Hot fun in the Summer time....

So as you all know my kids are involved in whatever passes across our paths. Baseball, Soccer, Basketball, church production and now swim team. Which I thought would be great. Gabe had lessons when he was 5 and Abby is self taught. But they are both self motivated so I knew they would be fine. As a matter of fact when I signed them up they told me it was the best way for them to learn to swim. So we started with our first meet on June 3rd. Gabe did well, he came in 3rd in his heat but Abby was terrified of how large the pool was and how deep (5 1/2 feet). Now mind you we had to beat her to keep her out of the 8 foot diving well last Summer. So last Wednesday she had to have a "swim buddy" help her in the pool and hold on her until she knew she was going to be able to touch. Our team (Sherwood Park Sharks) won the meet last week by 101 points! This week we swam against the Lily Flagg Cows (LOL) I had been giving Abby pep talks since last Wednesday hoping she would be able to go by herself. She swims against 4,5, and 6 year olds and she was the only one that had a swim buddy. Tuesday I took her to swim practice and she worked out with her kick board and when it came time to practice her dive in she stood and watched everyone and finally told her coach, "I know that it is silly, but I am afraid I will drown if I dive in here in this deep water." So he explained she was going to have to do it. But he didn't break her and I didn't say anything. On the way home she informed me that next Summer she doesn't want to be on swim team. I felt horrible I wanted her to enjoy it so much.

So this week we prepared for our meet. I bought posters and one of the girls at worked worked with Abby and Gabe and they were terrific! Abby was very excited to go. She loves the team suit and wearing a swim cap...but I think it may also have to do with the concessions and the bake sale that we have at all of our home meets.

I missed their warm up and when Abby come to dry off she said that she had swam by herself but I wasn't sure, and I didn't know if she had inched herself down the ropes or what. So we got our supper and sat down to wait on our events to be called (13, 22, and 88! it was a LONG night)We watched our buddy Harrison fly with his amazing backstroke and then we all waited for Abby's event. (a quick back story there are 140 kids that swim on our team but we have a clique of 6 kids that have played baseball/soccer with us. So we have a cheer squad of at anyone time of at least 12 adult members and 3 younger sibling strong.) They lined up the little girls and our little cheer squad got into position. I could see Abby trying to get some adult's attention and they were dismissing her and telling her to get ready. Finally SOMEONE listened and I could see them making concessions for her. They blew the warning whistle and she slid into the pool in the dreaded "deep end" ALONE. Then they shot the starting gun and they were off...there she went as hard as her little body would carry her ALONE in the DEEP WATER. For the whole 25 meters! She did it! (She would tell you she did have to rest on the ropes 2 times) She did it! All by herself!! All of us adults were going BANANAS! You would have thought Michael Phelps himself was swimming the last lap of his 400m IM! We were on our knees screaming "GO ABBY! SWIM!! YOUR DOING IT" I yanked her out of the water when she touched the wall and soaked myself as I squeezed the life out of her! I was so proud of her I could have bust and she was smiling and panting! You could just see how proud she was. All of our friends surrounded her and hugged her and high fived her! It was amazing! She came in 5th place which is 1 place improvement from last week!

Now not to leave out my oldest I want you to know that he has been a fish since he was born. He has always, always loved to swim. Swimming is Gabe's thing! It is all him. He loves it. He has improved since last week as well. He came in third last week in his 8 and under 25 meter freestyle. He was fast but he wasn't sure of himself. This week he was ready! He knew what was going on and he was helping his buddies so they were where they needed to be. He was entered in 25m freestyle and a 100m freestyle relay. It clicked this week for him and he flew! He was several strokes in the lead until the end and he slowed as his stamina gave way and the other little boy pulled ahead. But he improved his time and improved with a second place finish.

I love Summer! Swim team is fun even if the meets do last forever!! I couldn't have had a better time than I did last night. Good friends, wet kids and lots of excitement! I LOVE IT!!!

Moms...

My friend Hillary over at Other Mother posted about the show Miss O put on for the masses yesterday. I have to admit that I haven't kept up with Oprah in the last I don't know almost 10 years. But I do catch tidbits via the MamMaw. But apparently yesterday Oprah had Moms on. Moms telling their dirty secrets. I am sure that Oprah finds the brutal honesty of a Mom shocking and funny. I am sure that as some watched they tisked tisked everything these Moms told. But being a Mom isn't for the faint of heart. It is kinda like the old Army commercial "I do more before 6am than you do all day." Well, let me tell you that is the truth. There are lots of us out there "being all we can be". And we don't get to play in cool camo and have someone pat us on the back and thank us for serving our country.

I mean honestly that is what we are doing. It is a Mom that can make or break this world. Hello if Norman Bates' mother had taken good care of him maybe there would have never been that crazy shower seen. Sybil was all of who she was because.....of her Mother! See if we don't do our jobs right the world will seriously go right down the drain. The hand that rocks the cradle and all you know....

No,really hug a Mom today. They deserve it.

Not Me Monday...

Welcome to Not Me! Monday! This blog carnival was created by MckMama. You can head over to her blog to read what she and everyone else have not been doing this week.

Over on the Frozen Tundra MckMama has "Not Me Mondays" every week. I love them...It is a time to be brutally honest with everyone and clear the air. Start the week out right and let you know all the things I most certainly didn't do last week....so here are todays "Not Me's"


I most certainly didn't forget to give Pudge her daily dose of maintenance antibiotics for at least 4 days straight so now she was whiny and pitiful this morning because her ears are hurting her again. I would never do such a thing I keep meds right on schedule!

I didn't leave my darling husband all days Saturday to do the mountain of laundry in our house and take care of Frick, Frack and Pudge on a rainy Saturday while I ran errands that had really nothing to do with my family. Only to come home and announce I wasn't cooking supper that we could grab something and go to the MIL's so that I could use her sewing machine. Then again leaving him to deal with all three in a house that really has nothing for them to do...I would never I am a terrific wife and always consider my husband and what his wants and needs.

I also didn't leave him with the same mountain of laundry yesterday after church while Pudge and I took a 3 hour nap. No not me...I do laundry every evening and keep it up so that there isn't a back up. There are not 5 baskets of clean laundry just waiting to be put away!

Okay there we go, now do you have the courage to be brutally honest???

Bill, Barb, Nikki and Margie Marry me!!!

I love the show Big Love. Bill Paxton is WONDERFUL. (Now I know that this is not a true representation of the Mormon Church. I have very close friends that are members of the Mormon Church so yes, Mom Trevino I know that isn't how it really is. But I love this show.) For those of you who don't have HBO I will give a brief summary of the show. It is based on Bill and Barb who are married and sealed in the temple. Bill grew up on the compound of Juniper Creek (picture Warren Jeffs and his followers) so after they were married they decided that living "the principle" is what they wanted for their family. They married Nikki who is the daughter of the prophet and Margene. Bill has three houses right next door to each other and they share a backyard. All 3 women have children by Bill. All kinds of craziness goes on. Most of it surrounds Nikki and all the fruits on the compound. I LOVE IT! I am almost convinced that I would love to have sister wives. I mean 3 best friends living together taking care of their children. It couldn't be better! LOL

Here we go again....

So I wonder how long it takes most people to get their blog up and rolling?? I am hoping that it takes most people several tries. Because to be honest this has been the biggest pain in my tookus that I have ever dealt with. I totally have a block when it comes to certain things and apparently html coding is one of those things. I just don't get it. Oh well, I have decided to leave the coding to the professionals. So here I am blogging again. Finally! I have thought and pondered what kind of blog to start. There are recipe blogs that I love. I just love reading the tidbits over at Tip Junkie, I adore MckMama and her MSC, we keep up with Kelly and Harper everyday at PGA. I just couldn't decide where to go with this blog. Several of the girls at church keep their families updated through their blogs. I really couldn't find a path. Finally, I decided that was it, there isn't a method to my madness in anything else I do so why pin myself down to one thing. Here is where I will lay it all down. Where I will "expose my soul"! Where I will force readers to be apart of my rants and review. I will subject you to photos of my 3 beautiful children and stories about every little thing they do. So here I am tap tap taping away on my laptop. Remember keep your feet and hands inside the car at all times, enjoy the ride....