Thankful Celebrations

The Sunday before Thanksgiving we went to Layton to visit with the Jacos. It was also a belated birthday celebration too (which Hayden loved, of course). We had a lovely dinner and it was wonderful being able to visit with eachother.

Feast Days
 

A couple of days later, Hayden had a feast in his kindergarten class. Everyone is in charge of bringing something and then the kids all share their food. It's also a great way to encourage kids to try some new foods. I tried to get Hayden to eat olives, but it was a no-go. I even explained (and demonstrated) how fun olives can be by putting them on your fingers. Hayden just thought that was gross (oh well, I at least gave it my best effort).

Thanksgiving morning...making turkey pancakes!

Yummy! Hayden's enjoying his festive breakfast!

Time to make and decorate turkey cupcakes to enjoy later on after dinner. Hayden's doing a fantastic job with the decorating!

A quick pic of me at my Mom's house...my mom and sis asked to be edited out (they didn't like the pic of themselves...GIRLS!!!)

One of the boys and Hayden's (?) thumb

 

Happy Birthday, Mom/Grandma!

Here we are celebrating my mom's birthday (56th, but I think the candles on the cake show "30").

Dinners at RedRock with Andrea

I met my new friend, Andrea, through an online private group (UFA...Up For Anything). We also both participated in an online dating site called "Date Nate." Neither of us won the dates, but Andrea ended up dating him anyway (isn't she beautiful, too!). So, we ended up bonding over the experience and becoming friends. She is tons of fun, a Canadian, a nurse, and she's incredible adventurous. Both pictures were taken at RedRock by Fashion Place Mall on two separate occasions.

HaLlOwEeN

Halloween fell on a Monday this year...interesting way to start off the school week. Hayden was so excited to dress up as Scooby Doo this year and I decided to go with the maiden costume again.
Hayden got to play games and frost cookies at school. After school, we went to my mom's house for a taco soup dinner before trick-or-treating. My friend Marc, who dressed up as Superman, joined us too. We ended up trick-or-treating with Hayden's friend, Rex, who lives next door to my mom. Brooke, Travis, and Gage came over and we went out with them for a bit later on.

Random October Stuff

Here I am with Brian doing the whole Haunted House thing at Nightmare on 13th.

Flowers from my friend, Marc, for my birthday

One of the pumpkins we decorated for our front porch

The Mayan

We had a birthday dinner with Grandma and Grandpa Barnes, Brooke, Travis, and Gage at the Mayan on the last night it was open. Hayden got to have his volcanic dessert that he has been talking about forever.

October 27, 2011

After school on Hayden's "actual" birthday we went to Boondocks. Hayden wanted to play mini golf, and luckily the weather was nice enough outside for us to play. We also played some of the arcade games too.

Then we went home and Hayden opened presents from mommy. He got an Angry Birds game, clothing, and his own computer (an educational one for kids).

Hayden's 6th Birthday Party

This year Hayden decided he wanted to have his friend birthday party at the Living Planet Aquarium. We ended up having the party a week before his actual birthday during the UEA break. Hayden had 10 friends come to celebrate with him and the kids all had a great time!

These are the party bags we put together for the kids...it was filled with "under-the-sea" themed treats and non-edible goodies.

Hayden with Marcello, Sophia, and Graci Gonzalez

I decided that cupcakes would be much easier to serve this year instead of a birthday cake. So I made fish, octopus, and crab cupcakes.

Here's Hayden blowing out the candles on the fish cupcake he picked out.

Yummy...cupcakes, icecream, and drinks!

Hayden's cute cousin, Gage.

More of the group: Graci G., Sophia, Paige, and Graci E.

Opening presents! Hayden got some fun, cool gifts from his thoughtful friends.

After opening presents, Hayden and his friends (along with Grandma and Grandpa Barnes, Aunt Brooke, Jenny Gonzalez, and mommy) went and explored the aquarium. Here's a shot of the group: Gage, Ty, Abbi, Hamilton, Sophia, Graci, Marcello, Hayden, Rex, Graci, and Paige.

Red Rock Relay 2011

Back again for another year, but this time I was in the Sun Van (harder legs than last year's Snow Van). We had seven of our original team members from last year and five newbies. This year our team name was "Cool Runnings," and we tried to wear some tye-dyed shirts for the group shot (at least the girls did). We left on Thursday, Sept. 8 and headed to Brian Head. Our Van stayed in the condo while the others camped out in the RV. This year we used trucks and an RV. We were pretty smart and used one truck for the runners and then the other truck stayed with the RV that met us at the exchange points. That way, if your group wasn't running then you could hang out in the RV. Yes, we're a smart team! There are 12 members on a team and each person runs 3 times (a total of 36 legs from start to finish).

After we dropped off our stuff in Brian Head, we drove to Cedar City for packet pick-up and the pre-race dinner. Below is a picture that we took after dinner...had to throw in one of the official RRR vehicles in.

Friday--race morning! Debbie started the race by riding the ski lift up the mountain at 7:30. Amy, Camille, Mariangel, Jake, Suzie and I posed for a pic while waiting for her to race back down.

My half of the team waiting for the others to finish their first legs. Pictured are Chelsea, Jess, me, Mariangel, Jake, and Shyrlan. Oh, the butterflies are starting to set in.

I was the seventh runner out of our whole team which meant the first runner in the Sun Van. Here I am waiting for Amy to pass off the baton (aka: the slap bracelet).

And I'm off!!! Notice those dark clouds in the background...they played a role in my run.

So here I am going along and running the "Navajo Ninja"--this was labeled as one of the hardest legs of the whole race. Why? because you basically run up a mountain during the whole leg (which is almost 6 miles). Now if that isn't enough of a killer, let's add in some more fun. How about a little rain?

Oh, that actually feels refreshing!

Okay, how about a lot of rain?

Now that's a bit too much, but it could be worse.

Worse you say...hmmm, how about some hail mixed with some lightening right above your head?

Okay, now I'm freaking out a bit. At the same time though, it's motivating me to keep on running.

I found out later that lightening did strike and break a tree that fell on this route sometime after my run. Glad no one was hurt.

My next leg was almost at 11pm. I had to run 8.4 miles on a semi-flat highway. A little after 7 miles I had to stop because I needed something to eat. Jake jumped out and finished my last mile and told me I could make up for it by doing one of his miles. After we finished our legs we found out that we had a few injuries. Mariangel's feet were done in and Amy in the other van had sprained her ankle. Also, Shyrlan had been sick during this whole race and Jake's knees were starting to bother him. We knew that finishing the last legs of this race would mean really pulling together and working as a team. Once the "baton" was passed over to me I ran my last leg around 7am Saturday morning (another 5 and a half miles uphill) on about 45 minutes of sleep. I knew that I wasn't done yet... Shyrlan ran his with a little help from Jake. Chelsea and Jess ran their legs, but we knew Mariangel would need help with her 7 miler. Jess kept running and did the first part, Mariangel ran a quarter mile, I ran a mile, Chelsea ran 2 miles, and just as I was about to switchout and run another mile we got into a car accident. Our truck hit another truck coming down the mountain. Luckily we were all ok, but the truck wasn't driveable. This is where team work really comes into play. The other half of the team had dropped the RV in Sand Hollow and was with us in the other truck. Also, one of the runners (McKell) had her husband there in their SUV. So I kept the race going and ran to the next exchange point. Brandon (McKell's hubby) met us there with Jake and our captain, Camille. I passed off to Jake then hopped in with Brandon and Camille. After Jake ran for a bit, I got back out to run another mile. Then Camille ran one and at this point we had the other truck with us. Shyrlan ran a mile and Jake finished up the race. However, we couldn't cross the finish because we wanted the rest of our team with us. Rae Ann took the truck and went back down to get the others (they had been doing an accident report and having the truck towed while we were running). Finally, we were able to all cross the finish together...yay!

Group shots

Front: Me, Tegan (Camille's son), Suzie, and Debbie

Back: Rae Ann, McKell, Chelsea, Shyrlan, Jess, Camille, Amy, Mariangel, and Jake

Chelsea and I doing a sno cone "cheers."

So, Camille arranged a ride for me that night (since we were short one vehicle getting back). It's always fun to meet other runners and make new friends.