Inspirations, Birds & Easters

Kenni & Sparky both entered the Inspirations contest at their school this year.  Kenni put a ton of thought into her piece.  It was really creative & well-executed.  It was a photography entry which displayed random objects around the neighborhood that she had photographed & arranged on a board based on their color.  Her piece was called “a world of color” or something like that.  Sparky, bless his little heart, decided the night before that he wanted to make something, and threw together a go-cart made out of legos.  I wasn’t sure if legos was a proper medium for a 3-d art entry, but who was I to tell the kid no? 

So, the day of the competition I got a phone call from the lady in charge.  She said “Mrs. Wallace, I’m calling to tell you that your daughter didn’t win a prize.”  I said “um..that’s just fine”. (& wondered, why is she telling me this?????)  Next she said, “It doesn’t make any sense because her entry is clearly the best one here, I’m just trying to figure out why they wouldn’t have awarded her a prize.” She said she felt bad for having to ask me, but did your child take all of the pictures herself?  I answered of course, yes. 

Anyway- her thought was that maybe the judges didn’t believe that she had actually taken the photos because they were so good! I decided that was probably a compliment, I just wasn’t sure.  She told me that she was going to make sure that Kenni got a prize for her work.  I assumed they would add her an honorable mention or something, but the night of the awards they passed out all the prizes, 3rd place, 2nd place, 1st place- no prize for Kenni.  Finally, the last award was for “Grand Prize”- which was awarded to… (drum roll please….) Miss Kenni.  She was absolutely over the moon.  I so appreciate the mom who took the time to notice that she had been overlooked because she really did put so much work into that dang project.

OH, and as for Sparky and his hastily made lego-cart……. he took 3rd place, which shocked us all.  He was grinning EAR to EAR and told me that next year his lego-sculpture was going to be even more amazing! (that cute little turd)

Next up- birds.  This has been an unusual spring here in Mtn. Green.  Cold, really really WET, and full of large, migrating flying creatures.  They are everywhere.  Geese, heron, cranes,- I even saw some pelicans up on silver lake the other day.  PELICANS!  Weird! Last Sunday a few of these huge things flew into our backyard and landed on the hillside.  The kids all sat around watching them for hours.  BTW- what are they???  We call them whooping cranes because they are so dang loud, but I’m not actually certain what their title is.  Anyway- there is ONE fun thing about this cold, miserable spring.  The fowl.

Those things must be at least three feet tall.  They are huge!

 

Ok, next up—Easter! We kept it low-key this year.  Didn’t even go anywhere fun for the kids spring break (which was over Easter weekend).  We did take them to the movies (a rare treat at our house) & out for pizza afterwards.  We also helped Seth’s brother & sister-in-law move into their new house (FINALLY!)  They were so excited to finally be in!

The only pictures I have from the weekend are a few that I forced the kids to pose for so that I have PROOF that I actually did it.  I sewed their Easters outfits like a dang betty crocker or something! (p.s.- it was all Michelle’s fault……. don’t let her talk me into crap like that in the future!)

But, they turned out cute despite my best efforts to ruin them!  Who knows, maybe someday I will actually become the seamstress my mother has always hoped I would.  But its going to take lots, lots, lots more practice. :)

Oh, wait.  I forgot.  There are a few more pictures from the Easter egg hunt at my mom’s house.  Always a classic photo op.

All the cousins!

 

 

By the Way (and this is the last thing I have to say about Easter…..)

You are evil, evil little birds!!!!!!

Dear Melissa……

My sweet friend “M” has a fantastic blog (check it out here) that is always providing a bit of inspiration, a bit of fun, and a bit of self-loathing. :)

You see, she is always fabulous.  And her stuff is always fabulous.

So, the other day when she posted a picture of her kitchen counter at 6:45 a.m. with all the adorable decorations, and everything “just so”….. I had to sigh, because THIS folks is what my counter looked like that day when I arose (which by the way was not at 6:45 a.m.).

You see what I mean??????

One more time, just for the record.  Her counter:

And you remember what mine looked like, right????

Sometimes other people’s fabulousness makes me wanna barf. (And be more fabulous, of course).

But for today, I’m hoping just to get in a shower. :)

(I LOVE YOU “M”, but I just HAD to do that!)

Cruisin

About two years ago I received an e-mail from a friend asking if we would be interested in going on a cruise with a whole bunch of our neighbors & friends?  I figured we had two whole years to plan and save, so why not?  We decided to go for it.  Seth and I had never done anything like this, and we have always wanted to- and to be able to go with so many fun people- that was just icing on the cake!  I can’t believe two years has come and gone- just like that!  The cruise was a 7 day, western caribbean with stops in Haiti, Jamaica, Grand Cayman, and Cozumel.  In all, there were 16 couples, mostly from our neighborhood in our group.  We left on the 6th of March and were actually gone for 9 whole days, so I have to give a HUGE thank you to all who helped with babysitting, but especially to Jeremy & Chris who did the lions share.  We couldn’t have done it without you!

We played, partied, relaxed, acted like children, acted like teenagers, and acted like complete fools! It was the greatest time ever!  Below are some of the many highlights. (Warning- it is a bit of a photo overload, but I just couldn’t help myself!!!)  

Oh, one more thing.  I have to give a shout out to my mom’s blue dress.  I wanted to wear it so bad.  It is really hard to find something that is modest & elegant to wear on a cruise.  Everything I looked at was either too slutty or too casual or just too boring.  Her dress was gorgeous.  The only problem: My mom is a stunning size 4 (at age 61- yes, you can HATE HER).  Me?  Not so much.  Never fear!  I went on an insanely strict, 2-week crash diet (not recommended except in cases of EXTREME emergency, as this clearly was).  I dropped 8 lbs, and my mom was kind enough to alter the dress just slightly to cover the rest.  So voila!  I was quite proud of myself. I stuffed every ounce of my booty in there & lets just say thank goodness formal night was on day 2 of the cruise & not day 7!  Ha!

1st stop- Labadee, Haiti. We spent the day on the beach. Several of us got a good game of beach volleyball going, there were also a brave few who played beach soccer.  Nate took me for a ride on the Dragon Coaster (thanks Nate!).  It was actually really fun!  And of course, my favorite part, just lying around on the beach with a good book, ordering a delicious virgin pina colada from the nice fella walking around takin’ orders!

Next stop: Falmouth, Jamaica.  We braved a harrowing bus ride to go on two really fun adventures: first, tubing down this beautiful river with the whole group.  That was a blast.  We took a time out for some cliff jumping & stopped at a  tourist trap in the middle of NOWHERE.  Next we were on to Dunn’s River Falls which is a GIANT tourist trap, but still really fun & really cool.

Next stop: Grand Cayman.  My favorite one.  The water was so, so beautiful!  We took a catamaran out to a sandbar in the middle of the ocean where we went snorkeling and then over to the stingray cove. That was so, so cool!

Last stop: Cozumel, Mexico.  When we got to Cozumel, we boarded a ferry that took us over to the mainland & docked in Playa Del Carmen.  From there we took a bus up to Tulum, where we were greeted by Helamen, our LDS tour guide.  That was such a great experience.  Seth and I didn’t want to go at first because it was going to be so expensive, but I’m so glad we did.  We learned a ton and it was really neat to see how the archeology and history of the place related to the B.O.M. and its people.

 

 

 

 

And of course there was all the awesome stuff to do on the boat….

Eat.  Need I say more????? Ok, eat and eat and eat and eat…………

Side note: Happy Birthday Tricia!!!!  Trish celebrated her 29th birthday (again) on the first day of our trip. So fun!  I brought her a “birthday queen” hat to wear at dinner.

Play.  (You’re looking at the Royal Caribbean Dodgeball Champions! Wa-hoo!)

Partay all night long.  (BTW- this particular move is dedicated to my sweetie.  We nicknamed it the Seth Wallace fist pump. Yeah Baby!)

More dancin.  Trish led us in some zumba dances.  SO MUCH FUN!

And lets not forget Karaokee. Justin was our rockstar! (And give props  to backup dancer Cade…….)

Shows.  We went to lots and lots of great shows!

Climb the rock wall!!!!

And of course the flow-rider.  Seth was awesome at this.  I was terrible.  I think its safe to say that a few members of our group became insanely obsessed with this sport (Seth included).  They spent all of their spare time practicing & trying to get better at it.

In fact, below is a picture of us all cheering the boys on at the flowrider championships on the last day.  Nate was the only one who made it to the finals.  He did awesome!

I am so sorry.  I know I have issues.  But there are just a few more photos that I had to include.

Again, I am so sorry for the picture overload, but this trip was definitely one of the most fun things I have done in my adult life!  We enjoyed every single minute of it! Hopefully in another 10 years or so we can do it again! (sigh……….)

Grandpa’s Race

I posted awhile back about Seth’s Grandpa Wallace who passed away in October.  He was a huge supporter of the Ogden Trails Network, donating massive amounts of time to building, engineering, and repairing trails.  If you have ever spent any time on the trails in O-town, you know they are some of the best in the world for their beauty, quality, and just overall awesomeness!  Anyway- the Ogden Trails Network, along with the Northern Utah Trail Series wanted to start an annual run in his honor, with the proceeds going towards beautification of the many, many trails that Grandpa helped implement over the years.  When we heard about the race, we knew we had to run it!  Then we heard that it was a 10k trail run on a fairly difficult (mostly UPHILL) course in early April in Utah.  (translation- the weather is most likely NOT going to cooperate!)   Still, we knew we had to represent! So, Seth & I made an effort to get in some kind of decent running shape, we marked our calendars, and we did our best to rally the fam & a few brave friends to come & run with us.

The morning of the race we woke up to about 5 inches of fresh Utah powder.  Yes, this is on April 9th- not the strangest thing, but certainly not the spring April morning we were hoping for! Oooh- I was so tempted to stay in my bed, but after dressing in about 5 too many layers, we headed down to the race.

This is my friend Brooke and I walking from the car to the race start. Yes, as you can see, i was wearing my ski goggles, and my big wooly ski socks because I was so afraid of the cold (and the wet).

However, a miraculous thing happened.  The minute we started running, the snow stopped. And I even want to say the sun nearly peaked through, but that may have been my hallucinations from running straight up Taylor’s canyon. Anyway- it turned out to be a delightful run.  Just delightful! I thoroughly enjoyed it.  Lots of brave Wallace’s showed up and we had such a good time. If you have never participated in a N.U.T.S. run, you have got to put it on your list of things to do.  They do a great job organizing, the shirts are much better than average, and the trails are so much fun! You can see their schedule at www.northernutahtrailseries.com 

(I bet they think I’m so nice for that little plug :)

My brother Marty finishing.  He finished first out of all the people I knew that were there.  (That’s all that counts :)

Seth came in just a few minutes after him, that sucker.  He never even trains!  He’s just good at stuff.  It really makes the rest of us angry.

And there’s me.  I’m going to say not too shabby.  I finished much faster than I thought I would.  It only took me 1 hr. 17 minutes to complete 6 1/2 miles going straight UPHILL in the SNOW!  I think that’s pretty darn good.

Anyway- a great time was had by all.  I’m so glad I participated & so thankful to all the Wallace’s young and old who made it out.  We had a common goal and that was to in some way thank Grandpa for all the work he did on those trails.  We love you Grandpa!  Thank you for making the snow stop, even if it was just for one hour!

WALLACES!  Kim, Brian, Wendy, Wendy’s mom?, Amber, Travis, Jim, Dianna, Travis & Dianna’s girls, Me, Seth and Bob. Oh, and don’t forget my brother Marty.  Not technically a Wallace, but everyone wanted him to be in the photo anyway, since he supported us! (and he’s almost related!)

P.S.- These photos were all stolen from the N.U.T.S. website.  Yet another reason you should run one of their races.  They take your picture, and they don’t make you pay $40.00 for a copy!

P.S.S.- In case you were curious, I didn’t end up needing my goggles.  (And Seth thought I was the biggest nerd ever.)  But I’d rather be safe than sorry!