Coop's First Swim

We took Cooper swimming for the first time yesterday. I have been wanting to take him for a while now and we finally made it to the pool. It was so much fun and such a good family day! I am just in love with my family!

But first, the boys could not stop watching motocross...

(don't mind the dates on the pictures, I have to reset my camera.)

We finally headed off to the pool.

Coop did not like all the noise and activity at first, but soon enough he warmed up.

And then after all that playing it was time to go home and nap.

(we caught him in mid-yawn, so dang cute!)

It was such a fun day and good way to celebrate Coop turning 8-months!

The Sweetest Thing

San Diego

Levi and I were able to take one last trip before we became a family of three. We visited Levi's best friend and his wife, toured the aquarium, took a dinner cruise and while Levi went off to ride dirt bikes I got to go shopping and...the Glee concert! (squeal) It was so much fun! I could not have asked for a better quick get-away for us before we welcome our new little buster. Here are a couple pics from our dinner cruise.

This is while we were passing under the Coronado Bridge. The "legend" is that if you kiss the one you love while passing under the bridge you'll have eternal love and happiness.

This is a picture of a ship at dock and it had red, white and blue twinkle lights strung across it. So beautiful. (You can't really tell from the picture :/)

Jimmy.

We were skyping with Arianna and Antonio yesterday, when Levi decided to get out of storage a "buddy" from when he was just a little boy. Jimmy. He showed the kids this toy - a kind of a creepy doll now that it had been worn down from years of play and then stored for such a long time - when he began making the doll attack me as if "Jimmy" was "Chucky". Tonio was laughing and Arianna was a little freaked out...I don't blame her.

I should have known that would not be the end of it...

Last night when I was getting ready for bed I walked into the bathroom only to turn around and find Jimmy hanging there. It scared the @#$% out of me and I gave a blood curdling scream.

Levi, of course, was laughing so hard he couldn't talk.

I thought I would share the pics of what I found in the bathroom last night.

I must admit, after the initial horror wore off, it was pretty funny. :)

Reuniting the Class of 2000

Saturday night we had Levi's 10 year high school reunion. It was so much fun! I had such a good time meeting all these people that are part of my husband's past and being able to put a face with a name or a story from his childhood. It was so much fun to see Levi reconnect with all those lost or forgotten friends as well. When we first arrived we sat with some of Levi's friends with whom he he still keeps in touch. Levi kept looking around and saying to me, "Oh my gosh so and so is here," or he would say, "wow, that is so and so." It was funny to me that he seemed so surprised to see these people at the reunion. But it was so neat to see his excitement at seeing all these old faces and to see Levi through the eyes of people who knew him when he was younger.

It was a great night, unfortunately, cut short by food poisoning for me. Here I thought we were thinking ahead by having dinner and then munching on the heavy finger foods - but I definitely had food poisoning from...Chipotle. Bummer. At least up until that point where I got nauseous it was fun...and even then, after we had to leave, Levi and I found something to laugh about because if you can't laugh at yourself, who can you laugh at?

Blue Clear Sky

I've had this George Strait song in my head for the past few days and it seems pretty fitting...

I woke up late one morning in a rush for work. I grabbed the first items I could get my hands on (aka I looked frumpy) and I didn't do my hair. I didn't really care though, I was at a point in life where I was over dating and really just wanted to make it through my internship. I walked in to work only to be told that my desk was being moved...next to my crush! UGH and double ugh! Now I cared. I was thanking God that "he" took the day off when "he" walked in late to find the fiasco in his cubicle AND we were moving my stuff in.

It was the start of something wonderful, though. I was walking, talking true love - out of the Blue Clear Sky. Here are some pictures of our kids and the amazing family we have.

Champ clobbers us all, Butch mostly though

Aspen is such a daddy's girl
Champ waits everyday for Levi to take him to work, this was when Levi left without him :(

We are rocking the side of our house and the "kids" were helping

Aspen wanted so bad for me to cuddle her, she climbed on my back and wouldn't get off

Levi just home from work saying hi to the boys

Champ and Aspen hanging out officially after we first got Champ - November 18, 2006

Super Champ - this is from when we first had Champ, September 2006

Champ and Butch keeping me company one night

Cronies

Eclipse...
Once again my girlfriends and I immersed ourselves in the twi-hard, twi-mom, teen, tween and everything in between crowd so that we could be one of the first to see the new Twilight Saga: Eclipse movie at 12 AM on June 30. IT WAS AMAZING! I think this is the best of the three thus far. Don't get me wrong, I love my Twilight and New Moon movies but this one was...fan-freaken-tabulous! This time we did not get in trouble by a group of teens, in fact we were actually asking the teens in front of us to quiet down. Maybe in the past six months since the last movie we have grown more mature...or maybe we have aged enough not to act like fanatics. Probably neither. Before we went to the movie Sabrina had a Twilight movie marathon and hosted dinner which she and Mike made for us. It was fabulous. OM-Gosh, no...it was amazing! They are awesome chefs and I love going over to their house because they make the best food...I feel so classy. :) (Levi still raves about the truffles Sabrina made from scratch!) Mike made us dessert - crepes with berries - they were so good that I had to take a picture. Luckily I thought about the picture before I dug in...otherwise you would see an image of an empty plate to the right. : The movie was great and if you are a fan of the series you are going to love this new installment!

Tiffany...
Last weekend I was so lucky to be able to spend lunch with one of my oldest friends. Tiff lives in Arizona and so we don't get to see each other much, actually we only see each each other when she comes to town. (I need to make it out to AZ to visit her!) It was so good to catch up. She is such an amazing friend and it is always as though we just pick up from where we left off the last time we saw we saw each other. Tiffany is a constant. She never changes, only gets warmer with the years. She is an amazing mother to her two little girls and 10 month old boy. She is one of those friends that you realize how lucky you are when she is right there, but when she is gone it is like a hole in your heart for the void she leaves. I wish I could bottle up a little Tiffany for each one of you so that you would know how wonderful both she and her friendship are. Even though it would be just a little taste of the wonderful blessing I get to experience all the time, you would know what a blessing she is. I am thankful to God for the friends He brought into my life. Without those friends, past and present, and my sister I don't know where I would be. Ten years later, after graduating and going our separate ways (so to speak), Tiffany, Tess and I are still friends. (And by the way Tess you owe me a lunch :D) I love these girls because they are my past; they know me as the person I was and now the person I am. They understand me in ways others can't because they have seen the changes that come with growing up, moving on, and enduring life. They have whiddled their own niche in my soul that no one but that them can fill, and I wouldn't want it any other way. I love my Tiffany (and my Tess)!

Count Your Moments

There are moments in life where you need no affirmation that you are exactly where you are meant to be.  When the muddled what if's or should have, could have, would have's fade away.  Moments when future plans blurr, too distant to discern.  Moments when you wish you could freeze time.  Stand still.  Never change.  I often find myself watching our 'kids' and wishing with all my heart that I could make time stand still so that nothing would ever change.  Old age wouldn't consume our dogs.  Time wouldn't haunt our bodies and we could simply be exactly as we are at that moment. 

But what is life without adventure?  How could you know the happy times truly are happy without knowing the sad?  How can you touch lives if you never grow into the person you were meant to be?  Life is complex.  Filled with too many moments to freeze.  And if that invisible force pushing us forward, moving us to the next day, never gave us that gentle nudge to move on would we then never know the bliss that awaits us?

There are moments in this life that I will never forget.  My grandpa calling out, "here comes star."  Hiding from the neighborhood boogie man with girl friends in middle school (the pee man - LOL).  Showing up on my sister's doorstep crying and her enfolding me in a hug.  My family laughing so hard at a silly shrunken T shirt.  Seeing my husband for the first time.  Seeing my husband at the end of the aisle...

Too many moments to recount here. 

I pray that I never forget those moments.  That I can look back on life, unleash the treasured times and be filled the memory of a life well lived.  To everyone reading this, treasure your moments.  The good, the bad and the ugly.  Tally your blessings and let go of that which holds you back.  At end of my life you'll find me recounting my moments....date nights with grandma and drinking too much wine...giving my parents a 'cool' wave at my volleyball games...playing in the halls of the hospital with Levi the night Arianna was born...meeting Tonio for the first time...Marilyn's patience teaching me to ride the quad...the night we brought home our Champ...

Let's Get Physical

Oh My Goodness!  This is the best thing to start your week and it will tickle your funny bone. 

While Levi and I were at his parents' house this past weekend, Ron gave him an old Iron Man magazine that talks about fitness and the body building competitions of the time.  This is easily from the 1960's, maybe even earlier.  (I can't find a date.)  Anyway, the advertisements and articles are so funny because the information is outdated and we know now that this information is no longer relevant or better things/ideas have come along.  Thank God, could you imagine everyone walking around with these shoes?  "I'm just getting my workout in for the day."  LOL!  I thought I would post a picture of one of the ads...too funny!

1. These are weighted shoes.                                                  

2. These are exercises for those shoes. Check out the bottom two where he is actually holding the shoes and doing upper body with them as weights.  They're versatile shoes! 

I hope you are getting as big a kick out of this as I did. :D

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