Days with the Dorans

 Ali LOVED her Com Arts class and her teacher. I think if she had a different schedule, she'd be on a stage for acting. It's fun to watch our painfully shy Ali Jane, get on stage and speak out. I took a personal day on Friday and Jeff had finals so was able to get out and we joined my parents and watched her. You can see her short performance HERE . After we took her home so I got to see her locker where she STILL had her decorations from her birthday LAST MONTH. I love that some of her friends did this for her though. She can be so quiet and so hard to read but seeing this made me happy. Good job, Al! We loved watching you!

I'm proud to say that I've been doing a good job keeping my junk counter CLEAN and our dining room table (also a dumping ground usually for Jeff's music stuff") clean too. We try to do the "No Screens" stuff Monday through Thursday and the way I think we survive it (especially when the weather isn't great for being outside) is with game nights! Our current favorites are Bounce-Off, Garbage (a new game Al learned from friends at school) and of course... UNO! I just love the time where we are all around the table laughing and talking! I hope we always do this (Al obviously doesn't join us all the time because of dance). I also love that Joe taught Z how to play chess and Z taught Seany! Now if someone would teach me...

Ali's Dance Showcase is a night where the competition teams perform all their numbers for the season. It's a great night for dance, but all the solos make it VERY long (I almost wish they'd split it up somehow and do solos one day and groups another).  My folks, the Drapals, my Aunt Barb and Gary and of course all of us were there to cheer Al on but after her last performance, they all left. Ali was great and it is amazing how much she has grown in such a short time. Here are some pictures that were taken by a professional photographer (and dance mom). After the show, the girls were starving and it was late!! We headed to a little diner and they got one booth and us dance moms got our own. I love and adore how much these girls love each other and how well they get along. Ali was just saying how lucky she is that she gets to see her friends every day and it took me a moment to realize she was talking about her dance friends (none of whom go to ...

I don't know exactly when it happened, but as a teacher I see it all the time. Suddenly... they read! I am amazed at how much Sean loves books. His current fav is Dav Pilkey's Captain Underpants books~ not my favorite but it has him reading and laughing and LOVING books and that's all I want of all my kids. He takes them with him everywhere and is always taking a moment to share and laugh and read to us. The other day Sean said, "It's my favorite day... LIBRARY DAY!" That made my heart smile. Love this kid! Keep reading, my love!!

Ali tends to be a perfectionist and can get frustrated when things don't come easily... Thankfully she's worked hard and for her Viola BA she was able to upload a video. Here she is playing~ and yeah... a smile at the end! Way to go, Al!

 I was so excited to be at Hugh's Baptism! This year they were at a local church so all of us were able to go (easily). Huey was great! He didn't fuss at all and it was a nice service with a good message. After the baptism we headed back to Jodi and Randy's to celebrate!  Huey slept for a while while we ate, but he woke up happy and I had to get a picture of him in his adorable outfit before he got changed into play clothes. His grandparents were all there and his great grandpa too! Randy's brother and sister were there and a little later Jodi's brother, sister-in-law and niece came over. It was good to see them. We also celebrated Jack's second birthday. He was cute and definitely into opening the presents. He had a quiet audience for all his gifts and wanted to open them all.  I'm used to LOUD at the Doran house!  Of course the way toys are packaged, it isn't easy to get inside them. It was fun to watch Joey step in and help out. He'...

 After Stoning Day, Jeff and I were excited to go out without kiddos to celebrate our friend JoJo! We've had so much fun hanging out with her and Dave, Angie and Ty and Kurt and Eric. We usually have the kids (which is great because they all get along) but this was an adult evening!  We headed to The Root which was SOOOOOO yummy and we had so much fun that we closed the place down. It's nice having a teenager and 12 year old at home so we can head out without having my folks have to come over. Dave and Jeff have been hanging out a lot lately! They have been disc-golfing (we haven't had too much snow this winter) and also are playing their instruments quite regularly!  I think we all agree we have a blast when we get together and the goal is certainly to get together more! I can't wait for our next night out (or night in) with these awesome people!!

Stoning day was great this year! It went fast and I certainly have gotten better at it. Stoning Day is a day when every dancer at Al's dance studio has a representative come in and work on costumes. The point is to try to keep costs down (I've been told) by having add stones to the costumes ourselves. E6000 glue and a toothpick makes for a long and stinky day. This year I worked on the "Let it Go" costume which is Al's understudy piece. We started at 9am (I was there at 8:20 to set up) and we were done by 3 which was MUCH faster than last year. All the costumes looked great.  Al only had 2 out of her 3 costumes stoned and one (Chelsea's Jazz- Until we Go Down) only had the buttons on the skirt stoned. Her tap costume is super cute. Just regular jeans and this Love T-shirt with the word love in different languages. I think the little stones did make it look cute! While we were stoning, the girls were rehearsing. Al had a break and Stacy took the girl...

So what a year we had! There was much sadness in 2016... A lot of famous people I grew up with passed away~ George Michael, Prince, David Bowie and Carrie Fisher to name just a few! We also had that election which brought out a lot of ugliness. So I am very happy to see 2016 go but with it we got a lot of great things including new friends and new grades (for me too). It was hard to choose just 10 (and I actually chose 11). Honorable mentions go to: fun concerts, games, WMU Rowing the Boat, having a teenager, hair donations from me and Al, Jeff playing for Money at the Glengary Inn and all the great sports seasons the kids had. But I did pick the following top 10 (in no particular order except that last one...). To read in more detail, just click on the the number/ heading. 1. Singing to my Nana. I can't put into words what this moment meant to me. I think it may have been the highlight of the year. I have missed my Nana who has been stolen by dementia. We got a glimpse ...