Goodbye my Olympic Friends!

I have sincerely enjoyed every minute of the Olympic games this year. The Chinese did a fabulous job sponsoring it. At least from everything I saw! That "Bird's Nest" was awesome and the "Water Cube"! I want to swim there!! I have watched the Olympics with my family as a youth and now as an adult with my kids. It always fills me with amazement. I look at their determination, their drive, their passion. I see their muscular bodies pushed to their limits. I love all the little side stories where you get to hear about the circumstances that brought them to these Olympic games. If I were a teary woman, I'd have shed quite a few this time around. It was amazing to watch, again. It always is and I love every minute of it. The Olympic anthem always fills my heart with such joy. I will miss staying up late to see Phelps, Johnson, May and Treanor... a million others... My favorite events this year were the Beach Volleyball, Gymnastics, Swimming and Diving. I think some small part of me always wishes I could have been an Olympic athlete. How cool would that be? My body will appreciate the extra sleep I can get now that I won't be staying up soooo late to see the events! I say a fond farewell to these amazing athletes.... I'll see you again: on billboards, cereal boxes, commercials, and magazine covers. Go make your millions. You earned it!

Is she deaf?!

It was a good day. Chris and I took a nice long bike ride this morning after putting the kids on the bus. We rode down some sandy backroad trails and then on the road back up into our neighborhood. I was dying! I hate how quickly you lose that feeling of fitness after being semi-inactive for a little while. It takes so long to get up to a good level and such a short time to lose it. Man! Anyways, after that, we went and ate lunch with the kids at their school. They tell us everyday how wonderful the food is there! We ate with them and it really wasn't too bad! They actually season the food here! Today's special was Taco Pizza and these yummy peanutty caramel cheerio bars. Mmmmm. Not bad. Jilli loves the chocolate milk! She always gets a cute little brown milk mustache. After lunching with the kids, we drove to the clinic to get hearing and vision screenings (a requirement here!) and get their immunizations updated on the state forms. It turns out that both Jess and Miah needed a second Chicken pox vaccine... ugh! Good thing Chris was there!!! Jeremiah did great but Jessica freaked out! Chris, the nurse and I had to hold her down while she was stuck with the shot. It was all over in less than a minute but Jess really thought the world was ending or something... Silly kid!!! I don't know why she can't just be cool with stuff! Jillian was very worried about Jess. It was just dumb. You would think she'd grow out of this whole freak-out thing... We stopped at the PX on the way home for some ice cream and I shopped around while they ate - avoidance is a great diet! I found some shirts on clearance and a new book to read. It was awesome. We drove home and got all the schoolwork done so the kids could go and play in the backyard. They invited some neighbors over to jump on the trampoline and soon ALL the neighborhood kids were over and their moms... So, I had to go out and be social. I guess I missed the good part though! I was inside cleaning up a big poopy explosion that Jillian blessed me with - can't wait till that girl catches the vision of potty training!! I went out and heard that one little girl in the neighborhood came out to play without her mom's permission. She is a very precocious little girl with way too much energy. Her mom began calling for her. My kids just watched this girl completely ignore her mother calling her with astonishment. One of the other moms was telling me that Jess turned to her and asked, "Is she deaf?" Jess just couldn't believe that she wasn't listening to her mom!! It gave them all a good laugh since they all know how crazy that little girl is. I guess there are lots of stories to tell about that little girl and her mother.... more for another day! I just loved that my kids were so shocked and amazed that this little girl didn't want to go and see what her mother needed! That wouldn't fly around here!! We live in a pretty close knit neighborhood and I'm pretty excited that the mom's are so hands on and watch their children so well. It's quite a change from our crazy old neighborhood! I don't miss that part at all!
I think I may go take some tylenol for my poor head... I'm getting pounded by some serious Guitar Hero. Chris and Matt Holmes are rocking out!! We have Matt for the night! Yay! Chris has a playmate! Well, I'm going to go crash on my bed with a book and some earplugs!! Ta ta!

Favorite Photos...

I finally got the photos downloaded from my camera! These are some of my favorites. (For more... again, family blog).


Monica came to visit me on Saturday!! She and the girls stayed overnight here with us and we had the best time. She was so awesome to come down here and be our first visitor!! We went and got pedicures and manicures, shopped at Bath and Body Works, laughed, ate boiled peanuts and laughed some more! We ate at a local restaurant that was AMAZING - (the Mellow Mushroom!!) and I hope she comes again soon so we can go grab some more delicious Hummus dip there! MMMMMM. Thank you Monica for coming to see us!!! You ROCK!

Chris brought me these gorgeous roses one day when I had nearly finished unpacking. He is such a sweetie! They totally made my day. Aren't you jealous!??


This photo is of 4 of my friends whom I left behind... Rose, Jessica, (me), Marcia and Marcie. Marcie sponsored a "Blue Without You" party for us one day for lunch. We got to eat some delicious food and chat with our friends. We miss you all so very much!!

This photo is of Jilli. We were walking up to the River Walk and we walked past this locked gate. Jilli thought this was the entrance and she was totally upset that we couldn't go in because she had been talking about going there all morning! She looked so cute standing there, rattling the knob... I just had to snap a photo!

Getting pulled over...

I know it's been a while.... (If you want to read about what I've been up to with the move - head over to my family blog!)
Ok. This morning, I woke up and got the kids up and ready for school. We loaded Jilli in the stroller and walked over to the bus stop. It usually comes around 7:48. At 8:00 I began to worry that it wasn't coming. We started to walk in the direction of the school and saw it coming down the street. Thinking we wouldn't make it back to our stop, we walked down to the next one at the corner of our street. The kids got on the bus and I stayed to chat with the other moms who live in our culdesac. They were going to walk together, so I joined them. We walked down the North Range Road. It starts out with a steep hill and there is no sidewalk (of course!) We walked facing traffic and when cars would come we'd step off to the side into the grass or sand. About 3 minutes down the hill, we were pulled over by a police car. Yep. We started laughing, and heard him say, "that we couldn't walk on this street!" Great. So. We turned around and started back up the hill. About 2 minutes later, he pulled up behind us again. We started getting worried that he had heard our jokes about getting a ticket for walking and was really going to give us one!! Instead, he said, "He was mistaken. We can walk on that road as long as we don't walk at night (this was at 8 am!!) and as long as we get off the road for coming cars (duh!!)" SO!!! We turned around and continued on our walk, laughing and joking about our great luck at getting pulled over twice by a police officer as we walked down the street!!! It was an awesome walk with 2 huge hills (hee hee!!) and about 4 miles long. I was sweating and loving it since I haven't been getting my exercise in with all that's been going on. No worries!! I'm getting back into the swing of things!
Chris is out back with the kids putting up the trampoline. I took some pictures... but can't download them yet. Hopefully Chris can hook me up with Picasa tonight. We get sort of distracted by the Olympics every night!! GO USA!!! Chris is such a great dad! He helped the kids with their homework after school. I get so annoyed with them when they can't follow the directions and just get it done... They have a lot of homework now too and it's really pretty hard stuff! Grrrr! It's funny, I'm sitting here typing this and listening to Dr. Phil while I wait for the local news to come on. It's a show on mothers who don't want to be mothers anymore... Talk about lame! These women are struggling so much with their divine role. I can't help but think - Where are their husbands?? They all say that they wish they could get a break and find a hobby that could take them away from their kids so they could get recharged... I am so lucky that Chris is so good at giving me that break! From the minute he gets home from work, he's the man. The kids go right to him for everything. I get to relax and make dinner, blog like I am now, watch TV... It's great! He takes care of the bedtime routine too and that is such a help. I love that he's such a hands-on dad. I know I'm very lucky! Love you Chris!!! I felt so bad for those poor mothers on TV who feel so overwhelmed. I know I have had times like that. When Jilli was born I didn't think I would survive having three children! My sweet sister is feeling some of that as she figures out how to juggle her new little one and the other older two! Hang in there Beck!! I definitely think that having a hobby and a hubby who cares are the two things that keep me sane as a mom.