Go Hawks!

Football season is well underway and I haven't found the time yet to post a picture of our little cheerleader cheering on her Hawks.  

Last year I put Isabelle in the following outfit and thought, "my doesn't she look so sweet?".

  This year when I put her in it she said, "Mom, I'm so pretty!"  

Isabelle, I agree whole heartedly! You are beautiful.  

While our Hawks suffered a really sad loss a couple of weeks ago to that other state school, we still cheer them on and bleed black and gold.

Here's Bellie admiring herself in the mirror... She was trying to figure out how to see the back of her skirt.  

Never mind Dad's shirt in the background calling for me to iron it. 

Here Isabelle decided accessories aren't all they claim to be, so off went the necklace.

and minutes later, off went the bow and headband.  And soon, my Hawkeye photo shoot was over.

Oh well, we'll still cheer for our favorite team.

Go Hawks!
Angie

7 HABITS

The school the boys go to was awarded a Leader In Me grant last year from the Stephen Covey foundation.  Being a Leader In Me school, means they focus on the teaching the children leadership skills and the 7 habits highlighted in Stephen Covey's books.

As a parent who sees the messages they come home with, I'm impressed. I love it.  And while the teachers do a great job reinforcing it at school, we try our best to model and implement the same habits at home. 

As part of their leadership curriculum, Michael had to memorize the 7 habits and do a presentation in front of his peers using the actions for each habit.  Michael worked very hard on memorizing his habits and we tried together to come up with hints to know what order the habits go in.  As a result, Mom is pretty well versed in the presentation and actions as well.

Here's Michael showing us his 7 Habits presentation...

Habit #1: Be Proactive: I'm in charge of me!
       This habit focuses on being responsible for our actions.   Make good choices!
Habit #2: Begin with the end in mind.  Always have a plan.
         Set goals for what you want to accomplishment and then create a plan for how to get there.
Habit #3: Put first things first.  Work, then play.
    This habit encourages the kids to be responsible and make sure they take care of their        
    responsibilities before they play.
Habit #4: Think win-win. I win, you win, everybody wins!
    This habit encourages the kids to play nicely.  To think about how they can get along with others
     and find solutions to disagreements they may have.  Compromise is key!
Habit #5: Seek first to understand, then to be understood.  Listen before you speak.
   This habit is, my own admission, the one I'm the worst at.  It talks about the importance of listening      to other view points, instead of just thinking the way you know it is best.
Habit #6: Synergize!  Together is better.
  This habit focuses on the good old skill of teamwork.  Working together, you can achieve more.    
    They focus on skills to help the kids work well together and to encourage an environment of
     thinking as a team.
Habit #7: Sharpen the Saw.  Balance feels best.
    This habit reminds kids about the importance of balance.  Living a healthy lifestyle.  The importance of eating healthy, getting enough sleep, exercising and spending time with loved ones.

The qualities we have seen the boys develop as a result of this program is so encouraging.  While I believe the academic curriculum they are learning in school is very important, learning life lessons of leadership, team work, and treating others with respect, is just as important.

Michael, we are very proud of you for embodying and living these habits. I hope you remember and use these habits for the rest of your life.  They will help you as you face many challenges or situations in the future.

Until next time,
Angie

Baseball, Buddies and a Bag of Chips

Now that fall is supposedly here, (no one told Mother Nature here in the desert), that means the fall baseball season is officially underway.  A couple of weeks ago Gabriel has his first baseball game and we all headed out to support the team.  

We seem to still be in the middle of our monsoon season.  On the Saturday before the first hurricane (the one that brought us the 100 year Phoenix flood I blogged about previously), Michael, Isabelle braved the 100 plus degree temperatures and the 50% plus humidity and sat outside from 11:30-2:45 for Gabriel's noon game.  Now if that doesn't spell LOVE and SUPPORT, I don't know what does.

Simply put, it was miserable.  No not the game, sitting out there watching the game.  Thankfully some wonderful friends, upon hearing our plans for the day, loaned us their pop up tent and said, "Here this will help, please use it!"  and it was wonderful, but still miserable.

I tried to present the idea of a noon game to Isabelle and Michael in a way, that would make them believe it was going to fun!  Michael's too smart and knew immediately I was trying to pull one over on them. "Mom-do we HAVE to go watch Gabriel?" Can't we just stay home?"  Even he's tired of the heat.  Knowing he wasn't going to get the answer he wanted to hear, he thankfully didn't put up too much of a fight when I denied his request.

So off we went.  I set up the tent, pulled out the lawn chairs and set up for a picnic lunch.  I looked around to see our always-in-motion Isabelle, lying on the tent bag on the ground.  YES- She was lying on the ground, with sweat caked on all parts of her body.  For a minute I was thankful, and then I thought, "Should I be alarmed?"  She never sits still, was she overheating?  I gave her some water and opened up the sandwiches. 

Meanwhile the game went on in front of us.  While the two little ones ate their lunch and entertained themselves on the ground, I wondered how long we'd be able to stay and watch the game.  I feared not very long, until I opened up the bag of chips.  

They both went from being horizontal, sharing a tiny portion of the tent bag on the ground, to sitting up right, along the fence, taking turns shoving their hands into the bag.  They'd compare the size of the chip each one of them got and then Isabelle would try to give Michael her smaller chips, so she could stick her hand in the bag again to pull out a larger one.  They played so nicely together, I often found myself watching them more than the actual baseball game.

As they almost devouring the entire bag of BBQ chips themselves, I many times thought about stopping them.  And then I stopped myself.  I told myself, the salt from the chips would be good for them to keep them from getting too dehydrated and I reminded myself how nicely they were sitting, playing together, allowing me a chance to watch the game.  And so, I decided to let them keep on, keeping on.  I picked my battle and this time, I let it all slide by.

And the end result...

It ended up being a fun time.  No not the weather, the weather was still miserable; but everything else was nice.  The younger two had a lot of fun, they sat still in the shade and played nicely with each other.  We were there to support their brother and his team went onto win. And I got to sit and enjoy an entire game.  This hasn't happened in... well, it hasn't EVER happened.

Who knew baseball, buddies, and a bag of chips could make a hot, humid afternoon so much fun!

Until next time,

Angie

Grandparents Day!

Last Sunday was Grandparents Day, and while our grandparents still haven't received their cards (oops, sorry about that), I did want to share that the kids worked hard in creating a special message for each one of our special loved ones

Sadly Mom didn't get her act together in time to get the cards mailed out early last week.  So instead we did it late last week, one day after school.  Better late than never right?!

The kids, all of them wrote a personalized note to each of their special grandparents.  While some notes were shorter than others, (ahem, Isabelle's rainbow picture), some notes went on an on.  The truth is we all feel so blessed for the 6 grand and (great) grand parents Gabriel, Michael and Isabelle have. 

Here are a few pictures of them working hard to express their love and appreciation.

We love you Grandpa Chip and Grandma, Nana and Papa, Grandpa Ray and Grandma Doris.  We feel so blessed to have you in our lives and we can't wait to see you in person again to tell you.

Until next time,
angie

Should we build a boat? The 100 year Phoenix flood!

So last night we got some rain.  And by some rain, I'm talking 5.28 inches in less than 8 hours.  Yes, this is EPIC.  I can say it, because the local weather man I've been watching since 5 am has said it about 50 times.  This storm is EPIC.  There, I said it again.

For those who are not currently living in this state, the one that currently resembles the state of Minnesota (as the land of 1,000 lakes), I'm not exactly sure how to describe it.

Around midnight last night, I was lying in bed (because I still seem to spend more of my night awake than asleep), when all of a sudden I heard a loud crack and the reflection from the lightening strike peer through the crack in our bedroom blinds.  Seconds later, I heard a downpour begin that I believe last until the wee hours of the morning.  While I drifted in an out of sleep, the sound of the rain pouring down outside was continuously heard and a part of my alertness and my dreariness.

Waking up for good a few minutes before 5, I looked out the bedroom window and could hardly believe my eyes.  Our swimming pool was full up to the brim top of the deck and with the rain coming down so hard, I couldn't tell if it had already breached the top of the deck.  I stumbled to the kitchen and flipped the back porch light on.  I opened the back door and stepped outside, still in a state of sleepiness.  The moment my foot hit the cool rain water, I was awake!

Why yes that is my foot stepping right outside my back door.

And while hard to see, that light reflecting is on the 4 inches of water that completely covered my backyard as our pool overflowed.  In the far background is our pool, running level with the 4 inches of standing water in our "lake front property."

After accessing the back, I had to go check out the front yard.  I opened the front door, again to the noise of the downpour hitting our house and looked out to the road.  Or what use to be the road in front of our house.

Where our road had been previously, there was now a lake.  Our neighbors trash can floated gently down the stream and with the crack of thunder I decided to head back inside.

I turned on the TV in our bed, and just like I was an elementary school kid, I prayed for a snow day.  Or I guess I should say a "rain day."  I thought for sure, if we were THIS flooded, they'd have to cancel school and work.  Turning on the TV and catching the images/stories of the mess that was everywhere in the valley, I wasn't sure what to do, as it was way worse than I ever thought it would be.

The road Jarrett takes to work looked like this...

Um yes, that is 6 lanes of the I-10 Freeway that are completely underwater.  Why yes, that is one of the main through-ways millions of people pass by daily in our city.  And yes, that is a road that is at flooded with at least 4 feet of water.   And that was just one of the roads.  The majority of the others were the same way.

This is the aaah road, I guess you could call it, I take to work.

The TV announcers warned everyone about every 2 minutes that the only people that should be out on the roads are emergency personnel.  The governor sent a message and begged people to stay home.  We received emergency announcements on our phone asking people to stay at home and that traveling is extremely treacherous.  I thought, for sure, schools going to be canceled, and for sure work will send a note saying to wait to come in until it is safe.

As the minutes ticked by and school after school canceled their classes for the day, our school instead called us to say, "Classes will begin at normal time.  Students should report to school promptly by 7:35 a.m.  Buses may be delayed due to road closures.  Again, school will begin as usually scheduled.

I thought, wait a minute.  Did they not listen to the news, do the administrators not have a cell phone to get the same emergency alerts we did?  Do they live some place else in this state?  How can they not see how flippin bad out it is.

Here is the view of the water overflowing from our pool in the backyard.


Well, I guess so much for that snow day.  And then my phone rang again.  It was our wonderful Aunt Stacey, the best pre-school teacher in the world, who teaches at Isabelle's school.  She said, "Angie, I'm calling you as my friend.  Just so you know our school was completely flooded last night and it is a mess. Please don't bring Isabelle today, we are closed."  Finally I thought, some one, some official, is thinking straight.  

Telling the boys they needed to get their butt in gear, to leave, I knew it would take us a lot longer to get to school than the normal 2 minutes it does in the morning.  Backing out of the drive way, the only way to make it down our street was to drive in the very middle of the road where the pavement is peaked.  Thank goodness we drive an SUV.

As I turned or tried to pull out of our housing development and onto the main road by our house, I had to turn into the far center lane and the rest of the road was completely flooded and pouring over the side walk.  Looking to our right, we looked over to see a sunken green belt that is at least 8 feet lower than the sidewalk on the curb, by our housing development.  It completely flooded and pouring right back into the street.  It had no where to go.

We slowly followed car after car as we made waves higher than our windows plowing through the water to get them to school.  I couldn't help but wonder if I was going to become one of those motorists whose cars were stalled in one of the 100's of roads across the valley. We are well aware of the stupid motorist law they have here, I wonder if that law applies in the great 100 year flood?  I worried, I was about to find out.

Turning the corner to head to the school, we noticed the lake was completely out of its banks and pouring into the street like a beautiful waterfall those wealthy housing divisions have welcoming home their residents.  I didn't like the welcome all that much.

After many a scary moments, when it felt like the tires on our car were floating under the water below us, we arrived at the school.  It looked something like the moats kings would build around their precious castles.  There was no resemblance of the playground and the water went almost to the front door.  The parking lot was completely flooded.  Thank goodness for the weaving cones to direct us to the least flooded route.  I couldn't help but think to myself, where again were the officials who made the call it was safe to send our children to school in this weather.  I'm not sure I want them making safety calls any more.

I dropped off my boys, who had to walk through a stream of water to the building and then they disappeared behind the gym door.  It was then my turn to begin the journey to work.
After plowing through waves of water at almost every street I found, I finally made it to the parking lot at my work.  It turns out half of the spaces were inaccessible, because they were completely under a foot of water. I parked, gathered up my belongings and set forth determined to reach my office building.

The campus, for 8 a.m. on a Monday morning, was eerily quiet. I wondered if everyone else got the alert and I had some how missed it.  As I turned the corner to my building I saw this...

Now, I don't claim to be a genius, but I'm pretty sure caution tape means to stay away.  Yes, that is the entrance to my office building, yes that is how I'm suppose to access the building.  Since I clarified that I'm not a genius, I guess than I better tell you what I did next.  I pulled up my pants as far as I could and I started tromping through the flooding to get to the front door.  Stupid, yeah, okay maybe a bit.  How else was I suppose to get in?

All the while, I kept thinking about what every emergency professional, news announcer and government official begged us to do.  STAY HOME.  Here I was doing exactly the opposite.

Soaking wet to the middle of my calf and dripping water from the top of my head to my knee, I arrived at work safely.  As I turned on my computer and put on the newscast in the background, I heard the weather man say that in the last 12 hours we received more rain that we had received in total all year. With more than 5 inches of water falling in less than 8 hours, we were living through the 100 year flood.  

I'm thankful to say we all were safe, unhurt and have memories that will last forever.  I can see it now.  Some day, when my boys are in their 80's and their grandchildren ask them about the great 100 year Phoenix flood of 2014, I can picture what they are going to say, " It was EPIC.  There was water everywhere, we had to walk knee deep in water, our swimming pool was over flowing and WE STILL HAD TO GO TO SCHOOL!"

Until next time,
Angie

I WANNA GROW UP!!!!!

Isabelle loves to read books.  For about the past 6 months she's been really into her monthly Highlights Hello books.  In the few weeks though, mainly because I'm needing some fresh material, I've been trying to introduce her to some new books.

Here are a few of them....

Thankfully Isabelle's been open to it.  Actually she loves the new books and has almost completely replaced her Highlights book with the newest selections. Of those listed above, some she likes the most are, "Are We There Yet?" "Cooking With the Cat" and "When I Grow Up"  We read the books, cheer The End  and then she says READ IT AGAIN!  Yes, pretty much in the same demanding tone you just read that in.  So, we read it again, and again and again.  She has the words memorized to each of the books, so a lot of the time I'll just say the first word on the page and she 'reads' the rest.

The other night we read the same 5 books for almost an hour.  When it was time for bed, I put the books down, grabbed Isabelle and her blankies and told her it was time for ni-night.  She was NOT having it.  Immediately she started screaming, "I WANNA GROW UP!"

Jarrett, who was in the kitchen next to us in the living room, looked at me and we both started laughing.  While she was 100% clear in what she wanted (to read the book When I Grow Up), it came out sounding completely different.

I said, "Oh Isabelle, please don't grow up.  Mommy loves you being small"  Insert Isabelle throwing a tantrum and screaming "I WANNA GROW UP!"

"Isabelle," Daddy said, "Do you want to grow up?" now playing along.  Still adamant she was not going to go to sleep, was now flailing her arms and wiggling like crazy to get out of my arms. "Mommy, I wanna grow up."

After 5 minutes of Isabelle demanding she wanted to grow up, I gave in and told her I'd read, Mercer Mayer's When I Grow Up one more time.

Funny, after reading it one more time, she seemed perfectly fine to be just the age she is now.  I put the book on the table, grabbed her blankets and picked her up.  "Isabelle" I asked, "Do you want to grow up?"  Looking at me with her droopy eyes and her head halfway resting on my head, "I wanna go ni-night"

Until next time,
angie

A confession....

So I have a confession.  I love donuts, specifically I LOVE bear claws.   I love all of them.  From the tasty almond paste to the chocolate and almond frosting and the almond slivers sprinkled on top.  Just talking about them makes my mouth water and its way too late for a donut, criminy its almost 3 in the afternoon.

I've tasted many a bear claws, and my all time favorite bear claws are at Disneyland, the Disneyland Hotel that is.  It's been almost 5 years since I've had my last 'best' Bear Claw.  Thankfully Fry's makes themselves a pretty amazing Bear Claw too, and with two stores less than one mile from my house, I'd be lying if I said I didn't give in to the Bear Claw cravings more often than I should.  I can't help it, there just so darn tasty!

Thankfully my mini me also likes donuts. We're quite the duo. It's become almost a tradition.  Once a month, on a Friday, Belle and I drop the boys off at school (Lord knows they don't need the sugar before going to school) and on our way home,  we just happen to swing by the grocery store.  Low and behold, if you get there before 7:30 a.m. they still have Bear Claws.  It wouldn't be right not to get one, right?

Isabelle's favorite donuts are the Long Johns.  She says, "Mommy, I want black one and candy."   Basically that means she wants the chocolate iced donut with sprinkles on top.

This past Friday was one of Mom and Isabelle's donut days.  I think Isabelle enjoys our special treat as much as I do.  The truth is, Isabelle doesn't really eat much of the donut.  She spends most of her time picking off the "candy" and when she can't pick off any more, then she's done.

Here, I'll show you what I mean...

 By the end of her donut eating fun, she pretty much has a smeared chocolate frosted donut sans sprinkles.

Oh and it might be more accurate to say that there is usually more frosting on her hands, face, arms and belly than there is on the actual donut. 

While I love me some Bear Claws and Belle some Long Johns, it really is a treat for us to get a donut.  I know it isn't the healthiest of things we can do together, but for our once and a while treat, we sure do have enjoy it!

Until next time,

Angie

A Laborless Labor Day...

In honor of Labor Day, we did our best to have a labor-less holiday.  So what does a labor-less Labor Day holiday look like you ask?  Late mornings, lazy afternoons, mid-morning movies, snacks, free time, naps and little chores. Yep, I'm pretty sure we perfected the definition of the labor-less Labor Day.

Did I forget to mention that it was glorious?  It was glorious.

Given that the past few weekends have been busy, I purposely decided to leave this weekend open.  I wasn't sure what Dad's work schedule looked like, but I could tell from the "I'm overwhelmed with work" look he came home from work with everyday last week, Dad was in need of some down time too.

Friday night after work we had a babysitter come over so Dad and I could go out with some friends who are just in the beginning stages of adopting. They are a wonderful couple who are going to make excellent parents.  They are recently certified and hoping to adopt children around our boys' age.  I am so excited for the day when they "get the call" and I hope our children can all play together in the future. The world of adoption is really pretty small and I'm so happy we get to share in their joy as this wonderful journey is just starting for them.

While Jarrett and I enjoyed getting to spend time with them, another perk of the evening was getting to enjoy a night out without children.   I forget what it is like to eat my food while it is still warm and what it can be like to have a meal without getting up to help someone else 6, 8, or even 10 times in a matter of a one meal.  It was the perfect start to our lazy weekend.

Saturday morning, I got up early to go run.  Its something I've been doing now for the past 4 months. Earlier this summer I decided I needed to commit to taking time for myself.  Knowing I wouldn't actually stay committed unless I had committed to a race, I took the plunge and I signed up to run a half marathon in January.  I've been training since May.  I can honestly say, it has been the best therapy for me.  I'll blog more about running in another post, but I will share, taking a 4 year hiatus from running isn't well advised.  I swear for the first two months, I wondered if I could ever run like I use to.  Slowly, very slowly, its coming back so I'm thankful for that.

Getting back early, I debated about waking Dad up as it was the first Saturday in College Football, but thankfully I didn't have to make that decision.  Isabelle had already done the honors and had the entire house up.  We spent most of the day watching college football on the couch.  It was WONDERFUL.  I forget how much we missed college football until it came on.

After spending a solid 4 hours in front of the TV, munching on terribly unhealthy food and taking naps in between games, my phone rang.  My cousin Brian and his wife Brenda from Iowa were in town and were in the area.  They came over and we had a wonderful time visiting with them.  People refer to Iowa being God's country and I think it is 99% in part because of the people who live there.  Brian and Brenda are definitely some of the strong representation for why Iowans are such great folks.  We had such a fun time visiting with them.  Gabriel strong armed Brian into playing baseball, football and soccer in the short time they were here.  Never mind it was 108 on Saturday, Brian was a great sport.  And Brenda she went outside and played chalk with Isabelle on our deck blocks.  Isabelle thought she was very fun and asked me about 30 times the following day, "Where Bend-a go?"

Before Brian and Brenda left, the boys begged to go the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge.  Here's the video of the boys participating...

https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=10204981830333696&set=vb.1479750245&type=2&theater


On Sunday morning before church Jarrett and I were talking about what we should do for the day. Jarrett debated about going into work.  At Church we received a sign, I think directly from the man above.  The sermon was about work, playing and relaxing.  The pastor shared how God made us to work hard but to also take time to rest (or play).  In today's society, Pastor Troy shared that often times we skip out on the resting part and only do that if we have extra time.  The message could not have been any clearer. I looked at Jarrett, he looked at me and we smiled.  Jarrett decided to stay home and not to work all day!  It was the first Sunday in months (not counting the week we were in Iowa)  he didn't go into the office.  

We decided to take the kids to see Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.  While Isabelle would have preferred to watch paint dry, the boys (including Dad) loved it.  They were opened mouth, eye's glued on screen, hand shoveling popcorn into face, the entire movie.  I don't even think Dad noticed I took Isabelle to the bathroom 4 times during the movie.  After the movie, the boy's imaginations were running on high speed.  Before even coming into the house they scavenged through our recycle bin to find as much cardboard as they could.  Michael said, "Mom, can we turn our house into a sewer so we can be like the Ninja Turtles."  With Isabelle napping and the boys (all three of them) actively at work on creating cardboard cutouts of the weapons the turtles had, I went back to the couch and took a nap.  When I woke up 15 minutes later to the feeling of a karate chop and cardboard sword on my back, I looked to see the boys dressed like this...

 Yep, there are my two Ninja turtles.  Their masks, yes those were my dusting rags.  I saw were for obvious reasons.  The two of them were entertained for hours practicing their moves and talking about how they were going to fight the bad guys.

 They were also trying with all of their might to convince Dad to dress up like Splinter, the 6 foot, talking rat who trained the turtles.

Meanwhile Isabelle and I played with her toys.  Now that she's a big girl and doesn't wear diapers, she wants to use all of them on her baby Minnie.  I helped with putting the diapers on Minnie and then taking them off and putting them back on.  We also built blocks, sang songs and she made me food.  It was nice just to have free time, not dictated by where we had to go next and what had to be done before then.  The schedule was completely free.

Before bed, we took a family walk and talked about how nice it was to have time to spend together.

Last night after the kids went to bed, Jarrett and I enjoyed watching a movie together.  Its one of our favorite things to do, but most of the time I fall asleep 10 minutes into the show.  Jarrett was excited I stayed awake through the entire movie.  He said, "maybe you should take a 15 minute nap most days and then we can enjoy the movies we watch together, instead of me having to tell you what happened in the show the following morning."  He's so funny, isn't he?!?!

Today has also been a relaxing day at home.  While Jarrett's labor-less Labor Day came to an end bright and early, he's hopefully getting a lot done while the rest of his office enjoys their holiday.  I hope when he comes home tonight, he will have the "I got so much done" expression on his face.

I'm probably the biggest one at fault for our crazy, super scheduled, overly hectic schedule, so having a weekend like this one, reminds me why we need to have down time, when we just spend time, spending time.  We hope your Labor Day weekend was labor less, relaxing and wonderful!

Until next time,
Angie