Visiting Home

Saturday, we arrived and it felt like forever til we found my dad picking us up. Then we got a wonderful enchilada dinner at my mom's house, Adam's family joined us. It was nice to finally meet Mia, she was beautiful. It was great to see all my nieces and nephews and how beautifully they've grown. Isabella has especially wrapped us around her finger with her enormous brown eyes and funny faces.
Sunday, we got out really late, had Village Inn, visited my mom's, then went to Adam's house. He and Kim made us a very nice family dinner, then we dropped Xai back at mom's because he had school the next morning.
Monday, we started the day with a visit to Mom's while the Adam's kids came for the morning. Next, we grabbed Sonic for lunch on our way to visit Kara & Lauren. We had a sweet visit and got to see how much Lauren's grown, Kara's tiny baby bump, and the girls loved hanging out with Maggie. It was exciting to see they're new property and to imagine all the cool things they will do there with their beautiful family-so cool.
Tuesday, was pretty special. I went and got all the kids from Mom's (which took forever), ran to Nobbies to get a balloon bouquet for Ari and all went back to billetting to surprise her with it. Then soonafter we went out to the Pizza Factory to celebrate with Owen and his family. Today he changed his name to Owen Dennis DeLaCruz and went through court to be adopted by Adam. It was pretty neat that we were here for that. Afterwards we spent the day at his house had a bbq dinner and cake. We sang happy DeLaCruz day to him and happy birthday to Ari ;)
Wednesday, we went to Borsheims and later on, Mitch and I got to see Fatima for a late dinner. It was so good to get to Kona, I've missed those avocado eggrolls and Cosmos like you wouldn't believe. It was great to see her and I hated imagining her not being in Omaha the next time we're there. I'm gonna miss her, but I'm excited for all the new ventures she has in store.
Thursday, Lili was gone all day..we went out with Aaron that night. We had M's pub then out to the Prestige lounge, I had a creme brulee martini, yum.
Friday, all the kids were finally home for their puney spring break and had a blast together. They put on a little show, made us lunch and spent the afternoon at Skate City. Kara & Lauren even joined us to visit for a little while. That night Mitch and I went to Shawn's birthday party and he FINALLY got to see everyone, which was very cool.
Saturday, M, I, Mom & Sara went to HuHot for lunch and I had seconds for the first time..mmm Then Mitch & I went to Gretna and visited with Karan & Rich, which was so nice & relaxing.
Lastly, we finished our visit to NE with another family dinner and goodbyes at mom & dad's, then we stayed the night at the Hilton to catch the shuttle to our very early flight. We loved this visit.

We're on our way back to the O! I've been trying to think of anything I need to finish up before we leave. I've got Marley situated, but I need to give him a bath and clip his claws. I've paid the bills, I only bought a few groceries to make meals of the food we have left in the house and even a few travel size toiletries since we'll be hotelling it while we're there.

I am excited to see all my people. I wish I didn't have such a gut on me and that I didn't love to eat so much now..dangit, that will be embarassing..oh well ..see which is why I have the problem now. I miss everybody, especially My DADDY. Liana can hardly stand it anymore..I don't blame her. Its so hard to be patient when your little.

The worst part is packing..I don't wanna, but I'll be getting started here after this. Especially with laundry for kids..its like as soon as you declare it done, there's a whole new load. I only hate packing because you have to pick so many outfits and for so many ladies. Its hard enough for me to pick the one I'm wearing daily!

Anyways..boring ..not much to say..HERE WE COME OMAHA!

kinderqueen

I'm so excited for Lili, her name finally came up last Friday for Queen of the Week. Basically this little person is the teachers helper for the week and gets focused to learn more about. The entire class learns to spell their name, draws a portrait of them, she gets to bring show and tell each day and she gets to make a poster about herself (by the way she says she wants to be veterinarian now), her favorite things and about her family. At the end of her reign the entire class does a cheer spelling her name and it just seems like it makes them each feel so very special.
Monday, she took her tiger Rajah and said the class was amazed how it growled and moved. She was proud to say that the person that liked it the most was her teacher, Mrs. S. and to top it all off it was her turn to bring snacks so she took green sugared shamrock cookies from the bakery.
Tuesday, she took her tiger & cub figurines. They asked her lots of questions about what other animals she had. So many the teacher let Lili decide whose questions she would answer.
Wednesday, she's was mad there was no school for PM Kindergarteners, but since she came with a bad cold its a good thing she was home.
Thursday, she was still pretty sick but insisted she HAD to go, she couldn't miss a day of being queen AND the kids were able to bring a teddy bear to school today and there was no way she was wanting to miss that. She showed her Air Force bear she won at the DaddyDDance. She said everyone said he was really cool and all the boys wanted him.
Friday I was there to volunteer and it looks like Lili got her wish to stay on til Monday at least. I got to see her do the calendar and show her cat, but it was a fast and busy day.
Monday I asked her teacher if I could come in the few minutes before class end to catch the cheer, it was cool. I wondered if any other parents have known about this and gotten to see it.

Ariana's Play

Ariana is in her school play. She even got to be one the cowgirls as she had hoped for. She has been going to rehearsals every week since January and the time has finally come. This week has been busy with dress rehearsals and lots of practice. She has explained that the show is a collaboration of lots of different plays put together as some type of more of a musical show..but that her songs she is in are from Oklahoma. Its all very hush hush as a surprise for parents, family and schoolmates. The first run is for the school on Thursday morning. Its exciting because they use a high school's Performing Arts Center and that first show will be a field trip for the whole elementary school. It hasn't been fun going across town every day for rehearsals on mommy's part, but the Center is really nice (its actually the same place they had their dance recitals).
Thursday is opening night, and Lili, Mitch and I will see it together. We are excited to see the big surprise.

We saw the play all three times! It was really impressive, they did an amazing job! Ariana even had a little solo in her group's song and she did great! The best part was how much fun they seemed to be having. It looked like a blast. It sucked that no cameras or video were allowed, because of course they'll be selling photos and videos. These are a few pictures of everybody in their show t-shirts.

spring ahead

This weekend is Mitch's last chance to get in as much studying as physically possible before he tests on Tuesday the 10th. He's been working really hard towards it and has even taken time off to get in more time to study.
I got the girls out the house by 11:30 this morning and we stayed out til like 5:30, trying to give him a quiet house. We had fun! Ari had a short play rehearsal, so Lili and I hung out nearby at Kmart, then we picked her up and went towards Olympia. We went downtown to check out the toy shop we had seen. It was very cool and we were in there for what felt like hours. Even I was down on the floor playing and getting into EVERYTHING! Lili picked out tiger & cub figurines and Ari picked out a lioness & cub. I couldn't believe how cool the little store was-it was actually hard to leave-and I NEVER feel that way about toy stores. We were especially lucky that the bad weather had the store nice and not so busy. Next, we stopped and got them Happy Meals cuz they're big into the little pet shop toys that are in them right now ;) then we hung out at the mall for a while. We got smoothies, we spent a little time at the playing, climbing thing and I scanned a few stores that I'd like to explore when they maybe aren't with me, they get bored so understandably easy.
Since I realize we were gone so long, I'm surprisingly proud that I didn't really spend hardly anything today. I'm glad to have worn the girls out so that they had no problem getting to sleep with rush to bed for the clock's spring ahead.

heart

although this place seems to be abandoned, I think I still want to write occassionally because I know I forget too easily to not give myself some place to look back on. Its probably good for me to go here.
Friday, the girls had their school parties and had lots of sweets to show for it. I had hid chocolates hearts in Mitch's front seat under his lunch and a big chocolate heart in his back seat. When I came out from Lili's class there was a navi system in my 4runner-very cool. So then we got home I gave Mitch the last gift I had gotten for him, a gift certificate for a massage at Massage Envy.
Saturday was Valentines day, Mitch had roses delivered for us. I had these beautiful pink (on the outside) red (on the inside) roses. The girls got three yellow roses each with a stuffed animal (that they each went gaga over), they were all very cool. Otherwise we were pretty lazy, low-key throughout the day then we had reservations for dinner at a japanese restaurant we hadn't tried yet, Fujiyama, which turned out to be incredibly delish. Sunday we were just lazy and stayed in from the cold.
Today, we went exploring a little to try out the nav system and found a ferry to cross to Anderson island, which we also discoverd has absolutely nothing on it but houses and a school. So we let the kids play on the playground for a little and then crossed back over to get back home.
Mitch took this whole week off, and the girls have one more day. Tomorrow we are going to Seattle to go to the Lion King, the broadway play. We're all excited and looking forward to it!

mommy power!

I found both the girls' dresses last night and did so at amazing prices! I went to all seven major retail stores in Lacey and picked them from two different stores to get them to somewhat match or at least coordinate together. I ended up with white and black polka dots. So today Ari's dress got taken to the seamstress cuz it was wide across her ribs and she needed shoes. Now I just wish I could find them some little sweaters or something cuz they're both strappy dresses.. I'm not having any luck. The couple I did find were ugly or ridiculously too much dinero.
I got them ruffley socks, and I found a cool aqua colored headband set that came with a couple other silver glittered ones, so I thought Mitch could wear that aqua color shirt. I wished I could come with something more fancy, but that ended up being all I could find in that color for him.. I hope they look nice when it all comes together. Its not even that I want them to be as fancy as last year, we're so grateful that they even all get to go to the Daddy Daughter Dance together. If Mitch had come home when he was expecting to, they wouldn't have even gotten to ;')