Vida. Risa. Amor.

The beach is truly the best vacation location for our family. We just spent a week at Puerto Penasco and it was actually hard to leave this time. In October the weather is perfect there and it is just the right time of year for us to be able to get away before all the busy holidays.

I was able to spend a few mornings and afternoons alone just walking down the miles of unclaimed beach. Before this vacation a million different activities and responsibilities had been taking up me and my family's time and it was just such a nice change of pace to be able to take a break from it all and not have a single thing on schedule to have to do. There is something absolutely overwhelming about standing in front of a huge ocean alone with no noise to hear but the waves with the wind on your face and the sand beneath your feet. With nothing to distract my attention, I always seem to have my heart to heart moments with God there. I came home completely refreshed and energized and refocused.

I was also surprised when I noticed that it was very rare if I ever heard my kids complain about anything while we were there. And the best part of the beach is that all the fun stuff was free! (What a difference to Disneyland!) Aydan commented several times throughout each day that this beach was the best vacation ever. He wanted to get up to go jogging early with me one morning to hunt for the biggest shells that I had found a couple miles down the beach. Lanie and I built a super cool sand castle together, and Rylan was fun to follow to find seashells....for hours!! Josie even snuggled up to me a few times when watching a movie together and hung out with us on the beach at night looking up at the stars. It was fun to be able to be one on one with my kids at different times...and then also seeing them all play together too. This vacation has given us all some fun memories. I think one thing I will always remember is the way the sunshine would reflect a similar shade of golden brown in all my kid's eyes. I have Chemo to thank for that too.

Anyone who knows me knows I cannot sit still for long. I decided it was high time to dig out the massive ugly spiky prickly plant in the very front of my yard....and get rid of the lame river of rocks around it. Now moving river rocks really doesn't take a whole lot of brain activity. You can't dig them up so you basically just have to get yourself comfortable on the ground and pick them each up one by one. I don't own a wheel barrel so my boy's John Deer Tractor wagon comes in handy for getting large amounts of the rocks moved....or I just throw them occasionally, whatever works. So after about the 5th load of river rocks that had been relocated, I jumped back after I had moved a rock that must have been a little bug's home. Whatever it was quickly kept hiding under another rock. I was stupidly curious and when I finally was able to get a closer look, I noticed it was a lizard the size of my thumb with a black and white tail. I tried to mind my own business and give it some space but it just didn't get far enough away from me so when I went to move a rock too quickly I think I smashed it's little tiny head. I felt so mean and clumsy and hoped to the state of Arizona that it wasn't a gila monster since they're a protected species out here. I respectfully took it's picture and since it was permanently still clinging to the rock I just moved it to a quiet place in the front yard. That was the exciting landscaping adventure of my morning, and it wasn't until later that afternoon that I realized I was going to need better tools to get the plant out of my yard besides just my shovel. I had been hacking and hacking and hacking away at it for a few hours with no success, so I knew it was time to call in a favor. I needed the man with the ax. The rootball expert. My Dad always has the perfect tool for these things. I'm sure I amuse him with my strange obsessions to finish a project, but none of my kids were getting dinner until every last root had been hacked. After 3 tries with a chain attached to my van, we got the devil plant out. I'm pretty sure the neighborhood was relieved too since at one point I was flying my next door neighbors rusty old pick ax away at it. I might not be the sharpest knife in the drawer, but I'm pretty sure I'm not the dullest either. So when Chemo asked me what I did that day, I'll bet he never would have guessed.