One Decade of Marriage

Vinny and I start off every year celebrating our wedding anniversary.  This year we hit a major milestone, 10 years.  It's an accomplishment that we are pretty proud of because I'm sure that many people did not think we would make it this long, but we did!.  We might have been young, but we took those vows seriously.  It wasn't always easy, sometimes it was down right hard, but for all those hard time, there were three times as many good/awesome/amazing times.  

We celebrated by spending the night at the Cliff House in Manitou.  It was cozy and the rooms were very nice.  We had an awesome time just wandering around Manitou in the snow, but the only bad thing was because it was the 1st about half of the stores were closed.  We splurged on some pottery locally made and hand panted, it was absolutely beautiful, and then we ate dinner at the Cliff House.  The food was delicious and we took our dessert back up to the room to eat by the fire.  It was awesome and relaxing.  A perfect way to celebrate us.

This is not the pic from when we stayed I forgot to snap a picture..it was cold and snowy when we stayed.

Walking Manitou in the snow!

Vinny and I have come a long way in 10 years and I know it will keep getting better and better.  I thank God everyday for my husband and the life we created, it's beautiful and messy, but it's real and it is ours and it's more than I could have ever hoped for.  I love you Vinny.  Always. 

December 2014

The beginning of December flew by!  With Vinny and I both finishing up another semester of school and the boys busy with school and wrestling Christmas Break was MUCH needed.  We didn't do a whole lot of much besides enjoy time with family and celebrate the season.

The bottom Ty happens to be Ty...with his high score of 125!
He had the highest score out of all the boys both games we played!

We had some crazy cold temps..that's right you are reading correctly -5

Luckily, there were a few warm nights and we took the kids to the zoo..always love seeing all the lights!

Heading to Christmas Service.

Merry Christmas 2014

A Ft. Worth Thanksgiving

For Thanksgiving we made a quick trip to Ft. Worth to spend some much overdue time with Vinny's side of the the family.  It was wonderful to see everyone...it's amazing how much all of the cousins have grown!!!

The boys on Thanksgiving

While we were there we ate SO much.  We had to eat at our Texas favorites: What-A-Burger...the absolute best fast food burger!  We also had Shipley's do-nuts.  Hands down the BEST do-nuts EVER!!!  Their hot and fresh glazed do-nuts are amazing, melt in your mouth...they also have kolachies (think pigs in a blanket only much, much better)  sausage, cheese, and jalapeno.  Shipley's has ruined all other do-nuts for me (when we lived in Houston we would eat there once a week if not more).  I don't want to think of how many do-nuts I consumed while we were there and my stomach literally just growled thinking of those do-nuts!  If the closest Shipley's wasn't 577 miles away I would totally make Vinny drive me there in the morning (yes I did just look it up!)  Vinny's brother took us to a true whole in the wall Mexican restaurant..that was delicious.  We ate Fuzzy's Tacos...weird name, but very good!  Then Saturday we went to the flea market mostly so we could get our Mexican cup of fruit with lime and chili powder. 

Besides all of the going out to eat, we had an amazing Thanksgiving dinner.  We had a TON of family at Vinny's brother's house.  We had 4 turkeys, 2 deep fried by Vinny and 2 baked and then all the traditional fixings.  We were all stuffed!  Both of Vinny's brother were there and this was the first time in like 15 years they have all been together for a holiday.  After eating we played some games, Left Right Center, Spoons, and Poker.  I even went out "Black Friday" shopping with my sister-in-law and her sister.  It was pretty fun!

We made a trip to Cabela's and this was the best Cabela's I've ever been in.  It was so awesome.  They have a ton of taxidermied animals, but they have them grouped in sections almost like a museum.  Plus they have a huge aquarium.  (Oh and across the street in a huge pasture, there was a herd of buffalo!)

Love those Texas sunsets!

Those are birds!

I have a big love/hate relationship with Texas, but while there I was reminded of a few things I love: #1 Family, of course!  and then the big beautiful sun sets (Colorado sunsets are amazingly beautiful, but very different because we have the mountain in the way and it is so very different!) and the crazy amount of birds that just sit on each intersections light posts.  It's one of those random things that I completely forgot about living in Colorado, but was a regular occurrence in Texas.  I don't know why it just fascinates me!

Ty Turns 5

How is my baby 5?!?!  It's crazy to me he is already 5.  He is in that semi-awkward place of being a 'little' kid and a 'big' kid.  In many ways he acts much too old for his age, but he will always be my baby (but I am trying very hard to not treat him that way!)  He is doing well in his second year of preschool and almost has his last name down, both writing and spelling it.  His is definitely a leader (thankfully in a good way) within his classroom and has done well with his new teacher, her maternity leave sub and now back with his new teacher again.  He has numbers down and is even starting to write and recognize the bigger numbers, and can recognize time on a digital clock.

Ty's Packer Party

Once he turned 5 we told him it was time to start going to Sunday School class and even though he sometimes gives us a hard time about going, he actually really loves it.  It is taught by two of his little soccer buddies moms' and the 3 of them are in class together, so it's fun for him.  Ty also has amazing recall skills and after each class he will pretty much word for word retell the bible story he learned in class to us.  His favorite is where Jesus performed a miracle by putting mud on a blind man's eyes and then the man could see.  Ty is my most vocal prayer.  He always reminds everyone to pray and the number 1 thing he prays for is "to not have nightmares!"

Ty's nickname is Repeat.  For a couple of years now, Ty has been repeating what others say, whether it be me, Vinny, his brothers, his uncle, tv commercials, and even sports commentators.  I'm not sure why he does it or how exactly it got started, but he just can't seem to help himself.  We always joke that he would make a very good sports play by play commentator!  He also likes to say "nothing to see here" when he is being funny or sneaky or running around the house with no clothes on.

He still has a touch of OCD, lining things up in straight lines or organizing things in a way that only makes sense to Ty.  He is silly and loves to laugh and make others laugh.   He absolutely loves dogs and cannot wait to get one of his very own.  He said he will name it "Ty."  If it were up to Ty he would own a whole pack of dogs and they all would be names some combination of Ty, Green Bay, or Packers.  Whenever we go to the pet store or the Humane Society, he says "I would name that one Ty, I would name that one Packer Ty and that one Green Bay Ty.  It's pretty comical.  For awhile we had to take a break from visiting any sort of animal place because he would just cry that they animals were so sad and they need homes.  One particular day at the pet store in the mall he just could not stop crying because there were about 5 tiny puppies in one of the windows and 4 of the puppies were picking on the one puppy and he was so worried that something was going to happen to the other puppy.  No matter what anyone said, he could not be comforted because he was just so worried about the puppy.

If Ty had it his way all he would do is play video games, so we have to monitor that very closely with him.  Video games are always his first choice, but when his time is up, he still loves his Imaginext Batman toys and he really likes to read (or more accurately be read to), his favorites are #1 Curious George and then the other favorites are all tied between Pete the Cat, Llama Llama, and Little Critter books.

He pretty much always says what is on his mind and doesn't have much of a filter.  He calls it like he sees it.  Ty is very pointed about telling you when he needs space or doesn't like what you are doing,  it is not always popular with some of my family, but I like that he is able to verbalize his emotions, now it is just working on saying things in a nicer way.   He has little reguard to other people's personal space and I think he thinks that smacking someone's butt is a way of saying he loves you (thankfully he only does this with our close friends/family.)

Mischievous is another way to describe him!

When Ty grows up he wants to be a hunter (but he changes what he wants to be quite often, sometimes it's a zoo keeper other times it's a builder like Trey, but most often it is so off the wall or random and it changes so frequently I can't even keep track.)  He also tells me that he wants to marry me when he gets older, but I keep telling him I'm already taken :)  My wish for Ty is he keeps loving with his whole heart and keeps that open relationship with God going strong.

November 2014

November was a good month for us!
Ty celebrated his 5th birthday at this awesome place called Dart Warz!  It was so much fun and we are all dying to go back!  It is an indoor Nerf  battle ground (think paintball except for inside with Nerf guns!)  It was seriously so much fun, I wish I had a better picture of Ty's vest pocket because you were supposed to keep the darts in your pocket that way you can have them ready to shoot.  He had his pockets stuffed, whenever he would bend over or run darts would spill everywhere!  We all highly recommend you check it out.  (Must be 5 years old to play and they offer black light play where you must be 8 years old.)

Ty in action!

Our "Team" minus me and Bella!

After Dart Warz we had the rest of the family meet us back at the house for a small party, a Green Bay Packer birthday party!  I made Ty's cake again, this time a camo colored cake on the inside!  (Those two ball cake pans are the best money I've ever spent!!)  All in all, Ty had an awesome birthday!

Ty's actual birthday is on Veteran's Day and there was a huge snowstorm that day so we didn't get to eat our normal Golden Corral meal, but he was okay with it.

The Sunday after Veteran's day Vinny, Tucker, Trey, and I ran in the National Veteran's Day 5k.  Now remember when I said that there was a huge snowstorm on Veteran's day, well the weather hadn't warmed up much, so it was FREEZING!!!  There was still a ton of snow and ice on the course.  It was seriously the coldest race I have ever ran!  Vinny and I ran together the whole time and even though I was running, I just couldn't seem to get my body warm, it was the slowest I have ever ran before, but it was actually nice to do this with Vinny.  Trey smoked all of us again, but got his slowest time ever because of all the ice he said he had to walk quite a bit.  Tucker keeps improving upon his 5k time each time he races and I am proud of him for taking on these runs.  It was a great way to honor Vinny and all of the Veteran's and the proceeds went to a pretty good cause too!

My parents gave us all an early Christmas presents of taking us to watch Wisconsin play CC.  We all proudly wore our WI Red, but got spanked by CC!  It was a lot of fun going to the game anyways!

We have had quite a winter so far and man has it been beautiful!  I just love the mountains covered in white!  I just had to throw this picture in here (I actually took it with my new phone..I am loving the camera and the phone in general.)

November also brought the official start of wrestling season!  This year all 3 boys are wrestling.  Trey finally decided to wrestle, but strongly told us that he is only doing practicing and only to keep in shape for running and soccer.  I think it is extremely important for the kids to participate in some sort of physical activity so Vinny and I were completely fine with him doing practices and no tournaments.  (I know there are a lot of people who do not like wrestling, but I honestly thing it is one of the greatest sports for kids to participate in, I know it's not for everybody, but if children are coached correctly the benefits are huge..I think I might have to post a separate post on this because it's kind of hard to explain in a few short sentences...)
Tucker moved up to 10 and under this year and it has been tough.  He now has to wrestle 5 matches instead of 3 and he is in A class, which is made up of very good wrestlers, some of these kids have been wrestling for over 7 years now, where as this is only Tucker's 3rd year!  Although challenging for him, he has made a big mental breakthrough, which for him the mental/emotional stuff is his biggest challenger.

Well remember how I said Trey only wanted to do practices, well the second tournament of the year, his cousin Bella (yes girls do wrestle, we have 6 in our club and they are AWESOME) decided to do the tournament, Trey, not one to get shown up by his cousin, decided to do the tournament too.  To say I was nervous was an understatement!  However, this boy got on the mat and it was like he has been doing this for years!  He did amazing!!!  He wrestled hard and listened to his coaches.  I was so proud of him!!  He took 2nd place (but he should have taken 1st, but the Ref was messing up on the handing out points and gave points to the other kids, and when our coach tried to talk to the ref about it, the ref wouldn't admit his mistake...so Trey ended up loosing by points..when he actually won!)  However now we always have two coaches on the mat, one coaching and one taking points down!  Trey has done every tournament since then and has taken 2nd twice and 1st 3 times.  My favorite part about him wrestling is that when his coaches tell/show him to do something in between rounds or when time has stopped, he will mimic their actions on the mat.  It is so comical, but it works for him because when the match starts he will do what they told him!

Trey Turns 8!

I know I'm way out of order, but it just felt weird to not post about Trey's 8th birthday.  Every time a birthday comes around it always amazes me how fast they grow..I can't believe he is already 8 years old!!  It's crazy!

Anyways, Trey ate at Golden Corral for his birthday.  He is so fit and trim, but this boy can put away some food.  He eats more than both of this brothers.  We had a little git together the Saturday after his birthday after his baseball game and he requested his usual homemade Oreo cookie ice cream cake.  He had a good birthday!

Trey is my silly boy.  He loves to laugh and to make others laugh (an he definitely has a very unique laugh.)  His special skills include popping out his shoulder blades and showing pretty much everyone he possibly can.  Trey is an exceptionally hard worker, but hardly ever lets the stress/pressure get to him.  In those situations, he stays level headed and looks calm on the surface (even if he is literally shaking with adrenaline.)  He is pretty much good at everything he does with little effort (or maybe he does put in a great deal of effort, but just doesn't show it).  Not many things seem to get to him, except for his baby brother who can get under his skin in a split second.  

The one thing I have learned the most about Trey, is you cannot force him to do anything, he has to do it based on his own choices.  He takes a while to warm up to things, but once he makes the choice to do something, he jumps right in and it is like he has always been doing it.  He is in his 4th year of elementary school and has never once taken hot lunch and tells me he has no plans to ever get hot lunch.  He loves creepy crawly things, like snakes.  His feet are only 1 and a half sizes smaller than my own!  He still writes solely with his left hand and is left footed, but playing sports his is pretty ambidextrous. 

I love his dimples and his blue eyes and that even though he is now 8 years old he still will hold my hand, hug me, and kiss me.  

And one last thing, for months he begged for cowboy boots and recently he got a pair and has pretty much wore them every single day, even with sweat pants and one time with tall Adidas socks and workout shorts!

My wish for Trey is to always be your sweet, silly self, you are one of the kind.

Fall 2014 (in review)

Fall 2014 was full of fun and very busy!!
Vinny and I both started another full course load of classes for college. Depending on how the college offers classes, Vinny and I both will have our associates degrees by summer (or Fall at the latest if they don't offer the classes we need.)  It's a lot of work, but totally worth it!  (I totally tried to take a picture of me and Vinny on our first day of school this semester, but he shut me down!)

Tucker and Trey started 4th and 3rd grade.  They are doing great in school, but 4th grade is definitely a challenge for Tucker.  He is such an over-achiever and always strives to do his best.  He was really bummed out that 1st quarter he got 1 B and the rest As.  I'm so proud he is working so hard to get the good grades!

Trey is excelling in 3rd grade.  He loves his teacher and before Christmas break he was moved to the highest reading group (he is so proud of this and will try to bring that fact up in most conversations he has.)

Ty started his 2nd year of preschool.  He is excited about being back at school, but definitely missed his friends that moved onto Kindergarten.  Luckily, his cousin is in the same class and he quickly made some new friends.  His goals for the year is to write his last name by memory and to have the beginning basics of reading down.  He excels at his numbers, he can now even recognize all his numbers and write them by memory.

All 3 boys played soccer again.  Tucker and Trey were on the same team this year and they did awesome.  These boys can play some soccer!  Ty was much improved this season (mostly because he is no longer the smallest kid on the team), he is still a star defender, but actually scored a goal this season!

Being in 4th grade, Tucker had to complete a science fair project.  He chose to do a project on plastic shopping bags.  He took 2nd place at the school science fair and even competed in the district science fair.  Although he didn't place, it was a great learning experience and he is excited for next year.

We found out last spring that Trey is a natural long distance runner.  This boy can just run and run!  He is so fast and even after he finishes a run he could go run again.  He participated in a season of Cross Country with the Landsharks running club  and did amazing.  He took 2 Second Places over all and 2 First Places in the boys division.  In the last race he took 1st place overall!  Pretty good considering he is running against kids up to 5th grade.  So proud of my boy.  He even told us that his favorite sport is now cross country!

Ty took his annual trip to the pumpkin farm with his preschool and true to Ty's quirky nature, he picked yet another tiny green pumpkin.  He was thrilled to ride the bus again and had a blast looking at all of the animals.

The boys and I did a family 5K at their cousin's school and we had a blast.  Even though it was late in the fall the weather was gorgeous!  This was Ty's 1st 5K and he ran the 1st mile in about 11 minutes and ran about 1/4 mile more, then I carried him for awhile, then ran the last 3/4 of a mile.  He was so tired, but proud of himself.  Tucker ran pretty good finishing in 30-something minutes (I feel bad that I can't remember!) and then Trey, that boy did awesome!  First place over all, finishing at 22 minutes and 10 seconds!  (Just a reminder it is 3.1 miles!).

I am going to end my fall post with out 'crew' we had out trick-or-treating on Halloween.  (Ty was Ironman (he had a Death Eater from Harry Potter costume, but chose to wear that to the Halloween Party at school.) Tucker and Trey reused their old costumes Ninja and Swamp creature, but got to buy new weapons to add on.)

Been Busy Living Life

Every time I long into blogger to see if anyone has posted anything for me to read I always think 'dang, it's been so long since I've blogged...I will do a post soon.'

Usually I always blog with pictures, which is a big part of why I haven't blogged because I am too lazy to get my memory card out of my camera.  When we went camping my 8 megabit SD card was full and because of my procrastinating nature on certain things, I was trying to download thousands of pictures the night before leaving...I was getting frustrated, so Vinny just went and got me a 16 megabit SD card, which means I still haven't done the 8 SD card and now I am filling up the 16 SD thinking 'man I have so much space, no need to transfer pictures yet!'  And yes I do realize that in a few months I will most likely just go buy another SD card to replace the full one...but with the state of things here I am just happy I am still taking pictures (not that things are bad, just busy and since Vinny is home, I am much more in the mood of being in the action instead of behind the camera.)

So here is a very general recap of things since Tucker's b-day post
1.  Vinny, Trey and I have each celebrated a birthday, making our ages 32, 8, and 28 respectively. (Ty turns 5 in November...I try not to think of how old my baby is!!)
2.  Vinny and I both have been working our butts off in college!  It's a lot of work, but we are both doing pretty well.  We both are over half way done with our degree program.
3.  Tucker, Trey, and Ty all excelled in school.  Tucker and Trey both ended up earning the highest renaissance cards each quarter.  Ty finished up his first year of preschool with flying colors.  His original teacher moved over Christmas and when I did the end  of the year conference with his new teacher, she told me "he is proficient to move onto kindergarten in all areas except for one."  I told her that because of his November birthday, he has one year of preschool before kindergarten.  (The one thing he wasn't proficient on was his shapes because he knew all of his shapes, except for a triangle, and to be proficient he must know the triangle.  So we worked on it and he learned what a triangle was within a week of that time.
4.  Summer was fun and busy.  I worked full-time, Vinny went to school full-time.  The boys spent quality time with my mom.  They all played baseball.  We went camping and did a lot fishing.  Vinny taught Tucker and Trey how to paddle their kayak all on their own.
5.  We did some running and races as a family.  We took the big boys up the incline and Trey smoked everyone.  This kid can seriously run, so he joined a local kids running club.  As a 2nd graded he took 3rd place over all (out of kindergarten through 5th graders) in the mile run with a time just under 7 and a half minutes.  Tucker and Trey both ran their first 5k this summer and Trey, yet again, smoked Vinny and I.  I love that he loves to run!
6.  We have have some down time in between school, work, and sports, which honestly has been a little weird, but nice.
7.  Currently, we are all back in school,  Vinny and I both full time in college, Tucker is in 4th grade and Trey is in 3rd grade.  Ty is in his second year preschool (my goal is to have him reading by the end of the year, but we will see, I know he is capable, but he can be stubborn.)

That's my recap...I want to promise that I will be better about posting, but I honestly don't know if that is going to be a reality.  All I will say is that when I have the time I will post something :)

Tucker's Birthday Weekend -- 9 years old!

Tucker's 9th birthday was last weekend on Sunday.  On Saturday he had a wrestling tournament and he did awesome again!  I am seriously impressed with his wrestling, he is listening and using actual moves instead of just muscling people to their backs.  He took 1st place again (so he is still undefeated for this season).  I have been horrible about taking pictures lately and didn't even get a picture of him with his 1st place medal.  And we stopped and at Texas Roadhouse for his early birthday dinner (again I didn't get a picture of it...ugh).  It was delicious as usual!

Look at him actually using moves...nice cradle buddy!!

 Sunday morning he woke up and asked for a ham and cheese omelet.  The weather on Saturday was very cold and snowy and since we had to be out for the tournament, we were glad Tucker just wanted to hang out at home for his birthday.  It was a good day of hanging out and watching the Super Bowl!  He was cheering for the Seahawks and was happy they won.

Beautiful big snowflakes!

Helping frost his own cake!

My birthday boy!

Very Excited - he got an Ipod

9 years old!!!

Cutting his own cake...He is getting so old and I am just going to pretend that he is not on his way double digit age!

Loose Teeth!

Trey is 7 and a half years (almost 7 and 3/4 years old :) and he has still only lost his 2 bottom teeth.  Finally a couple of weeks ago the two side bottom teeth were finally loose!  Last Saturday morning they were so loose, but he just couldn't get them out (he, unfortunately, has very long roots that just are not dissolving.)

Can you see how loose those teeth are?!?!

Thursday night he finally pulled out the one tooth!

Saturday morning he pulled out the other one!