Twinkle Toes

Last spring, while my son was still on his mission, I had to register him for school for this fall. I spent days calling and talking to a counselor, planning his schedule and trying to guess just what career path he would take. In the middle of all this a mother of one of his friend's, who was going through the same process, called and asked what I registered Jason for. She proceeded to talk me into registering Jason for beginning ballroom dancing with her son.

When Jason found out he was registered for ballroom dancing there was no note of excitement in his voice; in fact, I think it was disbelief and disgust. I explained that it was a great way to meet girls and that he would have a friend to suffer though it with, and besides if it was really that bad he could drop it.

Well, school started and I would inquire occassionally how the dance class was going and I always received the same reply, "It's okay." Those of you who know my son know that's about all a reply I can expect from him.

Then a couple of weeks ago the relpy to my usual question about the dance class was, "It's pretty fun." Imagine that - three words and with emotion!

I also found out that Jason's friend had dropped the class the second week of school and Jason had continued to dance by himself (well actually he did have a female partner, that was "pretty cute"). I was amazed that my 'macho' son seemed to be liking and was sticking with ballroom dancing.

A week ago Jason told me that his teacher had told him the he "a lot of potential" and Jason seemed really pleased. (What was happening to the son I knew? Could he actually be enjoying something as cultural as ballroom dancing?)

It all came to a head last Saturday when I made my usual call to check in on him and found out he had missed a coveted intermural flag football game, that was a play off game, to attend a dance competition! He and his partner had made it through all the morning rounds and had to go back that night to finish the competition. He was excited and I guess he must be pretty good to make it that far - right?

Later that night Jason and his partner made it to the quarter finals before being eliminated. In other words, they made it down to be one of the last 12 couples out of about 100.

Kids never cease to astound you. You think you have them figured out and then out of the blue they like ballroom dancing and do well in a dance competition and actually enjoy it.

So when Jason was registering for classes next semester I asked him if he was going to take the next ballroom dance class. He said no, he was good, but he really would like to learn how to country western dance! As long as we have kids, wonders will never cease.

Glimmers of Hope

I have always tried to instill in my children a desire to give service and to enjoy it. When I woke them up early years ago to help pick corn at our church's welfare farm they didn't seem to happy but they went. When my kitchen was a disaster and I was trying to prepare a dinner for an elderly couple, they helped me clean, cook and carry and they did it pleasantly. As I hauled my boys to the Humanitarian Aid Center for hours every summer to iron, sew, pack, bag, clean, haul and do whatever they asked, they did it without complaint. But as a mother you always wonder if they are really internalizing what you teach or are they just obedient and want to avoid your wrath.

Last night I had a glimmer of hope that maybe this one teaching was sinking into my 17 year old. My husband is in charge putting up some of the tens of thousands of Christmas lights that adorn our temple each Christmas season. He had informed us several weeks ago that he had a large group coming to help and he needed Preston and I to help, too.

As Preston and I drove down to help, Preston remembered that he was supposed to check and make sure his group of boys had a service activity for their weekly meeting tonight. He called his adult advisor to see what he needed to do. Preston was told that since his whole youth group would be putting together gift bags for the city of Tempe on Saturday and five of the boys would be setting up flags for Veteran's Day today, that that was enough service for this week and they would do something else for their activity tonight.

My son hung up the phone, explained the situation to me and said, "Can you do too much service?"

He then proceeded to spend the next four hours hauling boxes of lights, running extension cords and sitting at the top of an orange tree stinging light around it and I never heard a complaint or a whine. At this time of year when we turn our thoughts to the things we are thankful for, I am thankful that maybe, just maybe, one thing I hoped to instill in my son has taken root. And I hope he continues to see the value and joy in service though out his life.

Quality Time with my son

This week Preston and I spent some fun quality time together. A month or more ago Preston pointed out to me the The Phantom of the Opera was coming back to Phoenix. (I had promised him I would take him when it came back - dang his good memory!) So a couple of weeks ago I noticed that there was a Thursday matinee with tickets almost half price and there was still good seats. I decided that Preston could miss his last two classes of the day and we could go, besides I love Phantom so he didn't have to do too much talking.
When I went to Gammage to purchase the tickets they told me it was cheap because there was no parking on campus because school was in session. I next decided that he would have to miss all his afternoon classes so we would have time to walk from wherever we could find to park. Then I remembered Phoenix's move into mass transit and we decided to ride the light rail into Tempe and walk across campus. After having ridden mass transit in most large American cities and a few in Europe and Japan, I feel as though I'm pretty experienced and a fairly good critic.

So last Thursday, I picked Preston up and we headed to the park and ride lot, bought our tickets and climbed aboard the clean new train. Needless to say we were very impressed and we got to Gammage about an hour early - it was much faster than I had anticipated. We both felt that Phoenix has moved to the big time with their light rail - just too bad it isn't underground and much bigger.

We had a great time at the play with the bus loads of old people that came in from all over the valley, but what do you expect who else can take off in the middle of the week, in the middle of the day to see a play? Preston loved the music and we hummed it all the way back across campus and on the light rail home.

Then yesterday we had to carve our pumpkins for Halloween. We usually go all out on the pumpkin carving but both of us were feeling a bit pressed for time so we opted for easy designs.

Here is Preston's trick-or-treater pumpkin

and my witch.

I don't know what I will do when I no longer have a kid to hang out with and especially one as great as Preston.

Ohio Trip part 2 - Hocking Hills

On Columbus Day, we waited for Scott to get out of class and we drove to Hocking Hills State Park. It was about 1 1/2 hours from Lonica and Scott's and Preston, Lonica, Amelia and her car seat and I all squished into the back seat for the ride. Good thing we all love each other.

At Hocking Hills there are lots of different hikes that lead to water falls, caves, canyons, or lookout vistas. We chose a couple of hikes we wanted to take and then had to get ready. Any time you take a baby anywhere you know how long it takes before you actually leave.
You can see the excitement on Preston's face, he just can't wait to go!

Amelia is excited to go on her first hike.

The fall colors were just about at their peak and we had some beautiful views. Our first hike we took was to Old Man's cave and we were thinking of Arizona hiking. We weren't prepared for Ohio hiking; the 'hike' took us about 10 minutes to get there and was paved the whole way.

Here is Scott, Lonica and Amelia in the 'cave' which was actually just an overhang. We could have done the whole 6 mile loop but decided not too. Preston and I had to go check out the old stone bridge though. We are the little specks on the bridge.

From there we decided to do the 'hardest' hike in the park but that offered the best views of the fall leaves. We found that is definitely wasn't hard but it did offer great views.

The weather was perfect and we had a great time wandering around in the forest. At least this time the trail wan't paved.

Scott had Preston walk along this log to get some cool looking pictures.

And here he is 'flying' off.

On the way home we stopped by this little dive deli that Scott had seen on TV. They had a Dagwood (from the comic strip) challenge. You had 30 minutes to eat a pound of fries and a sandwich with turkey, ham and roast beef, lettus, cheese, onions and a large bun. It looked as though there was a pound of each of the meats. For doing all this, you got your picture on the wall and a tee-shirt. The record was eating it all in 4 minutes and 33 seconds. Preston and Scott were up for the challenge.

Look at these optimistic faces.

Scott was winding down after about 20 minutes. He did a good job on the fries and made it about 1/2 through the second half of the sandwich.

This face says it all - they were defeated by the Dagwood.

Needless to say, we didn't have dessert or win a tee-shirt and no one's face is on the wall of the Ohio Deli and Restaurant from our family.

Ohio Trip part 1 - Amelia's blessing

We had a very auspicious start to our Ohio trip when Southwest Airlines was looking for someone to give up their seat to Chicago and would pay them $200. Unfortunately, I had booked our tickets late and we couldn't use our free tickets on the nonstop flight to Columbus so we were leaving 20 mintues later than the nonstop but arriving 2 1/2 hours later after changing planes in Chicago. When I heard the announcement my mind starting working and after they asked several more times I went up and offered one of our tickets if they could move the person to the nonstop flight that was leaving in just a few minutes. Scott's parents were on that flight and I thought we could send Preston with them and Garth and I would fly on our original one. When the gate agent found out we had three flying together she said she would try and move us all but could only give $200 for one seat. At this point I didn't care about getting any money if we could all get on the nonstop flight. As luck would have it we all made it on the nonstop one but our luggage did not, it had to go to Chicago, but it didn't complain much.

We picked up our rental car (the guys all loved it - a fire red Dodge Charger) and followed Scott to their house. Here are some pictures of everyone meeting Amelia - the reason for all the traveling.

Garth thinks she is 'pretty special' and told her that over and over while we were there.

Uncle Preston wasn't too sure what do with a baby and thought she was pretty worthless - 17 year old. He did warm up to her and feel more comfortable holding her after a few days.

Here she is with her Rowley grandparents, Robin and Paul.
And here she is with her grandmas. Since the Rowleys were only going to be there until Monday morning, we let them do most of the holding, we would have plenty of days to spoil her.


Sunday moring we had to leave bright and early, church was a 20 minute drive and it started at 9:00 am. All of you know how hard that is to do when you have a new baby, but we made it. Once we got to church we changed Amelia into her dress (it wasn't too conducive to riding in a car seat) and I was so happy to see that it fit (I guess we should have done that the night before). She wasn't too excited and promptly fell asleep. She slept the whole meeting expect for during her blessing. She woke up just before, was wide eyed all during it and then went back to sleep as soon as it was over. Scott did a great job and we hope she will live up to the blessing she received.
Here are a few pictures of Amelia in her dress. I had carried the dress on the plane with me and I had so many women come up and ask to see it. I was glad that it turned out well and was finished. I barely got it done Friday night before we left Saturday morning.

Grandma Honey (Robin) had crocheted Amelia's booties and they fit perfectly.

After church we did a 'family photo shoot' in front of the temple. The Colombus temple is just across the parking lot from Lonica and Scott's building, so we didn't have to go far. The day was sunny but it was a bit cool, especially if you had just come from Arizona where it was in the 90's.
The new little family
Our whole group
That afternoon Lonica and Scott had a bunch of friends over to celebrate and it was fun to meet them and of course to eat all the wonderful food Scott and Lonica had made. They are quite the chiefs. I get parinoid now when I have to cook for them.

Even in Lonica and Scott's little house they were able to fit quite a few people and their kids. It had been a great day and I was glad we were going to be staying most of the week.

Crazy Porters

Last weekend Christine's (my sister) kids come down for a quick visit. You could tell they weren't Arizonans because they wanted to swim in our pool. Everyone in Arizona knows that even though the sun may shine, unless you have a heated pool you don't get in it after Labor Day. Most valley residents won't put a toe in a pool if the water temperature is under 80 degrees, me included. We are cold blooded creatures!

At any rate I tried to deter my nephews from entering the pool, and they told me they would wait until the day heated up. As I was folding clothes at 9:30 am (in preparation for our trip to Ohio) I heard splashes in the pool and went to investigate. I found Ross trying to not get wet on the pool mat (he did manage to keep his head from getting wet).
And I found Shawn shivering on the side, he had gone under twice and has 0% body fat

to help keep him warm. They continued to 'play' in the pool for a few minutes, but I guess even New Mexicans like their pool water a bit warmer!

Homecoming

Last weekend was Homecoming and Preston went with Christina. She had asked him to Sadies last spring and they hung out most of the summer and here she is again. She is a cute, smart and fun girl.
Here is his whole group that went to the mud caves the week before for their day activity and then to Rustler's Roost for dinner. Check out the girl in her tennis shoes. She had on black ones and her date had on white ones.

Preston had a great time but wished he hadn't been so quick to say he would bring Christina home a midnight when he was asked what time she would be home. Next time he decided he will ask the girl's parents what time they want her home. Since he had told her parents midnight, they had to forgo all the after dance activities. Both of them where bummed but they had a good time the rest of the night.