A Bissfully slow January

January in retrospect, was a blissfully uneventful month.  I am thankful.  We are hitting our stride out here.  Our life is pretty routine in that we go ninety miles an hour pretty much all the time.  Sigh.  But not in January.  New Year's eve the group of ladies I am hanging with decided we all needed to go to Mexico for a day of shopping.  I was just in Mexico the week before so I was thinking I was going to pass.  Well, they would not take no for an answer.  So off we go to Mexico with a wagon to bring our treasures back over the border.  Everything was going great.  Lots of purchases, laughs and good natured ribbing was going on.  Then we stopped for lunch complete with Margaritas.  That is where things went off track.  Ha Ha Ha.  I had been waiting purchase the few things I had seen the week before and thanks to a Spanish-speaking friend I was able to get an incredible deal on these pillows!  I am so excited.   We desperately need some color in our living room other than shades of brown and I am hoping these will do the trick.  

The border crossing was uneventful and much quicker then when we did it on New Years Eve-Eve.  

The next afternoon I was putting away some groceries when I discovered a GIANT bottle of Vanilla in my cabinet.  

I was puzzled, we had talked about buying vanilla the day before, but I don't remember actually buying it.  Well apparently the Margaritas made me do it! I have ZERO recollection of this purchase.  ZERO.  Oh well, as a friend told me later, if a giant bottle of vanilla is the only thing you don't remember after a day in Mexico, you can't really complain.  Good point. 

The kids are still doing track on base.  I must say, as much as I love track, this has been a letdown.  This is not the first time they have had track on base, but it feels like it.  The program overall is pretty disorganized, there are tons of kids and the meets/practices take forever.  Plus it's hard to get a good track picture.  But at least the kids are getting good exercise and they seem to enjoy it.  

The kids did get to participate in a swim meet however and that was AWESOME!!  I know next to nothing about swimming other then what they show on the Olympics every 4 years.  I really like to watch it on TV, but in person there is A LOT going on!  I was not really prepared.  The kids had a great time though.  They swam in several races and actually did pretty well considering they have only been swimming at this level for 5 months.

They don't call it the Polar Plunge for nothing - brrrr!

Mid breath in the breast stroke

Lucy off the blocks!

Ben doing a little backstroke action

The Coach giving some post swim corrections

The team apparently does an actual polar plunge in the Colorado River every year after the first day of swimming.  My kids were all about it.  I told them to keep their heads OUT of the water.  I probably needn't have wasted my breath.

Jim got to go to Swansboro for a quick dinner with my folks the next week while he was in town for work.  Lucky.

The next week we finally were able to turn in the girl's science projects!! They had been working on them for months!!  While not exactly earth-shattering discoveries were made, they completed the assignment with all the required elements and did all the work themselves.  Unfortunately their grades did not reflect the work they put into this project, but we are very proud of them!   

Suddenly it is Girl Scout Cookie time.  Each scout is required to attempt to sell $404.00 of cookies each.  So lucky me, I get twice that amount.  We need to get on the stick and start going door to door!!

So they loaded up the wagon and took off around the neighborhood.  Naturally Lilly was leading the charge!  She would have stayed out all night if I would have let her.  Lucy is more like me. After a few streets, she was ready to call it quits. 

Did someone say cookies?

I am the first to admit that I am not exactly over-joyed about living in Yuma. However we have reconnected with great friends and of course made some new ones, so it isn't nearly as bad as I make it out to be (is anything ever?). Between the wind that NEVER seems to stop blowing and oppressive heat in the summer the town really comes into it's own in the winter.  Just take a look that that sunset. It is gorgeous!  

It is hard to believe that it is already the 100th day of school!  The children were encouraged to dress up as a 100 year-old person.  Of course no one bothered to tell me about it.  So this is as good as we could get on the fly.  Lilly was the only one who was interested in participating.  I think her favorite part was the baby powder in her hair to whiten it up.

The very last thing that happened in January is I ran a 1/2 marathon.  I wasn't really planning on it.  Several friends of mine were running it, so it seemed like the thing to do!  I was pretty happy with my effort - in that I finished it!