Really? January is almost over??

There have been memes floating around fb that January has 347 days and sometimes it really does feel like it but January has been a great month.  The kids have enjoyed their extra curricular activities.  Colten was able to go to karate 3 times this past week due to missing one day last week with his eye infection.  He also brought Alijah and Jeramiah along with him one day as his buddies.  I think the boys had a good time.  Aspen is still killing it at her art.  She was the only student this week but didn't seem to mind the one on one.

The weekend was eventful as it should be.  Friday afternoon I went in for a 90 minute massage that I won during a 12 days of Christmas giveaways.  It was heavenly.  I definitely need to try and fit more massages into my life lol.  Then I picked up the kids and we headed down to Mesquite for the Hot Air Balloon Festival.  Last year Hollee (her family) and my parents went and said it was fun.  No one was able to join us this year but I think the kids had a good time.  We saw the night lantern thing (where they leave a select few balloons on the ground and use the torch to light them up).   It is amazing how those torches really do light up the night when they all go at once (it was also the best time to get pictures).  It was cold so we didn't stay too long and headed back to the hotel to participate in some of the things available there.  Aspen hit up the hot tub while Colten played a little basketball.  I eventually joined him for a little and we also tried our hand at Pickleball (really we played it as tennis/ping pong).  I also spent quite a bit of time in front of the fire trying to stay warm.

Saturday morning I was up bright and early, so I hit the fitness center.  Then woke the kids up and we headed out to see the launching of the balloons.  It was really neat to see how they blow the balloons up on the ground.  The kids favorite balloon was the Humpy Dumpy one :)  We weren't too close to see that one get blown up but the kids were excited to see it up in the air.  Colten was a little grumpy so I didn't get great pictures of him...silly kid.

We got to St. George with plenty of time to get our Saturday chores done.  I went to Grandpa's to clean and the kids got their chores done.  Aspen was helping out with babysitting for the stake single sister's dinner and I was attending the dinner lol.  I love that the stake sets aside to recognize those sisters that don't have a spouse...granted most of them are older but it was still a fun evening.  They served pasta from Pizza Factory and I gave Aspen my custard dessert.  They had a speaker from the Young Women's board presenting but I was only able to stay for about half of it because the dinner took longer than they expected.  So I took my daisy flower and left a little early haha.

The singles ward was having a bowling night that night as well.  The ward had rented out the bowling alley, had pizza and water, and invited kids :)  So the kids were excited to join in on that activity.  It was a lot of fun.  There were quite a few people there.  I met Zac (connected on the Mutual app and invited him to come out).  He will be a great addition to the social life :)  Aspen killed it at bowling - Colten and I not so much but I did get a strike once :)  That was the highlight of my bowling game lol.

After bowling I took the kids home and went to hang out for a little bit with some friends.  We went to Nielson's Custard and then to Buffalo Wild Wings.  It is always a good time when hanging out with people from the singles ward.

January is off to a good start...

...with not much happening :)  The kids are getting back into the routine of school as am I.  Colten invited Alijah to his karate class on Monday, which happened to be Alijah's birthday as well.  We didn't know that Darcee had to sign a release form (duh) so he didn't get to participate but can come back for his free class.  Wednesday, Aspen got to go with her Young Women's group to go do baptisms for the dead at the temple.  Despite the group having a reservation, the temple was behind so she had a later night for a school night.  But she said she had fun.  The kids and I have discovered a new show called "The Masked Singer" that is really fun to watch.  There are celebrities hidden underneath masks and sing a song.  Clues are given and a panelist (as well as audience) are trying to figure out who it is.  One person gets voted off a week and has to reveal who they are.  So far the one of the panelists has figured out 2 out of the 3.  It is fun to listen to the kids try and figure out who it is too.

Thursday morning I got a call from the school saying that Colten had a red eye and that they had a bout of pink eye going around.  So I went to get him and took him to the doctor.  The doctor didn't say that he had pink eye but he indeed had an infection and to stay home until it cleared up with the help of drops.  Man - it is hard for a boy to stay home when he feels fine and mom doesn't let him have much screen time.  He did get a lot of reading done though lol.  His eye pretty much cleared up by Friday night.

Friday night I went to a Alison's 40th birthday party while the kids stayed home and watched some Hulu shows.  Netflix  is raising their prices again so I won't be continuing using them.  The party was fun, pretty low key but we had some good laughs and enjoyed our time celebrating with Ali.

Saturday was finally not one filled with "other" plans.  I did my normal thing, temple, gym, grandpa's cleaning before making it home.  The kids had done pretty good with their chores.  I told them if they could complete them by 3, we would go see a movie.  They did so I took them to see Aquaman.  Aspen wasn't sure she would like it but she did!  I learned that Colten loves to talk in movies haha.  We had a left over bucket of popcorn so the kids shared that and they ATE it all!  I couldn't believe it - and then they came home and ate dinner.  I guess they are growing lol.  After the movie we worked a little on the Bronco puzzle Colten got for Christmas.  The kids have been slowly working on it so we sat down together and worked some more on it.  Aspen is really good at puzzles.  Colten - he is hit and miss but can only work on it for so long.  It was fun to see them work together on a project.  They really are best friends even if they don't know it yet.  I went out to a movie with Greg and Cole about the time the kids were calling it a night.  I went to the movie "The Escape Room".  Not a big fan of it - but I will definitely be hesitant if I ever go do an escape room lol.

This picture is from last Sunday.  Hollee says that she tries to take a picture with Oaklee and she won't cooperate.  But every time I hold up the camera she is all about the smiles :)  I told her to get used to it. lol

On FaceBook there has been a picture challenge going around to compare your first profile pic with your current one.  I went back through and realized I didn't do many selfies back when I first started FaceBooking, so I did the comparisons with whatever pictures I could find.  I included the kids and Hollee too :)  Left picture is around 2010 and right picture is 2018.