Halloween 2014

So this years theme was, once again decided by Elia.  La Sirenita.  She has been into ariel lately, so of course we made it a family affaire and she got to choose who we were going to be (yes, she chose ursula/vanesa for me, apparently she thinks im the villian in the home).  Im not too keen on spending a lot of money on costumes (elia's was the only one we purchased), or halloween in general, so we decided to see how much we could "make" at home.  One thing i need to point out is that Danny was super excited to take on the project of making daniel's sebastian costume and his king triton costume, and he did a great job on them. At one point i thought we were spending more money on all bits and pieces we needed to make the costumes (but we didnt thankfully) and i started to get annoyed and tired of the late nights putting it all together ( which in reality danny did 80% off the work, so i cant complain too much) but it was the satisfaction of seeing the end product and seeing how excited Elia was that made it all worth it!

Alittle blurry but at least princesa ariel is happier

Carving pumpkins

I came across some old halloween pictures and thought id share

Elia's first halloween

2nd im pregnant with daniel

3rd and all homemade

4th

Big 30th birthday celebration in Monterey

For the longest time, ive been telling Danny that we need to take a trip out to the coast, and i'd hear great things about Monterey.  The beaches are beautiful, the Monterey aquarium and Cannery row.  So to my surprised he said yes to the trip ( we went the weekend after my birthday) and he actually planned the whole thing and it was a pretty inexpensive trip (we saved money on the aquarium tickets, thanks to a friend who let us borrow their passes and the free food at the hotel). I kept telling Danny, i wouldnt mind living in Monterey and that he should apply to teach at one of the schools there. Anyway, it was a much needed family fun trip! We didnt have to worry about school, work or especially church callings, branch president stuff, so i was happy.  The kids loved seeing and touching different sea urchants, and my favorite thing about it was all the imformation plaques and displays were in both english and spanish! 

Our view

She is always posing

They sure loved the big comfy bed

Best friends, shes a great hermana mayor

It was overcast and cold but that did not stop Elia at all! She and danny played in the water, while danielito and i stayed wrapped up in towels

He wasnt too sure

A lot better

Medusas, this was one of my favorite parts

Sardines... Photo credit Elia

Curious little minds

My kids had no fear

Our friend rosa la nutria (sea otter)

Mi picaron

Cannery row

On our way home we drove straight out to roseville to see the last showing of the opening weekend of meet the mormons! Great movie!

Birthday night

Birthday fruit tart cake! 

My birthday present from danny (the ARG jersey of course)

Flowers sent from my sister!

Birthday treat made by a sweet friend

This is the 2nd family selfie we have ever taken! Danielito obviously was more interested in the cake!

My catch up list

Im not sure if anyone really follows or reads my blog, but for my own sake of some type of record keeping i need to write a list of some special events these last couple months i dont want to forget about.

Summer activities:

Guatemala

L.a reunion

utah reception

Time out for women

30th birthday/monterey bay

The kids

Halloween

Stay tuned! Hopefully this time it wont take me 6 months to post something new(:

Living legends in Nor. Cal 2014

Back in January Danny and i had the opportunity to work with the BYU alumni sacramento business mangement chapter, who sponsored living legends performance in Sacramento.  We met with Ed Blazer and the pres of the chapter and collaborated on ideas to advertise and other tour stuff.  It all felt so, professional, and it was great see Ed and chat with him for a while.  It was a great experience to help with the tour because having been members of the group ourselves we were able to better explain the purpose of the group, thats its not just a dance group.  I suggested to the pres of the chapter, Stan if we can have them do a morningside before they left to the next city, so he put me incharge of organizing that and finding host families for the group to stay with.  I can now say that I've been involved in all the parts of being in/planning a tour.  I was a member of the group so i understood the logistics of being a performer, while at byu i worked at performing arts mangement as an assistant and planned Living legends South America tour, and now i was able to help in hosting the group and experience what its like to organize everything for their show/nights stay.  They had asked Danny to be the  MC the night of the show, and boy was he nervous but he did great!  It was ALOT of work but Id do it all over again! It was such a blessing to host them and we got a great response from the youth who went to see them.  The spirit was so strong at both the show and the morningside!  And im so glad my kids were able to experience it.  Elia sat through the whole thing by herself and she was able to pick out the dances from Guatemala, Paraguay, Argentina and Mexico.  We were able to be in green room with them and that experience alone brought back so many wonderful memories.  Although they were in our area for a little time, it was such an uplifting, rejuvenating weekend and our hearts were full!  I wanted to be a groupie and follow them on tour!  

Like always it was great to see Janielle and John.  She is such an inspiring women and needless to say  both Elia and Danielito loved all the attention.  Some great memories were made that weekend!

Members from our ward went

Hosted these beauties in our home

Getting in good with Janielle 

Getting a feel of the tour bus

One of the most beautiful couples/dancers.... They loved being with the kids

Janielle in action!  We got to see hoop one more time. Up close and personal!