Robert's singing debut

Robert has been in the children's choir at church for a year now, and Mary, the choir director, suggested when the summer started that he and I should cantor a Mass together.

I wasn't quite sure he was ready, and I couldn't really get Robert to practice music with me. But during the school year we also have a weekly prayer service before religious ed starts, and since those are geared toward the kids, it's all stuff the kids know, including Robert. So he stood up there with me, with his own microphone, and sang.

Once I knew he had it handled, I just tried to stay out of the way and let him do his thing. He did great!

I hear through the grapevine that Cate was beaming with pride. Robert also said he got plenty of compliments.

An Easter Story

At the breakfast table, Colleen tells a story to Amelia ---

Once upon a time in a galaxy far away, Jesus was coming to town and everybody was there saying "Yay! Yay! You rock!" and Jesus was tired so they gave him a donkey. He was riding the donkey and there were kids there and they said "Hoshana!" And Jesus said "I'm the King of Peace!" Then they had dinner and Jesus got in trouble with the police and they arrested him and threw him in jail. And they lived happily ever after - except then he died. But that's okay because he came back on Easter morning. But then he went away again. It's all very confusing. The End.

Amelia clapped and said "Yay! Yay!"

Presenting the two-time champ

Cate has done it again. The defending St. Thomas the Apostle jello creation champion pulled off the repeat.

Last year, granted, the title was as much a result of Robert's charm as anything else. It was a wedding cake that fell apart and got rebranded as a volcano. This year, we made one entry, and made it work. You can see at left here, Robert defending the Colemans' jello entry from the grazers.

These are not Dots. These are jello dots -- several different colors of jello molded in tiny ice cube trays. In the end, a fairly simple result, but clever and time-consuming, including the precision with which the molds were poured.

Watching Cate pour a lot of work into this (and a lot of jello) this afternoon, and stress out over it, I was ecstatic to find out that "we" had won.

Wednesday night is church night for us, starting with Robert's children's choir practice at 5:30, followed by a community meal, a prayer service and religious ed classes. While the kids and Cate (who assists the kindergarten class) are in class, I'm in church choir rehearsal. When Cate and the kids came into the church to wait for us to finish, I motioned for Robert to come up and sit next to me so I could ask him who won.

It was a close vote, apparently. But not in my mind. Best dish, hands down.

Cate also prepared her grandmother's seafoam salad, which is a green jello whipped with cream cheese and pears, layered. Surely not doing the concept justice. (And Cate wasn't blown away by the imprecision of the family recipe card handed down, either!)

The other part of jello night is playing Bingo, and the parish has these vintage cards from the 1950s. This year, Colleen put her reading skills to the test for a while, playing one card. For most of the two-digit numbers, one of us would have to translate, but she enjoyed it enough to keep playing for three or four rounds before losing interest.

Party weekend

Last weekend was a pretty busy one in the Coleman household, as we celebrated Colleen's fourth birthday party, Elizabeth made her First Communion and Robert had his first-ever T-ball practice.

Saturday was a beautiful day to be outdoors, so we tried to make the most of it.

The weekend hadn't started off so hot, however. I tried to take the new grill that we bought Mom for her birthday and Mother's Day out for a test drive, and, lo and behold, the Weber grill caught on fire. Spent a couple hours Friday night at Home Depot and on the phone with Weber, so I was less than happy. Thankfully, our neighbors let us borrow theirs for Saturday cooking.

Colleen's aunt and uncles and godmother and family came over Saturday afternoon for cake and presents and the fruits of the grill and we had a great time. Nonna made Colleen the traditional doll-in-a-cake cake, similar to what she made for Elizabeth's third birthday when we were here for Thanksgiving in 2000.

Colleen got a great set of clothes, a kickball for backyard playing, a tricycle (honest-to-goodness red metal trike with assembly required and everything), books and Wii paraphernalia. Too often Colleen has been forced to play a spectator role while the older two play, but now she has her own Wii controller.

On Sunday, Elizabeth made her First Communion, part of a gigantic class at St. Thomas the Apostle, 60-some kids split over six Masses. We've been doing her preparation work ourselves so she didn't have to sit in a class full of 7- and 8-year-olds, and that was an interesting experience. I'll be glad when Robert goes through the class with everyone else and we just get to sit back and smile.

And Robert had his first T-ball practice. Today they actually played their first "game" -- you know, the one where everyone bats, they play about three innings, there's a minimum number of outs, everyone changes positions, coaches stand in the field. Mostly a lot of hitting and running, sometimes throwing the ball in the general direction of first base.

Robert got a new glove for the occasion (don't ask whose signature is on it, though at least Derek Jeter hasn't tested positive yet), but we drew the line at cleats. There are a couple kids on the team who wear them, though, one who has his own baseball pants.

And this morning, everyone had a coat. Brr.

Breaking the mold

Robert's wedding cake turned into a disaster, but when rebranded as a "lone volcano," it ended up winning first prize.

Sadly, Patrick didn't take a picture of it because he was so crestfallen and he didn't want to remind him that it wasn't what he was hoping. You can see it off to the right of the white rabbit with the spooky eyes.

Robert's was a too-tall jello mold (three tier). We think our jello wasn't sturdy enough for the height. And Robert carried it on the plate for a while so it got extra jiggled. It sort of melted/fell over. He was very upset and then was very surprised when they announced his name about a half hour later.

He was even more surprised when he found out there was an actual prize (a clip-on pen). He said, "I thought I just won but really there's a prize too!!!"

We think his natural charm had a lot to do with it. Teenage girls (in charge of the tallying) love him.

We might work with the jiggler recipe next year. Elizabeth's design held together better with the sturdier jello.

This was a Pizza/Jello/Bingo Night at church. Not sure how such a tradition got started but the Bingo cards were circa 1955. I was shuddering at the idea of kids with sticky jello fingers (you get to share the jello creations for dessert) playing bingo with those vintage cards.

Oh the Blessed Competition

Shall I set the scene? Three kids in the back seat. One worn-out driver/mom. All slightly irritated. Colleen sings and nearly starts a riot...

"Oh the Blessed Gospel,
Oh the Blessed Gospel,
It shall be mine.
I will labor for it.
I will labor for it.
It shall be mine"

Robert picks up the tune and when he gets to "it shall be mine" Colleen shouts "No, Robert! It shall be MINE." Elizabeth can't let that go, of course, and starts to sing "it shall be mine." Robert: "No! Mine." Colleen: "No! It shall be mine!" And so on and so forth.

Mom: "Urgh!"

Yikes. Good thing they were all strapped down and couldn't do damage to each other.

On the plus side, the kids are really getting settled into the St. Thomas the Apostle community. Robert will be in the Christmas pageant and is waiting patiently until he can join the Children's Choir (has to be in second grade).

Being a godfather

Neil and Alicia's daughter Amelia was baptized today in a nice ceremony after Mass at St. Thomas the Apostle. It was nice because she was the only one being baptized and while Elizabeth was one of a group of six when it was her turn, apparently St. Thomas has baptized as many as 12 at a time.

So Amelia got all the attention from Fr. Steve, just like Colleen did when he baptized her three years ago.

I don't wax poetic about my beliefs and Neil even less so. But everyone had a good time. Robert really enjoyed being put "in charge" of Da's camera and delivered some great pictures.

So in the end, I don't have much to tell you that actually goes with the title of this blog post. I guess I'll figure that out in the years to come.