The Scott Kesten Family Adventures

fair trade

2012-02-15T17:34:00.000-08:00

a dozen overpriced golf balls for a dozen overpriced cupcakes..... sounds good to me. hope you had a great valentine's day and your children have gotten off their sugar high!

Two Cups Please!

2012-02-12T20:15:00.000-08:00

had another busy week at work .. luckily, it ended on a positive note and reminded me that perseverance pays off and my OCD tendencies are good for something. i was also happy to see the new ASCRS/ASOA program for the annual meeting. excited to be presenting again this year. unfortunately, the meeting is in Chicago so no fun trip attached to it :( .. next year, San Fran

we had another snow fall friday and i faced a really long commute downtown for a baby sprinkle. after some contemplating, i opted to drop off the gift early downtown and get out before 5 o'clock traffic hit. proved to work out perfectly (as we missed the 2+ commute times my co-workers had) and had fun visiting with friends.. and their gummi bear and cashew treats!

saturday, scott had to go into work so josh and i tagged along. we walked michigan ave stopping at josh's favorite places (jamba, lego, disney, nike, yogurt). he had fun making cards for loved ones at disney, ordering our jamba ("make sure it is in two cups please!" -- said by josh hence the title)and picking out new shoes. after downtown, we took josh to another birthday party. josh loved the water park. sunday, was stake conference and we enjoyed being close up as it was so much more powerful than being in the back with all the distractions. josh did great job reading 20 chapters in the child's old testament (thank you ipad). this next week we prepare for joshua's birthday party.

past few days in caption form

2012-02-05T19:20:00.000-08:00


j had fun decorating his v-day box & 100 day of school poster. so cute to see your little one get excited about art. speaking of art... i helped a friend with her Save the Dates and can't wait to be her wedding day coordinator at Crystal Gardens

celebrated his buddies birthday that kicked off a string of bday parties in the next few months

Scott was able to get home early friday so we took advantage and went out to Maggianos for family night

josh loved the green beans, scott the steak and me .. the pasta!


Picked up a ton of new books after dinner. josh trying to read a Pokemon book before we left as he was having buyers remorse about WarHorse. I wouldn't let him change. was feeling crafty this weekend and made this little ipod holder. i have held onto this jcrew skirt for a long time (even though i don't wear it anymore) b/c i loved the fabric. happy to have put it into good use. we now have cubbies for josh's (i mean our) iPad and iTouch :) finished the weekend with Sunday Dinner with new friends in the ward. one of the couples have a son josh's age and fun to see them enjoy each others company.

2012-01-30T19:50:00.000-08:00

Started the week with lots of snow! Josh loved it but had to laugh as he is very cognizant of longer commute times and road conditions. on our way to sports play he said: "mommy, i wish i snowed a little more so no one would be out of the roads.. just us... that would be easier and safer in case we slid around" not sure how to take that in regards to his confidence in my driving.

josh with his afterschool friends. they are so sweet together

Loving the Snow

During the weekend, Scott was busy with work and school so josh and i kept ourselves busy: reading charlotte's web (halfway done), finished a painting, gym time, swimming and doing valentines... trying to train this little guy early the importance of being thoughtful, courteous and handwritten correspondence... i hope he remembers just a portion of the things i am trying to drill into his head. we also made a quick trip downtown to visit scott at work so i could work on some spreadsheets for him. Scott also didn't want me to mention that he made dean's list this past semester so i won't.

Valentines for his class

Piglet listening to charlotte's web

Tia and i at a warehouse sale... i might have went twice! :)


Loving his new hat fr Dottie (a friend of my grandmas)

staying warm

2012-01-24T08:36:00.000-08:00

we were hit with another snow storm this past weekend causing crazy commute times and ridiculous driving conditions. scott stayed at work late on friday trying to avoid the traffic but sadly, the traffic waited for him. josh and i have stayed warm and read charlotte's web waiting for daddy. i forgot how much i loved that book. it has been fun reading the classics with him. stuart little it next! saturday, scott had to meet with some clients for meetings but got out and played in the snow with josh. they had lots of fun and i managed to take these pics from our balcony with my paparazzi-like lens.. considering they were 150-200 feet away, i was pretty happy with pics.

josh and i also were outside to take some engagement pics for a friend. considering they are hiring a very high end photog for their wedding, i was flattered to take them and think they turned out cute.

that evening, scott and i went out for a date night with friends to Ted's Montana Grill. aside from the intense waiter, we had lots of fun. we hoped to make an appearance at this ugly sweater party (i even bought some awesome ugly sweaters) but sadly, we ran out of time. scott's had rhinestones, flames, skulls, broken hearts... it was pretty amazing and ugly! next time!

another winter week in the books. scott and i both taught sunday school to the different high school classes. i am hoping it will be a fun year with my crew. scott is much more of a scriptorian than myself so i am sure his lessons are superior than mine but i hope i make up for it in preparation. :)

first snow

2012-01-15T20:41:00.000-08:00

The craziness continued this week as my office "went live" with our new practice management system.... a few of us cried over it and i had enough conversations with Sunil in India (IT support) to last a lifetime. Luckily, we managed and survived the conversation... so far.

We were also hit with our first snow storm this week. Josh started a new sports program and because of the snow, he was the only one to show up! He still had fun and i liked the one-on-one hour he got with the new coach. Friday, had dinner with friends in the city and Saturday, helped a girlfriend with some wedding invitations while josh played outside with her kiddies. Love how kids seem to ignore the bone chilling temps while they are frolicking in the snow.

That evening, we had a date night in the glen with some friends. love good conversation and eats! Sunday we had Ward Conference. Looking forward to starting my new calling next week (Sunday School Teacher) and looking forward to studying The Book of Mormon with my high schoolers!

We also were able to book trips to: Cali, Jersey/NYC. Very excited and love having that carrot to dangle during those hard work weeks! This is will be josh's first time to Visalia and NYC. Looking forward to him seeing more of our beautiful country!! Cheers to another week!

its going to be a busy one

2012-01-08T19:10:00.000-08:00

2012 is going to be a busy year! Scott and i mapped out the trips and places we want to go and are excited for what is to come this year... this week was a blur getting back to reality. got home last weekend and found it hard to walk through O Hare and not think of Home Alone... and considering OHare uses the same decorations they used in the 80's, i don't think you can blame me.

great to have off monday for New Years. we cleaned up the house, regrouped and enjoyed lazy time as a family. this week began another conversion for my office which translates to another hailstorm for my life. the trainer that has been with us this past week has made my life fairly stressful and needless to say, i am ready for february and this conversion to be behind us.

josh was off this week and enjoyed being at lifetime. we also finished James and the Giant Peach and started Charlotte's Web. I have enjoyed reading the classics and didn't realize how many potty words Roald Dahl had in James. I made sure to take the pages with the potty words so i could some modifications. One pic of josh here as his new thing is sleeping with a stuffy in his shirt to ensure his mother doesn't take it from him. love it!

11 things each of us will remember for 2011

2012-01-01T21:26:00.001-08:00

... in no particular order ....

Nic's

san diego and sea world with family. shamu soft pretzel
annual solo trip with scott (plus larkins!) to mexico.free upgrade to suite!
official meltdown at work in may
presenting at my first national convention (will be presenting again in 2012)
being truly proud of scott for all he is doing to better our family and himself.
making trips to the temple a priority in my life
living it up in vegas thanks to jen
missing daddy at disneyworld... and making memories with josh.
making the most out of our triathlon weekends and golfing more hours with the family than racing
called to primary (for church) for the first time
being reminded how precious life is

J's

playing football with daddy
spending time together
reading james and the giant peach
visiting grandparents in ohio and utah
seeing mystere in vegas
going to animal kingdom at disneyworld in florida
doing ticket to read on the computer
going to san diego and seeing nathan and jacob (what up hellers!)
playing in the snow
going to lifetime fitness and playing with camp counselors
downloading new ipad apps

Scott's (yes, he actually participated... semi-willingly)

utah trips
new job with JPMorgan Chase
record snow in february
golf trips (utah and indiana)
mexico trip
passing the series 7
started the MBA program
staying home from disney to study for exam
watching and playing football with josh
second new job with JPMorgan Chase
fun family trips (sandusky, wisconsin, vegas, cleveland)

St George, Utah

2011-12-30T13:59:00.000-08:00

After running around in vegas for 3 days, we spent 4 days in St George resting/relaxing and Scott playing lots of golf. i think he got 4 rounds in total with Greg. Josh and I spent our days with Grandma and GiGi Taylor and got one day with Lani who flew down to spend the day with us! Here are some pics of our adventures. Great few days of relaxing, playing sequence and joshua quizzing us on country facts!

Dino Tracks Museum in St George

Waiting at Texas Roadhouse

Josh sleeping on his little cot and stuffed one of his stuffed animals down his shirt so we wouldn't steal it

Cafe Rio dinner with in laws, gigi and lani

View from outside the condo

St George Temple

On the drive back to Vegas to catch our flight

a very merry vegas christmas

2011-12-29T11:35:00.001-08:00

instead of being in chicago over the weekend and flying out on monday, we figured... why not spend christmas in vegas?! unconventional, yes... fun and memorable, double yes!

The trip was amazing. my friend was OVERLY gracious and hooked us up with so many perks (front row mystere tickets, tickets to mandalay bay shark reef exhibit and mirage's dolphin and secret garden, free dinners, amazing rate for our suite, seinfeld tickets and golf for scott). she has vegas in the palm of her hand and not only was thankful for the deals and cutting lines but more importantly, the chance we had to spend time together on Christmas! it was so much fun!

{sidenote: scott and i have randomly reconnected with jen when we were dating 9ish years ago on the Old Strip at like 2 am. He was wearing an OSU shirt and she said something and we recognized each other. totally random! so happy we did though as we have kept in touch over the years and i am so proud of all of accomplishments!}

instead of long poorly written paragraphs, i thought a picture story would be easier on the mind. however, beware---- lots of pictures! ... and yes, scott and i packed poorly so we are wearing the same three things over and over.

scott finally reading devil in the white city

Korean's have arrived

One of our bathrooms (other had shower)

hanging out in the room

Dinner with Jen at the TI Steakhouse- j slept the whole time due to the time change.

Mirage


Venetian- J was fascinated with the gondola's but when we finally caved and said we would go, he didn't want to.

Christmas Morning- too lazy to hold the phone!

Bellagio


Tiffany Love

family photo attempt

nevermind.. just scott and j

After Front Row Mystere. Amazing way to spend Christmas Night together

at City Center


walking on the strip

We saw Freddy Couples at Caesar's Shoppes

jen at the dolphin habitat and lion secret garden

picking up tix for Seinfeld {photo by josh}

at Sugar Factory where the sell overpriced lollypop holders


M&M Factory with Leslie

Burberry Love

VIP Hospitality Lounge Love

Meeting "the situation" at the airport (he was very kind and sweet to josh btw)

"our christmas"

2011-12-27T08:58:00.000-08:00

as we were in vegas for christmas, we decided on thursday to be "our christmas". josh was so excited to hear that his countdown to christmas was shortened and couldn't wait for thursday to come. wednesday, josh and i headed to museum campus to meet up with out of town friends.

Josh dressed up for his "dress up" school day

i was able to get all of them in for free (5 total, score another point for the field membership!) and we roamed around and saw the highlights of the museum. got to see an engagement in the hall of gems which was super sweet. afterwards, we thought about doing zoo lights but with us leaving in a few days, felt like we got our fix and headed home.

thursday, after work, we did "our christmas". josh enjoyed opening all his gifts from loved ones around the country and then playing with his toys till it was time for bed. it was about as low key christmas as they come but still special and memorable.

friday, we put in our last day of work and then went to have dinner with the Whites again. love their entire family and crazy to think i have know tina and lance for over 10 years. so happy we have kept in touch! josh showed off his saleman abilities and made paula buy stack the states for her ipad. very cute seeing josh play with his little girlfriends. such a great week leading up to Christmas.

Joy to the World

2011-12-23T21:52:00.000-08:00

Hope you have a wonderful holiday and new year. Here are copies of our holiday cards...
Version 1 (both sides) and 2 (just the front). Which one did you get??? Love you all!

Holiday Parties Galore!

2011-12-18T15:58:00.000-08:00

Week was a blur.... Thursday, josh and i went downtown and hung out on the magmile while scott was wrapping up work. we enjoyed hot chocolate and talking about state facts (that is his new thing) while we waited for daddy. i love spending time with my sidekick. once scott was done with work, we dropped josh off with a friend. he spent the evening watching Arthur Christmas while scott and i rubbed elbows with his co-workers and their girlfriends. it was a nice evening getting to know scott's colleagues who see him more than i do. i am grateful he has a good set up and networking connections.

Team CPC: Chase Private Client at Michigan Ave

Ben, Scott and Brian (the two advisors he works for)

Scott and I. note, coke tastes just as yummy in a white wine glass

Friday was my office party. there were 24 of us at the party and we now have 19 employees. it is amazing how big we have become. we really have a great group of people and i love working and managing this crew... most of the time. :) Our party was at pinstripes and we did bocce first and then family style dinner.. the food was perfect. i had some fun games (name that logo and did a little special employee nomination vote). everyone had a great time. i did my annual poem to the docs (which has become a fun way of thanking them while also roasting them at the same time). ended the evening with gift exchanges and pictures. Such a fun night. (ignore my wet hair please)

nora and us on the bocce court

scott and brown bocce-ing it up

jo, sarah and i ... and funny gorla

part of the crew

girls with high school adam... kid from church that works after school

Fab Four

Dr Young and Tony with a overexposed me

More of the CGC Crew

Saturday, a brief office trip while Scott helped a family move and then we had some quality family time watching movies, shopping and had josh wrap his first present completely unassisted. (that was fairly hard to watch) but he was very excited to pick out a gift for daddy, use a gift card he got and wrap it for him. Sunday, was the last class with my primary class which was bittersweet. I had them right up a review of their favorite moments, what they learned and how they hope to be better. We spent the rest of the class making picture frames and then wrapped them. Fun last class. Finished church with tithing settlement and then Scott went to Harvey's college graduation. Scott is such a good friend to Harvey.

Scott and Harvey at his Graduation

We plan for this week to fly by as well. Hope to see some college friends and celebrate the season with josh's buddies (and their mom's!) before we head out to vegas/st george utah!

2011-12-14T08:30:00.000-08:00

josh enjoyed some time with my boss' dog this past weekend.

he threw the frisbee and kicked the ball with hank. it was pretty adorable.

"you always blog on sunday night!"

2011-12-12T11:55:00.000-08:00

... "i don't know what to do with myself b/c you haven't' updated yet"....

I had dinner with a friend tonight and she said this to me... i didn't even know that she read my blog and aside from getting warm fuzzies while filtering out the sarcasm... i felt i should probably update with a few random noteables.

not much happened this weekend. scott continued to study for finals (his last one is tonight!) and josh and i laid low. we wrapped presents, dinner with friends and i worked during the evenings when scott studied.
my job has been fairly hectic lately..... prepping for another conversion (Erx, Meaningful Use and a new Practice Management system to be specific). i have hopes for a smooth transition as the last one about did me in!
tonight, josh noted that he has 8 gifts under the tree and asked me when the 9th gift will appear... i didnt get why he thought he was getting a 9th. i asked him and he responded, "well, you said i get 9 and the 10th goes to africa for water".... WOW! someone actually listens to me! i guess i need to get him a 9th. luckily, the only thing josh wanted was some beyblades and they were cheap. the other gifts are just notions and some shirts... how long will it be this easy?
we did have a family night at the movies to see the muppets. i loved it.... and i especially loved hearing joshua signing... "am i a man??!!! or a muppet of a man..." in the shower sunday.
here is a pic from the weekend. josh and i are playing nindragos.. i seriously have no idea how to play and the other pic is for bev who prompted this post!

most wonderful time of the year...

2011-12-04T20:16:00.001-08:00

love feeling the christmas spirit! we are definitely in full swing after this weekend. i got a new-fake tree as we upgraded from a 3' to a 5'. coming from a family where we did 12'+ real trees, i have no expectation of replicating that but just want a tree that fits all our ornaments. as i have the tradition of collecting ornaments from our vacations + josh's homemade ones, we are growing our total every year. also, our place is too small to have a huge fat tree so our mini 5' is perfect for us!

josh spent a lot of the week crafting with me while scott studied for finals. we painted plates, made a shrinky dink tree (AKA shrinky dinkY tree as he called it) and he helped me wrap our ToysforTots gifts. i also was able to finish all my christmas cards and ornaments for my staff gifts.... it was a super productive weekend while scott wrote about land use.

we did manage to venture downtown friday night to meet some friends for dinner and enjoy the lights downtown. the city is really beautiful during this time of year and we have been grateful to not have the bone chilling cold yet.

Thankful Weekend

2011-11-26T18:08:00.001-08:00

We had a great Thanksgiving weekend. I was able to take wednesday off work to spend the morning with Josh and get ready for the trip. we picked scott up from work around lunch and were super lucky to leave early as we avoided any rush hour and basically had no traffic out of the city.

Thursday, Scott, Ryan and I went to the Cleveland turkey trot downtown. the weather was nice and we enjoyed catching up with friends before and after.

Thanksgiving dinner was a feast.... my parents prepared surf and turf with asparagus along with all the traditional sides. Josh had his first taste of med rare filet although he probably would have preferred tacquitos! needless to say, the adults were stuffed... and this feeling continued all through the weekend as my parents continued to make elaborate meals (omelets, ribs, great bread and homemade apple butter, pies galore).

Friday we did some obligatory shopping. no crazy shenanigans but we did hit up Brooks Bros. where Scott was the big winner of the day. I have learned more about dress shirts (fit, collar, cuff options) then i thought were possible but we got him some good threads for work. I did manage to sneak over to Lulu and Anthro to try to even the ledger sheet :) Then it was back for another feast.... ribs!

Saturday, Scott and I met up with his friend from law school and his wife. It is nice to have great friends to visit while we are in Cleveland. then later, we got together with a high school friend for a polar bear dip. I have seen my friend Josh do these throughout the winters and have been wanting to take the plunge. So, this was the weekend for the dip. We met up and into the 45 degree water we went. it was cold.... however, not nearly as bad as I thought it would be. The current was a little strong and for a moment I was quite convinced that I was going to be swept away. But luckily, the mossy rock held out and I made it to the Polar Bear hang out. I need to go again when there is snow on the banks.

Rest of the weekend was quiet, hanging out with the family, watching josh make massive amounts of legos that were waiting for him and sneaking out for late night movies... had to capitalize on the babysitting and dollar theaters (that don't exist in chicago). josh was in heaven all weekend as king of the castle and spoiled rotten. he was very sweet with all of them and even knew to speak up for pop-pop. thankful for the family weekend.

scott and i are constantly reminded of all the blessings in our life. yes, we have our wants and hopes but we have all we need and life has been really good to us. after some discussion, we have decided to donate funds to: Unicef (specifically the Horn of Africa) and josh will be forgoing one gift this year to go towards our donation. The droughts and poverty are so heartbreaking and hopefully our small donation will help. definitely consider Unicef if you are looking for a charitable giving option. I hope we can teach him that giving is just as important as getting.

32!

2011-11-20T19:47:00.001-08:00

quiet week. scott had a birthday and celebrated with a long day at work and school. i didn't even get a picture of him so this is a leftover from earlier this year. he has been busting his hump lately with work and school so seeing him is a commodity. however, we are grateful for his dedication to continuing his education. it has already started paying off and we are excited to see where this takes him professionally.

i asked josh to draw him a picture and he chose a helicopter/mountain scene. not sure if it is scott hanging or is he bungee jumping?? or are we rescuing him? ....but josh seemed to like it. we did gentleman's themed gifts this year. handkerchiefs/cuff links/ties for father's day and cologne/ties for birthday. i have had his christmas gift planned forever which started the gentleman's theme. scott now will hopefully be smelling better when he runs from work to school!

aside from dinner with some of our dear friends friday and neighbors sunday, we laid low. josh and i were a little under the weather so we played geography games, read books, watched movies and took naps. kindof perfect weekend prepping for our eating fest for thanksgiving! bring on the filet mignon! (and chicken nuggets and PB sandwiches for j :)

Perfect 10 Weekend!

2011-11-13T21:08:00.001-08:00

Great, busy weekend. Friday, Scott and I had dinner at my boss' country club to end a long interview day for a prospective doctor. We are in the process of potential big change and growth which is exciting and nerve racking at the same time. During dinner, Scott and I's steaks's were switched and i Might have not mentioned it as his filet was bigger than mine! :) After dinner and ridiculous sized dessert, we went downtown to spend the night at the Palmer House.

It was a long story but we ended up getting the hotel gratis which was great considering i was doing a race at 7am Saturday morning. We invited our friend Michael along to the hotel to avoid stress in the morning and it worked out perfectly. The room was huge with two beds and we made a bed out of the chairs and ottoman for josh which he seemed enjoy.

The race (Perfect 10) was Perfect! and enjoyed seeing so many friends. The weather ended up being beautiful considering it is mid November. Loved being there to support Julia in her first run since the Marathon (and baby :). They handed out free Breakfast Sandwiches after the race at McD's which we took full advantage of.

After the race, we got back to the hotel and Scott took off to meet with a client while j and i spent the afternoon with friends downtown. Stops included: American Girl, Lego Store and the intense trendy foot court. We had a few good laughs along the way as Rachael and I laughed at Michael's fiesty mood! Josh loved being with their 4 girls and i had quite the lesson in the cost and world of American Girl!

2011-11-06T16:30:00.000-08:00

quiet weekend spent:

running a 5K in sarah's honor
breakfast at nookies with the missionaries and then a trip to the chicago history museum. (since we will not be able to take them out for christmas, we decided to still treat them with a fun day)
a evening at the temple with scott. so quiet... so peaceful. so thankful to have the temple so close.

a tribute of sorts.......

2011-11-06T13:15:00.000-08:00

i have been blessed to have had a lot of good friends in my life. friends that know me better than i know myself in a lot of ways.. friends that support me in a way that i didn't even know i needed. one of those friends is dan shurtz. he was the first person i met when i moved out to utah. i recently had joined the church and wildly decided to "try out byu" for the summer. i bought out someones summer contract and moved in with no roommates (as they were not back yet for summer classes). after getting out to BYU, i got really sick... i.e. 105 temp and miserable. i slept a good 3 days and still had not really met anyone... BYU was not turning out to be as angelic as i hoped. then in the midst of one of my naps, i heard this pounding on the door... it wouldn't stop... i opened it wearing random pj's, no glasses and surely looked homeless.... it was dan knocking... he needed some sort of condiment.. i can't remember.

anyways, we ended up chatting and became really good friends. friends that ate together, studied together, shopped together (my favorite), burned ex's pictures together, watched movies together, went to the temple together, etc. at BYU, it is somewhat rare to have a close male platonic friend (which, by the way, i was lucky enough to have two of them) and i really cherished both of their friendships. as someone new to the LDS faith, i was still finding and solidifying my testimony while at BYU and i couldn't have asked for a better example than dan. dan was solid in his faith, testimony and confident in how he lived his life.i ended up being one of "those girls" and married someone i only knew for a few months. :) dan was at our sealing and reception and continued to be a support and part of my new life. even when i moved to chicago, we emailed and talked on the phone. no, we weren't in constant contact but both of us made it a point to check in now and again... him just as much as my neurotic self. whenever i was in utah, we saw him and the few times he came to chicago for work, we got together.he and sarah started dating on/off a few years ago. i heard lots about her and first met her in 2008. dan was smitten from the beginning. shortly after her diagnosis in 2010, they were engaged and married.they battled cancer bravely and with unparallelled courage.. sarah gained statewide attention for her optimism and frankness about her disease. in the short period we knew her, we were better for it. dan and sarah demonstrated true faith that families can be together forever, a gospel truth they found comfort and strength in. sarah passed away this past week after ~15 month battle with cancer. she fought hard, never gave up and never lost faith. i can't say i could have handled her burden with such eloquence. dan was by her side every moment. i have been so touched by their example of faith and hope these feelings never fade.

dan has been an amazing friend for over ten years. we love you and our hearts, thoughts and prayers are with him and sarah's family during this time of heartache. information on how to donate for Sarah's funeral costs: http://www.sweatinforsarah.org/

temps are falling

2011-10-30T14:40:00.000-07:00

this past weekend, we were out and about enjoying the last bit of fall. i am guessing we are on the end of nice weekends and will be approaching our 6+month frozen tundra temps soon. friday, i left work early to see joshua in his halloween parade. he really wanted to be mario this year... just like 7 other kids at his school. i contemplated making his costume but he loved the hat from the pre-made one and knew i was either 1. too lazy and/or 2. not a good enough seamstress to pull that off, so we helped the halloween temp store's bottom line and bought the pre-made costume. he loved his mustache and was so excited about it. saturday morning, i participated in my last big race for the season. had a great time taking pics, seeing a handful of people i have become course buddies with and meeting new people. since the course was an out and back, i got to see them quite a few times... love the positive energy these people bring with them! scott and josh kept themselves busy while i ran with visiting scott's office and soccer.

that evening was the ward trunk or treat. i originally planned to go but then laid down and was quite certain i couldn't move so i stayed home while josh got even more candy. finished the weekend off with church, visits from our home teachers and a yummy yummy pasta bake! thinking seconds sound good right about now!

Halloween Fun

2011-10-30T13:22:00.000-07:00

annual halloween party at our friend's house. as always, it was such a fun time and people really stepped up their game this year with costumes. we went as angry birds. i made the costumes and was happy with how they turned out. here are some pictures of the evening...

a practically perfect in everyway weekend

2011-10-23T15:17:00.000-07:00

warning: it is a "lots of pictures post"

parents were in town this weekend and we enjoyed one of the last nice weekends of the year... the weather was really perfect. friday, i was able to take a half day and headed downtown for a trip to the Field Museum. We hit up the chocolate and whale special exhibits and the chocolate exhibit and definitely a let down (rach, i am talking to you). i wouldn't even recommend it just for good measure. i would recommend Crumbs Cupcakes though. we picked some up before the play and enjoyed them throughout the weekend. i still think sprinkles is my favorite as these are much more "cakey" but they are still amazing.

after we met up with scott and grabbed a quick bite before going to see mary poppins. mary poppins was a favorite of mine as a kid (i had an umbrella with a bird)... and was excited to take josh. although they made some variations from the movie, it was great. josh loved the big numbers especially the chimney song and the end was perfect.
saturday, we got some tickets at a great price for the northwestern/penn state game on craigslist. the seller lived on the south suburbs so we decided to meet them by the museum of science and industry. we enjoyed skipping rocks and running along on the beach before they came.After the exchange, we decided to go to the city of Pullman.

Now a rundown city on the indiana border, this town was once the model industrial community centered around production of high end railcars in the late 1800's. The pullman car gained fame as it was attached to the funeral train carrying Pres. Lincoln. Mr. Pullman believed making better housing for the workers would provide better production... which it did... Until, the economy took a dive and he cut wages (25%) but didn't cut rent, groceries, utilities; all of which he controlled. Pullman quickly became Public Enemy #1 and the workers went on strike. He was hated so much that his coffin was covered in tar paper and asphalt, and enclosed in the center of a room-sized block of concrete, reinforced with railroad ties to avoid workers robbing his grave.

The city and "newly remodeled" visitors center was nothing much however, we enjoyed walking around the little blocks and imagining what the city was like in it's prime. sadly, i don't see the town every coming back to it's initial grandeur.

That evening, we went to the game. luckily, it was fairly warm up until the last quarter and all of us had a blast. penn state won and a perfect way to finish up the fun filled weekend!

best laid plans.....

2011-10-15T20:42:00.000-07:00

Happenings of the week in a somewhat coherent fashion......

surprised scott with a new driver. the salesman was so helpful and nice, and helped us pick out the R11 series. We went with a driver and 4 wood and scott went back to adjust them that evening. i think he really liked them instead of getting new couches as i was planning on. celebrated early in the week with a trip to the driving range.

josh rarely gets sick, which we are very thankful for. so, when the school calls me and tells me he has a 103 temp that came on very sudden, i get nervous. after leaving work in a tizzy, we ended up in the ER that evening. luckily, it was just an acute viral infection that had to work itself through his system. i had tickets for SYTYCD with my friend that evening and luckily, the ticket didn't go to waste and she took her 9 year old. rach, i still owe you big time! (also, the irony of this happening the ONE night have something planned during a work night).... anyways, the pic was taken at the suggestion of the x-ray tech b/c everytime he was told to hold his breath, he puffed up like a blowfish. the tech was trying not to giggle and said "take a pic mom, you want to remember that".... sadly, none of my pics had the 'puffing'.
work has been pretty hectic with lots of new hires and lots of changes. was very excited to hear that my lecture was accepted for a 2012 national convention. it is in chicago though so sadly, no combined vaca next year.. instead, i will be able to get to work through the weekend.. how exciting! (note sarcasm)
the weekend was completely low key. we rested and had josh re-coop. only times we saw daylight were for lionking 3D and primary practice. thankfully, i think the overall rest and naps helped josh (and i). he is back to normal and hopefully will have a good next week!

peaceful moments, bloody toes, chipping in and bad directions

2011-10-09T16:56:00.000-07:00

weekend went by so fast!!! we have been very lucky with a warm october and are enjoying it to the fullest! started the weekend with a trip to the chicago temple (of my church). i have made a personal commitment to attend the temple 18 times this year and am close to hitting my goal. something about time standing still there, provides me the peace i need during stressful times. love that feeling. (picture taken during an open house) saturday, josh and scott played golf while i ran a marathon. the boys went to the backyard par3 course and josh had a legitimate par! off the tee, from the fairway and then CHIPPED IN! i have never done that myself... was so proud to hear that! not sure about his grumpy face here but happy scott at least took a pic!although the temps were a little hot, i enjoyed the run. i was grateful the course was in the shade as the course was mostly in the trails. the trails did have a negative though, as i kept getting rocks in my shoes and got horrible blisters and bloody toes... yuck! i had no one meet me on the course this time and because it was a small race (only 250 people running the full), it was definitely a nice 'silent' run.
that evening, i had a girls night out with the White sisters. josh and scott had the night in and i think they enjoyed the solo bonding time as they never get it! I had a great time with the girls, just chatting/catching up and the food was delicious. aside from the waiter giving us the stink eye when we asked her to split the bill, we had a great time! i was a little late getting there though. the girls blamed it on the poor map i created for myself. i got lost in the where the road bent down a little bit in the middle...perhaps it was becuase i didn't make it to scale!
ended the weekend with a little family movie time. josh got comfy on the step stool with my favorite blanket. 9/10 on the cute scale if you ask me. :)

2011-10-03T10:53:00.000-07:00

This weekend was General Conference for our Church and it was a wonderful, uplifting Conference. Twice a year, the leaders of our church share messages for the whole world to hear. They don't necessarily give specific new directives but remind us how to keep our life focused on the right direction. Many leaders of our church are older and some ailing in health but their knowledge brings much needed historical perspective. (kindof like when i am complaining i can't eat out more and then i remember my pop-pop talking about eating cabbage for an entire month during the depression). anyways, we stayed close to home so we could hear the Prophet and other leaders speak during those times and went to a friends house for the last session. josh and scott played some chess while i made tutu's during conference. when we weren't home, we managed to have a date night with friends, josh ran a local kids race, went to soccer and hit up the bloomingdales sale. i have been on the hunt for some bowties (that you actually tie) for josh and was hoping to score some but ended up getting scott more ties... the guy at bloomies knew my and josh's name... yikes!

Getting Cold

2011-09-25T16:54:00.000-07:00

Fall has come in full force and it is getting chilly! This past friday, we had classy Chick-Fil-A with friends in the city. The air was so crisp and the city looked amazing. As Scott literally works and goes to school on the MagMile, he is so over downtown, but i still love it. I think him working down there has ruined our chances of moving to NYC... (like i even had a chance)...

josh continues soccer and i even tried kicking the ball around with a fellow parent. aside from still being able to kick, i was reminded how old i am getting as my kicking foot was sore for 2 days.

Finished the weekend with a dapper josh at church. Love this little boy! His cuteness was by far the best part of the day. Looking forward to another work week full of fun HR issues!!!!!

back to reality

2011-09-18T11:12:00.000-07:00

i think we are back to normal from our travels and getting ready for our first full work week. the week went by quick and i was able to give a lecture at the Chicago Ophthalmic Administrators Meeting on friday and it was nice to meet fellow admins and present my 1 hr lecture. It looks like i am going to submit again for ASOA's main meeting as it is in Chicago so i might as well give a lecture.

this weekend was just re-grouping, cleaning and relaxing. josh started soccer again and really likes the place we chose. we opted against AYSO for many reasons and are happy with our decision. scott was even able to play golf before the game and attend the temple after so it worked out perfectly. later that evening, we brought our second TV into the family room and had friends over for the Utah/BYU game and OhioState game. Scott and Dave, being utes fans, had fun seeing them do so well while Brandis and i crafted and ate the entire night. After they left, Scott passed out for the second half so i watched Utah dominate while making Shutterfly books.Sunday was our regular routine (church and then naps). We did have some new friends over for dinner along with the Missionaries. Laid back, perfect weekend!

reflective weekend....

2011-09-13T15:15:00.000-07:00

We had another long weekend, this time in Sandusky at Cedar Point. Josh, Scott and I went there for a few days as i had a triathlon. The park was basically empty when we arrived friday and we ran around like kids in a candy store as there was NO wait for any of the rides. Dragster, Millennium Force and Maverick were our favorites and we were able to just keep riding them (without even getting out of the our seats).. it was awesome. the last ride on friday was with josh on the Magnum. A 200' drop older thrill ride that we "may have" tricked josh into going on. as it was dark, it is was difficult to tell (for all of us) how big the coaster really was :) he loved it though and was hilarious as after we got to done, he let out this awesome sigh of relief that followed with scott saying "j, you almost ripped my arm off!" classic family moments. .We stayed on the cedar point pennisula which proved to be really convenient. my parents came into town saturday and josh was in heaven. iron dragon and the wildcat were his top rides. we also had scott and j do a family race saturday. they had checkpoints including chugging a powerade!Sunday was race day, they had a wonderful tribute for the 9-11 before the gun. The race did not go as i hoped and i was stopped by medical after 2.4 mile swim and 50 miles into the bike (low BP 80's/50's, fainting and GI pains) You can read more about it on the other blog when i get around to writing it....

a few things that i am appreciative of that day. 1. i swam 2.4 miles in disgusting lake erie (see all the nastiness we went through in the pics) 2. after i stopped 50M into the bike, a guy pulled up and thought his day was over... he broke a spoke... as i was finished already, i offered him mine. we exchanged a sweaty hug and off he went. that evening, after he finished, we exchanged wheels and gratitude for each other. in the end, it was a great learning experience and there will be another day for another race. obviously i was bummed but considering the magnitude of the day (sept 11), not finishing a race seems pretty inconsequential. i am so grateful for my life, my family and my country.

looooong weekend

2011-09-05T17:52:00.000-07:00

nothing like getting off of work friday and knowing you don't need to go into the office till tuesday! (doesn't mean you won't still work, call staff, text your boss... but no official work for three days)

friday evening, j and i took the L downtown to meet scott at his office. he is officially with JPMorgan now (per his new business cards) and things are going well. we took a cab over to navy pier for a speedboat tour we purchased in the beginning of the summer. the day was soo muggy and sticky but it was perfect out on the lake. finished the evening with overpriced snacks as you can't have a fun evening at navy pier without overpriced snacks!

saturday, scott had a 6am tee time and flew through 22ish holes. was back before our late breakfast and then we took josh for a bike ride. it was a little traumatic as traffic can make things stressful but we survived and baked in the heat. that evening, scott and i had dinner with good friends in the city. had some yummy homemade pasta and swapped some funny stories between the ladies. love our friends.

sunday after church, we went to visit scott's friend, harvey. he needed some things done in his apartment and help with his new remote, so we went down to the city as a family. we spent an hour at the beach with him which he loved. he lives maybe 2 blocks from the beach and probably never goes so it was nice to get him out and enjoy the perfect weather. after we cleaned his apartment, we called it an early night.
monday, scott played some early golf with his buddies and then we hit up 6Flags. it was a little overcast and cool but we had a fun time even on all the water rides josh really wanted to go on. the picture below is my favorite as we took j on a bigger wooden roller coaster. he totally didn't want to go and he held onto scott for dear life! this picture was take a few seconds before scott lost his hat... luckily, a few cars back caught it so Cubby survived! back to the grind tomorrow.. ready to take on the week!

Golfing with daddy

2011-08-29T19:22:00.000-07:00

quiet weekend:
spent at the beach with friends and swimming at sunset
josh golfing with daddy
scott having a boys night with wings
pretty perfect

"why don't we sit in these seats all the time?"

2011-08-23T17:44:00.000-07:00

josh's question to me after we were served chocolate in first class. got a random "lady was nice to us at the counter" upgrade. thanks random lady! :)

Magical Moments

2011-08-21T16:31:00.000-07:00

Had a magical time in Disneyworld this past week. We got home from IM Steelhead Sunday night only to get on a plane 12 hours later. As i knew i wouldn't be working out that next week, i figured it was good timing and knew i would have to gut through recovery... which is definitely what i had to do for 48 hours, gut through it. Stairs, sitting, moving in general was fairly painful for the first 2 days.

As J and I flew solo, we opted to stay on site at a WDW resort. Got a great deal ($60 night) at All Star Sports. The accommodations were perfect for us... even at a no frills disney resort, they do everything perfectly. We did 5 days in the park and "hopped" around to 2-3 parks/day. i let josh dictate most of the decisions except for Toy Story Mania. We went on the ride 5 times and that is seriously, hands down, the best ride in the park.

It was hot/muggy and we saw pouring rain everyday. after finding shelter the first day (and losing precious time), we made use of our jackets and ran around, jumped in puddles and just enjoyed ourselves. we got through lines so much faster as people weren't mobile and we dried off fairly quickly.

Josh's favorite rides: Kilimanjaro Safaris, Toy Story, Buzz Lightyear, People Mover, Figment, Pirates
Nic's favorites: Toy Story, Carousel of Progress, Space Mountain, Laugh Floor

I could post 5000 pictures but will post a select dozen :) to spare readers like me who have short attention spans. also, in case you were wondering, i did wear the same outfit over and over as it was comfortable and dried quickly. that running skirt (that i actually don't like to run in) saved me as all my other bottoms were cotton.

Scott Survived

2011-08-21T15:35:00.000-07:00

this past week, josh and i went to disneyworld. scott stayed back b/c he just started his new job as Investment Associate with JPMorgan and felt he couldn't take the time off. It ended up being for the best as the market was crazy while we were gone and he was part of the damage control team. He also finished all his licensing required for his new position and finished his last test a few days ago. although we missed him tons, we both managed and scott is now ready for school to start next week. (he got a whole 4 days of vacation which included sat/sun!)

he did manage to reward himself by getting new golf clubs and got out and played a little. after his busy summer and soon to be super busy fall schedule, he deserves it!

last night after we got in early in the morning, scott and i did a quick drop by at an engagement party for my boss' daughter. the storms stopped and it was a perfect night in their backyard. we only stayed for a bit as we didn't want to leave josh but always exciting sharing in someone's engagement bliss!

the seas were angry that day my friend.....

2011-08-15T07:57:00.000-07:00

spent the long weekend in benton harbor, mi for ironman steelhead. rolled in friday to check into hotel. with it being a small town and limited hotels, prices were outrageous so we went for the el cheapo motel6 option. it was definitely a sub par motel6 if you can imagine but there were lots of triathletes there and were ok to rough it for two days. saturday, the day before, the lake was white with lots of little 3-5 foot waves that extended far out so it was impossible to really swim. i managed to get ~800M in and it was rough. there were rumblings of the swim being cancelled which created my regular anxiety to heighten more but i was just happy i had gotten in the water and was somewhat confident i would not drowned. after i racked my bike, scott wanted to play twilight golf. when we pulled into the course, these dark clouds came rolling in... fast! the scary clouds came so fast and were followed by a downpour. we opted for a showing for Cars2 and then grabbed some dinner with my friend jen.

race morning: race report will be on the other blog soon but in a nutshell..... like the title and as george costanza would say (when he pretended to be a marine biologist), "the seas were angry that day my friend." we were told NO SWIM as small boats were banned from the water so they couldn't patrol swimmers. the race ended up being Bike/Run with a time trial start. overall, i was happy with my race but bummed my improvement could not be properly measured as the 1.2 M swim was skipped in the beginning. finished to a WINDY beach side chute. Ate some sandy pizza and then headed home.

scott and i had a conversation on the way home about how we have had really good luck with our short weekend getaways, but this weekend didn't quite pan out as we hoped. bad food, bad storms which led to no swim and scott/josh couldn't golf, bad luck on the bike (other blog for details).. however, we were given a reality check when scott had a conversation with a family that was staying next to us at our dumpy hotel. he found out that they live there. he was a truck driver for 40 years and lives at the Motel6 now with his family of 5. definitely put things into perspective. when we got home, we sent something to the family in room #113 and hopefully remain grateful for all we have been given.

wrapping up summer

2011-08-15T07:14:00.000-07:00

summer is sadly coming to a close. although i am looking forward to a better routine, i am not looking forward to scott starting school up again. josh wrapped up summer camps (this last week was basketball camp). i was able to do a medal presentation to Mercy Home (a home for displaced boys) which was really heartwarming. whatever life gives me would never compare to what these children go through. josh came with me and i felt like he understood the magnitude of their situation. they plan to use the medals for academic and athletic accomplishments. i love the idea that they will also earn their medals for future achievements. love Medals4Mettlewe also made a pinkberry run with some friends before josh and scott went to a Cubs Game. Love their endless toppings.. just wish they had sprinkles.

fun.packed.week

2011-08-07T18:43:00.000-07:00

finally saw harry potter. was sad to see the series end but i must say, it couldn't have ended better... well, except the fact that they made hermionie look 21 years old instead of 38 in the end. she did manage to get some burberry on her though. did have fun with the girls and eating lots of junk food!
Enjoyed a night with my staff at the racetrack. josh was a little bummed that Secretariat wasn't there but we managed to still have lots of fun. one of my bosses brought his kids so josh had fun cheering on the horses with them and playing with bakugans. fun work bonding on a perfect night. saturday, had a bridal shower in the city for an employee and then the rest of the day was lazy. scott played twilight golf while josh and i watched movies and did a dessert run. josh wanted TCBY (or was it me... can't remember :) and said hi to the koi fish at the mall. we ended our weekend on the beach with friends. after church and mandatory naps, we went over to Gilson to enjoy the sun for about an hour in between thunder storms. The kids had a blast as did the parents. It is fun to get to know new friends and here is to many more outings this fall!

Sugar Magnolia

2011-08-05T06:51:00.000-07:00

fun night at Soldier Field last night. josh and i volunteered at the Terrapin 5K. I have been wanting to volunteer for a while and thought this was the perfect event. josh and i were put in gear check. it started slow and josh was pretty bored but then after the race, we were running all over the place. josh was running back and forth with bags and had a blast! he thought he definitely earned his free sprite at the end of the night and i enjoyed listening to Mr Blotto (GratefulDead cover band).

perfect summer... slow down!

2011-08-01T07:10:00.000-07:00

we are having such a fun summer. staying close to home, enjoying the few mths of nice weather chicago gives us and cramming lots in!

This week, we enjoyed:

...the west loop with good friends at a neighborhood park. the kids loved the playground and josh is proving to be a very good 'honorary' big brother to lots of our friends' kids.

... museum campus to see The Horse exhibit at the field. it leaves soon so we were happy we were able to see it. josh and i went saturday morning. i was able to give the remaining free tickets for the exhibit to some people walking up the steps with us. they came from wisconsin specifically for the horse exhibit. not sure if it was the cowboy hat or matching horse shirts that gave them away :) at any rate, we have horse riding lessons free to us next time we are in their area!... a night at the movies with josh. j has been really hoping to see The Smurfs and loves all the advertisements for it. we caved and spent a family night at the smurfs. j laughed the entire time and scott at least stayed awake. we all had a smurfing good time.

... watching scott pretend like he was in college when he decided to play midnight golf with some friends. he got home at 2:30 am and went to work the next day.

...the western burbs visiting our friends that recently moved out to chicago.

... not looking forward for summer to end.... so, here's to a great august!

i propose.....

2011-07-24T20:19:00.000-07:00

josh lost his second tooth this week while shopping. as soon as we got home, he ran and put it in the little felt tooth i made for the 'tooth fairy'. he came out of his room and this was his proposal:
"mommy, i propose i get $2 this time b/c this is my second tooth. i also think i should get $3 for the third tooth, maybe $4 for the forth tooth... you get it mommy, right? it's a pattern"

the next day: josh got two dollars under his pillow. and i need to start putting money away for braces!

it's raining... it's pouring

2011-07-24T18:03:00.000-07:00

quiet weekend. crazy storms once again ripped through the area knocking out power again at my office and flooding lots of streets (8 inches in 24 hours or something like that led us to lay low most of the weekend.)

we did manage to get out for a beachside party for scott's work. it was a perfect set up; huge deck on private beach. his co-worker had 50ish people there and lots of Brazilian meat and dancers. Scott even got pulled up on stage to dance but i was too busy getting seconds for meat on the stick, so i missed it. josh loved running on the beach and playing games with the kids. I had fun meeting Scott's co-workers and the weather and atmosphere was divine. perfect chicago night!we also lightened our load and gave our spare chair and ottoman to scott's friend, harvey. he needed it more than we did and were happy to make it a win-win situation. josh noticed the extra space in the little area we have and decided to have a dance party. with scott. to led zepplin.... scott wouldn't have it any other way.

Down South

2011-07-18T08:49:00.000-07:00

spent another weekend in central illinois. a triathlon and 27 holes of golf were on the agenda for the weekend. we got in friday just in time to rack my bike and then checked into our cheap hotel. josh wasted no time falling asleep on the beautiful floral comforter! race morning came very quick and i am happy to report smooth sailing. swim went great, hills on the bike were annoying as usual and the run was nice and easy. this is the second time i have a done a race with this crew in central illinois and they know how to run a tight ship. not only are they the kindest people, they have great courses, marked well and very supportive. (like how in the second picture, i am totally looking at Scott? he took 10 pics of a swimmer he thought was me and found it hilarious the only one with me in it, i am looking right at him!)got back to the hotel to shower off the nasty/humid/lake/sweat smell and everyone took a quick nap. we woke up around 3ish and headed out for some golf. We played at The Den, an Arnold Palmer course, which proved to be quite frustrating. over 125 bunkers and lots of water lead me to lose a lot of balls! Josh had lots of fun keeping score and commenting on my numerous double bogeys. Back to reality now and only negative of the trip was the lack of good food where we were. I think i need a detox this week from all the processed food... at least for 24 hours :)

just another brick in the wall...

2011-07-18T06:44:00.000-07:00

i turned 31 last thursday, bastille day. the days preceding my birthday were stressful so i was just hoping to get through the day uneventfully with little to no expectations. scott and i already decided that disneyworld was my birthday gift so no gifts were anticipated. to my surprise, scott had a little blue box waiting for me on the kitchen table when i woke up! along with that, he had some joke gifts and a beautifully written letter. love the fact he is so good with his written words. his gifts along with josh's card made my day.

that evening, josh and i went downtown for the bastille day run. we met up with scott and a friend from work and ran the 5M race. finished the celebration with Swirlz cupcakes! it was a great day!

Seven

2011-07-12T19:02:00.000-07:00

.. the name George Costanza hoped to name his first baby
.. the middle name of the most recent Beckham's baby
.. the name of a creepy movie
.. in the brand name of pricey jeans that i don't own... (i don't wear pants if you haven't noticed)
.. highest probability of occurring as an addition when rolling dice.
.. The neutral pH value

and the Series test that Scott just passed. congrats!

as George C. would say. "SEVEN!!!!!"

DMB Caravan

2011-07-10T19:45:00.000-07:00

Our summer really seems to be flying by. This week, Josh finished the last of his private chess lesson and went to a White Sox game with his summer camp. We gave him $10 for "spending money" and he exhausted all of it. Popcorn, drink and cotton candy! Had to laugh as he has been hoarding his money for a long time in his wallet and finally, he went crazy with it! rest of the evenings, you could find him hanging out in his underwear reading, watching movies or playing pretend Cars3. He has quite the set up in his room and it is funny as the parents always have to be the "bad guys."This weekend, Scott and i acted like we were young again and went to see Dave Matthews Caravan on the S. Side. A Dave concert was the actually the first thing Scott and I did together (aside from knowing him on his church mission). He literally got off the plane and we went to Dave. (it is kindof a complicated but let's just say we have seen now dave in the following situations: before we dated, dating, honeymooning, celebrating a pregnancy, as parents and now... as old folks). the concerts were a blast. i went to the first two nights and then scott took brendan the third. the dust at the event was crazy and i really couldn't handle standing another night. (hence, feeling like an old lady) however, well worth it and this continues scott's summer concert series!

fun weekend and now ready for another week! as a side note: because of the weekends festivities, i didn't prepare my primary lesson for church well.... (read: did 10 minute before we left for church)... and ironically, it was the best lesson and most well behaved my kids have been all year.... not sure if i want to push my luck to see if i can get a streak going!

Packing it in!

2011-07-04T19:30:00.000-07:00

what an awesome week/weekend.... a few highlights

josh:
*lost his first tooth
*finished chicago storm soccer camp
*learned how to ride a bike sans training wheels!
*gave his first talk in church

along with all of josh's monumental events, we also were able to see cirque de soliel's traveling show OVO and had a blast. the acrobats and performers were amazing and josh loved the animal/bug theme.
sunday, after church, we spent a few hours at the beach and enjoyed the perfect weather. there are some great suburb beaches which are free (most of the time in the evenings) and are normally empty and quiet in the evenings. i also watched a bunch of john adams episodes on HBO. loved that series and was so happy they were replaying in honor of the forth. we did try to watch 1776 with josh but i don't think he is quite old enough yet.. perhaps next year!

monday, after a ride and run, we took the training wheels off!!! it was long overdue but b/c we live in a condo, we have dragged our feet. he is great on two wheels but stopping will take some time. considering i still fall off my bike (b/c i can't unclip when quick stops are required), we will will let him slide. that evening, josh and i met up with the ellsworth's to participate in the Unofficial DoLife tour! Got a chance to meet Ben and ran a 5K with fellow DoLifers!
The run started at Buckingham Fountain and we were at first concerned with crowds and mayhem. But, to our surprise and elation, we had no traffic and a perfect street spot on Columbus! (sorry, but documenting and touting good parking spots is something Scott and i pride ourselves in... we routinely bring up the street spot we found our first july 4th by navy pier...5 years ago)anyways, the run was great. i stayed with j, grant and max and pushed blythe half the time. we did a run/walk and was pretty proud of keeping the three boys with me. only had a few meltdowns by all. it was a great night and loved breaking in my new pink shoes!

As we celebrated the forth, we would be remiss not to thank all those men and women who serve our country and put their lives on the line for freedom. For this, we thank you.

Storm is a brewin....

2011-06-28T10:39:00.000-07:00

Chicago was hit by some crazy storms last week. Power was out, large trees were torn up and there were tornado warnings throughout. Luckily, our area was not really affected except power was spotty everywhere. Two days after the storm, our office decided to lose power for two working days. aside from the financial costs associated with loss of power, we were inundated with so much back work. It was a long few days and i am happy we got through it. Needless to say, i am already excited for the long weekend!!!!

Friday night, we said goodbye to our dear friends who are moving to Arizona. Both are physicians and they are starting their careers in the southwest. It was a perfect evening for a picnic and we look forward to visiting them soon!
Saturday, josh and i had a lazy morning. We laid around in our PJ's for a while and then went into the office to get it back up and running. That afternoon, we played twilight golf with Scott. It was my first real round since my back surgery and could have played worse.

another trip to WI

2011-06-19T20:57:00.000-07:00

decided to celebrate father's day in appleton wisconsin this year. (perhaps a triathlon had some influence in the decision) friday, we rolled into town and after checking into our hotel, we got some dinner at texas roadhouse. no better way to carb up then over large amounts of bread and cinnamon butter. after wards, we swam at the pool for a little and then hit the hay early. the race was uneventful saturday, but a tough course. there was a high descent up 'high cliffs' outlook both on the bike and run which caused me to think about getting off my bike and walking the entire first mile but i slugged up it. great first race of the season and back felt good. the volunteers and organization was one of the best even with a non-closed course. finished the race and was handed a plate of pasta+breadsticks from fazoli's... score! after a shower/nap, we refueled at the food court and then accompanied scott for 18 holes. i just rode along but then was quickly regretful i didn't bring my clubs. josh played some and we had lots of fun as the weather was beautiful. scott got through 20 holes in a little over 3 hours.

perfect family getaway to bond and celebrate father's day. josh and i got scott a new tie and some linen handkerchiefs. i was hoping to get them monogrammed but ran out of time. maybe next year!

2011-06-19T15:32:00.000-07:00

happy father's day.

2011-06-12T20:15:00.000-07:00

josh is now a 1st grader! his class celebrated all last week with: chocolate, teddy bear, pajama and game parties! josh enjoyed all of them especially the chocolate party until he threw up when he got home. i am quite certain he inhaled a whole bag of chocolate prior to the meltdown.

this year, his teacher and aide were so sweet and we couldn't have asked for a better one. in the beginning of the year, i really wanted to keep him at creme and spend the money on private but because our school system was full day, we opted for public. i am so pleased with our decision as josh couldn't have been happier and i am pretty confident the quality of education he received was superior.

this week, i took josh for a Lego build event with noah. they made little graduate people they got to take home. midweek, i had a little setback with my back so we laid low... literally for a few days. we did manage to venture out saturday for a bit. medication and lots of ice allowed for a few hour hiatus. josh and i volunteered at an eye fair downtown. josh put pamphlets at the stations and laid candy out for patients. he enjoyed it for about 15 minutes and then felt like he did enough. the rest of his volunteering was looking at dino flashcards and occasionally refilling the candy bags. johanna and i helped with patient flow and it was a good way to start the day.

afterwards, we went over the Field Museum and saw the new Whale exhibit. josh is really into whales now so it was perfect. rest of the weekend, aside from church, was quite lazy. lots of recovery and laying around. it was nice to get out saturday morning... till the drugs wore off! :)

it was a hot one....

2011-06-05T19:44:00.000-07:00

lots of fun this weekend! friday, i took a half day and scott enjoyed an afternoon of golf while i spent the afternoon in a city park with our friends. josh loves hanging out with his triplet girlfriends and when asked if he was going to watch over them, he responded "why, so you and their mommy can just sit on the benches and do nothing?" classic!

saturday morning, i had a race that ended up getting black flagged due to the heat. i still got my 13.1 miles in but after digesting the series of events, was disappointed with the way the race handled it. one person died and 11 hospitalized due to the heat and could have been handled differently when they went to red flag. i was happy all my friends were safe and healthy at the finish but sad that the outcome did not end as well for many.
that evening, i visited a friend's art gallery opening. She uses media strips (i.e. magazines/newspaper), rips it up and then paints over it. Her art was beautiful and she sold many of her works!! the rest of the week involved bringing a few dinners to friends who recently had babies and lots of visits to the pool. josh is doing great in the water and i am hopeful he will be a full swimmer at summer's end!

Getaway up north

2011-05-30T20:06:00.000-07:00

Enjoyed our long weekend, celebrating Memorial Day, in Lake Geneva with Scott's parents. Scott left early friday and enjoyed a round of golf before we met up with them later that evening. before heading to our hotel, we stopped at the outlets where Scott cleaned up!!

We stayed at the Grand Geneva again and enjoyed the spacious accommodations. Saturday, we ventured out to Yerkes Observatory to see the world's largest refracting telescope. josh enjoyed the moving floor of the telescope and the blow up spiderman they had hanging from the dome!.That evening, while Scott and his dad played golf, we went downtown for some ice cream cones and walk along the beach. Sadly, the weather wasn't super nice most of the weekend, but we still got in some pool time and bike time. Sunday, we went to church and watched Disney movies while it rained most of the day.Before heading home on Monday, i had to hit up the breakfast buffet over at the Lodge. I love a good breakfast buffet and enjoyed eating my weight in bacon and eggs. Nothing quite beats it! Overall, a great, relaxing weekend. Thanks to the in-laws for hosting us!

thank you groupon.

2011-05-22T11:27:00.000-07:00

well, at least someone was listening... apparently, me (and 12 other people) were itching for some cheap chess lessons and we cashed in. not surprised by lack of demand but that will only make it easier to schedule our lessons!

2011-05-21T19:41:00.000-07:00

after j and scott returned from the father/son campout (no, no pictures) and i finished a long ride with some trifriends, we fulfilled our Church duties by cleaning the church. i attempted to clear the stink out of one of the women's bathrooms but no luck. josh, on the other hand, conquered the numerous dust bunnies in the vents! he is giving his best statue of liberty impression! that evening, we chowed down on some olive garden with the johnson's and then finished the day with a night at the driving range. we had to take advantage of the beautiful weather b/c who knows how long it will last??

josh worked on his golf grip, i was trying to keep my back in good shape and scott was dreaming about Qschool.

check mate!

2011-05-20T20:07:00.000-07:00

josh's first chess tournament was yesterday. there were 60some kids participating from 1st-8th Grade. J was the only kindergartner to participate and we were unsure how it would go. he played 5 games and lost the first 3 (to a 4th, 8th, 3rd grader). the second kid had a mustache! they were all very gracious and good sports to j. they shook hands and the first kid recommended some reading material to josh to improve his ability to advance to check mate.. i had to laugh as the kid was totally serious.after dinner, they played the last two games and he won both!!! they were 3rd and 4th graders (both were girls but josh had no problem taking the W). the second to last game he made a come back and got his queen back to finish her off. he had a great time and interacted very well with the older kids. he ended up in 2nd place for the first graders. 1st place won by .5 points. (which mean he took a draw in one of the games josh lost).

so, looks like chess camp is on the list for summer along with basketball, swimming and soccer. josh seems to like the game and it is nice to balance out all the technology distractions!

april showers bring may.... showers

2011-05-16T09:57:00.000-07:00

hmmmm... the weather really has been crappy and temperamental lately.

scott finished finals last week! 2 years down, 2 to go! he will be taking one class this summer and credentialing at the bank. not quite the summer break he hoped for but it will be nice to have him around some evenings. he celebrated by taking a boys golfing trip in indiana. not one pic was taken but i am told lots of golf was played. i hung out with the husband-less wives saturday night where we had some yummy pizza and the kiddies had lots of fun running around and playing.

we also had two baby celebrations this week. josh came to one and helped with the games and was on "eating lots of pita chip" duty. the other was at the Melting Pot for a Girls Night Out. (sidenote: Why do you smell so bad after you eat there?!?!) anyways, both events were lots of fun and i was excited to be able to celebrate with close friends!

It's Go Time...

2011-05-08T17:42:00.000-07:00

that is kindof how i felt all week. started off trying to think happy thoughts as last week was so draining and i was so sick. midweek, josh and i met up with the powells to see RIO which was so adorable. the character choices were perfect and the boys laughed so hard. friday, josh had a mother's day show i was able to attend where they sang songs and presented little crafts to us. it was pretty cute however i did get the giggles as josh stood around the: 1. i have to keep waving to my mom kid, 2. the girl that was forced to wear tights and kept adjusting herself and then tucked her dress into her tights at one point and 3. fidget kids... i know, who is the mature one here!? after the show, we headed back to my office as i had to finish up a few things and put josh to work :)
i decided last minute (as in thursday) to participate in the half marathon as my friend was running her first full and we wanted to support! as scott was scheduled to work (and was on studying finals lockdown), i invited my pseudo-nanny to come with. after a quick stop at the outlets to shop for her prom dress, we met with jen for pre-race pasta. the day ended up being long and we were happy to check into our hotel and crash as saturday was going to be another long day. we woke up to surprisingly good weather and were out the door by 6am. the night before i made a cheese embellishment for my hat so i could start in the all cheese corral... we ran into another tri friend highlights were the full on cow suite, the beer and cheese girls and of course, the big foam cheese hats. Race was uneventful but cold! Sammi and j hung out by the water while i ran and met me at the finish for josh to run the last 100M with me... which was sweet.
after i re-gained feeling in my fingers, we stopped at the Jelly Belly Factory for a free tour as it was on the way home. we got hats and took a little train around the factory and learned about their production and history. josh loved the tour and i ended up dozing most of the time. i did perk up to down a hotdog in the gift shop and we loaded up on outlet candy! after we got back to illinois, we continued our whirlwind weekend. i made a quick trip over to the Temple for stake temple day and then josh and i went to a wedding shower and then we concluded with dinner for a friend's bday in the city.. it was a long day and the bed felt great that night!!!!

Sunday, we had church and josh made his phone call rounds for Mother's Day and got a little extra mileage out of my cheese hat!!!

can't get enough....

2011-05-02T08:21:00.000-07:00

sleep!!

i felt like i slept more this weekend than the entire week combined. it was nice for a change especially as i was dealing with concurrent infections and the antibiotics were making me feel wonky. i did manage to enjoy a little bit of the beautiful weekend on saturday. j and i had lunch with scott on michigan ave and josh picked out some new sneakers at niketown. he loved the conveyor system for the shoe delivery.

rest of the weekend we/i laid low, scott studied (as finals are approaching) while josh and i read lots including books on: abe lincoln, the stars, birds of america and spongebob lovepants... you know, the classics :)

2011-04-29T21:42:00.000-07:00

although i didn't watch any royal wedding coverage... if it means more dresses with sleeves.. i wish i would have supported.

What does your 401K look like???

2011-04-27T11:39:00.000-07:00

I texted scott earlier this week asking him how my 401K was looking as he ... ok, let's just be honest, i don't deal with the money in the house, i just make some and spend it :)

anyways, his response was "it's tall, brown hair. Devilshly handsome".... then he called me shortly after and i picked up the phone saying "so, you are saying my 401K looks like Ben Affleck?"

..... um, that didn't go over so well.

1. it was supposed to be him, not ben affleck
2. does my husband really have brown hair????
*i argued it was dirty blonde....

Earth Day 5K

2011-04-25T08:22:00.000-07:00

Josh's first 5K was this Saturday before the wedding. J was super excited about earth day so, i thought it was only appropriate to find an earth day 5K. We ran through a park in the city but first started with some retro warm up drills.. everyone was laughing so hard during the warm up as the MC was hilarious and josh had a good time with it. The race was a run or walk so it was perfect for us to complete with no pressure.
The first quarter mile we went at a 10 min/mile pace and then he had a meltdown. "Couldn't run anymore... was tired... was hungry... etc..." We managed to overcome that hump and did a run/walk the rest of the way. He enjoyed picking a point and running to it and then we walked to another.. it worked out well.

Funniest part was at the water station... i threw my cup on the side (as you normally do) and josh started crying b/c it was earth day and i was littering....Touché

Josh finished strong and we got him a Jamba to celebrate!

Julia & Kam Woodard

2011-04-25T07:34:00.000-07:00

We had such a fun weekend celebrating Julia and Kam's wedding! Friday, the festivities began at Pinstripes for the rehearsal dinner. They served yummy sandwiches and we played Bocce Ball. Josh had a blast and was pretty good!The wedding/reception was on Saturday at the Redfield Estate which turned out so lovely for the occasion. It is an old mansion set in the woods and has such a nostalgic feel. As julia and i put together all the handouts and i helped with the flowers, it was awesome to see everything come together. (they are both math teachers, hence the chalkboard table #'s and pencil/math problem table seating)Our bishop, from church, married them in a lovely ceremony. The dinner was wonderful and they did champagne/sprite toasts from the balcony. As the matron of honor, i was able to share some fun memories from high school along with words of wisdom. I am so excited for their baby boy to arrive this summer and look forward to the baby shower soon!

Easter Sunday

2011-04-24T19:39:00.000-07:00

Great, quiet Easter Sunday after a fun wedding weekend. We had the missionaries over for some yummy ham and lots of carbs and candy. We read John; Chapter 20 and enjoyed the quiet reflective day.

Rain Rain Go Away!

2011-04-17T12:35:00.000-07:00

we celebrated our weekend with going downtown for some Sprinkles cupcakes.. i have gotten them in dc before am totally a sucker for the overpriced cupcakes... seriously what tastes better than a $3.50 cupcake?? (my baking friends.. stop rolling your eyes). Sprinkles is actually right around the corner from scott's school and i can't believe he hasn't been there more often.. better him with the close proximity than me! saturday, i had a 10 Mile race along the lake. suboptimal race conditions but i was pleased with my time. Full race report on the "other blog."after a big nap and putting together some legos, we had dinner with the Johnsons and got to catch up after a long hiatus. Cheap mexican food hit the spot.

*no pictures of Scott this weekend as he boycotted the cupcake picture. if i had pictures of him they would have been of him hitting golf balls with friends, stressing over planning a golf weekend or making graphs about supply and demand of abortions. sadly, none of those actually came to fruition but it was nice to have him off on Saturday!

2011-04-10T14:38:00.000-07:00

i think we are finally back to normal after a whirlwind March. josh had a fun playdate on tuesday thanks to the gracious kim! (thank you!) thursday, j and i went downtown to meet up with scott and dan (who was in Chitown for work). we hit up baisi thai at 900 n michigan which is one of the first restaurants scott and i went to when we moved here. combined with the fact scott gets cheapo parking b/c it is next to his school, it is one of our favorites. friday, i survived a busy day at work..... i swear that office is making me (more) emotionally unstable... (sorry, i digress..)

anyways, after work, we went into the city for dinner at Epic Burger with friends. it was delicious! Before bedtime, J read the kiddies Green Eggs and Ham. It was really a proud moment for Scott and I as J read the entire book.. so awesome to see him reading. saturday, scott went golfing after work and josh and i started on a craft. that evening we had a family night out. Moonwok and Red Mango... does it get much better than that?

Spring has Sprung...

2011-04-03T15:48:00.000-07:00

We have been waiting forever but it is finally here... hopefully Spring stays as i have officially put the windbreakers in the front lines in our jacket closet.

I celebrated by running a half marathon down in Springfield. The Medals4Mettle C. Illinois group was pacing the event so i wanted to go down and support them. Also, I was graciously housed by a running friend while his wife watched josh while i ran... super awesome, i know.

Race was fairly uneventful. More hilly than i expected but clipped along at my usual pace. Josh was at the finish line waiting for me which is always an awesome sight. My tri-friend Jen also came down so it was fun to celebrate with her too! (love josh jumping in the background)After the race, we decided to hit up the Lincoln Presidential Museum before we left town. The race started and finished right next to it which was extremely convenient. Josh was excited to go back and i was shocked by all that he remembered (i.e. injury Abe sustained to his eye as a child, his kids being known for their antics and all but one of his children dying). I thought that was pretty impressive for a 5 (now 6) year old to remember. We loved the movies and they had some new exhibits we enjoyed. Joshua is excited "daddy is going to be a lawyer like President Lincoln" :)Josh did great on the drive and we made it back in decent time. Sunday, we visited my parents who were downtown for word and then we listened to General Conference. Josh and I have enjoyed doing little projects while watching conference. Although it may sound counterproductive, i think it helps from wandering away from the computer, for both of us! So, we made cards for loved ones and sent them on their way this evening!

San Diego Part Two

2011-03-28T20:10:00.000-07:00

First and foremost, the lecture went well at the ASCRS/ASOA Congress. (entitled: Lessons Learned after a year with EHR:a Retrospective Review). About 85-90 people attended and we avoided a potential disaster with our PowerPoint. Somehow when it was loaded onto their server, it was in "Timing Presentation" Mode so it was automatically turning slides which were too fast for our presentation. After about 15 slides and a mild freak out (which audience members told me they couldn't tell)... we figured it out and all went ok. It was nice to finally be able to share our thoughts of our EHR conversion.... and hopefully help other practices around the country. Looks like i might be able to get more mileage out of the presentation as a drug company asked me to present the same lecture in a few months.The evenings were spent running around and visiting with friends and family (Hellers, Lani/Cam, Emily/Gary and Jim/Cheri) We were really appreciative of them making the effort to see us and it was great to see all of the while we were out there. It was an exhausting trip but worth it. Josh and Scott had a great time and ran around town while i was at the conference. They went to Sea World two days in a row (i joined Saturday after the conference), Balboa Park and swam at the pool everyday. We are back to reality for a few days and then headto Springfield this weekend. Here's to spring and hopefully a fun/busy summer!

Sunny San Diego.... Part One

2011-03-26T22:51:00.000-07:00

In San Diego for the long weekend... have a conference that i am lecturing at and Scott and Josh are enjoying the nicer weather. A pic of Emily and us at Mormon Battalion Museum. More on the vaca when we return to the Chicago Tundra

Star Student

2011-03-25T21:29:00.000-07:00

Josh had his special day in class... it was adorable and his friends really are the cutest..
I came to class and read them a story and led a little craft (candy tic tac toe). josh then was able to explain all his pictures he brought and the kids got to ask him any questions they wanted. it was a great day for j!

Down Time

2011-03-21T19:22:00.000-07:00

We sometimes struggle to have downtime/family time all together with Scott gone so often. Luckily, this weekend, we were able to relax together and enjoy QT as a family. Josh had some birthday parties and I had a wedding shower but the rest of the weekend was spent lounging, watching movies, cleaning and getting our 72 Hour Kits Re-Vamped.

Our church promotes us to have 72 hour kits ready for transport in case of an emergency and immediate evacuation. We have had all the pieces but they were in an arduous bucket that was not easy for transport. So, i used some race bags we had laying around and get them ready. Our kits are not as inclusive as the link but we have all the essentials for 72 hours INCLUDING an extra set of glasses for me. Imperative for people with Contact Lens. It felt good to have them complete and we put all our extra supplies in our cars.
We also put together some things for Joshua being the Star Student. You might recall his little hitting incident, which was followed by "reflection week".. well, he has kept his hands to himself since then and is being honored as Star Student. They asked for pictures of him and his favorite things.. it was fun to put together and j was excited about the angry birds i made for him.

Japan Relief

2011-03-21T08:24:00.000-07:00

"When baked potatoes and pudding and milk are needed, prayer will not supply their place."
—Brigham Young

Please consider looking through your houses to see if there is anything you can donate to the Japan Relief Efforts. I made a quilt, some wall hangings and pulled some clothes that josh outgrew that he never wore and asked my staff if they could donate any items and got a nice full 18 x18 box. I shipped them to LDS Charities and the link has items they are currently looking for. Eventually when the clean up is over, rebuilding will begin.

My efforts definitely align with "every little bit counts" mantra. Our monetary and supply donation are not substantial in the grand scheme of things but hopefully can make a small difference.

here's the thing....

2011-03-13T15:28:00.000-07:00

it started out very innocently... and then before i knew it; he took one of my bishops, then a knight... i was texting at the same time so i stopped to pay attention but it was too late, my queen was gone... he lays traps, he rubs he hands together... it is pretty cute... and impressive.

i demand a rematch.

Random Conversation:
I was hugging Josh today and the following dialogue transpired:
nic: "josh, i want to be with you forever and i love you so much"
josh: "mommy, i love you too"
... pause...
josh: "but mommy, eventually you are going to get old and die and i will live on my own with my own family"
... pause...
nic: "won't you be sad"
josh: "kindof but we will have a long time till that happens and you will get really old so you won't be as sad"
then he hugged me.

i might have cried a little....

PlayaDelCarmen Getaway!

2011-03-10T15:28:00.000-08:00

Scott and i took a 5 night trip to Mexico. It has kindof become our anniversary tradition where we escape the snow and Josh goes to Ohio where he is treated like a little prince... the jury is still out who got pampered the most.

Our trip started with a 5:45am flight only to realize that our plane was oversold (by 25+ seats) b/c of change in plane size. As we were making a layover, i was first in line to offer up our seats. We ended up switching to a direct flight that got us in 30 minutes earlier than our original itinerary. For our "trouble"... we were given $600 in flight vouchers! (score!)We stayed at the BlueBay Esmeralda in PlayaDelCarmen which was beautiful. It is about 45 minutes south of Cancun. After check in, we were bummed to hear we were in one of the buildings farthest from the beach but got over that quickly when we realized we had a suite! Two full bathrooms, two tvs, couch, dining table... amazing! (#2 score! and the 5 minute walk wasn't that bad)Some highlights included getting together with Joy&Aaron who were staying at a resort nearby. The men played some golf while joy and i walked, talked, ate and laid on the beds on the beach at their resort. It was such a peaceful day. We went into town that evening; got some Mexican food, Scott got harassed by the peddlers for carrying my bag, got some souvenirs and then called it a night.We also did an excursion to Tulum and an adventure ranch that included zip lines, rappelling and snorkeling in a cenote. Great day and fun to break up the pool time. Sadly, i realized something was wrong with my camera while we were on the excursion, therefore, many of our pics turned out blurry. (luckily it is still under warranty so we will survive)Rest of the days were spent lounging, reading, sunbathing and eating. It was a great re-group for us to talk about our life goals/hopes/dreams. We hope to lots of changes in the horizon as we have already had many changes recently.... We look forward to see where life will take us next!

scott keeps getting the big winner of the week.....

2011-03-03T12:10:00.001-08:00

Today, he found out he was officially accepted into the JD/MBA program at Loyola University Chicago. He didn't even have to take the GMAT!

... so, in approx 2.5 years, he will be able to sign his name:

Scott H Kesten, Esq, MBA

at some point, i will concede he is smarter than me but i still have some time left :)

"it's my birthday week..."

2011-02-25T07:13:00.000-08:00

i heard the title to be the reasoning behind every request joshua made this week.

"can i get a slurpee? it's my birthday week..."
"what about popcorn at target? it's my birthday week..."
"let's watch another family show b/c it's my birthday week..."

i caved for most of them as it was his.... birthday week.Monday was president's day so there was no school. i took a day off and spent it with josh after we made a pitstop at the office. per his request, we went downtown to the shedd aquarium. after arriving, i realized it was a free day which is never fun as hoards of people line up and the line was almost to the field museum. so, i broke his heart and said no, and we went over to the planetarium. we saw two movies; one 3D on observatories and another on galaxies and stars. the seats in the second theater are so comfortable and i totally passed out during the show. i was woken up by a child next to me poking me in the cheek.... afterwards josh asked me how cool it was about the supernova in Orion's constellation and black holes and i had NO idea what he was talking about...
when we finished in the kids area, we gave the aquarium a second shot and found the line was gone as it was 2 hours before close. we went right in and paid the extra for the shark area. josh enjoyed seeing all the sea animals and found the big sawsharks to be his favorites. had to laugh at this pic b/c he asked for a picture here and then proceeded to do the "big eyes" which he said mimiced the yellow fish behind him as it has huge eyes.weekend was fun and went quick. josh went to another birthday party. it was lego themed which was a huge success! they built and battled the entire time. kiddies at this age love building. that evening, went to a friends for a family birthday gathering where we had lots of fun and i ate too much food! finished up the weekend with church and having a soon to be missionary over for dinner!

6 Years....

2011-02-22T07:46:00.000-08:00

Happy Birthday dear Joshua.... Happy Birthday to you!

Birthday Bonanza

2011-02-20T17:59:00.001-08:00

josh celebrated his birthday this weekend starting with my parents coming into town. after school/work on friday, we went down to visit Scott at his new job on Michigan Ave. The offices of Chase Private Client were quite swanky. We got a reservation at Osteria via Stato which was a yummy Italian restaurant we tried for the first time. Josh got a $8.50 kids meal which might have been the priciest we have paid yet! That evening, we chilled, read books and J played fruit ninja on the ipad with nana and pop-pop.
Saturday, was his birthday party at Skokie Exploritorium. J requested (also read as: demanded) a Mario Birthday Party which was fun to do. We had about 28 kiddies there and it was so much fun having all his friends there to celebrate. The boys ran around like a pack of wolves which was pretty humorous to watch. The other kids enjoyed the huge tube, water area and costume stage.
After the party, we all took a cat nap and then opened 'some' of his gifts. Highlights included a chess set, space puzzles, Legos, Legos and Legos! (he loves them) and some fun crafts! Sunday, we had a great day at church and ended tonight with some more legos and leftover cake! a super fun and memorable weekend.

2011-02-13T14:11:00.000-08:00

Saturday, j and i went to the Chicago History Museum as they were promoting a new Lincoln exhibit. i was a little disappointed to find that the 'exhibit' was just a few items they already had and period pieces... we still enjoyed our time there. josh was really interested in the meat packing history as i think the concept of "where we get meat" finally sunk in. he said he felt bad he eats so many chicken nuggets but followed that comment with... "but they are really good". i don't see him turning vegetarian anytime soon.

the rest of the week was quiet, however, we did manage to get dinner with some good friends multiple nights which was lots of fun... as my life revolves around food!

*midweek- girls dinner with our kiddies at Olive Garden. Nothing like generic chain food with endless salad and breadsticks to enjoy company with good friends.

*Friday, met up with the Johnson's at L. Woods. Have been wanting to eat here for a while and we had a great time. We had a perfect booth for the kiddies to have space and enjoyed our BBQ/Ribs/sides. Scott wanted to try this $13 dessert which was an apple crisp which was a let down but we managed to eat it all after they provided us with $8 ice cream.

*Sunday, we went to a friends house for dinner and ended up laughing the night away. j loves being around a big group of kids.

2011-02-06T20:27:00.000-08:00

After all of Chicago shoveled themselves out of the snow, rest of the week went on normally. Thursday, j was with me at work as school was canceled. i moved my computer to the docs office where there is a couch and josh kept himself busy with math, reading, movies and took a huge nap. Friday, i went to the Chicago Temple (look at all that snow!) and then our entire family fell asleep at 8:30 pm till 8 am the next morning.. it was pretty awesome as we were all exhausted and able to catch up on sleep. Saturday, we babysat and then celebrated our friends 30'th birthdays with some WhirlyBall. Lots of fun!!! However, two days later i have 2 huge bruises and 1 minor one to show for it. Still a great time with friends and boys loved it!

Sunday, Scott helped me in my primary class and then we had Harvey and the Johnson's over for the SuperBowl. Right before everyone came, i got this horrible migrane/light sensitivity/etc. and was feeling horrible. Steph was nice enough to keep me company while the Ty and Josh watched Nemo in our bedroom and we laid around chatting and eating like 2 lbs of grapes. I was really looking forward to gorging myself but maybe it was for the best.

BLIZZARDRAMA 2011

2011-02-06T19:49:00.000-08:00

that can be pronounced, blizzard-rama or blizzard-drama... take your pick.

this photo is of Lake Shore Drive early Wednesday morning.this past week, Chicago was hit with a pretty huge storm. tuesday, it started coming down as we watched from inside. the winds were really strong and the snow blew sideways...

wednesday morning, the snow drifts in the front of our building were 5+ feet high and one reached the height of our fence in our backyard (maybe 6'.. notice how by the trees there is no snow as it all collected onto the fence). my boss still wanted to see patients, surprise!, and so i attempted to go into work. i drove our low lying saab and proceeded to get stuck 10' out of our garage. the picture makes it look worse than it is but there was an opening from people coming and going so it looked liked i could make it. i ended up getting stuck in about 10" of snow. 60 minutes later, scott and some neighbors helped up out. Condodwellers don't really own snow tools so we used a pitching wedge and antifreeze to get the car out....we spent the rest of the day at home. joshies was sick so he couldn't even enjoy the snow and i had to answer phones remotely, which ended up killing my battery in my phone. i have decided that unless my boss gets me a fancy car like his or a snowmobile, next time we have a bad storm... i am staying inside :)

lay low....

2011-01-30T16:03:00.000-08:00

with the accident, new job and insurance drama related to the car (looks like the range rover is officially uninsured)... we needed a quiet weekend. Friday, we went downtown and had dinner with some friends. Joshies loves their kiddos (3 -triplet- girls+a little boy) and will talk about them for days. i haven't figured out if it is because he gets bombarded, or their energy or that he gets to call 'some' of the shots! either way, he had fun as did the parents. We had some great Chinese and then played Bananagrams and a Senior Citizen card game.... it was pretty fun. (sadly, no pic) Saturday, J and I hit up the gym, office and then one of his best friends birthday parties. That evening, we laid low, played some chess, got take out and i made some church based games (Valiant Scattergories!) for Sunday. Today, we had one of the best church services we have had in a long time... simply amazing. The third hour had people from every auxiliary (leadership branch) speak and they showed this video. It was a great way to end the weekend!

and the winner this week is....

2011-01-26T17:47:00.000-08:00

SCOTT!!!

Today, he was offered and accepted a new position through JPMorgan Chase in Private Client Services. Currently, he is part time at Chase in Glenview. The new position is full time and could have long term opportunities after he completes his JD/MBA. It is also great to know that he is marketable in this crappy economy.

Have no clue how it will be having him working full time and going to school but i believe he can do it esp now that the classes seem to peak his interest more. He will be working on Michigan Ave on the Mag Mile as well so i look forward to visiting him on friday evenings for nights in the city.. esp in the summer (like how i have already planned that :)

Yeah for the big winner: Scotty!

its official...

2011-01-25T18:17:00.000-08:00

we really have bad luck with cars and getting hit .... and we were a double winner as the range rover that hit me was another un-insured driver (yes, range rover)... the best part was i was t-boned by her as she pulled out of a driveway and she tried to say i ran into her.

thankfully, it was just me in the car and i am ok. here is the 1 blog post of my comment about our nissan when we got it less than 18 mths ago and the history behind it. we should have never gotten rid of the acura.

Reflection and Hubble 3D

2011-01-23T14:16:00.000-08:00

The week started out with Scott and Josh returning from Utah Sunday evening. Early in the week, i was pulled to the side by j's teacher and was told that he mimicked her when being scolded..... classy. i knew he was in trouble the second she said my name when i went to pick him up....
so, for the rest of the week, we had a "reflection week" No TV, No video games, just books for the first two days and then toys were ok for the rest of the week but no technology while he "reflected" on his choices. i told him we could resume to normal life by Saturday if he behaved. this seemed to work in the short run but who knows if it will stick for the long run....Saturday morning we went down to Navy Pier as they were playing a free showing of the Hubble 3D Movie to Adler Planetarium Members. I could get 8 tickets so we went with the Ellsworth's. The clarity and 3D of the movie was amazing. It covered the last shuttle missions to repair the Hubble and highlighted all the new knowledge we have gained b/c of the Hubble's telescope. Seeing some of the images that hubble has captured in 3D was pretty amazing. Josh loved it and the kids got some good laughs over the astronaut's life in space. That evening, we went out with the Johnson's for dinner... Wings of course. Sadly, we were a little disappointed with the food but it was great to catch up with them! The rest of the weekend was pretty quiet; Church and starting the crafts for Josh's party. Hoping i am able to do half the things i am planning and also able to finish half the projects i start...

at the request of my father...

2011-01-17T20:52:00.000-08:00

i am reading team of rivals...

after you get over the fact that holding it is a bicep workout, and get through the first 50 pages, you are hooked. i am about 200 pages into it and finally feel the weight of the book distributing correctly!

anyways, definitely recommend it and cannot wait for our next trip to Springfield this spring!!! We hope to hit up the sites we missed last year along with New Salem (where Lincoln grew up).

a trip to 'the tah'

2011-01-17T07:11:00.000-08:00

(when i was at BYU, we always called Utah... The Tah. it stuck. my other nickname for it is THE U.T. (not to be confused with the OC) :)

scott and josh had a planned 5 day trip out to Utah and i tagged along for a few days (thanks to a buddy pass). the trip was quick as i was only there for 2 full days.. however we seemed to manage to pack in a ton of stuff. with scott's family spread across the valley and trying to squeeze in some friends... it keeps us on our toes

thursday, scott and his brother went skiing at snowbird while the ladies and kiddies went to Discovery Gateway (Salt Lake's Children Museum). we were able to get in free (thank you Adler Pass) and it was a nice afternoon catching up.
that evening, we went to texas roadhouse for some good grub with the shurtz's, aka: newlyweds sarah was recently diagnosed with stage4 cancer and is currently going through treatment. i am pretty sure it is impossible not to feel so much love for both of them when you are around them. dan has always been a great spiritual example to me (he was the one of the first people i met at BYU) and has married a wonderful woman. such an awesome evening.
friday, the kidlets went sledding at chris and emily's. josh loved playing with his cousins and the weather was really nice where jackets were optional. we then took pics at lani and camerons and had our first dinner (Cafe Rio). After saying goodbye to them, we went to our second dinner with the kete and lindsay at Rocky Mountain Pizza. scott was formerly employed by the pizza establishment so it is definitely more of a nostalgic eatery than it is good. however, we enjoyed the company more than the sub-par pizza.
after i left, scott and josh did another set of rounds on saturday along with some sledding and finished at his brother's house for a family gathering. another fun quick trip to utah in the books!

Another really cold weekend

2011-01-09T13:29:00.001-08:00

I mentally prepare for Chicago winters. even growing up in the snow belt of Ohio, the wind here can get to you. that bone chilling wind that drives you crazy.. this doesn't stop me from wearing open toed shoes to church.... but it does put a damper on your ability to run around for a few mths so we try to find as many indoor activities as possible.josh and i did a mid-week movie with the Powell's and then Scott and I had a date night planned Friday. i had hopes to go to L Woods but lack of planning meant a 2 hour wait so we ended up at Chilis. Scott was in heaven but i was hoping for something a little nicer. We still had a nice evening and enjoying his break from school.

saturday, scott went with 3 good friends to the Colts/Jets game. His buddy got some face value tickets and they had a great time... until Colts lost. (i asked scott to get a shot of all the guys, and this is what i got... better than no pic i guess)with the entire day to ourselves, josh and i laid low. i did manage to go to a 5:45 Spin Class (but then took a 2 hour nap when i got home). we had original thoughts of making the day an exploring day but opted for a close to home day. now that he is older, i normally give him a choice between 4-5 things to do ranging in exertion level and he picks.

he chose going to the Log Cabin and old Firehouse in Skokie. For it being an extremely tiny and free museum (if you can even call it that), we had a good time. we were the only ones there and j was really intrigued with hook and ladder truck and the old jail cell. the log cabin (c. 1860's) was bigger than expected however, it was for a family of 10. josh and i had fun in the cultural hall where there were antique games which turned into us running around and taking funny pics.
sunday, after church, we had a family over that moved in recently (What Up Katie!) and had fun getting to know them. Hope to more hanging out in the future!

End of 2010

2011-01-01T10:42:00.001-08:00

We ended the year well! My office did our "year end" numbers a few days early as my boss was leaving for two weeks. The numbers looked really promising for a strong positive year. With our purchase of EMR, increase in staff and decline in commercial visits, we were extremely lucky to end up esp with the economical climate the way it is. Scott got his grades and continues to improve on his GPA which is what i like to hear. Josh has been enjoying his time off. Between playdates, tagging along at work with me and sledding trips with daddy, he has been keeping his calendar filled.

New Years Eve; we went out to dinner at a cute Italian restaurant in city with some friends and then had ice cream to ring in the new year. New Years Day, we planned to see Zoo Lights but due to the subzero temps and bone chilling wind, we opted for chinese food back at our friends place. The long weekend was really nice and awesome to spend time together as a family. Sunday, we switched to 9 am church and started my new calling teaching the 8-9 year olds in Primary. I was fairly nervous but it was a great experience and think i am going to enjoy being with the kids for this year.

Christmas Day....

2010-12-27T06:56:00.000-08:00

... it was a quiet day
... we slept in
... had some breakfast
... listened to Charlie Brown's Christmas Music
and enjoyed spending the day as a family.

we aren't Santa people at our house so our presents have been under our tree for a while. josh loved picking out the gifts and giving them to us. he made a little clay paperweight for daddy at school and was bursting to give it to him. like his mother, he is not very good at keeping gift secrets..

For Example:
last week, we were headed to the gym when J said
J: "Mommy, daddy and i got you something today"
me: "ohhh.. what was it?" (yes, i egg my child on)
J: "can't tell you"
me: "ok, that's fine"
... 30 seconds later
J: "lemme give you a hint, they are red, gummy and they are your favorite candy"

anyways, this dialogue between us is quite common when gifts are around but somehow he managed to keep the beloved paperweight a secret. when we started, he wanted daddy to go first and it was pretty cute. fun to watch a little one be so excited about their gift.our dinner was a Mexican theme. Fajitas, tamales, potatoes and chips and salsa. harvey came over for dinner and then he got to open his gift. we got him a new jacket which i think he liked. the rest of the night we put together all of the Legos we got joshua and played with my new Flip video camera. I have a feeling we will put our gifts to good use this year!

finished the night with a movie, reading Luke2 and appreciating all we have!

Christmas Eve

2010-12-26T07:48:00.000-08:00

"This is a glorious time of the year, simple in origin, deep in meaning, beautiful in tradition and custom, rich in memories, and charitable in spirit. It has an attraction to which our hearts are readily drawn. This joyful season brings to each of us a measure of happiness that corresponds to the degree in which we have turned our mind, feelings, and actions to the spirit of Christmas."

- Thomas S Monson

We had a great Christmastime this year. Amazing how it comes and goes so fast. Both Scott and I were off from Friday-Sunday and it was awesome to have three whole days together with no major agenda. This is our 8th Christmas together and we have spent everyone here in Chicago. Shortly after Josh was born, we started the tradition of having the missionaries from our Church over and have loved this tradition. This year, we took them downtown to visit the Adler Planetarium and went to see a show along with running around the exhibits. on our way down, we dropped off a dozen sandwiches and food to some homeless under the freeway. I have seen them a few times and wanted them to have food too. I think they appreciated it.

The Adler recently completed their kids area which is awesome. Josh loved doing all the activities and playing with the rovers. I think the missionaries loved it too! After Adler, we took them out to dinner to Buca di Beppo. They requested Italian food and i really wanted to take them to Quartino (as i love the Gibson Restaurant group and its Chicago flair) but Buca was the only place that i could find that would take reservations. Harvey, a friend of ours, joined us as well. We had lots of fun chatting and eating. We ordered way too much food.... Salad, Bread, Pizza, Pasta... we were stuffed!

Between the museum, playing with our iPad in the car and eating out, i think they had a fun time. We love this tradition with the missionaries and hope it continues.

Merry Christmas! (click images to see larger view)

2010-12-24T18:31:00.000-08:00

Christmas Traditions

2010-12-22T07:14:00.000-08:00

this was year three of going to see WonderLand Express at Chicago Botanic Gardens. Josh and I went with the Powells and had a blast! The trains and Chicago site replicas (made out of natural resources) are awesome and always fun to see the new additions. We took in the lights and candy village as well. Love Christmastime!

tis the season... for Holiday Parties!!!

2010-12-20T11:39:00.000-08:00

it has been a great few weeks leading up to Christmas. Scott is done with finals and i am looking forward to spending some good quality family time together!

this past week was party/friend week and was so much fun!
1. Friends Party this past Sunday- lots of fun and i love the gift basket swap at the end.
2. Farewell party for an employee at work- we did dinner in "little india" on devon the city. i didn't each much but enjoyed the company.
3. Ladies Party- every year, an awesome lady from our ward has a fun party that culminates with a grab bag. although it sounds pretty standard, this gift exchange always seems to be the most exciting and hilarious!
4. Dinner at Fuego with friends in the city and then we were able to attend their son's baptism the next day. josh enjoyed watching the baptism and loved visiting with friends (who, because of new boundaries for our church wards, no longer attend our ward in the burbs).

the week flew by as this next one will. we have some great things planned this week and hope to provide service and love to many.

freezing cold temps with j

2010-12-10T06:22:00.000-08:00

well, winter has officially blessed us with its presence bringing in freezing temps, icy roads and bone chilling winds. to be honest, i am pretty used to it and the fact i bought a real winter jacket last year has definitely helped (my semi puff 3/4 length down LL Beaner vs. a NFace Denali that wind whips right through).

with scott studying non-stop for finals, we have been doing our own thing. wednesday, i was able to take a personal day and chaperon a field trip j's class had to the Museum of Science and Industry. i like going every year around the holidays as they have all of the trees representing countries throughout the world. i was in charge of three boys (including josh) and it was fun to run around with them. we did all the standard things but also got a personal tour of the coal mine. normally, the lines are outrageous for the exhibit, so i was super excited when we walked up and there was NOONE. we did the tour with just us and the 'miner.' he tailored it for 5 year olds and let them touch everything. it was a blast. when we finished, we found the line of at least 50-60 people! it was lots of fun and the boys were great!i also took josh to see Tangled with the powells. thee boys loved it... it was really cute and john lasseter continues to WOW me. rest of the weekend, we laid low, went to the bookstore, got some books and josh also picked out a piggy bank for the toys for tots drive at our gym. we managed to slip away with daddy for some dinner, thanks to an employee who got me a gift card!! we are looking forward to scott finishing finals next week so we can have some more quality time with him!

First Snowfall

2010-12-06T08:01:00.000-08:00

at least one of us in our family was excited!

Saturday afternoon, i had big plans to take Josh out and buy snowpants and be a good mom and play outside with him. Unfortunately, after a few errands, my stomach had different plans and kept me housebound for the entire weekend. Finished all my Holiday Cards which was the only plus of the weekend. I guess i will have to be a good mom another time :)

It's a CGC Holiday!

2010-12-05T15:44:00.001-08:00

had my work party this weekend. lots of fun, great food and lots of laughs. the party was at my boss' country club and it was a great venue, very intimate and great service. my staff was kind enough to get me an REI giftcard which is perfect timing as i am finally ready to pull the trigger on a garmin watch. we really do have a great team and it was fun to celebrate a long, tough year! the docs got us beautiful silver frames and shirts that said "the beatings continue until morale improves".... it was a fun night!

Cleveland 5Mile Turkey Trot

2010-11-28T17:21:00.000-08:00

After rolling into cleveland late wednesday (thank you chicago traffic), we woke up for the Cleveland 5Mile turkey trot. it was freezing rain and windy that morning and it was looking pretty bleak. however, we all made it downtown and met up with matt and natsumi (matt used to go to law school with scott and now is at casewestern).

we all started running the race together and went the first mile in a group. after that, we started spreading out. i lost scott around mile two (during the incline at the browns stadium) so i just kept plugging along. ended at 52 minutes and realized i could push myself a lot more ... if i wanted to... but normally, i don't want to push myself :)

it was a great way to start our thanksgiving and look forward to next year!

Thankful for Thanksgiving

2010-11-28T16:55:00.000-08:00

Great to be back in Cleveland for the Holiday. Our agenda was pretty simple; eat, lay around, eat, relax, visit friends, eat... you get the picture. it was nice to have the newest member of our family (Stephanie, Ryan's wife) with us. We were able to spend some QT doing crafts and shopping.Evenings were spent with the entire family (us, ry/steph, my parents and my 3 grandparents) watching movies by the fireplace. Josh slept in a tent (per his own request) and loved being the king of the house. Unfortunately, didn't take a lot of pics... guess that was because i was in the same outfit the entire weekend!

Birthday Time

2010-11-22T11:46:00.000-08:00

Had two kiddie parties this week. One was for Josh's Creme friend and the other was for triplet girls. Both were lots of fun! We also celebrated Daddy's 31st birthday this past week. He celebrated it by working, going to school, missing the train and getting home at 10:30 pm. Although it was a normal day. the missed train was slight insult to injury.

Saturday evening, Scott and I did sneak away for a quick dinner and movie saturday night. Nothing too exciting but as we are going to be gone for a few days in C-Town, we had some stuff to catch up on.