The Last of Fall 2014

Hello everyone!

This post is the rest of our October that we captured in pictures.  Joey went to his first little pumpkin patch (sort of), we enjoyed our ward's Trunk or Treat, and we played a Halloween concert on the Children's ward at UNM hospital.  So, here are the pictures:

Joey playing with the car I grew up with.

At Galloping Grace:

                                      Joey not sure of the festivities                                     Leah Bee-a's 1st birthday 

                                                 I adore that silly face of his                                               Tractor time

                                          Mason and his faces are priceless                                  Working the water spigot
  

 Joey and his sensory activities (didn't like the corn pit that much)

"Ride 'em Cowboy!"

 Joey is full on walking now,

but here is the demonstration of his

willingness to actually be on his feet!

The mother? A year old.  The piglets? Ten days.

This pig and I have bonded.

Halloween:

                        Left:  Costume repeat: flying monkeys with our monkey who hasn't formed his chrysalis yet.
                        Right: Bandits, burglars, or Dick and Jane. Your choice.

This year for Thanksgiving we are planning on traveling to Idaho, which is a first for me. Looking forward to spending time with Sam's family!

A Year and a Half

Can you believe this boy is Nursery age?  While Sam was taking a nap after running a marathon I took this little guy to the nearby park to do a tiny photo shoot.  I didn't really edit any of these though.  Maybe when I have time...

I'm so glad to be this guy's mama.  I wish only the best for him and hope that we can provide that for him.  Meanwhile, enjoy these pictures of my silly boy (he wouldn't take any formal pictures).

Ah, in his element.  He is getting really, really close to walking.  He'll take quite a few steps then decide he's faster and more secure crawling.  As long as he has the desire, right?  We pretty much have a toddler in our hands (throws tantrums like one, too).  Definitely time to watch what we do or say around him, haha.

Duke City Marathon 2014

I can't remember exactly when Sam decided to run a marathon, but he was getting into long distance running and thought it would be a great goal to have.  Every year Albuquerque hosts the Duke City Marathon and for his birthday Sam signed up!  His friend in his Medical School class signed up as well and they were going to run together.  School was getting busy, but Sam still would get up very early in the mornings so he would have time to do some long distance running.  It crept up!

He ran the marathon on the 19th (yesterday) and did great!  We invested in good shoes so he survived without any injuries (apart from not being able to walk normally). He completed it in 3 hours 57 minutes!!

Here are some before pictures I took:

 Sam and his friend (it was still dark out, sorry it's blurry!)

Super surprised how many people choose to run this marathon! 

This line extended way back.

Our Stake Conference was that day and Sam told me he would take it nice and slow.  So I decided I would have time to attend a little bit then head on over to the finish line and take awesome photos of him.  Well, I got a text saying "3 more miles!" earlier than I expected so I bolted to downtown.  Since there were so many people and roadblocks, I couldn't find a super close parking spot.  But I did my best and ran to the finish line.  Then I saw Sam turn the corner and run past me.  I couldn't even catch up to him and I didn't just run 26 miles like he did!  Sorry I didn't get epic photos of his finishing.  Oh well.  Here are some "after" pictures: 

 I made this sign for him and had him use his last strength

 to stand there and hold it so I could get a picture.

So positive!  Taking a little break while walking to the car.



Sam ran with his friend over half of the way, but decided to run on his own after mile 16.  He was able to keep going by saying "that person shouldn't be in front of me" and passed them.  He was able to talk about school and the church with his friend, then listen to some general conference (it was held on Sunday after all).  In the car he kept telling me "Why would anyone do this to themselves?" And I couldn't agree more.  At home Sam was getting some serious chills and had to hop into bed to take a long, nice nap.  I made a nice, carb-ilicious lunch after he was done feeling like throwing up.  He is now back to normal except for the extreme soreness.  Way to go on completing your first marathon, Sam!

Joey at 17 Months

Joey turned 17 months a week ago and I felt it was time for an update both on him and the blog.

He is generally a happy boy, but he doesn't like you leaving his sight.

He is in love with toy cars and balls.  Any car is his car, and he'll let you know.

He enjoys climbing on top of things, including his mom and dad.

He used to be a great little eater, but he's starting to have more interest in playing than eating.

He won't go to bed until you are exhausted and need to go to bed yourself.

He will sit and watch a movie, and although it's suggested no screen time until age 2, it's worth my sanity.

He doesn't use a lot of words yet, but he does know mama, dada, bah (ball), go! (outside), vrrm (car), nana (no) and "uh oh!"

He loves going to the park or being outside in general.  He gets really mad when you leave without him.

He loves books, but we still have to use board books.  He's not afraid of ripping a page or two!

He found out he loves to draw, mainly with pens and pencils.  My homework, the sheets...

He is still clogged.  Poor little guy it takes him a couple days to get something out of him.

He has the cutest little gap-toothed smile courtesy of Sam.

He is 17 months and is still not walking.  We're making baby steps on the matter (pun intended), but he's having some balancing issues and he's not very confident.  He can stand on his own if you distract him and will take a couple steps if he thinks you're about to grab him.  He can cruise just fine and recently let us hold his hand and urge him to walk.  I don't know if he's really stubborn or if something's going on, but he is still in physical therapy (been since June).  I feel like a bad mother because every time there is a new baby that is starting to walk that is considerably younger than him I get frustrated, and I shouldn't.  I just need patience.  Being a first-time mom can be hard.


Now here are some pictures of Joey hamming it up for the camera:

School, School, School

Hey everyone who actually reads our bloggity blog,

For those of you who don't know, last week has been the first week of school for Sam and me.  That's right, I'm back in school full-time.  There has been a lot of thought put into finishing school, so here I am, back at UNM for the next three semesters until I'm done.  Soo close (yet so far it seems).  Our family is surviving.  In fact, we didn't leave Joey with anyone else for this entire first week (although that will probably change here on out).  I only go to school three days a week, so I have super long weekends every weekend, woohoo!  However, Joey has been throwing up and not feeling that well, so I feel guilty that I'll have to leave him to go to school this week.

This summer has been great.  The last little vacation we had before school was going on a little one night camp out in the Jemez mountains.  The campground was semi-closed, so not that many people were out there when we went.  My parents, two of my sisters and their families made it out.  A great time, and Sam even got me to sleep in his little shelter at night (just tarp and rope folks).  Enjoy the photos!

 This is Bailey.  My sister Heidi's new baby. 

 "Why is mommy holding a camera and not me?"

 This girl is something else.

 Sweet little Leah.  She turns one in October!

 Bailey's terrorizer.  What's funny was at night 

we couldn't find Bailey because we didn't see her 

cuddle up to sleeping Noelle.

 So happy after a wonderful night's sleep in my own tent

 (since mommy and daddy decided to sleep outside).

 Tried to get an artistic photo, didn't work as well as I hoped.

The Cello Story Part II

I don't know why I feel an urge to post this, but music is something that has played a huge role in my life and Sam's, and I really dream it will with our children.  It's about how I got into the cello.  It's pretty very detailed, so feel free to skip this.  It's more of a journal-like entry anyway.  Part I is here. 

By this time, I felt pretty comfortable with the cello and made some good friends through playing.  However, the next year I would be starting high school and the auditions are harder and require more preparation.  There were two high school groups at the time, the Albuquerque Youth Orchestra (AYO), and the cream of the crop, the Albuquerque Youth Symphony (AYS).  I really didn't have a chance of making it into AYS that year, so I was pretty content landing a spot in AYO.  My good friend Bethany who played the harp and grew up in the same ward as me got a spot as well, so I wasn't going in having to make new friends (all the friends I had were younger than me).  Of course, I made new awesome friends, like Katie, Kristin, Alex, and Taylor.  Katie took lessons from Pamela as well and the last three played in the same high school orchestra as me.  I really enjoyed AYO.  The conductor, Ms. Siverson, was an extraordinary trumpet player and picked pretty cool pieces.  The years sort of blend together, but I remember playing Mars, Schubert's unfinished symphony, the Carmen Suite, and Night on Bald Mountain.  This year AYO got to tour along with AYS, which hardly happened, and got to go to AZ. Lots of embarrassing stories on this trip, including having to dig through the McDonald's trash and cuddling with a stranger at night (we had to share beds...I was asleep when this happened).  I had a lot of fun in the school orchestra as well.  I believe I started piano lessons back up this year, and although I was progressing a little on the piano, cello was my main instrument by far!  

I made AYO again my sophomore year, but since I must have done so well in the auditions (haha) they allowed me to play a solo at Hummingbird Music Camp.  Although some of the friends I made that year moved up to AYS, I still had lots of friends.  Bethany, although I'm sure outshone the AYS harpists in talent, was still there with me, along with a girl named Samantha who played bass and was in our ward.  Can I just say we were an awesome trio. Johnny, although an excellent player, was in AYO as well (he played a solo at camp, too).  A few words about Johnny: his family migrated from China when he was young.  He has always been an amazing friend to me and I'm so glad I got to meet him.  I'm positive he's going to be famous one day with how well he plays the cello :)  What's funny is that when I played my solo, the cellists in sectional were impressed, if I say so myself, but then the next night Johnny played, and well, we all knew who was guaranteed a spot in AYS next year.  The tour that year was in Pagosa Springs and since I vacation there all the time, it was fun to travel there with friends. In school orchestra I met one of my best friends in high school, a guy named Aaron.  He was a cellist in AYS and a year ahead of me.  He and all my other friends who were in AYS and a year ahead were one of the reasons I wanted to make AYS so badly the next year (that and there was a huge possibility of an international tour).  It would be their senior year and I wouldn't have another opportunity like that.  It was going to be a tough audition, though.  Only four cellists would be graduating high school that year, so that meant only four slots were "available" (those who made it in still had to audition, but they already made it in once, twice, or even three times--Quinn Boyack--)  There were really talented cellists in AYO that I didn't know if I could beat.  I practiced really hard, by golly, but I didn't know if it would be enough.  

Bethany, me, and Samantha in Pagosa Springs, CO

Well, guess what?  The Lord gave me the huge blessing of playing in AYS my junior year of high school.  It was the highlight of my cello career for sure. The night I found out I didn't know if I could handle the disappointment or embarrassment of not getting into AYS. When I saw my name in the list of cellists, I ran through the house whooping for not being able to contain the excitement.  I made it in!  The highest group for high school musicians, wow.  Who knew starting the cello out when I was nine would lead to that moment.  I hadn't thought I would become good enough, but there I was!  Junior year had to be one of the best years for me as a cellist.  Later that summer the musicians and parents went to a meeting where we played a game to find out where our tour was going to be.  We weren't disappointed as we found out we were going to Australia and New Zealand!  My stand partner for that year was Katie, and I didn't want anyone else she was so awesome.  Well, before camp started, my pediatrician tried to burn a wart off my hand, and my hand didn't take it so well.  It was right before camp and it swelled really bad.  So embarrassing and made it hard to hold my bow.  The first concert was a dance theme (I am a sucker for themes), so we played the Polovtsian Dances, Dance Bacchanale, and Afternoon of a Faun to name a few (great songs, look them up).  To help fund the trip to AYS we made and sold luminaries as a group.  There was a big weekend in the year we would go and deliver them.  Another thing that happened my Junior year was that in my school orchestra there were no bassists (sound familiar?  Happened to my brother in middle school).  Since I wanted to start on the bass, it was a good opportunity to learn and it wasn't that hard since I already read music and played the cello.  Not only that, there were no bass players for Jazz band and suddenly I found myself trading in my Italian class for Jazz band (I met awesome people here too, even if I was wary of it at first).  The tour was in the summer after my junior year, so I actually auditioned for the final time before I even was finished with AYS.  Since 8 of the twelve cellists were seniors, my chances of making it in that year greatly improved and I hardly worried myself over it (I got in, yay).

Bethany and me

Pamela's AYS students: me, Johnny and Katie

This was the first time I would be leaving the US, who knew it would be so far away?  There was an incident last year's tour with the cellos and airplanes.  Let's just say, out of the 12 cellos that travelled on the airplane, only 4 came home undamaged.  Holes punched through, scrolls ripped off...you get the idea.  So R & S made their very generous donation of letting us use their special cello cases intended for travel (a lot safer).  Then when they got them back, they were selling them for a discounted price since they were used on this trip.  What an amazing gift to us!  Traveling with a cello was interesting.  We had the biggest instruments to travel with since the venues there would supply harps and basses.  Along with our luggage, it was intense...but also a blast.  We got the special treatment of flying directly to LA because of our instruments while the other musicians had to deal with layovers.  So we got to spend time in LA and play on the beach while waiting for everyone else.  The flight there was long, but I got to sit next to people I liked, so that's always a plus, right?  After landing and spending time in New Zealand we finally made it to our destination.  We were going to spend time with host families, but this year had the big H1N1 scare, so it had to be done away with.  That meant staying in hotels which meant the trip ended up costing a lot more than anticipated, but AYS took the hit, not the musicians.  So generous of them!  Over the course of the trip we played 4(?) concerts, spent time in a wildlife park, held koalas, petted kangaroos and emus, got pooped on by Lorikeets, ate Australian BBQ, travelled all day on the bus, enjoyed an Australian ranch and throwing boomerangs, souvenir shopping, hiking, amusement park, aquarium, cruise, and last playing in the Sydney Opera house for our final concert (full house and all).  I couldn't tell you how much it meant to me.  A special thank you to my amazing parents who always encouraged me, Pamela for instilling her knowledge in me, the AYS program who gave this opportunity, and my friends who always make it more enjoyable.

Back: Kira, Nicole, Alex, Aaron, Kristin Front: Jason, Amberle, John, and me

Sydney Harbor

Before our first concert

Whole group (I'm in the front with the plaid burgundy jacket)

I was going to wrap it up in this post, but seeing as it is still so long, I'll write a third part soon.