Save a Sister 5k Run 2010

Each year we have made it a tradition to participate in the Save a Sister breast cancer walk/run. The past three years I have walked it and pushed my kids in a stroller completing only the one mile portion. This year I attempted to run the 5k. Martha and Hillary did it with me.

Pre-race jitters. (I am looking oh so lovely since martha and I had just raced over there from working/sweating at our Bountiful Baskets site just minutes before.)

And the gun goes off and the race starts! Lots of happy faces at the start of a race, less smiles at the end. :)

They didn't have a finish line sign, only the start. Myself, Martha and Hillary: red faced beauties. No time worthy records but for a good cause.

Searched back through my files and found the previous years Save a Sister Races.

2007

2007 Me (pushing Howie), Martha, Michelle and Maria

2009 Me pushing Olivia one month old, Kristi pushing Skarlett 2 months old and Martha pushing her grandson Braxton, newly born also. Yes, you can imagine, we did the one mile walk.

2009 Amy. Kristi, Trina, Martha, Myself, and Suzanne, all friends from work who participated.

For the life of me I can't find 2008. I don't know if I didn't participate for some reason or what. Hopefully I can find the pictures and insert them later. Maybe, that is if I actually did the race!

Pumpkin Story

Howie had an assignment from school to decorate the pumpkin and write a story (mom writes it, he makes it up) about it. We did this last month but an apple was the topic. (It was very short last month. He drew the apple running and his story said "Run, run as fast as you can, you can't catch me, I'm the Apple Man.) We cut out scrapbook paper to decorate his pumpkin. His story was pretty cute so I wanted to share:

"Once there was a Halloween Jack-O-Lantern that was very spooky. If you tried to eat it, pick it or touch it, it would bite you. One Day a boy picked it while it was asleep. He took it home to his garage. At night, the pumpkin came to life and broke down the garage door. He wanted to bite the boy who picked him. They boy was sleeping and then he bit him. The boy turned orange and grew a green stem from his head. The End. Mmmuuuuuhhhhhaaaaa"

Really, that last spooky halloween cackle/sound is really written on his paper. We don't know if that is how to spell it so you know what we mean, but hope you get the point.

Halloween Party

Oh, What a Night! Late October back in 2010. Cheeeezzzzzy, I know. We had an amazing time at our Halloween party.

It started out with these lovelies I had fun making, inviting my goul-friends to not forget the date for our big bash.

Julie's home was decorated perfectly for a halloween bash. I loved her framed art. Forgot to get a pic of the other one, of the count.

Okay, starting out with the food! Oh my, have you ever seen such a beautiful cake??!! I thought it was a decoration for the longest time. Sara did an uber-cool job on this witches hat. It kind of reminds me of the sorting hat from Harry Potter.

love the stitching in the back

The kids and I, along with Tommy, had a fun time making these shrunken heads. Here's the details.

My famous jello worms. You can't have a party with witches brew. Fun spread of some of the food. Shirley's famous sugar cookies and a new addition of witches fingers.

Witches hats, pretzel treats and bloody fingers, but I really had fun making pumpkin bread bowls. Thanks so much Falon for the yummiest !bestest! recipe EVER!

Howie enjoying some of the treats.

Josie and Mark bringing 70's back, Steven and his cute fairy girls. Shirley as Dorothy 50 years later (that's what her button says). She was great along with her basket with a blanket that said, 'RIP Toto'.

Melissa and Chole, Boston loving the witches brew, Toto's tomb, cute table decorations.

Phantom (Tommy), Steven with crazy eyes, Jess and Sub, and Kenzie

New guy Andy and family, Dino Boston, Steven and his posse of fairy daughters (got them in here twice), Shirley and her daughter devil and monkey grandson.

Me and Sub, The Thing and the Munchkin, Tara Taysome punk something, cute fairys and Chole and Sam along with cat women Kenzie.

Brook and Rick, one rocking hot pirate Julie, Melissa sporting her baby bump as a basketball, and Erin and AJ.

My old work team, fabulous as always.

Tommy and I sported the Phantom and Christine duo.

Our little family, Phantom duo, The Thing and our little munchkin.

I had a lot of fun with my hair and have to give a huge shout out to Julie for helping me create this look! Thank you Thank you Thank you. I LOVED it. I felt like I was dressing up for Prom again.

Our party was complete with pinata!

Just wanted to show you how cool the back yard of Julie's home is for this annual event. Halloween lights strung all over the yard. It was so fun, the weather was perfect, we didn't want to leave.

We had a spooky body parts laboratory but didn't get any pics. I would lead each of the kids that wanted to do it to a dark corner of the yard where they got to feel body parts. Witches eyes (peeled grapes), petrified rats tails (chow mien noodles), dried up witches skin (torn tortillas), oger ears (peeled and slightly dried apple wedges), small witches' heart (peeled tomato), smeared cat intestines (cooked cold spaghetti) and ogre tongue (banana peel). Most of them were grossed out.

We had smores later when the sun had set.

This was the result of a campfire ghost story gone very badly for this little girl.

Check out this cool photo of Chole doing a summersault. Way cool.

Caught Julie, the lights and the full moon together, cool effect.

And there you have it. A frightfully spooky Halloween bash that was a monster of a good time.

Registered Nurse

This deserves a post of its own. Tommy just passed his nursing boards and is an RN! This has been a long hard road for him and we are really happy for him. He has been struggling with this test (not the information but the actual test itself and all of the anxiety that comes with it) for quite a while and is very relieved to have it finally behind him! We might be adopting a new motto for our family: 5th time is the charm! We are a firm believer in try, try, try again. Way to go Tommy!!

Potty Training

Started potty training with livy last week. Wow! It is hard. It was a very rough week, but this week is good. We are three days with no accidents and six days with no accidents through the night! What a great sign. Read a little ebook with some good advise and went to town. I can't say again how rough it was, but I guess that is the teaching aspect of the whole ordeal. However, I wouldn't trade it because now I have little girl that can go potty and I don't have to buy diapers any longer. YEA! What a beautiful thing. Simple pleasures that makes mom happy.