Surprise Party!!!! Grandpa and Grandma Wheeler's 60th

We had an awesome surprise party for my parents who both turn 60 this year!!  We decided to have the party in between their birth dates so they wouldn't suspect the surprise.  My youngest brother Jesse "flew" in to Vegas and had my parents pick him up, while my brother Jed and Ryan began decorating and my sister Loni and I and our families drove to Logandale to make it on time!  We had a great weekend!!

Lovely Lit. Lady

I have completed a second year of reading to classes at school, which means dressing up as book characters.  The kids seem to enjoy it, but I enjoy it more!  I love books and my hope is to help kids love books too, or at least help them understand that books can be more fun than just the required reading.  The school theme for the year was Celebration! because it was the school's 50th birthday, so almost every month we celebrated some sort of theme in books.  Here's the year in review:

"Celebrate you!" books: I'm Gonna Like Me, Ramona and The Giver.  I dressed up as me. Can you tell?  My favorite things: my hair is in Princess Leia buns because it's one of my favorite movies, my favorite sock (one green and the other striped), green is my favorite color, my favorite holiday is Christmas (Christmas sweatshirt), my favorite slippers.  One of the teachers took her class to the grocery store for a field trip and they all received stickers that said "special today." She gave me her sticker. Wonder why?

"Celebrate Imagination," books: The Borrowers, The Librarian from the Black Lagoon, Not a Box/ Not a Stick.  I was the Teacher from the Black Lagoon, complete with eyes in the back of my head.  The kids had a really great time pointing out my stick on mole. I had a great time pretending I didn't know what they were talking about. . which drove them crazy. . I really am the teacher from the Black Lagoon.

"Celebrate Kindness," books: The Unfinished Angel, by Sharon Creech, George and Martha, Piggie and Elephant books (favorite books at our house), by Mo Willams, one of my favorite children's book authors.  Yes, I am wearing gold shoes and gold stockings:

For Literacy Week, I read to the kids during lunchtime. Although it worked well last year,  I'm not sure I will continue next year because they would not listen.  Maybe because I looked like a stranger and they were trying to ignore me.  I read, The Twits, by Roald Dahl, therefore I dressed as a Twit, complete with barbs in my beard.

"Celebrate Fairytales," books: The Kiss That Missed (very cute), Peter and the Starcatchers, Moongobble and Me series. I twirled a lot in this dress. You can't tell from the picture, but I also have ringlets. :)

"Celebrate Sports," books: Heat, by Mike Lupica, sports selections from The Bailey School Kids,  Good For You and Me, by Mercer Mayer.  I'd just like to say, that I am wearing Spencer's jersey.

"Celebrate Reading," book: The Wretched Stone, by Christ VanAllsberg.  I am an ape.  You have to read the book to see why.  The kids had a great time guessing what the stone represents.  A good book to encourage reading through the summer.

Many thanks to Mark who took all of these pictures on rushed mornings. Hopefully the chuckles were a satisfactory payment.  This is just one of the many things that you don't find out about someone before you marry them.  The poor man puts up with a lot of my shenanigans. Though truthfully, when I thought about being involved in my kid's school career, this was not foreseen.  Hooray for adventure!

Valley of Fire; A Man Turns 60.

On May 1st my Dad turned 60 years old.  To help him celebrate his wonderful 60 years, we made the trek to Nevada, which proved to be a very relaxing get-away for us as well.  My brother Ryan and his family have been exploring places in and around Moapa Valley.  I really didn't appreciate what I had when I lived there, either because it was too hot to enjoy it, or because I was too self-centered to notice there was anything else in the world but me, as teenagers do.  Probably mostly the later reason.  He took us to the Valley of Fire State Park, which I have been to many times, but apparently not to ALL of it.  We went on very relaxing hike through the red rocks, red sand and variety of other pleasant scenes:

 Nature is amazing!

The sixty-year old and his nearly sixty year old wife. The greatest people I know. Plus Mark. And my three boys. 

 D.J. is a natural care giver.  When he is with cousins he is often playing with the younger ones.  This younger one is my nephew Jack.

A bit of a squeeze through this canyon. 

I have never seen a green cactus flower, and I got a bee in the picture to boot! 

James in a hole in the rock with cousin Mason and Jara. 

Not sure what Spencer has in his hand, but apparently he's got plenty of rocks in his pocket that I will need to remove before washing. 

Mountains beg for testosterone laden people to climb them. Way to go guys! 

Who says the desert is not full of color 

Yay for sixty year olds!

Want an Ant Sucker?

Have you ever been to the science museum? In their store, they have suckers that have critters in them.  Scorpions, spiders, cockroaches.  Never tried one.  But I know how to make them. Now.

At the beginning of soccer season this year, I got out the camp chairs out of winter storage and threw them in the back of the van (because of course we are in a hurry).  When I got to the soccer game and lugged the camp chairs out to the field an orange sucker fell out of the netted cup holder.  This is what is looked like:

Can you make out the head, thorax and abdomen?  Sweet.  I stood in the parking lot for two minutes just staring at that sucker, thinking. . . really? Legos, rocks, k'nex, money, clips, pens and beads that I've found in my dryer are now surpassed in the category of unexpected discoveries.  Then I dryly wondered what would be next.

Now I'm a fairly adventurous foodie, but I just couldn't bring myself to taste it. But I still wonder  . . .

Two New Appliances; One Connected to the House, One to Me

When we moved into the house FIVE YEARS AGO, I was pretty sure we would have to replace the dishwasher very soon.  But, as the saying goes: use it up, wear it out, make it do or do without.  We did.  We used it up, we wore it out, I made it do, but as it turns out, it's no fun doing without a dishwasher.  So I braved the elements (continuous rain in Utah), and went to Sears to buy a dishwasher.  I strongly dislike salespeople.  And a second rant about salespeople. I'm sure they are very lovely people while sitting in their homes with all their warrantied appliances, but their on the job personality gives me the shivers. Be it known: I DO NOT WANT TO BUY EXTRA WARRANTIES!! I've lived without them all my life! I'll take my chances with just buying the product and living with the producer's warranty! If it takes me saying no three times, here you go: NO! NO! NO!  I'm sure I will reference this rant in some future post about salespeople, because it is a necessary evil that they exist and I will inevitably come across them again.  But let them be warned that after saying no to extended warranties so many times, I will likely turn into an ornery old lady that beats salespeople with canes if I am approached with the extended warranty line again.

I survived the visit, and we now have a lovely, sleek, black dishwasher that you can hardly hear when it runs.  It dries faster and more complete than the old one and I can put more silverware in it.  I won't post a picture of it because it's just a sleek black box, but I am pretty happy about it.

The second new appliance is attached to me and looks like this (though this is not my svelte belly)

That's right. I just can't get enough of my insulin pump that I wear 24/7, so I opted for another gadget that will hopefully help me control my blood sugar levels even better than I could with my little brain and blood sugar monitor (though my little brain is not too shabby since my A1C is 6.8, which is awesome for a diabetic!! Yay for me!).  So this little transmitter goes into my interstitial fluid (yes, via needle, but the needle is removed and a tube remains), measures my blood sugar level, and communicates my level wirelessly to my pump EVERY FIVE MINUTES! My pump keeps a record of each check and shows me a trending graph.  My pump has preset alarms that will go off if I'm trending too quickly up or too quickly down, so that I can do something about it before I feel the effects of the highs or lows.  I still have to check my blood sugar levels before I give an insulin bolus and to calibrate, but not feeling the effects of highs and lows is awesome and totally worth wearing another apparatus.  Plus, it wakes me up at night if I start going too high or too low.  This is the closest thing so far to a closed loop treatment for diabetes. Way to go scientists, engineers, doctors, nurses and sales reps (which are different than salespeople)!!!

Thank you to Mark, my wonderful, brilliant husband who has worked so hard to become the attorney he set out to be.  In so doing, we have good insurance to help me live a longer and healthier life. I will always try harder because I have been blessed with such possiblities.  He also provides the ability to buy a dishwasher when the wife-y realizes she can't do without :).

Ohhhhh, Mexico!

Mark and I spent four wonderful days in Cancun in April. It couldn't have come at a better time.  Mark has been working verrrry looooong hours at work and really needed a break.  Which means I was working verrrry looooong hours at home and I really needed a break.  My mother sacrificed her spring vacation to come stay with the boys and re-live the life of a soccer/piano/scout/homework mom. THANKS MOM!

It's always nice to leave behind most responsibilities and spend time with the person I decided to spend the rest of my life with nearly 14 years ago. We put away the roles of being parents, organizers, counselor, attorney and business partners at home, and were able to enjoy one another as best friends. Sigh. It was awesome.  Mark scheduled a couples massage right after we arrived.  This will be our tradition for any other vacation we take together, because it set the tone for a very relaxing vacation.  I nearly cried tears of gratitude when I said good-bye to the masseuse. We didn't have anything scheduled except flights and a hotel.  We were three hours behind any schedule we would have followed at home.

The view that greeted us from our room = automatic relaxation.

We took many walks along the beach after eating extremely delicious non-Mexican food. One night the moon looked red and fuzzy over the ocean, though you can't tell here. 

We signed up to take a jungle cruise (through ocean tree type things) in small speed boats for two, out to a buoy in the ocean where we snorkeled.  Snorkeling is probably one of the most relaxing activities in the world.  The sound of the water outside and under are so soothing and you just feel like you are in a different world, feeling lucky to be able to intrude upon fish who calmly swim from one rock to another.  Sigh.

We went to Chichen Itza - Mayan ruins, which were awesome!  It is amazing what people so long ago could build without power tools!  It was interesting to learn about their culture and what they worshipped and why. Before arriving at Chichen Itza, we stopped at a cenote - a sinkhole.  Some of our tour group swam in the sinkhole, others (us) took pictures and ate the only Mexican food we would eat during the whole trip! One lady asked me if I had a good lunch and how many tortillas I ate.  I purposely did not count, because I ate too many!! They were soooo good!

The sinkhole was cold, but very beautiful!

How happy and relaxed do we look?  Loved it!

After a long, hot tour.  Head for the ice cream stand.

The iguana is not for sale.  Though I'm sure if we asked one of the many, many vendors, they would have taken money for it.

Those rippling muscles can hold up a pyramid -with one hand and he's still smiling!

Our last full day in Cancun was one of our favorites as we literally swam with dolphins!  They kissed us, danced with us, sang to us, jumped over us, swam around us, and let us touch them over and over again.  It. Was. Awesome. Really, we were in awe.  How amazing it is to be around creatures which are so smart and so different and so friendly!

 We knew the dolphins were going to jump over us, but when it happens you are surprised and amazed!

Mark is being pushed by two dolphins, one on each foot. He got so far out of the water that it looked like he was water skiing! 

 Mark was a little jealous.

We spent a good amount of time just touching the dolphin as he swam around our group of four.  The trainer told us that they loved to be touched. 

I never was a very good dancer, and my facial expression shows that.  I was a nerd dancer, complete with "Rock Lobster" down on the floor. Obviously I don't care what other people think about it though, because I had fun anyway! 

We also went to the Cancun flea market, which gave me a lot of practice in saying, "No, gracias" though I had a lot of practice in Chichen Itza as well.  Our favorite line was, "Sir, come buy cigars from my store!" Mark: "I don't smoke." Salesperson, "You can always start!"  We bought some trinkets for the kids (what we called Mexican beyblade - though they were just wooden tops), a cool, wood inlaid Mayan calendar and a bow and some arrows for the boys, which brought great disappointment to Spencer since they are supposed to be used for decoration only. When we got off the bus, a man led us to the market and talked with us on the way.  I was surprised at how much Spanish I remembered from three years in high school (long, long ago), which was enough to learn about his family and talk about mine and a few other things.  He led us to his shop which was full of jewelry that I felt obligated to buy since he had been our guide to the market.  But Mark helped me get over my feelings of obligation and buy from other vendors who berated us for saying "we'll be back later." Pushy, pushy!

Our spoils of the flea market.  And the obsidian knife (which really does cut, good thing we have band aids) Mark purchased at Chichen Itza, represents power, which is now on display in his office.  Beware, clients!

What a great relaxing trip.  We would do it all again, though we were a little uncomfortable not knowing enough Spanish and making currency conversions.  Still, a great and adventurous trip!