Happy Easter

Growing up we usually went back to our hometown, a small town in Utah for spring break and for Easter. They always have an AWESOME easter egg hunt at the park on main street. There are tons of plastic easter eggs filled with candy, some real painted easter eggs, and if you find the specially marked eggs-PRIZES! I even remember the Easter Bunny arriving in a convertible.
When we got older, we stopped going home for easter every year and we started trying to find a comparable easter egg hunt in phoenix. I was all excited to hear about an Easter Fair. I was even more excited when we showed up and found two baseball fields covered in easter eggs~JACKPOT! Right before the hunt I overheard that the eggs were empty (just like our lame hunt from last year) and that you have to give the eggs back to get your bag of candy--oh well. We lined up waiting to hear "on your mark.." only to hear one last minute rule- "Each child may pick up FOUR eggs!" Are you kidding me??!! Why even bring our baskets ? We could have just shoved 2 in each pocket. Where did they learn how to do easter egg hunts? I would personally like to have them stripped of their easter egg hunt planner title.

Oh well-the kids didn't seem to care-- I just told them it was a race and the first ones to get 4 eggs gets to race over to the candy booth to get your candy. At least that worked-so we didn't have to wait in the super long line that inevitably formed. Here is Rach and her friend with their 4 eggs each. YEA!!

Good thing both of the Grandparents came through with some real easter egg hunts-lots of eggs FILLED with candy-you saved the day!

Thanks again Maddie for coming to join us -and playing at our house all afternoon :-)--(which allowed me to sit and read Twilight!)

Spring

Just one of those great days :-) this is what Rachel was doing for hours while I sat in my chair and read out in the sunshine. (my plan was to get some sun on my white legs...but they are still white :-( Making me look bad. So each time one of my plants die-despite my tender care--I just tell myself "it's not all my fault, I just live in the desert and it is hard for anything to grow." However, I went to the temple and the first thing I noticed was the fragrant smell of spring flowers. I looked around and was amazed by all of the beautiful flowers that were not only alive--but thriving and looking gorgeous. There was even this tree that was covered in flowers-hey-I didn't know there were any trees that did that here. So much for my excuse. I tried to tell myself that of course flowers would grow on the temple grounds...but I am still jealous. So I took a close up--and I am going to buy a tree just like it someday. And it will live, and look beautiful...I hope :-)

St Patrick's Day

I had to try and do something fun for dinner on St Patrick's Day...This is all I came up with :-) We put food coloring in the butter and when we put it on the potatoes it turned them SO green!

Whatever you do-don't sit down...

I think this is going to be my new motto. I was looking back at my day and was impressed when I realized how much I got done--and I was trying to determine what the secret was.

1. Went to the gym from 6am to 7:30am-yea baby- 3 days in a row! :-)
2. Ate a good breakfast (hard boiled eggs, toast, and orange juice)
3. Went to work from 8:30 until 5:00 (okay I admit-i sat down at work)
4. Went to the grocery store, (needed something green for dinner)
5. Made steak kababs, baked potatoes, and salad for dinner (even though a little voice inside of me was saying '...just make frozen pizza')
6. Unloaded the dishwasher
7. Cleaned up everything from dinner-AND washed all of the dishes
8. Swept the floor (why not right?)

I just hit the wall and I am now sitting down...and I can't get up. lol! The only thing I can think of is that I just kept moving. Most days when I am home all day long I can't seem to find the energy to make dinner and definitely rarely have energy to clean up. So why is it that today-one of the busiest of all days-I some how found the energy? Maybe it was because after the grocery store I just unloaded the groceries and started making dinner. Maybe it was because I got a jump start on the day by working out at the crack of dawn, maybe it was those 4 push-ups I did. Who knows-but I am pretty sure that the less I sit down-the less i will realize how tired I am ==and therefore the more I will be able to keep moving and the more I seem to get done.

It's Spring-let's celebrate

My only regret is that I did not have the camera for her first jump in the pool--she had goggles on and jumped in all the way! Man is she brave!

Inspiration/Motivation from friends

I am a person who needs friends-and I am noticing that it is more than just to keep me company. There have been many times that my friends inspire me to be a better person, or motivate me to step up and do something that I have been meaning to do but keep procrastinating.

Today I have been thinking especially about all the friends who have motivated me to exercise. Today -I was motivated by a new friend Natalie -well, a new friend from the past : ) You would think that learning that the new rec center is FREE for the next month would be enough to motivate me to exercise...but it wasn't. It took my friend setting a day and time--not a couple days away- but 'tomorrow at 6am,' and offering to pick me up, and calling me when she got here and waking me up since my alarm didn't go off. Thanks to her we got a great cardio workout, some muscle building, watched the sun rise during our cool down, and I still had time to come home, take a shower-and even wash and dry my hair and be ready to go to work by 8:30am. You see it is friends like this that I couldn't do without. Here are a few things that my friends have inspired me to do:

• As far as exercising goes-it started back in High school with my best friend Nicole when together we started pre-season track workouts. This led to some of the most intense workouts I think anyone has ever done, I still look at these days and think of them as my Glory Days.-Man-we were buff--and tan-and we could sprint for a half mile! Then there was a spurt in Boston where Chris got me to meet her at the gym, and we were on a roll for a few months. Good times at the YMCA!
• Missy and Lisa got me psyched about making freezer meals--which most importantly got me motivated to cook period--the fact that I actually had meals for two weeks was an extra special bonus.
• Thanks to Heather and Kris keeping me updated on soccer registration deadlines my little Rach can play a team sport. Honestly I think of myself as being organized, but those deadlines never seem to make it on any of my calendars- and I would have spaced them completely.
• Lindy and Adah (and actually Christine back then when she was free) would always inspire me to forget for just a little bit about being a mom and have fun with my husband :-) Not sure you guys ever noticed that-but I really noticed it the first time we watched fireworks on Memorial Drive. I was so focused on keeping Rachel happy and awake and I looked over and your husbands both had their arms around you, and it was dusk and the Charles River and the entire Boston skyline was behind you-and it was so romantic-and I was missing it! So I made Rachel a bottle and let her fall asleep and was able to enjoy just a few moments in bliss.
• So many other friends motivate me in many ways (and I reserve the right to add on to this post as I remember all of them). Kim & Liz motivate me to get out of the house and do fun stuff! There is always stuff to see and who says you can't drag your kid to where ever you want to go! Lace inspires me to keep my house clean-it can be done with kids. Jen motivated me to start finding cool places in Phoenix to show out of state visitors-- I know I will find some someday :-) So many of you inspire me to be happy (even when you are dirt poor ;-) and just to keep going even after strings of bad luck.

Thanks to all of you for all that you do to make me more of the person I want to be!

How do your friends motivate/inspire you? Tag you're it! I want to hear about it

Just Imagine...

I wish I had pictures to capture a few of my favorite moments this week-but for now you will just have to imagine:

• Favorite moment #1. Everyone leaves the house -without you on a saturday morning. What would you do? After being a little caught off guard, I thought about what I could do to really take advantage of my free time. I walked to the radio and turned it on. Then when I remembered-'I am home alone' I turned it up a little louder. Then I remembered all of the times I wanted to crank my radio up while living in an apartment--and since I have my own house now--I cranked it up super loud! (just because !) Yea Baby! Then I started dancing. Dancing like Cameron Diaz in The Holiday. I have no pictures, and no one was there to vouch for me or anything-but I saw my own reflection in the sliding glass door --and let me tell you-I was lookin' good! It is amazing how much singing out loud and dancing around your living room can boost your spirits. I strongly recommend it :-)
• Favorite moment #2. It is the middle of March and the temperature gets in the 70s, and I have the day off of work. I remember that my neighbor brought me a good book from the library. I drag my papasan chair out into the middle of the yard, roll up my pant legs and sit there and read ...for hours!!! while Rachel just played in the back yard. Awesome!

Cell phones all the way

So I have a question to all of you who-like myself-have decided to bypass the home phone all together and just use your cell phone. Sam added me to his plan (until now I had been a little leech mooching off of my parents' plan) and he got us 1400 minutes. I kind of scowled at him when he told me that because i thought it would be waaayyyyyy too many minutes. Well of course-he obviously knew better. Last month I went just a little bit over (by about 255 minutes). At first i thought maybe it was because I was adjusting to being on a different plan than my sister and my parents-and realizing that I can't just call and talk forever when I am bored. And noticing that on verizon the night minutes don't start until 9pm (okay -worthless!) while on Sprint they started at 7pm. Plus-i had to make a lot of extra calls after the car accident last month. So I thought that it would be a one time thing...but I am noticing the minutes adding up pretty fast again this month with different 'one time things' comming up. So -how many minutes do you have on your plan? And who else besides Kirsten is on verizon? (so i can know who I can call for free?)

Sunday Evening entertainment

I can't believe we didn't think of this sooner! It brings a whole new meaning to sunday night family dinners :-) It is kind of hard to hear -but I love how Rach is giggling through the whole thing.