She’s plucky!

Johanna and I NEEDED to be somewhere.
Tab finished her work and wanted the car, which was in the parking lot at Hobby Lobby where Marie was working.  The plan was I would drop Tabitha there for the vehicle so she could go do things.

But TRafFiC!

And it would have taken me 10-12 minutes that I did NOT have to get through the intersection, into the parking lot, out of the parking lot, and through the intersection AGAIN.

So – I half-joked, “Could you just hop out and walk the rest of the way?  We are going to be late as it is.”

And she did. 

 

 

Photos for a senior

My friend Catalina met us in Greer early in the morning to take senior pictures for Tabitha.  It was a lot of fun.  I can’t wait to see what she comes up with!

  

80’s Dance–Hope Co-Op

I have the photos that I have because of friends who sent me pictures.  The blog has suffered the last few months as I found that my iPhone was storing photos in formats that are incompatible with blogging. 

Johanna was able to attend her first co-op dance.  This photo was sent by Taylor’s mom.

Johanna is seemingly following in her sisters’ footsteps… she appears to have more dude friends than female friends!

Meanwhile, Melody, Tabitha, and Emily got decked out for their last thematic high school dance.

 

 

Table Rock

Three plus months later what I want to remember is that I survived this hike…

It started with a group of co-op seniors making a plan to do a hike at a park in the upstate.  I was asked to be a chaperone by the sweet student coordinating the hike.  This seemed wholly reasonable, as I love doing the things my kids do, and I have a van large enough to move groups easily.

Early that morning, Tab headed out in her own vehicle to pick up her friend Daniel who was going to join the seniors (he graduated from the co-op last year).  I went to multiple stops to pick up other students.  We waited for the kids coming from the west side, and we started our hike around 8AM.

I had zero idea what I had agreed to.  None whatsoever.  I had no idea it would be like 5 miles up and 5 miles back down.  It took 5+ hours and I don’t know HOW I finished it.

 

 

At this point I rested and checked in on Instagram only to see most of the kids were already at the top.  Like an hour later I finally got there!

Tab made it up in the group before me. 

 

One of the students was kind enough to hang back with me as we made our way down.  As I grabbed on to every rock along the way down, he nimbly looked at his phone the whole time he descended the mountain.

Live and learn.

It was no joke.

BUT I DID IT!  At 51 years old!

Newly licensed Tabitha!

These are the requisite photos of our newest driver!

Watch out world.  She’s going places!

School’s done lunch

After Johanna, Katriel, and I went to a library field trip, we picked up Marie and Tab and headed to a local Mexican restaurant Tab had been to with friends.

It was incredible.

My only regret is that I  had forgotten how I lost my appetite a month or so ago and my brain rarely remembers.

May the 4th

The balloons are still up from Tab’s birthday party.  So we made good use of them.

It was Marie’s last day of her freshman year.

And we are getting serious about Tabitha clocking in driving.  We hope she has her license by the end of summer.

Out of practice for a party, and other wacky stuff.

I suggested to Tabitha she have a birthday party this year.  She hasn’t had a party since she was 10.  And between Covid and moving she has done pretty close to nothing the last three years.  She hesitated. That would mean revealing the time of year she has a birthday… but in the end her friend Melody and I were able to convince her it would be fun. 

 

 

So we did what all normal people do – we vacuumed the back patio.
Now – to be clear – we’ve had very few gatherings since moving in here.
And to say we needed to scale back is putting it mildly.

There would be none of this:

’

or this:

or this:

or this:

 

LORD have mercy, I miss my yard, driveway, and private property!

 

What did have was this:

Which made this:

It only took Melody, Johanna, and I three hours to assemble.

A friend brought lights.

And we borrowed ladder ball and corn hole.  And Melody had a fog machine, and they made a dance floor. 

And some kids had fun loud fun, and some seemed quieter. 

Prom 2023…

A/K/A Thank-God-that-is-behind-us!

 

I simultaneously want to tell the whole story for history’s sake and also want to just put it all behind us all…..  Immuna go with just the facts…

 

Tabitha went to the prom solo.  A lovely young man did invite her to the prom back in March. She thought it would be best to decline his thoughtful invitation as it may have been the breeding ground for rumors, something she has had front row seat in learning how to navigate this winter. 

We went looking for a dress in the mall when Nan was here, and couldn’t seem to find just the right one.  Though we had gone in looking for purple, she left the store with red on her mind.  Lo and behold, a quick peek at JCPenney.com found exactly the right dress for my elegant daughter.

That morning, on the way home from CBS, the little girls and I stopped by Claire’s boutique to procure a crown.  Seriously.  This girl had earned the freaking crown this year. 

I flexed my parallel parking skills with my 12-passenger van in downtown Greenville and we headed to Falls Park to find some of her friends who were going to be meeting there.

We caught up with some of the ladies and gentlemen and they waited their turn for photos by the fireplace.

Tab headed to dinner with her friends, and I followed a bit later just to be on call as a driver. 

They had some food at Gather Greenville and had some fun upstairs,

and I grabbed a Coke and chatted with some other parents on the lower level.

I left before they did, confident Tab was in good hands (and henceforth I do not have any photographic evidence of 8 of them riding in a Ford Escape from the food to the venue.)

At that point, I sat in the parking lot of the venue for the next three hours.  Not going to lie, we weren’t 100% sure who might want to be done with the prom when.  It hasn’t been a drama-free semester, and there was no telling which way things would go.  And I am now a card carrying Mama Bear.  God saw fit to have another mom stop by my van and we talked for well over an hour.  It was such a blessing of a conversation!

 

When it was time that parents were welcome into the building, I could see Tab and her friend doing the photo booth.  Tabitha was not Nathan’s date; he just happened to be wearing a red tie.  They spent the first half of the evening correcting people and the second half not giving a hoot what people thought. 

After the prom was over the kids spent an unbelievable amount of time figuring out where they were going to head.   A fair number of them headed out in the party truck, but I had given Tabitha  red light on that the day before. 

Lemmetellyousomething.  These kids – who walk around with communications devices our parents only dreamed about have zero ability to hammer down plans!!!

I drove Tabitha and Jay to Cook Out, and while the kids socialized, I visited with another mom who was chauffeuring her daughter.

Cook Out closed, and I drove Jay to meet up with her mom who was with another group at a Waffle House.  When we got to Waffle House, the plan was that Tab and I would then head home.  But as Tabitha walked Jay in, one of the moms I had been talking to at the prom waved me in… and I did something crazy and got out of the van and had myself a seat.

And now I can say I hung out in a Waffle House after midnight.