All good things

This past weekend was the state tournament for wrestling. The short story is that Kyle won his first match, lost the second. Therefore, he pulled out. No need to permanantly damage the shoulder for 5th or 6th place. Last week started out with us looking feverishly for a shoulder brace for Kyle...the one place we talked to ordered it overnight for us...I called on Tuesday, not there, I called on Wednesday morning, not there. Keep in mind I was told it would be in Wednesday morning at the latest. After a few more phone calls and Wayne going directly there...it was back ordered. That is something that they could have told us on MONDAY. Jerks. Thursday morning rolls around, we had found a brace in Scottsdale that I was going to pick up on my way to the tournament. That was good. Small victory. I pack up all the baby stuff that you could think of, get the babies in the car, hit Starbucks (thanks Cari for the gift card) and off we went to pick up Wayne at work...this was 9am. Our day was a long one. We were in the gym watching wrestling, making friends with the people around us and eventually headed home. Long day but the babies were great. They just took it all in, hung out and were happy to be home doing nothing the following day.

We also found out this week that Kyle made it to next level for one of his scholarship applications...Yippee. That is great news. The scholarship is the Elks Lodge one and it goes from city, regional, state and then national. He is at the state level now...

Taylor is getting her first tooth!! I can feel it and see a little speck of white. Unfortunately, she is rather miserable right now. She has a cold with a cough combined with the teething pain...she is an unhappy girl. She has had a hard time sleeping but overall in an ok mood.

Went to Jessi's volleyball game last week. She served about 4-5 points for her team. The level of play is so much better than last year. She is on a team with mostly 8th graders and a few 7th graders. They actually volleyed the ball, it was great and fun to watch. We have two games this week and next then it's the playoffs...short season.

We are also looking forward to Uncle Tom, cousins Abbey and Kelsey coming for a visit on Saturday. They have never been to Arizona and will be making the trek up to the Grand Canyon. We'll take the boat out, do some hiking, enjoy the beautiful 70+ degree weather!! Can't wait.

Wayne has been working hard installing a bathroom/shower in our trailer. We hope to have most of it completed by our sand dune trip on the 29th...Why is he installing this you ask...the answer: 4 girls! We firured it was a must especially with two little ones who will be getting absolutely filthy on camp trips and will need to get cleaned up.

Lauren has reached a whole new level of "mine" these days. Everything is "mine", especially if it's something that Taylor is holding...I am trying to be patient but it's starting to drive me batty. If there were two words I would remove from the toddler vocabulary it would be "mine" and "no".

Ok folks, no pictures today but will put some on soon...hope everyone has a "love"ly Valentines Day...

I'm Back

I have to admit, I have been a bit busy and haven't gotten a post done in over a week...there has been a lot going on so I will get right to it...

My birthday came and went...the big 33 now and it was one of the rainiest days so my wish of going on a hike was not happening. Instead we had a relaxing day at home, made a yummy shrimp alfredo dinner and of course had cake for dessert.

Jessi has started her volleyball season and made it onto the "A" team which consists of mostly 8th graders and is considered the top team as opposed to the "B" and "C" teams. She was pretty jazzed about making it and we have the first game today. I'll keep you posted on how that goes.

This weekend was Divisionals for wrestling. Kyle, as most of you know, had shoulder surgery last spring and had gotten everything back in order for this season. Well, just before Christmas, his shoulder popped out during a match and he has been going to PT to get it ready for this past weekend...the had 3 matches, his shoulder popped out in the second match and he wanted to keep going, he won and then wrestled his third match and won that as well. This means that we are going to state. Today's job is for me to find a shoulder brace for him to wear at the state tournament which starts this Thursday. It's really scary to watch but he told Wayne that he really wanted to make a run at winning state and well, he is an 18 year old boy so we'll see what happens.

With the impending Valentine's Day holiday, Lauren got right to work on some Valentines. She was loving the glitter glue and all the fun things to glue on the cards. Taylor was watching and smiling away. The glitter glue was such a big hit. I highly recommend it to any toddler parent. By the way, the card kits came from Target in the dollar section if anyone else is interested.

Theres still more so stick with me...

Yesterday my friend Katie had set up what she called a "2024 Preunion" Toddler Party. You see, Katie has several friends who all have two year olds. The really weird part is of the 5 toddlers, 4 are born within about a week of each other in December and one was born just a few weeks later in January. Isn't that crazy. So anyway, we went to this really neat park in Chandler, brought snacks, drinks, hats and mittens because it was cold and had a really nice time playing yesterday morning. Jessi came along as well and had just as much fun as the little ones. Lauren made a new friend in Reagan. They are only 2 days apart in age. They were running around and playing a lot together. Well, a lot in toddler terms. They are pictured here in the motorcycle and sidecar.

Well, that pretty much sums it all up for now. It is raining again this morning...maybe because the Patriots didn't win. That, by the way, was a big bummer. During the game (yes, I watched), I was teaching Lauren to say "Patriots" and she would say "ball game on" after every commercial.

I hope everyone has a great February. We are having my Uncle Tom and cousins Abby and Kelsey in town in a few weeks and then we will be heading down to the sand dunes at the end of the month for my first camp trip in a while and for Taylor's first dune trip. Looking forward to that. Also looking forward to much more outdoor fun with the family here, hiking, camping and boating all to come.