Hiking...How I Have Missed You

January 1st 2011....hiking new trails! Our new New Year's day tradition is searching for new and exciting places to hike. This year we found a beautiful trail that led to a waterfall. It was a gorgeous day. The air was cool but the sun was shining bright.

The hike took us deep into the Cleveland National Forest. The waterfall was a special treat to see. We do not have many of those so close to our house. With all the rain we had in December and early January the falls were flowing pretty good.

We stopped to eat lunch at the top.
View of where we were headed...the top!

The water was frigid!

Mady found out the hard way...with her foot!

2011....REALLY?

Is it really January 2011? Is it really almost February 2011!?! They say time goes by a lot faster when you get older. Whoever said that wasn't kidding!

It's been so long since I have updated my blog. Between school, kids and life I simply haven't had time. I decided to try and keep up on it now that the new year is here. Yes...I'm a little late into the new year to decide this. We'll see how it goes.

Here's some family pictures I took in December. We decided to save money and take them ourselves. We had so much fun. Laughed til we were in tears many times!

As you can see, my babies aren't babies anymore. 11 & 16! Scary!!

More Hiking Adventures

Spring is a wonderful time to hike. We went back to one of my favorite hiking spots in Murrietta. There is a beautiful preserve located there. There are so many different trails. The wildflowers were just coming out. Some areas were just covered in wildflowers. We packed our lunch and headed out to enjoy some outdoor time!

The bright colors of wildflowers was amazing.
When kids find water...they must throw rocks in it!

More beautiful wildflowers.

Isn't it funny that if these grew in our yard we'd call them weeds!

It was a chilly but fun day!

Mady's Lifeskills Awards

Mady's school has a Lifeskills program. Throughout the school year, students work to earn their stars. The stars are put on a certificate and displayed in the classroom. The first star you can get is red, then white and blue. From there you move to the patch. Then a silver and gold star. If you earn all of these the last thing you can get is a pin. It's a great program. As the kids get older it's a little harder to get to the pin. This year Mady has gone as high as her patch. With only four weeks of the school year left she'll probably end here. No worries though. In past grades, she has gone as high as a pin! I thought it would be fun to see how much she has changed over the course of 4th grade.

Red Star - Beginning of 4th grade
White Star

Blue Star - I love this picture of her!

Patch - She just earned this last week!

Sophomore Track Season

Brandon had his first track meet last week. He did a great job running for the JV track team. He has been battling a cold for the past few weeks so his energy level and wind is not quite there yet. He pushed through it though and represented his school well. He only ran in one race since he was not feeling 100%. He ran in the 800m. Normally he will do the 800, 1 mile and 4x400 relay. He really seems to have fun out there even though soccer is his true passion. He mostly uses track to keep himself conditioned for soccer.

Hanging with his best friend before the race.

Spring Soccer

Mady decided she wanted to give soccer another try. She did it for two seasons when she was 4 and 5. She decided then it was not for her. Many of her friends play and since she is not doing ice skating anymore she decided to check it out again. I must say, she did great. We were a little nervous since it has been almost five years but she proved us wrong. We were worried she would hate it and want to give it up after the first game. That was not the case. She had so much fun and really got out there and worked hard. We are excited to see how she progresses through this season. The Spring soccer season is mostly for fun. They don't keep score. If she decides to play in the Fall, she will move up an age bracket where I think she'll have even more fun. Bigger field and they keep score!

Her team is the Lightning Strikers

They were getting their game plan in place. Scott is the assistant coach.

Great throw-in even though the ref said she lifted her foot. Doesn't look like it to me!

Big Bear 2010

We took our annual trip to Big Bear. It is so beautiful up there. We are fortunate Scott's mom has a timeshare there we are able to use. We drove up Friday afternoon and left Sunday morning. We had a great time and there was a ton of snow on the ground. When we went last year there was not much snow at all. We did ski but it was mostly man-made snow. This year there was plenty of snow that actually fell from the sky! We decided not to ski and opted for playing in the snow. We brought our sleds, packed a lunch and played all day in the snow. Mady was feeling really sick though so she did not do as much sledding. We felt so bad for her but she was such a trooper. She rested on the sleds and played as much as her body would let her.

It snowed Saturday night. I made Scott go outside with me.

One of the many snowmen the kids made.

One of the hundreds of times Brandon went down the hill.

Mady had more fun riding with us than she did alone.