Our week in Review

We had a lot of fun all last week. So much I haven't really recorded it. Here is our week.

We celebrated Damon's birthday on Monday. He stayed home from work and we just relaxed and played. We are so thankful for Damon and all that he contributes to our family. He is a great dad and husband and we all love him dearly. He didn't want cake for his birthday so we made rice crispy treats with butterscotch chips in them dipped in milk chocolate. Way yummy!

Tuesday marked a momentous milestone for our family. Our Honda reached 100000 miles. This car keeps ticking through all we have done to it. It has gotten us through snow storms, rain storms, moves, camping, various trips to visit relatives, survived one car accident and day to day stuff. She has been our family car for 5 1/2 years. We hope to have her for another 5 1/2. Congrats for reaching the big miles. No other car of ours has gone that distance.

We drove to St. George, Utah for Thanksgiving. It was an uneventful drive. We really enjoyed seeing all of Damon's family during that time.

The day after Thanksgiving, after I did all my crazy early morning shopping, we headed out to Zion's National Park. It's about 30 minutes from Damon's parents house. We have never been there before. We loved it. We went on a few small "hikes". We saw wild turkeys, deer, reindeer deer, sheep, horses, cows and ostriches. We hiked up to Weeping Rock and also to the view ramp of Court of the Patriarchs. We can't wait to go back and go on some real hikes.

On our drive home we had traffic and rain. it took us 7 hours to do a drive that normally takes 5. We stopped at Mortensen Manor to take a break from being in the car. We had dinner and got to listen to the last part of the BYU vs utah game. That was the last treat of the weekend. BYU beating the arch enemy, utah. Sure, it wasn't pretty, but a win is a win and I never doubted that they could pull it off.

This is a picture of George catching the winning touchdown in overtime!! Go Cougars!!

It was a great week! Now bring on CHRISTMAS!!

A day of Thanksgiving

What a turkey day! It is a day of thanks as well. We had a great day with Damon's family. All his siblings were in St. George for Thanksgiving dinner and it was so much fun to have all the noise of the cousins running around. They had a great time together. Lily really enjoyed having someone younger than her to run around with.

I must give more of my gratefuls because I am thankful for all that I have been blessed with.

22- I am grateful for good choir practices. I am also appreciative of my fabulous pianist.

23- I am really, eternally grateful for my super spouse. We have been together for 13 years now and I still love him so much

24-I am really grateful that the CHP that pulled Damon over 5 minutes after we left our house for our trip to Utah, doing 79 in a 65 zone, did not give him a ticket. That really would have ruined our Thanksgiving.

25- I am thankful for the roof over my head and the food we have to eat

26- I am really grateful for those pilgrims, my ancestors, who braved the unknown and got on a little boat to seek out religious freedom.

27- I know I will be really grateful for the treadmill so I can burn off all the calories I consumed yesterday

28- I will be really grateful if BYU beats utah (yes it is lower case. They don't deserve capitalization) today in the football game.

What was the best thing you ate at Thanksgiving?

The activities keep coming!

We have still been having fun this week. So much that I am a little tired. Just don't tell anyone that.

Our field trip Thursday was another magical one. The kids have had a week of half days and I had about had it with them. (the half days, not the kids) We played hookie from school and went to Disneyland with our friends. It was a fun day for the kids. We took two of our babysitters to help with all the extra kids. It was work with such a big group, but the kids really did enjoy themselves. It is Christmas time at the park and it was fun to be there. The kids loved the Christmas parade. The park wasn't crowded so that was nice. I have such great kids. I love taking them there.

Friday was back to the grind with a bit of a Disney hangover. After school got out (early again) we spent 2 hours outside playing with the kids on the culdesac. It was our last day of school before a week off. So much fun. I was going out with some friends to celebrate a birthday. To celebrate we joined the throngs of screaming teenagers and a bit obsessed older women to see the movie, "New Moon". It was fun being out with the girls and the movie was definitely better than the first one. I know Damon is feeling like he is a single parent lately since I have been absent a lot. Thanks lovey for letting me have some fun. You are the best!

This morning we had Adam's last soccer game of the season (quiet excitement from parents). He tried so hard all season to score a goal. He had a couple of breakaways today, but couldn't quite get it in the goal. We are proud of him. He definitely improved this season.

Is it almost vacation yet?

More November Thankfuls...

17) I am thankful for kids who do well in school. Their parent/teacher conference rocked!

18) I am grateful for quiet evenings. This was the only one of the week

19) I love my babysitters. They are great!

20) Friends who help keep me young and like to act goofier than me

21) I am thankful for the end of soccer season

Fun times

The holidays are in full swing and it seems like there are more things going on then ever. I am feeling much better although my run today was slow and short and quite horrible. Apparently I need to take working out more slowly.

Monday I kidnapped a friend, who was having a stressful day, and went to Starbucks. My new favorite hot chocolate is caramel. Yum. I remembered how nice it is to take a step back and relax and that is what we did. We weren't even there for that long, but it was nice.

Tuesday a crazy friend of mine (yes you are crazy Heather) had a Five Favorite Things party. We had to bring 5 of our favorite things and share them and then draw five names from a bowl and those 5 got our 5 favorite things. It was a nice party and a great way to see what else is out there. I enjoyed myself. I got small tongs, hand lotion, fun lip gloss, a magic eraser and note cards. I thought it was about your favorite holiday things so in my cute little Christmasy container I put a sparkly ornament, some holiday scented lotions and my most favorite holiday thing, sugar cookies. I just put a mix of that in there though. Who has time to make sugar cookies?

So I have a question for you. What is your favorite thing? (Holiday or non holiday)

Sickness

Boy the past week has been very humbling and very frustrating. When a person is a busybody and doesn't like to sit still giving them and illness where they need to rest and recoup is way annoying.

After a week of not feeling good, but still pushing myself (not to hard. I haven't worked out since the triathlon) I finally went to the Dr. I had a sinus infection/head cold that was moving towards my chest. Yea. Not quite pneumonia, but still annoying.

So now I am on the right medicine and told once again to take it easy (grrrr). I am feeling much better now and am itching to get moving again. However, on Saturday night Lily started not feeling good and now she is sick. I was worried about it being the hini virus since some of the kids in her class have had it, but it turned out to be just a really high fever and nothing more. Once again, I need to slow it down so she can rest. She is on the mend, but is housebound for the next couple of days (grrrr)

I must do my thankfuls now that the month is halfway over and I haven't posted anything. I have a lot of gratitude in my heart so I feel that it should be expressed so here they are.

November I am Thankful...

1) That I was able to detox my body from all the sugar that was ingested during Halloween.

2) that a dentist in our neighborhood takes all the Halloween candy and sends it to the troops overseas so I don't have to have it in my house (my kids aren't to thankful for that)

3) for a free country. I really enjoy democracy even though it leads to bad choices sometimes

4) for my family. I really appreciate my sisters and brothers and my parents and Damon's parents

5) that I am all done working for the week

6) for my Lily. We spent some time just us today and I really do love her. She is growing up to be quite a young lady

7) for a really healthy body. I keep challenging it and it keeps doing everything I ask. The human body is amazing. I am also grateful for my triathlon being over.

8) for quiet sabbath days. In this busy world it is nice to have one day a week to slow down, reflect and to worship

9) for my piano students. They drive me crazy, challenge me and work hard. They are amazing.

10) for my Noah. He works so hard and is growing up so fast. It makes me sad to think I only have 8 more years with him living with us.

11) for Veterans. I love having a day off to reflect upon those who serve our country. I have such great respect and admiration for them.

12) for great friends. I didn't have any kids today because they were playing at friend's houses. It was so quiet all afternoon and I was able to rest from my illness

13) for Damon's job. It allows me to stay home and be with the kids. I am happy that he still has it. He works so hard for us.

14) for Adam. He works so hard and makes us laugh all the time. He is such a nut. I think he was sent to our family to help us take life less seriously

15) for antibiotics and urgent care facilities.

16) that Damon is such a wonderful husband. He has had to do his job and my job lately since I haven't been feeling well and I know that must be exhausting. He has done dishes, bathed kids, gone to soccer games, made dinner and taken care of Lily in the middle of the night so I can rest. I so appreciate that. He is wonderful, not perfect, but wonderful.

There is my list of Thankfuls thus far. I will try to be better about posting them so I don't seem ungrateful.

Field Trip Wednesday!?

First and foremost we need to send a shout out to all of those military who have served or are serving our country. Thank you for all you do!


Secondly, I am sick. A head cold which feels like it is quickly becoming a chest cold. Love it. If this is the only sickness I get this year I will be glad.

With a day off from school on Wednesday we decided to go on our field trip today instead of on Thursday. I rearranged my piano schedule so we had the majority of the day off. YEA! Today we decided to tackle two more of the California Missions.

We left around 9:30am and drove up to San Juan Capistrano. It was hard going all the way up to the OC and not going to Disneyland, but some how I survived. Actually, I asked the kids if they wanted to go to Disneyland and they said no, that they wanted to go to the missions (who's kids are those). We met up with my parents and my two nieces at the mission after we explored the area and found a park to play at.

The mission was huge. I don't even think we saw all of it. The gardens were beautiful and there were so many architectural cool things about it. It is a photographers dream. Unfortunately, Damon doesn't get Veteran's Day off so he wasn't with us. We enjoyed our time there. They had some really cool fountains with big fish in them that kept trying to nibble the kids fingers. They also have this 300 year old back wall in the apse area of the chapel that was sent over from Spain. Walking in and seeing it took my breathe away.

We ate a picnic lunch at a park that we just found around the corner from the mission. At the park there was a giant Christmas tree all decorated. That was kind of fun. It was a nice day for an alfresco lunch.

We drove back down to Oceanside after lunch and stopped at the mission, San Luis Rey. It is known as the King of the missions since it is the largest. Unfortunately the largest does not mean the most available to the public. The mission was mostly closed to the public and we were only able to tour the chapel and the cemetery. They also have the oldest pepper tree that was planted in the 1800's.

It was a fun field trip for the kids and for the adults. I am so glad that I am able to do this with my minions who I love so much. They are fun to be around most of the time.

Field Trip Thursday and a Race

Our field trip Thursday was quite "meaty". We went and saw "Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs". I know what you are thinking, "Didn't that movie come out in September?" Yes it did. We finally had an open Thursday. It was great because we were the only ones in the whole theatre. The kids liked the movie and I liked spending time with them.




I had another triathlon today. It was a bit different then all the other because I did an Olympic size one and not a sprint. My sister felt that our sprint tris were getting to easy for us. I thought it was a great idea until the night before the race when I wanted to do the "easy" race. Lily and I drove up to my sister's house on Friday afternoon. The boys enjoyed their "boys" night with Daddy.

All smiles before the race!

I started my race this morning in Lake Perris. It wasn't to cold so that was nice. What it was though was foggy. I couldn't see the path markers in front of me and kept swimming off course. Some where at the beginning at the race I wanted to quit. I was so ready to swim over to the life guard boat and say "pull me up. I am done". I didn't. I stuck with it. I started to view the water as my adversity and I didn't want to let it in. I ended up swimming most of the race with backstroke because I could breathe easier. I finally made it in.The bike was easy for me this time. I have been spending most of my time training for the bike part of the race. I didn't have issues on the hills and i fought my fear of going fast on the downhill rides. I almost got hit by a car who wasn't following what the police officers were saying. I also lost my water bottle when I hit a big bump. I was annoyed about that.

The run was great. I have trained for the 10K since school started so I really didn't have a problem with it. YEA!

When I finished the race my whole lower half was in so much pain. It hurt to stand, keep walking and sit. My muscles honestly felt like they were burning. It was a wretched feeling. They will be sore for the next few days I am sure. I had wanted to do the race in 3 hours and I got 3 hours, 3 minutes and a few seconds. Yea me!

I am glad I challenged myself to do the bigger race. It was a great accomplishment. One that I am not sure I want to repeat any time soon. As always I was the last one of my friends to finish the race, but being last has its advantages. They were all waiting for me at the finish cheering me on. I went to pack up my gear and get ready to go. I wasn't staying for the awards ceremony because there was no point. My swim was mediocre, my bike was ok and my run was average. You could have pushed me over with a feather when they announced my name for 3rd place in my age group. I got a trophy. Pretty cool!