Our Week – The One with Olivia’s 5th Grade Walk, Jacob’s 8th Grade Dance, and RECITAL WEEKEND!

Last week was insane, but oh so wonderful, and I have a SUPERSIZED recap for you today, so I’m just going to get right to it!

Monday, May 12

Monday morning, I dropped the kids at school, I swung by Walmart to get a few essentials like bananas and milk, and then I headed home to tackle laundry and do some work.  I had four loads of laundry to do, and somehow, I miraculously got them all done Monday and got all of the clothes put away the same day.  Usually that turns into a two- or three-day job, so it was a Monday miracle!

The rest of the day was spent finishing my blog post for Tuesday, starting my blog post for Wednesday, and entering 40 more people into the new alumni database.  Brian and I ate lunch together, and before I knew it, it was time to get in the car line.

Monday was the only day that we didn’t have after school activities for the rest of the week (including Friday and Saturday), so we made the best of it.  I got my Bible study done while Olivia did homework, as always, and then I took some time to clear out my email inboxes, pay a bill, respond to blog comments, and print MORE information for Olivia’s recital.

I got some of the laundry put away, and then it was time to make dinner.  I did sausage, peppers, and onions, tacos (a household staple), and while I made dinner, the kids hung out outside to burn some energy and get some fresh air.  It was cooler Monday – the high was only 70 – and it had been partly cloudy all day, so it felt great.

After dinner, I went through Olivia’s weekly folder… the last time I will ever go through a child’s weekly folder will be this week and I’m not ready for that.  :o(

Then I added a couple of pictures to my blog post for Tuesday that I’d forgotten to add earlier in the day.  I also ordered some new sandals for Olivia for summer since she outgrew hers from last summer.

While the kids showered, I went for a 2.41 mile walk, and it was just lovely outside! 

When I got home, I watered the ferns, I showered, and then we all sat down to watch episode two of Geek Girl.  After the kids went to bed, Brian and I watched some of the most recent episode of Saturday Night Live, and then we went to bed, too.

 

Tuesday, May 13

Tuesday morning, I dropped the kids at school, I headed home to work on my blog post for Wednesday, and then I had to leave at 9 AM for an appointment with my therapist.  After that, I headed straight back home, I finished my blog post for Wednesday, and then… I FINALLY ENTERED THE LAST OF THE 1,831 PEOPLE (1990-2020) INTO OUR ALUMNI DATABASE. 

Whew. 

What a process that was, y’all!  It was a big job, but it’s DONE, and I’m so glad I can just relax all summer now.  I immediately texted the sweet lady at the school who has been guiding me through the process and told her I was done, and she told me I could turn the laptop in later this week!  Woo hoooo!  I got it all packed up, and it’s nice not having that extra laptop sitting on the floor in my office anymore.  It’s been in here since September and I’m glad to have it gone!

Once that was done, I started this blog post that you’re reading, and then I downloaded the rest of Zach Paradis’s songs, organized some album artwork, and finally synced my phone so I could have all the music on there.

After that, it was time to pick up the kids.  I used my car line time to go over all of Olivia’s recital paperwork.  There are so many details about costumes, times, makeup, rehearsal order, dress rehearsal order, show order, etc. that it’s always overwhelming, so I went through and highlighted all of the important points and info that pertained to us.

When we got home, Olivia got started on homework while Jacob read for a bit, and I got my Bible study done.  I dropped Olivia at her last hip hop, lyrical, and musical theatre classes for the school year, and then I gassed up the car on the way home.

When I got home, I cleaned up the kitchen and paid a couple of bills, and then I headed out for a solo walk before grabbing Jacob to walk with me.  I walked a little over three miles, and I felt extremely winded afterward.  I had been having shortness of breath all day – not sure why – but by the time Jacob and I made it home, my shortness of breath was really awful, and I was really dizzy, too.

Thankfully, after a quick shower I felt a little better, and then after a glass of wine while I cooked, I felt totally back to normal.  While I do have mild asthma, I treat it with a daily inhaler, so it is well managed, but every now and then, my anxiety will cause shortness of breath, and I’m guessing since last week was so crazy, my anxiety was acting up in the form of shortness of breath.  Sometimes a simple glass of wine will calm my anxiety when nothing else works, and it did the trick after feeling pretty yucky most of the day.

I enjoyed my glass of wine while I made dinner – my momma’s famous ziti recipe, steamed broccoli, and bread – and we all ate dinner when Brian and Olivia got home from dance.  I listened to Zach Paradis all evening while I was cooking and I am head over heels!

I also deep cleaned the downstairs toilet and sinks while dinner was in the oven, so it was a productive evening.

While Olivia was showering and getting ready for bed, Brian and I tried to use a furniture jack to lift our large, heavy bed so I could get the old rug out and place the new rug under it.  The furniture jack failed miserably, and we weren’t even able to get the old rug out.  Sigh.  I have no idea what we’re going to do.

When Olivia was done showering, she put herself to bed – haha, so funny that she does that when she’s tired! – that girl knows her limits!!  But I went in there before she fell asleep to say her bedtime prayer with her, and then I let her drift off to sleep.

Brian and I watched some more of Saturday Night Live as well as American Idol, and then we went to bed.

 

Wednesday, May 14

Wednesday morning, I dropped the kids at school and headed home to work on Friday’s blog post.  I got it nearly finished when my hair stylist arrived to cut and highlight my hair.  After that was done, I had to get showered to wash out all of the hair dye, and then I got ready for the day.

The next hour was spent in a text quadrangle with Jacob, Brian, and the mother of one of Jacob’s friends because Jacob said that he and his friend needed to get together after school to finish a project for math that they hadn’t been able to finish in class. 

With Brian at work, me having to take Olivia to dance, and the other mom at work, none of us could be with them right after school, so Brian decided to come home a little early from work to be there when I left to drop Olivia.  While we will let Jacob stay home alone for short amounts of time now, we don’t let him stay home alone while friends are over just yet, so it was necessary to rearrange someone’s schedule.

However, the other mom ended up offering to pick up Jacob from school and take him and Jacob’s friend back to her office to finish the project, which was so kind of her.

I spent the rest of the day finishing my blog post for Friday because I knew that Thursday I’d need to focus on packing for recital rehearsal.

I grabbed Olivia from school when she got out, and she was so excited because my friend, Jeannine, our FAVORITE librarian and the kids’ “Aunt Neenie,” had gone to the kids’ school to talk about summer reading, and Olivia got to hug her neck!

When we got home, Olivia studied for a bit while I did my Bible study, and then she got ready for dance only to discover that her tap and jazz shoes were missing.  Sigh.  She hadn’t used them since class the previous Wednesday, so I was assuming that they were in someone else’s bag or at the dance studio.  Since it had been a whole week since she lost them, I was scared that they were going to be lost forever.

I texted our dance moms group to let them know we were missing our shoes, but nobody had them.  At that point, it was too late to get new ones as we have to order them online, so I was in full-on panic mode.

Since we were so panicked about the shoes, I had no time to help Olivia study for her social studies test the next day, so I knew we had a long night ahead of us as she doesn’t get home from dance until at least 8:30 on Wednesdays.

When we got to the dance studio, I walked in with her and headed to the office.  Bless the lady who runs the office – she had a basket in the office of shoes that had been left behind and BOTH of Olivia’s pairs were in there.  Olivia and I were both so relieved.  She’s never lost any of her shoes before, so the fact that she lost them the night before rehearsal, dress rehearsal, and recitals was NOT ideal.  Haha.

As I was leaving the dance school, I called Jacob’s friend’s mom to see how their project was coming along, and she told me that they’d just finished.  I had to stop by my parents’ house to drop off their recital tickets and then I headed to Jacob’s friend’s mom’s office to grab him, and then we headed home.

Brian and I made breakfast for dinner, and then I got out for a walk as it was my last chance to work out for the entire weekend.

When I got home, I got showered, then Jacob got showered, and Brian left to pick up Olivia from dance.

When she got home, she was exhausted as she always is on Wednesdays (three hours of intense dance is a lot, but she loves it), but she still had to shower AND study, so it was a long night.

We managed to get the kids in bed a little after 9:30 (which was earlier than I had expected) and then I flopped down on the couch and didn’t move for the next 30 minutes.  In addition to the last-minute school project, the lost shoes, and not having time to study, so many other things went wrong, so it was just one of those days.  I also had HORRID neck and face tension and some dizziness all day, so that didn’t help.

Brian was kind enough to make a Manhattan for me, and he and I enjoyed those while we watched American Idol.  Then we went to bed.

 

Thursday, May 15

Thursday morning, I dropped the kids at school, I grabbed Jacob’s signed Oh, the Places You’ll Go book from the school office, and I headed straight home to work my butt off on the blog.  I got my entire blog post done for Monday as well as the entire post for Tuesday, and I worked some more on this one that you’re reading today.  I knew I’d have zero time to work on the blog over the weekend, so it had to be done!

Mid-morning, it was time to stop and focus on the main event for the weekend – Olivia’s recital!  I headed downstairs to spray her ballet shoes white first.  This year, she is taking ballet and pre-pointe, and based on the costumes that were chosen, she had to have a pair of pink ballet shoes as well as a pair of white ones.  So, we sprayed her old ones white, and then bought a new pair of pink ones with the hope that maybe she can still fit in them in August when dance starts again.

After the shoes were sprayed, I gathered everything she needed for rehearsal, which wasn’t nearly as much as what she needs for dress rehearsal and the actual recital.  During rehearsal, she just wears her blue leotard and pink tights, and makeup and hair are not required, so I was able to pack pretty light for Thursday.  She just needed her leotard, tights, a pair of flip flops, all five pairs of her dance shoes (she takes seven different dance styles), and some snacks and water to hold her over since we’re there so long.

I also had to pack for myself as well.  The theatre is always freezing, so I packed a giant sweatshirt, a book (even though I never read it), all of the recital info, some snacks, my Stanley, and a charging bank.

After packing, I had just enough time to wrap up all of the daily things that I have to do around the house, and I got my quiet time and Bible study done for the day since I wouldn’t have time to do it later.  Then it was time to pick the kids up from school!

Olivia and I dropped Jacob off at piano lessons, and while we were there, Olivia got changed into her dance clothes.  We had canceled her guitar lesson a couple of weeks prior and we had already made it up, because she had to be at the theatre by the time her guitar lesson started. 

Once Jacob was settled in at piano lessons (and Mr. Jarrett and Mr. Steve were made aware that we were leaving and that Brian would be picking Jacob up), Olivia and I hit the road!  I let her choose the music for the night, and of course, she chose Taylor… specifically The Tortured Poets Department album.

We swung through the Chick-Fil-A drive-through to grab a suuuuper early dinner, and we ate in the car since we weren’t technically allowed to bring food into the theatre. 

We arrived just a little after four, and I finished eating in the car, and then we headed inside. 

Announcements started around 4:45, and they started the rehearsal just after 5 PM.  They do the Thursday rehearsal out of order to accommodate all of the littles so they can go first and get home to bed, so the older Olivia gets, the later we stay.

Olivia didn’t go on for her first dance until 6:22 (I looked at the time stamp on my phone, that’s the only reason I actually know this – LOL), so we watched all of the teeny tiny kiddos do their rehearsals first.  Olivia sat with all of her friends up front (they don’t use the dressing rooms on rehearsal night since they don’t have to change, and also this allows them to see some of the production), and I sat a few seats down from all of the moms in Olivia’s class with my friend, Bianca, who just moved her daughter to Olivia’s dance school. 

Her daughter is in kindergarten, so they got to leave pretty early, and then I settled in to watch the rest of Olivia’s performances.  As I’ve said before, she’s taking seven dance styles this year (ballet, tap, jazz, lyrical, musical theatre, hip hop, and pre-pointe), so she has a lot of parts in the recital.  And her ballet portion was TEN MINUTES this year, y’all.  She has come a long way from doing 90-second to two-minute routines when she was four!

We got out of there right at 9 PM, hauled booty home, Olivia took a quick shower, I quizzed her for her word work test on Friday, and then she got in the bed a little before 10 PM.  She was exhausted.

Brian had picked Jacob up from music and the two of them had watched Transformers since Jacob had never seen it. 

Once both kids were in the bed, Brian made us Manhattans again per my request, and we watched American Idol for a bit.  I probably should have just gone straight to bed since it was already after ten at that point, but we ended up staying up until about 11:15 which is way later than our usual time because I needed some time to unwind.

 

Friday, May 16

Friday morning, I dropped the kids at school, I grabbed some flowers for Olivia’s recitals, and then I headed home.  I got the flowers in some water, I spray painted one of the corners of Olivia’s ballet shoes that I’d missed the day before, and then I watered all of our outdoor plants and got the kitchen and living room tidied a bit.  It’s amazing how insanely cluttered the house gets when I’m not home for one evening to tidy it.

After that, I uploaded some videos of Olivia’s performances to Instagram from the night before, and then I worked on this blog post for a bit.

After that, it was time to get down to business – it was time to pull out all the costumes, make sure everything was there, label all the things, and get everything packed for dress rehearsal later that night.

I stopped briefly to have lunch with Brian since he was working from home, and then I did my quiet time for the day since I knew I’d have no chance to do it later.  After that, I freshened up, and Brian and I hopped in the car together to go to Olivia’s 5th grade walk.  Since they’re moving up to our middle school next year the school does a special parade for them around the whole school.

All of the grandparents came, and when she saw all of us, her face was PRICELESS.  She was beaming from ear to ear.  She told me later after the parade was over that she thought I’d be too busy packing for dance to come to the walk, so she didn’t expect any of us to be there (WHAT?!), so she was shocked when she saw Brian, me, and all of her grandparents.  She, of course, got to see Jacob, too, as he was in the middle school hallway for the parade. 

I told her I would NEVER EVER miss anything important in her life (unless something drastic prevented me from being there) and I couldn’t believe she thought we weren’t going to be there.  Haha. 

She came through our area first, and then she had to parade around the rest of the school, so while she did that, I chatted with the grandparents and some of our friends from the school, and then I headed to the front office to check Jacob out.  Olivia was released right after the parade, too, as it was almost dismissal time anyway, and it was soooo convenient that we got to leave 45 minutes early since we had very limited time to get ready for dress rehearsal!

Olivia also got to give her friend her birthday gift since she had to miss her party Saturday night due to her recital.  And, of course, we had to take lots of pictures.  ;o)

We ended up getting home almost an hour earlier than we normally do since we didn’t have to sit in the car line, and that was the best gift I could have received, because for the first time in my life, I had to do a French braid bun for Olivia.  She typically wears a traditional bun, but the older girls wear French braid buns because they’re tighter and more secure, and they last longer through all of the costume changes. 

This year, Olivia had more hats than usual, (including a swim cap – LOL – you’ll see the pictures and explanations later), so she had to have a VERY secure hairdo.  I have always sucked at doing French braids (or any other kind of hair styles for that matter), so a French braid bun?  Holy moly.

Miraculously, I got it done.  It wasn’t the best job, and I didn’t do a great job at hiding the rubber bands, but it stayed in place perfectly all night, and looked great from the audience!

Olivia did her own makeup for the first time ever for a recital (cue the tears!), but I did help with her eye shadow.  Who is this grown girl in my house?!

After she was done, we had some time to get pictures in a few of her costumes.  We do this every year while she’s in full makeup and hair so we can have good pictures of all of them, and I was grateful to have time to knock out four of them so we didn’t have to do all seven of them Saturday and Sunday.

They were “Sailors” for ballet…

And “Sassy Stingrays” for Hip Hop…

“Beach Party Teens” for Musical Theatre…

And “Undersea Symphony” for Lyrical…

She and I ate a quick dinner at home after that, and then we headed back to the theatre.  We stopped to take pictures at the step and repeat, and then we settled in to the seats in the theatre to wait for further instruction.

Meanwhile, Jacob had his seventh/eighth grade dance (his last middle school dance ever!) so Brian got him there and snapped this picture of him with two of his friends on the way in.  He said he had a blast!

I took Olivia down to her dressing room just before the dress rehearsal started, and then I settled into my seat in the theatre for the longest night.  The dress rehearsals are done in order, and they have to stop/redo parts/etc. every now and then, so we’re usually there from 5 until midnight or so, so it’s an incredibly long night.

While the girls were waiting to come out, one of the moms sent this picture from backstage… I always love getting these backstage pictures!!

The night progressed slowly, but I used the time to record her performances and then I went back and snapped pictures from the videos afterward while I waited.  We are not allowed to record or take pictures during the actual productions, so Friday night is the only night to get them in their costumes.  We do purchase a professionally recorded version of both productions after the show, but I prefer to have my own as well. 

Here we go…

First up for her was Lyrical – “Undersea Symphony”

Followed by Ballet – “Sailors”

Musical Theatre – “Beach Party Teens”

Jazz – “Synchronized Swimmers”

Tap – “Dazzling Desserts”

Pre-Pointe – “Hungarian Princesses”

And Hip Hop – “Sassy Stingrays”

I also grabbed this picture of part of the main cast (the older girls) because the set was just amazing this year.

Olivia’s scenes were spread throughout the entire production – Act 1, the Jazz Section, and Act 2, but thankfully, her last scene was #22 out of 27 in the second act, so we didn’t have to stay until the end… we were out of there by 11 PM!!!!  I was thrilled!

When we got home, I got Olivia’s hair taken down, she took her makeup off, and she headed straight to bed.  I had some cheese and crackers because I was starving, followed by a hot toddy because my throat was feeling questionable… thankfully, it turned out to be allergies as the grass pollen is now in full swing here.  Sigh.

Brian and I watched some of American Idol and then went to bed around 1:30 AM.  Whew.

 

Saturday, May 17

Saturday morning, we slept until 9:30 AM, I got up and made homemade waffles for breakfast, and Jacob and Olivia both got up around 10 AM just in time for breakfast to be ready.

I spent the next couple of hours being super lazy in my office, enjoying my tea, and posting dances/pictures on Instagram from the night before, and then it was time to get MOVING.

It stormed all morning – completely unexpectedly – and I was worried it was going to be bad for the recital, but thankfully, the rain cleared, and the sun came out just in time!

I got Olivia packed for the third time, and thankfully, everything had come home with her.  There’s always so much chaos in the dressing room with 15+ girls each having 7+ costumes, so I’m always terrified she’s going to come home missing something.  Haha.

After she was packed, I had a quick, light lunch, I got myself showered and ready, and then it was time to do my second French braid bun.  I thought for sure everything would go well since I’d done okay Friday, but nope, WRONG.

Saturday, I just could not get it together, and I think it was because everyone kept coming in and asking me questions and messing up my concentration.  Apparently, I have to have complete silence to do hair.  Haha.  I was soooo flustered by the time it was done, and it wasn’t as good Saturday as it was Friday, but it was good enough.  Olivia did tell me after the production that she had to add a few more bobby pins to it after a couple of costume changes because it started to feel wiggly.  Yeesh.

Olivia did her own makeup again, and then we did a photoshoot with the rest of the costumes…

“Hungarian Princesses” for Pre-Pointe…

“Dazzling Desserts” for Tap (and we had to get that costume from several angles because it was just fabulous!)…

And “Synchronized Swimmers” for Jazz (we didn’t photograph her in the swim cap because I didn’t want to mess up her hair)…

While we did that, Brian picked up Panera for dinner (it’s a Saturday night recital tradition), and then we ate dinner, loaded up the car, and hit the road for the theatre!

We always get there super early so we can get “our seats” (all tickets are general admission and first come, first served for seats) and we always leave plenty of time to get pictures before the production because it’s always dark outside by the time she gets done.  Just look at this beauty!

Once pictures were done, Brian and Jacob headed into the theatre to wait in line for the doors to open, and I walked Olivia around to the stage door and down to her dressing room to get her settled in.  We had five room moms working with our girls Saturday night, so they didn’t need my help, and I was happy that I could just watch the production. 

Once Olivia was settled in, I grabbed Olivia’s dance trophy, I met everyone in line, and then we were all seated.  There was an issue at our door scanning tickets, but thankfully, my parents were in another line and were able to grab the row in front of the row where we typically sit.

Once we were settled in, Brian, Jacob, and I went out for a quick bathroom break, and to grab beers for B and me and candy for Jacob, and we were back in our seats just in time for the show.  My dad snapped this picture while we were waiting, and he cut himself out.  Lol.

The show ended up starting at 7:10 (ten minutes late, not sure why) and ended at 11:15 PM.  It’s always a LONG show, but it is always OH SO GOOD.  This year, they did The Little Mermaid, which is my favorite theme yet, and it was just so well done.  The sets were gorgeous, the dancers were all so talented, and we got to watch our girl on stage for seven different scenes… it’s one of my favorite things, watching her dance on stage!

I also kept getting photos from the moms from backstage, which was so much fun.

After the show, I went to grab Olivia, and we met up with my parents and my mother-in-law and step-father-in-law who had all come to support her.  My Momma had made the cutest dance bouquet I’ve ever seen… she even had pink ribbon wrapping around the stems like a ballet slipper.

We got home around midnight, got Olivia’s hair down and makeup off, and the kids were in bed by 12:30 AM with Brian and me following right behind. 

 

Sunday, May 18

Sunday morning, I set an alarm for 8:30 because that was the last possible second I could sleep and still get everything done in time for the production Sunday afternoon.  I ate breakfast on my own since everyone was still asleep and I unloaded the dishwasher and tidied the kitchen while I was doing that.

After that, I packed Olivia’s bags for the fourth and final time, and once again, everything was accounted for!!

That ended up going so smoothly, that I ended up with about 30 minutes to spare, so I grabbed some hot tea and spent a few minutes going through photos and uploading a few things to Instagram. 

A massive thunderstorm rolled in at 9:45 AM and woke both kids up… I had hoped they’d both sleep a little later than that since we’d had three very late nights in a row, but there’s nothing you can do about the weather!

Once I was done with my tea, I got showered and ready for the day, and then it was time to do the dreaded French braid bun for the third day in a row.  This time, everything was nice and quiet, people weren’t asking me a million questions and walking in and out of the bathroom, and I ended up knocking the French braid bun out of the park… with zero cursing in my head this time!  Hahahaha.  I took a million pictures of it at the venue, because, yes, I am tooting my own horn since it turned out so well.  The best part was that it was super tight and secure… it was solid as a rock!!

Olivia did her makeup and got dressed after that, and Jacob’s friend, Jack, and his mom came to pick Jacob up around noon to keep him all day so he wouldn’t have to be home alone.  They ended up going to the trampoline park for hours, then out to a late lunch, and then to get ice cream and to a local candy shop, so he was in heaven!  And we were so grateful that she did that for us.

Brian made lunch for us while Olivia was finishing up getting ready, and we ate quickly before packing up and leaving for the venue at 12:30.  The rain had stopped again, thank goodness, so we were able to take more pictures, this time with Grandpa!  And of her hair!  And with her new bouquet!

After that, Brian and his dad headed inside to get seats, and I took Olivia backstage to get her settled in again.  I was prepared on Sunday to work backstage as I didn’t think we’d have enough moms to volunteer since so many had volunteered Friday and Saturday, but there were plenty yet again (a lot of them took dance at this very studio when they were young and they love being backstage rather than watching the production so I never have to volunteer unless I just want to), so I was happy to go watch from the audience again.  Olivia wanted me in the audience anyway, so that worked out well.  I also got to sneak a peek at all of the gifts the older dancers brought to our girls… look at that note from Miss Mary Burton… she was Olivia’s assistant teacher last year, and she was the lead this year in the show – Ariel – and I thought this was the sweetest thing!

I snuck in the side door of the theatre, and I was happy to see that Brian had been able to get “our seats” as the Sunday show usually has fewer people.

The production went beautifully again, and Olivia nailed all seven of her dances yet again.  The production also started on time (2 PM) and ended up being ten minutes shorter than the previous night (praise!) so we were out of there by 5:50 PM!  I received lots more pictures in the dance moms group chat from backstage during the show, and they’re all so cute!!

After it was over, Olivia wanted to give her assistant teacher, Miss Skylar, her flowers because she’s graduating high school this year and heading off to college so she won’t be back next year.  Skylar played King Triton, and her costume was amazing!! 

We let the star of the show pick where to eat for dinner and she chose… Culver’s.  LOL.  So, we headed to the candy shop to pick up Jacob, and then we headed to Culver’s for burgers and a cement mixer for Olivia.

When we got home, the kids got showered and in bed before nine, and then Brian and I made Manhattans and watched the most recent episode of The Handmaid’s Tale, and I finally breathed a sigh of relief!!

And that's a wrap on Olivia's 7th year of dance – ballet, tap, jazz, lyrical, musical theatre, hip hop, and pre-pointe are in the books!  After 10 months of hard work, 1 rehearsal, 1 dress rehearsal, 2 productions, and 22 hours logged at the theatre, she is DONE!  And she sure looked incredible doing it!  I am so proud of this girl!  There is nothing better than watching your babies do what they love!

We survived, y’all!  And now we only have today + two half days left of school!  Woooo hoooo!

Happy Wednesday, y’all!