Figure we should do a quick update before the festivities of this weekend get going...

Ended up being a pretty non eventful week.

Everyone got (Bethany/Mike) and stayed healthy. Pretty short-lived bug...

Mike had a bad week for working out. didn't make it to the gym this week. Instead he was busy doing a community project for school, working on papers for his other class, and staying super busy with work projects. For the community project, they went downtown and did a feeding at a food bank. He said it was very much like what the Rio Vista Center does in South Phoenix. We will have to go back as a family soon to help out again.

Bethany got a lead/solo part in the upcoming concert that the school choir will be performing. She is pretty excited about that. Their class also made candy apples this week as a special fall project.

The book fair at the school came to a close this week too, just in time for the fall festival today.

The heat turned back up this week. It's been nice having the windows open, but the second half of the week we had to cave in and turn the air back on :( Hopefully this will be the last heat hoo-rah of the season.

Need to figure out what to make with the pumpkin glop we made this weekend. Fortunately, we got over 30 more pounds of pumpkin to cook up and freeze....Love the fall

After conquering the monkey bars, Matthew is very impressed with his big, strong muscles...

He wanted me to do a close up...Look at those guns!! Wow Matthew!

This was how this week welcomed us in...such a beautiful sunrise this morning!!

Bethany was throwing up last night, so she stayed home today and took it easy. She's feeling much better and looking forward to going back to school tomorrow....She was quite bummed that she's spoiled her perfect attendance goal for this semester, but she'll try again next semester.

As we walked home from school today, Niko said bye to "Commander Larry" aka school maintenance man/crossing guard/cafeteria monitor...Commander?- I said to Niko thinking he was mixed up from this weekend. Commander Larry said, Yep, over the entire southwest region...So turns out he was on the campout with Niko this weekend. And not only that but he is the sectional leader for the entire southwestern Arizona region! Pretty cool to have him there with the kids everyday at school...

So this is how our week began...wonders what will come of the next four days....

The end of a weekend

Niko has a great time on his camp out. Though he didn't catch any fish, he and his friends had fun catching crickets to use as bait. He said it was verrrry c-c-c-cold at night. He said his lips were blue and he couldn't stop shivering-poor guy. But he survived and lived to tell about it. :) He came home with some badges and after he writes an essay, he'll earn a merit as well. He was happy to be home, showered, and in his warm soft bed tonight.

We're glad he's home too. Our family wasn't the same without him.

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Random thoughts-
We miss California :(

We were talking to a friend of a friend tonight who is here on business from Maui...we miss Hawaii :(

We spent yesterday morning up in the valley. Mike had an errand in Phx while I was in Mesa...We miss the Phx Valley :(

But then I drove up to do my shopping this afternoon and marveled at the beauty and detail in the Catalina Mountains...and later while standing in our friends kitchen on the northwest hill overlooking all of Tucson and Marana and Oro Valley...Gosh darn it, it is sooo gorgeous here, so many good people...It holds a special place in our heart just like the others do. We are blessed to be able to enjoy this place for however long we are here.

Beautiful Arizona Colors!!

Eastern Arizona

(Picture is by our friend Rick Furmanek of Lighthouse Photography on his recent fall road trip)

This picture makes me want to go on a drive to see the season in our beautiful state of Arizona.

Got to love going to church in jammies...

Today would have been one of those Sundays that we would have skipped out. But thanks to technology, we were able to attend via the LIVE webcast....in our jammies...eating breakfast.

http://vwcaz.org/experience/live-webcast/

Matthew conquered the monkey bars! He is so proud of himself and I suppose we are a bit proud of him as well ;)

Niko is on an AZ Fish and Game camping trip this weekend with Royal Rangers. He was so excited to go camping, go fishing, be with his friends...and have a break from his brother, I'm sure too...

I had training up in Mesa this morning with the Fire Department. Exciting stuff happening with the volunteer program. Big responsibilities being offered to us that are not threatening Fire fighter's positions or hours. Great stuff!! Excited.

Mike is enjoying his family this weekend. Been busy with work. Lots of projects coming down the pipeline before the end of the year. His workouts with Crossfit have been phenominal.

They started heating the pool this past week so we're going to go check out to see how well it's heated tonight.

The windows have been open all week. We had some lovely rain come and clean everything up and left us with cooler temps. Can't complain about that!

Gearing up for the last week of October. Can you believe it?

Wrapping up Fall Break 2010

Fall break continued on...

Thursday was spent retrieving Bethany from Phoenix. Bethany had a great time in Prescott, hiking and visiting and baking with grandma and grandpa. After we met my mom, the kids and I hit up Ikea while we were there. Needing some cheap throw-rugs gave us an excuse to make an outing out of it....

After a busy day in Phoenix, we had a quick swim with Mike before he headed to class. The pool has cooled off quite a bit in the past week or so-prrreeety chilly. Kids spend more time in the hot tub than the pool. Hope they turn on those heaters soon :)

Friday, we got out the door bright and early and headed for the mountain. Picatcho Peak has been calling us all summer and finally it's cool enough to play on it...

We were the first ones there. We've always had to fight for a parking space when we've been there before, so to have the entire park empty and be the only ones on the mountain was very odd, but sooo peaceful!...As we made our way up, someone else joined us and passed us by. He seemed to be the type that did this hike regularly...

As we continued up, enjying the views and rocks and plants along the way, other person joined us up on the mountain...and passed us by. Another regular maybe?

It was a beautiful day, so peaceful and quiet with the hum of the interstate below and the jet planes periodically flying overhead. We reached the Saddle and enjoyed the view. We decided to wait to go to the peak until Dad was with us. More hands to help. We went a bit down the trail on the other side though. It was completely silent! The mountain blocked all the humming and sounds from the highway and civilization on the east side. The west side was all quiet dessert and COMPLETELY silent. Beautiful. Even the kids sat there for a while and listened to the nothingness. When we came back over to hike back down to the car, a couple more people had began their trip up...Matthew was such a big help with his sister, helping her step down on the harder parts. Everyone was so encouraging with their words on the hike. It was such a pleasant change of mood to see them all working together and so positive....Ahhh, so glad it's hiking season again!

Saturday we went to the Oro Valley Police Department Discover Day. They had all of their different things set up to learn about and had demonstrations. They had an Apache helicopter to look through and the SWAT and Bomb squad, the explorers, K-9s, the motorbikes, all the other vehicles and many other things

Even McGruff was walking around entertaining people. We had to educate the kids on who he was. For some reason he was a bigger deal in the 80's I guess.

Matthew chased down the SWAT officers after their demo to get a picture with them all suited up.
And of course, Niko had to try on all the gear to get a feel for it. ..

After the OVPD event, we took Niko to the store to get him his first pocket knife. Wednesday night at Royal Rangers he received his Cut and Chop card. He had been studying and tested on the different parts of knives, saws, and axes; safe handling of each; the mechanics of each; and a practical test on how to carry them and hand them off. It was a big deal to him and something he's been working on for over a month.

We wrapped up Fall break with a nice swim on Sunday afternoon and getting things ready to get back into our routine Monday morning...

After a fantastic kick-off to our fall break, our week continues on.

Bethany is spending a couple days of fall break up with her grandma in Prescott. Meanwhile, back at the farm...

The boys and I have had a bit of fun. Monday was pretty uneventful-housework, swimming...

Yesterday, the boys and i picked out some pumpkins from Sprouts then headed to Reid Park to check out our little zoo here in Tucson.

It was our first time driving through Reid Park in downtown Tucson. It's quite a huge park. Would be fun to spend the day there by itself. It has lakes, playgrounds, tons of grass and trees, birds, a train, all sorts of facilities-tennis courts, horseshoes, a public pool, baseball, golf course, and the zoo.

The zoo has a good variety of animals. Different bears, monkeys, cats...

The peacocks roam the zoo. They weren't in the mood for showing off their beautiful fans, but they sure were friendly...

By the time we reached the Kenyan Village Water Feature, the boys were ready to play and horse around in the water...

Then it was off to see more animals...the elephants were getting their afternoon treats

The polar bear was showing off as we watched from the upper viewing area...

Moments before, he had come out and began to play with his stick, throwing it into the water, jumping in after it and swimming right by us. Then he floated in the corner, watching us and blowing bubbles in the water...He was a huge bear.

What is a zoo without flamingos?

We missed feeding the giraffes, but they were still beautiful to watch

The otters were showing off too, jumping and diving and twirling around playing with each other

The black jaguars were being lazy. They sure are powerful looking cats though.

The boys coming out of their shell

As if the zoo wasn't exciting enough, we went to the cheap seats last night and finally saw Toy Story 3. It was cute, but really think it encourages hoarding (haha) It was a pretty cleaver movie though...

This past Thursday, my Dad came out for a weekend visit. We spent some great times together. We hung out, showed him the lay of the land...

...took him to Savaya coffee for a Turkish coffee and chai tea...went swimming, enjoying the beautiful weather, meeting some of Bethany's BFFs...He got to see the kid's school...Hear Bethany play her flute...We went hiking through the Sonora desert at Catalina State Park, saw tons of stink bugs, ants, and other fun things. Niko spotted and caught a brown praying mantis...

...and we went to a couple parks. Matthew has just conquered the monkey bars at school and was eager to show us how he could do it. He struggled with the ones at the park, but Grandpa was there to help.

...we had some good food too....

Sunday morning came too quick...But Grandpa left us all with some great memories and eager for the next time we can meet up, hopefully with Granda too...

Wow!!! The storms we have had. Love them, love them! Lightening, thunder, dust storms, hail (in phx) winds, flooding, tornados...It's been spectacular!! Not to mention it's pushed some of that HOT weather outta here :) Don't get me wrong, still very nice and warm, but perfect!

Last weekend, we stayed pretty busy. We met up with some friends-no kiddos-on friday night. Saturday we went swimming, then headed over to a church in central Tucson and helped serve the volunteers there-including the pastors- dinner. It was a night of refreshment for them where they didn't have to worry about serving. The kids did a great job keeping everyones drinks full and serving dishes and clearing plates. All five of us really enjoyed it...From there we went to play cards. It was a laaate night by the time we made it home. But such a wonderful, jammed pack day.

Sunday we recovered a bit from saturday. Got caught up on our groceries and then went swimming again. Perfect way to end the weekend.

Monday we were thrown back into the whirlwind of the week. This week has had a different feel to it, being that it's the last week of the quarter at school; it's a short week in that they have half days on Thursday and Friday; Fall break is next week; and Grandpa Biddle's coming tomorrow! Not a routine week.

Funny thing. When the school year started, everyone talked of this thing called 'freedom' that I would now enjoy with all three in school all day. I found this quote today, "Freedom means choosing your burdens" I've been thinking a lot about that given some changes that are coming. As a mother, I don't think one can ever be truly free from the concern and energy put into a child, let alone three of them, weather they are at home or away. As we raise them up to be adults, our priority is always what's best for them, what will help them be successful in life, what will mold who they are. We never really get a break from that.

Another random, lighthearted, unrelated thought-while we're on the topic of being a mom-I often think of what material I'm giving my kids to bring up in therapy several years from now. :) We do the best with what we got, but I know we're screwing up in some places. No one can do this thing perfectly.