Update--at long last

Here is a long awaited update.  I can't believe I haven't posted since last January. It is mostly my wonderful family reading this, so I feel bad about not updating you guys.  I really love reading about what is going on in your families.  I'll just do a quick overview of our happenings this last spring.

Kobe had a fabulous soccer season!  His team moved up to the premier division.  Kobe started playing midfield wing and really liked it.  He even got a few shots off, but sadly their goalies stopped them.  He completely surprised me by coming to me the evening before tryouts for the next year and told me he had decided he wanted to take a break from soccer and not go to tryouts.  Since he has been living and breathing soccer since he was 6 years old, I was totally caught off guard.  But, he is big enough to make his own decisions and he feels good about this.  So he is going to focus on cross country and track right now.

 ........Which brings me to my next set of pictures.  Kobe had an amazing spring track season with the Lehi Junior High team.  He ran the 800m and the 1600m (1 mile) races.  His fastest mile time was 5:20. 

 This is the boys distance team

 Sprinting for the finish

And then on to Alex.  He went to prom at the end of April.  There is nothing better than seeing your son all dressed up in a tux.  He still hasn't picked up his pictures (I hope they still have them at the school), but here are some I took of him before he left.  

 He wanted to go like this....

 But I made sure he went like this

And then Alex turned 17.  Wow!  He loves the Costco 4 layer chocolate cake, so I obliged.  He was so happy. 

 He actually ate this huge piece in one sitting.  If you've ever had this cake before you know to be properly impressed.  I will also add that the whole cake was devoured (mostly by Alex) in exactly 34 hours.  It didn't even last for 2 days!

Then Steve and I took a much needed trip to Hawaii (Mauii) to celebrate our 20th wedding anniversary.  We went with my cousin Vance and his wife Annie.  It was so much fun.  Neither of us had been there before and it was fun to experience something new together.  We spent a week with no kids and it was awesome.  Steve's parents were kind enough to come and stay at our house with the kids.  My favorite part?--I really loved snorkeling and seeing giant sea turtles.
 

 Now on to Brooklyn.  She has finished up a great year at dance.  She did most of the choreography for one of her dances.  They took this dance to the Releve' competition and won 1st place with Honors in their age category.  She was so proud.  The trophy was huge.  Since it will stay in the studio, I took a picture of her with it.  I am putting a video of her class performing her dance at the final concert at the end of this post.

And......Brooklyn is doing swim team this summer.  She is doing great.  She likes the breaststroke best.  I love this because that was my favorite as well.  She got 3rd place in the IM at her meet last Saturday.  

We also had a great time competing in the Bone and Back race.  Tia posted all the pictures on her blog, so click on her blog link to see those. We won the family division again this year.  It was a cold windy day-bad for the spectators and perfect for the runners.  Tia joined the team for the first time this year.  It is so fun to do a race with my family!  Alex and I each won $50 gift cards to the running store in Idaho Falls, so we got a little shopping spree in before we went home.

Now I am working on painting the inside of my house.  Everything except the kid bedrooms. It is a huge project and I'm excited to get it done.  I repainted all the trim last week.  While I wait for that to harden and cure I am going to refinish the railings in my kitchen and get all the windows and counter tops re-calked. When it's all finished I am making new curtains for the kitchen and living rooms.  Hows that for a summer adventure! 

Here's Brooklyn's video.  She is the short one in the front at the beginning of the dance.  She gave herself the first solo and worked in a solo for each girl in the group.  And since my video camera films in wide screen, you have to double click after you hit the play icon for full screen so the right side doesn't get cut off .......

catching up

Once again, life has sped past me and I have neglected to document.  My last post was about soccer, and we are leaving Thursday for a tournament in St George.  I don't want to bore you with 2 soccer posts in a row, so I decided I better come up with something to go in between.  (Yes, you will probably have to hear all about a tournament in a few weeks). 

We had a great Christmas break in spite of Steve and I being sick.  It was wonderful to have Tia home with us....even if we did get her sick just in time to go home.  We visited our favorite Lowe's Airsports, went ice skating, skied, and shoveled lots and lots of snow. This Christmas was the first time since Steve and I got married that we have been home at our house for Christmas Eve and Christmas Day.  We usually spend Christmas Eve at the Mickelson's, but Steve's parents are still out on their mission.  We often go see my parents on Christmas day, but us parents were sick.  I had great plans to go see the lights at temple square and have dinner at the Lion House for Christmas Eve, but the weather was terrible and us parents were sick.  So we just stayed home.  And it was really nice.  I guess now that I have kids coming home to my house for Christmas we may need to rethink some traditions. 

And I will mention that I'm pretty sure I cried half of the way home after dropping Tia off at her apartment (good thing I was the only one in the car).  It was harder to send her back this time than it was to send her off last summer!!  She is such a joy to have at home.  We really miss her when she is gone.  This is a tough phase of parenting!

So here are some pictures.  This first one is funny mostly just to me.  Background:  Alex chose to get a tablet for Christmas (I got the same one).  I haven't seen him this excited for Christmas in years.  I'm pretty sure he didn't even sleep.  I came home from work on Christmas Eve morning to find charging cords sticking out of our wrapped tablets because Alex decided he definately couldn't wait for it to charge on Christmas morning before he could use it (and he kindly thought of my feelings on this matter also).  So I took a picture. 

farewell soccer

Kobe had his final game of the fall season this weekend.  They had such a great season--I just needed to brag a bit.  They finished 2nd place in their division (1 point under the 1st place team).  So they get to move up to the premier division next spring.  Kobe is so psyched!!

Here's some pics from the last game.  I have to give some thanks to my good friend Jill (she has the cool sport lense and can take much better pictures than I do--and she always shares them)

 Arsenal U14--yep Kobe is the 3rd shortest now (he's moving up....)

 Yes, he did win this one

Cross Country!

 We are about half way through the cross country season at our house.  Alex is running for the high school and Kobe and Brooklyn run for the junior high.  (Brooklyn's commitment level waxes and wanes, but overall she likes it)

We spent last Friday afternoon up in Park City for a meet.  Alex was running with the high school team.  The junior high didn't qualify as a team, but their top 5 runners had fast enough times to go compete--and that was Kobe.  So we got to cheer two boys at one meet. 

Alex had a great race.  He got a personal best at 18:45.  WooHoo!!

Kobe ran a 20:06.  That earned him a medal for 2nd place over-all in the 7th and 8th grade category.  WooHoo!! (again)  (Lehi Jr. got 1st, 2nd, and 3rd--awesome)

I guess you can tell we had fun

Homecoming--Boy Perspective

 Alex went to his fist Homecoming last weekend.  I have to say it is a little less crazy when your son goes than when your daughter goes.  But still a little nerve racking.  It is hard to wait for the girl to answer him.  I mean, what if she says no?  How would I handle that?  Luckily I didn't have to. (Because a mysterious doorbell-ditcher left this:)

Alex and his friends decided to have their dinner at my house.  I was happy about that, but it was a little pressure.  I had to do a good job of it so they would want to come back again~
So I turned to Bree--always my go-to source for decorating.  She helped me arrange all the stuff I bought for the table so it looked pretty.  And she had the great idea of putting white Christmas lights up for some soft lighting when the sun went down.  The picture below shows how this was easier said than done.  The strings of lights were long and heavy.  And we were putting them up at about 4pm on the west side of my house.  The heat kept melting the stickiness off the tape.  We did the logical thing--just keep adding more duct tape.......beautiful isn't it?  It did hold for the entire night.  We kept wondering what would happen if they chose to fall down right in the middle of dinner.....

 Fortunately the yard and table looked much nicer, and hopefully no one was looking too closely at how the lights were hung.  Brooklyn, Olivia, and Eva dressed up and served the food.  They did a great job. 

 Bree also took the pictures for everyone.  She always does a great job with this.  I've had lots of comments from happy customers, and their mothers, on Bree's photography skills.  Here are Alex's pictures and a group shot.

The fun thing about doing the pictures and having dinner at my house is that I got to meet everyone and see all the great dresses.  It was wonderful.

Have you ever wondered?

Have you ever wondered what it is like for those people who organize and run the big events at school?
Well,  I was in charge of the school carnival for the second time this year.  In many ways it went much more smoothly because I learned a few lessons last year.  BUT....there are some things that just can't be done ahead of time.  So I thought I would show you what happens to my world during the last week before the carnival.....( and I can't get that picture up there to move, so just pretend it is below this paragraph please) (carnival also happens to fall right in the middle of canning season, so you can see all my canning supplies and apples being pushed aside and hoping to get finished off before they spoil)

For several days my house gets taken over by very large posters, and a few games I am building and adding to the party this year.  Yep, I made that very cool bean bag toss game.  I end up staying up very late into the night, and spend the rest of the night worrying and planning when I should be sleeping.

 And then things get sort of crazy and I have to enlist the help of the children to get some things finished up....because I have about 30 emails a day coming in as I attempt to organize a small army of volunteers.

 And then things get even crazier and my family sees notes like the one above way too many times to be admitted to.

But the carnival comes anyway.   And my van looks like this.  Brooklyn had to crouch on the floor in the very front of the van and Kobe had to sit Indian style in the front passenger seat.  It was an eventful ride to school.  And yes, that is 350 cans of soda, supplies for 15 carnival games, posters, 3 different kinds of tape,and anything else I might need--cuz I'm not coming home today.

 Oh, and there are also 6 cases of bottled water, 6 coolers, and 8 extension cords in the middle of the van.......and that's just the supplies I have at home.  (not in the picture are 70 2 liter bottles of soda on the floor under the coolers) I will unload this stuff at the school and spend the rest of the day driving around and picking up more stuff from other places.

 

 And then everyone comes and has fun.  I should have gotten pictures of the set up.  It's pretty much organized chaos, but it always seems to work out.  However I was too busy directing the chaos to get any pictures.

We had even more people come than last year, but I was too busy to take pictures during the first half of the carnival.  So these are toward the end when people were starting to leave.

But I think it was a success, and I'm pretty sure it is now time for someone else to take a turn.

I didn't even get to have a rest, because the carnival happened on Thursday and I hosted Alex's Homecoming group for dinner on Saturday.  I'll do a post on that as soon as I get pictures done.  HINT:  It went great?

So now I need a bubble bath and a long nap.  Thank goodness for 1:00 church! 

project reveal!!

Very quickly before I start--Tia has started her own blog.  I put her link up on the blog list over there on the right side of this pages with the other family blogs.  So if you'd like stay informed on her college adventures, you can find her there.


As most of you already know, Tia moved out at the beginning of the summer.  This started "the great room swap"---because Tia's room was now vacant and available.  This also coincided with Brooklyn's great desire to have a desk.  She tells me daily of all the wonderful things she could do if she only had a desk.  But our upstairs kid rooms are small.  And I also can't bear the disappointment on her face.  So I start looking for solutions......and I find the answer on the Ana White website.  Yep, a loft bed will fix everything.

So I print out the plans and naively jump in and start.  (special thanks to Cory for loaning me his saw)  And I find out that building stuff is really really really fun-even if it takes longer than originally planned.

I'm really quite proud of how it turned out.  Because I just couldn't bring myself to paint over the awesome periwinkle color on the walls in Tia's room, we moved Brooklyn over there (luckily her bedding and lamps also match this wall color). Then we made Brooklyn's room into Kobe's room. So now Alex has an awesome man cave all to himself in the basement.  And we all live happily ever after because all the children finally have their own room. (at least that how I think it should work......) 

Here is the whole loft bed (I even built that ladder!) (the chair came from IKEA--but since I painted it and put it together I'm still taking credit for it):

Full bookshelf at the foot of the bed:

 Desk!!!!!

I painted magnetic primer on the back of the tall bookshelf so it can be a magnet board for hanging projects.  (Brooklyn made her own custom magnets)  That's one of the cool things about building your own furniture.

Kobe wanted orange.  I was a little scared of that idea, but Jen's sister Tamaryn had some great inspiration on her blog. (thank you Bree for sending me over there)  I even got brave and went a little darker than she did.  Kobe loves his room. This was my first go at doing multiple colors.  I just painted a white stripe in between them to help the white furniture tie into the room. (He's stuck with Brooklyn's old nightstand, chest, and bookshelf--although I did remove the picket fence headboard)  I'm still looking for some wall stuff.  I've learned that boy bedding and accessories are very hard to find if you don't want Disney characters or sports teams!