CHRISTMAS: day 1

 Decorating the Christmas tree is not just the application of ornaments when we are putting up the "family tree".  It is like opening up a scrapbook of our adventures.  We have all the handcrafted ornaments that the kiddos have made since they were old enough to hold a pair of scissors or squeeze a glue bottle,  We have the wreaths made of puzzle pieces that capture how young they were at the time.  Reindeers made from their hand impressions and various paper mached items.  Then we have the ornaments that we have gotten on various trips or vacations: cruise ships, mermaids, pieces of Yellowstone or Yosemite.  My favorite is when we start putting up the ornaments that Steve and I have given to each other.  Sometimes they are just cute holiday ornaments and others represent something we did that year.  For example this year Steve gave me an ornament that looks like a purse to represent my new "business" venture.  I made him one with a picture of Suzy Bogguss and a little guitar because he got to meet her this year after her concert. 

  Once it is all done, the ornaments are on, the angel is atop the tree and the pretty red bows have been attached to various limbs.  I love to step back and bask in all we have done in our 16 years of marriage.  A reminder of our good life and how much we are blessed.

TEMPLE to TEMPLE

 What a great way to start Labor Day morning, we woke up early and drove up to the Oquirrh Mountain Temple to participate in the Temple to Temple Steeplechase race.  Steve and the kids did this one last year while I was in Virginia Beach participating in a Half Marathon.  I was actually kind of jealous that they had done such a neat race, so as soon as I heard that registration for this had opened I made sure we were doing it.

The kids took off and Steve hung out with me in the rear of the pack.  It is actually a pretty cool course.  I would like to do it more often.  We caught up with the kiddos at the finish which was at the Jordan River Temple, 5 miles later.  I think one of the best parts of doing these races with the kids is seeing that look of accomplishment in their eyes.

PHOTOS of HAWAII

Wait a minute...that doesn't say Washington DC!!!

Body surfing on Kamaole Beach II

Katie ready to do some snorkeling at Black Rock

Belle with her completed sand sculpture.
People stopped and took pictures of it.

After snorkeling with the sea turtles at Hono Cove

Stopped at the BlowHole

A little shaka from my two guys

One of the many waterfalls on the Road to Hana

Stop at "Halfway to Hana" for a shaved ice with vanilla ice cream...YUM-O!!!!

Steve and the kids after hiking down to the "Three Bears" falls

Steve showing us how to climb the coconut tree. 
Its not as easy as you would think

My awesome family at Wai'anapanapa State Park

 

Yes, we have bananas today!!!

Becky making a sea turtle

Nikki boogie boarding for the first time in YEARS!!!

Some good looking kids...can't believe how big they all are

Belle at Haleakala National Park...10,000 feet above sea level!!

My beautiful daughter, Katie, during the beautiful Maui sunset

Can't believe how beautiful these girls are

Aloha Maui....Mahalo for a wonderful family vacation!!!

THE FAMILY THAT RUNS TOGETHER...

 Saturday, June 18th...the family was up and dressed at 6:00am in the morning and we were driving to the Pavilion at the River Trail in South Jordan.  Steve, the kids and I signed up to run in the Country Fest 5K.   We did this race with the kids a couple of years ago and had a GREAT experience and the kids have been asking to do another race.   The weather was perfect and the race started on time.  Steve and the kids began in the front of the pack while I took my usual place bringing up the rear.  I started with my friend Mikki by my side, but as soon as I began to "run" I realized I needed to start of a little slower and waved her ahead.  The sweetheart that she is, she tried to encourage me to stay with her, but I told her to go ahead and make her best time.  So I was on my own and to be honest, I don't mind it too much.  It makes me very self conscience to "run" with someone.  I don't run for long and feel like such a loser, so it is just easier to run alone and go at my pace.  I do try to challenge myself.  As the continued down the path I could see Mikki and one of my girls running together.  What an awesome feeling to know that there was someone encouraging my daughter along too.  I did not see Steve cross the finish, which told me I was doing better than I had the last time I had run this course.  I kept pushing along and began to made my way through the neighborhood.  I actually enjoy that portion the most.  I love the pretty houses we run, or in my case, wa-og by.  As I was about a half way through the neighborhood, there I saw my angel.  Steve was there to help encourage me, as he has done in all my races, through the remainder of the race.  I love to see his face.  He always makes me feel like I am accomplishing something and that I have ALL the abilities to do it.  I crossed the finish line a little after 45 minutes (my goal was 45minutes).  Mikki, who had come in 6 minutes before me and all my kids along with Steve, stood there at the finish cheering me in.  Gotta love that family of mine!!!

 We hung around for the awards.  Steve knew he was getting an award for his age division, which was a FIRST place.  He also came in FOURTH overall...holy cow that man of mine can run FAST!!!

We hung around through the other awards to see if any of our kiddos had placed and we were glad we did...

BECKY won a 1st PLACE medal

BELLE 2nd PLACE medal

&

KATIE took a 3rd PLACE medal

in their age division...They were all tickled and I must say, I was a pretty proud mama.

As usual, I am very blessed for my family, especially Steve that supports me and is my biggest cheerleader.  He makes me feel like I can do ANYTHING and has helped me to do things I would never have dreamed I could do.

HP 7~The Deathly Hallows pt.1

Last night Steve and I took the kids to see the first movie in the Harry Potter Series. The kids had done so well on their report cards, we wanted to do something to celebrate, so we purchased our tickets a few weeks ago. We thought about going to the midnight showing, but we could not get seats all together and the prospect of going to bed at 3:30 and waking up a few hours later was not fun.
We waited for Steve to get home from work and went to the Megaplex Theater at the District. We had 10:10 pm tickets for the Imax version. The kids were so excited!! We purchased our popcorns and sodas and got settled into our seats. It was fun to listening to the audience (and Steve) cheer when the Harry Potter theme music began playing.

I have complained when we have watched other HP movies, that they leave our parts of the book that I think are so important or had looked forward to seeing how it would be depicted in the movie, but I did not have that feeling with this movie. There was a few instances where things were changed up a little, but over all I was pleased with what we saw last night. Even though much of the movie is dark and intense, there are some very funny scenes.

Probably the saddest part was a scene involving Dobby. I looked over to see Katie and Belle wiping her eyes to the right of me and then to the left Becky looked into Becky's eyes to see them filled with pools of tears...too cute!!

Definitely looking forward to July 15, 2011 to see Part 2.

It might worth getting tickets to the midnight show and being inconvenienced to getting to bed at 3:30am to say good-bye to all these characters that our family have enjoyed reading and watching.

PERSEVERANCE

Steve and I took the family to Yosemite this month. It was a family trip we had been planning for a few months. I was excited to take the kids to this National Park. It is just such a beautiful place, but that was not the only reason I was excited to go back...yes back. Steve and I had been there about 5 years ago. During that trip Steve had planned a hike that started from Glacier Point passed by a few beautiful waterfalls and ended at Happy Isles where you could pick up the shuttle to take you back to you campground. It was an 8 mile hike. I was TOTALLY out of shape and was carrying many more pounds on me (think 6 five pound bags of sugar strapped to your body). It took us 10 hours. The last 2 miles probably took us more than 2 hours, much of which had been done on my bum. Yes, I said on my bum. Descending the granite rocks that lead down the trail from Vernal Falls. It was an eye opening experience and one of the things that made me realize I needed to do something about my weight and health if I wanted to be a participant in my life and not just a spectator. Especially since I married to Steve. He is such an outdoor enthusiast, I should be able to accompany him on (some of) his adventures and not be stuck in the car or camp because I am so out of shape. When the hike was over I was glad I had finished it (alive), but also pretty embarrassed and I felt bad for Steve, to be in this beautiful park and he and spent the last few hours unable to appreciate it because he was concerned that I might not be able to get done without assistance from rangers. So once this trip was calendared, I saw this as a great opportunity to "conquer the hike" that had literally kicked my butt. Steve and I toyed with the idea of doing the whole hike beginning at Glacier point with the kids, but then determined that the 8 miles might be a little boring for them. So we opted to hike up from Happy Isles at least to the top of Vernal Falls and then back down (seriously, I think this is way harder than the original hike we did 5 years ago). The trail was nice and shaded in some parts, but it was a climb. You ascend nearly 1000 feet in the 2 miles to the top of the falls. I took it slow and steady as we climbed. My little "billy-goat" kids just bounded up the trail. They would stop every so often and wait for me and Steve to catch up. It was great, the closer you got to the falls, you would get sprayed by the falls. It was so refreshing, just what I needed. But just as I remembered there were more of those granite stairs...that good thing was that they were not as tall as I had remembered them to be.

I made it to the TOP!!! It was hard work, but definitely I was in better shape that I had been 5 years ago and I was proud of my performance getting to the top. We looked over the edge and watched as the falls crashed to the bottom. It was incredible but to be quite honest, I was still celebrating making it to the top and knowing that only half the hike was done...I still had to go down...1000 feet.
I had time to relax though. I took off my shoes and socks and stuck my feet into the Emerald Pools at which time Steve surprised me with a Diet Coke from his backpack. That was the best present he could have given me. I savored every sip of that. Steve and the kiddos went off to see the bottom of Nevada Falls which was about half a mile from Vernal. I stayed there and sat on a rock and had a mini celebration in my head until I saw them approach and I knew the hard part was about to begin.
We started the descent and I won't lie, it was as hard as I thought it would be. I don't have very strong knees. That is one of the reasons I wa-og instead of run. So every stair I stepped down on, I could feel my right knee want to give out, but I did EVERY stair on my feet. My wonderful husband took it slow along with me. He would let me know when I was holding up traffic, so I could pull over and let people pass by me. I just kept thinking, "...slow and steady wins the race..." Thank heavens for those trekking poles they helped me on each stair. Once the stairs were done, the rest was cake...ok, maybe not cake but it was easier. It was a descent, but I have done that during my half marathons, so I treated it like a half and kind of jogged my way down. That made it so easy and before I knew it we were at the shuttle stop waiting to catch a shuttle to take us back to our parked truck.
I know lots of people hiked around Yosemite that day and had been on trails that were harder and longer than what I had done, but for me I had hiked "my" Everest and made it to the top. I proved to myself that I can do ANYTHING I put my mind to. I may not have grown up a jock and in my youth took whatever class I could to get out of PE, but I can be a sporty chick. I can be the woman that Steve deserves to be married to, to share these experiences with. I can be a woman that my girls can look up to. They knew how hard that hike was for, but they watched me persevere, not give up and I met my goal. Best of all I can look at myself in the mirror and know that I am the woman FINALLY on the outside that I knew always existed on the inside.

AUNT CHERIES VISIT

My Aunt Cherie and cousin Michael came for a visit over he 4th of July weekend.

It was great to spend some quality time with them. I have not seen Michale for 19 years...he was just a little boy who was fascinated with my cassette playing walkman. He is not quite such a little guy any longer and technology has come a long way.
It also gave me the chance to spend som time talking with my Aunt Cherie. She is a pretty neat lady. Kind of sad she lives so far way and the opportunities to get together are so few. But I am grateful for the visit we had this summmer.
We took a drive to the Buckhorn Panel in Emery County. The sun was in an awful position to see the indian writings clearly and definitely impossible to take pictures.

After that we drove to Millsite and had a pleasant lunch at the golf course restaurant.

BOSTON

This year when we went to Rhode Island to visit Steve's family, we took the train into Boston for the day. This is my fourth trip to Boston, I think. I love all the history that is there. It was especially great to share it all with the kiddos.
One of the best parts is the cemeteries. So many of the patriots that played a part in our countries birth are buried there along with those that fought to make it come about.

This is the Paul Revere statue that sits in the North End. Behind the statue is the North Church.

One of the best parts was going to Mike's Pastry in "Little Italy" for a yum-o canoli. I have NEVER had a canoli that tastes better than theirs. Highly recommend making the trip to the North End, if you are EVER in Boston.

We took the tour of the USS Constitution. Most of the upper deck was being refurbished, but we did get a tour of the lower decks, which was quite interesting.

The kids followed the "red brick road", which is the line you follow as you go along the FREEDOM TRAIL.

We ended the trail at the Bunker Hill Memorial. Unfortunately we were 15 minutes late to be able to climb to the top of the monument.