Well, the summer has been extremely busy at the Janssen house. I find the date of the last post staring me in the face and realize it’s been a long busy summer. I’ll try and do just a quick recap, to bring everyone up to speed and then hopefully things will slow down enough this fall to stay on top of posts here.
Summer Baseball – Tom and Jac finished off another successful year of “T-Ball”. They enjoyed it all and it was wonderful to watch them develop their skills. They are already looking forward to next year. Robert had a season of making progress as well. At the beginning of the season he struggled a little at the plate, but managed to maintain a high batting average through the beginning of the summer. Then the coaches came up with the idea of having Robert bunt. He quickly became the bunting specialist on the team and actually got very good at it. I missed a few games but heard all the stories of the “perfect” bunts, and then got to witness them towards the end of the season. He really became good at what he was asked to do and we were so proud of him.
Job Transition – I’ve been making the transition into my new Principal position and have it’s actually been pretty smooth. The people I work with are so wonderful in helping me learn the “ropes” of my new job. It’s been a wonderful (and learning) experience so far, and I’m thinking that things will just continue to get better.
Losses – The biggest story of the summer has been in losses to the family. Most people that read these words are probably already aware of the situations, but we’ll give a brief overcap anyway. We started off June with a phone call in the early morning hours that Jo’s brother had been involved in a swimming pool accident and was being life flighted to St. Louis. Unfortunately he did not pull through, and we’ve had to adjust to life without “Uncle Buddy”. It was such a shock to everyone involved and adjustment has been difficult. However, I think it did actually make the other loss of the summer a little easier for the kids anyway. When Jo’s grandpa passed away the end of July, it was still a great loss, but I think at least the kids handled it a little better than they would have as they knew the “routine” so to speak after going through it with Alvie. There were still a lot of emotions, but as far as the routine, they knew what was happening.
Scout Camp – The boys again attended Cub Scout Day Camp (Robert for the last time) and loved it. Thomas managed to get awarded the “Camp Archer” of the week for having the highest archery score all week and then went on to get the Marksman award for his den (group of kids his age). Way to go Thomas! Thomas also survived staying overnight with the “big boys” since I was staying with Robert. We camped out in the tent and all went well.
Fat Steer Show – The last hurah of summer as usual was the Avon Fat Steer Show. The first night of scrambles was great as Thomas and Jaclyn both caught a chicken and Robert did manage to get a pig in his heat. It was a tough struggle, but he got it accomplished. Jaclyn managed to win the girls division of her age group in the peddal tractor pull. Robert became the first annual winner of the Photography Sweepstakes award by achieving the highest point total with 5 or more entries. The show also went very smooth (which was a blessing with Chris as Vice President of the Businessmen’s Association that puts on the show).
That has pretty much been our summer in a nutshell. Due to the circumstances we’ve got to see a lot of folks we don’t normally see very often and that has been a blessing through the tragedies. We’ve also got to spend time with those we do normally see (living at the ball park together). Overall it’s been an extrememly busy summer, and tragic summer, but also filled with highlights.