Honor Roll

Second trimester report cards have arrived and the girls have made honor roll again. I just have the feeling that it has something to do with honor roll being connected to their cell phones. Whatever works:)

Walt Disney World 1/2 Marathon 2009

I am sure there is nothing better than being in Disney World with my 3 favorite people in the world. It takes Larry about 24 hours from the time we leave the house until Mr. Engineer begins to relax, and from that point on it is just a blast.

The girls were amazing in their first Disney 1/2 marathon. They stopped for many pictures and still finished way ahead of us. I began crying at the Start line as they were crossing, realizing how quickly they are growing up. They had cell phones to call if they needed us, of course we found out they were texting friends as they were running. Larry and I are just trying to breathe and they are texting - but we are not getting old.

It was wonderful that all of us finished the same race and we had so much fun wearing our medals to the parks the next few days. People were shocked that we did this as a family. We did admit that the girls finished way before us. I found the only downside was how much it bothered me to not be able to watch the girls cross the finish line. I explained that I only saw two solutions and that was for me to run faster and beat them or not run the 1/2 on Saturday but run the whole on Sunday. My family explained very quickly that me running faster and beating the girls just wasn't going to happen. So, the plan as of now is for Larry, Gabi & Emily to run the half on Saturday while I cheer and I will run the whole on Sunday while they cheer in Januar 2010. Hey, when you live in a cornfield you have to have something to look forward to at all times.

Happy New Year

Happy New Year!!  We wish all of you a wonderful 2009 full of blessings.

Pictures from the 1/2 Marathon will be coming soon!

Outdoor Christmas Decorations

I was hoping to be able to post a picture of our outdoor Christmas lights but they still are not finished.  We have had a rain/snow mess all day today and yesterday.  Hopefully we will be able to finish the lights soon.

This is the last post for today.  I promise not to wait so long between posts:)

Disney

Friday afternoon we were able to see Disney on Ice in Des Moines.  

Through Musco we were able to buy discount tickets.  When the email came that tickets were available to purchase I was terrified that the girls would say that they were too old and didn't want to go.  Luckily they still wanted to go although I'm not sure we are supposed to tell that they went.  We had great seats in row A.  There were two rows in front of us on the ground level so we saw everything up close.  Of course there were plenty of younger children but it was fun to see the few other families that had just teenagers.  Those families are called true Disney fanatics!

This just made us even more excited to go to the 1/2 Marathon in January.  It has been very cold and windy for all of our long runs.  Gabi has been leading the way with Emily right behind her.  I have had my best times ever.  I think it has something to do with wanting to keep up with the girls and not wanting to look as old and slow as I am.

Christmas Picture

For 14 years now I have been taking a Christmas picture for our Christmas cards.  In one of my earlier posts today I stated that I would keep my teenagers the majority of the time.  Today, however would be one of those times that one of the teenagers was acting like a teenager.  In fourteen years it has never taken me this long to take the Christmas picture.  So which one of these angelic teenagers was acting her age today - I will never tell because I still love her.  Now to decide which picture to use - Larry and I prefer one of the pictures and the girls prefer the opposite.

AARP

This past week Larry received his first AARP card.  I couldn't stop laughing.  He may be younger than me but he got his AARP card first!