Link # 2 for Breast Cancer Awareness

http://ww5.komen.org/

Link #1 for Breast Cancer Awareness

October 1st

http://www.cdc.gov/Features/BreastCancerAwareness/

Cheergirl's cake.........

Cheergirl is practicing her husband catching skills......

Friday Night Lights..........

It is that time of year again. This year cheergirl is a varsity cheerleader so this is officially her first varsity game.......

I loved this picture, the sky came out so pretty. It just screams Friday night High School.Hey Band! Let me see you get down, let me see you get down!

Ice, Ice, Baby......

Dinner is served.............

While daddy and pizza boy were out hunting last week they added a gourmet item too their catch of the day. Daddy and pizza boy were the only ones to eat this, although origami girl did take one nibble. Cheer girl and myself were too smart.

Fashion Show......

Cheergirl's team participated in a fashion show at the local hot spot in our city. Before the show began her team got to perform. Unfortunately from my spot I couldn't get the whole team so I just had to aim the camera at the section where cheergirl was.

Camping August 2009..........

Better late than never on this post I guess. We went camping up at Wood Canyon Lake last weekend and it was one of our best trips.

I really needed to get away. Lots of stress on the homefront including the death of our neighbor.

This trip was pretty much a last minute decision. When it comes to vacations camping is up there with one of the most frugal things you can do as long as you already have all the equipment you need.

We left for our trip on Thursday afternoon and arrived back home on Sunday before noon. I had totally forgotten that Friday was my birthday until hubby pulled a flowering weed from the ground and wished me happy birthday. We wanted to arrive home pretty early on Sunday since Monday was the first day of school and we wanted the girls to be well rested and ready to go.

It took us a while to decide if we would be going fishing on this trip. Originally I said no, let's just relax and sleep in and take it easy. We finally changed our mind and decided to go ahead and buy two day fishing licenses because some peeps in the family were afraid they would get bored.


Thursday night we took it easy but Friday morning we were up bright and early and bushy tailed at 4 AM (you can decide yourself how much sarcasm is in that sentence). I made a nice hot breakfast and we headed off. I usually don't make a hot breakfast before heading out for fishing as we like to be at our spot when the sun rises, so cooking this time did delay us a bit.

Friday morning we went to Willow Springs Lake. Ugh it was windy and cold. We didn't see any fish jumping like we usually do at our regular spot at Woods Canyon but we hung out for a few hours anyways. It was a total bust, no nibbles at all. As well as fishing being a bust cheergirl was suffering. She didn't sleep too well and when she got up (at 4 AM) her neck popped and she ended up being in pain all day Friday and early Saturday.

While at the lake Friday morning cheergirl didn't even put her pole in the water. She instead found a nice soft rock (more sarcasm inserted) curled up and slept. Not even her Twilight book could get her attention and that is saying something.

Darling big brother, always ready, willing and able to antagonize.Message for the ducks ........"Go ahead, make my day"
A couple morning shots at Willow Springs Lake

Get lost mom..... Sleeping beauty has awakenGuess I was wrong, she did pop her fishing line in the water for a bit....Friday afternoon at camp is spent, reading, eating, napping, and target practicing. No injuries reported. Friday late afternoon, headed back to our favorite fishing spot at Woods Canyon Lake. Victory was mine. Momma proved to be the fishing queen, I caught the one and only fish that evening.
Can you see the choppy waters in the pictures from Friday? Ugh is was such a terrible windy day. Almost a deal breaker, it wouldn't have taken much to convince us to pack and head back home. But we persevered......

Saturday morning we awoke to a much more calm day thank goodness. We again woke at 4 AM and I hustled to make breakfast burritos to take with us to the lake. We arrived at our favorite spot at Woods Canyon lake just as the sun was rising.


Look how still and calm the water is...

Origami Girl, kicking back and enjoying her burrito.

Cheergirl was fascinated by these two oak trees smack dab in the middle of all the pines. She liked the way they leaned towards each other making somewhat of an arch and feels it would be a great place for a wedding. No more pictures of the fish being caught, just a couple pics when we got home. Drumroll please. Momma ended up being the master fisherwoman this trip around. I caught THREE fish, the two biggest were mine, and then one of the smaller ones. I also reeled in origami girls fish as she was busy reading. Hubby brought in a fish and pizza boy brought in a fish. The debate is still out on who's fish was bigger. Poor Cheer girl, didn't catch a thing. By Saturday afternoon she was feeling much better and the kink in her neck was almost gone so she was eager to go back to our fishing spot again. Alas we had no luck on Saturday evening, not even a nibble. I think we were at the lake a little too early, should have waited a little closer to sunset.

One more side note....... Saturday afternoon hubby and Pizzaboy drove down to get water and chit chatted with the attendant about fishing. The attendant stated that people were reporting very poor fishing results, nobody was catching anything. HMMMMM, guess I was lucky or skilled.

Geocities is closing...

so my solar cooking site will soon no longer exist.

It took a bit of work and I am finally done moving my site over to a blogger page.

http://solarcookinginarizona.blogspot.com/

Cheer Girl has returned.....

Well Cheer Girl made it home safe and sound on Saturday. She has had bits and pieces to share with us but for the most part has slept a lot. She is simply exhausted, so much so that I am a bit concerned. I am thinking spinach served with liver and onions would be a great meal until she feels more like herself.

There were a couple very exciting happenings at camp.

The first exciting happening is that Cheer Girl was nominated for the All American Team. During camp the representatives from NCA keep their eyes open for girls that catch their eye and nominate them. The girls tried out on Friday night. Cheer Girl didn't make it but she was already in a state of exhaustion and had no voice. Kudos to her for trying anyways. If she had made it she would have been going on a trip to Hawaii and a few other places.

The second exciting thing is that Cheer Girl's varsity squad won a trophy. Out of about 30+ different squads only five trophies were given. By winning the trophy they have to option to go to Florida and participate in the Walt Disney World Christmas Day Parade. Kinda of scary thinking of one of my kids being all the way on the other side of the states but I have already talked to the coach and I am confident with her plans. It is her goal to have one adult chaperon for every 2-3 girls. Now comes the fundraising. The girls will be working their hiney's off the next few months trying to raise money for the trip. They will be learning what it means to work for something you really want.

New Name Assignments.......

Wow sixteen days since my last post, shame on me.

Henceforth new names will be assigned to the characters on this blog. Oldest child, son, 18 year old creature from the planet Talkbackalot, shall now be called Pizza Boy. Middle child, daughter, 16 year old creature from the planet Textalot shall now be called Cheer Girl. Youngest child, daughter, 12 year old creature from the planet Moodyashell, shall now be called Origami Girl.

So Pizza Boy has now graduated from high school and is working. You guessed it.. at a pizza joint. He has already learned that there is a big difference from sitting at a desk for 7 hours compared to standing in a kitchen for 7 hours shaping pizzas, tossing wings, salads, etc. etc. He has been exhausted.... and usually quiet after his long day, which is a good thing. Pizza Boy has officially now opened his first checking acount, now he has to learn the joys of budgeting and trying to save for a car.

Cheer Girl, well we packed her off to cheerleading camp yesterday. This is her first time away from home. She has been to a few sleepovers with friends over the years but never any extended stays away with family or friends. Soooooo Cheer Girls highschool squad rode a schoolbus for 4 1/2 hours yesterday to their destination. I can only imagine what a miserable ride that was. They had been told they were getting a charter bus, no idea what happened with that. So here are all these cheerleaders, at least 40 girls, who each have a large suitcase, sleeping bag/bedding, and stuffed carry on bags. All of that stuff that would have fit nicely into a large compartment under a charter bus now has to be crammed into a small compartment under a school bus and in the back seats inside the school bus. I have been informed by Cheer Girl that the drive up to camp was pretty miserable too. As they climbed mountains the air conditioning had to be turned off on the bus, imagine, hot Arizona, hot sticky seats, two girls to a seat, no air, ick! So they finally get to the college where camp is being held and they arrive at their dorm rooms. The girls are on the fourth floor, no elevators, so they get to lug all their heavy gear up 3 flights of stairs. They get to their little rooms, they will be two girls to a room, and they find the rooms have no air conditioning. Not sure of the logic on that, this is still Arizona. Guess they figured nobody would ever stay in those rooms in the summertime. Luckily the cute little dorm rooms do have refrigerators so they can chill or freeze their water bottles. And frozen water bottles do come in very handy since Cheer Girls roommate has already been injured...... sigh fingers crossed everyone that Cheer Girl stays safe and unharmed because she is prone to being a bit of a clutz.

Now a bit on Origami Girl. It is a bit harder to come up with a paragraph on this kid. She isn't involved with any sports, no special interests except for origami and she is actually getting pretty good at that. She whiles away the summer hours, computer time, nintedo ds, and she is quite talented, sometimes she can do both of those at the same time. She did state yesterday that she will be happy when school starts back up, poor thing is bored. School does start in just a few weeks so that should make all of us happy.