Ben's 13!

This awesome guy turned 13! It was probably a lousy way to spend his birthday with his eyes half way shut still from surgery. Originally, the surgery was scheduled for the week before, but he didn't want to miss his school's Valentine's dance. So, it is what it is.

He was home from school, so I guess that's always good. Unfortunately, Emily was at a winter guard festival in Phoenix, so she didn't celebrate with us.

But, we went to Culvers for dinner. Ben loves their burgers.

Then, he opened cards and presents.

The pets wanted in on the action.

Kind of as a joke, I got him this game called Pimple Pete. We love watching Doctor Pimple Popper on TV. So, you put water in Pete's nose and pull out the pimples and if you move him too much, the water shoots in your face. It's gross and fun all at the same time.

Ben got squirted.

I made him a yellow bundt cake with chocolate frosting.

It was a pretty uneventful 13th birthday. But, we have plans to go to Vegas when it warms up. That's the new tradition. You get 2 nights in Vegas for your 13th birthday. Sounds good to me!

Another Eye Surgery

Ben had to get another eye surgery last week. He had surgery on his bad eye when he was 5 because it was turning in, and things were good for 8 years. Now, that his body is changing so much, it started wandering out. Basically, his brain isn't very good at controlling his eyes together.

The doctor wanted to do surgery on both eyes to try to reset the brain to move them at the same time. So, that's what we did.

We headed down to Phoenix last Tuesday at 4:00 in the morning.

 

They wanted to do an IV as it's easier to put him to sleep that way instead of laughing gas. They say he's too big for that method now. But, Ben handled it like a champ.

Funny thing was we saw another doctor there and I realized it was the one who did surgery on Ben's hernia when he was like 3.

The doctor put marks on his forehead to make sure they operate on the correct eye. But, they were doing both, so hard to mess up.

The waiting room is so nice. He gets assigned a number and you can watch and see where he's at. The whole thing was maybe 20 minutes.

Then, we got to see him in recovery.

Poor guy.

 

Luckily, he didn't vomit after like last time. A few days later, his white parts of his eyes were super red. He took 4 days off of school to recover. Luckily, it was on the cusp of a 3 day weekend. He's pretty much all back to normal, but his eyes are still red. We had a follow up appointment yesterday and the doctor was thrilled with how everything looked. 

Around Our House

I know I've been majorly slacking on the blog. I'll get caught up today and explain why we've been so busy.

Noah got Honor Roll and almost had straight A's. He also got Perfect Attendance and Student of the Quarter!  He's been working so hard and is doing so well in school.

Ben got Principal's List, which is all A's. 

Ben also got inducted to National Junior Honor Society last night. He had no clue what it was, so I told him it's a group for smart kids to be leaders in their school and community. He was game.

Emily got her first C. I think high school was a come to Jesus for her. She really skated by for the past 9 years with every little effort. Then, she got to high school. Color guard added 20-40 hours to her weekly activities and I think she was underestimated how hard the classes would be. She's back on track, but she had a hard time making up for the not so great first quarter. So, she ended up with mostly B's and a C. It is what it is. She's putting in the work now, and hopefully will have no C's this next semester. Not that a C is bad, we just know she can do better, and she expects more of herself. She really beat herself up about it. It's not a bad grade. Some people are thrilled with C's. But she's capable of better. But, there's more to life than just getting A's. She's learning hard work, dedication, team work and so much more in guard.

In other news, I wanted so badly for her to meet great friends in high school and be a part of group and find her people, and she's done just that in guard. She has so many great friends. This is her friend Delilah and she comes to our house a couple times a week and I take them to practice. I love to see my girl happy and enjoying her high school years. In the end, a C won't matter. These friendships and memories will. They had to wear black lipstick. That's not Emily's typical color of choice. Actually, she doesn't wear make up except a little mascara.

And guess what? We bought another home! It's not for us though. We've been working on getting Gwynne and Enrique out here for years. They finally decided it was time. We thought they'd buy a house. But, Gwynne said they really just want to rent one or an apartment. Rent here is crazy expensive. An apartment is $1500, a house is about $1800 or more for a small one! Then, we thought, why should they pay off someone else's real estate investment. We can buy a second home. Basically, we don't charge them anything more than what covers the mortgage payment, they get rent for cheaper, we have an investment property and everyone wins. 

So, I have been on a mission the last month to find them something that will work. We finally went with a new build home about 8 minutes from us. It'll be perfect for them, and they have about 6 months to get their affairs in order and get out here. It's super exciting. I'm so glad that they will be close by and we can see them often and help when they need it. It's a cute 3 bedroom, 2 bath house.

Here are a few pics of the model.

We picked out the lot and they already started building. These were taken a week apart.

The power lines will come down. They put them up just for another builder that is going in behind us, but we should still have a pretty view of the mountain.

And you can see Glassford Hill too from the backyard.

We took the kids by to see the model and they were so excited. They were ready to move in. We don't know what the future holds, and we hope Gwynne and Enrique have many happy years in this house. And after who knows? We may move in there and downsize. One of the kids could move in there with a roommate. We could rent it to someone else. We have options. I'm just glad Gwynne and Enrqiue will have a stable place to live without the threat of a landlord deciding to sell and forcing them to move, etc. It really is great for everyone.

Oh and we went on our favorite hike last weekend. The weather here is beautiful and we took advantage of it to soak up some sunshine. I'm glad the kids enjoy our outdoor family time.

This is our favorite hiking spot and we were half way through and I stopped for a second and looked over and saw this door and hole in another hill. I don't know how we've never seen it or what it's for, but it was pretty cool. I think we are normally going downhill and our eyes are down.

Between buying a house and dealing with financing, the kids school and after school activities and planning a trip to Maui and our summer vacation, I've been beyond busy. I don't know where all my time goes, but it's always gone in a flash. 

Cuddle Time and New Years

When we first brought Prim home. She hated Rio and hated Rocko even more. She hissed at both of them. Her and Rio became friendly in a few weeks. It took her a few months to start to like Rocko.  

We were all surprised to see Prim cuddle up to Rocko while he was sleeping.

Then, Rocko woke up and he looked confused, like what is this fluff ball doing in my bed?

They are sweet. They cuddle almost every night now.

Then, we hosted a New Years Eve party. It was totally last minute. Emily begged us, so we just had our 2 family friends over.  Rio was happy about it.

We always work on a puzzle. This one was a beast. I was still working on it the next day.

The guys watched a movie.

The kids played games.

And we  made it to midnight!

It was a fun night and I'm glad we got to spend it with good friends.

Snow....Finally!

We finally got some snow. At first we thought it was just going to be a little bit, but the kids were excited.

But, then it snowed and snowed and snowed. 

Emily got out and played for a bit.

This was Prim's first time seeing snow.  She kind of liked it, but then ran inside and licked her paws like they were covered in acid.

David left work about noon and roads were closed, so he had to detour around and got stuck on a hill. Luckily, our friends came with their 4 wheel drive and gave him a ride. They went back later and got his car.  He snowed 6-8 inches. 

The boys were excited to have a snowball fight.

David shoveled the drive.

The boys wanted to run around in bare feet.

The snow stayed around for way longer than normal. David and I continued with our walks which were pretty.

They say we are going to have a cold and wet winter, so this may be the beginning of it.