Our Girls

Time:  February 2017 Place: Southern Boone Elementary Gym Tradition dictates that the Valentine's Day party for the fifth graders at our school is a big '50s Sock Hop held in the gym. Emily and her friends broke out the poodle skirts and saddle shoes and had a blast. 

Time: January 2017 Place: Blue Devil Gym Jessica's cousin Andrew is the Blue Devil! We made a few trips back to Quincy to see Cousin Andrew wield the flaming pitchfork for QHS. The first time we came back, we joined Grandma Betty at the Blue Devil game!  We sported our team colors with pride (and Andrew was going through a period of beardedness at the time).  We got to go "backstage" and meet the Blue Devil in person!  Before, during and after the game, there was time for many hugs and cuddles with Grandma Betty.  Thanks to Aunt Sara, Uncle Eric and Cousin Andrew for a memorable night! Andrew and Jessica even saw one of their favorite high school teachers!

Time:  December 25,  2016 Place: Quincy, Illinois It's Christmas MORNING!!!! This year we woke up at Grammy and Gramps' house in Quincy. It is SO hard to wait to go down the steps to see if Santa came.   He came! He came!

Time:  December 2016 Place: Ashland, USA This year we did something a little different for each girl's Christmas. We re-decorated everyone's rooms. It was a long, time-intensive process that involved painting, vinyl-ing and - in the case of Katie's new headboard - carpentry. Katie now has the superhero room she wanted, Emily's room is decked out in "elegant elephants" and Molly has a hoot-worthy owl-themed room. May it be another 6 years before we re-decorate. 

Time:  December 2016 Place: Moosetracks In what has been our annual tradition since Emily was 18 months old, we attended the Moosetracks Family Christmas program. Since Molly is Kindergarten bound in the fall of 2017, this will be our last Christmas Program with Miss Pat and the Moosetracks gang. The kids sang songs, there were delicious snacks and desserts and we spent another great evening with the Moosetracks family. 

Time:  December 2016 Place: Ashland, MO The holiday season also means it's birthday season for Molly. She turned  five and celebrated with a small family party. She asked for a cake "full" of Minnie Mouse. So this is the best that the Bach bakery could come up with on a short-ish notice. Happy Fifth Molly!

Time:  December 2016 Place: Ashland, MO So Elfie, our very own Elf on the Shelf, occasionally gets into serious mischief. In fact all of the girls specifically ASK him to get into mischief. On this particular morning, he decided to teepee the stairway and "barricading" the stairs. The girls decided to (not take down the toilet paper of course) get downstairs by sliding head-first underneath the paper.   With Elfie around, there's really no telling what may happen each day. 

Time:  December 2016 Place: CPAC, Columbia, MO Molly was the only girl to be in the annual Christmas Recital this year, but she had a ball. She did a great job with her dance, dutifully posed for pictures, and then met Santa in the lobby (and took a few cookies for the ride home).  

Time:  November 2016 Place: Evansville, Indiana Katie made it to Nationals in Cross Country! We were incredibly proud of her effort during the season, but she found a few of the races stressful. We wanted to encourage her in a sport that she loves, but didn't want to push her too far too fast. But she was really excited about running.  So we packed up the minivan, and headed off to Indiana. The newness and size of the race and the cold temperatures all led to some significant starting line anxiety. We questioned our decision-making abilities as parents. Katie questioned whether she wanted to run. We were all very stressed. Jessica cried. Katie cried. Maybe even Molly and Emily cried. There were tears.  Eventually, through the encouragement and patience of some coaches who probably deserve sainthoods, Katie got to the starting line and began racing. When Jessica saw her early in the race, Katie was close to dead last. Seriously.  At that point, we ...

Time:  November 2016 Place: Evansville, Indiana Katie's 2016 Cross Country career took her all the way to the National Youth Cross Country Championships taking place in scenic Evansville, Indiana. While Jessica and Katie got familiar with the racecourse, Andrew, Molly and Emily went to the Evansville Children's Museum, which was surprisingly AWESOME. Another bonus was that since it was the middle of a week-day in November, we had the entire place to ourselves. We spent hours there, and I think we played with or experimented on every single display there.   Molly ran a grocery store for part of the afternoon and then took a promotion to work ...  ... at the local bank.  Molly and Emily put on a few different plays on their kid-sized stage ... ... and then put on some crazy stage make-up. 

I can't really be certain if anyone reads this blog, though perhaps our complete lack of content for ... let's say 14 months ... may have affected our readership. But because we use this blog as a way to chronicle our life's adventures and misadventures I am about to catch the blog up. That's right. In a matter of days there will be pictures and (some) words detailing everything that has happened to the Bach family since Halloween 2016. It promises to be interesting. I make no promises now about the sharpness of the prose or the quality of the photos. Brace yourselves.