Mothers Day.

Our mothers day was very quiet this year….more than the usual quietness on Mothers Day.  We spent the weekend in Palm Springs celebrating our friends achievements…but rushed home Sunday morning because I was missing my babies. 2 nights away seemed like an eternity!

I have the best Mom on the planet. It was HER day just as much as it was mine…but she told me not to rush home, she wanted to spend as much time with my kids as possible. I hear about some people that don’t have grandparents to watch their kids…and I feel bad for them. I’m SO overly blessed to have my mom. Not only did she watch and care for my children for 2 nights…my laundry was done and put away, clean sheets on every bed in the place, dishes away…she is a real life living saint!!! I can never thank her enough for what she does for me and my family!

Awesome Nana…brought the kids to the Nature Center to find duckies and built amazing forts in the front room to play in!! I love that my kids love her…and hope this relationship continues to grow for many many many more years to come!! Keep it healthy Bernie!!! I wanna see you drunk and dancing at my children’s weddings!!! haha

Happy to see Nana had put Ella’s hair in pigtails for the first time too!!! Made her look so grown up…I absolutely loved it. And Mom said she sat still and liked getting her hair done!

 
Some holidays sneak up on you…and you totally forget to do all the damn cute crafts you pin on pinterest for days like Mothers day…so Nana got a cute pair of sandals I think she was eyeing lately. I know she loves anything that’s shoe related and it was a safe choice.  Sorry for the non-sentimental gift this year Nana.

And she got me our day at Glen Ivy.  We went for a Mothers Day/Race Recovery Day last week…it was a marvelous day with relaxation and friends!!

But I have to say…these kiddos make me oh so very happy…I love being their mommy. Feels right and like I was destined to be in this roll. I don’t know what I’d do without them.

And Owen was full of cuddles when we got back from our weekend getaway…I think he missed us. And both Daddy and I were TOTALLY ok with all of it. 

 

After Nana headed home (she probably missed that romantic husband of hers) we had some family time looking for luggage, new couches and then dinner at outback (mama’s favorite!). Nothing extra exciting, but it was awesome!

 

Ended my night with painting Ella’s toes for the first time….she is SUCH a girl!! Love it. Sat still and watched me like a hawk. After I was done and they dried she was so excited to show Daddy too…i die at the girlyness!! 

(I went with clear glitter for the first time…I was freaking nervous I’d make a mess of it if I went with an actual color! Next time its pink forsure!! heehee)

 

 

 

 

My special people…this year and last year…

ps. I should be getting my other years of blog books sometime…right dear?? lol (My Mothers Day gift was hands down the most thoughtful awesome gift ever….if you remember my earlier post about the book Yosh got me for my mothers day gift)

Celebrating Friends

Some friends are like family…for different reasons and in different ways.  The Browns are friends of ours that go WAY back…actually they are the reason that Yosh and I are together. They introduced us! They brought our worlds together and they collided almost 12 years ago.  crazy right.

The story about us and the Browns could go on and on…but they are very special people to us and we consider them more like family than anything! And they are definitely ones that are ALWAYS there to celebrate our milestones in life (weddings, babies, cancer, graduations, etc)! Little party animals. lol j/k

Anyway, Kyla’s been working super hard the past 18 months completing a Masters Program at CBU…while Sean stepped up and held the kids and household together to let Kyla get her stuff done. Very proud of them both.  Sean mentioned that instead of throwing Kyla a graduation party they wanted to do a weekend away in Palm Springs. We were IN…and excited!

We stayed at the Riviera. I guess the pool can be kinda Vegas-ish on the weekends BUT the fact that there was an AA Convention (the waitress told us that was what it was for Gay Men)…so having a hotel sold out of non-drinkers, you can understand why the pool wasn’t exactly going off the hook!

BUT Friday we arrived in Palm Springs and had a GREAT time at the pool!!! Stayed until last call and then headed up to our rooms.  Here are some of the Shenanigans on the way up to our rooms (only posting the appropriate ones…your welcome Kyla!).

Had a late night of pizza and line dancing in the Brown’s suite…which made for a rough Saturday morning roll call!.  Yosh missed a few of the line dances while takin’ a little nap!

But Saturday morning we were up and freezing at the pool eating our breakfast sandwiches and waiting for the sun to come over the palm trees.  Ugh. Wasn’t fun, actually totally miserable. But we kicked it back into high gear once we warmed up and spent 8 hours laying around the pool and relaxing. It was wonderful!!

Can you tell I really liked that ivy covered wall…it was so cute. I want to do one at my house! haha jk

Sobered up…I mean cleaned up and headed to dinner at Trio!

Funny, not so funny little story.  We took a free tram into town to our restaurant.  Everything was going nicely. I was photobombing the couple sitting in front of us…thinking I was so funny. Don’t worry they weren’t annoyed, they actually loved it and was sending it to their kids! haha And this was my attempt at yet ANOTHER group shot.

 

First stop (of a tram FULL of people) was for us! Yosh was off first…followed by me. **side note: I had told Yosh earlier that night that my new sandals were very slick…and I hoped I didn’t fall!**  You see where this story is going???  Yeah…well I slipped and fell down the stairs of the tram. On my ass and back. In front of everyone!!! No one laughed…just heard a loud “OHhhhhhhhh” in unison. Yeah. I wasn’t sure if I was going to laugh or cry. I was closer to crying to be honest. My back/ribs were KILLING me…I wasn’t sure if I broke them.  BUT I was fine. Just bruised, scraped and a bit rattled. (Only my luck!)

Dinner was nice…and we tried to get the party going again with full bellies. And it just wasn’t happening. Sorry Sean!  Getting too old for the partying by the pool and into the night for 2 days thing.

 

Headed back to the hotel, spent some time in the spa and was fast asleep by midnight. Was nice.  And poor Yosh this morning at breakfast he was moving some palm frawns so I could park…well a little bastard wasp was hiding and stung him! Great end to a lovely mini vacation!

I’m thankful to have an amazing Mom that came over and stayed with my little babies. She takes such good care of them and we are truly blessed to have her!!!! Love you Mom. Can even juggle bath while facetiming…lol love it.

Thanks Browns for inviting us on the celebratory weekend! Had such a great time!!! The Browns, Martin’s, Smiths, Starlings, and Hunes…good times! We gotta do it again!!

OC Half

I wrote this on Sunday evening…but just posting now…

I hate running

Like really…I don’t like to run…at ALL…BUT somehow I always end up getting talked into signing up for races! haha. I hate it in the beginning when it hurts to run one mile without stopping…and I was impressed with myself that recently I was able to run like 5 miles without stopping and it didn’t hurt too bad!! Thats GOOD for me! lol

Here is Taryn and I meeting halfway during our last training run…she lives on one side of Eastvale, I’m on the other…so we’d run in the same direction and meet up. Then she’d turn herself around and finish her run with me…always being able to get more miles in than this girl. She’s crazy.  But it was nice to have a partner on some runs…being alone can be kinda lonely at times.

The past few months I’ve been “training” for a half marathon that a few of my girlfriends from work were doing. They train HARDCORE…I pretend to train “hardcore” haha. Unfortunately one of my girlfriends broke a rib from coughing a few weeks ago and had to pull out of the race. But I was running like 3 times a week…trying to make one of those runs a “long one” 4-5 miles. I got up to 6 miles one weekend…and should have gotten up to 9miles BUT it didn’t happen…and I felt it today…around the 8-9 mile marker. Ouch. 

waking up at 3:30am to get to Costa Mesa by 5:30 was kinda tough…

Waitin’ to start….we met up with some of our co-workers. Math Department strong here! lol

Thousands of runners…but ran into a few old friends…was nice.
 
  
My only “goal” was to beat my last half marathon time…which was 2:38 at the Surf City back in 2011…and I’m happy to say I did it!! Woot Woot.

Above: At Mile the end of mile 1.5ish. We were going downhill toward PCH and it was a beautiful view…and Below: you KNOW I stopped to take a pic at mile 3 overlooking the ocean at Corona Del Mar…I’ll admit it was very nice…and easy at that point! lol Hence why I was able to stop to take a pic. As the course went on and on the ability to be taking pictures was GONE! lol
 

Happy to see Mom cheering me on at Mile 7….

 

And then I starting hitting a wall….lots of hills, narrowing of the path forcing me to get behind slower runners, water stations were falling behind not having water ready and the water was warm, running into the warm sun…I had to dig deep! haha.

These girls kicked my booty. Taryn got a 2:05, Nichole got a 2:12 and I got a 2:23.  I’m happy with that….and have said NUMEROUS times today…I don’t want to do another one of these again. I’ll stick with the 10k’s…6 miles is TOTALLY do-able. 

I have a sense of major accomplishment today. I don’t run because I like to. I don’t run to lose weight (because that doesn’t happen for me since I still eat like shit!).
I run because I can!! There was a time when I couldn’t run with my friends and family…a time I had to go as a spectator…

And when you can’t do something for reasons out of your control, it makes you strive to do things you might not necessarily LIKE to do just because its something you CAN do!  In 2010 these ladies participated in the Surf City Half Marathon in honor of me…Mom walked and finished with pride…I was SO proud of her (even though I was NOT feeling well that day!)

Mom finished and handed her medal over to me…which in turn I gave back to her since she so deserved!! She walked 13.1 miles like a champ…they all did! I love these ladies for that!

Since in 2010 I wasn’t able to participate, I made it a goal to do it the first year I was healthy enough to….and the following year it happened…

All the support was amazing during my first half…missed you LOADS today Trish!!!! She had my ass running during Surf City like I never knew I could run. She would have gotten me to finish earlier if she was with me today…thinking about you girl over in Afghanistan. I admire you and all your do for our country!!

So another half marathon in the books…think I’m done with them now (I’m saying that now as my feet and knees are throbbing and I’m sipping my wine!!) Looking forward to running a few 10ks (which is only 6.2miles)…thats about the perfect distance for my non-running ass!

And I stole these off the website…hence the shitty quality. That might be illegal…oops.

…and what run is next you ask…a 10k in Galway Ireland in June! THEN a 10k Pinkest Run Ever in Santa Barbara in September (I’m buying a freakin’ sparkly skirt for that one!!). What the heck am I thinking….lol Guess it keeps me pretending to be in shape. haha