First high school gymnastics meet against Homestead!

This past Tuesday was my first high school gymnastics meet as a head coach! I've always been the gymnast competing, so it was a completely different experience being the coach this time around. To say I was nervous would be an understatement. I didn't have an appetite for a week before the meet. One of my friends whom was also a gymnast in high school told me I'd be more nervous as a coach than when I was competing. I didn't believe her ...until now. I'm so invested in these girls and want each of them to succeed so badly, that I get so nervous for them!

Of course, being my first meet and my bad luck, things were a little rough that night. During warm-ups one of the links on the bar cables broke off and the bars almost collasped! No one was hurt, thank goodness and we eventually got them fixed, but when that happened I just wanted to run and hide. :) Then, right before floor one of my gymnasts sprained her ankle and had to scratch that event. She should be back for Tuesday's meet. Lastly, as I was going to announce scores, I realized the score table didn't get the all-around scores correct, so the Homestead coaches recalcuated that for me. LOL It was after 10pm, by the time I got home.

All in all, the girls did a great job for their first meet! We scored a 94.9! We didn't win, but it was still a great night for the team. It's been a rollercoaster of a ride so far, but I'm having a great time and I got lucky having such a great group of girls!!!

Merry Christmas!

The stockings

All their loot

The Before

We had great first Christmas in our new house! Santa got Jayden and Talan a Playstation 3 to share. While Kylen got a John Deer tractor power wheels from Santa. That was only the tip of the iceburg for the kids as they continued to get spoiled by us and grandparents on both sides. I really wish my kids could understand just how lucky and fortunate they are. It was a wonderful Christmas and we're all looking forward to see what the new year brings to our family!

A Christmas tree adventure

Kylen working hardJayden and Talan
The tree we spent hours trying to find

I realize I'm posting this late, but better late than never, I guess. The last couple of years we've been putting up our artificial Christmas tree, much to Jarrad's dismay, because we haven't wanted Ky to mess with the needles and such. So, this year Jarrad was pretty adamant on getting a real one. So, the second Sat. in December we head out to get a tree. We thought we'd just head out to Lowe's and pick one up get home and decorate it and we'd be done around noon. Boy, were we ever wrong! Long story short, there were NO Christmas trees in Warsaw at all!! Jarrad was so mad because we had been driving around Warsaw for almost an hour and we were still without a tree. The kids were crying because we wanted a tree and there were none to be found. I mean really, who would think you couldn't get a tree the second week of December.

We eventually headed up to Goshen because we saw there was a Christmas tree farm up there. As our luck would have it, we pulled into the tree farm only to see a sign that said closed for the season! I started laughing at this point because what else can you do.

We drove a little further into Goshen and finally saw a sign advertising Christmas trees. And, after about 2 1/2 hours of driving we finally found a tree place that had beautiful trees extremely cheap! We picked out our awesome tree and paid $25 and were finally on our way home!! Jarrad and the kids were finally happy and I was grateful to be done tree shopping with four unhappy people in the car. The best part was after we got the tree on top of the car and were about 10 minutes from home, it started to rain. That meant letting it dry in our garage for a couple of hours before we could even decorate it. This is exactly why I like putting up the fake tree!

I'm officially one of those Mom's now...

You know the ones that drive with those hideous bumper stickers that I've made fun of since I can remember. Yet, since I've officially "joined" that group I can't help but be proud. Jayden came home so excited that he was Citizen of the Month at his school! He came home with a large car magnet and a regular bumper sticker that says, "My Child Was Citizen of the Month at Washington Elementary." He also got his picture taken for their school newspaper. He was so proud of himself as was I, but then he asked the question I was dreading. "Are you going to put the magnet on your car now, mom?" No matter how proud I am of Jayden, I will never put one of those on my car! So, in order not to hurt his feelings I just told him that I think Daddy would be jealous if it I was on my car and not his, so we better put it on Daddy's Mustang instead. :)

End result...both the bumper sticker and magnet are on the fridge. I am so proud of Jayden, he's such a good kid. Way to go buddy!