I have been the worst blogger ever this year. In an attempt to maybe redeem myself a little, I’ve put together a “year in review” post for 2011… Enjoy!!

January

• Livie turned 5 and had a “Tangled” party

• I went back to school after a 10 year hiatus… being a mom. I took 13 hours at Texas Woman’s University- majoring in Family Studies.

February

• Seiuli was awarded OFFICER OF THE YEAR at his PD for 2010.
  

  He's mine.

  March

• Seiuli was in a major accident at work when he was t-boned by an unobservant driver. He was off work for 6 weeks…
  

  Wrapped around a pole

  

  He's alive!!

• Isabel’s basketball (coached by my dad) won 1st place for the season!! Isabel led her team in steals, points and assists.
  

  Winning!

  April

• Tristan turned 16 and got his driving permit…
  

  Driving on the road... gulp

• Isabel turned 12 and had a “Photo Scavenger Hunt” Party! So much fun!!
  

  Take a pic of entire group at a STOP sign

• Our family formed a team for the “WALK LIKE MADD” fundraiser. We earned over $1000 in honor of Kandi and Autumn, a mom and daughter killed by a drunk driver on Easter weekend 2010. Seiuli was a police officer on the scene and also testified in the murder trial.
  

  Our Walk Like MADD team minus Brad and Larissa...

  May

• I got my CHL (concealed handgun license) and a new Ruger LC9 mm. I named my gun “JET” after Jason Terry because it’s black and can shoot.
  

  JET

• The semester ended and I made straight As!!

• Tristan was in and out of the ER for over a week. The doctors finally decided he was fighting a virus. He eventually got completely better, but it was scary at the time.
  

  ER visit #2

• My Mavs WON THE NBA CHAMPIONSHIP!!!!! They swept the Lakers and killed the Heat!
  

  Dirk- MVP

  June

• I went to Houston with Nancy and Stacy to see NEW KIDS ON THE BLOCK and BACKSTREET BOYS in concert!! It was so so so much fun!!!
  

  Well, hello Donnie...

• My siblings and I managed to plan and throw my parents a surprise 40th anniversary party! It went awesomely and they were so grateful.We even had relatives that came from Louisiana.
  

  My parents and the "candy bar."

  July

• We took a family vacation to Destin, Florida and had an amazing time!!
  

  My beautiful family

  August

• School started for the kids and me!!! I took 13 hours again.
• Tristan is a junior in high school.
• Alec is a freshman.
• Isabel is in 7th grade.
• Taj is in 2nd.
• LIV STARTED KINDERGARTEN!! I have NO kids at home during the day!! HUGE MILESTONE!!
  

  My big girl!!

September

• Taj turned 8 and was baptized a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.
  

  8 years old!! Baptism day

• Seiuli and I celebrated our 10th anniversary on Sept. 14. We are planning a trip to Hawaii in June to celebrate.   Sooo excited!! Sooo blessed!!!!

October

• Took Isabel, my sister Ali and her friend, Maddy, to the Taylor Swift concert at Dallas Cowboys Stadium. We had a blast!!!
  

  Taylor Swift, here we come!!!

• Had a great Halloween!!!! I went as Flo from Progressive. Liv was Rapunzel, Taj as Capt. America, Isabel as a dark fairy, Ali as a psych patient, my dad was a “spider man”, my mom Minnie Mouse and Idk wth Sei is… The older boys went out with friends… wearing white masks and dark hoodies.
  

  Trunk or Treat

  November

• Alec turned 15!!! He also made the freshman A-team in basketball. SO PROUD!!!
  

  Go Wildcats!!!

• Isabel made A team for 7th grade!!!!
   
  

  #00

• Tristan played with varsity in the playoffs at Cowboy stadium!!!
  

  They lost But doesn't he look cute???

• Me, Taj and Livie went to Kansas with my parents and Ali to spend Thanksgiving with my sister’s family. Sei had to work so he stayed behind and the 3 oldest were at the ex’s house…
• Taj started pre-team gymnastics and is doing great!!

December

• Finished the semester with 4 As and a B. My Earth Science class was ridiculously hard so I was thrilled with the B!
• Tristan got his drivers license. We had to wait until after football so he had time to go take the test. He did great!!
  
• Loving being a psycho sports spectator at my kiddos games!! We have 2-4 games a week!
  
• Seiuli has Christmas Eve and Christmas Day off for the 1st time in 3 years. YAY!!

I am soooo looking forward to 2012! How was your 2011??

 

We had the opportunity to go to Florida with my family. My parents and little sister went as well as my older sister and her family. We stayed in a time share condo– each family had their own. It was SO nice. We went to Destin again like we did in 2009 and it was absolutely WONDERFUL!!!!  We were a little worried because the weather report for the week said rain and thunderstorms every day. On Saturday and Sunday it was cloudy and rainy. We went to WonderWorks in Panama City Beach which was super cool, to stay out of the rain one day. Then the weather cleared up and was absolutely beautiful the rest of the week. So, the other days we basically hung out on the beautiful white sand beach, body surfing, skim boarding, tanning, feeding sea gulls, eating PB&J sandwiches, building sandcastles, collecting sand dollars, FUN…!!!! Seiuli has been working so much so it was nice he was able to take that time off, hang out with the kids and just chill. I think family vacations, even if they aren’t all the way to Florida, are so important.

Here’s a few pics. If you’re my friend on Facebook you’ve already seen a lot more than these!

 

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We hiked the Y Trail.  We lived in Utah 7 years and never hiked it because I am scared of mountain lions. Well, Sei brought his duty weapon with him, so he could save us if necessary. It was a steep hike and Sei had to carry Livie quite a bit of the way. But we made it!!!

I also got to have dinner with friends!! Klin, Suzanne, Mikelene, and Gina all met me for dinner in Provo. Thanks Suzanne for taking the time to set that up!! It was so great to see them. It was my first time to meet Mikelene, so that was extra special!! Yep- I met all those awesome ladies online. So awesome.

The boys got to hang with their old neighborhood friends. I cried. Several times. Seeing them all together again and watching how they just picked up where they left off just made me happy and sad at the same time. I love that group of boys. They are all good kids. They used to hang out at our house. We carpooled. They went to church together. They are such a cool group of kids. And now I’m crying again. Boo.

Then came the long trip home… 1400 miles and 20 hours can make you go  a little mad…

It was a super great family vacay. We missed having Kelsea and Karlea with us, but we had a good time. Thank you to my parents who helped with hotels on the way there and back, Sei’s cousins Jasen & Joann for letting us stay with them and Sei’s parents for paying a chunk of our part for the family reunion. Love you all!

I have a lot of catching up to do, but having gone of vacation for 2 weeks to Arizona and Utah… well, I’m just in lazy mode. So, here’s the Reader’s Digest version. I’ll give more details later.:

We went to the Grand Canyon and no one fell it. It sure is beautiful. The kids loved it. We hiked down a little, but figured going too far wouldn’t be smart since most of us had on flip flops…

We had a family reunion in Cedar City, Utah. There was some drama, but I like to stay out of that so I took a nap instead. I hadn’t seen my inlaws in over 2 years. It was good to see them again. We rented out an entire dorm at Southern Utah University. There was over 130 people there. The kids were in heaven staying up late with cousins. It was awesome.

We got to see and stay with our besties, Julio and Heidi.  We rode wave runners at the lake- which was an adventure in itself… That was my 1st time to drive a wave runner. I also learned what happens when a knee boarding rope gets sucked into it… Oops.

Stay tuned for part 2!!

I finally got around to making a montage of all the family skimboarding. However I was disappointed to find that a lot of the video I took apparently didn’t get uploaded to the computer. I thought I got everything off the card, but it’s not here. And the memory card is now in Canada because we used Karlea’s camera most of the time. Sad when a 10 year old has a better camera than you do…
Anyway… I have no way of getting the other videos. Even if I had them here, with the way Sei’s ex is we’d probably get sued for them and they’d end up in Canada anyway… Yes – I went there.
So… for your viewing pleasure I made a montage with the pics and videos I DID have. I’m sad because I know I had Alec doing his 270 and Sei doing a lot more tricks. I also had Sei and Alec going at the same time and it was so cute.

I never finished my posts about Florida. Basically we  hung at the beach. All week.  BEST.VACAY.EVER. Wait, no… my cruise with Sei was the best ever, but this is the best vacay with the kids.

We got to go out a couple of times sans kiddos for some adult conversation… Here we are at Pompano Joe’s with my parents…

And I still need to make a montage of Alec and Sei skimboaring…  I should have it up by next vacation.

All thru out the week Sei kept calling the hotel in Biloxi to see if they had found Livie’s missing blanket.  Then one  morning, at 6:42 am, Sei’s phone started ringing. It was Jessica from the hotel. She was getting off work at 7 am, but wanted to call to let us know she had FOUND THE BLANKET!! She had searched in the laundry and asked the head housekeeper if she had found an old blanket. The lady said, “No, but I found this…” and held up Livie’s poor, abused, but dearly loved blankie!! Jessica even took it home to wash it. You have to understand that this blanket is IMPORTANT. All thru out the week Livie cried to go home and cried for her “white blankie.” We had bought a replacement pink blanket and it worked for a lil while, but it wasn’t the same…

So, on the Friday we left to head home, top priority was going to the hotel in Biloxi to get Livie’s blanket. She was so happy. And if you look at this pic I look like I’m on drugs. I’ll never tell if I actually was on  drugs or if I was just worn out… It’s funny how on “vacation” you are so tired and worn out. Sei and I didn’t even make out the entire trip. Seriously. I wish I was kidding. 

Anyway… that’s the story. We had a great trip. Livie got her blanket back. We didn’t beat or lose any kids. We made it home safely. It was awesome and I can’t wait for next year when we go to California baby!! (We must be insane.)

Really. They do. Bad. How do I know? Because while in Florida Isabel and Taj found a couple of crab legs. Not crabs- just the legs. So, what’d they do? They stuck them in 2 ziplocks full of water and stuck them in the bedtable drawer at the resort. I’m not sure how long they were in there, but I walked in their bedroom and was nearly knocked out from the smell. OMGosh. Y’all- it was BAD. I searched the room trying to find what was causing the smell. The kids were oblivious… “It doesn’t stink in here…” I finally found the baggies and hurried them out of the resort room. I dumped detergent on the carpet and vacuumed it up. It helped some, but the smell lingered for quite a while. Kids are so weird. What exactly were they gonna do with 2 crab legs?

….So, where was I? Ah, yes… I was at the beach. Everyday. For hours. It was so wonderful. That’s what we did the entire week. The resort was nice with a little village that had a park with swing sets and slides. We did visit the Gulfarium one day which is like a very mini-Sea World. The kids- especially Liv- loved the dolphins and petting the sting rays. We also ate great sea food, but I don’t really like fish, so I got more chicken than anything. We went to this cool restaurant called Fudpuckers. Yeah, say that fast 3 times…  They had alligators in a swamp area right there surrounding the restaurant. Taj pet an alligator and then 6/7 of my kids and 1 sister got to take a pic with an alligator with Kelsea holding the head, Taj holding the belly and Isabel with the tail. It was really neat. Later Taj and Livie fed the alligators with a fishing pole. Most of the alligators were so stuffed they ignored all the dangling meat, but Livie and Taj actually had a biter!! It was really a fun nite at Fudpuckers…

I attempted to skimboard on the beach. Yeah… I suck. I tried though, even after biffin’ it good a few times. And I pulled my groin muscle too. One time I fell so hard that all the kids came swimming towards me “Mom are you ok?!?!” Soooo embarrassing – especially since I wasn’t even hurt. They all thought I hit my head, but I only hit my shoulder blade. Then I noticed the people sitting near us on the beach were being entertained with my falls. Not cool. I should have faked like I was knocked out and floated out to sea…  I didn’t do too badly a few times.

Sei already knew how to skimboard- of course- and was bustin’ 360s. Alec was awesome too. He skimboarded all week with Sei and by the end of vacation could do a 270. I LOVE watching them interact together. They are like twins in the personality department for sure.

And Omar- I already told you on Twitter, but I had to let everyone else know that you were remembered while on vacay. Tristan bought Crocs- and we all know how much Omar LOVES Crocs.  Tristan picked some out and said, “Now I can have Crocs like Omar…” Thanks for setting such a great example Omar by wearing, to use your phrase “The Mullet of Shoes.” (*rolling eyes*)

During all this beach and skimboarding and eating Sei called the hotel Biloxi where Livie left her blanket and spoke to a few different people. Finally a girl named Jessica took an interest and said she’d check with housekeeping and search in the dirty towels… More later… I still need to tell y’all the crab leg story too…

Our vacation to Destin was so great. I really don’t know where to start. We left on Friday to make 9 of the 13 hour drive. Driving with 100 kids wasn’t as bad as I thought it’d be. That’s probably because Livie rode with my parents over 1/2 the time and it was wonderful. We drove thru Louisiana Swamplands which Taj thought was the coolest and we crossed the Mississippi River.  We stopped in Biloxi, Mississippi for the nite. The next morning we visited a memorial park- I can’t remember the name. But it had the USS Alabama Battleship, Air Force helicopters and more. The kids LOVED it!!

After checking out all the cool stuff we headed on. We stopped in Crestview or some other town that starts with a “C” to eat and that’s when it happened… Livie asked for her blanket. I knew at the hotel she had insisted on carrying it along with her “Gameboy” (aka V-tech toy.) But I didn’t remember seeing her with it in the car. CRAP. I dug thru the suitcase. Nada.  Looked thru my Yukon, my parent’s van… nada. Livie started to cry. I started to cry. I cried because it had been “her blanket” since she was born. I cried because I had all of my other children’s “fave blankie” from when they were little, but now I had lost Livie’s. She was more attached to this blanket than any of my other kid’s had ever been. I cried because she was sad and now we were going to be in an unfamiliar place and she wouldn’t have her comfort. I sat at the table in Arby’s and tried not to look like a crying dork, but Sei even said, “Babe, everyone’s gonna think we’re fighting…” Sei called the hotel and the desk clerk didn’t see it anywhere.  I cried some more. It was horrible.

But we continued on… and made it to Destin,  Florida. I tried not to think about the blanket at all. We unloaded our stuff- which I must brag… I was able to pack for a family of 9 in ONE big suitcase and a big duffle bag. I pretty much rock. When you know you’re gonna be in swimsuits and have a washer and dryer there’s no need to pack a lot. Anyway… we unloaded at our fancy resort with walk in tubs, changed into our swimsuits and headed to the beach. White sand, clear water… I was able to stop thinking about the blanket for a lil while….

I could soooo be a beach bum. Totally. I’ve always believed this, but it was confirmed this past week. Sei and I took the 7 kiddos to Destin, Florida. My parents and little sister went as well because they have a timeshare and let us use some of their points to get a condo for our family. THANK YOU AGAIN!!!! Our resort was awesome. Our family had 2 bedrooms and a sofabed, a kitchen, 2 bathrooms, washer and dryer… PER.FECT. And the beach… oh, the beach. In Destin it’s white sand and clear water. BEA.U.TI.FUL. I would have posted while I was there, but I didn’t bring my laptop. I will give a ton more details in my next few posts- I took notes on things to blog about. But I will say that I am brown, except for 2 huge places on my back that are peeling. (Yuck.)  And I have a pulled groin muscle from attempting to skimboard. I pretty much suck. I also wanna give a SHOUT OUT to Jessica at the Best Western in Biloxi, Mississippi for going above and beyond in her search for Livie’s lost blanket. That’s a whole post in itself, so stay tuned…