Breaking into Spring

This year we have started Spring Break the right way.  We headed to the beach, which was a great start, but it became even better when our friends came with us.  Since their plans were cancelled, the Buscos joined us at the beach.  It was a gorgeous day, the weather was sunny, and calm.  We spent the day playing volleyball, and riding the waves.  The waves were huge and powerful.  We didn't dare go out to where they were breaking, but they were coming in with enough force to catch them on a boogie board and go hurtling toward the shore long after they had crashed.  After playing and swimming all day, it was nice to just sit on the shore, watch the waves crash, listen to the rythmic sound of the ocean and just relax.  It was a fun day.

Engaged

This week, Maddie and Patrick Hodge became officially engaged.  We knew there were some discussions about this subject between them, but weren't sure of the timing of things.  Now it is official!  They are talking about having the wedding in early 2016 in Los Angeles.  The reaction here at home has been wide.  We are excited to be gaining a son/brother-in-law, but sad to be losing a daughter/sister (in a sense).  Allie is especially sad that her sister is not going to return home to live again.  Her only comfort is that after August, she will only have one brother to contend with instead of two!  I would post a picture, but I really don't have anything to post yet, as they are in Utah!

Pi Day

As some of you may know, our family has been celebrating Pi Day (3-14), the day of the first 3 digits of Pi,  for many years now.  A few years ago, we looked up "Super" Pi Day where the next two digits of Pi would be included in the date.  We were delighted to discover that it would be soon, in just a couple of years.  So the plans began many years ago, and finally came to a culmination yesterday.  To celebrate Super Pi Day, we made nine dessert pies, and two meal pies.  We had egg and sausage breakfast pies for breakfast.  We even pulled off the road to celebrate "Super-de-Dooper Pi Second", 9:26:53, which added the next 5 digits of pi.   We ate some apple pie and took a picture to celebrate the moment.  We had apple and blueberry pie for lunch (along with a subway sandwich).  We were supposed to have deep dish pizza pie for dinner, but due to an excessively long volleyball tournament day, we postponed the pizza pie until Sunday and just ate dessert pie for dinner.  We had sour cream apple, strawberry, cheesecake and raspberry cheesecake, mint oreo ice cream, and banana cream pie for dinner.  We finally rolled into bed around 11:00 with full and happy tummies.  We determined that the mint oreo ice cream was easily a favorite, and the raspberry cheesecake a surprise favorite.  Really, they were all excellent pies and we felt that "Super" Pi Day had been celebrated properly.

Whose at BYU?

Back in November, Jayd applied to BYU in Idaho and Provo.  We heard back from the Idaho campus a few weeks later, but Provo takes a little longer.  After an agonizing 4 months of waiting, we have finally heard back from BYU Provo Campus.  Jayd was accepted!!!  We are so excited that he will be attending school in Provo where he will be close to his sister, Maddie, who is currently a student there, and his grandparents.  He is excited because there is volleyball there.  He is already looking forward to attending the games in the Smith Fieldhouse.  He watches so many of the games on TV, he feels like he has already been there!

My True Love

I spent Valentine's Day with my true love this year.....volleyball.  One of the tournaments where I regularly play happened to be on Valentine's Day.  Since we don't normally do much to celebrate valentine's day, Jeff was willing to let me go, and even willing to fly back from Connecticut to be with the kids while I was gone (luckily, his testing was delayed, so he was in town over the weekend).  Is that true love or what?  My friends and I had a great weekend.  We played board games and laughed until we were crying.  We played hard in the tournament, and wound up getting 3rd place, complete with bronze medals and all.  It was a really fun weekend, and I am grateful that my sweetheart let me go.

Soaking In Style

Ever since we have moved into this house, more than 10 years ago, there has been a beautiful jacuzzi tub in the master bathroom.  The previous owners added the tub, but never completed the construction.  The area surrounding the tub was just drywall.  After many years of pleading from our children to use the bathtub, we have finally done the work to tile around it and make it functional!  We hand selected travertine tiles to place around the tub.  It was a lot of work, mostly because of the shape, we could not use a single intact tile, every tile had to be cut.  But it was worth it.  The bathtub looks great.  The kids aren't really that thrilled though, they are way past the age of playing in the tub....maybe some nieces and nephews will enjoy it some day.

Cars Land

About two years ago, California Adventure opened Cars Land, a new section of the park that was entirely dedicated to the Cars movie.  Since we had season passes during most of the construction, but not during the grand opening, I was very interested in seeing the new area.  I happened to have some tickets, so we went in December, of 2013, to go on the new ride, Radiator Springs Racers.  We went straight there upon entering the park, only to discover that it wasn't working!!  I was sorely disappointed, so I complained to customer service.  Since the park had only been open 10 minutes, they gave us free passes to come back on a day of our choice.  I was quite impressed by their generosity.  We went back last week, and were thrilled to find that the racers were up and running.  We went on the ride 3 times.  First, we went on a tour of Radiator Springs and shared in Lightening McQueen's adventures.  Then we raced with another car around the track (by the way, the car on the right always wins!).  It was great fun.
Also, since we waited to come back, we were able to attend Frozen Fun!  There were a variety of activities.  We met the princesses, Ana and Elsa.  Gabe decided to be the photographer so he wasn't in the picture, but he was willing to take a picture with Olaf.  We went to the Snow Fest where they had real snow for playing, and even a sled run.  Despite Gabe's protests, we even went to the Frozen Sing-A-Long for a quick rendition of the plot along with all of the songs.  I even caught Gabe singing during Olaf's song.
We went on nearly every ride in the park, including California Screaming and Hollywood Tower of Terror twice.  We had a great day together reliving old memories and making a few new ones.