Christmas 2009

This was the first year that we have not gone anywhere or had company come for Christmas. We did miss seeing family, but we also really enjoyed being home and being able to just lazy around all day as a family. The kids were so excited for Christmas this year. It made it a lot of fun. We really had a fabulous day. Santa came!Isaac was very excited to see Santa had brought him the Sparks Scooter he had been asking for. He braved the cold to head out and see how it worked. I'm just wondering if the black marks will wash off the patio. He rode this all day!

Hannah was kept busy painting and making crafts for mom and dad with her new art set from Santa. Grandma Parker made the cute little apron she has on. Another success!
Nathan and Justin spent the morning putting music on Nathan's new MP3 player. Once that was done, on to the Lego's!

The day after Christmas we headed to town to exchange a few things and have lunch. Isaac had been asking for a suit. I'm not sure why he wanted one, but when we were at Sears, he kept eyeing them. Since they were on sale, Justin gave in and bought him one. Later that night we went to see The Nutcracker. It was fun to get all dress up and head out for the night. I was a little worried that the kids would be bored, but they actually did really well. I think they were mesmerized by the beautiful sets and bright-colored costumes. It also had a lot of kids dancing in it and the kids thought that was cool. I have to laugh at their favorite parts though. They are as follows:

Nathan: My favorite part was when the toy soldiers came out with their guns and shot the big mouses. It was also funny when the grandma fell at the party.

Isaac: My favorite part was when the girls were dancing in circles with their dolls and the boys came out and scared them and beed pests to them.

Hannah: My favorite part was in the snowflake forest when the dancers were all white and glitter came falling down.

Very gender appropriate. Ha!!
Don't they look handsome. Isaac loved his suit and all the compliments he got from women at the ballet. He was even excited to go to church on Sunday and kept asking if it was time to get dressed. So cute.

Santa and the Tooth Fairy in the same night

Christmas Eve was a little crowded at our house this year. Isaac has been telling us that his tooth was loose since just before Thanksgiving. I could finally tell it was getting pretty wiggly the last week. We were at a friend's house for dinner on Christmas Eve and he came running up to me and said, "Look mom". He then opened his mouth really big. There was blood everywhere in it. I totally freaked thinking he had gotten hurt and cut his mouth on something. Then, he showed me the tooth. I think I scared him a little. Instead of excitement that was there moments ago, he was suddenly worried about the blood. When I asked him how it came out, he said he just jumped on the bed and it popped out. He was with two other boys in one of the rooms. I'm still wondering what the whole story is...ha. This did lead to a cute conversation about how Santa and the Tooth Fairy would organize themselves to come at different times so they wouldn't be in eachother's way. Thank goodness the Tooth Fairy remembered to come early;)

Always a goof ball!

Rillito River Run 12/19/09

I am really behind on posting! Back in July, Justin decided to put on a running event to benefit the Volunteer Center of Southern Arizona. He is on the board of directors there. They lost one of their big money-making events so he decided to try and make up for this with this event. Over the last five months, he has put a lot of time and energy into getting everything ready. It was definitely a learning experience for the both of us. He was able to secure about 12 sponsors varying in different levels of donations from money to add space to bagels. I was in charge of getting the shirts designed and ordered and also in charge of getting the courses mapped out for both the 10k and 5k distances. We had a lot of fun working on this together. It was definitely a lot of work though!! Race day started at 5:30 a.m. for us. Justin worked on getting the main starting area set up and organizing volunteers and I took some volunteers to get the the water station set and then get all the mile markers set. Friday, I had ran both courses spraying chalk at all the miles so that morning I just had to drop cones and markers. I learned that I need a bike and trailer or else rent a golf cart next time! Between Friday and Saturday getting everything sprayed, cones/markers dropped, and post-race pickup of all of these, I put about 17 miles on my legs, about three of those carrying big construction cones! Needless to say, I was very sore on Sunday. I never did get to see the start/finish area, but I heard it was really nice. I ended up standing at a turning point helping direct the runners. It was so much fun to be able to stand there and cheer on everyone I new. I only missed one friend come through. Sorry Melissa! Justin was busy at the finish line working with timing and announcing awards. Many of our friends won awards which was fun too. It was a beautiful December morning. We could not have asked for better weather. The turnout was really good too. It was definitely a success! Best of all, Justin was able to raise over $7,000 to give to the Volunteer Center to help them continue running their awesome programs in the community! Thank you to all who ran, donated and helped in any other way!!

Ready and Go!
Justin with Lazlo, the timing guy, getting ready for the awards.
Justin and I after the last runners/walkers had come in. The only time we saw eachother the whole morning..ha! Jillian and Shayne are in the background. Jillian won first place overall girl for the 10k and Shayne won 2nd place in his age group for the 10k!

Annual Vail Jingle 5k and kids 1k run

Saturday was the annual Christmas run at Cienega High School. This year I decided to let Justin run since I had a race last weekend and will be running the race he is putting on next weekend. It was fun to be able to cheer for him and all of my friends who were running. I was also able to help some of my friends out by watching their kids so that they could run the race. We had fun having "mini" princess races while we waited for their parents. Very funny. Justin had not trained at all so he was a little worried before starting. He did great. He finished! He is very sore today and thinking that he probably should have ran a couple times beforehand. I was very proud of him. Hannah and Isaac ran the kids race. Earlier in the week, Isaac asked if he could run it on his own this year. (I ran with him last year.) I told him of course. He was very confident that since he ran it last year, he would know where to go. About two minutes before the race started he asked me if I could run it with him. I was not prepared. I was in my Levi's (without my belt). I kept having to pull my pants up the whole time (like Isaac did last year)! The kids always sprint so fast at the first not realizing how far 1k is. I wish I would have had my watch on to see how fast they started out. I had a hard time keeping up with Isaac. He did great! He ran the whole way never stopping. Hannah was about a half of the track in front of us on the way back to the finish line so I could watch her cross the line. She is such a natural runner (I'm jealous). I really should get her out running more. She really likes it. She got 2nd place overall and was the 1st place girl! It was a lot of fun to be able to see so many friends in the community there. Nathan had a great time playing with friends and he went with me to double check some things for Justin's race and walked 3 miles with me that afternoon. It was nice to be able to have one-on-one time with him. It was three hours of nonstop talk about Runescape (a computer game), but at least he was talking and enjoying being with me too. It was a great day.

Justin coming down the home stretch. My good friend Debbie went out to meet him.

Hannah waiting with friends for the race to start.

Hannah heading back into the track for the final lap to the finish.Isaac running his hardest and me trying to keep up:)Hannah crossing the finish line. I wish I had her stride! Isaac crossing the finish line.Hannah with her first-place award. The race director always gives out hand-made ornaments as awards for this race.The three runners. They all did great!The whole family.

Christmas piano recital 12/07/09

Monday was Nathan and Hanna's annual Christmas recital at Fellowship Square. They did a fantastic job. The piano is not the easiest to play. I was very proud of them. I was not as prepared as they were and ran out of batteries in the camera during Hannah's first song. You think I would have learned to check everything after the problem at Isaac's karate last weekend. Apparently not.

Bragging

Last Saturday was a busy day. It started out with a race at the Sahuarita Pecan Orchards. It was a cold morning. Justin and the kids braved the cold to see me off. Then they headed to Walmart to keep warm and then came back to cheer me at the finish line. I ran the hardest that I could and can honestly say that I could not have done any better. It was suppose to be an 8-mile event, but 8 miles came and the finish line was not there...ugh! I really didn't think I could go any farther. A half a mile later, I went through the finish line. I was very proud of my time. A personal best. 8.5 miles in 1:14 minutes. This makes it a pace of 8.45 per mile.

Our next event of the day was for Isaac. He has been working hard in karate and earned his first color belt, a yellow one. He has been so excited about this for weeks. He was all smiles the whole class knowing that the ceremony was at the end. I tried to video it but kept running out of room on the memory card. I had to stop and delete pictures really quick. I definitely should have been more prepared! Anyway, it is in three clips. Justin and I had "date night" that evening. We really needed that! It was so nice to be out together. We finished our Christmas shopping for the kids and had a great dinner where we just sat and talked. All in all, it was a fabulous day! Isaac and his classmate Noah being tested on escapes.Receiving his new yellow belt from Sempai Ashlie.

Breaking open the new belt with a loud Kiai (kee-I) to cleanse it from any demons.Tying it the new belt in the arrow knot.The traditional throw by the instructor.
And there it is. An official yellow belt. I am definitely a proud mom. He loves karate and it is fun to see him learn not only the moves but all the tradition and respect that come with martial arts. Now to work towards the orange belt!

I really wish I could have got the end of this when he gets up and gets back in ready position. His face was so funny. I think the turns shocked him a little.

Enjoying family

My parents, Ginger, Jaikka and my niece Ryanne came to spend Thanksgiving with us. It was so nice to have everyone here. It had almost been two years since I had seen Ryanne. Hannah and Ryanne are four months apart and were always best buddies when we lived in Idaho. Unfortunately, the wind decided to blow horribly most of the time they were here, but we were able to go to the park once when it died down for the evening on Wednesday. Thanksgiving day was full of really great food that mom and I got to make together. I got a babysitter Friday afternoon and all the adults went to see the Christmas show at The Gaslight Theater. It was really good. Ginger and I went to see The Blindside Saturday night. It was fun to be out with her and the movie was excellent. We had a really great time with them and I miss them all so much now that they are gone!

These girls were so funny. Every day they had to try and see what they could wear to look the most like triplets. Some of the yummy food we made! It was nice to spend a day in the kitchen with mom.

Nathan and Grandpa enjoyed playing catch and basketball (with the football) together. The two lefties.Grandpa also decided to give the scooter a try. I love Nathan's face in this picture.
Didn't take long before he had the hang of it. Looks like he's enjoying himself!

Isaac enjoyed spending time with Grandma. He got to show her his shoe tying skills....
and scooter skills.
I can't wait to see you all again in July!

Pictures

I am not very good about having family pictures taken. I had one taken when Nathan was six-months old. Our next one was not taken until the year we moved to Tucson five years later. Now, four years after that, I finally had another one done. Ashlie did an amazing job and I love the new pictures. I sent them off to be printed and was very excited to get them in the mail. I couldn't wait to change out the old ones. Although, very quickly that excitement changed to a little bit of sadness as one by one I took out the old one picture and put in the new one. How had my kids changed so much!! Where is all the cute baby fat that was once on their faces? I looked over at Justin on the couch and he was having the same feelings. It is crazy how fast these sweet little kids grow up. I only have Isaac that I can still pick up and carry without breaking my back. Nathan is almost as tall as me. I'm sure that the next time we have pictures done he will be.

3rd grade music program

Thursday night was Hannah's 3rd grade music program. It is always fun to watch these. It is nice having the new auditorium at Empire High School so we can actually see the kids. When it was in the MPR at the grade school, it was always so hard to see anything besides the back of the head of the person in front of you. The music lady may not seem to be the most relaxed fun-loving girl, but she certainly knows how to put on a good, short program. This year it was exactly 19 minutes. It is fun to see our friend Janelle playing the piano. She plays for pretty much everything that needs a piano in the whole school district. She is amazing. Hannah got to play the xylophone and enjoyed that. She was so funny. She was a little sad that she had to be in front on the "regular floor" again. Her and her friend Olivia are just about the shortest in the whole class. She really wants to be able to stand on the bleachers. I'm guessing she may never be able to.

TP creations

Apparently, this is what my kids think I mean when I say "put the toilet paper away in all the bathrooms". Very creative.

Halloween/birthday

As most of you know, my birthday is on Halloween. The benefit of this, is that it is a date everyone remembers. That is pretty much the end of the benefits. I have pretty much always disliked my birthday being on this day and I guess I always will. I had a great morning. I got up and went for a run with two of my friends, Melody and Julene. They sang me a lovely rendition of the birthday song as we ran. I had been craving BBQ sauce for some reason for weeks so I asked that we drive all the way across town to Famous Dave's BBQ for lunch. Justin agreed to take me even though it was football Saturday and BSU was playing. We listened to ESPN radio as we drove across town and sat at a table that had ESPN on one side of us and ESPN2 on the other side so he didn't miss the games that were on and could see the ticker across the bottom of both for updates on BSU. Yes, he is lucky he married me. After all, I am use to this kind of thing. I think we had every TV in our house in our front room one year when I was a kid so my dad could see all the games he wanted to watch. Famous Dave's hit the spot just right! Love the pulled pork sandwich. We then ran across the street to the mall and got Nathan some much-needed pants. After that, Isaac had karate. I wish I had remembered to bring my camera. He was so cute doing his karate in his ninja costume. Justin took Nathan and Hannah to do my birthday shopping during this. Being in Hawaii left no time for shopping before. I had been feeling sick the day before and that day, so I laid down for a while when we got home. We then had the gifts. I got a hair brush, a bag of chocolates, some lotion and a Costco card since ours had expired (really needed that). I'll just say that after that we took the kids to a couple houses trick or treating. We had gone to the ward trunk or treat party the night before so the kids didn't need much candy. This is the part of the day I hate. I really don't want to blog about the details, but lets just say it was our yearly fight, cry and total frustration. Next year maybe we will learn and skip Halloween. The kids were cute though!

Two ninjas and a skeleton princess.

Hawaii 10/22 to 10/26

Justin has wanted to go to Hawaii to see a BSU game ever since we were married. We decided we would do this for our 10th anniversary. Things didn't work out for us to go that year and since they only play every other year this was the next time they played. The game just happened to be on the same day as our 12th wedding anniversary so Justin thought it was just meant to be. I was hesitant on going because of having to leave our kids with friends. I hate to ask people I know already have a lot going on to take on three more kids! Our friends are so great though and offered to take them. They stayed with the Boydells Thursday and Friday and the Trapaniers Saturday and Sunday. Monday Cherece Hancock picked them up from school and took them to her house and then brought them to our house to put them to bed and stay until we got home. The kids had a great time. Thank you guys for being so willing to do this for us. It is greatly appreciated!! This post is going to be very long as I want to document everything. Sorry.

We stayed in Waikiki at the Ilikai hotel. It was at the beginning of Waikiki beach. We had the marina to one side and the beach to the other side. Our room faced the marina. It was a great place to stay. Nice to be able to walk to everything. The first group is from Friday morning when we visited the USS Arizona Memorial/Pearl Harbor. This was one of Justin's favorite things we did. It was very interesting learning all the little details of what happened that Sunday morning. What an overwhelming feeling of pride and also sorrow as we walked onto the memorial.

I need about another 6 inches to my legs to be able to work this thing.

This is the view as we got on our ferry to go over the the memorial. Picture as we entered the memorial.Behind this rusted part you can see white and black ship markers. They have these all down the shore line marking where all the other battleships were. They sat in rows of two. It must have been so impressive to see.These are two areas that guns attached at the top of the ship. You can also see part of the ship underwater in between them.Justin with Honolulu behind him.Even after all these years, there is still oil rising to the top of the water. It is amazing to watch as what looks like a dot the size of a teardrop comes to surface and then slowly expands. The oil smell is very strong too.

I love seeing our flag. It is just so beautiful. What a great tribute to have this flying over all the fallen men and women.

After we left Pearl Harbor we headed out to go up to the North where we thought we would drive through the pineapple plantation and up around the famous North Shore. However, we got lost and ended up on the most beautiful drive. The road was right between lush, green cliffs. They were amazing. We went through a tunnel through the middle of a mountain that was cool too. When we found the road we were looking for, we realized the ocean was on the wrong side and we had gone across the middle of the island and ended up going up the coastline in the opposite direction. This took us up by the temple. When we got there, Justin's stomach was upset and he got really sick for about an hour. So, we never did go see the temple up close, we just took a picture as we drove by. It is closed right now for renovation. Luckily, whatever it was passed and we decided to head over to the Polynesian Cultural Center where I had tickets for the luau and their night show. This place is pretty impressive. They said 60% of the workers were students attending BYU Hawaii from various islands. On the grounds they have mini villages set up as they were in their native land. They put on little shows and demonstrations of crafts and such. I guess you could say this is Hawaii's Disneyland. It was fun to see. The food was great and the entertainment was great too. We ran into two people that Justin served with on his mission there. Always suprises me how he will now someone wherever we go. This is at the Polynesian Cultural Center. They had a parade of islands where each island had a canoe and they would come through and do their native dance while on the canoe. It was pretty cool. These girls from Tahiti could really move their hips!! They were Justin's favorite.These were some of my favorite dancers.Enjoying a canoe ride from one side of the center to the other.
Getting dinner...all cooked. Boy the pulled pork was good!! This is at the big show they put on called Ha Breath of Life. It is at an outdoor amphitheater. They had dancing styles from all the islands and they also had fire dancers that put on a pretty good show too. Looks painful to me!After the luau. The flowers smelled so good, but they were heavy.

The next day, we got up and headed over to Diamond Head Crater. This is an old volcano crater that the military used as a lookout during the war. They said that no fire was every shot from it. It was pretty cool to see how they used this and crazy to think of coming up and down it and getting all their equipment there. While we were in Hawaii, apparently there was a hurricane way off shore bringing in a lot of humidity. It was also 10 degrees hotter than usual too. Basically, we started sweating the second we stepped outside. Hiking up to the top was very hot and very tiring but a lot of fun and there is a great view from the top! This is the trail. I believe it is 0.7 miles from the base to the top. Not that long, but definitely challenging.

Once you get up close to the top, it is stairs and tunnels through the crater to the top. Justin heading up the first set of stairs.This was the longest, steepest set of stairs. Boy my thighs were feeling it by about half way up! You can see where they use to cover it with camouflage.There are four floors dug out inside the crater. I don't know how they ever did that. This is the last staircase before heading to the top. It is on the floor that was used for a fire fighting crew.
View from the top. It was just beautiful. Worth the hike but quite the workout. We needed a break before heading down!Going down was definitely easier than going up!
After Diamond Head, we went back to our hotel and changed into our swimwear. We walked through the shopping section of Waikiki down to the beach. We found a little spot that was perfect. I can see why Waikiki is always named one of the top beaches in the world. The sand was perfect and the color of the water beautiful. It was also so clean. There wasn't any seaweed or anything. The water was cool enough to be refreshing but didn't take any getting use to. It was also shallow enough to stand in for a long way out. I really wish that we had taken more pictures, but we were having so much fun in the water that we forgot. It was so much fun just bouncing around in the gentle waves. After the beach we walked back and got ready for the game. We went to a little pub to get a pizza before heading out to the game. Our tickets said kickoff was at 6:05. We ran into some very friendly Hawaii fans who let us know that the game actually started at 5. Apparently they changed game times so that more people could see the game as it is so much later in Hawaii. Nice!! So glad we knew. We grabbed our pizza to go and hurried to the stadium. All the Hawaii fans were so friendly and wishing our team luck. All they wanted was Boise to "cover the spread" and "run the table the rest of the season so the school can get its million dollar payout for the WAC" I don't think there was actually a Hawaii fan hoping Hawaii would win. It was funny. We sat in the BSU section. This was at the corner of one end zone. We were in row 1. For most of the game, this was a horrible seat. We ended up watching most of the game on the big-screen TV. But, during the 2nd and 3rd quarter when Boise did all the scoring in this end zone, it was the best seat in the house!! It was a lot of fun. Touchdown..AGAIN. Boise won 54 to 9. Extra point...good.After the game, the players came over to greet all the fans.

Day number three. We got up and drove over to Hanauma Bay. Talk about breathtaking. Such a beautiful place. It was really hot so the water was very refreshing. Justin and I decided to try snorkeling. He was very excited and headed right in. I was a little nervous. I'm not sure why. I know how to swim so I didn't think I would be. Something about trusting that little stick to breath maybe. I would go under and then realize I was not breathing and have to tell myself to breath. I definitely learned I would not want to deep sea dive EVER. I found myself get almost claustrophobic out over the corral. I liked staying on the outside looking into it instead. Of course, you don't see the pretty stuff staying close to the shore. We did see some really pretty fish. Apparently, there are sea turtles out farther, but we didn't make it that way. Justin did great at first but then had trouble with his snorkel. They were all sold out of the open ones so we had what is called a dry snorkel. This is suppose to keep the water out. Trouble is that when you do get water in it, it is hard to blow it out. He would get water in and then panic. The longer we were in the more comfortable I got and the less comfortable he got. It was funny. I also found myself feeling quite nauseous after being bounced around on the water. We lasted a good hour and decided we were done. I am glad we did it. It was fun being out there with Justin. Hanauma Bay.Me attempting to snorkel.Can't relax until I know what the BCS standing are! Ha.

We dried off and then took a drive. We had decided to drive up along the coast the whole way and have lunch at the North Shore. Driving up the coast was just spectacular. We passed a blowhole that was interesting to watch. We also passed several very popular surfing areas. It started to rain as we got into more of the jungle areas. There is only one main road that goes around the island and it is 35 miles per hour. On a Sunday it was heavy traffic. It starting raining really bad and we were in this line of traffic that just stopped. It looked like there may be some flooding so we wondered if we would be able to finish our drive. We found ourself coming to a very narrow bridge with muddy water coming over it. Being stuck in the middle of traffic with no where to turn off, we drove ahead. It was so scary. There was a part that I new for sure we would not get through. The water was running up to the top of our car!! I sure wish we had a picture. At the moment, we were both freaking out hoping to make it through and not have the car stall! A truck in front of us did. Somehow we made it. A few minutes after we got through a fire truck and an emergency vehicle pulling a trailer of jet skis went by. Glad they weren’t having to rescue us!It rained the rest of the afternoon. It took us almost an hour and a half to get up to North Shore. We ate what was now supper. North Shore is definitely a lot different than the Waikiki area. Very much more Sun Valley-ish. A lot of surfers. We really wanted to get to the Dole Pineapple Plantation before it closed so we didn’t stay long. We got to it 15 minutes before closing. Just long enough for Justin to get a shirt he wanted and for us to have the most delicious pineapple cheesecake. So yummy!
At the blowhole. It was a pretty calm day. You could see how high the water would get sometimes. It was fun to see it spout up. The sign said that at times it would come all the way to the parking lot. Unfortunately some people have ignore the signs of staying in the gated area and have been sucked down. Yikes!This is Sandy Beach. It is a very dangerous surfing/body surfing area. They say you should not attempt it here unless you are a professional. I'm sure a lot of tourists think they are..ha. They say some days during the year there can be up to 40 rescues a day. Crazy. Very beautiful!
This is just off the shore of Sandy Beach.

I wish we would have thought to stop and take a picture of the mountain/jungle area. So beautiful. This is just a shot Justin took from the car.

Fields at the Dole Pineapple Plantation. It was neat to see how they grow. The worlds largest maze is here. Would be fun to go through.

We had to leave to the airport the next morning so we headed back to the hotel to get to sleep early. It was such a fun trip. I wish we could have stayed one more day…or week!