Mama has a melt down!!

I was busy, busy, busy with last minute Christmas preparations. It snowed and they cancelled school (can you believe it?). So instead of doing what I needed to do, I did what I wanted to do and that was play in the snow with the kids.

We made a snow family with a mama, papa and 6 little ones! Of course by the next afternoon it was melting rapidly and the mama had a melt down. I almost followed her because there was so much to do, but life is just too short to worry about meltdowns!

So I just put my smile on and kept going. Turns out that there really wasn't anything to worry about after all...everything turned out fabulously!

What a wonderful holiday we have had.

Hope yours was as well!

Don't worry be happy!

What the heck is a tag?

Okay this is a new one on me! Tia tagged me and I really hope that I am doing this right or I will feel sooooo stupid!

This is the fourth photo in my fourth folder! (say that 10 times fast) :)

Batter Up!!

Larson played machine pitch this year and it was really fun to watch him get into it so much! He could play just about every position and really got frustrated when the new comers to baseball wouldn't move, throw or catch fast enough! He is such a happy kid and I really love having him around!

Naomi runs the Butch Cassidy 10K

Naomi has tenacity. She had to look that up, then decided that she liked the word. I used it the other morning at 5:45 when I was struggling to keep up as I rode the bike and she ran 3 miles.

It all started about a month ago when one of her soccer playing friends commented on how volleyball players weren't really in that great of shape, because volleyball doesn't require much running. Naomi argued with her about how hard they work and the amount of exertion that is put forth, both in practice and games. But to no avail.

Another friend who didn't make the volleyball team, decided to get into better shape for the next tryouts and decided to run a 10K. She invited Naomi to do it with her. Naomi began training and thought that this would be a great way to show her soccer friend that she was indeed in as good if not better shape than the soccer players! She even invited the soccer friend to participate with her in the 10K. The friend suddenly had something else scheduled for that same day. Hmmmm????

Naomi was diligent in her running and really came to like it.

The day of the race came. It was a chilly morning. Over six hundred participants started in Springdale and ran to the small town of Grafton. (This is well known as one of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kids hideouts) Most of the course is on a dirt road, up and down hills.

I waited anxiously at the finish line. Naomi hadn't ever ran the whole 10K at one time. I was nervous, was she okay? could she really make it? could she do it without me riding a bike with her? (okay that was a silly thought, because I was always lagging behind)

Pretty soon, here she came down the dusty dirt road. She was still running and had the biggest smile on her face. She was so excited! She had done it! And then she found out..... she was first in her division! That was the icing on the cake!

Needless to say, she took that medal to school the next week and bragged it up to her friend. The friend didn't have much to say, but Naomi knew that she had proven something to herself... she really is in shape. She didn't need a 10K to prove it, you can see it when she plays volleyball!

Way to go Naomi!!

What I've learned!

It really isn't fun to "Blog Blitz". I think the anticipation is the key! You anticipate an "occasional" post from me (and you know it tends to be more sporadic than occasional) and I anticipate an occasional comment from you. It works best that way! I guess I will just have to try to keep up on the blogging. It is still a fun way to keep up on all that is happening! Thanks for being good sports with my blogging lesson!

Warm Springs... Again!

We love this place!!!! We invited some families to join us this time. Everyone had a friend, including mom and dad! We thought that there was going to be around 600 other people there, so we decided to go in the morning, have lunch then leave when the crowds arrived. They never came and we pretty much had the place to ourselves.

The teens played water basketball for a solid two hours, then we ate, played volleyball, ultimate frisbee, explored and swam some more! It was delightful.

Thanks to the Spendloves, Heatons, Fishers, and others who joined us!!

What are you doing for Spring Break?

Rototilling

As I mentioned before, we are doing some super duper remodeling of the backyard! (Don't even get Rick started on it... it just gets him all worked up). We had a rototiller break down, so Rick rented one for the day and he a Presten went at it like gangbusters. I think if the truth be told they were really having fun with a Big Boy Toy!

Getting Wood

We have been trying to get the whole family to go to the cabin so that we could enjoy the beautiful fall colors and also to clear some of the dead trees nearby, but the kids are so busy with school and "such", they can't go so Rick took the day off and we went with his mom and dad.

The boys did the cutting and the girls did the loading. We didn't do too badly either. Three loads in about 2 hours.

We ate a little bit of lunch then headed back down the mountain and got home right when the kids were coming home from school.

Now the kids get to do the splitting and the stacking!