Little swimmers

Went to Andrea and JPs for a cookoff between JP and Bobby's brother Mikey the other day - before the cookoff started, we swam for a bit. It was Hailey's (Andrea's 9-month-old baby girl) first time in the pool! (by the way - I think the boys tied, with JPs great chicken, and Mikey's wonderful pork loin. Good job, master grillers. Yes, Bobby, Andrea, Ashly, Tyler and I were just the judges.)

Sid is thrown across the pool by the strong boys












Sid - airborne.












Happy Hailey













Ashly and Jack













Alyssa

My grandpa's wheels

Driving toward my parents' house the other day, I saw a familiar site - my dad, driving my grandpa's (his dad's) Mercedes. To me, it's "Grandpa's funny car," as my sister Cherie and I used to call it. Wow did that bring back memories. I stopped my dad and OF COURSE had to take a picture. I believe the Mercedes is a 1956, and honestly the model and year mean nothing to me - what means the world to me are my memories of riding in this beautiful machine with my grandpa, watching him shift gears, touching all the neat looking things inside, waving to everyone because I knew I was in a cool car, the wind in my hair, begging him to go faster, and wishing I grew up in the 50s. My dad, in the photo, is on his way to get the car a nice little tune up so my grandpa can drive it to his high school reunion, how cool is that?

Mother's Day at the beach

Mother's Day @ Huntington Beach - couldn't have asked for nicer weather or company.

Stephen, Andrew, Alyssa and Sidney.













Does this look like a grandma to you?

















Mikey













Jack

















This is how I roll - Jack and Hannah in the back













Jack and me - that water was tooooo cold for us.

















Sidney, in the freezing cold water - her element.

















Alyssa and her cousin Andrew are two peas in a pod - always together.

















Ashly, Andrea, Hailey, Jessica













Tyler shows Jack how to ride.

















This is how Bobby rolls - on MY ride. He might be a bit big for my bike, but I think the kids like it better when crazy daddy drags them around.













It just wouldn't be a trip to the beach without sunburns, a crier, and one that conks out on the way home....

Our photo and videos were on TV!!!

I know, I know - we are so lame. To be excited over this is sorta funny, but I have to admit, it was fun to see!
Yesterday Bobby's mom came to watch the kids so we could go out shopping together and have lunch. It was great. Until on the way back, from out of nowhere, there was traffic on the I-10 near our house, just a few miles away. Traffic came almost to a stop, the rain was coming down lightly and the temp was in the 60s. Two minutes later we were commenting on the hail. Two minutes later, traveling at only 2 to 5 mph, we were being pounded by hail and sleet, temp went down to high 30s, and it started to stick! Now, every year we've lived here in Beaumont it has snowed - IN THE WINTER! We just broke records with our heat this past weekend, and now snow, on the freeway, two miles from our house???
We were in Bobby's truck (NOT A 4x4, like most other cars around us) with street tires with LITTLE tread. Now we're mountain kids - snow doesn't scare us...ON THE MOUNTAIN. But on the freeway? With cars on either side of you, and SEMI trucks? What? Now THAT is foreign to us, especially in a non- 4x4 vehicle! So I started to take video with my cell phone (hence the poor footage) to show grandma when we got back home. For about a two mile stretch (which lasted more than 30 minutes in the car) we were in about 6 inches of snow/sleet whatever you want to call it. When I showed Mary, she urged me to send it to the news stations, so I sent it to CBS and KCAL, and then ABC Eyewitness News. During the 6 p.m. news on Kcal a guy named Josh Rubenstein (weather guy) used our photo. Then I got a text message from the exec. producer of CBS2 and he told us to watch the first ten minutes of the Kcal9 news at 10 - our video was on there, but they said we were from beaumont and the video was in baldwin hills! Oops. I texted him back, and at 11 p.m. on CBS2 it was corrected. Here's a shot of our photo on Kcal last night, and it later played as a video on the CBS2 news and Kcal9 news. I have to admit, we DID jump around and high-5 a bit. I can't lie.

sophie goes to prom

My little sister Sophie had her prom last weekend.

God Bless the USA

Sidney just learned to sing this song - so cute.

Ashly and Mikey's engagement party