10 Things

My relief society sent out a survey a couple of weeks ago asking us to list 10 things that they may or may not know about us.  I found it quite difficult to come up with 10 things but thought it would be fun to post them here. 

1.  I married my high school sweet heart and my best friend.
2.  I love to bake and think it would be fun to own a bakery, but maybe too much work.
3.  Because of the baking, I love intense workouts like P90X and Insanity but think that maybe I do not do them enough.
4.  I would love to develop a charity foundation that helped families of cancer patients with the little things of life.
5.  I am a working mom and have coached gymnastics for more than 18 years and LOVE IT.  I have been able to work side by side my own mother which is something I will always treasure. 
6.  In my spare time, which is not much, I really enjoy playing the piano just for fun.  Before children, I would sit at the piano and play for hours.
7.  I participated in a few Miss Pleasant Grove Pageants and was in the royalty a few times (always an a attendant, never a queen).
8.  I graduated from Brigham Young University with a degree in Dance Choreography and use it to choreograph my gymnasts' floor routines. 
9.  I watched a Cirque de Solei show in Vegas once and can honestly say it is the BEST show that I have EVER seen, even compared to a Broadway show in New York.
10.  When I have a chance to get outside I really enjoy running and hiking.   

Another Goodbye

You would think that after teaching gymnastics for almost 20 years that I would get better at helping to encourage my amazing gymnasts to move on and aspire to great things, but it is just as hard now as it was the first time I had a girl quite gymnastics.  I think that I just get so attached to them and love them so much that when they leave and quite gymnastics a piece of me falls apart.  It is really hard for me to say good bye.  I think that this time of the year is the hardest for me because some of the older girls decide that it is time to move on and maybe try new things.  I love to see them grow up but at the same time wish they could stay young forever so I could continue to enjoy their sweet personalities.  I truly am blessed to be able to teach a team of gymnasts who are so amazing and so beautiful but I am terrible at letting them go. 

Shout Hooray!!

Busy season ended and I could not be happier.  It has been a hard busy season on our family.  Hal has been his busiest yet and did not get home until around 2:00a.m. every night from mid February on.  I do not know how he did it.  I could not sleep until he got home and I was exhausted after only a few days.  But it is over and things are back to normal (normal for us anyway).  He still has to put in 8 hour days and we have not been able to get away together for a long time, hopefully we will find some time in the future.  My dad is slowly doing better and is able to move around a little more.  He will start his next transplant on May 13th.  Hal was working during Spring Break so I was able to spend some much needed one on one time with the kids.  We had a good time (pics to come).   

Update

Well, my dad is still fighting and fighting hard but it has been the hardest thing I have ever had to watch.  As a quick update, he did qualify for a stem cell transplant and is almost through the first phase.  Dad has had two round of extensive chemo so far, after the first round of chemo they collected as many of his stem cells as they could so that they could do two possibly three transplants.  He is almost through the first transplant.  He went through his second round of chemo which they say if it wasn't for the transplant would kill him.  He is in so much pain and misery.  I cry almost every day because I feel so bad for what he has had to go through.  I can not even begin to describe the pain and anguish I see in his eyes when I visit.  His treatment has been an outpatient treatment but mom and dad have had to live in Salt Lake for the past couple of weeks.  Because of the risk of the treatment, patients have to live close to the hospital in case they have to be rushed to the hospital for complications.  They have been living with a friend who lives close.  Dad actually was admitted to the hospital last night and will be there for a few days because his body is too week to fight and his transplant has not taken yet to help his body fight.  After his new cells start working he will be able to come home and it will take 6-8 weeks for him to recover from this treatment at which point he will begin the second chemo/transplant treatment which is said to be more intense.  I do not know if I can watch him go through this again and cause him even more pain and anguish.  We have been keeping a blog for him to keep friends and neighbors updated on his condition, it is cancerreallyreallysucks.blogspot.com.  The hardest thing he says is the fact that he is going through all of this and there is no surety that it will put his cancer in remission.  Because some of his cancer cells are said to be resistant to treatment no one really know what the outcome will be.  I think that it will devastate him if he fights so hard only to lose the battle.  I think that it will devastate us all!!  Thank you so much to all of my family who have been so supportive and thoughtful.  Your thoughts and prayers have meant so much to me. 

Hallie Jo really loves her Grandpa and she really misses him.  She writes him notes of encouragement every day!

So now an update on my own family - - It is that time of year again, TAX TIME, so my sweet hubby is busy as ever and has been running on only 3-4 hours of sleep every night since mid February.  This year as been harder and more hours for him than years past because his firm lost a few tax seniors at the beginning of the year so he has to carry a heavier load.  I have been really struggling to take care of the gym, take care of my sweet children, and take care of mom and dad as well.  Thank goodness for wonderful neighbors and a wonderful Relief Society Presidency.  I have really gained great respect for the Relief Society Organization lately and hope that I can return all of the favors some day.

Hallie Jo has been participating in quite a few gymnastics competitions lately and has done really well.  She is a born performer but competes because it is fun.  She is not super competitive which makes it even funner for me.  Here are a few pictures of some of her competitions.  Her next competition will be on April 29th or 30th at All American Gymnastics in Lindon.  She has also recently switched ballet studios to the Barlow Arts Conservatory (the one she did the Nutcracker with) and is absolutely loving ballet.  They placed her in a Level 3 class and she seems to fit in very well.  They will be performing Alice in Wonderland on May 13-14 at the Covey Center for the Arts.  She sure has a love for life and has sure enjoyed making friends at school, she even has a few boys chasing after her, but she has bluntly told them that she can only be friends with them and that is all and that her mom said that she can not get married until she is twenty.  They seemed to be okay with that and now are just her friend.  I hope that this attitude will continue into her teenage years.

Having a good time!

Some of her Team mates!



Hallie Jo and her cousin Harlee compete in the same Level.  It has been fun for them!




My Level 4/5 Team



Happy as Ever!

Cody is sure a handful, and with all the things that are going on right now I feel like I have not been able to give him the one on one time that he is so in need of.  He runs from one mess to another faster than my feet can run.  I feel like all I do all day is chase him around.  He has figured out how to unlock doors and tries to escape.  I am going to have to get a lock to put up high so he can't reach it.  He still loves his sister so much and he is learning how to interact with other children his age.  I hope that I can tame his craziness a little.    

So Mischievious!

 

A Sad Beginning to a New Year

I have been delaying writing this post not quite sure what to say.  It seems as if this year is going to be a tuff one for my family.  We got news just last week that my Dad has been diagnosed with Multiple Myeloma.  This is a type of cancer in the plasma cells inside his bones.  There is no cure for this type of cancer.  I think that my entire family is still in shock by the news because of all of the cancer that has sprung up in our family.  My mom was diagnosed with breast cancer about two years ago and under went extensive chemo therapy.  It was tuff on all of us not knowing what to do and how to help.  Just as she was finishing her treatments we found out that my Grandma was diagnosed with a type of Ovarian Cancer and now it was her turn for the Chemo.  It took a toll on my Grandma and although she fought hard she lost her battle last February.  It was awful watching my Grandma in so much pain and anguish.  And now, just one year later here we go again.  But I have a feeling that this one might be the hardest on us all.  My dad is only 56(almost) years old.  It all began with a broken rib from playing with his dog.  Shortly after that he hurt his back by sneezing and found out through an MRI that he had borken a vertebrae and there was something else not quite right in the MRI.  The plasma cells in his bones are multiplying so fast that they are putting great amounts of pressure on his bones causing tremendous pain and easy brakes.  There are treatments for his cancer and we are all very hopeful that he will still live a long time but there are no certainties at this point.  He still has many tests to undergo to decide which treatments he will qualify for.  I have to admit that when I first was told of the diagnosis I was angry.  I couldn't figure out how this could happen again.  I am still a little angry but more than that I want to do what I can to help out.  My dad is a very strong man and is very optimistic at this point and I know that he needs us to be as positive as we can.  I love my dad very much and he means the world to me and this family.  We are with you DAD!!