Cleaning this gun

Earlier this year I was helping Dan's family to make a DVD for my father-in-law's birthday. When I was going through arranging all of the music, the songs that we used played over and over in our home for a few days. Jacey memorized many of them, and LOVED this one. She learned all of the words and still sings it every time it comes on in the car. I've been trying to get her on video singing it for a long time, but she would always get too shy. She decided that she wanted to have a family talent show for family night last night (starring her and Broden, of course), and singing this song was one of her (many) acts. She practiced all day and spent an hour before Dan got home choosing the perfect outfit. She sings the whole song, so it's kind of long, but it's so worth the wait. She especially gets into it when it gets to the chorus. I think Dan's going to show this video to every boy before the 1st date when she gets older. Enjoy....

P.S. OK- so apparently I do not know how to upload videos to blogger :) It seems fairly simple, and I'm sure it is, but for whatever reason it is not working for me tonight. So if you click on the title of the post it will take you to my picasa account where you can see it. And if anyone has any tips for posting videos, send them over my way!

A break in weather....

Current temperature: 76 degrees

Feels Like: 77 degrees

Humidity 82%

What's an almost-5-year-old Texan to do when she has a day with this kind of weather, after she's adapted to 100+ degree weather and swimming all summer?

Go to the indoor mall playground, splash in puddles on the way out, and drink hot chocolate when you get home of course! (OK, I just realized that you can see 2 cups of hot chocolate in the picture, and so I am busted. Jacey was so pleased with her idea that she insisted that I have a cup too!)

Mr. Independent

Broden is becoming more and more independent. He loves eating avocado, but does not like me to feed it to him. I got this idea from my BYU roommate, Ashley. (Thanks Ash!) I just peel it all except the very bottom, and he eats it like an ice cream cone. He's such a little guy, I let him do this almost every day!

Happy Travels! :)

While our family generally sticks pretty close to home (unless we're going to visit family), we have a couple fun trips coming up that we're really excited about! I have been doing a bit of running lately, and decided that I was ready to look for another race to do. (Disclaimer: I am NOT a competitive runner, nor will I ever claim to be. I just love having a goal to work towards, and tend to be more consistent if I have already invested some $$ in an upcoming race.) Saturday races are hard to find, but I was excited to find 2 in October. One was in Tyler, TX (closer, but not as exciting), and one was at South Padre Island, TX (farther, but definately more exciting!). The responsible side of me was going to stick with Tyler, but after I heard it was a hilly course and after finding a friend that was willing to make the trip with me to SPI, we decided to be adventurous. So it's official.... I finally registered for the South Padre Island Half-marathon beach run. I've been wanting to do a beach run on the gulf coast since moving down here, and this seems like a great time! Most of the run is done right on the beach along the Gulf of Mexico. Doesn't it look beautiful? Sadly, Dan won't be able to make the trip with us. As much as he would love to take a trip down to the gulf coast, he got some great news yesterday.....

He was selected to take a trip down to Venezuela with Parker! We have been crossing all of our fingers and toes (not to mention a LOT of prayers!) for a long time that he would have this opportunity. He will be gone for a week with the vice-president of the school and one other student. They will be traveling around the country treating professional baseball players. He is so excited for the opportunity to travel, see new places, treat atheletes, and especially to fulfill some more requirements. He will receive a significant amount of adjustments, which at this point is a huge blessing for us. He will leave for Venezuela on a Monday, and the rest of us will probably leave on Thursday to drive down to SPI. We wouldn't want to make things to easy on ourselves, would we? :)

Future runner?

Jacey's running debut- Sound to Narrows diaper dash in Washington - 18 months old.

This morning Jacey slept in late, and by the time she woke up and had breakfast I was trying to hurry her along to get ready so we could head over to the YMCA so I could run. When I asked her (for the 3rd time!) to go get her wake up clothes on, she disappeared into my bedroom. She came out dressed like this:

and said, "actually Mom, I'm going to exercise with you today!" She was in a very silly mood, and cracked her self up over wearing my clothes for a good 10 minutes. In the end, she was much happier going to the "play area" where she met up with a couple of friends.

Baseball fun!

Yes, this is a Mariners fan dressed in Rangers colors. Oops!

When our usher saw Jacey walk in with her pink mitt she said, "I sure hope you catch a ball tonight with that pretty mitt". She came up right before the game started and gave Jacey this baseball, a foul ball hit the night before that she had been saving to give to just the right kid. Jacey was thrilled........

.....then she said, "quick Mom, hide the ball. I don't want them to know I already have one. They might not hit one to me." So she sat like this for much of the game, waiting for her ball...

When Jacey realized they weren't going to hit another ball to her, she began to get bored. Luckily she found someone to be her friend, as she usually does.

Friend had to leave.... Jacey passes the rest of the time crunching all of the peanut shells into tiny pieces. (Sorry to whoever had to clean up that mess!)

Baseball season is here! Ok, so it's been here for quite awhile, this is just the first time we made it to a game. The timing was perfect- Dan had to come home from school early to pick up our car from the shop anyway, and it just happened to be the night that the Rangers played the Seattle Mariners. Dan called on the way home from school with the great idea to go to the game. We got the kids ready, and headed down to the ballpark for a HOT evening of baseball fun. It was interesting going to a Mariners game in Texas. We went to one the first year we were down here and had a lot of fun cheering for our "real" home team. Over the past 3 years though, we have become Rangers fans! We were a little more timid in our cheering this time, being surrounded by Rangers fans. We didn't forget where our true loyalty is though, and luckily the Mariners won. I realize that Broden is under-represented at this game. He was too busy trying to grab the beer bottles that the guys sitting right next to us had in the cup holders to pose for pictures!