Day 12.141: Mow a meadow?

This might be the weekend when I feel I have to cut the grass down the side of the house. It has survived the first two cuts of the season because I saw lots of bees feeding on the wildflowers and didn't have the heart to deprive them.

Day 12.140: More awards

Tonight was the turn of the Junior class to get their awards and Exile #3 received four subject awards including a Certificate of Excellence in Sociology, her Honor Roll award and a book award - quite the haul!

Here she is with one of her friends after the ceremony:

Day 12.139: Obsessive sorting fun

Exile #4 occasionally tips me off about a good smartphone time-waster. The latest one is particularly satisfying. The game starts strong with a Dad-joke type pun for a name, I Love Hue and consists of swapping coloured tiles until you recreate a smooth gradient fill that it was shuffled from.

What's particularly weird is how difficult it is to believe that the tiles you ended with are the same colored rectangles you started with - and even at the end that they are just uniform blocks of colour. Colour perception is very strange.

Day 12.138: Class of 2022

We were invited to school for our newest high-schooler to be awarded for making honor roll and for her achievement in Math and English. She also walked in her heels without incident:

Day 12.137: Marching with the band

This morning it was perfect weather for watching the Memorial Day parade - possibly a little hotter and sunnier than you might prefer for marching in a marching band. Exile #2 and I walked at the back with a few others distributing water whenever there was a break in the playing to keep the school marching band hydrated.

This was just before the parade started:

Here they are getting going:

By the time we crossed the river and headed down our own Main Street, the marching was getting a bit ragged, but the playing was gutsy and met with an appreciative audience:

And here they are in action towards the end of the parade:

Day 12.136: Exile #2's Sunday Column #249

Exile #2 writes...

The second of E5N1’s Peter Pan shows went off without a hitch, as far as we can tell, and the cast celebrated with a party afterwards. We are very grateful to Mrs N and all teachers who make these things possible.

Tomorrow, E5N1 will be playing with the also wonderful Mrs W and the school band in the Memorial Day parade. Exile #1 and I have offered to help with water supplies during the parade, and it sounds like it might be needed, as the switch seems to have flipped from winter to summer, largely bypassing spring. The parade route reverses each year, so I guess we’ll find out whether slogging up the hill is easier towards the beginning or the end of the parade. Either way, it’s going to be a long haul up the hill towards our town!

Day 12.135: A bit of graphic design

If dancing in five dances, assisting with a sixth and providing the choreography for a seventh wasn't enough, Exile #3 also designed the logo for this year's recital. It's the sixth year for the studio hence the theme:

I caught her - appropriately enough - between a dance class and E5N1's musical theater performance.

Day 12.134: Opening night

I present to you... E5N1 as Skunk in Peter Pan Jr.

The middle school kids including ours put on a great show:

Day 12.133: Show time!

Today I picked E5N1 up from his last after-school rehearsal for the school musical which has performances tomorrow and Saturday. He also brought his cast shirt home:

We're looking forward to seeing him perform tomorrow!

Day 12.132: A visit from phoebe

Welcome little phoebe:

but Exile #2 would respectfully ask for you to poop elsewhere than on the washing line - especially when there is washing on it.

Day 12.131: Attitude shot shot

...and here's the "making of" shot for the last photo of the day on Sunday - the group photo for the student dance company:

Day 12.130: Action shot shot

It seems that Exile #3's dancer photos will mostly be of her mid-jump this year. This may be the moment when one of them was taken:

Day 12.129: Exile #2's Sunday Column #248

Exile #2 writes...

What a weekend! Yesterday, Exile #3 had a long afternoon rehearsal for an evening dance show, followed by a late night of laser tag and a sleepover. She rolled home at some point this morning, and had a little time to recuperate before heading out to take some dance photos (always a sign that the dance year is coming to a close). Needless to say, she barely made it through dinner before heading off to bed.

Exile #4 had a slightly more relaxing day yesterday, after a hike she was expecting to go on was canceled. But she made up for it by hanging out with a friend.

E5N1 spent Friday night watching one friend play baseball, then spent much of yesterday celebrating another friend’s birthday. They had a blast at the local fun fair and then tore about in his friends’ backyard.

Exile #1 and I had slightly less fun but we did get done some of those jobs that you just have to fit in in the few months when things are not covered with snow. So now, the grass is short, some plants are in and our bulkhead door has a nice new shiny coat of Rustoleum.

Phew! See you next weekend?

Day 12.128: Last show before the show

It was the last dance of the season for Exile #3's dance company. All that remains is the end-of-year recital. This year, that will include a piece she choreographed for the rest of her Modern class - here they are performing it today:

It was a really great show, bringing together the professional company and some friends from the area as well as showcasing the student company's dancing and choreography.

Day 12.127: Eclectic

I happened upon this collection of pictures. I think they are all the album covers I tracked down to add to my iTunes music collection when the automatic search failed but I'm not entirely sure.

I'm sure it doesn't represent all the music we own or all the music we love - in fact I know there are some albums here that I would not choose to listen to today, but I like how varied and - in places - unusual it is!

Day 12.126: Another then-and-now triumph

This time the auto-generated combination was seemingly on the topic of "Exile #3 with weird colours on her face", for which it found these:

A photo with some odd green reflection from some summer foliage and a photo with a big bruise from her wisdom teeth removal!

Day 12.125: Maine in songs and pictures

The answer to Day 12.123's picture mystery is that it is a CD design (without the text) for our latest little musical project.

Eight songs about and inspired by specific places in Maine. The cover includes two pictures from each place - so you can play along again and see if you recognize them! Seven of the songs have been released before, but we have done new versions of them. One is brand new.

Day 12.124: Oil, oil!

I bought a new mower the other day - it had this sticker on the box.

The only other mention of oil were tags on the display model informing you that they needed to have oil added before use. Not unreasonably (I think) in the absence of any other mention of oil anywhere on the box or where I could find in a quick internet search, I bought some oil to put in it.

Of course, as I had suspected in the first place, there was a bottle of oil in the box.

I feel like they could have done a better job of letting me know that.

Day 12.123: Monochrome mystery

Can you guess what this is?

and why?

Day 12.122: Mother's Day

Maybe it wasn't the thorough spoiling that Exile #2 deserved this Mother's Day, but she did receive some artwork from the kids:

We had a very nice lunch after church at Empire Chinese Kitchen - where she had been wanting us to go since she had a meal there with friends a while ago:

and I gave her a Sunday off from writing a blog post - Happy Mother's Day!

Day 12.121: Spring is really springing

It was a yard-work day today - a dry weekend day with no major prior commitments (for the adults at least - for a while all three of the kids were out at different activities). We did some more raking of heavy wet and partially decomposing leaves and I cut the grass for the first time.

But look - growing plants and some spring flowers for the bees!

Day 12.120: Happy Friday!

Here's a short video about having long hair on a windy day!

Day 12.119: Donut Bird

Cambridge MA’s answer to Pizza Rat was Donut Bird.

Day 12.118: Spring Choral Concert

Tonight was our night to go to the choral concert. Both the girls are in the auditioned treble choir who opened the concert. Here is a still from the TV broadcast that you too can watch here: 2019 Spring Choral Concert on Livestream

We thoroughly enjoyed the Chamber Singers, which both the girls have successfully auditioned to join next year and finally, they were back for the full concert choir:

It was a wonderful evening!