We're Official!

A few Friday's back my kids had their orientation for school. We got their school supply lists (which is always overwhelming), they met their teachers and of course we couldn't pass up on some new school spirit shirts. They are green and black and the mascot is the stormers! Taylor was especially excited that her shirt had some bling on it.

First Day of School
San Tan Elementary

We are currently into our second week of school. Luke was beyond excited the first couple of days and then he decided that staying home sounded much more fun. It broke my heart to see him so sad about school. He loved it so much last year, but I am sure that a large campus is MUCH different than little preschool. Luckily by Thursday he was all smiles again and found himself a little buddy (which is now in our ward--yay!)

This is Luke and Magnus (both in navy blue) on the first day of school. It cracks me up how shy they are and once we see them afterschool they are completely different little boys.

On the 31st my sweet Taylor turned 11. She is growing up to be quite a young woman. It's crazy to think this will be her last year of primary. Her biggest birthday surprise was getting sung live to by her dad. And since her dad was home he was able to grill her steak (I don't do the grill) She received a lot of clothes and her prize possession i-pod. (it's nicer than mine) All and all I think she had a great day.

With Doug officially home I can now sleep sound. I can't even explain how nice it is that we are a family again. My kids behavior has improved tremendously and I have now learned to cook again (ha). We spent the day on Saturday swimming at Doug's sister Debbie's house and then on to more swimming at our ward party.

Doug and I have been trying to finish up changing our address, opening up bank accounts, etc. It has been a long process and I am thrilled to say that we will NEVER be moving out of this state again. We spent the morning getting our car tags and drivers licenses. It's official we are Zonies!

Don't Get Too Comfy

Moving into this house has been a process for me. I am starting to feel more and more comfortable as time goes on. I think it helps that school has started and I am able to see the same faces on a daily basis. We were fortunate enough to move to an area where the church is strong and so many children surrounding us. A huge bonus that Luke has found a buddy (Mangus) and Taylor has already exchanged phone numbers with several little girls, I know Jared has as well (we just don't hear much about it).

The kids and myself are going on just over 6 weeks living in our new area. We have been at church 4 out of those 6 weeks and I am just now starting to get name and face recognition. Last week we got word that they would be splitting our stake and adding two additional wards. This is good right? Meaning our area is growing and more and more members are moving into Chandler. Unfortunately, we really didn't think it would effect us. I never thought I would be bummed about being separated from people I just barely met. Wrong. We attended a stake meeting tonight going over the new boundaries.

This really isn't anything new to us since we just did this literally 9 months ago in San Antonio. I have decided change no matter how short or long is hard. Period. Us and another family in our subdivision was placed into a new ward and the remaining 70% of the "familiar faces" were kept in the other ward. I know that good things will come of this and that it was done by the Lords hand, but that doesn't make it easy. I think the hardest part was coming home to tell Taylor and Jared the news. As a parent you worry about your kids making friends, especially in a new environment. Luckily, my kids are pretty outgoing, but still...... Taylor's little friends that she paired up with are now in a different ward completely.

It's strange to be in an area and having someone live 1 block south of you in a different boundary. This is completely new coming from New Orleans and San Antonio. I explained to her that we still at their number and can still play at their house, but sometimes words aren't very comforting. (especially to a tween). Needless to say we had some major tears flowing, along with our sad Jared saying "now we have to meet all new friends all over again." My heart sank when I heard him say that. Really all I could say was, I know, but it will be fine I promise. We will get through this and we weren't the only families effected. There were several tears shed at the meeting tonight, so I can only imagine those families who have lived here for a few years must have felt. I know my kids are resilient, but that doesn't mean my heart doesn't ache for them. As a mother hen it's tough to see you chicks struggle. I just have to keep self talking, things will be alright.

Angie's Visit

I am so behind on documenting. Angie flew in last Thursday morning and what a time we had. Some of it better than others (I am mainly speaking for myself) It's difficult to relax, shop and go on a whim when you have children in tow (especially 3 very rowdy boys), but we were at least able to make the best of it. I was just thrilled she was able to come and see our "neck" of the woods. The first stop after the airport was none other that Cafe Rio.

Of course, Meg had to eat as well. She was such a trooper for the entire trip. The only time you really heard her fuss was from being tired and hungry. Don't you love those little legs? I had to laugh because as I was looking back through photos the only ones we ever took was at the places we ate. So it appears like we ate a lot (which we did). We ate at In & Out, Rubios, Costa Vida, and Oreganos.

Most of our window shopping included home decor stores. I found this 49x49 painting and fell in love with it. If only the price was right. I am afraid it was a small mortgage for this beauty. Perhaps sometime in the near future I will have something similar to this on my family room wall. My favorite part about it was the vibrant yellows.

In between eating and shopping we took the kids swimming a few times. Luckily, my sister has a pool about 10 minutes away. The hardest part was trying to convince my kids to leave. I think they would live in the swimming pool if I allowed it.

I think the most comical part was cramming all of the kids in the car. I think if anyone were to look inside of my van it appeared like we had a mini circus. We tried to capture a self portrait to document, but you can't even see some of the kids. And yes, that is my son illegally on the floor. We were one seat shy, hence we didn't travel a lot of places.

We also trekked out to Mesa a few times. I drove her by my old stomping grounds which also happens to be a mile away from my in-laws house. We couldn't drive by without stopping in for ice-cream. Each time I have asked Grandpa Dale for a photo I get some crazy face. (oreos anyone?) He really is one of my favorite people and this really brings out his personality.

We were having a photo session with Meg since she started to sorta sit up by herself while they were here. Here is each of us with our babies, well mine really isn't a baby anymore.

We spent some time with Doug's family and then some with my family. Angie and I were amazed that my sister could still do the splits with her prego body. Apparently, I lost that touch years ago, I couldn't do the splits even if I tried anymore.

My mom stopped by on the morning of my birthday to drop off her gift. It's a nice feeling to have family around again. It still is a bit strange and something I am still getting used to.

me & mom

Sunday afternoon (my actual birthday) my grandma had us all over for dinner and cake. Taylor and Mackenzi seem to be into a new peace thing. Taylor insisted on getting this peace hat with her money.

My dad never fails to be the hit of the party for my boys. Jared was so curious as to what this bottle of wine tasted like. I told him we don't drink stuff like that and it probably would burn his throat. Of course, this didn't stop him from asking question after question about it. (hmmm I may have a problem later in life with this one).

Grandpa Stan, Weston, Jared and Luke

Sadly, Monday came much too quick for me, but also happened to be our most relaxing day. My kids started school that morning and once I got them off we only had Weston, Meg and Mackenzi. We spent the day in Scottsdale at Fashion Square Mall and then I had to head back to pick up my kids from school.

Her flight was leaving around 8pm so we headed over for one last meal at Oreganos with all the kids. It was SOO crazy, especially having such a quiet day.

The hardest part for me was dropping her off at the airport. I lost it completely. What I would do to have her closer! It makes me so sad to think that Meg will be walking the next time I see her and Texas seems so far away. I know that we have phone and internet, but the 13 miles away we had apart is no longer there.

Thanks Ang for making my birthday extra special. I really had a great time and hope my kids won't keep you from coming back (Ha!) Next time the entire family needs to come.... Love you to pieces!!

Happy Birthday Krista!!

Belated Birthday Surprise

Look who drove up and totally surprised me last night. Little did I know he had this plan in the works for a few days. He called me on the phone pretending he couldn't sleep because he was so excited. I kept asking excited for what? And explained how he should be heading to bed for his long day tomorrow. That was when he said, well why don't you look out the front door?? Needless to say I ran out and screamed with excitement!!! What an awesome birthday present for Taylor and belated one for me!

My 33rd Birthday

I am so behind in the blogging world, but couldn't forget to document all of the kindness that has been shown to me over the past week. Many thanks to those who called and sent packages for my special day. I am hoping to update soon! (I have no idea why it didn't include my captions).

It FINALLY came to pass

Taylor, Mackenzi and Jordan

After my morning facial (my mom gave me for my birthday) so yummy! I headed over to Mesa to drop Jared off at his cousins for a sleep over. In exchange we took my niece Jordan for the day and went on out to Queen Creek. Taylor was in heaven being around her two favorite people. I thought Mesa was far from my house, however, heading over yonder to Queen Creek is a whole other road trip. Literally. I drove over 70 miles today. Yikes! Despite the distance it was well worth it because I hadn't seen my good friend Krista (from highschool pomline) since Taylor was 2 years old. We have been keeping in contact via email and phone, but there is just something about speaking in person. It was fun to catch up and see her for the afternoon.

me & Krista

We took the kids swimming and due to hungry tummies we stopped by the closest pizza buffet. I am not a huge fan of these places, but the kids loved it! After taking this photo I realized the sign behind them read: chugga chugga poo poo station. Nice. I guess that goes to show you the class of pizza we ate. Ha!

Weston, Luke, Parker and Chandler

(click to enlarge the sign above them).

SPT-Elements of Summer

It was my sister's birthday yesterday and I think this is one of the first times we were able to enjoy a birthday lunch out together. She picked Dilly's Deli which was new to me and really good.For some odd reason I had green on the brain this week for the SPT challenge, so instead of trying to concoct a new set of ideas I guess I'll be slightly off and use the grass color--green. I couldn't resist taking this photo of Janet in her green dress. She wanted me in the photo, but as you can see from the previous posts I am getting a little sick of seeing my face posted on the computer! Isn't she so cute in her 7 month glory?

Weston did this for 90 minutes straight!
I had to pry him in tears away from the pool.

Since we mainly support a brown yard of dirt soon to be filled with grass (in the near future), we have spent a ton of time around the valley at various pools. My sister happens to be the closest and free (10 minutes away) so it's so nice to load of the kids for the afternoon to waste the time and cool off. This green and blue floaty has been literally a life saver for me. Weston has been my daredevil child since birth and wants to swim. I was tired of worrying about him every second in the pool, but with this flotation device he can now swim on his own. It was the best $15 I ever spent! Now, if I can just get Luke to swim.........

Last, but not least poor Jared seems to always be the typical younger sibling and feels left out. I really can't blame him. I think being a middle child would be hard. With Taylor having Mackenzi here for a week he wants to tag along with them most of the time. Can you blame him? In fact, the minute he saw her at the airport, he says where is Maci? I think the best way to describe it is green with envy. I couldn't resist this face when Jared was having one of his moments today. I don't even recall what it was he was mad about, but I think the expression speaks a thousand words.

Extra Baggage

Last night about an hour before I was ready to head to the airport it dawned on us how fun it would be for Mackenzi to tag back to Arizona with me. Taylor has been begging for her to come out and Angie had two free tickets. Greg worked his magic got online, and got the ticket. So, we quickly packed her suit case and was out the door. The best part was Taylor was clueless that Mackenzi was with me. I tried to capture it on film the best I could. It doesn't really show in the video but Taylor was beside herself. It was such a great surprise! Even better Angie gets to come out on Thursday to spend my birthday with me. Yay!!

Happy Birthday Janet!!

Doug Time

I have never gone on a vacation without getting a tad homesick for my kids. This was definitely an exception. I could have stayed another week without thinking about it. I knew the kids were in good hands and what better vacation than spending time with friends one day and Doug the next?

Saturday we went for a 3 mile walk and headed out the door for lunch at Red Robin. We both really wanted to see a movie and the Dark Knight was at the top of the list. At first, I feared it may be pretty dark, but it didn't disappoint. Heath Ledger did an AMAZING job. And if you are any type of a Christian Bale fan you MUST see it. Doug and I thoroughly enjoyed it from start to finish. We finished up the day with more shopping for Taylor (her birthday is coming up) and headed back to the Gordon's to hang out. Good times.

left to right
Claudia, visitor?, Raoul, Doug, Ryan, Nathan and Eric

Today we headed over to our old ward. I couldn't believe how many families have moved in over the past 3 weeks upon our departure. Other than a handful of friends that we have there, I really felt like it wasn't our ward anymore. Despite our records already transferred Doug still is teaching his youth Sunday school class. We had intentions on just staying for sacrament, but he ended up teaching (well more like a thought) for Sunday School. This was the first time in several weeks they all were there. One more Sunday down and only one more to go!

Girls Day

I think I must have been running on adrenalin most of the weekend because we ended up going to bed around midnight Thursday after our dinner and my eyes popped open around 6am Friday morning (which is really 4am to me). Anyways, it isn't a secret that Angie and I must find time for the gym so we headed over around 8 am. I quickly was reminded how hard it is running next to her. She seriously is a machine and runs at a 7.0 on the treadmill, which subconsciously makes you feel like a snail. However, 4 miles in 4o minutes still isn't too shabby right?

Doug and Greg had about 1.5 hours in between clinic and ended up meeting us over at Chuy's for lunch. Even better, we lucked out with Alberto as our waiter. Cha--ching! After lunch was when the party began. Our husbands are still giving us grief over it and I am sure they will to the grave. Angie left the girls with Greg and we headed north to San Marcos for a day of shopping at the outlets.

I am most certain it is more dangerous to shop without kids since you have the luxury to browse around without dealing with screaming and whining. It really was pure bliss. The bummer part was I only walked away with towels (pretty boring) I was hoping to find a cheap hutch or some sort of piece of furniture. Oh, well. Since we didn't getaway until around 1pm our time was cut short since we had to meet the other girls at 6:30pm for dinner.

Jenny, Hillary, Angie, Sandy, Nicole, Chelsea, Kari-Dawn and Ellice

I remember last month feeling so sad that June would be our last monthly girls night, but it turns out I got one more in July. We ate at Cosi's and headed over to Nordi's for the annual yearly sale.

Once again I struck out and didn't find anything worth buying (unless I wanted to spend some major cash for it). The girls were trying to talk me into buying some True Religion jeans, (bad, friends) but I couldn't justify the price not to mention my husband probably wouldn't be so happy either. After dinner and shopping the girls surprised me with my favorite birthday cake from Cold Stone Creamery. It was a chocolate snickers ice-cream cake. Yum!

Kari Dawn and I share a birthday this month and so we combined our candles together making it look like a miniature bonfire. We watched So You Think You Can Dance (I hadn't watched it this week) and Angie and I didn't leave Nicole's house until 2am. From start to finish we had nearly 12 hours of isolated girl time. Doug jokingly said I think you missed them more than me! He knows that isn't true, but I really will miss having these monthly gatherings. Not to mention these girls hold a special place in my heart. There is nothing better than a girls night out!

Happy Birthday Susanne & Courtney!!

Fellowship Graduation

Grandma, Papa and Grandpa Stan

I set my kids up with a different set of family members over the space of 4 days in hopes that it wouldn't get too overwhelming for anyone. My grandparents had the first shift and my dad filled in as well to help out. It is so nice to be able to live in a place where they can come to you. This makes it especially great because all the kids have their stuff all in one place. My flight was pretty uneventful unless you want to include the male flight attendant flirting the entire flight with a woman in front of me. It was quite entertaining and I really wish I had the guts to have taken a photo of him. To top it off as he was welcoming us to the city he said and I got Jenny's phone number!! (Kinda ironic we had the same name eh?)

I can't even express how excited I was to see Doug. I felt like we were going on a fancy date much like when we were courting. The restaurant where the dinner was located reminded me like uptown New Orleans on St. Charles. In order to even eat at this place you have to be a "member" of their club.

Since super nice restaurants are out of my comfort zone you can imagine the anxiety I had upon our arrival. Mix that with our non-alcoholic beverages and people you really aren't exactly used to being around (catch the my drift).... but I was pleasantly surprised at how easy going everyone seemed to be (perhaps the amount of liquid being passed around). These are all the physicians Doug worked with over the past year. They are quite an eclectic, yet great bunch of men.

left to right
Dr. Toland, Dr. Jakobs, Dr. Delee, Adam Perry (the other fellow),
Doug, Dr. Huff, Dr. Kaiser and Dr. Casillas

The Argyle House

My camera doesn't even come close to doing this amazing house justice. They have restored this home and it is not only used as the Argyle restaurant, but parties and weddings are also held here. The grounds are breathtaking!

chocolate souflee

I ordered the lamb chops. I figured I had never tried them and decided to get a little crazy rather than order my safe "steak" plate. It didn't disappoint they were really delicious. The lamb was based with a lingonberry sauce. At the same time we placed our order if we wanted dessert it had to be placed then due to the time it takes to make. I got the chocoloate souflee, again so yummy!

Adam & Heidi Perry, me and Doug

Once dinner was pretty much over Dr. Casillas got up and made remarks about Doug and Adam. Despite the crazy schedule it brought for Doug, he had a great experience. Overall, I think he feels more comfortable doing surgeries and going in a practice by himself. This year he logged in over 600+ cases. I don't know much about surgery, but that seems like a lot to me!

Dinner got out around 10:30pm and we headed on over to Givenchy Hotel (aka The Gordon's) Mackenzi was sweet enough to give up her room for the weekened so we could have our own private suite. This is the current view....ahhh I love the hill country. I am off to play weee!

Boarding Gate C-13

In just a few hours I will be back around large oak trees, lush green hill country, reunited with Doug, and hanging out with my bestest girlfriends. Yee haw!! San Antonio here I come!!

Smiles From Ear To Ear

My quick run into Chandler mall turned into much more of another shopping excursion. Jared saw this store the other day and was insistent about going in to check it out. I wasn't expecting much, except for over inflated prices. However, the look on Jared's and my boys faces were priceless. It was as if they had set foot into a candy shop. Ooohing and ahhing over the different lego concoctions. Did you know that you can even grab a basket and pick your own colors??

Weston and Luke thought it was pretty cool they could set up shop and start building their own.

Can you believe this entire figure is ALL legos? Wow.

I have to admit I am a huge sucker for the Lego brand. I am amazed at how this company continues to keep up and impress the public with their structures. This may not be new to several of you who have been to Legoland in California. But this was the first time we had experienced the real statue (I have seen several photos). Jared left the store spending his entire savings (from his birthday) but he said it was completely worth it. How can I argue with a building toy that makes you use your imagination?

Later this afternoon we headed out to Uncle Duane's office for our annual checkups. I was so impressed that Luke didn't even cry. This was Weston's first official cleaning and he did such a good job. Even better no cavities!! Yay.