Danny's Accident

I'm sure that anyone who actually follows this blog has actually already heard about Danny's accident but just in case, I decided to post it in one more place. He and his friend Broc were heading home at about 2:30 wednesday morning (they'd been out tuesday nite) and Broc was driving. He understeered into a turn coming off the off ramp of the Hwy and ended up rolling the car down an embankment. Both are very lucky considering how much worse it could've been.



http://www.tri-cityherald.com/945/story/797776.html



Broc ended up with 3 broken ribs and a punctured lung but wasn't hospitalized since his lung didn't deflate. He was treated and released. He may also have a broken arm but they weren't able to tell from the xray yesterday.


Danny however, is still in the hospital - Hopefully to be released tomorrow. He ended up with 3 broken ribs, a punctured lung, broken sternum, broken scapula (I think shoulder blade), and 3 broken toes in his right foot, not to mention a concussion and many cuts and bruises. He's in a lot of pain but is overall extremely lucky. Both guys were in their seatbelts, proving once again, that seatbelts can save your life, SO WEAR THEM. :) If they hadn't had them on, they might not be here today.


So keep them in your thoughts and prayers and if you don't have a way to get ahold of him and would like to talk to him, email me or comment here and I will email you with a phone#. I will be heading over to see him today and will hopefully have more information after the weekend.

Indoor Soccer

There is nothing like jumping back into indoor soccer to find out just how out of shape you are! I started indoor two weeks ago. The shocking part is... SCOTT is also playing indoor soccer. He'd never played before but Glassman Inc has so many men and women who play or have played soccer in the past, they decided to put together a team. I'd actually hesitated to play until he said he was playing. Once he told me he was playing I knew there was no way I could stand on the side lines and watch! Overall we've ended up with 3 couples playing and lots of other glassman employees and of course... Ben, Scott's best friend and my other husband.

The first game was a shock to all of our systems. In the first minute of play Scott managed to shoulder a girl right in the cheek. His fault, but not... he ran around one guy and she was right in front of the guy and he didn't see her in time. But about one minute after that, I managed to trip a girl and get a foul called on me. So, within 2 minutes, both Waring's had a foul called on them. I think they were ready to kick us off the field. :) But after that it smoothed out and Scott even got a goal!! However, the drive home was the 3 of us (Ben was with us) all complaining of the different aches we were already feeling. Game one was a reality check and I realized I needed to start running if I wanted to survive the season. Scott also has more sympthy for my aches and pains after a first game back than he did before - since I'm still pretty sure Ben and Scott complained more in 2 hours than I do the entire week after a game. :)

I spent most of last week running on our treadmill that had been gathering a nice layer of dust in the garage. Between my Ipod and movies on the DVD player out there I've managed to get up to 4 miles in 50 minutes. I should've gone the additional 10 minutes yesterday to make it an even hour but I needed to get in and feed the family dinner. Not to mention, the DVD was at a good spot and I wanted to save the action to motivate me for tonight's run.

If I wasn't trying so hard to catch my breath during the short breaks I get during the games, I'd take some pictures. Maybe by game 5 I'll manage a couple of the Monkey running around. Yes, I told Scott he looks like a monkey running. He's SO tall and skinny and his arms are so gosh darn long that I laughed the first game and pointed out that his elbows are out when he runs. He is already keeping them down and I must say, I am JEALOUS at how natural he is at sports! He jumped right in with no problems. It's almost like me trying to jump into basketball. I know the concept, have played it for fun (eon's ago) but if you were to put me out on the court and give me a ball, I'm not sure I could dribble it down the court muchless make a basket! He had a goal in 2 minutes and no problems with passing, trapping or dribbling!

So if you are in Tacoma in the next month on a sunday, let me know. Our games are fun to watch. Not to mention there is a bar upstairs in the soccer center so you can have a beer while laughing at us. As long as it's an afternoon game... so far we've only had morning games and the bar hasn't been open yet. Bummer!

Corn mazes, Zombies and Transformers

While I love the halloween season, I'm glad it's over for the year. Braden wanted to be Bumblebee - a transformer. Kelsey was undecided so eventually I convinced her to just be a soccer player. That wasn't good enough, she wanted to be a dead soccer player. So... she became a zombie soccer player with a cleat protruding from her chest.

Braden loved his Bumblebee Costume. He wore atleast the mask almost every day from the time I bought it until Halloween. Here are a few pictures from the various halloween events they went to over the season.

Busy Month

I don't even know where to begin. It was such a busy month of October and November is already in full swing.

Kelsey is just winding up her soccer and volley ball seasons. Two sports in one season are just not advisable. She had Practices monday, tuesday and friday with multiple games on saturdays. Unfortunately she only made it to half of the volley ball games due to conflicting soccer games. She did very well in both sports. She's really beginning to show signs of being an excellent defender in soccer. She could be a good forward too since she has great passing skills and the ability to shoot if she got close enough, but she won't dribble. Doesn't quite have that confidence yet.

Today was the most miserable soccer game I can remember watching. unbelievably windy, rainy and cold. Kelsey was so cold by the end that as she warmed up her hands hurt bad enough to make her cry. Although.... it doesn't always take much to make her cry.

Cruisin' in our ScootCoupe

Since I mentioned it in the last post, I thought I'd talk about our ScootCoupe. Before we went on our weekend get away Scott and I spent a few hours searching for fun things to do during our weekend on San Juan Island and we came across this....



We decided to spend our anniversary day checking out the island in it. It was definitely an experience. The first hour was cold and foggy but not raining, which was a vast improvement over the time we went 5 years ago and we went whale watching in Kayaks. We were so wet that trip we couldn't even dry our hands to eat our picnic lunch.

During our cruise around the island we took many stops. During the stops we checked out beaches, trails and lighthouses. Not to mention, a lavender farm, a huge pod of whales and some random wild life, such as a few foxes, deer and birds. Actually... I managed to HIT a bird with the scootcoupe. Not easy in a vehicle that isn't supposed to go above 25! LOL.

Speaking of not going above 25. Check out the spedometer here. It's almost redlined. Scott was adamant we get a picture. I thought I was going to die. I do NOT advise going 45+ in this thing. It gets a little wobbly!!

Mona the Camel

I know, I know... you can all say it, I've been a slacker. We had a busy and very eventful summer but when I sat at the computer, I just couldn't come up with anything I wanted to write.

Last month was mine and Scott's 10 year anniversary. WOW does time fly. Anyway, I tried to convince him to go to Jamaica to visit my dad for our 10 year, but Scott refused. Then, the closer it got, the emptier my bank account seemed to be getting, so we decided to head to the San Juan's for a weekend get away. We are not strangers to the San Juan Islands. We've gone a few other times. One time was off season, we stayed on Orcas Island in February. It snowed... it rarely snows in the San Juans. The next time was about 5 years ago, probably for our 5th anniversary or so. We camped on Friday Harbor and it rained... poured actually. For the ENTIRE weekend. We had puddles in our tent. Terrible.

So this time we had no clue what to expect. Turned out we had perfect weather. Perfect camping weather. We did lots of fun things including rent something called a Scoot Coupe which we drove around the entire perimeter of the Island. I also managed to kill a bird.

Now... Mona the Camel. Mona was about a mile away from our campground across from the winery. She's a local celebrity. We weren't actually going to stop by and visit Mona but some guy at the gas station asked us if we were going and we said of course!! So he gave us an apple to give to Mona.

Which meant, we hunted Mona the camel down and gave her an apple.


Mona LURVES APPLES.... I mean REALLY REALLY loves them.

She wanted more apples.... if I didn't have any, she was going for my clothes.

She even bit me in the butt. Then... as quick as that, she was done with us. We had no more apples, so she wandered off. But Mona was fun. We meant to go back and give her more apples but we never got around to it.

Kids and Random thoughts.

As I was vacuuming the house tonight I was thinking about my kids. Could be because I was yelling at one to pick up his cars and transformer pieces before I sucked them up or because the other one was yelling at me over the vacuum to ask what to pack for her trip which isn't until tuesday.

Regardless, thinking about them made me smile and I thought I'd post some of the random thoughts I had.

I love that as soon as I got to daycare today I got a big grin, hug and a "HI MOM," from Braden. Kelsey was busy sitting on the couch with Amber learning how to cross stitch. Glad she has grandma's and daycare providers to teach her these things. I am horrible at crafts. Anything I have started gets to a certain point and I either get bored and give up or I get stuck and put it away because I can't get any further.

Kids will embarrass you unintentionally... If I bend over too far and my low rise pants show more than needs to be seen, Braden will quickly laugh at me and say, "haha, I see your butt." So at least I know the rest of the world sees and I fix it.

Kids also have ways of pointing out all of your flaws... Often I yell at Kelsey to clean the clothes off her floor and pick up her room. I then go into my bedroom and notice that I have piles of clothes on my floor so I'm just as guilty.

As a toddler I one time caught Kelsey talking very sternly to her dolls (not yelling but in an angry tone). I realized that it was probably what she heard from me and then felt guilty.

If Braden goes to daycare and says a bad word I know that he probably heard it from our house. Although I'm going to blame that one on Scott. Mostly because I've specifically heard Braden say it immediately after Scott said something.

Today, in addition to the big grin and "HI MOM" I got from Braden when I arrived, I also got an "I like your hair." Nice ego boost, thank you B. :) Then, later in the evening, I get a "Mom, I like your shirt!" from Braden again. Personally I think he was buttering me up for the next "Mom, will you transform this into a car for me?" But since you know kids at that age are honest... gotta appreciate the compliment.

At Kelsey's age I get a lot of eye rolls. But still affection. She just wants to spend time with me and I need to be better about it. From playing games on the computer with her, to board games, watching TV and cuddling on the couch, to shopping, she wants to do it with me. of course, she also wants me to spend money on her that I don't have, but I suppose that's what girls expect.

At 10, she's starting to want to be more of a teenager. Which means conversations about shaving legs, bras, deodorant and periods.

Kids can make you laugh no matter what the age, Braden, in his transformer obsession, really just another version of a "vehicle" which he has been obsessed with since birth, has decided that his name is Optimus Prime. He will ignore you unless you call him Optimus. If you don't, he will correct you and say, "Tell me ________ Optimus Prime, Not Braden." This is only today though, tomorrow he might be Megatron, Starscream or Bumble bee. You just never know.

That's all for now... I know there was more running through my head but I seemed to forget a lot of it the second I sat down to type. It's amazing what can pass through your head in 15 minutes of vacuuming the house.

Waterfalls and the Capital Building

We've been needing an excuse to test out the durango on a longer drive since Scott did some work on it. We decided to take the kids down to Tumwater Falls Park and have a picnic. It was a great day for it. Not too hot and not raining. Traffic was a bit of a challenge on the way home and we were forced to use the back roads, but the kids had the Transformers movie to keep them entertained. It's Braden' new "Cars" movie, which as many of you know, he would watch as many times a day as we would turn it on for him. The DVD no longer works.

Braden was being a transformer in this picture.

They wanted to be part of the totem pole.

After we left the falls we decided to see if the State Capital was open. Kelsey and I have taken a picture outside it but never been inside. It was open so we went in to check it out. I've never seen so much marble. Walls, floors, stairs, probably even the toilets although I did not go in the bathroom to check. :) The detail was very neat.

waaaay up there in the middle are Scott, Kelsey and Braden.

Check out the detail on these doors!

Apparently we have a time capsule buried under the marble. Pretty neat.... I wonder what's in it.

Marble, marble everywhere......

Recent Heatwave

I have been neglecting my blog, mostly because it was too darn hot to sit with a computer on my lap and try to string sentences together. But we did enjoy our very very warm Washington summer. It's been almost a month since we've had any measurable rain. My yard is very very dead. ALthough since it's mostly all weeds at this time, I'm not complaining not having to mow them down.

On the hottest day of the wave, my outdoor thermometer showed 108 and my inside thermometer showed 90. OUCH. I met a good friend of mine and her two kids at one of the free spray parks in tacoma. Basically just a bunch of sprinklers. But it was a nice and cheap way to cool down.

That same day, my awesome in laws brought us a window A/C unit. AHHH relief. Unfortunately Scott didn't get home until 9pm that night so it wasn't installed until 11. We didn't feel the relief until the next day but it made a measurable difference, I think we were down to 78-80 degrees inside. MUCH better. The heat wave has finally broken and it's down to 60-75 again.

Here are a couple pictures from our trip to the spray park.

Slumber Party Fun

This year we skipped the big birthday party Kelsey usually has and as you read on the last post, we took her to dinner. I promised she could have a slumber party with a few friends. She had her party this past saturday. It was a whirlwind of chaos but I think everyone had a blast. Scott and I set up the tent on the back patio for them, complete with a tv and air mattresses.

I think I was a bit more ambitious when I was shopping than I was when the party actually arrived. I bought tie dye and tshirts. It was extremely messy so not sure I'll try that again. I think the kids like the results, but it was something I'd never done before so I know that you need a lot more dye than it looks like or it doesn't soak all the way through the shirt. But it was still fun... I suppose. I didn't want to send the kids home with dye all over their clothes so I was a bit OCD about them touching the stuff, but it worked out.

Another first for me was making Pizza on the barbeque grill. Still wondering why I thought I had so much energy. But it was a hot day and I really didn't want to heat up the house with the oven. If i was smart, I'd have bought the pizza at Papa Murphys and then put it on the grill, but nope, not me, I bought frozen dough and did it myself.

The rest of the night consisted of the girls playing games, smores over the fire pit, making braceletts and a movie. This morning we had waffles and fresh fruit. Oh and whipped cream, Jocelyn obviously enjoyed the whipped cream. :)

HAPPY 10th Birthday Kelsey

It seems a lot of my posts start with "Happy" something don't they? :) I really need to become more original. Yesterday was Kelsey's 10th Birthday, it was a ton of fun. For all of us. This year was a big one for her, not just because she entered double digits but because she ended up with a laptop and dinner at a japanese steakhouse.

We had a ton of fun torturing her with her gift. Since her laptop was a more expensive gift than we've ever bought for her before, we decided it was her one and only gift. But we still wanted her to enjoy opening gifts. So, we wrapped a picture of the laptop in a box and then wrapped that box inside another and so on. I think she ended up with about 7 boxes to open before finding the picture. Then had to stare at the picture for a minute to see what it was and where it was sitting. While she was busy unwrapping I snuck into her room and set up the computer. I know I'm a bit crazy for buying her such an extravagant gift now, but I justify it by reminding myself that our desktop is a dinosaur and she couldn't even load games on it. Plus, I got sick of sharing my laptop for her reports during the school year. :) Also, when I was growing up, there was no need for a computer as a gift, I always had one in my room and even if I didn't, there were 2 or 3 others in the house.

Thank you Great Grandma and Grandpa Perez for the clothes.

Thank you Great Grandma and Grandpa Spadt for the Polly Pockets


Thank you Grandma and Grandpa Waring for the computer case, clothes, money, hairdryer and straight iron. (hmm... spoiled much?)


Starting to open her picture.

Thanks for the brick!! This is what we used to give the box a little bit of weight.

What the heck?! ANOTHER BOX?!

Seriously mom?! Another one? I think here she was saying, "Oh my GAWD, another box."



I think by now she's just trying to figure out why she spent all that time unwrapping for a picture. I missed her expression when she figured it out and took off running down the hall.

Checking out her new toy. And yes, she thinks it's a toy. She keeps wanting to take it places, to daycare, to Jocelyns. I guess I should've gone for a desktop. :) But the laptop will be nice when I do allow her to take it places.... someday. But by then, she might need a new one because this one will be outdated.


Great Grandma and Grandpa Spadt (to Kelsey) and Grandma and Grandpa Waring also joined us for her birthday celebration. We had an excellent dinner at a local restaurant called Samurai's. The kids loved it. We got to watch someone cook our food in front of us and he even drew a heart with a smiley face on the grill and then lit it on fire for her. After we ate, they rolled out a big set of drums and Kelsey got to play them.

Braden's first try at chopsticks. he did awesome. Ate a whole salad that way and a lot of his fried rice before changing.

This was Kelsey's first try. I only added the picture because as I was taking the picture and laughing about her having her mouth wide open, a woman tapped me on the shoulder to tell me that we have two beautiful kids. :) Very nice of her.




This was Kelsey's flaming heart/smiley face. What, you don't see it?!

This was Kelsey playing the drums, it's pretty dark and difficult to see, but I thought I'd share it anyway.

Happy Belated 4th of July

Happy 4th of July!!! Belated of course. I'm behind on my updates, nothing new.

Our 4th of July this year was fairly low key. We almost never leave our house, instead we invite people here and between us and our neighbors have lots of food, friends and fireworks. This year was quieter but we still ended up with a fairly good size crowd. We enjoyed a BBQ at the neighbors house, played a couple board games and then sat in our culdesac watching the boys blow things up. Scott even let the kids do a couple of their own. The kids getting to light them made me a little nervous but Scott watched them carefully. Actually, Braden never lit any, he just got to hold the bottle for the bottle rocket.

The dogs behaved very well and Gauge didn't freak out too much at the noises. Especially since there were 6 or 7 of them running around between the two houses. We had our fences open between the houses which allowed the kids and dogs plenty of room to run.

The Newport Aquarium

On our last and final day in Newport, we decided to go to the aquarium. Scott and I went there more than 10 years ago when Keiko the Killer Whale was there. From what I remember, the aquarium has changed quite a bit and it's nothing like what I remember before. Keiko is gone and they obviously did some remodel. It was a lot of fun and there was plenty of hands on touch pools for the kids to enjoy.


Gee... Kelsey looks thrilled that I asked her to touch the starfish so I could get a picture.



Check out this giant crab... oh and the one in the tank behind him. I would not want to run into one of these in the ocean!! Poor Braden, not sure if you can tell in this picture, but his head was as red as a cherry tomato! He got burnt the first day. I wish I knew who his parents were so I could tell them off for forgetting to put sunscreen on his newly shaved head.