When the horse is dead, get off of it!!

I was listening to a book on tape by Amanda Dickson (KSL radio announcer), thanks to my mother-in-law, and the title of one of the chapters was "When the horse is dead, get off of it!" I started laughing before I could even hear the following words. I think I will adopt this as my new phrase.

Now we should all ponder a minute about how well we let the worries and cares of the world just slide over us. I am so much better than I used to be...thanks to my husband. It used to drive me nuts when we were having an argument and a few minutes later he wanted to kiss and make up, while I wanted to wallow in exasperation. I am much better now at letting things go!

It has been a pattern I've seen by many people in my life that want to rehash a subject or issue or complaint or whatever...this cycle can be hard to relinquish. BUT it can be done! The hardest may be when you perceive that others are intentionally doing something to hurt you. Never mind their intention. Appreciate what you can about them and then let it go. Anyway, I'm not as clever as some at waxing philosophical, so just use the phrase how you would like, whatever it means to you.

Bruised, but not broken.

First of all, it's not a great picture of the bruise on my left arm (it's the one on the right side of the picture), but it's the best I could get. So, 0k, you might look at this picture and think, "Oh, she's hurt and she's looking for sympathy..." Nope, I wear these bruises proudly. And even though I'm struggling with the sore muscles as well, I struggle with a smile. So, here's the scoop.

A friend invited me to come and play volleyball at her church building both Tuesday and Wednesday night this week. Tuesday they were having a tournament and needed enough people to make a team and Wednesday is the normal night for volleyball. Now, I really like volleyball. By saying that doesn't mean that I'm really good at it, but I really like it. It gets my blood pumping and it takes some physical agility. I am not a great setter, nor do I take flight and hit a great spike onto the opposing team. BUT I do "Bump" the ball well. I am not afraid of those hard serves that come whizzing towards the back row. Hence the bruises! For about 2 hours on Tuesday and again on Wednesday, I received serve after serve during volleyball. The bruises aren't really even that tender (perhaps there might be even a little nerve damage, JK), but my ego has a little boost. I'm certainly not the greatest player on the team, but I'd like to say that I'm a contributor, a real team player. These bruises will heal and the sore muscles will fade, and hopefully I will be allowed back next week to do it all over again!

Mother's Day

I like Mother's Day mostly because John doesn't have to go to any meetings and he's so willing to make me breakfast. I got eggs over-easy, hash browns, sausage and milk - my favorite! Then a calm morning to get ready. It was wonderful. After we went to church, my mom came over and we had roast chicken for dinner- her favorite! Overall it was just a lovely, relaxing day.

I am so incredibly spoiled. I have a terrific husband. Two fantastic kids. A family that loves me and appreciates me. I couldn't ask for much more!

Birthday Time: Not all what it's cracked up to be.

So, Sunday was Hayden's birthday, but we celebrated on Saturday. We bid and won on an auction item that had a birthday party at Skateland for 10 kids for free. Hayden was ecstatic (never mind that he's not so much as tried on a pair of skates!). We sent out the invites, the kids came and there's was plenty of fun...except for John.

John was just going to come and help keep the kids happy and content. He didn't have plans to skate. When he realized that the kids were going to need some help and encouragement on the skating rink he put on some skates and got out there. After about an hour, he was on his way back to the party table when he fell halfway on the skate rink and and halfway on the step...right smack on his tailbone. Ouch!! He didn't break anything, but bruised his fanny and ego a little.

The kids had a blast even though they fell more times than they could count. Hayden got to request his favorite song (Cha Cha Slide) which was a big hit for everyone.

Then later that evening we had family over for burgers and dogs. I would say the best part was the ice cream cake from Cold Stone Creamery. Again, the free coupon came in the basket we won from the auction. It was delicious! Good fun, good times.

The part I'm having trouble swallowing is that my little boy is 6 now! How did he get older so quick, I didn't. I don't mind too much now that the kids are old enough to start taking them places...now we just need to go someplace.

We have the greatest friends ever!

Some great friends of ours (pictured below) won (bought) some Diamondback tickets in an auction and invited us to come along.

Now check out how great these seats were!! Directly behind home plate!! You could see everything from where we were sitting!

The game was so fun! Especially the 4th inning...we got 4 runs! And yes, the Diamondbacks won. We were worried we were going to have to catch a pop fly, and none of us brought our glove, but they only dropped around us, not really that close to us. We got the whole experience...ball park food, the lady who wouldn't leave her lucky seat, and the guys who yelled much louder at the end of the game because of the beer they drank. All in all a great night.

Thanks Todd and Kara, you guys rock! P.S. When are we going on the next cruise?

Crazy Hair Day

On Friday, it was Crazy hair day for a few Kingdergarten classes at Hayden's school. Luckily, Hayden's hair was long enough that we could shave some spots into it and then I colored the spots black so it would look somewhat like a soccer ball. He got lots of comments and some raised eyebrows.

The real fun part was washing it out. I used black eyeliner to color it in because I knew it wouldn't bleed if he got all sweaty and stuff at school. I did cake it on pretty thick, it's hard to tell from the pictures. Well, even though I told Hayden to use extra shampoo and scrub it really hard, I still had to come in and scrub each spot for a good minute each patch. (And we women put this stuff on our EYES!)

These pictures were taken last October when we gave Hayden a mohawk for about a week. Something to understand about Hayden's hair is that it is needle straight. It doesn't lay down, ever. We've tried letting it grow out to see if the weight of his hair will make it lay down. Nope. So, I truly hope that Hayden will be alright with this permanent hairstyle, buzzed. At least nothing has to be done with it, except to wash it and cut it. When he wakes up in the morning, hair's done, nothing to it.

Oh, and just to clarify, John passed on the dead straight hair, it runs in his family. My side is curly and wavy, so it wasn't me. I am glad that John passed down the light hair though.