Madrid

Today we are trying to recover from 5 fast days in Madrid, Spain!  The purpose of the trip was so I could run a marathon with two of my friends but my knee is messed up so I stood at the finish line cheering instead!  It was neat seeing all of the TNT (teamintraining.org) runners so I yelled their names and they looked at me crazy, just like I'm sure I looked at people in San Diego. 

I have yet to go through the pictures, I will do that tonight and put more up and more details of the trip.  Let's just say I REALLY want to get my knee fixed so I can run!!  I hate running but I was so sad I wasn't able to and get the race medal.  And it's such a great excuse to travel around Europe.....

Crayon Art

I finally had some time to try my own crayon art today.  Here is a step by step of how it was done!

I already had a blank canvas that was covered in fabric, so I took the fabric off.  It's pretty large, I do not recommend starting with such a big one the first time.

Taking the wrappers off of the crayons took a lot longer than I thought. I tried keeping similar colors together.  Originally I was going to try and do some sort of wave pattern, but I didn't have enough blue. So here's what I came up with:

Broken Crayons

Hoping it turns out ok.......

Next I put parchment paper over the whole thing and melted the crayons. I just used my iron set on the highest dry setting. Some spots melted quickly and other I had to keep hold it on for awhile.  I spread them out (with the iron) as they melted to fill in most of the white space. There were some parts I had to go back over again that were not melted enough.

And this is the final product:

Crayon Art

The lower corner is a little too grey, but it is growing on me.  It's a little dark but I do love the color in the middle.  Hopefully I can take down the mirror in the living room and hang it up.

Update on Pictures....in no particular order

Pop culture party

Britney Spears Concert

Britney Spears Concert

Friends Halloween Party.  Zombies in front of the meat table.

School Halloween Party. Cody and Titus

Adult party at the club

Baby Kirsten and I.

Brice spent a day with Shauntai and she painted him like a puppy!!

Brice at the park

Field Trip to the History Museum on base

The boys at the park. Kari and I left them with some friends so we could go to Schinnen

Titus and Cody at the Valentine Party

Learning at Summer's house

Coming down the water slide at Micah's birthday party

The boys at the pool!

Running

Today I attempted a 13 or 14 mile run, and started out amazing!  I finished 7 miles in an hour and 17 minutes, stopped at my friend Samantha's house to use the bathroom and refill my water bottles, and started back out to go home. I made it one more mile and it started to HAIL. Freezing. Cold. Hail. Of course I had no minutes on my phone so I was sending Brandon thoughts to please call me and pick me up!  By the time the hail reached Odiliapeel and he did call (YAY!!) I had gone two more miles. It was so nice out when I left the house that I was only wearing one long sleeve shirt and my short running pants. Needless to say I was freezing. When he found me I had gone 10.81 miles. When we got home he ran a warm bath for me and I sat in there slowly warming up. I wasn't completely warm until I put my sweats on, crouched by the heater, and then curled up in bed.

I am so bummed I had to give up today because I was doing so well.  And tomorrow I will be going to T-Mobile to get a contract phone so I don't have to worry about minutes anymore!! 

Congratulations are in order

Brandon was promoted February 1st!  He is now a Technical Sargeant.

Brandon and The Commander

The 1st Sargeant and the Chief pinning him on

We also attended the Annual Awards Banquet where I received Volunteer of the Year. 

Look at those big smiles and big stripes!! 
The medal around my neck is the nominee medal

My dagger

Valentine's Babies

We had an eventful 2 day Valentine/Birthday celebration this year.  I am glad every year will be a party since it's Brice's birthday!!  The day before we had the boys school party on base, I was up late making their delivery boxes.....

I forgot to take a picture of the ones we made, but I did save one of each.  Cody's were a jar with a ladybug that said Happy Valentine's Day Love Bug, and Brice's was a picture of a dinosaur that said You're DINO-mite!  Pretty cute.  Of course I forgot to take the camera, I remembered the 50 other things I had to take, but there are pictures from the party on my Facebook that one of these days I will save. 

Brice had a pretty busy birthday too!  We went to Mommy and Me class in the morning, T-ball after work, and then presents and cupcakes.  I made chocolate cupcakes with a thin mint in it, and we had a little party at T-ball with yummy cupcakes and juice.

I love watching Brice open presents. He is always so excited for everything he gets and his face is priceless.  I hope he doesn't grow out of that!!

Yes, I made him put on another shirt because I didn't want bright orange T-ball shirt in all of my pictures!

This is the only video I can get to upload anywhere.  I think the other two are too big  :(

Wow, time flies!

I realized I have not posted ANYTHING since September, and I am sorry!  This week I will try and catch up on everything we have done over the last few months, but there is a lot so it may not all get in.  I am killing time right now waiting to go eat lunch with Brandon at the Dining Facility.  That is one of perks of being here, we get to eat some yummy food at chow hall prices so it doesn't break the bank and we get to 'eat out'!  Cody and I are super busy with all of our school work, he is making such great progress, especially this last week.  I think something finally clicked in him and he's getting a lot better and retaining more information.  He told us he wants to be a cop when he grows up, because this family needs more of those, right?!  That's what Brandon wants to do when he retires too.

I am trying to train for a marathon that is on April 22nd in Madrid, but so far it has not been going well.  We have had such a nice winter and now it's getting cold and I don't want to be out in it!  I need to find some movitivation, and quickly!!  It is a lot easier to here than it was in Albuquerque, getting back down to sea level makes such a huge difference.

I will put up some pictures tonight, need to go sweep the floor of cereal crumbs and head out!