Thanks Jen!

Thanks to Jen I have a new look.  She rocks!

I also have to give credit to my wonderful hubby for the awesome photos.

Thanks guys!

New Blog Look

I know that I have not been keeping up with my blog and making posts like I used to.  I hope all that will change with a little inspiration and help from my sister.  She is the one that put my blog togehter and designed it all for me.  She is planning on helping me again with updating the look a little.   She is so good at it!

With my husband being the aspiring photographer that he is, I have some new and awesome photos to use that will help spruce things up a little.  He actually does not like the photos but then again he is really critical and has a real keen eye for photography.  I know Jen is working on it now and the new look should be up soon.  So, only time will tell if the new look will give some new inspiration.

Featured Blogger! WooHoo!

Thanks Jen for adding me as a featured blogger for today. That is pretty cool. Thanks, also, for the sweet words about me. Your the BEST! Yes, you did beg (pretty much :)) for me to start blogging. I know I am not "in to it" as much as you are but I do still have fun with it. Thanks for getting me started and for all your help with the blog "look" and such too. You are so talented with all that you know how to do with blog design. So, if you are a guest reading this and working toward winning a blog make over for yourself, well all I can say is keep working towards it because if you are her lucky winner you are in for a big treat.

On another note, if you are a guest here today and have never been to my blog, thanks for stoppin' by. As you can probably see, I am not an "everyday" blogger (I don't post everyday). I mostly use my blog to post about my kids, family stuff, all our sporting adventures (we are a sports crazy family) and a few other hot topics that come up from time to time. One of those hot topics you will find here are autism related posts. My oldest son is mildly autistic and I have found that posting and communicating with a few others out there has been an outlet for me as we (my hubby and I) walk this autism road together. So, if you would like to know more about our autism story I would love to share. Just leave me a post in the comments.

I guess I had better update a little on the latest with the kids and family soon. It has been a while since my last post. I will try and add some updates in a while so make sure to check back. We have been on spring break so there is plenty to post on, I just need to do it. :)

Happy Birthday, Jen!

Happy Birthday to my younger sis! I had a hard time finding a picture of just her so here she is with the family at her graduation ceremony for her masters degree. I am so proud of you Jen!!!

Quick Update

Here is a quick update on what I have been up to this past month...

-Worked some more on our house. It is coming into the home stretch...maybe...I think it will always be something that is ongoing. It has turned out really nice and we are really enjoying it.

-Both boys started a new hockey season and they are playing on the same team. That makes it SO nice as we will not always have to be going in different directions during the week and on the weekends, too. Their team is called the Admirals and their jerseys are green. They have only played one game so far. I will post pictures of them both in action soon.

-Tyler had travel skill assessments (kind of like tryouts) for hockey and Kyle had the same except it was for soccer. We are not sure if we want them committing to club teams right now as they are huge time commitments however, it has been a good experience for them.

-I am in the middle of my soccer season. We are currently playing in our seasonal tournament. Last I looked, I think we are in 1st place. Yea! We still have the payoffs to get through though.

- The kids have been working hard on sticking with their school work as we are upon the last few weeks of school here. I can't believe another year has already gone by.

-Planning another trip to see my sister and family soon. She is just about finished with her masters work and getting ready to graduate. Big Kudos to her and congratulations!

-Followed the entire season of Big Brother 9. Adam won! Yea Adam. I am glad to see him win it. I actually liked him from the beginning. Also, he claims he is going to give 100K of his winnings to Autism research. I have to say that after watching him through out the season, he seems to have some autistic tendencies himself. hummm?

-Still following The Bachelor. Only one word for this season so far...."whatever"! I guess it has a few more weeks to go before we find out who "the girl" is. One is very high maintenance and the other very reserved and laid back. Totally opposite! It will be interesting to see what type he will go for. With them having such different personalities he HAS to be leading one of them on. again...whatever

-And last but definitely not least....The reason for the season....The Stanley Cup Playoffs....oh yea...it is either on the TV or the radio (or Internet, sometimes). They are already through playing the first round and now there are 8 teams still battling it out in the second round. I wonder what team will claim Lord Stanley this year? We shall see...

Happy Belated 31st Birthday, Jen

Well I know that I missed posting this by one day. But as MawMaw says... "for every day I am late that just means I love you more". I like that, don't you? :)

I hope you had a wonderful day!
I love you!

Out of touch for a while

Well, it has been a wonderful whirlwind this past week. My sister, Jen, and my brother-in-law came to visit. They arrived on July 28th and left today, Aug. 5th. They stayed for over one week. It was the longest time that we have had to spend together in a REAL LONG TIME! It was absolutely wonderful! We visit them quit a bit through out the year, however it is just not the same as when they come here. There is a lot of family for us to visit in TX when we go there so we pretty much only get "shared and split time" together. When they visit us here in AZ it is just us and them.

We did many fun things together this past week. The week started off with hockey and baseball. They got to see our kidos play hockey (several times actually) and on Sunday we went to see the Diamondbacks and Braves play at Chase field in Phoenix. Then on Monday it was the boys' first day of school. They were so excited to have family here to share in their first day back to school. One of the days Jen went and had lunch with the boys at school. That was a big treat for them. One of the days, after dropping the kids off at school we went out for an entire day of shopping and walking the mall. There were some days that I was not able to spend parts of the day with them, now that I am back to work and volunteering at the school, and they enjoyed getting out and checking out the Scottsdale mall as well as take a few Apple imac and ipod classes.

On Friday we went to see a movie, "The Bourne Ultimatum". It was a great movie, specially if you have seen the first two. After the movie we came home and greeted our dad, who drove in that afternoon from TX to spend the weekend with us. That night we invited some of my hubby's family over and had a little family b-day party for the boy's here at the house. The next day was my b-day. It was a full day, too. Again, more hockey, then some open skate (ice skating)time for those of us who wanted a little exercise. After that we took the long drive out to Cabela's outfitters, per my dad's request. That is a massive store!

We had a relaxing time at home most evenings just enjoying family, doing Sudoku puzzles and watching the BB8 live feeds. There were many wonderful times and lots of memories made. I can't wait until we get to do it again.