Enjoying Winter

One of the best things about living in Arizona is winter. I hate snow and I hate being cold so living in Arizona is perfect for me. But some years we get so busy that before we know it winter is over and we have to be inside or in the pool. Don't get me wrong I enjoy our lazy summer days of swimming, watching movies and playing video games in our air conditioned house, but I just love being outside when it's a perfect 72 degrees. So I have been trying to make a point of planning some outings and getting our butts outside while we can and really enjoy our fabulous weather this year. So we took a trip to Castles and Coasters for a round of mini-golf. They really do have a cool course, actually 4 of them. So here we are in short sleeves and sunglasses on a fabulous January day. If I remember right Shawn barely won with only a few less strokes than Athena. Crazy considering I think this is only her 2nd or 3rd time mini-golfing!

Athena is really good at taking selfies, must be her long arms.

Honor Roll Breakfast

This one is a quick post. Athena managed to pull off honor roll again second quarter. Not straight A's this time but still really dang close :) This is the breakfast they had for all those that made honor roll. Very proud of her!

Christmas in Utah

We try to alternate year to year going to Utah to see our family for Christmas or staying home. This year was a Utah year but with Shawn starting a new job we weren't sure if we would be able to. Luckily it worked out and we got to go. It was nice to be able to fly this year as that 12 hour drive is not exactly fun. I slacked on the pictures but we really had a great time and loved seeing everyone. We tried to include some activities this time too because you can only sit around visiting for so long before your brain is fried. We went ice skating, took care of our Crown Burger fix, met up with some friends for wings and brews, and Shawn took the girls skiing. Athena twisted her knee the first time down and sat out the rest of the day in the lodge. She decided she will just hang out with me from now on when Dad and Hailey ski :) Now on to the few pictures I did manage to take!

Our grand nephew Parker, such a cutie and he loves cars!

Our sweet grand niece Freya, she is sooo adorable and a total hoot!

Athena with Freya, they are great friends now.

Our nephew Oliver, he was cracking me up pulling these muscle poses when he put his Nana Sweater on

Nana Sweaters for the girls!

Silly Athena and Oliver

Athena being silly with our niece Molly, Athena had so much fun with all the little ones this year!

And then before we knew it, it was time to go home. Here is a shot of our New Years Eve. We like to play board games and watch the ball drop on TV, party animals right?

Some December Things

That's her on the far right

December  was full of activities. Athena's dance studio had a big charity show to benefit Phoenix Children's Hospital. It was a lot of fun, I was busy backstage and didn't really get any pictures though. I'm thinking I need to somehow convince Shawn to take up photography as a hobby so I get more shots of her on stage. They also danced at Glendale Glitters again this year. Luckily no rain this time around! We always love doing Glendale Glitters, even though it is a crazy, chaotic mess backstage :)

Athena and I finally made it to the Nutcracker this year. We have been wanting to go for years, but time just never worked out, but I made it happen this year. What made it even more fun is that a few of her ballet teachers from the past were in it! It was a really fun day with my little ballerina, that isn't so little anymore.



Athena also had a Holiday Choir Concert at School, I got a new video camera just in time to test it out at the concert. Here are a couple of my favorite songs they did. Please excuse the jiggles of the camera, it was my first time using it and I didn't put it on a tripod.

Since this was a Utah for Christmas year we celebrated our own Christmas (or as we sometimes call it Festivus) on the weekend before. It was a very nice, lazy day. I think the only reason I got dressed was to wear a new shirt, otherwise it would have been PJ's all day!

How adorable are these Thing onesies I found for the girls?

Roasting Festivus Eve S'mores

My beautiful girls on Festivus morning

Bindi likes her new toys

This has ended up being a very long post so I will make our trip to Utah it's own post, coming soon!

Thankful

Ok let's get to November! Athena worked really hard to get straight A's the first quarter of 7th grade. She has never gotten below a B but really wanted to get all A's this time. She did it and earned the chance to apply to the National Junior Honor Society. She had to fill out an application and write an essay. She found out in November that she was chosen. Here are some blurry photos of the induction ceremony and her proud parents afterward.

Thanksgiving is my most favorite holiday. I just love it! It's the only day I love to cook. Not sure what it is about this day that I enjoy it so much but I do. The funny thing is I hardly ever take a single picture to remember my favorite day. This year was another great one. the turkey turned out great and everything was delicious!

We had so much fun last year going out to the forest to cut down our tree we decided to do it again. The only weekend that this was going to be possible this year was Thanksgiving. Athena had so much going on at dance and with Shawn having a new on-call rotation at his new job it was the only way to make it happen. Luckily Thanksgiving was late this year so it worked out great! Our friends the Richardson's came too so that made it even more fun. You can tell Athena and her friend Annie are both city kids though, I had to teach them how to make a snowman. The snow wasn't the best for snowman making and they ended up with a snowcat in the end. A few days after the tree was home and decorated Shawn pointed out that it really looked like the tree from Nightmare Before Christmas. I was very tempted to take the decorations off and try to re-create it. Then I got busy making a bazillion boot covers for dance though and that never happened :) Cutting down a real tree that grows in the forest doesn't give you the most uniform, full perfect tree, but it sure is fun! I was all about making this Christmas about experiences and less about things.

The Fair and Halloween

Way back in October Athena danced at the Fair. Then of course we had to walk around and find the strangest food to eat. It was a really fun day. We had deep fried White Castle burgers, deep fried red velvet cake, bacon wrapped cherries, and Athena had bacon flavored cotton candy. Let's just say we found the one thing that bacon doesn't make better, it was yucky!

For what I think is only the second time in her whole life I didn't make Athena's Halloween costume this year. She wanted to be Marceline from Adventure Time and while shopping one day we found the perfect shirt, she already owned leggings so we just needed red boots and an ax shaped guitar. We found blue boots that were perfect and painted them red. I cut the guitar out of several pieces of cardboard glued together and Athena painted it all on her own. She did an awesome job don't you think?

Catching Up.....Again

Here I am again, catching up after not blogging for months. I have found that I really enjoy going back and reading things we were doing a year or more ago though so I am going to try and keep up better if only for my own personal enjoyment. So today will be a quick run down of the last 5-6 months and then over the next few days I hope to post some photos and video (if I can figure out how to upload from my new camera) of life's bigger events.

Athena has probably been the busiest of us all. She was on the honor roll the first two quarters this year and was inducted into National Junior Honor society. She danced at a walk for MS, the State Fair, a big charity show at Christmas and Glendale Glitters. She auditioned for a part in Alice in Wonderland and will be the Caterpillar next month.

Hailey is still a bartender at Applebees. She was in a show called Quilters the musical that was fun and will be Mayella Ewell in To Kill a Mockingbird next month.

Shawn started a new job at DirecTV, the commute sucks but the pay is good and he is learning some new things, plus who doesn't like free TV?

I have been doing more sewing, made a Halloween costume for a friends daughter, she wanted to be a Rockette, made a bazillion boot covers for the Christmas show at dance, and am now working on more baby things for another pregnant friend and gearing up for play and dance things coming up including some adorable orphan dresses.

We cut down our own Christmas tree again this year, had a nice visit to Utah and are trying to get out and enjoy our fabulous weather before it gets hot again. We went mini golfing and to the Botanical Garden to see the new Chihuly exhibits recently.

So that's the past in a nutshell, keep watching for pictures and video!