1st Soccer Tournament of the Year

Logan made the All Star team this year for soccer. This weekend was his first tournament. It was over in Tucson. 

 

The opening ceremonies were held at Kino Parkway. The kids got to be part of a large parade and run around the in field. 

 

The Fierce Knights! 

Such a fun group of boys!

 

Following the opening cerimonies the boys each participated in different events of the night. 

Logan was in the dribbling relay. 

 

We got a room at a hotel where the Rogers and Rojas families were staying. Oh yeah it was 30 minutes away. So bright and early before the sun was awake we headed to the first game of the tournament. 

 

Little rough to be on crutches but I survived it. I can feel my biceps getting stronger....hahaha....wishful thinking. 

Kiersten had plans for the weekend with friends so the catch was that she had to watch Ella all weekend. Then my mom came over in the evenings so Kiersten could go out with her friends. And Hunter ended up staying with his brother from another mother...... Brody Brown! 

 

Logan is enjoying being on the all star team this year. When it is all done he will have played soccer for 7 months straight. Whoa....this soccer mom will be ready for a break! 

 

Logan celebrating the win of their evening game with oh yep that would be octopus!  Eek! 

We went to "You Like Buffet" with the Rogers and Rojas family. Jenny and I did our best oriental impersonations and literally about peed our pants. It was a great night!!

 

The last game of the tournament got rained out so we ended the weekend watching a movie at the Roadhouse theater. Reclining chairs, yummy food delivered right to your chair and great company!!  We watch the new Star Wars movie, Rogue One. 

Great weekend with good friends!! 

My New Ride

My sweet friend Darlene Alder really helped me out. She saw me limping along on my crutches at one of Hunter's basketball games. She came up to me afterwards and said, "I am letting you borrow my knee scooter if you don't have one."

 

I was so happy! 

 She even dropped it off to my house the next morning on her way out of town.   What a lifesaver this thing has been!

Now I can actually carry a few things. Another plus is Ella loves me giving her a ride on it and I can get a little cardio in in the process....lol!!

I love you Darlene!!

Ella's First Birthday Sleepover with Grammie

Ella was so excited to turn three and get her birthday sleep over with Grammie Cluff!

What an amazing mother-in-law I have!!

She is so good to all her grandkids and always does such fun things for them. 

Now look at that smile....

You can't tell me Ella wasn't thrilled to go for her sleep over. 

 

Ella made it through the dollar store but didn't make it through the McDonalds drive thru to get her chicken nuggets. 

 

Ella did perk up enough to eat her nuggets and have some of her sucker. 

 

This was the messages I got from Christi during her evening with Ella. 

That Ella Jane is hilarious! 

And we are all blessed to have such an amazing Grammie!!  Love you Mom (Christi)! 

Scares Me!

The boys found a snake and have decided to make it their pet. Yeah, this isn't going to last for long.  This momma isn't a fan of snakes!

Ella isn't afraid of it or anything!

This worries me because hello we live in the boonies where there are tons of rattlesnakes.  I don't want her to be comfortable around snakes.  I want her to be terrified of snakes like most little 3-year-old girls!

Ella's Puppy Paw-ty

As with most birthday parties at our house it starts with a cute invitation! 

Only fitting to have Ella a puppy party because she pretends to be a dog everyday. She has been so excited to have her party. It's been so fun to watch her excitement build. 

 

This little lady's animal spirit is a dog for sure! 

She plays puppy EVERY. DAY. OF. HER. LIFE! 

 

Wow throwing a party while on crutches is no easy feat. Thank the heavens I have good kids to help me or I never would have been able to pull it off. All the kids helps decorate, fill party bags and pick up the house in preparation for the party. I am so grateful for all their help! These crutches are REALLY, REALLY cramping my style! 

 

Simple but cute cake! 

First thing we did was paint everyone's face to be a puppy for the party! 

Kiersten is such a good big sister!  She isn't thrilled that Ella loves pretending to be a puppy.

But she was a good sport and was the Dalmatian puppy leader for the party. 

The kids all loved dancing to "Who Let the Dogs Out."  It was hilarious!  Kiersten would give different doggy directions for them to do while dancing. Super funny! 

 

Making puppy eyes. Cutest puppies ever!!! 

 

The kids all love making their puppy collars with their names on them. 

 

Grant was a little whiny during the party but look at that face. He is too cute so he didn't get beat. 

 

Pupperoni pizza, pupcorn, chew sticks (licorice), dog food (trix cereal) and toilet water (blue koolaid) for lunch. 

The kids all enjoyed loading their doggy bowls with the treats they wanted. 

 

We had hidden bones all over the backyard and the kids had a fun time going on a bone hunt!  

We also played a game of fetch in race form. One kid against another. Ella loved that!  We cheered as each kid got a turn to play fetch. 

 

Ella was hilarious with her birthday cake!  As we sang to her she kept wanting to blow out her candles. It was so cute! 

 

I think Ella Jane was pretty happy with her puppy party and she was definitely thrilled with everyone singing her Happy Birthday!!! 

The kids all went home with a treat bag and got to pick a stuffed animal puppy to take home. 

So grateful Miss Ella Jane joined our family!  It took some convincing to get her to come....lol. She surely completes our family!

Happy Birthday Ella Jane!

Three Things I Love About Ella Jane

1.  Her humor!  She is such a funny character!

2.  Her snuggles!  She loves her mommy and I am enjoying that. 

3.  I love how much she adores her siblings!

Starting the New Year Off with a BANG!

So only 5 days in to the New Year and already having a minor hiccup. So my leg has been hurting for a good 3 weeks or so. I figured I had pulled a muscle in my lower left leg. I iced it some, stopped running on it because that was too painful. Other then that I mostly just tried to ignore it. Figured it would eventually heal up and go away. 

That didn't happen, my leg kept reminding me it didn't care if I tried to ignore it. It would then just remind me, "ouch you're leg hurts. Oh yeah remember that!  Boo yeah!"

On the cruise my leg was waking me up in the night because it hurt. I figured it was mostly just the rock solid beds and that once I got back to my nice bed my leg wouldn't hurt during the night. 

Well after 2 nights home and still waking up because of my dang leg I decided I better go get it checked out. 

My doctor decided that I had torn a muscle because she said she could feel a separation. Yeah let's not talk about how fun it felt having her feel around in my leg.....ouch!

Anyway, she sent me for x-rays just to make sure there was no stress fracture. She sent me home with a prescription for Ibuprofen 800 and said to take it every eight hours for 2 straight weeks to help with the inflammation.  

 

Then I get a call back the next day. It's the assistant telling me I need to come in so I can talk to the doctor about the "options with my leg".  I am like serious what options are there......this is strange. So I go in....

My doctor says the x-ray indeed shows a stress fracture of my tibia. She said the first option is putting me 

in a cast up to my hip for 3-4 weeks. 

Well to me that WAS NOT AN OPTION!!!  And I am sure after just talking to me for a short minute she knew that wasn't going to fly every easily with me. They would probably have to sedate me before I would let them put me in a cast up to my hip!!!

She said the only other option is keeping it wrapped and using crutches and being COMPLETELY NON-WEIGHT BEARING with my left leg for at least 3 weeks.

 Holy not happy!

I almost started to cry right then and there. But then I asked her if I was being punked. Lol....we laughed a little and joked around. 

Ultimately she wasn't joking around. And ultimately I did cry, not in her office but later. Only took like 10 minutes of being on crutches for me to learn that....

YOU CAN NOT DO ANYTHING ON CRUTCHES!!!

You can't carry anything, you can't hold anything, like your 35 lb 3 year old and everything becomes a challenge. 

 

I love my doctor though, she is funny. She said "I am going to just write down the ONLY TWO options for you so your visual side can understand one of these two things are going to happen!"  LOL....I love that we can joke around even when something isn't all that funny! 

Not sure how the next 3 weeks are going to go but after she told me "when we x-ray it again in 3 weeks if it doesn't show healing then you will be put in a cast up to your hip because I will know you didn't use the crutches like you should have. With a cast up to your hip you won't be walking weither you want to or not."

So I am looking at this like the year 2017 is going to be AMAZING!!  I am getting my bad luck out of the way right off the bat and things should be good from here on out. 

Also my New Year resolution is to LISTEN TO MY BODY!!!

When I am tired I have to slow down and rest. When my body hurts I am not going to just push through the pains and try to ignore them. I am going to listen to my body instead of always making my body listen to my mind. 

Happy New Year!

Cruise Time....Woot Woot!

It's always been a dream of mine to skip the traditional Christmas gift giving and go on vacation instead. AND be gone on Christmas Day. This was the year that dream came true for me. It's been a tough year in many ways but in the end we are moving in the right direction. So that is improvement enough and all I really need. Justin thought the idea of a cruise was great and so I jumped when he gave me the okay. 

Leaving Ella at home was hard, but I know she is in great hands with her Grammys to care for her. Plus all her cousins are on break so she will have plenty of playmates. 

Santa showed up Thursday morning and Friday mid day we left for the drive to LA. We boarded our cruise ship, the Carnival Miracle, on Christmas Eve day. 

Oh did we have some excited kids!!!

 

I figured the cruise would be super fun but I had no idea our kids would love every aspect of it. They loved it all!!!

I always wondered why people took their kids on cruises. But now I know. The cruise ships have great kids clubs and day care for the younger kiddos. Our kids really enjoyed having their own clubs they could be apart of when we weren't doing anything as a family or when we wanted to go some show they didn't care for. 

Now I totally see why people take their little kids on cruises. You can have a great family trip but still have alone time with ease. Super cool!  I see more cruises in our future. Next time when Ella is a good age to join us! 

 

I love this guy right here! 

We don't have a perfect life but it is amazing how loving someone gets you through some really hard things!  I am glad he loves me back! 

 

I enjoyed a few strawberry daiquiris, poolside on this cruise. I even read two books during the trip. With grad school starting up soon I probably won't be reading anything for leisure for awhile. 

 

Might seem like a silly picture of strangers doing Zumba but look closer. My boys are up on the hot tub level dancing right along with everyone else. I had at least 5 people tell me through out the cruise how awesome my boys were at dancing. One lady even told me she had videoed them so she could show her grandkids back home!  

 

Thanks to Hunter I got to go on stage and participate in a game. I had a box with ping pong balls inside, strapped to my waste and had to bounce all the balls out. I went up against another mom from the audience. 

Let's just say I went hog wild and totally won!  Bahahaha.....Justin said watching me do that was worth the whole cruise. Lol! My kids all said, "Wow mom you can really shake your stuff!  HAHAHA!
You do what you gotta do to win!  The other mom only had like 2 balls come out of her box.  
It was funny!

Hunter and Logan each had fun playing in the competition. 

 

Grant was thrilled to loose a tooth while on the cruise. That vacation tooth fairy is rich. Grant got $10 for his tooth and he spend every penny! 

 

The last day at sea the boys got to go to the build a bear workshop on the cruise ship. Hunter was so nice to make a bunny for Ella Jane. She loves stuffed animals! 

 

We had WAY too many ice cream cones in this vacation!  The kids could not believe they were allowed to get ice cream any time they wanted. I figured why not?

I am not a big ice cream lover but I did enjoy a few frozen yogurts through out the week. 

 

Drinks in silly cups are all part of the cruise experience. But I hate those stupid cups once you get home. So I kept telling the kids "no" to getting them. But this cute coconut is a bank so I agreed we could get it. 

 

The ice sculpting is pretty cool to watch. It is amazing at what they can sculpted in such a short amount of time. 

 

Ended up being an Indian chief. It was done by one guy in 22 minutes. 

 

We all loved the towel creations that we found each day in our rooms. 

 

Oh my gosh a chocolate fondue buffet. Ummm yes please!  So yummy!  I had just gone to the gym before I went to the chocolate buffet. So it totally canceled out any good I did in the gym. Oh well that's what the new year is for right?!? 

 

The delicious food is all part of the main reasons to take a cruise. Our kids loved the fancy dinners!  They loved that they could order more than one thing and that they got dessert every night. 

 

Hunter was our adventurous kid!

He tried something new every chance he got. He tried escargot and like it!  He tried clams and mussels and wasn't a fan. That's the picture of him and just the smell wasn't agreeing with him. I might or might not have had a laughing attack right there at the dinner table!  I honestly did. I don't know why I have laughing attacks every now and then. But Justin gets quite a kick out of them. So at least someone thinks they are funny! 

Hunter also had ox tongue, octopus, and frog legs. 

The whole cruise was a fabulous experience!!!  

It wasn't a super fancy or extra large ship but for a first cruise it was perfect! Our kids absolutely loved it. I can't count the times Kiersten wanted to talk about how amazing it is that so much happens on the ship. From the Laundry service to all the food to the entertainment. It is impressive. 

So grateful for the time we had together to make such great memories!