Riley Viking Award Winner

 

OMG!  Can you even believe how grown up Abby looks here!?  This past week we got notice that Abby had been awarded the Viking Award for her good grades and attitude at school.  Each month a boy and a girl from 6-8th grade is awarded the Viking Award.  They've been doing it for 25 years!  Abby was so honored and if I'm honest, I had more than one tear in my eye as Mr. Vicari read off the reason's she'd been nominated.  He was nice enough to share them with me, so they are written here below.  I am so proud to be her Mom!

Viking Award for March

6th Grade: Abby McGrath

Mrs. Wessel: Abby truly exemplifies what it means to be a model student. In the classroom,
her dedication to learning, willingness to ask thought-provoking questions, and ability to
collaborate seamlessly with her peers make her a truly standout student. She consistently
demonstrates strong character, empathy, and kindness toward classmates and staff alike; a
truly excellent example for her peers to follow. Her passion for science is evident in her
enthusiastic participation in experiments, her never-ending curiosity about the world around her,
and her consistent and thoughtful contributions to class discussions. I do not doubt that Abby
will continue to achieve great things throughout her time here at Riley, and I look forward to
working with her in the years to come. I am so proud of Abby's seamless transition to the middle
school setting and look forward to continuing to watch her grow! Congratulations Abby!

Mr. Hostetler (Band\Choir): Abby is an amazing musician! She plays flute in band,
guitar in rock band, and sings in the choir. She comes prepared and is ready to go for all
ensembles. She leads by example and is a true joy to teach students like her!

Ms. Moore: Abby is a kind and quiet student. She is always willing to help others and does a
wonderful job in art class!

Mrs. Long: Abby is a role model student. She is prepared for class and performs well in her
academics. She is polite and respectful to her teachers and peers. She participates in class and
cares about her academics. Her peers look to her for help as well in math class. Great overall
student! Keep up the great work Abby!

Mrs. Stratton: Abby had a sweet smile every morning for me! I loved it when we would have
a conversation, and she would nod her head and say, "Yeahhhh." It was so cute. She was a joy
to have in class. Also, her cursive was amazing!!

Mr. Zimmer: Abby is a joy to have in class. Her intelligence and eagerness to learn is what every
teacher loves. She does a great job paying attention in class, turns in quality work and actively
participates.

Mrs. Mortimer: Abigail is such a sweet young lady. She brings brightness to the class with
her smile and kindness. She works very hard and is always willing to give a helping hand. I enjoy
our many conversations together even though she needs to remind me all the time that she is a
Packers Fan! Abby is respectful to all those around her.
 
Mrs. Hernandez: Abigail is a kind and compassionate young woman. Her quiet
kindness does not go unnoticed. Abigail is also organized and well-prepared for
class.

Mr. Rogers: Abigail is one of the nicest students I have at Riley. She's a joy to have in class
and is always so nice and respectful. Abigail is most definitely deserving. Congrats Abby!!

Mrs. Schueler: Earning the Viking Award is an honor but to have earned it as a 6th grade
shows everyone that you are on the path of greatness. In fifth grade, you were always eager to
learn and to help others around you. When I think back to last year, I remember you sitting on
the edge of your seat, leaning forward, and a smile on your face. You were such a joy to have in
class. Congrats!

Ice Hogs Performance

Yesterday the whole family attended the Rockford Ice Hogs game to see Abby and the Riley choir sing the national anthem at the start of the game.  It was really fun to see the kids on the jumbo-tron (though, I admit Erin and I got a LOT of joy out of being featured dancing on it as well).  We all had a great time and we even got to take a school picture down on the ice after the game.

 It was a very fun night and I know Abby felt honored to have so many people there to support her.  I have a feeling we've got more of these games/performances in our future with 2 more years for Abby and 3 for Hazel after that!

Eclipse Camping

 

Two plus years ago we started planning our trip to southern Illinois for the eclipse.  The path of totality (which, sounds so silly) was set to hit southern Illinois, about 6 hours south of us.  When it happened back in 2017 people sold it as one of the coolest experiences of their lives so when we realized we'd have another opportunity in 2024, we popped it on our calendars and vowed to figure out a way to see it.

Ed and Marsha's son, Chris and his family, live in Marion, Illinois and it was set to be smack dap in the middle of where we wanted to be, so 2 years ago we inundated this little campground in Marion Illinois with requests for campsites for 4 campers - and it's a good thing we were so far ahead of the game.  Nearly everything was sold out or crazy expensive as the day neared.  We were all so thankful when about 3 months ago the owner of the campground called to get our credit card numbers and set up our reservations officially.  I really had my doubts, but it worked out better than I could have hoped!

We had to book 4 nights, which was fine because the eclipse was set to take place around 2pm Monday afternoon and we'd learned from everyone who went in 2017 that the traffic would be crazy afterwards so we pulled the kids out of school for the extra day and took a 4 day weekend in southern Illinois.

You know what's super questionable in southern Illinois in early April!?  The weather...that's what.  But, God must have been shining down with us because we lucked out with the most amazing weather.  I don't think I could have ordered up a better weekend.  It was sunny, 80 and exactly what I needed for my mental health.  A few days off, some sunshine and the feeling of summer...it really had us all feeling super grateful and thankful.

We'd put so much effort into making our way down there just for a 10 minute block of time...I was prepared for it to pour rain, or not be that cool, or to generally be disappointed.  But mother nature did not disappoint.  

When people ask me if it was worth it....all the planning, all the prep, the long drive down and back and I say hands down, if you ever have a chance to experience a full eclipse, fully in the path of totality, make the time, make the effort and you won't be disappointed.  It was such a cool experience.  

It went from full on sunny as you can see here, to night and back again in probably 10 total minutes.  The sun was fully covered for maybe 4 or 5 minutes, but it was wild how quickly it all happened.  Not like a sunset that takes an hour.  It was so much more instant than that.  The temperature cooled what felt like 10 degrees for the short time.  I even went inside the camper and grabbed a sweater!  The street lights came on, the birds flew to roost and stopped singing, everything was quiet and still, until it all came back up and everything came back to life.  

It was very hard to get photos of the sun while it was happening but these two were the best we got!  In the one above you can see the moon right in the center of the sun.  You can see from the sky that it looks like near dusk and I bet it was only another minute or two before the below photo was taken. 

Long story short this was an experience we will not forget!  

1 Family x 12 (April)

 

I can't decide what's funnier - our pasty white winter skin...or the glasses we got Copper to wear.  Either way, this might make the cover of the blog book for 2024.  

1 Family x 12 (March)

 

Check me out...remembering to take, and post (!) our monthly family photo BEFORE the end of the month.  LOL!  Today we joined the first ever, Marengo Park District Shamrock Shuffle.  The "race" was a walk/run 5k and with just about 40 registered participants, it was FAR from the real Shamrock Shuffle that takes place downtown.  But, it was 3 miles from the house, on a weekend that we were home and we're happy to support our local park district.  

Not pictured - the giant mud pit Hazel splatted herself in about 5 minutes after this was taken.  It really let the air of our her race sails...but we made it about half way through the 5k.  Ryan finished the full race in second place (I think).  

Belt Testing - We've got Yellow belts now...

 

You read that right!  We've officially got two yellow belts in the McGrath household!  Hazel has been asking to do karate for a long time and it took me while (probably too long) to find a place where we could do classes.  If I'm honest, I've been feeling like we're doing too much these days, between, homework and life, and flute and Abby's doctor appointments and all the rest, it felt like adding in one more after school activity was too much.

But, when I found a local Marengo business, just 3 miles from our house, it seemed hard to say no.  Hazel started karate back in October and Abby started asking to go just a few weeks later.  So, 5 months later, the girls have been doing karate 2 or 3 times per week for the last 5 months and last weekend they both belt tested to move from white to yellow belts.  It's our first advancement and honestly, watching the testing was really inspiring!  I might have even had a little tear or two watching some of the more experienced kids test for their brown (or higher) belts.  

The kids are learning discipline, self-defense, form, Japanese and so much more!  I'm really glad we figured out a way to make it work!  It was a good choice and I've been LOVING all the things we're finding right here in our little town.  We don't have to drive 20+ away to find the things we're looking for.  I'm going to try to keep leaning into our small local businesses and spend more dollars right here in Marengo.  

Winter Crafts (Part 2)

(Feb 8)

The past few winter months have been so filled with crafting that I ended up making a part 2 to share all the things I've been working on, but as the weather turns to spring, the days get longer and we're starting to see our weekends fill up with wood cutting, camping trips and hanging out with friends I figured it was time to wrap up this winter post and share everything I've been completing since Feb.  First up, Acadia hats for our trip to Maine this summer.  I know, I know, stocking caps in summer does seem a little silly...but, they'll be commemorative and I'm excited to have another National Park hat in my collection.  

(Feb 11)

I think I bought enough yarn to make a total of 4 of these hats, which might not actually be enough!  We've got lots of friends and family roped into this trip with us so we'll see how many I can get out of the yarn I bought.  

(Feb 12)

The nice thing about these hats is that they knit up fast! I think I can do them in just about a week.  I made two total over the course for a week or two and then decided to table the rest for another time.  I've been itching to dig into the free yarn Purl Soho sent me last year some time.  I wrote them asking if they offered free or discounted yarn for makers who were donating to charity.  I stumbled on a charity called Project Linus who donates hand made knits and quilts to hospitals in the community (for babies and children who are admitted into the hospital).

(Feb 19)

I started knitting over 15 years ago now and believe it or not, you can only have so many hats, scarves, blankets etc.  And, friends and family only need so many too.  So, after all this time, I've finally gotten to the point where I don't feel like I've always got a "need" on the back burner waiting to be picked up and I wanted to start donating my work to others.  The thing with handmade items though is that they cost a lot of time and money.  If feels like handmade should be cheaper than just buying something at the store...but that is exactly NOT true.  A quilted blanket or hand knit throw could easily cost $200-$300 and that doesn't include my time.  

Last spring I reached out to Purl Soho (one of my favorite online stores for knitting) and asked if they offered anything for people who were making for charity.  They nearly floored me when they sent me an entire BOX full of free yarn to use for Project Linus blankets.  I finally made my way through all the backlog of projects and I was ready to cast on and start working for charity!

(Feb 17)

Op!  Pause that story for a second.  It turns out I was also finishing up this second throw quilt at the same time.  I think I blogged the first one back in my Winter Part 1 post, so this is a matcher to that.  I'm not sure who will be recieving this one just yet, but I've got a few homes already in mind.  For some reason "boy quilts" are harder for me than the bright frilly girl ones...so when I stumble on masculine fabric that I love, I scoop it up quick.  This will either be a baby boy quilt for someone in the future or maybe a wedding gift for Dave McGrath and his new (soon to be) wife, Erin.  The girls and I have their shower coming up in late April and I'm not sure I'll have time to squeeze something else in before then.  Either way, this one will go to a good home!

(Feb 23)

Back to my Project Linus blanket.  This one will be made up of 6 total colors, perfect for the patchwork yarn Purl Soho sent me.  I pulled a few free patterns off their website and cast this one on.  It's knit in a series of triangles and as we speak I've moved onto the second of 4 triangles.  

(Feb 29)

(March 5)

I'll continue the progress of this one in my spring post!  I have a feeling this one will take me a few months to finish, though I've got more than a handful of flights in my future for work...and those days are great for my knitting (and audiobook) progress.  

1 Family x 12 (Feb)

 

The go-karts getting a make-over baby and we'll post some pictures when it's finished!  For now, our February family photo!

Winter Crafts

 As the weather cools and it starts to get dark earlier and earlier, I find myself with more time to craft - which is great because I feel like I've been in a bit of project slump lately.  But...not anymore!  I've started and finished so many things in the past couple months that I'm posting my winter roundup early and I might have a Winter Crafts (Part 2) coming later on.

Oct 29

First up, this beautiful two-tone cowl.  It's knit on the smallest needles I've ever worked with, Size 1.  Fingerling wight yarn and tiny lace work in the second layer meant that this one took me a LONG time to finish.

Dec 26

Jan 6

I made some pretty good progress the weekend we were supposed to be skiing but Hazel ended up with the flu and I stayed home while everyone else went skiing.

Jan 12

Finished it up in January just in time to give me time to squeeze in a last minute hat knit for myself.  (See below).  

Last Christmas I got a National Park Hat pattern book and I was so excited to dive in!  I made a Grand Prismatic hat for Jenny much earlier in the year (in prep for our Yellowstone trip) but when I finished my cowl just a few weeks before our trip I realized I might have time to make one for myself as well.  We got tons of compliments and questions about our hats on the trip...which made it all worth it!

Everyone commented how they liked that the little puffball looked like the steam rising from the thermal features!

Not the best picture...but you get the idea :)

Up next - a baby quilt for baby McIlquham (born just 2 days ago...so we know his name is Liam now...but this quilt was made before that).  I love these linen fabrics so much - they are a little tricky to work with (they fray easily) but they make great boy quilts, and I just loved the understated, but deep hues they come in.

This quilt has it's backing fully made it's ready to head to the quilter but I'm holding off because I think I can squeeze in a "twin quilt" (ie: the same quilt again for a future baby boy) while I'm at it....I don't think we'll see Liz and Bobby for a few months now that Liam is here so I've got time!

Plane project - two skeins of yarn and a hat pattern make the perfect travel project.  Hats knit up relatively quickly, their finished size (like...not a full-on blanket) and the limited amount of yarn needed meant this was the next project up on my needles.  A 2-hour delay on the runway + two three-hour plane rides and a few lobby chills gave me time to knit this one up in just under a weeks' time.  

Finished it up on our second night home by tying in all the ends and adding the puffball on top!  I love this one and I think Ryan has decided to claim this one as his own.  It makes me happy to know that he is into wearing my handmade items now too!  

Yellowstone in Winter - Chico Hot Springs

Our final two days were spent in the historic Chico Hot Springs hotel.  While the hot springs themselves were great, I have to say that after 8 nights of staying in historic (read: a nice way to say slightly outdated....but it's fine because we say historic) I made the comment that just because we're staying in a historic hotel doesn't mean we need historic mattresses!  We had two double beds in our cabin at Old Faithful and we had just one double at Chico.  We got lucky and were able to snag one of the few rooms that had a bathroom attached.  The other girls in our group had to use the communal bathrooms that were located in the hallways.  They weren't bathrooms for multiple people at one time, but they were shared acrossed a handful of rooms.

On our final day of vacation Ryan and I really packed in the activities!  We hiked twice, a total of about 7 miles and we visited Livingston, a small town about 30 minutes outside of Chico.  

Livingston was cute - it had two breweries (you know we had to visit them both!), a small little downtown area with some cute little shops like a kitchen store, a bookstore and plenty of local artist shops.  

After we returned from Livingston we met up with Jenny and Jack who had just finished a game of disc golf.  Jack, Ryan and I decided to take a hike to the Yellowstone Film Production film set (Not the Yellowstone show...the name of the company is confusing).  We looked up the movies and shows that Production company did and nobody recognized any of them, but, the film set was pretty cool to check out.

It 100% felt like we were doing something a little naughty by walking around an empty film set trying the door handles and peering into windows to see what was inside of the buildings.  Many of them were just facades with nothing behind the windows, but a few of them were fully set up, like the church and a fully functioning stable that appeared to have had animals bedding it the pens at one point.  

After 8 nights and 9 days of fun and adventure we traveled home on Thursday afternoon and made it back to Marengo before bedtime.  The kids had welcome home signs all made up for us and were jumping around in the window cheering as we drove up the driveway.  Erin held down the fort for us for the majority of the trip and I'm so thankful for her!  She did a great job...I think the kids wish she was their mom now!  She had all kinds of fun activities planned for them including a trip to Epic Air, Build A Bear, a movie at the theater and bowling!

Vacation is fun...but I'm glad to be home too!

Yellowstone in Winter - Old Faithful (Part 2)

Our final planned tour in Yellowstone was a 5+ mile snowshoe (or cross country ski) to Lonestar Geyser.  Turns out...we hiked out to this same geyser when we hiked to with the kids back 2 summers ago when we visited Yellowstone in the summer for the Ritterbusch family reunion.  The good news is that we fondly remembered this hike as one of our favorite places in the park because it wasn't crawling with people!  That wasn't a concern in January!  There were about 10 of us on our tour and maybe another 10 or so people that skied there on their own that day.  We missed the eruption by about 20 minutes and were hoping to catch some  minor eruptions but after hanging out for about 30 minutes we gave up and started our trek back to the snow coach.

Our group all decided that we pretty much hate snow shoeing - lol!  Ryan and I and tried it twice in our back yard earlier this year when we got a big dump of snow but 5 miles was too many miles for us with snow shoes.  They make you walk with a strange gait...and my hips were killing me by the end of the hike.  We do a fair bit of hiking and I'm always up for going longer distances...but by the end I was complaining like the kids and wishing Ryan and a snack to nudge me forward.  I was totally over it by the time we made it to the snow coach.  If we'd have has skis on at least we'd have gotten to glide for parts of the trail!

Being in the park in the winter time was really crazy.  We heard some stats on one of our tours that during the summer months they park sees around 7,000 cars per day and the annual visitor numbers top 5 million per year.  On one of our nights at Old Faithful I asked the front desk what the occupancy was for that day and she told me it was 125 guests total.  There were another 200 or so staff members so in total we're talking less than 400 people.  It was crazy to watch Old Faithful erupt alongside only a handful of other people.  Most of the places we went it was just our group.  And, over and over again we ran into the same couples and groups during our trip.  It was a little like college or a fraternity.  

This year was also very strange because there was so little snow around.  When we arrived at Mammoth there was bare ground everywhere.  Typically there is 2-3 feet of snow in most areas of the park and you could tell that the staff was a little worried about the lack of snow.  They are worried about it being a very dry summer and the potential for fires if there is a drought.  It was over 40 our last two days in the park and our tour guide for Lonestar told us that the staff was starting to carry around bear spray again because they were worried that the bears might come out of hibernation.  We didn't see any bear but on our way out of the park we stopped in Mammoth to pick up our luggage from the snow coach and one of the hotel staff said they found bear tracks outside the general store earlier that morning.

The above picture looks like a photo of nothing, but I wanted to capture a snow flea or springtail.  We learned that these tiny little guys are able to "jump" further than anything else relative to their size.  If we could jump the same distance as them we'd be able to fling ourselves over the Empire State Building in one bound.  Pretty crazy!

If you look right in the center of the above picture you can see a little trail in the snow.  This was a slide made by the otters into the river.  We saw quite a few animals on during our trip but sadly we didn't get to see the otters or a moose.  But, I think other than those two animals we got to see pretty much everything we named on our list before arriving.  

Needle Ice!  Another cool winter phenomenon we learned about on our trip.  It forms when the ground is over 32 degrees, but the air is below freezing.  Once someone pointed it out to us and taught us about it we found it everywhere.  I'm glad one of our friends grabbed the photo so I didn't forget to write about it.

Bobby Socks Trees - these are petrified lodgepole pine trees that sucked up the mineral water from the hot springs and eventually died where they stood.  You can see the characteristic white bottoms best on the left hand side of this photo.  Again, I'm bummed I didn't grab a better photo of them to share, but one of our friends took this and you can see them pretty well here.  They give the area the look of a bomb site.  

We spent 3 nights in Mammoth Hot Springs and another three nights at the Old Faithful Lodge but our trip isn't over yet!  We left the park and headed to Chico Hot Springs for 2 final nights of relaxation and exploration.