Easter 2011

We celebrated our Easter Sunday much like we do every year- wake up, read the easter story from the Bible, talk about it and pray, then storm and trample down the hall way in a mad dash to find the baskets...

We find the baskets, make and eat breakfast, then off to Nana and Popo's for egg hunt, swimming, dinner, and visiting...

This year we got to get to know our sweet new niece a bit too...

World War II Air Field Day

A couple weeks ago we took the boys to the airfield for a cool WWII thing. They had displays and aircraft all over the place. They really got to get in and explore the planes and check out all sorts of things. It was a lot of fun and surprised the socks off of Niko when we drove up to the airfield and he saw the B-17 sitting there (his favorite plane of all time)

climbing through the B-17

In the bomb bay of the B-17

radio on B-17

The top of the little pod that hangs from the belly of the plane...

below is it from the outside. A guy sits in there while it's flying and shoots at the enemies

checking out the field rations and supplies...Reminded me of the story, "The Things They Carried"

mother/son casino night

About two weeks ago, Niko had a Mother/Son event at the school that we went to together. the theme was Vegas Night. The set up fun, simple games and we won raffle tickets for several baskets they had to choose from. It was a great night spending some special time with Niko.

Playing Roulette. Niko had a great strategy. He won several times.

I didn't see these ones in Vegas...but they were fun for sure

Niko had the luck in High Roller too.

Very happy to have rolled double 6's

The night ended with the baskets being raffled off and an appearance from Elvis! It was the principle. So funny!

Exciting Update!

This year has been a very optimistic year, a year of focusing on being intentional about spending time and treasures in cultivating relationships, a year that has been stressed on not looking back at 2010 but looking ahead to a new thing for 2011. Tucson has been a training ground for our family, we knew that when we moved here for the job with Golder Ranch and when it did not work, that we were going to be moved to a new thing! We were here in Tucson for a season with a purpose.

Mike's current 'permanent contract' job with STAR Education is great. The ability to work from home means that he can work from anywhere geographically that has a high speed internet access. He also has other contract work that has been keeping him very busy. His new business venture is definitely a risk that was worth stepping out in faith in.

So, with that said, our apartment lease is expiring in July and we were faced with what the next step is going to be. We have been praying and seeking God to show us what exactly that is and where. Numerous factors have pointed our stride north to Prescott.

We are so very excited about this move. Below is the home we will be moving into as we settle into our new community.

As most know reading this, life is hardly ever dull around our home. Always new adventures, always new challenges, always shaking :) Thank you all for your support as we follow God's direction in our life.

1750 sq ft, 3 car garage w/opener, gas heat, gas F/P, A/C, ceiling fans, stove, refrigerator, D/W, disp, built-in micro, breakfast bar, pantry, W/D hook-up, walk-in closet, vaulted ceilings, skylights, jetted tub, intercom, covered patio, RV gate, large lot, fenced

What Is Cross Fit?

This is a great video to kind of give you an idea of why our family CrossFit's....and what exactly it is.

AIMS

Kiddos have AIMS state testing this week. I have never seen them so anal about getting to bed on time and eating good. Niko said this morning, "Oh, I can't wait to get to testing today!" What the heck?! At least i don't have to worry too much about test anxiety this time around.

Crossfit Kids

Kids started their Crossfit kids class yesterday. They had a blast while Mike and I did our grown-up class. Started with a warm-up. Then to their WOD that included squats, presses, running...and then they finished with a game of dodgeball. If they got hit or got a penalty (ie. hit someone in the head) they had to do burpees and then they could rejoin the game. They had a blast during their 45 minutes of activities. They are sore today :)

I'm hoping to be able to take pictures next week or sometime of them doing their class to share with you :)

Had 2 Helpings of Salad

OK I know this does not sound like me but yes today we had an awesome benefit dinner for our friends who are going on a trip to the Phillipines here very soon. I was pretty hungry and was waiting for dinner to be served. The start of the meal was a salad. I had a couple of nice helpings of salad. This is a nice start to my flexitarian lifestyle that I am trying to adopt.

Been doing some research and leaning more and more towards the flexitarian lifestyle for my meal plan. What this means is not necessarily a vegetarian but has those tendencies. The plan is to start the day off with some nice homemade steel oats oatmeal, a couple of hours later eggs with spiniach (sp). The lunch time meal is the protien / meat heavy meal, no red meat but more or less grilled chicken breast. I have been eating more salad, squash like butternut and spagetti squash.

I also have started running in the morning in addition to my workouts with Crossfit Northwest Tucson. Those workouts are going great by the way it is great to have Adriana working out with me. My plan is to start running 5Ks on Mon, Wed & Fri. Tues and Thurs I need to be available for a conference call with my employer in the morning.

I will let you know how it all goes.... so far so good, feeling a lot better.

My iPAD2 // :)

Well it has been a couple of days since I been playing with my iPAD2. I have read about it, looked at different web sites about it, but now I have it. In fact I am typing this message to you from my iPAD2. The iPAD2 is very awesome. It is a 95% laptop replacement. There are some features that you can not do with it. There is really no hard drive on it. You can not save files etc on it etc. But with the use of Mobile Me, and Dropbox you can save out files. In fact with Mobile Me it provides a ton of advantages. Anyways thought I would share about this.

21 Days of Prayer for Sons

21 Days of Prayer for Sons

This is a 21 day challenge that started on April 1st...so it's more than a third over. But you know what? that's OKAY! I will just pick up from day 8 and then go back to day 1-7. I'm looking forward following along with the book. Should be a good couple weeks.

These are the two gentlemen that are the focus of these particular prayers :)

Update:

Okay so I've started this afternoon with the praying and using the book. Let me change my statement of "Should be a good couple of weeks" to- this is going to be an unbelievable life-altering couple weeks in the destiny of our boys and the generations that will come from them. I am so excited about this. "The fervent prayers of a righteous man avails much." James 5:17

Today the prayer focus is 'Purity'

Today's encouragement on the blog link posted comes from Hal and Melanie Young, parents of SIX boys and authors of the book, Raising Real Men. Be encouraged reading their thoughts on the link provided.

The past ten years have brought a brutal assault on the purity of young men. Where it used to be that a young man had to happen upon a stash of wickedness in an uncle’s footlocker for a few stolen moments or risk his reputation to go buy something in person at a store, now the evil comes looking for him. The average age of porn exposure is now 11 years old! {read more}

I Remember Mama

Oh My Goooodness!!!

Bethany talked me into taking her to the high school play (Alright, it didn't take much 'talking into') Mike had class tonight so the four of us ended up walking across the street to enjoy the show. I'm thinking it's going to be a fun little play where we'll see the kids stumbling over their words, cuing each other, and having fun with their little high school play...

Wow, was I wrong! It was fantastic! The boys sat through the whole thing without incident. The 'kids' were smooth, owned their characters, were absolutely fabulous. They made us laugh and cry. It was such a good story and performed top notch. Long play too. Started at 7 pm and was over after 9-that's a LOT of lines to remember! The sets and props were quality, solid and amazing.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_Remember_Mama

Very talented people over there and we were privileged to see that talent.

Flexitarian

Thinking of Being a Reformed Vegetarian

Some of you know, but I have been on a PALEO diet which was designed and implemented by Crossfit Nutritionist Robb Wolf.  Or commonly called the caveman diet.  The focus is a good principal and I believe is the right one.  That we eat too many complex carbohydrates and in return those carbs turn into sugar which disrupts and confuses our insulin making system.  The idea is that with the consumption of lean meats and vegetables and nothing else essentially you will start to see fat fall off of you.  While this is true and it does work, lost a ton of inches from my body; the problem is that it does not work for me.  Let me explain....

I have been born and inherited with the blessing of having high uric acid & high creatine.  The fact that I have been eating way too many protein components has resulted in a high purine intake.  There is supposedly a purine blocker in food that you can eat, but the problem is that the high purines result and produce Gout, and high uric acid.  The acid is a process of not getting the insulin regulated correctly which can result in high blood pressure, diabetes, and kidney failure.

The thought is that I can just continue doing this great diet but the reality is that this diet works great for me but it is unfortunately killing me in the process.  Sending my kidneys into potential failure.  What can I do?  Well it is pretty obvious that the meat rich diet and the purines are causing some serious problems with my blood work and contains high uric acid.   So the alternative is to now start looking into regulating not only the carbs that are being intake but also the protein that is being intake as well.

Being a reformed vegetarian is starting to look good right now....  More on this later as I do more research.  I might not have a choice.  Like I said before the diet works great and you will see results just does not work for me.

Trying Something New

Trying some new recipes this week. Click on them to take you to the actual recipes. We will check back to let you know how they were...

Crockpot Chicken Tacos

Spicy Dr Pepper Shredded Pork

Cooking in crockpot

Chicken and Leeks

Quick Pepperoni Pizzas

four thumbs up...mini pepperonis were a hit...and on sale at Fry's-woo-hoo

BBQ Spaghetti

sides:

Southwestern Spaghetti Squash

Zucchini and Yam Fritters

So Sweet

Matthew got poked in the eye...

"Owieee, can you pray for it, mom? Good thing I have two of them."

Weekend Getaway

This past weekend we met up with Mike's Uncle Scott, Aunt Shara, and cousin Jake in Phoenix. They were in town for a business thing this week and made a trip out of it. We all stayed at The Pointe Hilton Squaw Peak in Phoenix. They have an awesome recreation area that includes pools, slides, lazy river, mini golf, tennis-a whole lotta fun basically. We spent the whole day Saturday playing. It was a great relaxing time visiting, catching up, and enjoying each other.

Dinner Friday night...playing hangman/tic-tac-toe, messing around with phone apps...We all got s'mores for dessert. Fun, entertaining...and interesting experience. Just think, fire at the dinner table with our boys...hmmm...yeah, interesting...
Bethany enjoyed her ribs....
Volleyball in the pool...


Matthew going down the slide. They had all the tricks figured out on how to go super fast...
There he is at the end of it...
Playing mini-golf...

It was nearly 100 degrees out, girls broke the rules and dipped in the water to cool off around hole 11-ish...RULE BREAKERS! Where's your floatation device in the Lazy River? :)
Matthew had to dive in after his ball...We're all jsut a bunch of rebels...
Ice cream cone by the pool, what could be better?
Girls getting mani/pedi's on Saturday night before dinner.
I had a guy doing my feet and hands...He was making me squirm for sure. My feet are very sensitive and ticklish...Nice expression here, huh?
Niko wanted his picture taken by the fountain in the courtyard outside our room...He got one dose of sunscreen. We will be better about RE-application in the future...Owie...

We all had a great time. Even though Uncle Scott got called "Grandpa Joe" and Aunt Shara got called "Auntie Jennifer" and "Auntie Kim"...it took them a bit to get all the names straight, but we still had a blast. We were having so much fun we didn't get pictures of everything. Wanted a group picture but didn't get it. pictures in the lazy river, didn't get them, better pictures of the kids on the slide, didn't get them...The ones we did get were because Matthew handed me the camera and said, "Take this Mom. Take lot's of pictures so we can remember all these fun times forever and ever"