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I am such a horrible horrible blogger now! Life is busy and computer is super super slow now because I have a program on my computer that takes up alot of memory. Brandon's laptop crashed so I have to rely on our desktop. I'm debating on whether or not I should continue blogging because I haven't done it in such a long time so we shall see.
Christmas has come and gone and it was a good Christmas. The kids were sooo excited to see what Santa brought them and no complaining. Honestly, my kids are soo good about not complaining on what they didn't get or a gift that they didn't like. Jazmin decided to wake up at 1 a.m. on Christmas morning that we told her to go back to bed. Brandon and I had just gone to bed about midnight so I was not about ready to get up at 1 a.m. The kids got up a little after 6 and off we were down the stairs. It was fun to be able to see Brock's reaction this year since he's a little older and knows what is going on. He was soo excited to see that Santa brought him a 4 wheeler (a remote control). I swear he saw that and he was done. He had no interest in opening the other gifts. The girls were happy with what they got and that was good. After we hurried and picked up and showered and packed and off to grandma's house we went. Brandon's family had a party planned at 10 10:30 so I asked Brandon if we could stop at my parent's house first to open gifts our gifts that we got from there before my family showed up for the Christmas party on my mom's side of the family. I know 2 family Christmas party back to back. We stopped and opened our gifts and then I stuffed my face with my mom's delicious tamales that she makes every Christmas. They were sooo good. That's one thing that I look forward to during Christmas time are my mom's tamales. I am vowing to learn to make those bad boys this year too and then sell them in the Walmart parking lot-kidding. It was a fun day and boy did I eat. By the end of the night I seriously thought I was going to throw up and not because I was getting my groove on, on my brother's kinect game dance central, but because I ate wayyy too much. It was fun though. I love going to my family's parties because good food and it's fun to hang out with my cousins. Sure they are a lot younger than I am, and I mean a lot like teenagers but it's fun to talk to them.
The kids got to spend a couple of days with their grandparents so that meant a couple of days of peace and quiet. I actually was bored though. The first day I didn't know what to do because it was soo quiet and I wasn't yelling at the kids to stop fighting. I do miss those little kiddos of mine and I am very very grateful that I have the opportunity to be a stay at home mom. I am soo excited to get them on New Year's Eve and take them sledding. My parents took them and Brock loved it. It's going to be fun to be able to see his face in person going down the hill.
2010 is almost gone and I can't wait for 2011. 2010  was a huge trial for us and we will never ever forget our trial that we have gone through. At times it totally sucked but it has helped us see what is truly important and how much we take little things for granted. I am ready to put this year in the past and welcome 2011 with open arms. Happy New Year's everyone!

Busy Busy Busy

Yes it's been a long time since I've last posted anything so here I am posting a little quickie recap of what's been going on the last couple of months.

November- Jazmin turned 8 on November 13th and we headed up north for the family party. She got lots and lots of clothes from all of her aunts and we had a blast partying with family. I did my annual Black Friday shopping and it was just crazy as always. Although, this year was different because Walmart decided to start at midnight but anything electronics started at 5 a.m. I didn't need a new t.v. or camera or laptop so my shopping was going to start at midnight. So I took my pregnant cousin with me to the Brigham Walmart and walked around the store to find the item I wanted. I was going for the Wii Band Hero for my kids because they love love playing band hero, and for $75 it was a steal of a deal. I found where it was at drove my cousin back to my parent's house and went back to Walmart at 8:30 p.m. to stand by my item. I know a little crazy but I know how people get when it comes to Black Friday and I wanted to make sure that I was the first person by band hero so I would have first dibs on it. I got band hero and some other things and waited in line for what seemed like 4 hours to check out. I didn't get out of Walmart until 2:00 a.m. needless to say I was really exhausted since I woke up Thanksgiving morning to go running at 7:30 a.m. in -3 weather. I know a little crazy but I figured it would be a good idea because I knew I would probably be eating a lot of food, which I really didn't grrr. On Saturday my friend and I signed up for the Ogden 5k Santa run and it was fun. We got santa suits with our registration packets and let me tell you they were pieces of hud. As my friend said they were some good quality crap. I am not kidding they bought the cheapest santa suits they could possibly find. I put my pants on and they were starting to tear. While running the race there were some people's pants that actually split in half, that's how cheap those suckers where. The weather wasn't that bad the day of race but it was kind of a boring race cause all we did was run up and down the street 3 times and then on the 3rd lap turned a corner to the finish line but it was fun to see 700 people dress up as santa running. I was pretty proud of myself because I finished the race in 24mins32secs my fastest 5k so I am getting up there to be where I want to eventually be someday speed wise in my races that I do.

December-On the first Saturday of December Jazmin was baptized. I couldn't believe my baby was getting baptized. I couldn't believe that 8 yrs ago we were blessing her and now she was getting baptized. We are soo proud of her and the beautiful girl she is becoming. Yes, she does have her moments and I want to beat her but I love her none the less. She looked beautiful in her dress and I made some cute announcements for family and friends that I will have to post later cause I am typing this post at my parent's house. It was a busy but good day that day. Mariah had her 1st grade Christmas program the following week and it was cute. I love it when the kids get to do their little programs and we as parents get to see them perform. Brock has finally stayed in nursery and I couldn't be happier. He loves it and gives me kisses and tells me bye. What a cute little kid I have. We are fastly approaching Christmas and I can say that I am excited. I am excited that they kids have 2 weeks off and we get to hang out for 2 weeks. Normally I get annoyed when they have time off of school only because I have to deal with the non stop fighting but I think this will be fun. I've got a couple of things that we can do so it should be fun. Right now we are up at my parent's house for a couple of days and then we will be back up for Christmas and Brandon has a couple of days off at work. I am looking forward to Christmas and I can't wait to see my kiddo's faces when they open their presents on Christmas day.

I've tried to recap what's been going on and I will post pictures up once I get back to my house. Merry Christmas everyone!

I saw him!

I saw him, I saw Cody Brown! You know the Cody Brown from the TLC show, Sister Wives. Brandon and I went to lunch at the Olive Garden and as we got up to leave Cody is getting seated. He didn't have any of the wives with him, he actually looked like he was having a lunch meeting. He was in a suit with another guy in a suit but no cameras hahaha.  When he walked in I turned my head to Brandon with this surprised look and we just start to laugh. As we were heading out of the section this waitress lady talked to me and said that he was her table. She didn't seemed pretty pumped that she had to wait on him. She told me that he comes in a lot there. I am thinking that maybe he isn't a good tipper. That is just my guess though, I'm not sure. I have the opportunity to go and take a picture of someone that is REALLY famous and I didn't do anything. That's right, I didn't go up and talk to him, ask for his autograph, or ask for a picture. I remained calm, which actually surprised me a lot. I couldn't tell you why I didn't ask for his picture. Maybe it was because it seemed like he was having an important lunch meeting or something. I am thinking maybe I need to apply at the Olive Garden just so I can be his server. Heheh. I know I am a totally nerd!

Happy 8th Birthday

8 yrs ago today Brandon and I welcomed our first baby girl, Jazmin. I can not believe I have an 8 yr old. Jazmin has been the best daughter I could possibly ask for. Even though she drives me nuts she is such a sweet little girl. She was the best baby ever and she is still the best. I love how she always wants to help out. Happy Birthday Jazmin!

And So It Begins

The cold weather has hit and I'm not too pumped about it. I hate, hate, hate the cold and snow. I hate driving in it, I really hate playing in it, I hate how it can all of a sudden snow in May. Snow and I are not friends what so ever. I seriously think it should only snow on Christmas Day and that's it, but I have to deal with it and right now I am dealing with it. It has been sooo cold this last week and I can just feel  a big snow storm coming really soon. That was one good thing about living in the Philippines was that it never snowed. I can handle the heat and the rain but not snow. Oh well. On a brighter note today the girls and I are going to start decorating the house for Christmas! I love Christmas and we've got a few things planned for the holidays so I can't wait. This year we are going to take the kids on a sleigh ride at Hardware Ranch so that should be fun. I told Brandon we will make sure the kids are all bundled up so they won't be to cold. I think Brock would totally love it because we get to see Elk. We are going to watch Christmas movies all together as a family at least once a week or so. I have a Christmas book that we read a story once a day all the way until Christmas Day. I started that last year and the girls want to do it again this year. I am going to make sure that I keep the Christmas Spirit instead of being all grumpy at the store because there are never ever ever people working at Walmart and you have like 4 people ahead of you. I am going to try to not yell at people in my head because they will not move and are just standing in the middle of the aisle staring at the toys. Ok I may get mad at those two things but I want to make sure that my kids know that Christmas isn't about getting presents it's about family, friends, giving, helping. I want to make sure that my kids know that there are others that are less fortunate and don't get to have Christmas. Hopefully I can teach my kids that and they will understand. Bring on the Christmas music and Christmas decorations.

New Month

Hooray that it's November! Call me a scrooge, but I am soo excited Halloween is done and over with. It was just a busy day that day and I just wasn't feeling all that great. The kids had fun and Brock loved going trick or treating again this year. I would walk with him up to the doors and towards the end of our trick or treating he told me to stay there. He didn't want me to come with him up to the doors anymore. What a little stink bug. He had fun going trick or treating with his sisters and Grandma Pena. It was pretty sad because Brock told his dad he didn't want him going trick or treating with him he wanted Grandma. This kid is already starting not to want us around, sad. I'm glad that November is here and I want to make sure that I will keep the holiday cheer up and not be too grumpy. In a way I just want this year to be over with because of everything that we have gone through. It has been a good learning year and I have learned A LOT this year. This month is going to be busy because of all the birthdays in November but I am going to try to not stress this month and just make it fun. So here's to November and lots of fun!

Halloween Shoot

So I've joined a photography club near where I live and I think it will be fun. I will be able to learn how to use my camera in manual mode and learn about lighting and other photography secrets that I would learn in a photography class offered at the high school through UVU but this is free! I love free things these days. It's a guy and his wife and he takes amazing pictures. Last Saturday we did a Halloween photoshoot in his basement and this is what I got with my camera.

Catch Up

Ok so I'm trying to do a little picture catch up. I finally uploaded pictures to the computer and they go back to the first day of school. I know that's been like 1 1/2 month. I say better late than never though, right.

We went to Temple Square one Sunday. We figured we would go on a beautiful sunny day since we always go in the winter when it's cold.

Brandon turned 30 on October 9th and I thought of doing a little surprise party for him at the last minute. Well not like last minute day of but last minute week of his birthday. I called up my friend, Ericka and asked for her  help in decorating the house while we were at dinner. She did great and Brandon was actually surprise about the whole thing. We didn't have too many people but we had a whole bunch of kids that enjoyed the cake that I got him.

 Apparently Wal-Mart doesn't know how to spell Birthday

So the house was decorated way cute but I took pictures towards the end of the night after the kids took down balloons and stuff. I know that 30 isn't over the hill but I like to give my husband crap for being sooo old!

Finally! Mariah lost her first tooth the day after her dad's birthday. She is in 1st grade and finally lost it. Jazmin lost her first in preschool and was pretty toothless by 1st grade. I was kind of sad when Mariah lost her first tooth because that just means she is growing up and losing her cute little baby teeth. Man they grow up soo fast don't they.

 She wanted her dad to pull her tooth out for her

 It was one little pull and it was out

 Proudly showing her gap in her mouth

Tried out the automatic button on my camera. We were at his parent's house for my sister in law's baby blessing.

Well I've got more pictures that I will put up as soon. Gotta get the kiddos all tuckered in for bed.

Thank You

Dear Biggest Loser
 I would like to express how extremely happy I am that I am finally watching your show. Because of your show my husband has gained motivation that he can to lose weight like the contestants on your show. I am extremely proud of Brandon for sticking to a diet for the past 2 weeks now. He is eating right and is exercising. He has lost weight and I am proud of him. Your show is amazing and I love how it touches people's lives. Thank you for all that you do to help change people's lives.

Family

So I have a cousin named Josh and I haven't seen him in like 15 or so years. So when I found out that he was in town I had to figure a way to go see him. He arrived in Brigham Sunday night and was only staying until Thursday. I wanted to see him so badly and we had just gone up north Saturday and went home that night. Brandon and I were both feeling sick that we stayed home Sunday. I decided I really wanted to see him so I checked the girls out of school on Tuesday afternoon and headed up north. It was kind of a short visit because he had plans to head to Salt Lake with some cousins so I got to visit with him for a couple of hours. It was nice being able to sit and talk to him and for him to meet my kids. It's been a long time and I'm glad that I was able to see him. Oh Josh is on the right side wearing red.

Stalker

Ok for most of you that don't know I am a celebrity freak. If I saw someone famous I would totally freak out. One day I will be able to bump into someone that is famous and get their picture taken with them. That's a goal I have, I know that's pretty sad but I totally dig celebrities. I have no clue why I just do. I haven't yet been up to Sundance Film Festival and I'm pretty sure my husband won't want to go with me. I think for fear that I may embarrass him. I pretty sure he was thankful he wasn't with me when I won backstage passes to the Tim Mcgraw and Faith Hill concert a couple of years ago. I screamed and ran around like a crazed women, but who could blame me I was going to see Tim Mcgraw and Faith Hill up close. Anyways the point about this blog is that there is a new show on t.v. called Sister Wives and it's based on a polygamist family here in Lehi, Utah. When Brandon and I first heard about the show I wasn't going to watch it because who wants to see a show about polygamist, right? Well then I found out that this family lived here in Lehi so I wanted to see where in Lehi the lived. So Brandon and I watched it one Sunday and knew exactly where this family lives. Ever since I've figured out where they lived I've been dying to go and see this house. I have seen this house many of times and I know where it's at but go figure I can't find the place for the life of me. I have the worse since of directions it's not even funny. I even asked a neighbor where it's at since she went to find the house also, and she's taken a couple of her friends. So I think I'm going to have to have Brandon take me to this house. I don't know why I want to. I guess it's the fact that I've seen this family on t.v. and they live not too far from us. I know lame. The show is now over but it's pretty interesting and it's kind of neat to see places that we know or been to on t.v. I guess my life has lead to stalking this family. I need to start running again and I would if it didn't hurt to run. I'm thinking it's time to head into the doctor to see what's going on with it.

Beautiful Girls

I may be a little biased but I think I have the most gorgeous girls in the whole wide world.

 

 I have a neighbor down the street that was looking for models and so I sent her pictures of my girls and she wanted to take their pictures. This is what we got and I ABSOLUTELY love them. Gotta admit I do a good job making these girls, well with the help of Brandon that is. Love my girls.

Farewell

Farewell my good friend, I will surely miss thee. I am starting a diet with Brandon today and I drank my last Dr. Pepper yesterday. Brandon is starting a diet today and to support him I told him I would do it too. I'm not going to lie this may be little hard for me because I love love love my occasionally Dr Pepper and my sweets. The thing that makes this the hardest is that I love to bake scrumptious desserts this time of the year. I told Brandon I will try for 2 weeks to help him get over the hump. I don't know maybe I will not want too many sweets after 2 weeks we will see. I better go cause looking at this picture saddens me. I'm pathetic.

Thirty!

Happy 30th Birthday to my wonderful hubby today. The kids and I made a cake and gave it to him first thing in the morning. The girls were excited to be able to have cake for breakfast, that's because I had to hurry and get the house all cleaned up for tonight. I'm so excited for what's in store for Brandon tonight. I'll post about it later.

Out

Grrr, I am so bummed right now because my knee has been hurting for a week now. I called one of my friends who is an athletic trainer and told her what was going on. She told me what she thought it was and I figure it was the same thing, patella tendinitis or jumper's knee. I had the first year I started running and I just wore a strap and it worked. My friend told me what I should do and to lay off it for 3 days so I didn't run, walk, or ride my bike for 3 days and it still hurts! It hurts to walk sometimes and it really hurts to straighten my leg out. I figured I would try to run on it and that was a HUGE mistake. I had a hard time and I seriously wanted to cry it hurt so bad. I told Brandon I think it's something more than that and I talked to my friend and she thinks it something different now. I may have a piece of cartilage floating around in my knee, which means I may have to get a scope. At least it's not like a serious surgery so I'm ok with that. I just want my knee to feel better so that I can run again. I guess that is what I get for trying to run with good form. This stinks because I was looking forward to running a 1/2 marathon on Halloween and getting all dressed up. I guess I gotta figure out what to do for working out now. This comes at the worst time-holidays.

Rest In Peace

My mom called me this afternoon and told me that my great grandma, who lives in Mexico, passed away last night. I have only seen my great grandma a handful of time and not even that. She lives in Mexico and was very very old. I was pretty excited when I had my kids to let them know that they had a great great grandma that was still alive and it would have been pretty cool to visit her one day. I remember my grandma as a short little old lady that loved loved her great grandkids. I can remember her giving you the biggest hugs and saying something in spanish to us. My mom won't be able to go to the funeral because where my grandma died they really don't have something to put the bodies after they pass away like we do. My mom told me that they give them an injection to somewhat preserve the body. She was just happy that she was able to visit her grandma almost 3 years ago. My great grandma was 90 something years old! Which makes me wonder I may be able to live that long, wow. I hope my great grandma will be able to rest in peace now and enjoy life with no pain.

Fun Saturday

I am super excited for basketball season to be here, why, because we absolutely love watching the Jazz play. I really don't care for football but basketball totally love and it's even better when we get to go to a Jazz game. We've taken the girls to a game and well lets just say we will take them when they are a little bit older. They really didn't appreciate it and they cried because they didn't get anything from the Jazz Bear. Brandon heard that the Jazz were going to do a scrimmage and it was free to the public, which we totally love free things these days, the doors opened at 11:30 a.m. Soo we figured we would take them kids and I didn't tell them where we were going on Saturday. We got there and they had just opened the doors and we were in. I thought that you could go in any portal and sit wherever but nope once a section was full they would open another section. Brandon wanted to sit as close as possible and we got there in perfect timing because the section was getting full and the next section opened. It was a mad race to get to the closest seats to the floor as possible. Brandon was able to get pretty good seats. We were able to sit right by the tunnel where the jazz dancers and jazz bear come out so that was pretty cool. We were able to see the reveal of the floor, because the Jazz have new colors, and we were able to be there while they shot some commercials. It was pretty neat. Brock was a little scared of the Jazz Bear and wanted to go home once he saw him. I only wished that he was not so scared because the Jazz Bear would get little kids and carry them over to the Jazz Players to give them high fives and he would have the players sign things. It was a good fun day and I'm glad that we were able to do something together that we all love, and Brock was starting to warm up to the Jazz Bear. He didn't seem so scared of him at the end. I think that it helped when he was able to see the Jazz Bear ride his Harley out on the floor. Brock loves loves loves motorcycles.

Enjoying some popcorn and churros. Brock wasn't so sure if he wanted to be here.

 Reveling the new floor.

 Shooting a commercial. I didn't take my camera so all of these pictures are from my camera phone so it may seem like we are far away but we weren't too far.

 Daddy and Brock watching the players say their lines for the commercial. Brandon says that him and Brock will be in the commercial we will see though.

Stretching. This was cute to see because the Jazz Bear would grab some kids and have them stretch with the players. This was a fun day and totally loved that it was free. For just being a scrimmage there were 10,000 people in the arena. Way cool. The new Jazz players got a pretty cool welcome to Utah, now lets just hope this will be an awesome season.

Picture Day

So today the girls are getting their picture taken for school. How I dread this day for the fact that I have to do their hair cute and I'm not very good at doing their hair. It seriously takes me forever to do their hair so I only do 1 cute hair do and put the other in a pony tail. So being picture day today the girls got up at 6 a.m. so that I can do their hair and not rush to get to school.  I have to admit that their hair turned out cute. Here's a peek

Mariah's hair is full of curls and it looked wayyy cute. I was going to put a flower in her hair but I forgot to. Now I just hope that their hair doesn't get messy before they take their pictures. I told them they weren't allowed to run around until they got their pictures done. I know mean but it took me forever to do Jazmin's hair!

Biggest Loser

The show, The Biggest Loser, has been around now for 10 seasons and I've never watched until now. I've always meant to watch the show because a lot of people tell me about it and how these people lose all this weight, but I would just forget when it was on or didn't know the day that it was on. This year I decided to watch because a lady in Eagle Mountain is on the show. Yup Eagle Mountain has another celebrity and her name is Burgandy Keel. I read about her in our little newspaper that we get twice a month and told Brandon that we should watch the show to support her. So last week was the season premiere and I recorded it. Brandon wasn't too pumped that it was a 2 hour show but I think he enjoyed it. So I now have the show recorded every week because I am doing a photography club on Tuesday nights and I don't want to miss out on the show. I got back late from the club and I watched The Biggest Loser at 11 p.m. I know late but I wanted to see when the contestants start working out and how the show works since I've never seen it before. I saw Bob and Jillian freakin work these guys like there was no tomorrow. I told Brandon that they were in boot camp hell. I couldn't believe what they had to do and the majority of them haven't worked out a day in their life or it's been years. When it was time for them to weigh in I couldn't believe how much weight some lost in 2 weeks! I'm happy to say that Burgandy made it another week so it will be exciting to see her next week to see how she does.  I ended up going to bed at 12:30 a.m because I wanted to finish the show and I did. Brandon fell asleep so I had to tell him what happened. So now I may need a nap because I had to get up early to help Mariah's class this morning.

Random Pictures

I FINALLY got the pictures off of our video camera and thought I would share some pictures.

This is a restaurant we ate at in the Philippines.

Brock fishing up in American Fork Canyon

Watching daddy fishing

Mariah being cold. She didn't want to join the fun in fishing.

Brock and Grandpa

 Brock playing with his uncle's football helmet. He wouldn't let us take this helmet off it was pretty funny.

Mommy and Brock at his first high school football game. Box Elder High School

Daddy and Brock

We decided to go camping over Labor day and this is the night shot that I took with the video camera.