Hawaii!!

Hooray!!! We had an absolutely fabulous time in Hawaii the past 6 days. For the first three days, we were on Kaua'i. Then we headed over to Oahu to stay with my dad for the remainder of the trip. It was so fun! We hiked, kayaked, zip-lined, saw loads of sights, watched sea turtles, ate tons of really good food, and relaxed. Oh, and we came home sun-burned, mission accomplished.
Here are a few pictures to enjoy!
This is my dad and I, on the beach at Turtle Cove.

Steve and I, again in Turtle Cove. We saw a least 6 sea turtles.

Here we are at the top of Diamond Head in Honolulu. Wow, it was hot, humid and way too many stairs. I was crying like a baby until we passed an 81 year old man who was hiking up the hill like he was strolling in the mall. The view was beautiful, honestly it was worth the quivering knees and jello legs.

While we were on Kaua'i, we did an excursion to the Princeville Ranch. They took us kayaking, hiking and zip-lining. I think this was the highlight of the trip. Steve managed to stay upright in his canoe, and we both went across the zip-lines like we were old pros.

Me, on the zip-line.

The start of our hike. This mountain is usually covered in clouds. It's the wettest place on Earth, but we lucked out and had a beautiful dry day!

Funny quotes from the past month

I was suffering a wonderful bout of PMS, dealing with lots of people, doing way too much, and coming down with an awful cold (that's my defense), when Steve warned my dad "don't poke the bear" (for clarification- I'm the bear in this scenario). It wasn't funny then, but it is getting funnier as time goes on. I think I'll get that printed up nice and big, frame it and nail it to my bedroom door as a warning to my children. DON'T POKE THE BEAR (and the bear doesn't go away until 8:00 AM).

Steve and I were having dinner with a couple of friends, who are both recently divorced. They were comparing notes on how long they were married (15 years and 12 years). I looked at Steve and told him "well, I guess we better not get too comfortable". What I meant was, there is no such thing as a safe year in marriage, what he heard was "start packing". Now, when he's being a brat I look at him and repeat myself "don't get too comfortable".

Ayden acted up in school last week and earned himself some time in "skills" (the elementary equivalent of detention). He spent his recesses picking up trash. "Mom, it was fun!! I even found a cigarette". Hmm, do I have an aspiring trash truck driver on my hands? And, what are they doing over there at South Elementary with the cigarettes? Granted, if I had to deal with 600 children under the age of 10, I would probably be doing much worse than smoking!!

Jade and I were playing pretend. For those of you who are not familiar, this is a game where we act like different people and do various things together like shop, cook, eat, etc. Jade tells me "mom, you pretend to be nice, like my teacher". Yup, I really need a vacation.

A Decade, Really?

Tomorrow, October 9th, we celebrate our 10th wedding anniversary. I remember not long ago thinking 10 years seemed like a REALLY long time. Now, I'm wondering what happened? How did we get here so FAST?? In honor of ten years, here is a list of 10 random things you may not know about Steve and Jayci.
1. We still use the majority of kitchen accessories we were gifted at our wedding.
2. I finally won the argument of whether or not to get a dog. Steve told me the other day, "good choice Jace, Ms. E's a great dog for our family". No, I'm not making that up, he really said it (and I needed to document it somewhere).
3. We love our kids more than we could have ever imagined. When we were first married, we did not want kids. A not so gentle urging from a power greater than us forced our hands and we are grateful every single day for the two little people who are sharing in this life with us.
4. We often want to strangle those same little people.
5. Especially today.
6. So far, we have met our goal each year of going on one big trip, just Steve and me. I can't tell you how much this strengthens our relationship. We have been to: Tahiti, Hawaii, The Bahamas, Jackson Hole, San Diego, San Francisco, Sedona Arizona, Portland Oregon, Springdale Utah and we leave again for Hawaii in 4 days.
7. A hobby we have found to love together is gardening. To my amazement, Steve loves to garden as much as I do!!
8. Steve and I are polar opposites in many, many ways. Most days this works very well, other days, well, not so much.
9. I can still count on just one hand the number of times we have been truly angry with each other.
10. The commitment we made to each other 10 years ago, is just as strong today as it was then, if not stronger. Neither of us could have imagined the challenge a successful marriage and family would be, and I'm still in awe that we have managed to get this far. 10 years is nothing, compared to what lies ahead of us. But, from the bottom of my heart, I have loved every minute of the last 3,650 days.

St. Jude's

I'm sure I won't be blogging again for a while, so I'm reminding you now. This month, Chili's is working on their annual fundraiser for St. Jude's Childrens Hospital. Chili's is amazing and so generous in doing this for St. Jude's. When you go and eat at your local Chili's ask your server if you can "create a pepper", then color your pepper and donate whatever you can. You can even purchase tee-shirts to decorate and the proceeds from the shirts go to St. Jude's. If I get a minute, I'll post a picture of my rockin tshirt!!
On Monday, September 28th, all profits from all sales at Chili's go directly to St. Jude's.
So, times are tough for a lot of people (but hopefully getting better), and it may seem pretty crazy to take your family out to dinner. I say it's crazy not to. I am so thankful that my children are healthy enough to take to dinner! I am so thankful that I am not in debt up to my eyeballs with health care bills due to fighting my child's cancer. Thousands of families would give anything to take their kids out to dinner and celebrate their health. And, hopefully by working together with Chili's, we can make that a reality for those families!

I'll take "Worst Friday Nights" for $1000, please Alex"

Spending two hours in Instacare, getting diagnosed with yet another Strep infection, filling not one, but TWO prescriptions for Amoxicillin because when you're family you share everything including strep, and not getting to bed until 11.
Jayci Bash's Friday night. WOO HOO, we have a winner!
It's not all bad, I know it could be much worse. I got to spend a whole sick day with Jade today watching movies, making a pie (because our butts were tired from sitting down so much), and catching up on this here blog!

Cedar Breaks with 120 kids, 12 adults and 2 busses.

Ayden still thinks I'm cool!

He's pretty cool too.
The ants go marching........

You'd be amazed how hard it is to get kids to form a line.

I went with Ayden's class to Cedar Breaks this past Friday. It was so fun, minus the one puke incident. Really, with 60 kids on a bus winding up the canyon, you expect a little vomit, right?

We listened to the park ranger explain "deposition", learned a new word- "OHWOW", hiked for a mile (listened to a lot of "I'm tired", "are we there yet?" and "I need to pee"), had lunch at Woods Ranch, then got to come home early for the day! It really was fun and I'm so glad I got to go with him. Huge thanks to my mom for taking Jadie so I could spend this wonderful time with Ayden.

Preschool!

Isn't she beautiful?
The official pose of preschoolers. Really, she's just showing off her new shoes (they make her run fast)!