Rollerdrome...We Own You!

The Johnsons, Terrys, Paynes and Weavers hit the only existing rollerskating rink in the entire Treasure Valley, which happens to be in my old hometown of Nampa and is right around the corner from the Arctic Circle I used to work at in high school. Can you say "glory days"? We really had so much fun and pretty much owned the rink that night. Jenni Terry and I were cracking each other up because we got our groove back really quick, doing the crossover on turns and keeping beat with the music! I know as a 35 year old mother of 3 I should feel at least a little bit out of place at a 5th grade hangout spot, but I actually felt super cool. That's one good thing about myself...I can feel cool pretty easily! Several of us made it to the final rounds of the limbo competition, and my graceful exit was even captured for posterity! My personal favorite part of the night was watching my husband and his buddy Jared wear their matching black and shimmering gold almost Ed Hardy shirts with pride. We finished off the night adult style and ate at a really good restaurant that 5th graders can't afford!

Our Second Home

Gilbert, Arizona was our home for four years and when we moved away we thought we would be back to visit once a year or more, however, life seems to get in the way and it took us nearly three years to get back to our second home...and home it still was. We decided not to tell anyone we were coming, except Mike Romney, which was kept totally confidential because he was in Haiti prior to our arrival! The evening we flew in we decided to drive through the old hood and just start knocking on doors. As we were entering The Gardens Steve said, "I think we'll see Matt Porter playing at the park with his daughters" and sure enough Matt was our first sighting! We then crashed the Jelinek pad, tried a couple others but there was no answer, and called it a night at the Nielson's. I highly recommend this kind of arrival - it was crazy fun! Even on short notice our friends were able to hang with us a bit. Our bishop and his wife even fit it into their schedule to join us for dinner. We ate lots of good food, laughed hard, and were reminded over and over why these people make Gilbert our second home.

Steve Celebratin' with Da Boyz

After surprising Steve with a "new to us" Ford F-150 for Christmas I officially had the surprise bug and couldn't get enough, so I decided to surprise him again for his birthday. Any of you that know Steve well know that he rarely splurges on himself, in the form of time, money, anything. My body doesn't want to let me ski anymore because it likes to vomit after only two runs, and this translates into Steve not skiing much anymore either, so I called a few of his favorite boys to join him in a Sun Valley ski trip. I even had his office manager clear out his Friday appointments, and to avoid any suspicion on his part, she scheduled fake appointments.

From what I hear the trip was quite a party. Lots of guy things, like playing cards till all hours of the night (is that a guy thing?), eating huge amounts of food, skiing hard, and did I mention eating huge amounts of food? There are some Bart Hamilton food consumption stories that will go down in history!!

The Fuddy Duddy that Wouldn't Skate

Notice who's not wearing ice skates in this picture...can you say f-u-d-d-y d-u-d-d-y! Although he does have a semi-good excuse - he claims they hurt his cankles!! Capri didn't ice skate either and was probably climbing up and down, up and down, and up and down (repeat about 20 more times for the full effect) the stairs of the rink lobby while this family picture was being taken.

Capri in '09

Can't leave these classic pictures out! Notice the text on Capri's onesie. How true is that! I'm not really sure why I love the screaming picture but there is something adorable and memorable about it. She looks like such a little munchkin in that picture. And I must mention that the sweater she was wearing is one of my very favorites! Is it obvious that I love dressing my girls!

Our Sweet Little Sophie in '09

Just a few pictures of Sophie that somehow missed the blog this year, but are definitely Family Yearbook worthy! We love our Sophie.

Maxwell in '09

These are a couples of pictures of Maxwell that somehow missed the blog this year, but I just can't leave them out of the Family Yearbook. I love his little face. He is my little cuddle bug. I just love everything about this kid...except his occasional moodiness, which he probably learned from me! As I look at the first picture below it reminds me of one of my favorite little things about Max - he loves to wear crazy socks, and he loves for all to see him wear his crazy socks. He has these really long (knee-high) bright yellow soccer socks which he loves to wear with shorts. It makes it quite easy to spot Maxwell during his football game...just look for the yellow socks. He also has some long black, grey and red striped socks, which he wore to basketball practice just last night. It's a quirky little thing that I adore.