The blogging universe has been minus one for the past several weeks. Almost a month it looks like from my last posting date. Holy cow. I have no idea what everyone else has been up to since I haven't checked anyone's blogs for weeks. And what the heck have I been doing? Living life, I guess. Many days, I wake up and think, "today I need to blog about such and such," or "I have the best pictures to upload to my blog today." And then the day comes and goes and the next one comes and goes and life takes over. Really, blogging is an indulgence for me lately. I love to write and think and share my pics. I love keeping a little history of the Mesa Brown crew. And I love being able to check up on all my friends and keep up on their lives - even if it's just from cyberspace. Hopefully with only six more school days to go this year and one more night of softball games, life will slow down just a bit in the summer and the memoirs will start to make their way to the keyboard again.So...as of late, this is what we've been up to:
- J.R. & crew finished up our master bathroom remodel (I might have already blogged about that. I can't remember it's been so long :) But it looks fabulous-o. Can't wait to find a minute to post the pics. It's like a little bit of heaven in my house. I super duper love it and think they did such a great job. Thanks, J.R. You are the best!
- Barrett and I went up to 6th grade camp at Tonto Rim Camp outside of Payson on April 25-27 with all of the sixth graders from her school and had an absolute blast. I was one of the cabin moms and loved every minute of it. I loved being up there with Barrett and her cute friends. I loved the classes and activities and cool weather and hikes and skits and all the fun. Such good memories. I have a zillion pictures from the trip (no, not really - only about 500). I was the camp photographer too and am working on the camp movie on my Mac, which will be shown to the whole school and parents next week at the awards assembly. No pressure. Super fun. Barrett and I spent a couple hours last weekend going through our music library to pick the coolest, hippest songs for the flick. Left up to me, we would have resurrected the 80's hits for the soundtrack. We all know how good the 80's music was, right? Just kidding (kidding about using it, not about it's greatness). I wouldn't have done that to Barrett. She's a little music connoiseur herself and certainly appreciates a good Sammy Hagar or Alice Cooper hit, but we let the music of 2011 prevail for this sixth grade motion picture extravaganza. Justin Beiber and Katy Perry and Taio Cruz and Usher and The Black Eyed Peas and all their cronies are taking over the scene to provide the background music for the movie.
- Softball season. Enough said. No, not really. Not even close to enough said. We've been doing four games a week since late March and really loving every minute of it. Our girls have been so much fun to watch this year. Rowan finished her season a week ago, and Afton & Barrett are still in the majors tournament. And finally, finally... both Barrett & Afton are off the DL and actually playing at the same time. Barrett got her splint off last Friday and she played on Monday with taped fingers. Hooray! No more broken bones in the Brown house (knock on wood.) Tomorrow is the last night, though. The Diablas (yes, they are the She Devils) went all season undefeated up through the first tourney game, then lost their first game of the year on Monday night to the Vipers. The Vipers were tough. Their #1 chuck was on fire, we had one bad inning, and couldn't get a rally going. Final score was 8-3. But our girls rallied back last night and crushed the Crushers 15-4 (both Barrett & Afton got some sweet hits) so now they have to beat the Vipers twice on Thursday night to take home the title. Can't wait. I love watching them play.
- Working out. Ryan continues to be a running machine, going long a couple days a week. He's building up some serious stamina and shedding the extra cushion. He's not training for any races or anything, just keeping in shape and getting the body ready for the next Rim to Rim coming up in September. He throws in some P90X upper body workouts in the mix and has been very consistent. I, too, am keeping up with the fitness and loving it. I started a new Beachbody workout series a couple of weeks ago (Beachbody is the company that makes P90X, Insanity, Chalean Extreme, Slim in 6, and a bunch of others, including the one I'm doing now). I'd tell you what it is, but my kids grin ear to ear every time I say it and then bust into a giggle. Ya, ya, I know it's a funny name, but it's fun and it's working! Really, working. My whole core was in need of toning since I've just been running and not lifting too often. I was ready to mix things up a bit. So I looked online for some new workout DVD's to help me firm up and get ready for summer. I think I found the answer! I've been working out hard 5-6 days a week (and squeezing in a couple of runs a week, too, so I won't lose the lung stamina) and doing some calorie counting to boot. I've never been a dieter, but counting the calories and focusing on making all of them count with good stuff has really been an eye opener for me. It's crazy how fast you can eat your way through 1500 calories. By lunchtime! So now it's about choices and eating smaller, more often, and staying away from fast food and white stuff and junk and getting enough protein to keep up the fitness. So hopefully it's all paying off. We'll see in another month.
- School projects. In one week, Barrett had to turn in her country report on Greece and her Roman castle project that she and Katy constructed out of cardboard and paint and glue and moss and sticks and all things crafty; Afton completed her desert animal report on the Banded Gecko; and Rowan finished her habitat diorama and report on The Wetlands. Why do the teachers all think it's such a good idea to save the big projects until the end of the school year? Maybe because they think that the recitals and ball games and field trips and end of the year programs and regular school work and all the extracurricular stuff won't be enough to fill our lives. I don't know. Maybe it's just me :) We (and I do mean "we" when I say that) still have to finish up a country poster, create and dress a 2- foot paper doll in "authentic" Greek attire, prepare an Indian costume for the Arizona program, prepare a Greek costume and snacks for the world fair, and make an Easton-sized car from a box for the kindergarten drive in movie day. All before we can officially pack away all things crafty for the summer. Should be another fun week.
I'm sure there's a bunch of other stuff that I missed too (like church callings and getting our website up and running and work and converting to a new software system at RMB and all the training that goes with that), yada, yada, yada...But this post is already crazy long and I have long since passed my small window of blogging opportunity. Gotta run. Hope to post the pics that go along with all of this stuff soon. Life is good. The Browns are good. Getting excited for summer vacations and camps and friends and time in the pool.
