Parade of Lights

It seems like all of the sudden our opportunities for spending time building holiday memories snuck up on us and they all happened at once!

I guess life is like that tho - I mean, just because I needed a break in the schedule doesn't mean that the Lights Parade downtown would change their schedule. Hmmmf.

I could have asked...but I didn't. We could have skipped it - I mean, who would have really known???

This guy of course. He knows everything.

I will just document one event at a time, just to keep you on the edge of your seat in
anticipation! We had a busy few weeks starting with the Lights Parade. They let nearly anyone in this parade.

I think I can mark this down as our cultural event for the year as well.

Because not only did the parade include an array of city vehicles doused with Christmas lights...

There were these guys...

I mean, Star Wars action figures and Christmas Parade go hand in hand right?

Entries that didn't make it into the camera (due to the small people in my party choosing to take pictures of this instead)

were the Ghostbusters clan, as well as these freaky clown guys on bikes. Seriously, their paper mache heads were like bobble head dolls and they were on bikes. Truly, very scary.

There were actually some really neat entries...

But this guy...

must be in several peoples camera.

We even got a family photo by a nice lady sitting on the side of the road with us (and she didn't run off with my camera. I'm afraid that must speak volumes to the quality camera that I currently own...)

And the fact that I have edited this photo 3 times, 3 different ways and it STILL uploads sideways speaks volumes as to the quality of the editing software that I own and the fact that this blogger uploader is angry with me and keeps uploading it sideways.

Sorry y'all have to strain to see the photo properly.

Go ahead, file a complaint. I'm sure that will help. :)

Next up? Glad you asked.

It will be our adventure at the miniature train museum!

Caught in the act...

My sweet husband told Agent P recently that I had eyes in the back of my head. Agent P actually almost believes that I do because I often know what he is doing without even looking.

More often than not, he is doing something he shouldn't be. Even though I told him not to. 17 times. In one day.

And then another 32 times the next.

(waving from stage)

He can't help it.

It is who he is.

So, look very closely at this very blurry photo. Look where he is going and the awesome expression on his face.

Yup, that is a microphone.

And yes. He is on stage.

With 120 other kindergartners.

With all their parents and siblings watching.

Tip toeing 3 steps to the microphone and say "hi". About 4 different times.

What can he say, he does live every moment to it's fullest. He makes no excuses and no justifications for his acts.

Truth be told, I would have NEVER placed him smack dab in front of a microphone. :)

But his teachers will have to learn the hard way :)

Christmas lights at warp speed!

I think since I got y'all through Thanksgiving, that's close enough to be caught up to present day!

That, and I just KNOW y'all have been waiting to hear about the 5k I'd been training for. What do you mean, you almost forgot all about that...? Really?? Wow, OK, that's just not right! I mean...really..have I not complained enough to have the event burned into your brain??? LOL!!!

So, I did it.

Actually, WE did it. I had indicated to A-Dog that he would likely be running it with me. I didn't want to do it alone and I didn't have time to interview other runners. I certainly didn't want someone who was going to totally smoke me, nor did I want someone I would have to pull the entire way. And then, as a last minute decision, my sister-in-law decided to do it too!


Pre-run excitement!

And we finished the entire race.

Or, all of it that was there. There was a slight course change apparently.

See, there was about 500 people running through a neighborhood decorated with beautiful Christmas lights. Dodging the people walking through, the horses carrying the huge trailers of people and sometimes a little special something that the horses left behind.


Group 1 heading to the starting line. (we were in group 2 - who caught the lights wrong or our group would have been Group 1)

 I guess that somewhere along the way, the first group that went thru took a wrong turn.

We were told during our pre-run information meeting (which was actually some guy standing on the tailgate of a little Toyota pick-up truck yelling in a bull horn) that there would be NO WAY we would get lost because there were these little wooden(?) trees along the road sequentially numbered so if we could count in order, we would be good to go!

This was good news for the 3 of us because A-Dog is NOT very good at directions. At all. I mean, really, it's bad. He can barely read printed out directions much less have any clue what-so-ever regarding a neighborhood he's not familiar with.

I did however, grab my phone back from my sweet husband, just in case. Of course, the bull horn guy said he had a bunch of maps...on his counter at home.

We made sure that we were always with a group of runners, so we didn't make a wrong turn. I estimate we were running about 6:30 per kilometer, trying to look at the houses as we raced by.

(as a side note, this is a much better way to get through the neighborhood than walking. However, we did note that bike and roller blades were even faster but refused to give in to the thought of cheating next year)

We kept a keen eye out for the little trees marked with sequential numbers...which I'm pretty sure that the guy on roller blades went thru and removed because we NEVER SAW A SINGLE ONE.

So, by my calculation it was only about 4.5k instead of the 5k it was supposed to be thanks to the lead group botching the course.

Either way, this little fun run WAS fun!  The 3 of us running had a blast and our supporters were awesome and gave us a good cheer as we ran by them toward the end.

And yes, I will be doing another one. In January. Crazy I know.

But to have these 2 cheering me on....it will be worth it!



Mini P, Agent P and Me

A request

A family that we know lost their wife/mommy yesterday Kimberly's Journey. She was a wonderful lady and will be missed by many. If you could pray for her kids - and her husband - they could sure use it. They only found out she was sick in October and she was taken from them 12 days before Christmas.

Thankful and Grateful!

Here we are at Thanksgiving now...cruising right along I'd say! But let's just glance up at the title of my Blog for one small moment..."Keeping up with live! (or Tryin')". Truth be told, I'd have to say right now we are in the "or Tryin' " portion of that statement.

I'd like to admit to you that hypothetically, I frequently slack off.

During nap. And maybe other times as well. Remember, it IS hypothetical. And I really haven't admitted anything.

I guess it is possible that I might watch some of my shows on the DVR. I'd like to admit this to you.

But then you might ask why I didn't clean the bathroom or fold the clothes...and I just don't think I could come up with a valid excuse if I had admitted to doing such hypothetical activities.

I could just say that during nap, I spend time doing things that keep me out of therapy and mental hospitals. Let's just go with that, since I've wasted so much time here avoiding moving on to telling you about Thanksgiving.

We need to move on. And you might wonder to yourself, how on earth we have even gotten this far as I do seem to wander onto tangents that relate to nothing.

Anyway.

Thanksgiving.

Honestly, this is one of my most favoritest holidays. I do have a handful of favorites, but this is at the top.

I know you are sitting there thinking "why, WHY is Thanksgiving one of your favorites?" I am so glad that you asked because otherwise I would have never known you were really interested!

Here are the top 5 reasons it is a favorite:

1. It is OK to start drinking wine at 10am as we prepare a Thanksgiving lunch feast (and of course continue to drink it all day long).

2. It is OK to take the whip cream bottles and have competitions to see whose mouth can hold the most (this may have been done before us cousins had kids and if they tried it NOW we would freak out in fear of running out of whip cream for our pie! Changed priorities ya know.)

3. There are usually so many people, no one notices if you spill, drop food and eat it off the ground or notice your child is peeing on bushes next to the porch (ironically, this certain event I'm thinking of, was NOT one of my kids. Weird huh?)

4. We eat off of paper plates and use plastic utensils. Simple I know, but such a blessing!

5. I am truly thankful that Thanksgiving lunch is at MY house and I get to host such a  wonderful (large) group of people!

This years group was smaller than usual by 4 families that equal 15 people. I think there was only 30-something. You can count if you want. Remember, we all started drinking wine at 10am. I'm glad my parents (and sister) were here this year. It was sad (for us here) that they had to have Thanksgiving in Hawaii last year.



Notice the 2 in the background working hard? Don't let that fool you, they drank too.



I'm sure this is off center due to the "self portrait technique" we used. Love my mommy!

This picture doesn't do the bottle justice. It was ridiculously huge...and we finished every last drop. So proud!

And then we ate. A LOT. Twice. Or so. Which is a key reason we do LUNCH, not dinner. Because in reality, we do lunch-dessert-dinner-dessert. It's a wonderful day!

I sure hope there was enough food...it seemed like there might not have been enough mashed potatoes...(wink wink).

Happy Birthday Twins!

I know what you are thinking...finally...

I assure you it's not like I didn't want to. Or I procrastinated. Nothing like that. Truth be told, being born right before Thanksgiving isn't all it's cracked up to be. It's probably not as bad as being born right around Christmas, but still, not easy.

You know they say, the more kids you have - the more relaxed you parent. It's a bit true. I suppose. And then sometimes we over compensate - lol! 

So, we decided that they deserved a real birthday party. One that included people other than the 6 people who live here.

They started off so small - 4 weeks early together weighed only 11lbs.


Babies on their way home from hospital-days old

And then, they got big and between the two of them, they weigh a total of 53lbs (Monkey 27lbs and Mini P nearly 26lbs).




3 years later - who wants cake?


They are as different as 2 can be.

He loves trucks, tractors, RV's, firetrucks and messing around in bed. She loves books, coloring and going right to sleep when it's nap or bedtime.  He is a morning person and she loves to sleep in.

She wears whatever I ask her to wear (nearly) and he hates pants and long sleeved shirts and has certain shirts and shorts he wants to wear every day.

He loves breakfast. She loves lunch. (but they both love cake)



(she demolished her cake and he had leftovers :) )

He is beefy. She is petitte.

She is totally potty trained. He...well, lets just say, doesn't wake up from nap or bedtime dry very often (he just doesn't care).

But they are sweet and lovable and genuine. They are head strong and independent. They are funny and wonderful individuals. And they truly love each other.

As long as she doesn't touch his new fire truck.

And they had a fabulous birthday. They loved what they got and they loved the people that came to party with us.

We've just gotta catch up!

I think that in order to catch up to present day events; I have GOT to put it all in one post. I am pretty sure that it will be quick.

Or not really.

You all know how I can take one simple event and make it into a very long post. I know, it's just a talent that I have, no need to be jealous of my ability to drone on and on about things and provide lots of useless information.

It's a talent that can't be bought.

Where shall we start?

Halloween?

Halloween it is.

I have a very sweet little boy who really struggles with things that don't go his way. He has a very clear cut idea of how things should be and often falls to itty bitty pieces when they stray from the plan. I pretty much have NO CLUE what the plan is. Just when I think I know, he changes the plan and our world is turned upside down.

Halloween is no different for him.

This is him last year:


Monkey absolutely refused to put on his bumble bee costume.



He is the one on the right - the one in a t-shirt. Yes, so is Agent P - but that is his custom costume :)

And then this year:

To my credit, I truly thought that if WE dressed up as pirates with the kids - Monkey would be all over that idea. (Let's not even look at the partially dressed "baseball player". I guess you get to a certain age and dressing up is not fun...until you get as old as your parents... :) )

Nope. That did not sway Monkey at all.

I did convince him to finally put it on when we went out Trick-or-Treating (however he refused to let me take a picture of him). Of course he couldn't wear it when we did Trunk-or-Treat at church or went to a Halloween party 2 days earlier. Now it is in the dress up bucket never to be touched by him again.

One of them really enjoyed Halloween...





And was the perfect pirate who wore her costume happily!

Next up?

Agent P's "Show me YOU" at school.

This is where the teacher sends a bag home and the kids put things in the bag that they love and is a reflection of them.  They get to show it to all the kids in class and talk about the stuff that they brought.

Agent P has been DYING to do this since the first week. 4 months later, it was finally his turn.

This is what he took:

I spy a Transformer, speed car of sorts, airplane and hot wheel. I also see a stuffed octopus and 2 shiny rocks/gems (orange and blue). Now take a look at the last item (top right). It is an empty box of Tazo Tea - Passion flavor (a personal favorite of mine).

I completely understand the cars and transformer. The stuffed octopus I'm on the fence about because I truly don't know why he took it. It's not like he sleeps with it or plays with it, but whatever. He packed it.

But let's talk about the empty tea box.

That he took from the recycle on his way out the door.

I asked his teacher how he explained the box. She said he told the class to look inside - that it was really, really cool. Yup. I've always thought kids just needed empty boxes. Forget the toys. An empty box will do it every time. Apparently he passed it around to the kids to take a look.

I think that about sums up Agent P though, someone who can look into an empty box and see something wonderful!

We have a visitor - 2 actually! :)

Grandma Joan (my sweet husband's mama) and "Grandma" Lynn (a dear family friend)

They are staying down at a State Park campground for 6 months and we couldn't be happier....especially the kids who are enjoying the endless reading that they have been doing. For some reason, there is no picture of Grandma Lynn with the kids - I think that I am so busy when they are here that I forget to take pictures. I will be better next time! 

I entertained the idea of putting the twins 3rd birthday here at the end - but there are a lot of really great pictures that my Aunt took and I don't want to deny you all the wonderful details of a party that revolved around 3 year olds - lol!

Cheers!

Fall Vacation (last month)

(Yes, the twins turned 3, I will get to the party pictures...I have some catching up to do!)

We love year round school for the simple fact that it allows an optional Fall Break Vacation which I'm always happy to take advantage of while most of the rest of the nation remains in school. 

This year we went to Pinetop. We call it "one of our favorite spots", but haven't been there in quite some time.



Picture from the drive

I won't admit the number of years because then you will just mock me :). There are so many other things you can mock me for, why waste your time with this little tid bit!

We were only there for a few nights, but while we were there - we had a nice little visitor.

Do you see the owl? Hanging out in the tree? Such a rare sight no matter where you are! That little fella never moved a muscle the entire time we were there. Certainly we are not quiet people. It could have been that he didn't move because he was plastic, but there are certain peeps who traveled with us who never got tired of yelling "the owl is still here!". Bless his fake little heart for sticking out with us!

There were other friends...

These hungry ducks bothered every single fisherman the day we went out with the kids. Including us, there were 2 others (which I think had something to do with the intensity in which they pursued us). It was very windy and certainly not a day to fish.

But it was the pressure that forced me to take them fishing. If you live in AZ, you may have seen the billboard or commercial about "Fish Arizona". (Now I'm wondering if they do this in other states....) It pressures you into thinking that your child needs to be taken fishing to have a memorable day with you. That is probably the short version (go ahead, be amazed I even used the words "short version"...but that amazement will dwindle as I continue on here...) but the billboard is huge and has a picture of a really happy kid that got to go fishing.

I am all about building memories for my kids....so, why not right? Who doesn't want happy kids?

I'm not convinced that fishing is the answer. In fact, I'm pretty positive.

Of course we are not easily dissuaded by a wind gust or a generally windy day that was strong enough to blow a kid (or two) off the dock. This didn't actually happen, but it could have.

That would have made it VERY memorable, but not really in a good way I suppose...but in the way where when you re-tell the story it includes you yelling to your spouse that they need to jump in and fetch a kid or two. And then to somehow remove the fish hook that the wind wrapped around a couple of them and stuck in the third. These are all things that raced thru my mind as the winds whipped the tackle box off the table, blowing our worms all over the dock.



This little Princess was so thrilled that she "caught a worm"!!!!! 



But here they all are :) Safe and dry :)

I wish I had photos of the true fun that we had, where smiles could be seen for miles. We got to swim. It was 50s during the day (and did I mention it was windy?) and 30s at night - and yes, we swam. The kids' pool -that was about 2 feet deep- was as warm as a nice warm bath and very big. It was even warm enough for Monkey and me - which means it was nearly hot for everyone else. By everyone else, I mean my family. There was not one single person who joined us.

Weird.

OH, I almost forgot, we did do this:

I realize that it might not count if S'mores are made over a grill, but the Fire Marshall said "no fires tonight"...so we improvised!

Pretty sure the kids didn't care - they ate them anyway!

And the best part? They were happy :). I think it was the chocolate. Moral of the story? When all else fails, chocolate fixes it all!