Dizzy has gone to a better place. Stapley and Main will miss him!

I can remember as far back as my childhood "Dizzy" the dancing preacher on Stapley and Main. If you grew up near Mesa, you probably know exactly who I am talking about. Everyday he would be on his bike or walking on that intersection dancing and yelling quotes from the bible or just "Jesus loves you!" He would rock out to his music in his earphones and dance to the beat of his own drum. Well, he finally succumed to cancer this week and I will be sad to not see him on Stapley and Main in the future.

I will be honest, there were times in my life that I wondered if he was sane and/or on drugs, but his message was happiness and love even if it was demonstrated in a unique way.

I am sure he is dancing in heaven!!!!!

Here is an article about it in the East Valley Tribune..

http://http//eastvalleytribune.com/local/article_8a54f2c4-86d9-11df-bea7-001cc4c03286.html

Slowly playing the catch up game. Also known as Lund's Lego cake about a month late..

Hello everyone, this is "Slacker Blogger" here!!! (don't ask me why everything is blue and underlined....just roll with it!) I am now on a new, working labtop and I now have a new SD card reader hooked up to it so that I can FINALLY catch up on all the blogs that I have been shirking.
You will have to bear with me, because I am WAY behind, and I am going to try to catch up one blog entry at a time. (I am not WonderWoman you know!)
The first blog entry here is definitely belated since it is from Lund's birthday, June 24th. He had an interesting birthday this year because we are living in an apartment while we wait for our house to get ready, and the kids don't have too many friends yet. On his birthday, he wanted me to make him a "Lego cake". I made a valiant attempt, but a you can see, I am not the cake decorator in the family! The true cake genius was at work, but Lund was so cute about it. I told him that it wasn't the best looking Lego cake and he said to me..."It's o.k. mom,..... you are really good at sports!" Thanks for trying to cheer me up Lund! I love you and your caring personality!
So after the cake was made, Lund figured out that he didn't have any friends to share his cake with. So I made a few phone calls and hooked up with a friend from high school that has kids about the same age as ours. We had been wanting to get together for a long time and this just seemed like the perfect opportunity. And we had a MARVELOUS time!!! the kids want to go back there everyday see their chickens and play Lego's with their kids. Thank you April and kids for being spontaneous with us!
They seriously played Lego's for three full hours and the moms had a wonderful time catching up on life.

Nobody even fought the whole time.....it was simply a birthday MIRACLE!

Oh my goodnes! I am so embarrassed looking back at these pictures! Look at my Lego cake!! Ha ha! (I also tried to frost it when it wasn't quite cooled off yet because Lund was antsy...big mistake!)

........but..... Lund is all smiles and I guess that is what really matters!

............And onto Sarah's favorite thing............the chickens!!

I love this picture because Will is trying to coax the chicken into submission.

Then he decides that might not work, so he backs up a bit. (The chickens were actually amazingly docile!)

..........And more views of my pitiful cake!!!

Here is Ethan showing the kids how to handle the chicken.

And Sarah is in Chicken Heaven when she finally gets to hold one!!! She stayed outside with the chikens in the 100 degree plus weather for over an hour and didn't want to leave.

the "in between" world!

Our not so great computer of a couple of years finally called it quits yesterday. I wasn't really sad at all because it has been a bad computer all along the way with plenty of workers coming out to fix it to no avail. The thing I am sad about is that my pictures are on that computer. I am trying to work out a way to transfer them, but so far, I am not successful. I will keep trying though because I am behind with some posts.....
Plus, we have some great things coming up in the next few days that I don't want you to miss out on. Like, for instance, I am going to be the main attraction on the Bagdad parade along with Cassidy's friend who has Luekemia and the librarian who just went through cancer this year as well. My younger sister made us some AMAZING hats to wear that have "Team Courage" embroidered on them. My kids are excited to be the first float in the parade. I am very excited to represent courage and to see Bagdad again.
Stay tuned while I am in the "in between" world and hopefully I will get it figured out soon enough.

Our search for a home sweet home is over!!!

In a nutshell, this is a list of what his been going on in our lives lately...

Because this has been a really stressful couple of weeks, I decided to sum up our life in checklist form...

• we get within two days of having a house and then lose the house because it was deemed "structurally unstable"
• started looking for another house
• found a couple perspective houses, made some offers, but still really liked the original house
• A contractor went out to the house and quoted 30k plus worth of repairs
• Will the sellers pay this horrendous amount???? hummm
• Do we walk away from it??? hummmm
• after much searching and praying...... we decide to go with original house
• Sellers decide to pay the full amount and fix it before we move in
• Move in date moves back to first of August
• Get ready for another month in temporary housing
• Switch apartment complexes to be closer to my radition and everything else

Science and the Metro

For Lund's birthday this year we had a wonderful time... We had tickets to get into the Science Museum in Phoenix from Morgan's work. And, instead of driving there like normal people, we decided to try out the new light rail system here in the valley, otherwise known as "The Metro". Will thought it was amazing and commented that he was "flying". The other kids liked it as well, but didn't enjoy all the walking in the hot weather (110 degrees). On the way back to our car stop in the evening, there was a car accident on the rail and so we had to get off the Metro and wait for a city bus. It was a very interesting experience and now I can officially say that I have ridden the Metro and the city bus. (but, I probably won't ever do it again. It was definitely a "once in a lifetime" experience)
We had a chance to go to the museum with Morgan's parents who are here visiting and his sister Alicia and her son Guilio. We really had a great time, even though we got there an hour before the museum closed and had to rush through everything.
After the museum, we walked over to Morgan's office and got to see the view from his office on the 22nd floor!
The view from Morgan's office window

yes, this view made me scarred due to the fear I have for heights.

hanging out in his office..

"Fear Factor" was the theme at the museum and this is Lund on the "fear of falling" ride. I did it too and screamed very soundly! It was quite a startling experience, even though you knew you would be perfectly safe.

.....................and there he goes, falling backwards!

...And here we are with tickets in hand, riding the Metro

Don't ask me why, but the kids insisted on taking a picture of this sign! (We were in the drive-thru getting shakes before we embarked out in the heat)

Here we all are riding along...

Will loved it and held his airplanes in his hands the whole way insisting that he was "flying along" the road

the happy birthday boy!

Lund turns double digits!!! Really, truly, my kids are getting old!

Here is the earliest picture that I can find of Lund on my laptop. The others are all in storage until we move into a house. He was two at the time and we were in graduate school in Flagstaff, Arizona. Isn't he such a cutie!!!

Lund is turning 10 on Thursday and I am stumped as to where these ten years have gone!! I can still remember giving birth to him 10 years ago...... he came a month early and the doctor told me he wasn't ready, but Lund had other plans! He has been a joy in our life everyday since then!
Qualities I love about Lund....
* He is AMAZING at building things, Legos, K'nex,..... anything. He can build ANYTHING and he never even uses the instruction manuals.
* He is super sensitive and always can tell what others are feeling. he is very, very caring!
* He loves to play sports and is really good at them
* He is great at taking out the trash (don't laugh, this is an AMAZING quality)
* He is super spiritual and always seems to understand and retain spiritual concepts.
* He is an amazing student!! Every teacher he has ever had can verify this! He is very attentive to his teachers and sits quietly in his chair. (the "sit quietly" trait is my favorite)
* He can do math proplems that I can't even solve, (this isn't exaclty hard since my math skills are mediocre at best.)
* He LOVES doing projects with his dad. Whether it is yard work or building something, he is always game.
* He loves his name and loves that he and his grandpa have that in common!!!

There is so much more I love about Lund, but I just wanted to let him know that I love him and wish him a happy 10th birthday. Tomorrow we are going to celebrate his special day by going to the Arizona Science Museum and he is super excited! I will report about that later... (I will also report about Father's Day eventually too...)

Tonight we let him open his presents from Morgan and I. The theme this year was Lego mania. So he got lots of Lego sets and a rubbermaid tote to keep them all in.

And as a special present, we let him stay up as late as he wanted creating with his new Lego sets. He made it until 11:05pm, and then crashed, leaving his creations on the table for his dad to see in the morning.

Holding up all his Lego treasures. Will was really excited because he has been really into Lego's lately and considers the new sets mutual property.

He was pretty excited about his presents!

Why we pay orthodontists the big bucks!!

This week Cassidy got rid of her metal imprisonment. She has had appliances or braces or both since she was eight. This week she met with her new orthodontist here in the Valley and he decided to take out all her metal workings. She was beyond thrilled and when they finally finished taking out everything she said, "Wait there is something in the top of my mouth, oh wait, that is the top of my mouth. Wow, crazy!"
She is only free for six months and then she will be re-evaluated and possibly get braces on, but for now, she is FREE!!!! She ate gum on the way out of the office and then popcorn at the movie theater. She was in unrestricted food heaven!
And now you will see why we pay the orthodontist the big bucks......

...Because they have video games...............

.............to keep the other kids busy...............

.....................they have Rock Band..............................

...................................and a great movie room for Will.............

..................here he is watching The Princess and the Frog............

So, maybe the big bucks are worth it!