Happy Birthday Buffy and Peter! We hope you both have a great time celebrating!!! We are having a great time here. I am so impressed with everyone and the running challenge, you are all awesome!! I am so inspired! As for the relay I think it sounds fantastic and I would love to do it. I can't see the future but I would think that since we are moving in June it would be a nice idea to plan to come back in August of 09 for a visit, we will have been away for over a year and will be surely missing you all. Plus, Alyssa will be just turning two so I shouldn't be pregnant yet. I make no guarantees for August of 2010. Is the race before school starts? I don't know what Tom will say since he is the stoic who says we aren't coming back until we move back but I am still optimistic since I haven't made that long flight yet! Anyway, those are my thoughts on the subject!

So let’s see, what have we been up to for the past week or so... last week Alyssa had croup and Danica had a bad cold so we didn’t do a whole lot. It was wet and rainy most of the week which cancelled Tom’s softball game and Hayden’s t-ball practice. On Saturday the sun was out and Hayden had a birthday party for a friend at preschool. I came up with the plan to drop Hayden at the party and to then for Tom and I to go to Miramar Lake and run around the lake with the girls in the jogging stroller. So we jumped in the car a few minutes before the party was starting and I punched the address in the nav system and it came up saying the party was 25 minutes away!! What are they doing driving so far for preschool!!!!!???? Well, we had no choice but to race to the party, Hayden had his heart set on it. We were hoping that maybe we would find a nice place to run near the party since it was too far to drive back to the lake. Unfortunately the party was up in the hills of Escondido with such huge inclines it would be miserable, especially with the stroller! But to make things worse as we pulled up to the house there were a ton of cars and I came to the quick realization that they didn’t intend on having us drop Hayden off... we hadn’t showered and were in our running clothes. I threw on my jacket and tried to forget my current state as we headed into the party to mingle with all the other preschool moms... Tom was thrilled to be in on all the fun, he loves to mingle with preschool moms.

Well, we did manage to salvage our Saturday, when we got home Tom went running around the lake and we got the house cleaned up. Saturday night we went bowling and had a great time, it was boys against girls and everyone did really well. They had one of those metal frames you could just push the ball off, it was perfect! Alyssa enjoyed all the commotion and Danica and Hayden were cheering for each other, it was great.

On Monday I had Hayden’s parent-teacher conference at the preschool and as I expected they gave a great report. He scored well in every area except scissor cutting and skipping (don’t you wish that is still what you were tested on!) He is very social and she said he never interrupts during group time and is good at helping other kids resolve conflict (was she talking about my Hayden?) His favorite activities are blocks and building materials and the playground. She said “Hayden is very sweet, bright and soft spoken. He has an easy going personality and likes to avoid conflicts and is level headed. He enjoys spending time with friends and shows an interest in learning new things.” So that is Hayden at school. Here are few things that I have observed lately:
He is very concerned with keeping Danica safe. If he is aware that she may be in danger he panics! He gets so frustrated with her if she won’t hold my hand in the road or if she gets to close to the treadmill, etc.
In the bath tub Danica was pouring water on his head so he shouted at her, but he didn’t shout “stop” he said “Danica, I don’t have invisible goggles on my head!!” Too bad she didn’t realize that!! He regularly has funny dreams he tells me about in the morning, I’ll have to start writing them down!

Danica has found a new love, she can’t get enough of Finding Nemo! She calls is “Emo” and asks for it all day, from the minute she wakes up. In fact, if she is the first one awake in the morning, which she usually is, I can pull her into bed with me, turn on Nemo and go back to sleep until someone else wakes up, it’s fantastic! Recently she has been willing to branch out and is now watching The Little Mermaid as well. It’s so funny to watch her because she laughs and laughs during the shark chase at the beginning. Finally watching movies with words, verses Baby Einstein, is helping her vocabulary as well and she is saying new stuff all the time.

Alyssa is great at sitting up and loves her baby food. She loves to smile and giggle and reminds me a lot of Hayden with her sense of humor. When the other kids act silly she will just start laughing, it’s hilarious. She is as bald as can be which seems to be the trend with my babies. Right now she looks so much like Hayden at this age! She loves the swings at the park. And (knock on wood) she is starting to sleep better at night... just in time for us to go out of town again... oh well... who needs sleep?

I think I got side tracked, I was talking about what we did on Monday. Monday night we went to our home teachers house for FHE. Our home teacher happens to be the wife of my good friend Victoria and the dad of Hayden’s best friend Cameron so he was in heaven. On Tuesday we went to the Wild Animal Park. Lately Hayden has been bored at the zoo and just begs to go home so I was nervous but we had a really fun day. We rode on the Safari tram, played at the playground and saw some animals. As we were walking out Hayden said sweetly, “I had a really great day here today.” Phew! Danica loved all the animals and could even name them for me.

Wednesday I had a girl come to my house to color my hair, I got it weaved with blond. It’s nice to be “blond” again, it’s just more me than the dark color. I’ve started a new thing where I run with the jogging stroller when Hayden is at school. I did 5 miles on Monday and Wednesday! I’m hoping to go run alone today when Tom gets home. It’s gorgeous this week so I can’t pass up going outside. It was 81 degrees at the Wild Animal Park!! This morning I babysat for a friend then we went to the park and Hayden went on a play date, his favorite activity!! Now the girls are sleeping and Hayden is watching the Backyardigans, he’s in love with that show again.

Okay, this is way too long... take care!