Breather Week

This week we aren't doing anything new for school, and we are accomplishing some of the other things that I just haven't been able to stay on top of. I think we're going to have to build these weeks in on a regular basis now. We are reviewing Latin vocab, math facts, and our memory work, and we are doing some history. We're also finishing another Classical Writing project. That's it for school.

On Monday we went to the commissary, and I bought tons of chicken to cook and chop for meals, as well as tons of squash, sweet potatoes, and other vegetables with which to make baby food. I got the chicken finished yesterday, but I still haven't tackled the vegetables--maybe tonight while the boys are at soccer. Yesterday Jonathan had a follow-up doctor's appointment. Good news--his poor little bum looks great, and the doctor thinks the strep is all gone, although she reswabbed to make sure. Also, I took the official pregnancy test, and now I am in the Tricare system, so we can start trying to get the waiver for off-base OB care.

Today we did something fun and different--we went to see the Washington Capitals, our NHL team, practice! They are building a new practice facility in Arlington, but it's not quite ready, so they have been practicing in Ashburn the past few weeks. And the best part is it was free! I realized how little I know about the Capitals, though. Without names on the back of their jerseys, I only recognized the big star, Alex Ovechkin, and that was mainly because we happened to be right there when he walked onto the ice, and he stopped to say something to some kids who were right by the rope (not mine, of course, LOL!). I have always read about how unfailingly nice and polite he is. Anyhow, then the only way I could keep track of him was that he had snazzy yellow shoelaces on his skates. Everyone else I was absolutely clueless about, including the head coach (although not anymore--his name is Glen Hanlon. I looked it up.) The other spectators seemed much more knowledgable. Many of them even had notebooks to scribble notes! They were not reporters either--I heard them talking about how they work over at AOL and were taking long lunch breaks.

The team was all wearing different color jerseys, with about 5 players for each color jersey--black, red, white, teal (is that a manly, hockey-player term? Because that is definitely the color), and gray. And 2 goalies. I could not tell which goalied was the starter one, Olie Kolzig, although I guessed he was the one with the snazzier helmet down by our end of the ice. The man sitting next to me came in after us, and after sitting down, proceeded to get out his own little notebook, divide the page into 5 areas, and then write down every player's last name under the appropriate color. I kept trying to look sideways at his notebook to figure out a few of the players' names, but I just couldn't do it without being too obvious, LOL.

So we saw about 24 players and the 2 goalies, and the paper said they have to be down to 23 by opening day. I couldn't tell if one color was the starters (Alex was in black, in case you were wondering), or if they were grouped by position (unlikely, based on how they were running drills). Anyhow, if one group were the "on the bubble" ones, I would have to say it was the gray guys. There were only 4 of them. But what do I know?! They all looked good to me! I love watching men play hockey--they are so confident on their skates, and they go so fast! Hockey is definitely a fast-moving, exciting game! I miss watching the Air Force Academy hockey games back when we were stationed there.