Animal Showcase

Today at school was the Animal Showcase.  Charley's class sang some animal songs, then they all presented their animal dioramas.  They had their fiction stories they wrote about their animal displayed, as well as a water color painting they made of their animal.  Next time you see Charley ask her about a llama.  We know it all! 

Swim Lessons

So I signed the girls up for swimming lessons.  We found this really great place that does private lessons for a really good price.  Every summer we go to the beach or my parents have a pool, so the girls needed to at least start learning.  These would be our first official lessons.  ....I had signed Charley up for Mommy and Me classes when she was 2, but that was just playing in the water for 40 minutes.

Day 1 of lessons went great.  But it was just getting used to the teacher and the water, and having fun.  Day 2 Charley did great.  She floated all by herself!  The teacher was impressed.  Charley hated it, but she did really good.  By the 3rd day, she was not doing anything for him.  She was still really clingy and wouldn't let go of her teacher. 

They have taken it a little slower with Gabby because she is younger.  But I have a feeling that once they start letting go of her, things are not going to be pretty! 

All these pictures were taken on the first day, when they were excited to go!!! :)  It is hard to take good pictures of them because I still have Dani with me.  And I am chasing her from trying to jump in the pool herself. 

We still have the rest of this week and next week of classes everyday. Let's just cross our fingers things get better!

I threw in a picture of Dani because she is just so cute in her little swim suit!

Spring Pictures

 So a month or so ago was school pictures.  Somehow the date for school pictures slipped my mind. And I sent Charley to school in a long-sleeve hoodie!  When she got the proofs back from school, they had her in a fake flower meadow back drop!  It was a cute picture of Charley, but had I remembered, I would have sent her in something more cute.  But really, the back drop was awful!

Ben still wanted me to buy pictures.  We didn't get fall pictures, and we wanted something to document her in Kindergarten.  And really, I try my best, but I am not a great photographer.  ...I realize and admit that!  And also.....they wanted me to pay $30 for 8 pictures!!!  Not even a digital copy might I add!  A friend down the street takes pictures and I asked about her pricing.  She was going to charge me $50 to take Charley's pictures, plus I would get the digital copy.  But if I took some of all the girls it was only $25 more, and I got like 30 images.  So all the girls got pictures taken!

They are amazingly beautiful, and Lori really got each of the girls personalities! I love them!!!  If you need Lori's info give me a call, she doesn't have a web site, but she does a great job!

Happy Birthday!

 Happy Birthday to my favorite person in the world! He is pretty much awesome!

Tonight we went to Tucanos for his birthday!  We went with some friends, the Duckworths, Forbes, and Boren's!

A few months ago I was all against Ben having guns in the house.  However, his work bought him a gun for Christmas last year.  I have gone shooting a few times with him, and have since changed my mind.  I changed my mind so much, I bought him a gun.  I have been saving my money from my jobs and even sewing some stuff for a neighbors company to get some extra money to buy him a shotgun! How crazy am I....I guess really crazy!

It was a good day.  Happy Birthday Babe! Love you.

How does your Garden Grow?

 Charley had a big project at here school.  They were all assigned to pick an animal, learn about it, write a paragraph about that animal, and then make a shoebox diorama of the animal in its habitat.  It was a big project for a little kindergartener.  Charley picked the Llama.  She said she wanted to be different, and she was!  I took her to the library last week and I showed her how to look up books on the computer and find them.  We found 3 books in the Youth NonFiction section that was simple enough for her to read. After we learned all we could about llamas, we made this diorama.  She did awesome.  She did it all, I just worked the hot glue gun.  We got creative, and added grass from Easter, the mountain is made of the top of a milk jug, along with rocks and twigs from our yard.   Next week all of the kindergartens are going to present their projects at an animal showcase they will set up in the library.  And then the next day they are going on a field trip to the zoo. 

We planted a garden a few weeks back.  And I went out to water this morning and found everything growing!!!....and some of the strawberries are starting to come!!!  I am so excited!

Childrens Garden with friends

We went to the Children's Gardens with some friends the other day. It was perfect weather!  And and so nice to get out!

laundry

I seem to always underestimate what my kids are capable of.

This morning Charley comes downstairs and is carrying a bunch of her dirty clothes in her arms.  She proceeds to stick them in the washing machine, gather all the hand towels in the kitchen, and then asks me to get her a tide soap pod (they are too high for her to reach).  She throws one in the wash, and turns the nob and pushes start!  All with out me telling her to do so.  I guess I didn't realize she knew how to do laundry!  What else can this girl do?! Probably a lot more than I give her credit for.  Poor kid...now I am going to make her do the dishes! :)

Hinkley/Ewing's at Temple Square

Every spring Uncle Ira puts together a Hinkley/Ewing family gathering up in SLC.  Everyone who is in the area goes to listen to Music and the Spoken Word, put on by the Mormon Tabrinacle Choir. Then we walk around Temple Square until we meet up at Ira's house for a big lunch.

It was perfect weather, and the flowers looked beautiful! There was a big group picture taken with everyone, but I didn't get one on my camera.  But it was a really nice morning/afternoon!

Happy Spring!

Thanksgiving Point Half

I have run 2 marathons, 3 Ragnars, and now I can add a half marathon to my resume'! I was originally going to sing up with a few ladies, but one by one, something came up and had to back out.  But I still wanted to run the half.  I was doing really good training up until a month ago.  I have been running/working out at least 5 days a week (I am doing a challenge with some friends...I'll explain at the end).  But I haven't found time to do any long runs for the past month.  I was a little worried about my legs not being able to make it, so I decided to just keep it at a good steady pace.  I found a pacer for the race, and kept with her the whole way.  I just looked at the official time, and I finished in 2 hours 19 minutes!!  (about a 10:37 min/mile pace) ....not bad. I was pretty proud of myself!  And to top it off I was greeted by my cute little family at the finish.....Ben got all the girls ready and out the door to cheer me on at the finish! 

I learned a few things while running:
1. I am slow, but I have a pace that I can hold forever. Even without my long run training, I felt like I could have done a full marathon.
2. Even though I am slow, I still like to pick people off. ....as in passing people. 
3. I am not one of those cool young runners anymore.  I am a mom runner....I run with a fanny pack.  It is a small running one, but I run with a fanny pack none the less!
4. And I am a little scared to see what I actually look like running. There was this lady who looked like a really slow runner....but she was a head of me. If she looked like that, then what do I look like?!
5. I hate training, but I love the actual race.

When I first had Charley, I made a goal for myself to run a marathon after every kid I had.  And I hope that by this fall I will have completed that goal! This half was to help me figure out how my body was doing.  Now, I just need to figure out what full  I want to do.

As for my challenge.  There is a group of 6 ladies that live in our neighborhood.  We all have recently had babies, and were looking for some motivation to get our baby weight off.  So we came up with a challenge:  We started March 1, and it will go until June1st.  We have to work out for 5 days a week, for at least a half an hour.  If we don't, we have to put $50 in the pot, and the money will get split between the ladies that make it the full 3 months.  I has been a great motivator to workout, even on those days were it is so easy to talk yourself out of it.  I think we are going to do a different challenge when this one is over. But this was a good one to start with to get us in the habit.

Our Little Garden!!

On Saturday we planted a GARDEN!!!  We never go in our back yard.  Why? Because we live on a mountain, and we have a cliff off our back!  Seriously! Plus it is tiny.  Since we have moved in I have wanted to plant a garden, and our back yard is really good for nothing else.  I saw on Pinterest to use cinder blocks instead of wood. This way you can use the little holes on the outside for little plants!  I asked Ben's aunt Liz to come help me....she is an expert gardener. Her backyard is AmaZING!!  She was so nice to come to our house all afternoon to help.  She even went to the store with me to pick out plants and get dirt!

The girls had so much fun helping.  Dani sat on the edge of the box and poked at the dirt for at least an hour!  We still need to get a few more plants.  The veggies don't go in until after mother's day.  But our big box has all of our berries.....strawberries, raspberries, blackberries and boysenberries. In our veggie box, the broccoli, lettuce and green onions are already in.  But the tomatoes, peppers and squash have to wait.

I am sooo excited for things to start producing!

TM5K

 Charley's school had a 5k run last Friday. Where we live, we are really secluded. And it was really easy to have the kids run through the neighborhood.  They actually ran most of the way on a dirt trail that runs along the front of all of the houses. Last year they did a "TRY-athalon".  They have always tried to encourage kids getting out and being active.  They sent home letters telling parents to have the kids train for the 5K.  I took Charley out a few times, and the day before the race, I took all of the girls. I was expecting Gabby to stay int the stroller, but to my surprise she ran all the way to the school from our house without stopping.  When she said she wanted to run the race, I was all for it.  However, I signed up for the race, and didn't think about Gabby.  So I got a shirt for me when I signed up, and when I went to see if they had extra, they were all sold out. So I cut up my shirt and sewed it back together.  It was a little snug on her, but she still looked cute! She was SUPER excited to have a shirt to run the race.

 At the start!  There were lots of mom's and dad's running.  Everyone in the school had to run it, even the teachers!  It was so fun to see the whole school out running!

 As we started running, I had one of those proud mommy moments.  It was one where I really just wanted to cry I was so happy!  I am not an amazing runner....I was decent when I was in high school. But I love it, and I was so proud of them so excited to run, and doing it!

 Crossing the finish line!

So proud of my little runners!

You can't make this stuff up...

The other day I was working at the computer.  When I was all done, I walk into the kitchen to this....

Now, earlier that day I had gone to the store, and bought the girls some new hangers.  They were out on the counter because Dani was sleeping.  I was waiting to put them away until after she woke up.  

I asked the girls (Charley & Gabby) what they were doing, and they began to explain to me that they were trying to make ICE SKATES!!!  So they broke the hooks off of the hangers, and tried to GLUE them on their shoes with a GLUE STICK!!!!  Apparently it was Gabby's idea, and Charley was the one that broke the hangers.

Yes, I did get mad at them.  I had JUST bought them! When I was younger my mom kept telling us she couldn't ever have anything nice because we just broke everything.  Well, I am coming to understand her a lot better these days!  

But after 5 minutes I couldn't stop laughing!!  Very creative girls, but maybe next time we try something stronger than a glue stick!  And maybe not try making ice skates when it is 60 degrees outside!

Omaha & Zoo

My girls have gone to the Omaha zoo more than they have gone to the SLC zoo....why....because the Omaha zoo is just plain COOLER!  Last week I took the girls back to Omaha for Spring Break.  I was asked by OPS (Omaha Public Schools), the Title VII program to teach another Hoop Clinic.  I have gone back a few times to do this....they pay me well!  :)  Plus it is a good excuse to visit Nana & Grandpa.  And of course the girls love it!  We had a busy week of dancing. And I ended up getting sick, and it was nice to have my mom help watch the girls so I could sleep!  But we managed to have some fun. The girls got to play with the Perez cousins, we went to the zoo, and got to visit with my grandparents. Ben stayed back to work.  However, he had to go to Santa Barbra for work, so he stayed an extra day so he could visit with his sister, Emily and family who live in Camarillo...just about an hour a way from Santa Barbra.  He loved his visit!  And the girls were a little jealous that he got to see AV and KD!  

But in all...it was a great spring break!  Now it is back to the schedule....and one of these days I will actually unpack from our trip! hopefully I will do that soon!!