Rachel turns 12...

Rachel turned 12 on May 22nd. Fun day for her-I sent 4 large pepperoni pizza's to her class to enjoy. Then we went as a family to Olive Garden for dinner- GRUB! The waiters/waitresses all sang to her-she was embarrassed which made it even more fun for Jon and I! We came home she opened up one gift card to Justice (clothes store) and one gift card to Michaels (colored pencils). She also got a cute sewing basket that Aunt Katie put together for her. Gma and Gpa got her a VERY nice gift...a sewing machine complete with a few patterns and material. Rachel loves to sew--she seems to be NOTHING like me! HA She is very much her daddy--
This morning Rachel received her Primary advancement award from the bishopric. She had to walk up to the front and recite an article of faith. She chose to do #10! She nailed it and I was a proud mama--trying not to cry my head off!
Today was her last day in Primary-I had the primary kids sing "Goodbye, Goodbye" instead of Hello, Hello--it was cute...and off to YW's she went. Poor Becca cried for about 10 minutes after Rachel left--soooo cute! Her Beehive leader came over today to introduce her to all that YW is about--
Rachel has grown into such a lovely girl. She LOVES to be creative. You can find her drawing, making origami, creating anything out of EVERYTHING which leads to me saying "rachel can you pick up what you created here!!", she is sweet to becca & anna, she loves to read-and reads BIG BOOKS!, she loves to play the flute and her latest is the mission impossible theme you can hear throughout the house flute style!, she enjoys volleyball and currently the swim team, she has AMAZING confidence in herself, she is good to always include everyone, & continues to always be smiling..just like when she was a baby.
It is great to see her growing up and moving into this next phase of her life!

Rachel's 1st Mutual activity & American Idol Season 8 Finale

Rachel had her FIRST mutual activity-they went in the spa at one of the leaders house. She had a BLAST! I took photos of her leaving and then recordered her on the video camera as I drove her there and then as she walked into the house. I drove home quietly thinking, wow we are at the next stage of life for her. She's amazing. I will post more about her on her actual 12th bday on Friday.
American Idol was AMAZING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I am still HIGH from watching the show!!! The guy who won is the person I wanted to win--Kris Allen. I LOVED that he's from a small town, married and humble!
Life has been good-I have been busy with some things-but all is well!
The girls have their first REAL swim meet this Saturday 9-1230pm. Jon is coming with-which is GREAT! He doesnt get to come to a lot of things, but since it is SO hot right now outside..he is able to come. The girls are SUPER excited about that.

Sunday Simpleness...

We had a good weekend, Rachel had TONS of fun at her 12th bday overnighter. We have a family rule of no sleepovers at anyone else's house and we rarely do them at our house, but decided for their 12th bday's they could have one here in our home with their friends. She had about 7 girls here. They were a lot of fun and were really good. They first swam in the pool, then I picked up pizza for them, then they went on their scavenger hunt & returned back with a bunch of items, one of them being a cake mix WITH frosting-SCORE! So I whipped that up and they DEVOURED that along with rootbeer floats. Then she opened up her gifts, one of them being a hot pink pillowcase where each of the girls signed it so that's a fun memory for her. Then they went on to play hide n seek in the dark, along with taking a twin size mattress and sliding down the stairs with it-classic overnighter stuff! By 1am I told them time to limit the madness to ONE room--so they giggled in the tv room and finally fell asleep. Jon & I were out just after 1am-so we slept good!!
Rachel woke up and made them all french toast-what a hostess in the making huh! They all left by 11am and Rachel cleaned up the mess they made.
We then drove to OC & I took Rachel to Claires Accessories to use up one of her gift cards. She has changed SO much, she matches now, like to use a purse, keeps her hair down instead of pulled back into a ponytail-she's really a cute girl.
We then hit the Orange Stake Talent show..it was longgggggg. Some of them were pretty funny--I recorded some good ones. Grandpa was dressed back in the 50's...he ended up looking like Jack Nicholson! Even his own grandkids didnt recognize him-pretty funny! I love going back to that Stake, we both grew up there and have such fond memories of it and everyone there. It is always like going back "home" when we go to any of their functions-it's like we never left. I kept thinking, I wish I brought my still camera so I could go around taking pics of everyone to share with all my old Orange stake friends!
Sunday was good-we shockingly made it before the Opening Prayer-which NEVER happens, and sadly church is at 1130!! Today was Rachel's last day in Primary..sniff sniff. Next week they will sing her favorite Primary song and off she will go to YW's. This Wednesday they have invited her to go in the spa for her first activity. We are extremely sad that there are ONLY SIX YOUNG WOMEN in our entire ward. We grew up with TONS of youth. We will see what happens.
Enjoyed the rest of our Sunday-we watched Freaky Friday on tv as a family. We hadnt seen that movie-so it was fun to be with just the girls & Jon.
Gearing up for another school week-along with a 4th grade school project looming, it's due next friday-I need to make sure we stay on top of that. I wish the school wouldn't give homework for the last month of school!

1st Swim Meet--too cute

Yesterday the girls had their 1st Swim Meet (it was a practice one but still!). They all had fun, it was too cute to see Becca working her hardest to get to the other side. I was incharge of getting 150 kids in proper placing for their race, it was 4-almost 8pm..HELLO long time, but I managed to do it correctly with no mistakes-WHEW!

My back is definately on the mend, Im feeling better and the muscles are not as sore as they have been. I have been taking the 800mg motrin with a muscle relaxer before I go to bed and it seems to really help, only it takes me longer to wake up in the mornings! Good thing my 3 girls that are in school are self sufficient enough to get dressed, eat breakfast and head out the door by 755am without any help!

A couple of nights ago when it was hot, Jon asked the younger two, Anna & Becca to roll up his pants so he could cool off. Becca was fascinated by Jons hair legs and kept rubbing them asking Anna to check it out. As they were both walking out the bedroom Becca said "wow Daddy has hairy legs Anna!" Then Anna replied, "Ya I know and someday when you get married and have a husband he will have hairy legs too!"
So funny....

Rachel is excited to have her birthday sleepover celebration with her friends THIS Friday. She's invited 5 or 6 I believe. Hopefully the other 3 siblings can have a fun night at grandma's house. It will be VERY low key-which I like! She just wants to go swimming, spa, pizza & the Wii-EASY!! Her real birthday is next friday-but she has a swim meet that next morning, so we opted for this weekend instead. She is definatley turning into a young lady, although she is still little in some ways, like still hates to take a shower!!! We are working on this...

Rough weekend...

Saturday I ended up messing up my back doing the food run, I still drove to OC to my sisters house to hang with my family--it was pretty miserable for me tho..came back home to see that Anna had somehow contracted pink eye!? what on earth!
SO sunday was spent as much as i could in bed, with drugs and anna with pink eye--the girls gave me their homemade cards and jon wrote a nice letter. I love that all my girls wrote in their cards "my mom loves to cuddle with me" - it makes me happy to hear that.
There were a couple interesting points..anna in her card said "Please dont brake up with dad"...um nice! And then Rachel's said "I know you are a "single" parent and it is hard but it makes you strong." Interesting to see things from their point of views.
I talked to them to reassure them I would never leave and that I love their daddy. Life would be terribly sad & lonely without him!
Hopefully tomorrow is a better day for my back & I can drive Anna down to the Dr's to get her a prescription poor thing. She's kind of had it rough with sore throat and now this---
This tuesday is a practice swim meet-hopefully everyone here is healthy enough to make it-including me!

Sad news for Rachel...

Well Rachel did not make the cheer squad for her soon to be Junior HS. She is upset and cried for a good hour. What's a parent to do...sniff sniff. It is definately a learning experience/growing experience for her. We are so proud she even tried out-that takes a lot of self confidence!
Tomorrow is my BUSY saturday mornings, I have to take care of Jon in the morning from 730am-1015am, get the younger 3 to swim meet practice by 9am, then drop rachel off for her practice by 1015am & pick up the other 3 by 1030am, then rush to go do the food run get back in time to pick up rachel by 1130am and then hand out all the food-GEESH its a nitemare every saturday-but somehow i make it happen!
Tomorrow the plan is to go to my parents to swim, clay, russell, heidi & her fam, brian & his fam will all be there, then Rachel will babysit all the grandkids while the adults go out to dinner for moms day..should be fun!
Im excited for Mom's day-jon and the girls do a fun/good job of making it so wonderful for me--they are such sweet sweet girls, im so lucky to have Jon and the four girls.
Anna told jon on sunday she was going to sit ALL thru sac meeting with her hands folded..sure enough 1 hour and 15 minutes she did! Never made ONE peep! So this evening jon walked with her to Kohls and she got to pick out a cute sunday dress and a new pink shirt-she LOVED it--she's so sweet.

Wednesday Funny's...

Becca was at my friends house whose walls are painted a plum color.
Becca: "Um how come'd you paint your walls purple?"
Tracy: "Because I like purple. Why did your mom paint your house yellow?"
Becca: "My mom didnt paint it yellow, it come'd like that!"
Tracy: "No, your mom painted it that way."
Becca: "No, she didnt."

Becca came outside to the truck after I brought him back from his Dr. appt.
Becca: "Where'd you go?"
Jon: "To the Dr.s."
Becca: "Oh, can you walk now?"
Jon: "No."
Becca: "When are you going to walk again?"

Too cute huh---I cant believe she'll be going to school here soon in a few months.
Life is going well, Rachel is grasping her cheerleading stuff-it's been fun to watch her here at home and be "judged" by her sisters and myself. Anna's comment was "Oh, wow Rachel, it was better then I expected!" Too funny.

It was super warm today-which helps Jons pain level to be at a lower spot. I spent the day cleaning up the upstairs-WHEW THREE HOURS LONG! I need my house cleaner back for sure!

The girls continue to do their swim meet practice. They have their 1st meet next tuesday-that will be fun. Hopefully it is warm and Jon can go. It is 3 hours long tho so we'll see if that is something he's capable of doing or not.

I went to a R/S activity where we talked about the symbols on the temple. It was really neat to see so many on the SLC temple. I was aware of the ones on the Redlands temple here, but not of SLC. Very intriguing!

Anna just came down suddenly with a sore throat and low fever. Hopefully she doesnt throw up during the night as we've had the flu going around the school. Time will tell!

Trying to be a little better...

at keeping a journal for our family. Life has been good. We are all healthy. Summer is ALMOST here. We have about 30 or so days left of school. We are excited to not have ANY homework once summer comes!
The girls are currently all in Swim. They are conditioning right now and then will be competing in Swim Meets-this is a first for our family so very exciting! Rachel is currently on a special volleyball team that is geared towards 8-9th graders but was asked to come play because the coach sees some potential in her abilities-OH YA!
The girls are all doing very well in school, last month they didnt miss ONE day of school-so they got to have a special party at school with their teacher and classmates.
Jon is busy trying to secure employment. No word on the book as of yet. He is waiting to see if he can get a teaching job at the local college here. We shall see! It wont start till September so we have lots of waiting time.
The food run continues to go well. I have more help on a daily basis now, I decided I just couldnt do it all myself. It works out quite nicely now-although Saturdays are my days and its very hard to try to get Jon ready for the day, all 4 girls at swim practice AND the food run all between the hours of 9-12!! But with help I miraculously make it happen!
Rachel's getting older, cant believe she'll be in YW's NEXT MONTH! She's going to have Cheer tryouts next week-we'll know by Friday if she makes the team or not. Im so proud of her for even wanting to try out- I was never that brave!! She is also doing lots of babysitting-which she loves and enjoys earning her own money.
So life is good, we just keep on rolling!