DCI Finals

Before Randy, Andrea and I went to Finals this last Saturday at the Rose Bowl, we went to the Freelancer Reunion. It was so much fun. I didn't realize how much I missed these people. Dan even mentioned that it has been 20 years since our rookie season. Time sure does fly. I loved meeting spouses and seeing pictures of kids. It was a blast.


This is a pic of Randy and I with Al. What fun!!!

And here is Andrea & I with Tom & Lance.

Boot Camp

For those of you wondering, I did finish my first month of Adventures Boot Camp for Women. http://venturabootcamp.com/home.html
It was so fun, hard but fun. I really needed to get out there and just exercise and this did it. I am most excited that from the 1st Friday to the 4th Friday I was able to cut a minute off of my 1-mile run. I can't wait to see what I can do next month.

Do you have a person like this?

Someone who brightens your day with a smile. Not a usual friend or family member, just someone that you know and look forward to seeing during your day. For our family that is Beth. We met her about 3 years ago while she was bagging our groceries at Ralph's. She wanted to talk about the twins since she herself was an identical twin. I found myself always going to the lane that she was working in just for a quick "Hi" and "how are you doing" She always had a great story about her family. The stories were sometimes hard to understand due to disabilities from a premature birth. But worth the trouble. At 45 she and her sister lived together and were very close. I would see her riding her bike to and from work - always with her helmet on. And I assume that she was wearing it Friday night when some 20 year old guy ran a red light and hit her before driving away. Beth died early Saturday and left behind many grieving friends and family members. When I went shopping on Sunday I knew it would be hard. But seeing all of these sad people in black was worse than I thought. By the time I left the checker, the girl bagging my groceries and I were crying hard. They had a great write up about her in the paper that day, I learned so much about her and her activities. And it was a little comfort today to hear that the driver turned himself in.
We will miss Beth and her smiles.

Look Who Turned 3

Yes - The Twingles turned 3 last week. They are getting so big and talking nonstop. They have an interesting LOVE/HATE relationship going on. And they are off to pre-school in August.

I guess I should use this post to catch everybody up.
Christian turned 9 in April. He had a Pirate themed party at the fencing studio where he and Randy take classes. Here he is taking Captain Crook down.



They next day we took all of the cousins to see Thomas the Tank Engine in Fillmore. They had so much fun!


Then in May Christian made his First Holy Communion. We were very proud of him. He took it very seriously and understood what a great Sacrament it is. He also looked so good in his shirt and tie.





Today is my first day of summer vacation, so I hope to be better about blogging. So sorry to those who keep emailing me that they want new pictures. I promise to do my best.

This makes me laugh because I feel I never say the right thing.

Your Dominant Intelligence is Linguistic Intelligence

You are excellent with words and language. You explain yourself well. An elegant speaker, you can converse well with anyone on the fly. You are also good at remembering information and convicing someone of your point of view. A master of creative phrasing and unique words, you enjoy expanding your vocabulary. You would make a fantastic poet, journalist, writer, teacher, lawyer, politician, or translator.

What Kind of Intelligence Do You Have?

Christian

I was going through the Easter pics tonight and came across this one of Christian. I love it! It is after the egg hunt and he has emptied his eggs into a bag. I am not sure why he has his book in his basket but it is so him. He always has a book out. Here he is surrounded by relatives and noise and he is content with his book.

Egg Hunting

Every year we say that we need to cut down the amount of eggs we hid. Over time most of the kids in the family are too "old" to hunt eggs. But with only 7 this year hunting, we still brought way too many. It is fun though. My sister Andrea bought the kids wax eggs that were filled with confetti. She then had her son Logan crack one on Randy's head. He waited hours to get her back, and you can see that she wasn't ready for it. What a fun day!

Egg Decorating

After we got back from feeding the horses, it was egg decorating time. The twins only wanted to do one each, which was fine. The bigger kids did 2 I think. Then the mommies and Tisha did the rest. I had fun trying different styles.

Easter morning

Easter started nicely with the twins sleeping until 7:30 - Yea! Then we had to look at all of the Easter basket goodies.

During the morning, Tisha(my niece) needed to pick up her prom dress from her mom's house. So she suggested we take the kids so that they could meet her horses. I had never been there, so I was excited also.

Here they are looking at the ponies.

Feeding them some hay with Tisha and Becca

Christian petting Romeo, I think. It could be Juliet.

Their favorite part was feeding the bigger horses carrots.

Cottontail Days

On March 30th, we went to downtown Ventura for Cottontail Days. The boys had a great time. This is a picture of Maya (my one and only student teacher from years ago) with her son Aedan and me. Here is Christian going down one of those big slides he loves so.

Here is Alexander touching a snake.

And Sebastian with a lizard.

We have no egg hunting pics. because it was over so fast. It is hard to believe that the twins would come down with a stomach virus the next day that would last most of the next week. Poor guys!

First Penance

Christian made his First Confession on March 24. He did a great job and we were so proud of him. We are also very excited for his First Communion coming up in May.

Happy St. Patrick's Day!!

Today we went to the 19th Annual County Ventura St. Patrick's Day Parade.

We had a lot of fun. The kids were very excited to see the motorcycles.

And we also liked seeing our friends Peter and Becky in their pretty Ford.

But I think their favorite thing was drinking over priced hot chocolate.

Christian started to get bored about 3/4 of the way through.

But my favorite part was buying the new refrigerator we desperately needed to replace the avocado one we have had for almost 15 years. And it was old when we bought it in college. I also bought a pretty pink iPod shuffle to listen to while I try to get my 10,000 steps a day in.

A good day was had by all. :)

Tall Ship(s)

The Lynx

On Saturday we took the boys to see the Tall Ships that ended up being the Tall Ship. One was missing. But the boys had fun standing on the "pirate ship" though the twins had more fun watching the people on the boats that passed us.

This is Christian pretending that he is about to crash into something.

Alexander, not to sure about the whole thing.

Sebastian watching the private boats - He wouldn't turn around for the picture.

So much for Resolutions

I make them and I break them. My intentions are good though. And I gave chocolate up for Lent and it has been a big sacrifice (which it is supposed to be). I miss it so.
I have a problem with my babies getting older. Half of me wants them to stay babies and the other half of me can't wait to get them out of their 2's. They are driving us crazy. Randy and Christian stayed home sick yesterday, I went to work because I want to save my sick days for when I can't get out of bed or for something fun. I usually use them for the kids though. Anyway, I was driving home after picking up the Twingles and I mentioned that Daddy and Christian were home sick and that Mommy was sick and was going to rest when we got home. Sebastian starts wailing that Mommy was not sick and she can't rest. Ha! But I did. I went straight to bed while they were eating dinner because Randy was feeling better. It was WONDERFUL!!! I miss those times were we could sleep in and Christian would sit on our bed watching cartoons. Not these guys, they want breakfast at 6 am (at the latest). So Randy sleeps in on Sundays and I get Saturdays. But today I had to drag my sick self out of bed early to make my 9 am hair appt. I am glad I did, it looks cute. But will never again after I wash it. I need to go to cosmotology school just to learn how to dry my hair the way she does. Oh well.

San Diego

We are here in sunny SD visiting my inlaws. On our way down, my youngest sis called to say that they were visiting her inlaws also. So the Chase family came to visit. Andrea and I went to a SB store called "Scrapbook Your Life". I had never been there before and it is only 10 min. away. How did I miss that? No idea. It is 5,000 square feet and looked like it will be a great place to visit when they get all of their CHA stock in. But they had a great selection of Technique Tuesday stamps that I love. I will be back on our next visit!! Then we took all 11 of us to one of my favorite restaurants - Fellipe's. They love kids there and bring them pizza dough balls to play with. It was a fun day. My sis's family went back to her sister-in-laws house and today we are going shopping for kids jackets. Grandma Zsa-Zsa has decided that the boys need denium jackets and who am I to say "NO"?

Another New Years Resolution

To be a better blogger. I need to take the time to type my own as well as read those of people I know.
I think "The Cold" has finally left our house. It stayed for about 5 weeks and was very unwelcome. Randy and I both took sick days for the boys and none for ourselves. I miss the time when a sick day meant I could stay in bed all day. One of the days was just for Christian and he was very excited that it would be just the 2 of us, even though he was sick. Poor kid has gotten the short end of the stick since The Twingles were born. I am going o keep the twins at day care on Friday for the holiday and just spend the day with him. But it will have to be at home since Randy's car is going in for brake work and he will have the van. So no outings for us. But we find something fun to do.

ABC Tag

Here's my try Liz.
ABC Tag.

A - Available or taken: Very taken
B - Best friend: My loving hubby!!
C - Cake or pie: I will always take cake first. YUM!!
D - Drink of choice: Water with lots of ice
E - Essential item you use everyday: my new smartphone, how did I live without it?
F - Favorite color: Has always been blue - any shade will do but I love dark blues.
G - Gummy bears or worms: Can't stand either.
H - Hometown: Born in San Luis Obispo, but spent ages 12-22 in Fresno, where my family is.
I - Indulgence: shopping, shopping and more shopping!!
J - January or February: I like them both - My wedding ann. is in Jan. but our first date ann. in Feb. 14. But Liz is right - more days off in Feb!!!
K - Kids & names: Christian, Sebastian and Alexander - Yes, they all have 9 letter names..
L - Life is incomplete without? My noisy messy family
M - Marriage date: Jan. 14, 1995
N - Number of siblings: 2 younger sisters
O - Oranges or apples: oranges - very cold if possible
P - Phobias or fears: something happening to any of my family members
Q - Fave quote: "This is true love - you think this happens every day?"
R - Reason to smile: All of my blessings
S - Season: I love Winter for the warm clothes, but Summer for the no school!
T - Tag 3 or 4 people: Andrea, Tracy & Eugenia
U - Unknown fact about me: I can't think of one.
V- Vegetable you don't like: The ones that taste icky - cauliflower. YUCK!!
W - Worst habit: disorganization. I am working on it though!!
X - Xrays: My knees - about 6 years ago.
Y - Your fave food: Pasta, pasta, pasta!!
Z - Zodiac sign: Pisces

That was fun!!

Family

Recent events have made me think more about family. While at my uncle's service I was watching my extended family. I thought about how close I was to the ones that I saw a lot when I was growing up and how little I know of the lives of those that I only see at funerals and weddings. Since my mom is the baby and 10 years younger than her next youngest sister, my cousins were mostly pre-teen and teenagers when we were born. So we went on their dates with the ones that lived nearby and were treated like younger siblings. Growing up, I aways knew that I would be able to sit down with any of them and catch up in an instant. Their children went on my dates and were in my wedding. Even now, though I only see them for holidays and when we visit my family, I know that they will be there and already know everything I have done since the last time I saw them (this is because of the amount of time our moms talk). I realized what a great comfort it was and is to have this relationship with them.
Where I am going with this is - I wonder what kind of relationship my children will have with their cousins when they are adults. Since Randy is an only child, they only have my sisters' 5 kids. And with us living here and the rest of them in Fresno and Selma, they only see eatch other once a month at the most (usually every other month). But they seem to fall into that love/dislike cousin relationship so easily. I feel in my heart that they will always have a special realtionship because my sisters and I make sure that we all spend time together. And I plan to do everything in my power to help them nuture these relationships and to realize how important they are.

Thanks

I just wanted to thank everyone for all the kind emails and posts. We did have another death in out family on Christmas Eve. Randy's uncle passed away. He was supposed to fly to Washington for the funeral, but his mother came down with a cold and worried she wouldn't travel well. So needless to say, Dec. was not a good month for us. But we are doing better.

Looking at Liz's blog made me realize how long it has been since I last posted. Life has been just one big ball of stress. We had an illness in my extended family that was very heart wrenching. But now my uncle is at peace and I am grateful for that. I am just sitting here waiting for Randy to get home so that we can head north for tomorrow's funeral. I am bummed to be missing the rosery tonight, but at least we will be there for the service. More after I get back. Need to finish loading the van.