Our Super Spring Break

We have never gone anywhere for Spring Break before.  This year we finally did, thanks to H3's final competition in Vegas.  We decided to stop in St. George for a visit with DH's sister who moved there nearly a year ago.  The weather was great and we had a wonderful time there.

We took a beautiful walk up in the rocks, and I even got brave and squeezed all the way through "the crack".  The kids enjoyed playing in their Aunt's pool and the girls and I got to do some shopping.

Our first morning in Vegas we had team photos at the Las Vegas sign.  There was a creepy but friendly Big Bird hanging out there.

It was really cold for Vegas.  None of us were dressed right for the weather.  Check out this adorable photo my friend took of our daughters trying to stay warm : )

She took some great team photos for us too.

That afternoon we had a yummy lunch at Buffalo Wild Wings and then took H2 to practice.  The rest of the family went shopping at the outlet mall.  H3 and I found some good stuff but the boys weren't so lucky.  That evening was the team BBQ by the pool.  It was cold and not good swimming weather, but the kids had a ball anyway.

That night we went out on The Strip to visit M&M World and The World of Coca-Cola.  We saw the 3D M&M movie (which was pretty dumb) and bought yummy, but overpriced, M&M's.  Mine were coconut and raspberry.  Mmmmmm.

At the World of Coca-Cola store we shared a variety tray of ice-cream floats and, my favorite, a sampling of 16 Coca-Cola products from around the world.  The nastiest one was "Beverly" from Italy.  Yuck!  Here is H1 giving it a brave try:

Some of the flavors we tried were: Bibo Kiwi Mango (South Africa), Kinely Lemon (England), Vegitabeta (Japan), Sunfill Mint (India), Smart Apple (China), and of course the nasty Beverly flavor from Italy.  It was a lot of fun.  And good shoppiing too, for someone who loves Coke.

On our way out we came across a street performer making up raps.  He had started making up a rap for H2, so H1 gave him some money and he kept going.  My favorite part of this video is when H3 slips on the pavement (It's hard to tell that it happens in the video, but what the guy says to her was hilarious.)  No worries, she didn't hurt her sweet buns : )

The next day was our first day of competition.  H2 did great!  That afternoon we had lunch at the Rain Forest Cafe and saw the Titanic exhibit in the Luxor.

That night we saw the fountains at the Bellagio playing "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds" and watched the volcano at the Mirage.

The next morning was H3's last day of competition.  They rocked it again.  Yay for the J2A Cubs!  Between her performance and the awards ceremony, we went to check out the Gold and Silver Pawn Shop from Pawn Stars.  It was interesting to see it...I wish now that I had bought a t-shirt while we were there.

We also found a Steak n' Shake in one of the casinos.  We love to eat there when we are in St. Louis, so we were excited to find one in Vegas.  Yummy burgers and fries!

We headed back to UNLV for the awards ceremony and were totally excited for the J2A Cubs to be awarded 5th place out of 14 teams!  Good job H2!

Our friends decided that H2 looks like Christina Ricci, so they started calling her "Wednesday".  I think they're on to something, don't you?  It's pretty funny.  She especially looks like this when she's got her grumpy face on!

Mommy Dates

It's been almost two years now that I started working again. It was just something I wanted to do. I have lazy tendencies and stay more productive when I'm busy. My job is a perfect mommy job: I go to school at 8 with my kids, work for 5 hours as a 6th grade aide, and come home two hours before the kiddos. Some days I can get overwhelmed because I still have so much to do at home after my hours at work, but for the most part I find it to be very rewarding and enjoyable.

One of the challenges I came against when I returned to work was how to handle those mornings when one of my children says they don't feel well enough to go to school. Getting a sub at the last minute can be tough, and going through all of that to find out that my child wasn't really sick after all can be a little annoying. So, the idea of the mommy date was born. The idea is that if the kids make it through a whole quarter without faking sick at all, they get to be checked out of school for a one-on-one mommy lunch date. It has really helped. The times I have stayed home with them, they have been legitimately sick.

We just ended the third quarter a little while back and so it was time for the dates again. I seriously look forward to these. They're so much fun! First was H1's turn (we usually draw straws to determine the order). He wanted to go to Shakey's pizza buffet. Since he was first, I hadn't yet thought of taking pictures, so here is an alternate picture of him driving his Grandpa's Polaris in the big fields:

Next in order was H3. She chose the Asian Buffet. Yum. I got to chow down lots of green beens, cream cheese wontons, and enjoy converstation with this cute little thing:

H2 wanted to go to Buffalo Wild Wings. That girl loves wings about as much as I do. DH met us there since it is right near his work. It was a great time.

We are almost to the end of cheer competition season. It has been fun. Saturday's was not my fave though because it involved a three hour drive both ways, which made for a long day. Here is the cheerleader herself all made up and ready to go:

The spring weather has been so nice! Last week after I weeded in the garden for 3 hours (ugh!) I took H3 and her friend to the park for a bit. Someone had the cutest little puppy there that she let us hold for a bit : )

H1's favorite pass-time lately is making stop-animation films with his friend. He's done quite a few. I asked him to make one for me to post on the blog.

And lastly, I got around to making a spring wreath for my door......my favorite steal from Pinterest so far!

H2 Meets Her Goal......and Then Some!

H2 has been telling me about her new tumbling skills, but I had yet to see them. So I got a sitter last week to stay with H1 while I went to cheer practice with H2. It was fun to get to spend that time watching and seeing what she does there twice a week. She's doing fantastic! A major step has been achieving her back handspring and she has done it.....she's able to do three in a row and is constantly improving. Great job, H2!

The spring weather we've had this week has been fabulous. I love it. We weren't so lucky last year. I don't think I was able to do recess duty without a coat more than a handful of times last year, and I've gone without it several times already this year. It's time to get the garden into shape! (The weeds are loving the weather too....I've got my work cut out for me!)

DH and H1 went camping with the scouts on Friday night and had a really great time. H1 went on a hike with his friends that he told me all about when they got home. It was girl time here at the house. The girls had some friends over and we made little pizzas and had ice cream. They also spent some time upstairs telling each other scary stories.

16 Great Years and Counting

In celebration of our sixteenth wedding anniversary, DH and I went on a little weekend getaway to Moab. We found a rental condo to stay in and did some exploring in the Jeep. I was glad it was our newer Jeep....a little more comfy for the long car rides. It was beautiful down there.....the scenery is gorgeous and the weather was perfect.

Meanwhile, back at home, the kids had a great time with their aunt and cousins. They got to try snow shoeing. Fun!

News in the World of My Kids

H3 is going to tell you about a picture she drew. She says:

I made a picture of me 100 years old. Because it was the 100th day of school. It has glasses, wrinkly skin, a cane, poofy white hair, and smells like oatmeal. It loves to eat oatmeal. It loves to watch TV. It's favorite TV show is soap operas. I got this picture back at parent-teacher conference.

H2 had another exciting weekend. Her team took 1st place in their division at this weekend's competition. We also brought her best friend along to watch, so it was really fun. I'm having issues with our new camera, so I don't have a video of the full routine yet. This is just the last part:

And some darling pics of them during the awards ceremony:

H1 is going to tell us about his favorite book, Michael Vey, by Richard Paul Evans.

He says: I'd recommend this book to anyone who doesn't have a book to read. It's a little bit science fiction and a little bit realistic fiction. It's about a kid that goes to high school and he has tourette's syndrome. He secretly has electrical powers. One of his friends knows about his powers. There's this one girl that he likes and it turns out she has electrical powers too. There's a group of guys called Elgen and they're trying to hunt Michael and the girl down.

That's all from us this week!

Idaho Cheer Competition

My cute daughter Haylee is being the "guest blogger" on my blog today....I will be editing what she wrote and adding in bits here and there.

it took about 5 hours to get to the hotel. we had to stop 3 or 4 times for a potty break. we got there at 7 or 8 o clock . The hotel had two beds and we brought the cot for someone to sleep in.

we had to wake up at about 6:30 and we had to be at the sports center at 7:30. we had to practice stunts then tumbling then the routine.

It was an early morning, but she was excited. Here she is all made up for her performance:

She is the second from the right:

And here she is on the left:

after we performed we went on the bleachers and walked around.

my team got 2nd place. we got a medal and a key chain bow.

after i got changed we went to a restaurant. I made my own pizza so did my sister.

I was so happy for their team getting second place at their first competition. They all worked so hard and H2 really gave it everything she had! Yay!

I had read about a place called Flat Bread Community Oven. They had a wood burning oven that they cooked things in. The girls each ordered a pizza and the waitress brought them the raw crust, sauce, cheese, and pepperoni. They got to assemble their own pizzas and then the waitress took them away to be cooked. Pretty cool.

Another place I read about was the Old Idaho Penitentiary. It is a state historical site. It was very interesting to look around the place. H1 couldn't remember what it was called and asked if we were going to the "Penetrationary". Oh, my.

we went to a penitentiary. we took our mug shots.

we went to a bunch of different buildings.

a lot of them had sell's and one of them had a place called death row .the people in death row were going to be hanged. only one peorson had been hung on the hanging divice.

It's true that only one person hung on the gallows that we saw. Before that, they did it on a gallows in what is now the rose garden. The death row cells looked out over the garden where the inmates could watch their own gallows being prepared. How nice, huh?

This was the oldest cell block. Boy was it creepy. It had four floors. Two people to a cell and no plumbing! Can you imagine what this place must have smelled like on a hot summer day?
This is in one of the more modern cell blocks.

they had to separate the women from the men so they made a building from the women.

my dad took a picture of us in a jail sell. (one of the old, plumbing-free ones--notice the bucket in the corner)

The creepiest part of the penitentiary was the solitary confinement cells. Ugh. You would not want to be locked in there. The whole family thought it was very interesting.

We spent time at the hotel pool and a lot of time together. All in all, a great weekend trip. We're all geared up for the next one!

My Little Cheerleader and The Leonardo

A big moment for H2....the arrival of her official cheer outfit. She loves it. She has her first competition coming up next weekend. Yay for the Jaguar Cubs! Here she is in all her cheery glory. The front:

And the back:

We read a book about Leonardo Di Vinci together as a family. Yesterday we went up to The Leonardo museum. It was pretty cool, but definitely a one-time thing. I was a little disappointed that there wasn't anything about Leonardo in the museum at all. The museum is a science, technology, and art museum.....so I can see why they named it after him, but it was still missing a little something. I'm glad we went, but for the price I don't think we'll go again.

I loved this interactive sculpture. It moves a little bit in response to people moving around it.

There was a desk designed for drawing self portraits

The results:

They had a great time playing with the green screen

And designing their own stop-animation

They got to see what it might feel like to wear a prosthetic limb.....and here is a stranger trying to help H3, which was nice.

We did a lot of walking downtown and got plenty of exercise. I'm ready for a relaxing evening....maybe getting some work done on my quilt once the house is cleaned up.