Update

Things have been good around here. I'm still staying fully booked at VIP which is awesome. I've started working just M-F again which has been really good. Having a full weekend off is great. Plus with the time change I can still work 20 hours a week. So I'm feeling really good about that. Scott's work is going good. He is leading his branch in overall performance for the quarter which is really great! Way to go Scott!

We are trying to figure out what we should do with our house and what options we have. We met with my brother who is a realtor. We went over our options and at least at this point we are leaning toward getting a shed in the back yard. No joke! There are lots of pictures and videos of people converting sheds to spare rooms. We would have it be the office/extra living space. An escape away from home! Ha. Anyway we don't really know and we aren't great at making these kinds of decisions. They stress me out! Moving seems terrible and exciting at the same time. There are some things that are hard to replace like our fully shaded backyard, the kids walk to school (which is beyond amazing, and necessary if I am going to sub and coach next year) and Scott has a no traffic 8 minute drive to work. Those things are hard to give up even if we are crowded. Anyway who knows, we will probably just put if off and do nothing for awhile. 

On Friday night I went to watch some of my basketball players compete at the track meet. After that Scott and I met some friends for a dinner date. The rest of the weekend we have just been chilling and doing house and yard work. 

Willow has found her spot on our patio couch. She better not pee!

The kids and neighbor friend (who practically lives here) having a backyard picnic. 

Lowes adventrue (Piper did not want to come). 

Happy Easter

Just like that our basketball season is done. I'm excited to be done and have more freedom. Overall it was pretty good. The dynamics with A team weren't the same as B team in a bad way. B team kids know that they aren't good enough for A team and there's a camaraderie that gets built among the team. That does not happen with A team at all. A team members are more competitive and less inclusive of the players on the team who aren't as good. Unlike my 8th grade B team that lost 2 games and won 8 games my A team only won 2 games. It was more painful for sure! Ha. Three games we got killed and three games we lost with three points or less difference and we won 2 games. So overall not too terrible really. I didn't have any parent complaints (that I know of) and the athletic director gave me a good review so I'd say that's a success! 

On Friday night we went to our nephew's b-day party and later we watched a movie with some friends. On Saturday morning I took the kids to our local Albertson's for their Easter egg hunt. It is the best! Less than 5 minute drive, easy parking, and you don't have to worry about the weather! 

We didn't do much for Easter. I hid their Easter baskets and made a special Easter dinner but other than that nothing much. At one point Scott checked on the sprinklers and the kids put on their swimming suits to run through the sprinklers. It was cold! They lasted outside for at least an hour. I couldn't believe it. BRRR! 

7th Grade A-Team!

Albertson's Easter Egg Hunt. Ryan's face! Ha

Easter Baskets

Cute Easter Bunny

Crazy Kids!

BRRR!

It's hard to see but a mommy duck and her little ducklings came in our back yard. AHHH!

Girls Weekend and Grass!

I had a busy week last week. I made it through okay. My team got killed against Eagle. It was so painful. They are playing a lot of teams that have better skills and probably better coaches no doubt. We lost by a lot against Victory as well but that game at least didn't feel as painful. We only have 2 games left. I hope we win at least one more game. 

On Thursday we had a meet up for local VIPKID teachers. They had an Easter egg hunt for the kids and the teachers. I won a Dino key chain and another teacher switched with me so I could have my own Dino doll. I'm so excited! I'll post a pic when I get it. The weather was terrible and we got rained out. 

On Friday late afternoon/early evening I met up with my sister and sister in laws so we could carpool to our airbnb in Hagerman ID. We were trying to find a spot where we could sort of meet in the middle for the Eastern and Western Idahoans. My sister flew in from Seattle. The airbnb was actually pretty cute and was right next to the water. It had tons of windows and it was like indoor camping! My favorite way to camp. We ate dinner and gabbed that evening until late. The next day we attempted a little hike that turned out to be a walk in a field! Ha. We got some sunshine and fresh air at least. The weather on Saturday was perfect, sunny and no wind. Amazing! We ate food and played games. Later in the evening we went and checked out the Malad gorge and 1000 springs. It was a fun little outing. That night we watched a movie. We got up and left this morning. I was happy to get back early and spend some time with my family and get some things done today. Overall it was a really fun successful girls trip.

While I was gone Scott spent the entire day trying to salvage our sad backyard. He picked up compost, sod, and a rototiller and worked all day long. I'm still worried the grass won't grow back there. We will see what happens this summer. Keep your fingers crossed for us! 

Easter egg hunt. Ryan is in the distance.

The view from the house.

Windows everywhere!

Yummy dinner!

Our field hike.

I forced everyone to participate in Speak Out! So fun. I kill at that game. Teaching English to Chinese students for the past 2 years is finally paying off! Ha. 

Taking this bridge picture was no joke! We could not get the timing right on the camera. Anna kept running back and forth. It was torturous! We were shocked we actually got a decent one! Everyone was there except for Christy and Amanda. 

Getting the compost.

Sod

Ooo la la! 

Summerwind Skippers

Last week seemed to drag and fly by at the same time. On Tuesday I was like how is it only Tuesday? Now it's Sunday and I'm like how are we already at Sunday? Ha. It was a bit crazy town coming back from spring break and jumping back into things. Things are always a little more crazy when I'm coaching and teaching online. My girls got slaughtered against Heritage on Tuesday. It was painful! Ha. Within a couple of minutes it was 20 to 0. I think the final score was 7 to 55. I don't think any of my teams have lost that badly before. Our game on Thursday was a much better match. It was a close game but we came out with the win 33 to 24. This week we play Eagle and I think we will most likely lose, Heritage and Eagle are always the best teams. I'm just hoping it will be a closer game than it was against Heritage. Our game on Thursday will be our last home game and it should be a close game. I think Victory might be a better team but I think we could beat them if all the stars align.

Piper has a science project we need to figure out sometime today. All of the good experiments have already been done. We are really struggling to think of what to do. Gabby had her Summerwind Skippers spring show. Summerwind Skippers are a little famous they competed on America's Got Talent a few years ago. They are really good. The head coach is the PE teacher at Summerwind and she runs a program once a week for any elementary students that are interested. It's pretty cool. Gabby is the only one that wanted to participate. She wants to do all the things.

All the participants. 

Here are a couple of videos. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_UQhGLGF7YQ&feature=youtu.be

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9NmFhh3uzt8&feature=youtu.be

On Saturday night Scott and I went out to dinner. Now that we don't have to pay for babysitters anymore we feel like we can get out a lot now. It's the best! Later we went and hung out with some of our friends. Tonight we are going to go have dessert and play some games with some of our other friends.

It's been rainy off and on all weekend. We did escape to the school yesterday and played some basketball. I'm going to be interested to see if Corbin plays and is any good in 7th grade. Gabby already shows lots of promise with her baller skills.

Well this week I have to sub tomorrow and Tuedsay. On Tuesday I will go from teaching online to subbing to coaching a game. I don't think I will get home until 7:00. I'm DREADING it. I hope that it's not as terrible as it seems. I will try to take a nap in a chair during my prep period that day.

Alright that's all.

Gabby's rabbit sketch

Spring Break

We mostly hung around the house during Spring Break until Thursday.  I did take the kids to the library and to the new Mary Poppins movie at the Dollar Theater. The kids couldn't wait until Thursday so they could get to Nana and Papa's house already! The drive down was fine. We made it for a late lunch at Hires. The weather was beautiful on Thursday so the kids had a blast playing down the hill in Rustin's yard and playing with the chickens. Rustin also set up a zip line and the kids had fun going down that. It was good the weather was beautiful on Thursday because we woke up to inches of snow on Friday. Annoying! I went to my eye doctor appointment to see about lasik surgery. It turns out I'm not a candidate for lasiks because my corneas are too thin so I will have to do a different kind of procedure that has a longer more painful recovery. I'm not happy about that but what are you going to do? I scheduled my surgery for June. I'm kind of nervous about the whole thing. We will see how that all goes! Scott and I left late Friday afternoon to spend a couple of nights at the Zermott hotel. We were planning on doing just one night but that didn't feel long enough. One night feels to rushed to actually relax and have a good time so we opted to go for it and stay for 2. We had a great time!The kids had a blast having all manner of adventures. Now it's time to get back in the swing of things. Full speed ahead! 

Getting ready for the drive down. Silly Pipes.

Playing with the chickens.

Rustin decided to buy a bunch of baby chicks. The kids are IN LOVE! So cute! 

Dance Party! 

Easter Egg Hunt

A Little Bit of Showbiz

We had a pretty busy week. My girls had their first two basketball games. We lost the first game by 3 and my star player scored 2 points at the end of the game for the other team. Ha. We won our second game 34 to 22 I think. We will see how we fair after spring break. Hopefully they won't lose all of the progress we have made.

Ryan's recovery went pretty well. He would cry at breakfast a lot of mornings and grab his head. It was kind of strange. I'm not quite sure why he would grab his head. Who knows? He also woke up in the night crying from pain three separate nights. Other than that he was pretty okay. Less energy and a little more grumpy. He seems back to normal now. His pitch is a little different when he talks and he's much more mumbly. I hope that changes because it is driving me nuts.

Gabby has been going to play practice for the last 8 weeks. She had her performance on Thursday. It was about how you would imagine a group of 4-10 years old's practicing once a week for an hour would be like. Ha. Gabby was a little more shy than I expected in her performance but it was her first time doing a play. It was very short. I think she really enjoyed the experience so I was glad she was able to do it. I think they may have a summer camp of some sort and I'm sure she will want to participate.

The kids didn't have school on Friday and no school next week for Spring Break. I am not motivated to think of activities for the kids to do. Ha. We will see if we do anything. We will probably go to the library and park but aside from that I'm not sure. We are headed down to Utah on Thursday for a quick visit. I am going to a doctor's appointment to see about getting lasik surgery. I have to wear glasses all week which is going to kill me! I hate wearing glasses so much. Ha. 

Last night Scott and I snuck away and had dinner at Freddy's. It was our first time eating there. I thought it was good! Later we went and watched a movie with some friends.

Well that's about all.

Scott went and got some free compost. I think he got Corbin to make a few shovel fulls before he had to take over. 

Gabby's play. I didn't really get any great pictures. I also can't load videos on here anymore. 

Tonsillectomy

What a week! Ryan got an ear infection a couple of months ago and when I took him to the doctor he was very concerned about the size of Ryan's tonsils. He put him on antibiotics for 3 weeks to see if that would help. It didn't. He then referred us to an ear, nose and throat doctor. We had that appointment Monday morning. Sure enough the doctor took one look at Ryan's tonsils and concluded that they should come out. Ryan snores and hopefully this will help. Little Gabby snored like a trucker before she got her tonsils out. Piper and Gabby have been complaining of Ryan's snoring forever. They were very excited that he got his tonsils out. I went to set up an appointment for surgery and they actually had a cancellation so they had an opening the next day. I figured what the heck let's get it over with. Scott already had work scheduled to be off that day so  it was perfect. The bad part was that when we got to the hospital 2 hours before surgery (as instructed) they were 2 hours behind schedule. We were hanging out for 4 hours before he finally got to get the procedure done. Not only that but he couldn't have anything to eat or drink either. He was a patient trooper. After about 3 hours he was ready to go home and started to complain but we were able to redirect him fairly quickly. After the procedure he was doing great early on and they sent him right home. We were at the hospital for over 6 hours. It was an ordeal! For whatever reason 5 years ago when Gabby got her tonsils out our doctor recommended a different doctor that was not in the hospital. That was so much better! We were in and out within a few hours. Oh well! So far Ryan's recovery has been great. For whatever reason he struggles at breakfast and cries but then seems to be fine the rest of the day. I can't quite figure it out. I think he should be good to go to preschool next week though which he will be very happy about.

The entire 3rd grade made a "wax museum" of students dressed up as different famous Idahoans. They had to do research, and memorize information about their person. All of the parents came and would push a "button" that would turn them on to say their part. Gabby did great! She said that Corbin did torment her when his class came and he kept pushing the button over and over and Gabby kept saying it over and over until she finally hit him on the foot with her golf club in frustration. I was proud of her for that! Corbin seems to love the role of pesky older brother. 

We have our first basketball game on Tuesday. We will see how it goes. The 7th grade season flies by because it's so short which I really love. Ha. 

Saturday night a bunch of my friends wanted to have a stay cation. They reserved a hotel room and spent the night. I am so crazy about sleep that I opted to go to dinner and hang out at the hotel for a few hours before I had Scott come and pick me up. It was really fun. 

I was not feeling like worrying about doing anything fun for St. Patty's day today. Piper built a leprechaun trap and I forgot to do anything about it. When I got up she said she as disappointed that she hadn't caught the leprechaun and that he hadn't taken the coins she left him. I told her to go to her room because I thought he was coming. Luckily I happened to already have some gold chocolates so I scooped up the coins and left the chocolate in its place. She was more than happy with that. I then decided to make green eggs and pancakes for breakfast and none of my kids would eat it. Fail! Next year we will have Lucky Charms for breakfast! 

That's about all. I need to gear up for a busy week! 

Gabby with Willow on her leash. Ha.

After surgery treats

Ryan playing while waiting for surgery.

More waiting. 

Finally, he's off!

Nana and Papa sent Ryan a special beanie boo for recovery.

Piper's Leprechaun trap 

Ha! I love that. So cute.

Green eggs and pancakes. NOPE. Kids were NOT down.

Dinner with friends.

Gabby at the "wax museum."