Second quarter

 Second quarter was packed full of stuff. Make a Difference Day was the first Saturday back at school and it was mostly my job to get everything bought and ready for it. It came together well and we got a ton of stuff done at the school. Including a ton of gravel spread where they've been wanting it for a couple years.

Trunk or Treat was the following week and came together smoothly. Jacob had to take Ryan to his basketball game, and Rachel was at a football game for marching band, and Annie wanted to stay home and have full control of the remote, so Megan caught a ride with the Sanders since I was already at the school helping set up. 

The following night was our ward trunk or treat. Megan was a crazy pet lady (like a crazy cat lady), Rachel was Alex from Minecraft, Annie was Shaun the Sheep and Ryan was a robber.

Halloween was a success. Soooooo much candy.

Rachel and I took a trip to Goodwill for some pants. She found her long lost trophy.

Annie wouldn't ride her bike to school before fall break because it was too hot, but she said after fall break she would ride it more. I think she rode once, maybe twice, with Zula and Hayley. Then it got too cold. Or she got too lazy. 

Annie decided she wanted to do a craft day with little kids to earn some money for Christmas presents (one of her love languages is gift giving and she really thinks about and plans out what each person would really like). So she came up with an idea of doing a craft and a turkey cupcake, made a flier to advertise, and I sent it out to our ward and friends on Facebook. 

She got 4 kids to sign up, plus Ryan, so she earned $25 in an hour and everyone had a lot of fun.

With trek coming up in February, we had the trek kickoff in September. I dressed up in pioneer clothes to help set the mood with some of the other stake leaders.

Rachel and I are working on getting more exercise in preparation for trek.

The week before and the week after Thanksgiving were both concert weeks. Rachel's concert band had a concert first.

Then the Rita Ranch Performing Arts group had their concert (a combination of kids from the 3 Rita Ranch elementary schools). Megan sang in the choir this year, and Ryan was in band. I helped with the field trip that morning to keep kids in line while everyone figured out their places and was able to snag some pictures from closer up. That night at the concert we were way at the back, so pictures were less effective.

Annie's band was after Thanksgiving. Annie won the band award for excellence for the 2nd quarter and was selected to participate in the Middle School Honor Band in January. She's well on her way to becoming a band nerd.

We had a girls night out to go see the middle school play. Megan was happy to have the Palmers there to have someone to hang out with close to her age.

I helped arrange for some smaller band ensembles from Cienega to come to Desert Willow and play during lunch. The kids enjoyed the music.

With the PTA I've also been helping arrange to have this turf installed for the new inclusive playground we're working on. The kids loved getting to play on it after it was installed.

Just like we had a better monsoon season than normal, our winter rainy season has been more active and started earlier than normal. The crazy kids went out to play in the rain even though it was a cold rain, unlike the summer rains. They came back soaked and in need of dry clothes and hot chocolate.

Megan was invited to her friend Kaylee's birthday party at Jump. It's good to have good friends.

Rachel got sick with a fever a week after Thanksgiving and we finally took her in to urgent care on Sunday morning and it turns out she had a kidney infection. It took her a couple days to recover after getting medicine, but she managed to get back to school and finish the semester strong despite missing several days. She should be a doctor's office model. :) 

I was so excited to get our new Murphy Bed that we ordered, but it turned into a mess that lasted a lot longer than I would have liked because we were just too busy and never home long enough to make progress on putting it together. A couple weeks later I finally managed to finish it. And I love it so much. Both the desk and the bed pack up neatly, but come out easily when needed.

The last week of school before break was insanely busy. Starting Tuesday afternoon I had something planned pretty much all the time until Friday night. In addition to the Holiday Store all week at Desert Willow, we had Rachel's Fine Arts Showcase, and Kayla's baptism (a new member of our ward), Cookies with Santa, a crockpot lunch for Desert Willow teachers, a crockpot lunch for Cienega teachers, the middle school awards assembly, helping with Megan's class party, helping with Ryan's class party, packing up the Holiday Store, a temple trip with the stake YW presidency, our ward Christmas party, and the regular after school craziness. I was so happy to make it to the end of that week.

Awards assembly:

Cookies with Santa:

The Grinch came to Ryan's class party!