Not quite Spring

I went for a walk today, here's my favorite pix. How lucky am I to live here??

BTW it was nearly 50 degrees and sunny, which was soooooooo nice!

Mo' Hockey

One of our friends plays hockey on a women's team in town. She texted me to let us know what time they were playing today so we could go to watch her play. It was fun, I was surprised how many people I actually knew that were playing. She and several others I know have suggested quite a few times that I should try. AS IF. First, I don't skate well (seems like that would be a crucial skill). Second, it takes a ton of time. Practices, games, tournaments, traveling here and there. Third, what about my family? Fourth, they don't get in fights!

(Side note, My Honey just made me some hot chocolate with something adult in it ...mmmm)

BUT ... after watching them today I might look into it next year. I can learn to skate (at least that's what my friends have told me). It might not be that much time. Traveling sounds kind of like fun to me! The family actually all enjoy hockey. And they were pretty aggressive today using their bodies to block and stuff like that. And the laughter!! They were all laughing at each other. Even the opposing team! What kind of fun would that be? A gaggle of girls laughing at each other?

So the idea is still there. Has been for about 4 years now. Maybe its time to put it into action? Plus, how cool does a hockey player look in all their gear?

Successes

So we are going to keep Karate. Bubba was promoted into the beginning class for 7 years and older. Thank goodness!! I was seriously about one week away from taking him out! It should be a good change. (Yes, I did talk to the owners of the studio. I don't know if that really had anything to do with it, but I feel better having done it.)

LK and Mason were here for the weekend. WHEW! It's a lot of fun to have them over :) But its exhausting in many ways too! Thanks, LK for keeping up on my dishes and helping with dinner and bed time and everything you did. INCLUDING an early morning workout! She got to see the sun on her way home and I am WAY jealous of that.

One of the dispatchers I helped train was shipped to Afghanistan a few months ago as a National Guardsman with the Army. He is home on R & R for two weeks and tonight there was a get together at one of the local Mexican joints. I am bummed I missed it, it would have been fun. Unfortunately, it started at 7pm and I work at 3am so .... well, you do the math! Not only that, the kids would have been up way too late. I can't wait to hear the tale of how much fun everyone had!

And lastly ... well, I don't have a lastly. Back to work tomorrow/tonight/later - what ever you want to call 7 hours from now.

Rime

From Wikipedia
"Soft rime is a white ice deposition that forms when the water droplets in light freezing fog or mist freeze to the outer surfaces of objects, with calm or light wind. The fog freezes usually to the windward side of tree branches, wires, or any other solid objects."

This phenomena has been occurring at my house and above for the past two weeks. I kept wanting to get a picture ... but this just doesn't do it justice. Its pretty cool to see just one side of a tree with frost on it, or the last 10 rows of an orchard all frosted out. I guess the fog is good for something... It's certainly not good for my disposition! But I am trying to see positive things and keep my chin up anyway :)

My sister and nephew have been here since Saturday. We had a fun-filled weekend. Saturday night we went to Mission Ridge to see Michael Carlos. He was very good. Kind of a light rock, Latino sort of coffee house guy.

Sunday we sat around like bumps on a log most of the day. Our step-dad visited for awhile and then My Honey watched all three kids while we went to a late lunch.


Today we took the kids to the play gym. They had a really good time. They're all trying to get a nap/quiet time in right now. Pretty sure Miss I is out, she played really, really hard.


Tonight they're going to my mom's for dinner. I don't know how all that will work out for us, there is Karate tonight where we find out how he did on his promotional test last week, school tomorrow and I would like to go to Bible Study. So I think we are going to skip it.

It was fun watching Bubba at the play gym, it happens to be at the same place where Miss I takes her gymnastics. He loved all the equipment, I wonder if we should change it up a little? Put him in gymnastics instead of Karate? We are pretty close to taking him out right now as it is. The plan is to hang in there until soccer in April and see what happens then. I don't think I want to do soccer, gymnastics and karate this spring. It sounds exhausting doesn't it?

Die Hard

I have worked out like 4 or 5 times since I changed shifts, and I just wanted to make a note of how I am feeling about it:

I am a little sore, but not too bad. I can't even run 10 minutes yet, but I haven't been running in several months, probably not since June or July, I don't think I went in the fall. I have done 2 (early morning) strength training classes that were pretty good. I wish the instructor was a little more form-oriented instead of letting us get by with slop, but what can you do? I did an early morning aerobics class this week too. Same instructor, same complaint. It sure is good to sweat though and I KNOW what good form is, I used to teach for Pete's sake so I just need to be a little more self-critical.

I feel good though. Yesterday I actually noticed I was a little more high energy and a little less crabby. But I am SO MUCH HUNGRIER! I need to remember to eat a little bit all day long and to keep up on the protein.

Speaking of hungry, I made this soup tonight. Easy, cheap and mmm mmm good. It would probably freeze nicely too since there aren't any potatoes in it.

Resolution

Ahhhh, finally. The computer runs much better.

After My Honey tried to do something on my laptop, he realized it was running really, really slow and had this GREAT idea: why don't we un-install and reinstall everything? I love it when HE has a great idea! Stuff gets done. Pretty much I was afraid to do it. If I ruin some kind of electronic equipment I will never live it down, if he does something wrong, on the other hand ... Well, suffice it to say that I wouldn't EVER make him feel bad about it since I didn't want to do it in the first place!

So I spent a couple hours saving things to our external hard drive-thing and then he spent a couple hours working on it reinstalling everything and BAM! The thing runs like its brand new. I promise not to download stupid things ever again. :)

A couple girls from work and I went to Mission Ridge for their music series on Saturday night. Fun, fun, fun! I can't wait to go back on the 21st of Feb for Fat Happy. They're a fun local group of guys I went to school with. My Honey and I actually talked about taking a lesson and skiing that day too. Stay tuned to see how that turns out.

LK is coming to town this weekend! YAY! I took Sunday off so we can hang and there isn't any school on Monday so we'll do something fun with all the kids.

F-U-N

The hockey game was so much fun! We stayed through the whole thing this time so it was a LATE night! Very late. 3 hours past the kids bed time late, and I was up for nearly 24 hours late. I sure ain't as young as I used to be!

My kids, Cousin Madi and I all had BLUE hair - or at least parts of our hair blue. I put Miss I's hair in braids and colored the braids blue, Bubba just got a haircut last week so it was short enough to spike in blue and I just put blue streaks in mine which hardly showed since my hair is so dark. Cousin Madi was sporting two ponytails that were sparkly blue hair sprayed. I would definitely do that to Miss I's hair next time! Unfortunately I didn't get any good pictures of the kids and their blue hairs all together.... bummer.



All in all a great time. Planning on going to that concert tonight too, it should also be a fun time!

What an outfit huh? Couldn't resist the striped tights, polka dot shirt, ruffly skirt w/flowers and "C-U-T-E" across the bum, and a Dora vest. Mean, mean mommy. She ended up changing her shoes to her winter boots. What a look!

Weekend fun!

We're gonna have some fun tonight! It's another hockey night! We get to go with a HUGE crowd from Bubba's school. They got a group discount deal and over 300 kids and parents are going to be there. I can't wait, it should be so fun.

Then tomorrow I get to go to a music event at Mission Ridge. The snow is pretty much gone, but they're continuing with their evening concert series. That should be really fun too.

My Honey is going to head south for the day and go golfing.

All in all it will be a full, fun weekend!

Mo' sno'

I am not sure how much we are supposed to get, but its coming down pretty good right now and it hasn't warmed up much either.

I have been trying to get myself motivated to get Miss I into something, swim lessons or gymnastics or something. Swim lesson registration was last week, and of course I waited too long and the classes for her age group were full. But, lo and behold a new session of gymnastics start this week. So we went today. She was hilarious!

Keep in mind she has never been in any kind of class - well except for a nursery class at church, but that's hardly anything. So here we are with a dozen other little 3-5 year olds and a couple instructors telling them what to do. She did great! She sat back and watched the first activity, but joined right in when they did the stuff on the trampoline - look at her go!

I must say I was really impressed with Coach Pam. She didn't force Miss I to do anything, but still motivated her to do it all! She is great with the kids. They did a cute little warm up; run to an animal rug, do 10 jumping jacks, run back to the line. Then did several different trampoline activities; jump with your feet together, jump with them apart. And then they did an obstacle course where they had to do several different activities; slide down the slide, do a somersault, some kind of jump, hold themselves up on the parallel bars. Miss I did a super good job paying attention and following directions and waiting her turn. I loved it! Not to mention gymnastics are just something I love anyway.

So we will go once a week on Tuesday mornings. That way it's just me that has to get her anywhere and it shouldn't be that overwhelming the class is at 9 so there is just enough time to get there after dropping Bubba off at school and it's my day off so it should work out pretty good.

Happiness

I did it. Went cross country skiing today. It was very nice out. Lots of fresh new powder. Probably 6 or 8 inches overnight! And I shoveled today too so I have had two great workouts today. My sister went with me, she went snow shoeing. It was a lot of work, she was a sweaty mess when we were done. But so was I!

She and her husband went snow shoeing one night last week, I am thinking that would be very cool. We talked about going on Saturday night, there is supposed to be a full moon. Wouldn't that be cool? Out in the wilderness, full moon, just walking along? I hope it works out!

I have been thinking about the things I take pictures of. Sort of. Anyway, I thought it would be nice to try to take some kind of theme pictures, so today's theme is "things that make me happy." Here are some examples:

Porter's Pond


My Sister


My Valley in a fresh blanket of new snow

Thankfully the snow was a light powder, it was able to be removed so there was school today! Not only that, Miss I did her regular Monday babysitter thing today and there was a substitute in Bubba's class, that is how I ended up going skiing.

Yawn

3am. Whew it was early. Only 6 more months!

And it was slow so that didn't help at all.

My computer has something wrong with it and I don't know how to fix it. If I try and search it comes up with ads. Nothin but ads. I really didn't care as long as I could get into blogger, but even that went to an ad today instead of the blogger page so now I am going to have to do something about it.

Speaking of my blog, I tried to change the template last night and failed miserably. Had to take it back to this again. I was a little bummed, but it will work out eventually.

I went and worked out after work today. I ran for a bit, walked and did legs. I did't think I did too bad, but I will definitely feel it tomorrow!

There is more snow predicted for tonight, 3-6 inches. Wouldn't it suck if it snowed so much that there was a snow day from school tomorrow? Yes, it would!

The kids were invited to go to a hockey game on Friday night, so I took them. Fun! Fun! Fun! Miss I has been asking and asking to go to hockey so she was very excited. We had a great time. We are going to another game on Friday night this week too, it should be a good time and a fun start to my long weekend. I hope I make it! I will have been up since 2am. Maybe I will see if Grandma can watch the kids for awhile so I can grab a nap ...