Christmas 2009

I can't believe it's been over 1 week now that we left to spend the Holidays in Michigan. On Tuesday, we woke at 3am to catch a 7am flight out of Phoenix. We didn't see much snow there (which is okay with me), but my blood is NOT use to the colder temperatures anymore.

Nicole spent Wednesday morning with her friend, Allie, and went to the indoor Warren pool. They have a kiddie section, lap pool, swimming section, diving section, lazy river and various slides. It brought back alot of memories for her because this is where she took her toddler swim lessons. Now, she can touch the bottom and go on the tallest of the waterslides. She had a blast. Thank you Laura and family!

Later in the evening we met up with our friends the Deliktas and Humperts. Played an hour of Wallyball. Wallyball is a version of Volleyball, but you are inside a racquetball court. So instead of the ball going out of bounds, when it hits a side or your own backwall, it is back in play. It is a much much faster game and is all about anticipation. Nicole played once before here in AZ. All the kids are around the same age and loved it. We use to play competitive wallyball in my younger 20s with these friends. That was when I could handle the body slams against the walls. I'm still trying to heal a shoulder injury that is 2 months old when I took Nicole.
Afterwards, we enjoyed dinner at the Deliktas and rocked out to Dan's early xmas gift....Beatles Rock Band. You can tell Dan thoroughly enjoys this gift! Another late night as we didn't leave until 1 am.

Thursday was Christmas Eve. My sister Rose and her family traveled from the Chicago area. Friday was Christmas Day. Had the traditional breakfast at Mom's with both sisters (Rose and Fran) and their families. Opened a ton of gifts and wasn't quite sure how I was going to pack everything to come home. But I did it! Ate again and again. Played a few gift exchange games and laughed our hearts out.

Saturday met up with most of my first cousins on my Mom's side of the family and their children for lunch. I can't believe how different the kids look after 2 years. Then headed over to my in-laws, Chris & Heidi's, house. Mom Donnelly made it down from up north to join us (Thank you Chris and Pat). We only had 2 of Dan's siblings missing.

Sunday, Nicole met up with her friend, Kara, from our old neighborhood for a couple of hours and then we proceeded to the airport. Since we were leaving out of Detroit Metro which had 2 airline scares, we arrived 4 hours early (Ugh). We opened up our presents to each other and from Santa. Finally hit our OWN beds at 2 am. You'll have to watch the whole video to see what Nicole's special present from Santa was.

Thank you to everyone in Michigan for a memorable vacation!

This video is from Nicole's previous school, Vistancia Elementary. Many of Nicole's friends still attend Vistancia and we were thrilled to go watch their Holiday concert. Enjoy!

Holiday Photos

Today, our friend, Kristin took our Family Christmas photos (thank you). These are the 43 best. I didn't even count how many we took in total.

Holiday Band Concert

Nicole's school, Lake Pleasant, combined its Band Concert with her former school, Vistancia. This is only the 6th grade Intermediate Band. Enjoy and hope it gets you in the holiday spirit!

Snow Day at Vistancia

Snow (actually shaved ice) is trucked in and dumped on a hill in our community and the kids have a ball for several hours.

Getting into the Holiday Spirit

Hmmmm, looking at our above family photo, I think I'm delayed in updating our Christmas photo. On that note, don't be offended if I don't mail out Christmas cards again this year. For various reasons, I may be sending out an e-greeting again.

As we head into December and the Holidays, I'm finally getting motivated. Trust me, I absolutely LOVE our Arizona temperatures, but it is really difficult to get into the Holiday Spirit when you're still wearing shorts and there isn't snow. Finally after Thanksgiving, I got my act in gear and started shopping and making plans. Now, 99% of all gifts are purchased (or created) and wrapped. Baking ideas and recipes are ready.

Even though this month gets really hectic, I enjoy having a full calendar. It gives me something to look forward to. The week before Thanksgiving, my company, Comerica Bank, volunteered again for St. Mary's Food Bank. We had a really good staff turnout and we did an assembly line packing Thanksgiving meal sacks for those not as fortunate.


Between now and the New Year, Nicole is taking tennis lessons and attending volleyball training with Club Coaches. Throw in some dog/cat/chinchilla/fish and babysitting, school turkey trot, birthday parties, New Moon showing and orthodontist appointment.

Thursday, Nicole's school held their Holiday Choir Concert with the 5th, 6th and 7th grade choruses. The students worked really hard and it showed. We were so proud of them. Remember to PAUSE my music playlist so you can hear their voices. Word of caution, it's an 18 minute video.

Up next, today is Snow day, so stay tuned for more photos of how us Vistancians get our sledding fix!

Holiday Choir Concert 2009

Flashback Friday

Nicole was 15 months old when she had her first "official" haircut on Thanksgiving day, 1999. Actually, it may have been 1 month earlier, that unbeknownst to me, my Mom trimmed a tad piece of Nicole's bangs off. Apparently, my Mom didn't realize how important the "FIRST" haircut was to me and that I wanted to keep pieces of hair as a memento and to take pictures....I balled my eyes out. Must have been those post-pregnancy hormones.

Autumn in Sedona

Our dear friends (thank you), lent us their condo this weekend in Sedona. What a thrill when we arrived to a two (NOT one) Master bedroom suite. Emma and Nicole were in their glory. I think their room may have been the bigger of the two and they didn't let us forget it all weekend.

Fall is my favorite season and one that I sincerely miss by not living in Michigan. But I got my fix this weekend. The autumn colors on the leaves were so dramatic and the earthy woodsy smells and the sound of the crunching leaves underfoot brought back memories. So did the freezing temperatures. Emma wins the prize for packing the best. I should've brought more than a flannel sweater. The day temps were about 58 degrees. Way to cold for this thin blooded gal. I was all bundled up, and Emma and Nicole were wearing short sleeves.

We've been up to Sedona about a half dozen times since moving here three years ago. We always go to my favorite park, Red Rock Crossing, off the Upper Red Rock Loop. Each time, there is some new trail that we haven't ventured on. Remember to pause the music play list and enjoy the video.

Lake Pleasant Elementary School Dedication

When we first moved to Arizona, Nicole's school at that time, Vistancia, was a brand new school in our community. We purchased a paving brick with our family name as part of their school dedication. So whenever you walk along the brick pathway along the school entry fence, look for our personalized brick. We were fortunate enough to have Nicole attend three grades at Vistancia.

This school year, another new school opened up in Vistancia, Lake Pleasant Elementary. It is only about 2 blocks away and now Nicole attends school there. Last Friday, the school held its dedication ceremony. Each grade was asked to donate items to a time capsule that will be opened up 20 years from now. A copy of this same video below will also be placed in the time capsule. The video is 14 minutes long. To see the list of time capsule items, fast forward to the credits. Remember to pause my playlist on the right so you can hear the band and choir performances. You may need to get out a tissue for the choir's first song. I could barely hold my camera still.

Halloween 2009

I think this is the last of my posts from this crazy weekend. I lost count how many times Nicole went trick or treating. We started around 5:30 p.m. and she finished around 9:30 p.m.

Harvestdaze

Each year, our community Vistancia, hosts a Harvestdaze complete with disc jockey, face painting, petting farm, pie tasting contest, carved pumpkins and hayride. I feel so blessed that we had the foresight to choose this community when we were purchasing our house.

Virg's Birthday

This last week has been a whirlwind of activity, so I'm trying to catch up on all my blog posts. Friday was my birthday. Thank you to all those that wished me a Happy Birthday. My favorite store bought cake in Michigan was a "Sanders" bumpy cake. Sanders makes the best hot fudge too. No one comes close. Since we don't have a Sanders bakery here, I have created a recipe that comes pretty close. Here is my spider web version of the bumpy cake for my birthday.

By the way, I had a wonderful birthday spending time with family and friends at Nicole's school's Fall Festival eating hot dogs for dinner. Tonight Dan and Nicole are taking me to Maggiano's Little Italy. I've only been once to the one in Chicago near my sister, Rose. Since we were with my dad "Papa Joe" at the time, we got our money's worth. Nicole has never been there, so I'm really excited for dinner tonight with the three of us.

Meghan's Flat Stanley's visit from Michigan

There is a school project, that many schools throughout the country participate in, called "Flat Stanley". Flat Stanley is a story written by Jeff Brown about a young boy named Stanley who is accidentally squished "as flat as a pancake" when a bulletin board falls on him. He discovers advantages of being flat, like sliding under doors and being able to fold himself up in an envelope. Flat Stanley gets mailed by a student to several friends across the world. The recipient records Stanley's adventures with photos and the student in the end does a presentation.

Nicole had her own Flat Stanley project in third grade and mailed him to her friend, Allie Nash in Michigan. This is our third Flat Stanley visitor. This one was from our friend, Meghan. We really enjoy being on the receiving end of this project and are thrilled when we hear back from the student about their final presentation. Enjoy!

Max's 7th Birthday

Dan and I bought our first Lab, Brenna, as a puppy prior to having children. As you all know, I'm a planner, and while Dan was finishing his second degree, I had the time to train a puppy, take her to obedience, agility and fly ball training classes. Brenna was smart as a whip, and calmed down by the time Nicole came along. Unfortunately, she passed away at 9 years old and Nicole was only 2 1/2 years old.

We waited a few years before we felt we could add another dog into our busy schedule. When Nicole was in first grade, she started eating lunches at school. She had a very difficult time for about 3 months and cried at every single lunch hour. Her teacher and I tried to figure what was causing all this stress. We felt she was overwhelmed with the noise and the crowds. So she started wearing ear plugs at lunch time. Then I "challenged" Nicole.......if she could stop crying at lunch for 30 days, she could earn a dog. IT WORKED like a charm.

We were looking for an adult dog that was already trained. We had our name on a waiting list for 14 years with Leader Dogs for the Blind in Rochester, MI. In all those 14 years, they never once called us to say a dog was available. So I called them. YES, YES, they had a male 2 year old lab available but we have to make a decision within 24 hours. YEAH RIGHT! I AM NOT a spontaneous person and I research things thoroughly, and YOU'RE telling me after 14 years of waiting, I HAVE to make a decision within 24 hours????

From the get go, we were hesitant because we wanted a smaller female. Dan and I checked him out at our lunch hour. Max was HUGE to us compared to Brenna. But he was very social and calm even when other dogs were passing us by (don't know what happened here) in the Leader dog lobby. We brought Nicole and 2 friends the next day to see how he reacted with children. While the girls swarmed him, he just laid down absorbing all the attention. So he became part of our family on Nov. 11, 2004.

Nicole's personality changed dramatically after adopting Max. She started becoming more outgoing and less fearful with crowds. We've been blessed to have Max with us for 5 years now and last Saturday, Oct. 24th he celebrated his 7th birthday. HAPPY BIRTHDAY MAX! WE LOVE YOU!

Flashback Friday

More older photos of Nicole's halloween years.

Flashback Friday

As we approach Halloween, here are some of Nicole's halloween photos from when she was little.

School Pictures and Grades

Nicole FINALLY got her 6th grade school photos in. I guess we don't have to do picture retakes :) Today we had her parent teacher conference. Her teachers praised her with compliments. She pulled all As and got a 4.0 average, 0 absences and 0 tardies. As always, we're so proud of her excellent work ethics. We went to Baskin Robbins tonight to celebrate with an ice cream sundae (Reesce's peanut butter cup ice cream with 1/2 hot fudge and 1/2 peanut butter sauce) Yuuuuummmmmmm. Congrats Nicole!

Lake Pleasant Volleyball - Game #6

Nicole's Lake Pleasant school completed their final volleyball game of the season against Nicole's former school, Vistancia. The players have shown vast improvement in the past 8 weeks. Being in 6th and 7th grade playing against 7th and 8th graders, and most never having played volleyball before, had its challenges. But they worked hard and Coach Shari did an excellent training job with them. We're very proud of them for their dedication and efforts. This Saturday, they are in a school tournament. We wish them the best of Luck!

Flashback Friday

Thanks for the great Flashback Friday idea Brenda! This was Nicole's first Halloween. She was 2 1/2 months old. I wore a matching lion cotume with her. Hmm... maybe I'll post the picture of both of us that year. I think we still have those costumes. They're probably somewhere in a box that we might not have opened or looked through in a while. I'll be posting some more halloween pics of us on Flashback Fridays!

Game #2 The Black Eyed Peas

Game #1 Black Eyed Peas

Today Nicole's Rec. team, Black Eyed Peas, played their first game. I am so proud of how well they played. All three games were so close in points, but sadly, we just never made it....just something to be challenged for next time. Note the last video clip. There was 15 touches on this one particular rally! Way to go Black Eyed Peas.

OktoberFest 2009

Here is yet another great reason for living in our master planned community, Vistancia. Each month there is at least one family social event. Last night's was Oktoberfest....complete with hotdogs or brats and sauerkraut. There was an excellent polka band. As I was arriving, I heard my Mom and Dad's favorite song playing, Blue Spanish Eyes. I could just imagine my Mom and Dad dancing out there. My Mom's side of the family were all great dancers. Me and my two sisters married non-dancers. I was a little disappointed that no one was dancing to this excellent music.... except for the little kids doing the hula hoop on stage. Well my dancing feet couldn't take it any longer...I grabbed my dancing partner, Brayden, who was thrilled to be on the dance floor with me. Unfortunately, we don't have video coverage on it, but I got my dancing fix for the evening.

Nicole Meets USA Olympic Champion Misty May-Treanor

Nicole Meets USA Olympic Champion Misty May-Treanor

Today, Nicole and I went to watch the World Challenge of USA Sand Volleyball vs Brazil at The Westgate Center in Glendale, AZ. The first few photos are of Nicole with USA Olympic Champion Misty May-Treanor. Some of you reality show fanatics may recognize her from last season's Dancing with the Stars. Nicole is also posing with USA's April Ross. The first video coverage is with USA's April Ross and Jen Kessy vs. Brazil's Maria and Talita. The second video coverage around the 11:10 minute mark is USA's Misty May-Treanor and Kerri Walsh vs. Brazil's Juliana and Larisia. We were outside for 4 hours in 107 degree temperature.....but it was all worth it!

St. Mary's Food Bank

Today, me and four of my Comerica Bank colleagues volunteered at St. Mary's Food Bank, in Phoenix, on 37th Avenue and Thomas for several hours. St. Mary's has a massive warehouse of non-perishable food and produce. Most of the food is donated to them. They provide food to most of the shelters and other charitable organizations, such as St. Vincent DePaul. They also have locations in Surprise, Glendale and Flagstaff. They have workers and volunteers that pack boxes and sort food daily. Our assignment today was to unload 2,500 pounds of potatoes and put them into small net bags.

You, as a consumer, may also purchase prepackaged food pantry or meat boxes at extremely low prices at any one of their locations. Select this link for menu options http://www.firstfoodbank.org/fvc_menu.html

You may volunteer as an individual or as a group. For more information, go to http://www.firstfoodbank.org/locations.html

Lake Pleasant Volleyball - Game #2

Nicole's Lake Pleasant Volleyball team has played two school games so far. Here is some footage from game #2 against Coyote Hills. Nicole's team has 6th and 7th grade players and they play against 7th and 8th graders. You can see the vast difference the 1-2 years make. All the opponents TOWER over Nicole's team. Coach Shari has done a great job in meeting the challenge of teaching all these players, most who've never played volleyball before. As you watch the video, Nicole is in the first still picture on the right with the white t-shirt and in the last minutes of footage on the far side, with #15 on her jersey.

My Handsome Max!

Max doesn't get enough airplay on my blog. Saturday, I took him to Petsmart for 2 hours for a professional grooming (it's been 3 years). He had his nails trimmed and grinded, ears cleaned, a special shampoo bath to reduce shedding and a 30 minute "furminator" brush out. He was so HANDSOME when he came home. He was just strutting his stuff!

The Eensy Weensy Spider........

Last night, we found this not so eensy weensy spider on our front porch coming to visit us. We caught him on the sticky trap. This morning he disappeared :( Does anyone know what kind it is?

Reunion Party

Dan's former company had a reunion party. As you can see, Nicole had a blast on their trampoline.

She made it!!!!

If you recall, during Meet the Teacher Night, we found out that Nicole's new school opened up the volleyball team to 6th graders this year since there is no 8th grade in the first year. Yesterday and today, for two hours each, Nicole tried out along with 30 other girls. It was tough but her and her friend, Kayleigh made it! We are so proud of them. It will be a challenging season as the school's 6th and 7th graders will be playing against 7th and 8th graders from other schools. Go Lake Pleasant Silverhawks!!

Happy 11th Birthday Nicole!

Saturday, August 15 (1998) was Nicole's 11th Birthday at 6:15 p.m. I can still remember the 3 days of pitocin labor (Aargghh). I have loved and treasured every single stage of her growing up. I wish I had done more journaling during those years, but I'm making up for it now with blogging. I am so proud of what a fine young lady she is becoming. Happy Birthday Nicole. We love you!

Oh to be 11 again and celebrate your birthday over the course of several days. Being from Michigan, there was always something in the mail for Nicole and she enjoyed opening up presents and cards all week long from friends and family. Thank you!

Believe it or not, we kept things simple this year with a pool and pizza party for a few girls. Enjoy the video.

Birthday Video

First Day of School - Lake Pleasant

Nicole (or should I say "We") survived!!!

Last night: Clothes laid out - CHECK; Lunch made - CHECK; Nicole in bed on time - CHECK; No Tears - CHECK....WAIT was that a "Check?", better double check that "Check". Yep, this is the first time in 7 years that there were no tears before the first day of school. I knew it was too good to be true...Read on dear Reader.

Today: Everyone woke up prior to their alarms going off. We had a minor catastrophe with ants raiding the bottom of our pantry floor, but "Dan the Man" was our hero in cleaning it up and caulking the suspected crack between the tile and door molding. Nicole and I left the house 10 minutes early so we weren't in Dan's way and just hung out in front until we saw more walkers going to school. We had fun walking with all our neighbor friends and everyone was excited. Everything went better than expected.

At 3:00 p.m, Kristin and I picked up the girls and still all was well. The day was fine. The girls played afterwards since no one had homework. Then reality KICKED in for Nicole and the tears started flowing. Apparently, there was some schedule conflicts and the 6th graders had to choose between either Band OR Choir and were not allowed to pick BOTH as in last year. Consequently, this evening, I spoke with the Band Instructor who performed her magic and had the schedules juggled around to provide the students an option to have BOTH. In addition,rumor has it that the 6th graders have a longer lunch WITHOUT recess. I'm working on that rumor and hope that this is not the case, since these kids are in school 7 hours a day and need a physical outlet/break during the day. So things have settled down at The Donnelly household, Nicole is doing her required reading right now and we'll see how Day #2 goes.

Meet The Teacher Night.........

It seems like just yesterday (actually 78 days, 5 hours, 30 minutes, 20 seconds)that I was writing the entry for the last day of school. But who is counting? Tonight was the much anticipated Meet the Teacher Night. Actually, Nicole was lucky enough to meet her teacher a couple of weeks ago when she helped our teacher friends set up their classrooms. However, at that time, she didn't know Mrs. Ritz would be her teacher. Nicole and Dan had the benefit of visiting the new school, Lake Pleasant several times, but this was my first.

We were all excited and the PTO passed out red white & blue popsicles to welcome us. Everything looked shiny and new. We met the Principal, music teacher, librarian, PE teacher, Homeroom teacher and the other 6th grade teacher that Nicole will have Social Studies and Math with. We are thrilled with the new school and I think Nicole's anxieties are starting to dissipate.

The norm for the K-8 schools is to start their school volleyball leagues in 7th grade. So the two highest grades, 7th and 8th are playing. Since this is the first year of our school opening, we don't have any 8th graders. So the ABSOLUTE BEST part of this evening is we found out they are bringing the volleyball team down to the 6th and 7th graders for this year only. Which means if Nicole makes it on the team, she could potentially play for the school for 3 years! Nicole was bursting with excitement when she found out about this. Keep in mind how challenging it will be because the 6th and 7th graders will be playing against 7th and 8th grade school teams. AND there is barely any overlap or conflict with her city league that she will be playing with.

Press the Play > Button below the picture below and stay tuned next week for the First Day of School to see if we all survived.

1 More Week to Go

We're all on countdown mode over at the Donnelly household, however, I don't think Nicole is as excited about the prospect of going back to school next week as I am. I'm looking forward to consistency, schedules, and not having to hear "I'm bored!"

There are many changes in our life as the school year approaches. Nicole will be attending a new school which is only about 1-2 blocks away (within walking distance) from our house. Our community has grown so much over the past three years and the land was donated that the need for a new school, in such a short amount of time, was warranted. Nicole's class last year had 36 students by the time the school year ended. So far, her new 6th grade class has 26.

I'm very much relieved that Nicole is so close to home now. I'll be changing my work schedule from part-time to full-time. It was very difficult to pick Nicole up, on time, last year from school and I had an excellent support system (thank you Erin) when I was late numerous times.

The new school is called "Lake Pleasant" and to get Nicole more excited, we bought her school t-shirt in advance. We think it looks pretty cool! We have an excellent PTO Board and we've heard many good things about the new administration. Nicole was lucky enough to help two teacher friends of ours set up their classrooms, so now she is familiar with the new school even before it has opened. It helps too, that the layout is the exact same as her former school, Vistancia.

Camping Video

Press Play

"A Camping We Will Go......"

Over a month ago, Wendy's Blog inspired our family to try our hand at camping. Now we're not expert campers and I probably could count on one hand how many times I've been camping in my life. Nicole has only been once before. So we first started to research "where" we wanted to go. Once we decided on Woods Canyon Lake, just East of Payson, I started calling around to reserve tent sites. I quickly learned that camping in Arizona is not like camping in Michigan. These die hard Arizonians make their reservations 6 months in advance. Since we were only going to go for 1 night and arrive on Saturday, we couldn't take the chance of a walk in campground where it was first come first serve. So out of 8 campgrounds, I found 1....YES only 1 campground (Aspen Campground) that had 2 sites available. I made my reservation 4 weeks in advance for site #95.

We started making our camping list a week early and would write things down as we thought of them. In the end, the one thing I forgot and had to deal with, was "tylenol". I had a headache that just wouldn't quit. We tried setting up our tent and airing it out the weekend before our trip. Once the tent poles sat in the sun for 30 minutes, they were untouchable. So that was a wasted idea.

Since we had time Saturday morning of our departure, we decided to take the LONG scenic route heading North on I-17, through Strawberry (if you blink you've missed it) and Pine. To our surprise, the Tonto Natural Bridge was opened. Their website said they were closed for the summer from the end of June, but it was misposted. The last time I had been to the Tonto Bridge, was when I was pregnant with Nicole 11 years ago. It was not a pleasurable experience and I was vomitting in the parking lot and could only make it to one of the lookout points. This time was different. We were destined to walk all the way down the ravine (2,200 feet) and climb the rocks under the waterfall. If you've never done it, it is a must. But what goes down....must come up.

As we finally made it back to our car from the Tonto bridge, Dan and Nicole kept looking at my face. I had this mysterious bright yellow sweat droplets. I HAD taken a shower that morning. I didn't have any makeup on and only applied sunblock to my arms. So I have no idea why my sweat was yellow unless it was from one of the prescriptions I'm taking.

As we headed into Payson, we stopped at The Beeline Cafe for lunch. This cafe was rated #1 on www.tripadvisor.com and it didn't let us down. Or maybe because we were starving from the rock climbing that we would have eaten and appreciated anything.

As we arrived to the Mogollon Rim lookout, the temperature was a COOL 84 degrees. Yes, in Arizona, that is "cool".

We setup our tent and ate dessert (ice cream) at the Woods Canyon Lake before dinner. (That's what vacations are all about). Nicole was disappointed they only had electric motor boat rentals and it was the end of the day. She really had her heart set on canoeing. No swimming is allowed in many of the AZ lakes. Saw a bald eagle. Dinner was grilled hot dogs, beans and corn. Smores for our second dessert. About 6 years ago, my sister made a craft activity for Jiffy Pop Popcorn. I thought the popcorn would still be good. Apparently not! It was defective.

Oh by the way, Michigan has flush toilets and showers in their campgrounds. The toilets here looked nice from the outside, but OH, when you open that door, it is basically a porta-potty. Need I say more. And of course, I had to make a trip at 2 am in the morning with only my lantern and there are no lights in it. Even for this 47 year old, that was a scary adventure. The toilets were just across the road from our site, but Nicole brought her scooter up there and really enjoyed riding it to the bathroom and around the campground.

Nature's alarm clock (Some crazy Ravens) woke Nicole and I up at 5:30 am.

We took our camp down and made some pb&j sandwiches while we attempted to go fishing at the lake. Nicole's fishing rod was all messed up and it wouldn't work. Then we headed over to Willow Springs Lake. There isn't camping on Willow Springs, but it is a much calmer quieter lake.

On the way home, we took Hwy 87 which is a definately a quicker route. Ate at the 260 Cafe in Payson. Good Pizza. From the campground to our house, it only took 2 hours and 20 minutes. We're so glad to be home and in our own bed. We're glad we only stayed 1 night. We all ran and took showers once we got home.

I liken Camping to having a baby. It is a painful process, but afterwards, you only have great family memories from it.

4th of July Fireworks

This 4th of July, we slept in and spent the remainder of the day relaxing. We decided not to fight any traffic to travel to see fireworks. However, the Sidaways scoped out a hill near our house that had a spectacular view of all our surrounding communities, including: downtown Phoenix, Scottsdale, Surprise, and Peoria. Brian and Kristin's family rode their golf cart to the top of the hill and we rode our bikes.

The video footage didn't come out well, and we couldn't hear the fireworks. Some even appeared close enough to be within our community, but we think those were private. There were a few other cars that pulled over in the street to enjoy the display with us. Surprisingly, no coyotes joined us.

Independence Day Celebration!

As many of you know, both Dan and I are not very spontaneous. EVERYTHING we do or purchase, we take time and do research on. When we were looking to move to Arizona, it was a painstaking process of Dan living here for 6 months and me and Nicole back in Michigan. I would research homes for sale on the internet from afar and send Dan out to see them in person on weekends. Our research paid off and we absolutely love our planned community, called Vistancia. Vistancia has been named in the top list of planned communities in the United States for the past couple of years. Our HOA is constantly hosting social events and it is very family oriented. Last night we celebrated 4th of July at the clubhouse/rec center. Enjoy the slideshow.

Father's Day 2009

We had a nice quiet day celebrating Father's Day with Dan. We spoiled him with breakfast and dinner and bonding time.....

Cheetos Team Pictures

Go Cheetos!

This summer will be Nicole's 6th season playing volleyball. I think she likes it! My friend Brenda (Izzy's Mom) signed up to be the Head Coach and I was crazy enough to join her as Asst. Coach. Truthfully, we are both thrilled teaching the girls and seeing them build confidence in their playing skills. Here is a clip from their first game last night. They won 2 of their 3 games. Brenda and I made the hairbands and matching tie dyed socks. They really look like a team! Go Cheetos!

Last Day of School

Nicole brought our camera to school on the last day of school and took a gazillion pictures....okay maybe not that many. Now it's on to 6th grade at the new school called Lake Pleasant which is 1 block away within walking distance.

Volleyball Trophy

End of Spring Volleyball Season

Spring Volleyball season has come to an end for the 9-10 year old age group. This was Nicole's 5th season in playing and she has shown dramatic improvement since she started. Here are a few snippets of all the games this season and pictures from our after season party today at the Vistancia pool. Many thanks to Coach Tracey and Coach Stephanie for all their hard work, patience and time. Players: Nicole, Izzy, Kayleigh, Annaleise, Shelbi, Ashley, Taylor, Casey, Kylie, Lana, and Jacqui.

For the upcoming Summer Season, some of the girls are moving up to a higher age category (11-12 year olds). Brenda has accepted the Head Coach position for the Summer and I will be helping her as her Assistant Coach. Don't ask me where I'm going to find the extra time for this, but I'll squeeze it in somehow. Watching Nicole over the past two years, I've been getting itchy wanting to play myself. So this summer, I'll get my fix.

Vistancia Talent Show

This was the Vistancia's third annual talent show. These kids were really good. The kids had to perform on Thursday night, Friday morning (for the younger kids kdg-4th), and also on Friday afternoon (for the older kids 5th-8th). I'm not sure if they had to do it Friday night but they sure had to practice alot if the did it three times. I couldn't get them all on tape but I got a few of some really good acts. I got the teachers playing the steel drums to "Under the Sea". I don't know if you can see it but the had a little boy blowing bubbles for it! I taped Tiffany Riley,Delaney Bare,Lindsay Lucas,Brock Murphy,Joseph Patterson and Jordan Weiner performing a skit. That's all I'm going to tell you about that act! I got Xavier Dunn who sang "Hold My Hand" (which he wrote). The students weren't the only ones who performed. Three of the teachers sang too. I got Nicole's teacher, Miss Ghaster, on video singing "Put Your Records On". Last but not least I got Alec, AJ,and Zach Derr performing "Enter Sandman". There were 25 acts. Even though I didn't get her on video, Kylie Bland did a great job. Everyone was so good! Now you can go ahead and watch some of the acts.

Choir Concert

Press Play button on video and pause my music playlist below.

Band Concert

Press the play button on video and the Pause button on my music playlist

Contraption in Action (CIA)

Projects...Projects....Projects....As we approach the end of the school year, it seems like there is a never ending list of school projects to finish up. The first project on the video is a Contraption in Action. It was Nicole's Science Project. She had to create a contraption to get an object from Point A to Point B going through at least 4 simple machines. Lots of time and thought went into this and we're very proud of her results. The second project was a Road Trip across the USA for Social Studies. The parents were invited for lunch today to see the posters, billboards, and postcards the kids created. Way to go. One more week until school is out!

PS Press Play on the video below. You may want to pause the playlist so you can hear Nicole's description

Our Friday Night Entertainment....Can you say "Eeww"?

Dan was out front early this evening and, literally, ran in the house to come get me and Nicole. Attached to our front tree was a cluster of bees. Talk about getting the "heebie jeebies"!

We called the Mountain View Pest Control (Joe) company who came out 1 1/2 hours later when it got dark and the bees were drowsy. Apparently, the swarm was new and the hive was not built yet. There was a cluster the size of a volleyball that had approx. 4,000 bees surrounding the Queen bee. In one minute, Joe doused the tree and the bees dropped dead into a bucket. If we had not reacted quickly, the bees would've built a hive in the tree or a more permanent strong structure (think inside hole of house) and start to build a hive. The bees build approx. half to one pound of a hive per day, so you can see how quickly the weight of the honey and hive could destroy a house. Joe said these were African bees and that a Queen bee broke off from another hive closeby within the day or two so be on the lookout.....

Heidi's Visit and other Summer Fun

My sister in law, Heidi, and her sister Kelli came from Michigan this week and stopped over for lunch and swimming. This was Heidi's first time (and hopefully not her last) and we haven't seen her since last summer. We had fun catching up.

Vistancia Broadway Play

Vistancia Arts Festival

Easter Sunday

Happy "Surprise" 40th Bday Mike!

Spring Volleyball

Spring Grades and Photos

This week is AIMS testing in the Arizona schools so Nicole and her friends have been a wee bit stressed. I thought I would lighten it up by posting her Perfect Attendance, Grade Point Average and Spring Pictures.

Twilight Release

Call me crazy, but it's all Kristin's fault. I had no desire to read any of the Twilight series books, but Nicole was interested in reading it and my friend, Kristin was OBSESSED! At the prodding of Kristin, I started reading the first book and got addicted. I thought it was clean enough for Nicole to start, so she did. Both of us read all 4 books in the series. We had seen the movie back in December at the theater.

Friday night at midnight, the DVD was released at Walmart's and across the country. I cracked under the peer pressure and waited with Kristin and Nicole in line for 1 1/2 hours in the middle of the night. I could've been in bed as a slight cold was just starting. Enjoy the craziness.

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Pause the song on the playlist at the bottom of the blog so you can hear the live band at Westgate

Flat Stanley goes to a Luau

When we first moved to Arizona from Warren, Michigan, Nicole's third grade teacher, Mrs. Yee, read the class a story about a boy named Stanley that got flattened. Each student cut out a paper Stanley and colored it. Nicole mailed her Flat Stanley to her friend Allie in Michigan as a school project. Allie took pictures of Stanley at Nicole's old school with her 2nd grade teacher. Mrs. Silverstein. Allie also took pictures of Stanley at McDonalds and other adventures. When Stanley returned, Nicole made a poster that went on display with all the other 3rd graders.

So now two years later, my niece, Christine, mailed Nicole a new Flat Stanley that she is doing for her school project. We think this Flat Stanley's name must really be Flat Stanella,because he has a curl in his hair and really long eyelashes. Nicole has had so much fun being on the other end of the adventure. We went to a Hawaiian luau today at an "active adult" community and we brought Flat Stanley with us. Enjoy the pics.
Make sure you select the Play > button to watch the slideshow. You may also want to press the pause button on my Playlist of music at the bottom of the blog.

Vistancia School's Daddy Daughter Dance

Tonight was Nicole's school's Daddy Daughter Dance. Last year Nicole didn't have any interest in going. This year was the opposite. Her and her friend, Emma, were so excited to get all dolled up. Talk about the star treatment!

Once I blow dried their hair, I wouldn't let them peak in the mirror until after everything was done (nails, makeup, hair, clothes). Then at the count of 1-2-3, they both looked at themselves in the full length mirror. I didn't think of it at the time, but I should've videotaped their reactions. They couldn't stop staring at themselves.

They had a "ball". The dance was two hours long. They arrived home around 9:15 p.m. and went promptly to bed after cleaning up (their choice). Maybe tomorrow morning, I'll get to hear more scoops........

Brownie Vet Field Trip

Many thanks to Kristin and Dr. Brian for allowing us to tag along with Brownie Troop #1955 to their Vet Field Trip. Press Play.

My Sister Rose's Visit

It's been almost 2 months since my last post. Things haven't been that exciting except for the many hours of work I've been putting in. And then as Emeril would say "BAM!"

My sister, Rose, flew in from Bartlett, IL on Saturday. This is her first visit to Arizona and she came by herself and left the 17 degree temps behind. She has a husband, Mike, and two grown sons, Michael and Anthony. We've been having a ball with Rose while she's here. Nicole has been laughing non-stop and Dan has been fantastic about chauffeuring us around.

We went to Sedona all day on Sunday. Since all of us but Rose have been there before, I always like to add something to the agenda that none of us have seen. As we drove in from route 260, we first stopped at Red Rock State Park by accident. Years ago, friends of ours (Jamie and Michelle) had taken us to this cool scenic area and I thought it was this Park. It wasn't. The Ranger was nice enough to refund our money. Then we took a dirt road for about 10 minutes to "Red Rock Crossing". This was the place that I remembered! Alot of photos are taken from this one particular lookout point for magazine shoots. When the water is higher, it covers the rocks, but it was low for our visit. We ate lunch at The Wildflower Bread Company. I highly recommend it if you like sandwiches and soup. Everything was fresh and it was packed which is a good sign for any restaurant. Then we browsed around the shopping district. I don't even think any of us bought anything.

As we left Sedona via Route 179, I wanted to visit the Chapel of the Holy Cross. We tried once last year to go there, but it was raining and my Mom, unknowingly, was coming down with pneumonia. It was strange, because we remembered that Chapel Road was closer to the city and we thought we had passed the street. It was late and there was alot of construction. I said "oh well, maybe next time." because I really didn't want to find a turn around it the traffic mess. Then about 5 minutes later, I see Chapel Road and we turned off to visit the church. Someone was watching out for us. We found a parking spot at the top of the hill, 2 spots from the walk up path. Another bonus. My Mom saw how high and winding the path was up to the church and didn't feel like she could climb it. We kept telling her it wasn't that bad and so she pushed herself. Was she ever glad she did. We all were! This was the most awesome experience to see this church and the views of the city. I can't even describe it. Lastly, as we walked into the church and the gift shop below, my sister hears this music playing that a dear friend of hers from Illinois always plays at her house for prayer services. As they say "It was meant to be!"

I took my Mom and Rose shopping the last three days. Nicole said "Mom I like it when Grandma comes in because we don't go shopping for the other 9 months of the year". My Mom said to me "Oh good, she caught the bug". As you can tell, I don't take after my Mom or sister.

Today after dinner, Dan drove all of us to Lake Pleasant, which is about 25 minutes north of our house. It's really funny driving through the the desert covered with cacti and all of a sudden there is this huge lake. We had some awesome views. But we didn't see any wild burros.

Tomorrow Nicole has a half day and we plan on going up to the pool after lunch. Our heated pool is closed for maintenance, so I don't know how long Nicole could last in the regular unheated pool. We'll see. Stay tuned because Friday is the Daddy/Daughter Dance at Vistancia and Nicole is Dan's date....or is it the other way around?

Student of the Month

Congratulations to Nicole and her friend, Emma, for being selected as one of the 5th Grade Students of the Month for December at Vistancia Elementary!!!!!

Nicole's Accomplishments

Well they say things happen in 3s, but this week, Nicole had 4 great things happen to her. Me, being the proud mother that I am, needed to share her good news.

First, while she was in Math class this week with Mrs. Bracht, Nicole's homeroom teacher, Miss Ghaster, came in and called her and another student out into the hallway to talk to them. Even though Nicole has never gotten in trouble before, that was the first thing that crossed her mind. Miss Ghaster took pictures of Nicole and Josh with their "Presidential Campaign Poster" that she created a few weeks ago (see December archives) for the school Yearbook.

Then today Nicole attended two celebration parties with those eligible classmates. One party was recognizing those students that met 4 of their 5 performance goals for this marking period. The other party was a Behavior Reward party for those students who received positives on their Character Cards.

Lastly, Nicole was one of those chosen as Student of the Month for December. The ceremony is next Thursday, so stay tuned for pictures.

Meteor Shower

I'm so tired. There was a meteor shower early this morning, so I set my alarm clock for 5:00 a.m. It went off and I got Dan out of bed. He turned to his clock and it was really only 3:30 a.m. For some reason, the time on my clock got switched.....must've been a "twilight" moment. So we went back to sleep. At the real 5 am, all 3 of us woke up, bundled up and sat outside in the back for 45 minutes. Max was smart enough to stay inside where it was warm.

It looked like falling stars about every 5 minutes or so. I think in total I only caught about 5 from my eyes. It happens so quickly that if you're not looking at the right part of the sky, you could easily miss it. Had hot chocolate and warm oatmeal and went back to bed AGAIN. Sorry no videos, it was impossible to catch on tape.