The Summer 2010 List

I made a list a few years ago containing the things I wanted to do once I graduated. I’ve done a lot of them, actually, or made good progress on them (see the list here)

In keeping with my habit of making lists, I am going to make a list of goals for this summer. I figure I better have a list of goals, or I won’t get anything done.

• First and foremost – become more deeply converted to the gospel of Jesus Christ – understand the significance of belonging to the Church of Jesus Christy of Latter Day Saints – possessing a knowledge of the restored gospel.
• complete Baby’s 1st year Digital Scrapbooks for Vince and Joseline
• Learn Bach’s Partita No 3 and perform at a Suzuki recital in the fall
• train for a 20K (Arkansas 20K/10K September 18, 2010)
• Run a 5K in 25 minutes
• Learn Portuguese
• Consolidate my blogging

This isn’t too expansive of a list. I think I can handle these things this summer. It will be fun to have some goals I’m working toward, as well. So I don’t let the summer slip through my fingers.

Time tends to do that to me.

Memorial

I want to write something profound about the men and women who serve and have served our country, but nothing really comes to mind, and I probably wouldn’t do them justice, anyway.

I am grateful for all those who have fought for freedom, whether here on our land, or in other lands. My thoughts turn to them and my priceless freedom this Memorial Day, 2010.

Let freedom ring.

Oh, and Russ called and emailed

My sweetheart called last night! In the middle of the night, as usual. Stupid time difference. I think either we should all not do daylight savings time, or we all should do daylight savings time. None of this each-state-chooses-for-itself.

That’s just downright annoying.

Anyway, we only talked for about 20 minutes (he was using a friend’s phone – thanks Dan and Michelle!!) and mostly it was stressful and not a good conversation.

I’m the kind of person who tells Russ everything.

Really. No really, everything. I like to tell him about how I got bit by mosquitoes, how I am now my parents’ official cook, how I won 3rd place in the Dino Dash in my age division, how I had strep, but got over it. I think maybe there’s stuff he doesn’t really want to know, but he’s my hubby, so his job is to care about every detail of my life – even if it’s gross or stupid or ridiculous.

He does a really good job caring, by the way.

So I had written him a gazillion emails before the phone call. And then after the phone call I wrote him another gazillion emails.

And while he was up on fireguard, he wrote me back. Several really cute, really short, really perfect, really sweet emails that made my life.

So now I know he read my emails, he knows what’s going on in my head, and that’s what is important to me.

Now if only I could get in his head… mysterious Russ :)

Park Day

It’s kind of weird being a mom in the ward I grew up in.

Thankfully, Wednesday was playgroup for the Relief Society, so I took the kids. We’ve been going stir crazy in the house. What, with me moping around all day … every day (not to mention the heat). But I just had to get them out yesterday.

So we went to Lake Willestein park in Maumelle. It’s about a mile or so away from my parents house – we could have walked, except it is entirely too hot to walk anywhere in Arkansas. Not sure how I did it as a kid. More carefree back then, I guess.

  Joseline was looking particularly adorable yesterday (if I do say so myself). Any she loved those graham crackers! She was also walking a lot more. I think she’s started to realize that walking is much more fixe than crawling (fixe – cool in Portuguese, pronounced like “fish” but with more of a long e sound than a short i sound).

Vince had a great time with a lot of new playmates. See the flush in his cheeks? I think he rarely got flushed in Monterey. It seems like every time we move here, we get flushed. Even if we’re just getting in the car! I can’t believe how hot it is. This weekend is supposed to be a little cooler, thankfully. Highs in the upper 80s. How’s that for “cool”?

(but don’t you love how green it is! And all the tall trees! Arkansas puts Monterey to shame – as far as green-ness. Although the beach sure beats the pool. Hmm… now that I think of it, the pool water is warmer than the ocean in Monterey, so maybe the pool still beats the beach. At least the beach in Monterey)

A Cold in Strep’s Clothing (or my immune system is really, really good)

So it wasn’t strep after all. That or it went away on it’s own, thanks to my amazing immune system (or the fact that I was downing 100x the recommended dose of every immune boosting supplement known to man. Like seriously, I think I was taking 4000%DV Vitamin C 3x a day for the past two days. I probably peed most of it out, but if it had anything to do with the fact that I don’t have strep anymore, bring on the Vit C pee!!)

Strep A+

It has come back to haunt me, laughing in the face of antibiotics.

I'm fighting it off with 3000mg of vitamin C, orange juice, herbal infusions, glutathione accelerators, water, and lots of PRAYER. Too bad Russ isn't around to give me a blessing :( I could sure use one right now.

Oh yeah, and last night I couldn't sleep, so I called his voice mail to feel like I was "talking" to him... But he doesn't even have it set up with his voice, so instead I had to listen to the weird voice mail lady tell me that "########## is unavailable"

Then I just sat there listening to the silence on the voicemail like he was there sleeping next to me.

It helped a litte, but I still miss him, and this lack of communication is unacceptable. If we're going to pay $39/mo for Internet, he better be emailing me every.single.day.

Punk.


-- Post on the go

The New Do

Before my hair met Christopher:

(this photo was actually about a month and a half ago, so my hair was probably a good 1/2” to 1” longer than this – yes, my hair grows that fast)

After my hair met Christopher:

  (the tan is from the 5K + 1K I ran yesterday. I didn’t even realize I got so much sun. I’m just grateful the kiddos didn’t burn, because we totally forgot sunscreen! I can’t wait to see my skin at the end of the summer! Basically I’m going to be hott! ;)  )

So there it is. Becca with a short “do.” It’s bee, I dunno, 12-13 years since my hair was this short. I just don’t really care for the short do’s. It’s still just long enough to pull back into a pony, too! A very very short pony, but a pony, so pulling it back to run and workout won’t be a pain.

Bring on summer!

Chop Chop

Tomorrow I am getting my hair cut here

at noon.

 

Short.

Probably like this:

Or if I’m really feeling brave, like this:

I promise to post before and after pics.

Which do you like better? Short, or shorter?

Pajama Party

A little bit of what we do in the mornings when we wake up. Probably my favorite part of the day is our morning lounge-in-the-bed routine before we finally drag ourselves to the kitchen for breakfast.








-- Post on the go

Keeping Busy

We’ve got a full summer ahead of us! Which is great.

This Saturday is the Museum of Discovery’s Discovery Fest and DinoDash! (a 5K/1K to raise money for the museum). Then next week is Riverfest (Yay!) and the community pool opens! I just bought our pool pass/fitness club pass today. It was actually pretty cheap, since it’s just me – the kids are free at the pool. I’m also going to pay for the fitness classes. And I signed Vincente up for swim lessons!

So, we’ve got the DinoDash, Riverfest, then we’re doing a neighborhood yardsale on the 5th, then I’m going to go with my BFF to take bridal portraits (yay, Meg!) and then we go to UT for Christy’s wedding, then we come back for a few weeks, then we go to AZ for 4th of July festivities, then we come back, then Vince takes swim lessons, then Meg gets married at the end of July, then August, then September, then RUSS! Still got to figure out how to fill up August and September. I’m sure I’ll figure something out.

In the mean time, my weekly activities will involve running (gotta get ready for the 20K in Sept!), going to the gym (yoga from my old seminary teacher, then I’m going to try out some other random fitness classes to find a few I like) then going to the pool ALL the time (we’re basically going to live at the pool). At some point I’m going to get my hair cut. And I’m going to learn Bach's Partita No 3 on the violin and play it at a recital in the fall before we leave. Oh yeah, and don’t forget the Children’s Theater! That’s going to be a good chunk of the first half of the summer, too.

And hopefully I’ll start tutoring again some next week. I just need to feel settled in. And having some contact from Russ would help. I’m starting to just treat it like Basic. Maybe he’ll call, maybe he won’t, and if he does, it’s only once a week. I’m sure he’s super busy. Plus, Russ is the kind of guy that doesn’t always call. Not because he’s no thinking of us. He’s just not a “calling on the phone” kind of guy. He’s praying for us and thinking of us constantly, I know. It’s just nice to get that phone call every now and then.

Well, I promised Vincente that I would take him shopping to buy goggles for his swim lessons. He’s pretty excited. Maybe we’ll go tomorrow.

I also have to go to Savers and see if I can find a rock and roll t-shirt to wear in the “Rock-n-Stroll” 5K next weekend at Riverfest. Since I don’t want to dress up like a rock star (can you see me looking like Bon Jovi? Wow)

I’ll try to remember to keep batteries in my camera so I can capture all our fun events over the next few months. And chronicle them here on my blog. And eventually try to use Photoshop and scrapbook a little 8-o

Ha – that’s what I’ll do in August and September – scrapbook! Play Catch up. Maybe get some books printed. Sweet.

Reason I Never Want to Be a Single Mom #1

Getting a three year old and a one year old ready for bed at the same time (while also trying to tidy up) is one of the most impossible tasks ever.

Thank goodness for Grandmas!

In a Far Away Land

Once upon a time, in a far away land, there lived a prince and a princess. The Prince had to leave the Princess for five and a half months, and the Princess missed him dearly. The loneliness birds had begun to lay stone eggs in her heart.

Every day she would fill with tasks and events, parties and engagements, hoping to fill the void left by the Prince’s absence. But to no avail. The Princess pined after her Prince.

Each night the Princess would resist sleep. It was hard to lay her head on her pillow without her Prince there next to her to sing her to sleep, as he often did.

How she longed for his sweet voice to sing her gently to sleep.

Photoshopped!

My very first photoshopped picture! The top shows the “before” and the bottom shows the “after.”

I darkened the silhouettes, then enlarged the backhoe in the background. I wanted to do more, but my bed is calling… no, SCREAMING my name.

Well, now that my compy is fast enough to actually run photoshop, I shall be having much more of this kind of fun! Just wait. It’s going to be awesome.

Memory

I just got my double pack of 1GB memory from the nice UPS man today! My computer’s memory has doubled – hoorah! And now I can run all my programs – including PHOTOSHOP! Look out, world, here comes the mama’s photoshoppyness. I am pretty much thrilled.

Too bad it’s too late to start playing around. I need to eat dinner, and then alas, tutor online. Since the AP Calculus exam was today I’m hoping that I won’t have a whole lot of tutoring to do. Not that I don’t love tutoring. It’s just that I don’t feel so wonderful today, so I would like to just take it easy all night.

I’m really excited to start playing with my photos. I’ll probably start taking more pictures of the kids once I learn how to really enhance them with Photoshop.

And I’ll probably start scrapbooking a lot more, and playing around with photography crafts.

Speaking of photography crafts – remember that family tree craft I was telling you about? I’m coming up with an idea that has to do with using photoshop.

I’ll let you know how/if it turns out.

Last Week of Sports – Next up, “My Family”

We finished our last week of our sports unit yesterday. We practiced counting and sorting balls, which Vince got a kick out of, and we have continued reading the sports books. Vincente has loved pointing out any balls he knows and saying their names.

I can’t wait to get him on a sports team this fall or in spring 2011. I think he’ll do great with soccer, and maybe T-ball. Only one sport at a time, though. I’m not really a fan of kids playing more than one sport each season. Seems like a little much to me. Especially for a little guy.

I was going to do plants for this week, but I want to have three weeks for the plant unit (and we’re moving to AR next week), so I think I will wait until we are in AR, and start the plant unit there.

Instead, we are going to do “My Family” as a unit. This will be great because right now we’re living with a lot of family, so will learn about uncles and aunt and brothers and sisters and grandmas and grandpas. We’ll talk about eternal families, and the temple. I think for our outing we’ll take a trip to the Provo temple. We may also visit a nursery. We’ll make a “Family Tree” craft – something fun and solid that Vincente can display in his room. I’ll have to come up with something cool, but I’ll be sure to take pictures when I do.

I’m also going to start giving each unit a group of letters and a number. We will learn the sounds each letter makes, and we will learn about counting to the numbers. The math concepts we are working on right now are number conservation – which means 5 golf balls are the same as 5 basketballs, even though the basketballs are bigger, the number of balls is the same, and classification – which is basically learning descriptions of things, and how to sort – like big/small, hard/soft, red, blue, green, square, triangle, etc.

We’re learning number conservation by counting groups of different size balls (this week, we’ll learn by counting family members – girls and boys, etc). We’re learning classification by talking about the different balls, and making patterns out of the balls (baseball, soccer ball, baseball, soccer ball, etc). This week we’ll make patterns out of pictures of our family members, and sort our family members by height.

I’m looking forward to this week!

What themes are you doing this week? Are you reading to your preschooler every day? (Don’t worry – I’m still working on that one! Some weeks we’re good… other weeks, not so much. Just do your best!)

Take Me Out To The Ball Game

For our preschool theme this week we checked out books about sports, counted balls, played soccer outside, and today we are at a baseball game. City league, not a big huge deal, but still fun! We're enjoyng the fresh spring air and the cool evening breeze. We missed our cooking day, but we had a BBQ on Saturday last week, and then again on Sunday, so we're kind of BBQ'd out. We may make some cracker jacks tomorrow, and we're learning the baseball game song at the game. So far I'm pretty impressed with how our first week of themed preschool has gone! I'm looking forward to next week.


What topic should we focus on next week? Music? Weather? Seasons? Writing? Something else?

-- Post on the go

One Year Older

Joseline turned 1 on March 23! She’s growing up so fast. Still not walking, but she’s my little sweetheart. She is so precious and snuggly and such a good eater (she ate that whole mini cake above. Probably in under 5 minutes)!

Grandma Shirley bought Joseline a pretty green Easter dress for her birthday (turns out I have two Easter babies!)

After church (and before the cake madness) we did a photo shoot of Joss in her pretty new dress.

 

We tried to get a few pictures of Joseline with her cousin, Annie, but I don’t think we ever got them to both look at the camera at the same time. I tried to get Joseline to walk – as you can see, she does a great job holding on with one hand.

She didn’t really like the feel of the grass on her feet, and kept trying to inch toward the sidewalk.

I am in love with this little girl. I’ve been listening to the General Young Women’s broadcast on my iPhone, and I just can’t help feeling so blessed to have this beautiful baby in my life – who will one day be a beautiful young woman! I feel very privileged to be the mother who will get to sit with her at the General YW meetings. To be the mother who gets to teach her to pray and to love Heavenly Father. I am in such awe of this beautiful little girl. I just want to be the best mother for her and Vincente. They are a precious responsibility that Heavenly Father has placed in my hands. I can’t do it without Heavenly Father, I know that for sure. Good thing He’s with me in this child-raising thing.

     

How does being a mother make you feel? Do you counsel with Heavenly Father every day, pleading with Him to help you be a better mother? Do you feel His strength with you as you strive to be a better mother?

Where Did All These Pictures Come From?

So I was about to sit down and write a little post about Joseline – because she’s a sweetheart, and I haven’t dedicated a post to her in a while.

Then I realized that it’s been a while since I got the pictures off my camera’s SD card.

Now I am downloading 214 pictures.

Whew.

Well, once I sort through them, I’ll be able to post some of the good ones.

And we’re going to buy Photoshop. Hooray! Elements AND Premier, so we can do home videos, too!! Yay!

Until then, you’ll just get the regular old what I’ve got from my camera pictures :)

I Know About Sports!

Day one of Themed Preschool has gone GREAT! We checked out a bunch of books at the library – I Know About Sports, Michael’s Golden Rules, Casey at the Bat, J is for Jump Shot, This is Baseball, T is for Touchdown, Just My Friend and Me, and Mia Hamm: Winners Never Quit!

So far we’ve only read 1 1/2 of them, but we did go to story time at the library, and it’s been GREAT weather, so we’ve been outside a lot.

Unfortunately, the weather is supposed to get cold and rainy and windy starting Wednesday morning. Yuck. So we’re moving our sports outing to tomorrow. We’re going to go to Uncle Brady’s soccer game! It’ll be a fun time, and Vince will bring his soccer ball and get to play during half time. Or between periods. Or whatever they have in soccer (can you tell this week is for me as much as it is for Vince!)

I’m excited for our weekly themes!

What did you do with your preschooler today? Do you have any sports knowledge for me to share with my preschooler tomorrow?

My Wonderful, Fabulous, Amazing, Very-Good Day!

Today I woke up at 5am.

Did some stretches (i.e. Yoga… it felt great) (did I tell you that my quads feel as if they have been mauled? More about that later… ),  studied the scriptures, blogged a bit, went for a three mile run, did some laundry, took the kids to story time, checked out books from the library, ate lunch, played with the kids outside, went to the chiropractor (really needed that!), ate Coldstone ice cream with my sweetheart (the best part was being with my sweetheart), did some more laundry, made dinner, had FHE with the babies, tutored for an hour, and now… I am going to get in my jammies and snuggle with my sweetie again while we watch a movie.

What a great day!

What did you do today?