So many things...

OK I know for those of you who actually read this it has been a while since I blogged. I am going to try and make time each week to even write a small bit of what is going on. That way I don't have the monster updates hahaha

Lets see it has been since our snow in March since I blogged...so here we go
The kids started soccer and let me tell you Caitlin LOVES soccer.




She wants to go to practice everyday. She wants to play in the game the whole time, but has to learn to take turns so other teammates can play too. She is the biggest on the team and fast and loves to score goals. Austin is not as excited about soccer, but he tries his best. (cub scout motto we use often with him :-))



He enjoys it, but doesn't have the same drive or compassion for it.



He loves art. Both kids love to draw or do creative things, but Austin really can draw well. Right now he wants to be an artist when he grows up. And that leads into a sweet story I have to share.

Dan was working so the kids and I went to a little chinese place for dinner (one of thier favorite foods). While eatting I like to make conversation with the kids and so I looked at Austin and asked him what he wanted to be when he grew up. OOo his face lite up and he said, "I want to be an artist mommy...a famous artist" He had this huge grin and you could see the wheels turning in his head. He continued on in detail and expression about him being a famous artist. He then said, "mommy when i paint my first famous painting I am going to sell it for one HUNDRED dollars and mommy I am going to give all that money to the children...then children in the hospital...so that way they can get the medicines they need to get better." By this time I was fighting back tears in the middle of this busy chinese resturant. I pulled it together and smiled through my tears and said, "OO honey that is very sweet and a kind thign to do and I bet those children would love that." He then continued, without much hestiation, on describing what his 1st "famous" painting would be and about the art store he wants to opne. BUT of course said it would "NOT be like Michaels where daddy works", but one where he could help kids to all kinds of art projects...like with clay and stuff. It was one of those parent moments when you know you are doing something right...My heart just smiled. See he really can be a sweet heart. ;-)



We had spring break in mid March and made a short trip up to Oklahoma City to see my family. I do not get to see them very often...so even 2 or 3 days is a lot. I usually try and spend tie with my girlfriends while I am there too, so it is usually non-stop the whole trip.

Then we had a busy busy week. We had Easter...lots of goodies from the Easter bunny, an egg hunt in the house and a day of true rest and family time. We didn't to much and that was very nice. BUT 2 days later our little girl turned 5!!. WOW so much has gone through my mind with that day. Thinking how fast time has gone by for one. Also knowing we have been in Texas since she was one month old. Kind of hard to believe too. Thinking back on the day she was born and her 1st birthday and all those 1st milestones. She is truely a joy to have around. A daddy's girl, tom boy, princess, and rockstar all rolled into one. She is very athletic...her shins all bruised up from playing hard and not being a wimp, but then lips that are so full of lip gloss that you almost cringe when she wants to give you a kiss. She is perfect just being Caitlin. :-) She had her birthday party a week and half after her actually birthday (man I will rethink that later)BUT her and Dan (who also had a birthday~32) got to celebrate together...we had dinner and gifts for Dan.
Here they are on her actual birthday:



She had to wait. :-) She had a roller skating party and LOVED it.



We rented the entire rink for 2 hours and could have 40 people skate. Plus it was by far the best cost to go over other party places. (And I love to roller skate too) I highly recommend this for new skaters. Caitlin is a pro, but she was one of the few.




She flows around the rink..while her friends held onto the wall. But by the end everyone was getting much better. She loved having everyone there and getting lots of cool gifts. We had a mix of butterflies and Hannah Montana stuff as her theme. She cried when we had to leave. She so far LOVES being 5!!! She thinks she is an adult now. Excited about starting kindergarten next school year and she thinks she can do everything by herself now. OOO my are we in for it!

We also got to go see my brother race in Dallas and that was very exciting. My whole family was at the races...something that doesn't happen very often now. It was a great day. I made Caitlin a shirt with uncle Robbie's number on it and made it sparkle with bling(rhinestones). The front said, "Go Uncle Robbie" and the back said, "Reynard 17"



It was very cute. The next day we had her birthday party at the skating rink...so my family was able to be there. So that was nice. PLUS she loves Robbie's girlfriend, Ashley. She has totally claimed her as her own. She always says, "I love my Ashley".

Lets see that puts us at the beginning of April now. :-)

Dan had his annual review with Michaels and they are still wanting him to move to Dallas...to be closer to his store. Of course they pulled every line of BS possible. "more time with your family, less expense in gas, shorter drive, not getting up as early, etc" of course they didn't mention the fact of trying to sell and buy a house in the wonderful economy we are having or the fact that we would have to pretty much still live 30-45 mins away to find an area we could afford that wasn't in the ghetto of Dallas. Of course Dan said if he had to drive 30 mins over on that side of town then we are just staying here...cause 30 mins over there could also be 2 hours with the traffic on the highway. So we are staying. I told him now if Michaels wanted to buy our house and give him a bigger raise then we could talk about Dallas. hahahaha but actually I cried over the thought of it. Moving is hard on me. Since I stay home it is harder to make friendships....not just a casual friend, but somebody (or bodies) I can actually do stuff with or talk too. Most of my friends are my kids friends parents. And a few I have gotten close too over the years. BUT I still miss my friends in Oklahoma a lot. Besides all of this Michaels is still something Dan enjoys most of the time. He of course has his moments where he is fed up and ready to find a new job. End of March and beginning of April he had a few of those moments. He worked a lot around then. He was getting ready for inventory and then had some BIG visits from pretty much every top VP in Michaels 2 weeks in a row. So he had a few days where he was at work by far more then home. I think both weeks Wed-Fri he put in a total of 48 hours(or more) in that 3 day time and he did it twice...I was feeling for him, but when the visits went well he of course came home tired, but with a very swollen head from his job well done. hahaha
He is an extremely hard worker and we are proud of him..even thought we miss him dearly when he is gone...after all of that he told his DM that if she called him on his day off again to come in to work he wasn't answering the phone...she laughed and he said, "NO really I won't answer it!" I was very proud then. :-)

I got to go to St Louis in mid April to see a bunch of friends. There was a race there. But my real reasons for going varied from that. I got to go see my friends wife and child who passed away in Feb. Tina was excited to have visitors and was going to the race, since her husband would have wanted her to do that and their child, Alexis..OOO my gosh she was so sweet and cute.



I wanted another one right there. :-) Or just to take her home with me. It was funny as I said that Dan called me on my cell. I think he knew what I was thinking hahaha. I told him I wanted one..he said it would be hard to work on that with me there and him in Texas. LOL Speaking of Dan..man he got a weekend with the kids in full force. I always think these are great weekends for him to spend with the kids and see truely what i do almsot every weekend, but man I felt a little bad for him. he skipped most of the Friday night activities, but Saturday was enough....9am, 11am, and a 1pm soccer games and soccer pictures at 10am. My list for the rest of the day was rest and have fun together...YES I made him a list! HAHAHAHA he made it through with blazing colors and the kids were still in one piece..so all was good. I wasn't too worried. He is awesome with them... just lacks patience at times. :-) BUT back to STL...I spent Sunday with Tina and Alexis and about an hour on Friday. I got to see a lot of Jason's family while I was there. I also made a trip over to the cemetary ..which was an actually funny ordeal. It was only 15 mins from my hotel and a friend of mine who I introdued to Jason 2 years ago went with me. It was raining and we had directions from his wife where he was at the cemetary. (He is burried in a national cemetary with the little white head stones. So it can get confusing with millions of them there. We of course wondered around in the rain for 20 mins looking for him. We knew he was laughing at us..two blondes in the rain with little umbrellas in the middle of cemetary..LOST! Well we weren't really lost...just misguided with the directions given. I went and printed a map of where he was and found out we needed 1HH not just HH...hahahaha ooo little details. We laughed on the drive over to the actual location. And then we turned the corner to the newer section with no grass but dirt..which had turned to mud in the rain. We knew he was laughing at us then. We decided to say hello and miss you from a distance. He would have loved for us to trot through the mud. But we were going to his house afterwards..so his wife might not have liked it too much :-)



I also got to see the little boy, Cody who I did the make a wish thing for 2 yrs ago. He was 11 yrs old with a brain tumor and it could not be surgically removed. Well now a 13 yr old with NO brain tumor and a head full of hair was an awesome sight. I keep in constant touch with his mother on his health and life. He has a girlfriend! :-) he still has to have regular check ups, but they have just been mmoved from once every 3 months to once every 6 months..which makes mom more nervous. They are a very special family to me! So seeing him was awesome.
I also did a little charity work while I was at the races. I was gathering auction stuff for a rider who has Chrones diesase. He had been misdiagnosised for several years, causing it to be a very severe case by the time he was actually diagnosised. He had to spend 6 weeks in th hosptial. So it was ok in my opinion to take an hour or so of my time on Saturday at the races to do that for someone I never personally met. But I did get to talk to him. He was a big time pro a few years ago..before getting sick and not knowing what was wrong.

Now we are at the end of April....Caitlin decided this week that she wanted to take her training wheels off her bicycle...again SHE IS 5 now! hahaha (we hear that once a day atleast) And after 30 mins of work...she was off on her own. She wasn't sure about stopping or turning, but she can go straight. When she wants to stop or turn she pulls into the grass and steps off the bike or falls over. hahaa I have lots of video and photos..but here is one.



We are still doing lots of cub scout stuff, soccer and dance. May will once again be a busy month for us. Mother's day, Sunday school for 2 more weeks for me, end of soccer parties(which I am not involved in planning :-D..a big deal if you know how I am) and planning Austin's 8th birthday party, mine and Dan's 11th anniversary, Caitlin's dance recital and all the end of school stuff...which seems like there is a lot of them. HAHAA I wouldn't want it any other way!
Check out my MonaVie website.. www.mymonavie.com/cheriek I really do love this stuff. Our whole family feels great, but my nails have never looked so good. HAHAHA I know odd. But that is all I have thought of the last few days. :-)

Sorry it has been so long...

I know I know..It has been a month since my last blog. It has been a very very long month. This will be VERY long with LOTS of pictures to get you all up to speed. Not sure where to begin. So we will start from where I left off on the last one.
I went to St Louis for Jason's funeral. I got to hold his little girl...she is so tiny and cute. I had put together a notebook of all the prayers and thoughts from the motocross community for his mom and his wife. That was an ordeal, but well worth it. Kind of healing for me as well. I met a lot of his other friends..some I had met before. We all vowed to make sure his daughter knew what a great friend her father was. After all she is only 4 months old. I had some fun flight issues going and coming home, but I made it home in one piece and that is all that mattered in the end. It was so good to get home and give everyone a big hug!

Austin had his Ben Franklin presentation and he did so good! I was so proud. He remembered all of his lines. He also gave each child a giant $100 bill. They were a hit. Here he is as Ben!


Later that night they had the 70's school dance. It was a lot of fun. I didn't have time to find the kids costumes, since I had been gone. So a pair of glasses is all they got. Here is Austin rockin the Lennon look! They had so much fun....

even though Caitlin had a sit on the stage by herself moment...



We had a Valentine Fairy tale ball for the 1st graders at Austin's school. I didn't do too much with it. It was so cute to see the kids come out by class. They walked in pairs. Austin was dressed in his suit and escorted a sweet girl named Hannah. Here is a picture of them:

They had also practiced a couples dance.

He was very popular with the ladies at the dance. When they were allowed to cut in. He had 3 girls come looking for him. :-) Here he is with a girl that was in his class last year, Natalie


And here is Austin and his best friend, Taylor. They had lots of fun. She basically kept putting him in a headlock. They were all grins the whole time dancing together.



And even Caitlin got dressed up for the Ball...for about 2 minutes until she had to get the "itchy" dress off hahaha.


I have been busy working on the Blue and Gold Cub Scout banquet. I was volunteered for it and still not sure how that happened. :-) I was in charge of all the decor and our theme was The History of Scouting.(this is my 1st year in scouting..so I am not up on all the history of it) It began with a very small budget of $75 and that included all the table decor and the room decors. I ended up getting an extra $100 a week before the banquet. This type of banquet is usually planned and done over several months, but we had a change of power in Jan and no one had taken on this. So we had our Tiger den (a bunch of 1st timers) putting it all together. I had about 3 weeks to get everything together on my part. 3 days before the banquet they had a lot higher number then I was told we were having. A total of 120 people coming. So had to do a lot of extra last minute stuff and adding 4 more tables. So most of the table decor was hand made from things I found in nature that I could use. I made napkin rings to look like neckerchiefs. They took a lot of time since it required lots of cutting of paper and I cut each one individually, since I had no other way. Here are a few pictures


One of mom and son!

Here is our center piece in the room....a campfire that I made and put a strobe light in the middle with metallic tissue paper to look like flames. When the strobe was going it looked very cool. Dan did the final assembly for me. He was a big help for me as usual.



Austin all dressed in his uniform! He is so handsome


Of course while I was in my final week of prep for this Blue and Gold banquet. I got sick...it started as a sinus infection and then I got the stomach bug everyone seemed to be getting around here. So all week I was exhausted and tired. So it made it hard to get everything done, but with Dan's help..we finished everything. My friend Susan (her son is in our Den) she helped a lot with the banquet too and her and her husband helped us with set up. It took us about 4 hours to set up the gym for the banquet. We were told by some scout parents that this was the best one they had been to in the last 4 years...so it made all our work worth it. But I tell you this. I WILL NOT BE DOING IT NEXT YEAR!!!

Both kids are also playing soccer this spring. They had their 1st practice last week. Both are very excited about playing and it makes us excited too.
Caitlin and her new Coach

And Austin loves hanging out at the goal



Caitlin has a birthday in less then 3 weeks and she is very exciting. She is turning 5!!! I can't believe it myself. She is growing up so fast. Turning 5 is such a big day and she has sooo many plans. Too bad mom and dad have to approve! haha On her actual birthday Austin has a field trip to the Dallas aquarium, so we are also taking her and she will get to hang out with daddy all day. It will be a day for the birthday pair. Dan will turn 32 the next day(yes, that is hard for us to believe too..can we really be 32 already!) So we will have a whole 2 day celebration! :-) Her party will probably not be until the April 6th since I have had no time to get anything put together for it. She wants to go roller skating..so I am going to work on that. So we will see. We might try for the 29th, but that is coming fast! :-)

Well then today the 6th of March we got 4 inches of snow. YES you read right SNOW!!! It was our 1st snow of the year and of last year. haha Snow is rare in Texas. Don't laugh or grimace all you WI people :-) It rained all morning and then turned to sleet and then on came the snow. Here are some pictures
This is our backyard as it started to finally snow

and an hour later of blizzard like conditions

Last weekend all of our trees started budding and had white blossoms on them and now the ground is covered with snow. So it gave a nice touch to our SPRING SNOW (that is what I am calling it!

Of course then it was time for us all to make a snow man and go sledding. We used the same sled's that Dan used as a kid. Sadly he doesn't fit the same on them anymore....Here is a big man on a little sled

The kids building a snowman with dad..of course it is giant!


Striking a pose with the snowmen!

We then walked over to the park and begun the fun of sledding down the hill


a little push from daddy



They were having sooooooooo much fun and smiled the whole time!



Then Austin decided to try rolling down the hill. He thought it was lots of fun and didn't seem to mind getting all wet and cold!

Caitlin had a blast making snow angels. She laughed the whole time and then would look at them.

Austin had to bring home a little snowman that he made while they were sledding. So he loaded it on the sled and him and dad dragged it home to put next to the giant one. :-)


OK, I think I have covered most of the things we did last month..I am exhausted now. :-) This month will be just as busy with Easter and 2 birthdays in one week. So much to plan with my Sunday school class and the birthday's. I hope you all are well and please stay in touch. We love hearing from you. Lots of love!

Rollercoaster...

That is the best way to describe this week. A Rollercoaster! It has had ups and downs.

Austin had a really good week in school and I was so proud of him for so many different reasons. He made a 110 or an E on a math quiz of 25 questions, he only missed 2 on his spelling pre-test, he got on Pink (above good behavior), he picked his Great American and the lines he has to memorize. He also had to birthday parties this weekend which added to our UPS!
Austin's cub scout den also went on a fire station tour this week, which was a lot of fun for the boys and Caitlin (she is the lil scout helper)

Wednesday night Austin wiggled another tooth out all by himself. So now we are up to 4 missing teeth. All the front ones. He is starting to get two new adult teeth coming in on the bottom. They are very jagged, so hopefully they even out, but he did say he wanted shark teeth! :-D



Caitlin got a fun surprise on Friday. I took her to see Hannah Montana/Miley Cyrus 3D concert in movie theaters. I know if you don't have young kids this may not make sense. BUT she is a huge deal to kids right now. Her concerts sale out in minutes. So I figured this would be the only concert I would take her too! :-) I bought our tickets a few days earlier, since they had been talking about it selling out. ($15 a piece was a shock) We went with one of her friend's, Quincy, there and they were so excited. It was good. I won't be lining up to go again, but Caitlin loved it..so that is all that mattered. She LOVES music.



On Tuesday while Dan was playing basketball he did a number on his back...well the other players he was playing against did. They were pushing him in the back which is normal for Dan's position, but his whole back spasmed when it happened that night. He was in a lot of pain, but played throught it. When he came home he fell apart. Not being able to move, stand, lay. it was bad. And of coruse he took it for all it was worth. He went to work the next day..came home early and rested. On thursday he went to the doctor and got some meds and they helped, but knocked him out. He is slowly doing better. He is taking it easy, but Caitlin is ready for Daddy to get better so he can hold/carry her. She is such a Daddy's girl.


Well our other down this week was a close friend of mine, who has been battling stage 4 cancer for 4 years passed away on Friday. His name is Jason, he was 34 and had a wife and a 3 month old daughter. I know he is now at peace and he is not fighting for everyday. I ask for prayers for his family as they go through this loss. I am flying to St Louis on Tuesday to attend the service. RIP my friend!

I have also been nominateed (if we want to call it that) to do all the decorating for the Blue and Gold Banquet in our Cub scout pack. Of course I know I can do this, but I have less then 3 weeks to get it all together. Plus I am designing the invitations and helping with the programs. I am sure it will all be great!