets to go with her own group. (She is soooo excited - you get to start going when you turn 8.) As it turns out, Angela's dance class is at the exact same time as activity days, which works out good, although sometimes she wishes she could come too. My girls are from left to right, top to bottom: Nicole, Sarah, Sunshine, Kaitlyn, Natalie, McKayla, Sierra and Mandy. Great girls. They are always excited and happy to participate in all the activities. In fact, they are VERY enthusiastic about everything. I love it! (o: We have a good time, though sometimes I have a little bit of a headache by the time we're done!