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Sunday, November 29, 2009

Turkey Trot



So I got this bright idea that since I have never ran a 10k that Thanksgiving morning would be a great time to do so. A couple of my friends (Nikki and Becky) decided to go along with the bright idea and joined in the fun. Well, there were more that 4,o00 people that decided to join in the fun! The Mi Amigo's Turkey Trot has been going on for a long time - I just didn't know about it. Apparently it's a tradition for many families. I did pretty well (better than I expected) for my first 10k. My time was 1:05 for a 6.2 mile race. Next year I'd like to come in under an hour. Up side, I didn't feel one bit eating some yummy desserts later in the day. The down side - my legs were so sore for about 3 days! Ooohh the burn! (By the way - you can't see me in the crowd- but you can see my hand! That's me waving to Daniel to the left of the middle of the picture!)

Just a little drumming

Here's Daniel along with Jonah and Livia working it on the drum!

Friday, November 27, 2009

Send your own ElfYourself eCards

Super funny video

For all of you out there who remember the Muppets - this one's for you...

Thursday, November 19, 2009

The Ward Talent Show

This is just one of the videos I'm trying to upload!
Jen Garrett - and her "un-talent"

Sunday, November 1, 2009

Their New Home

Here's a video of our six little chickies enjoying their spacious new home! (Especially compared to the blue tupperware they were in!)

Husbands should always listen to their wives

So the other day Daniel purchased a shirt, but the clerk forgot to take off the little plastic thing that's supposed to prevent you from stealing it. So I suggested he take it back and have them take it off, being that he was going back in a few days to pick up his new drill (to be blogged about soon). Well, did he listen... hmmm... that would be a "no". Instead he tells me, "I'm strong enough to get this off. Watch." He then proceeds to break the device, not getting it off completely. However there is a very dark bluish-green dye inside, which Daniel managed to get all over his fingers and the shirt is completely ruined now. I just had to smile and asked him to pose for a picture. I said, "This is going on the blog."

Blue fingers - after being washed and rubbed with fingernail polish remover!
The shirt.

Chicken Coupe Update

Well we (and by "we" I mean Daniel) finished the coupe - well ... almost. It needs to be painted and have a few little tweaks made to it. But the chickens are living in it now. Yeah!!! So exciting.
This is Chris - helping out! (Thank you!!!)
Here's Daniel - trimming the chicken wire. Not a fun job, "Especially when you don't have the right tools." (I think that was Daniel's favorite thing to say during this project.)

Here's Chris again working on the nesting boxes. It turned out so cool! (Finished project pictures to come.)



Halloween 2009

We had a fun time on Halloween - even though we both worked! We participated in the Tempe Ward's Trunk or Treat by running the Fishing booth (thanks Erica for helping out!). Daniel wanted to go as a farmer - being that he's all farmerish these days. So I got all "pertied up" and put on my good hat and my good teeth and my good pearls. I think that this may be one of the funniest pictures I have of myself. It makes me laugh EVERY time I see it. :)














Thursday, October 15, 2009

Projects at Home

First off - the chicken coupe! Yes, that's Daniel's cute bum in the picture :) He's building the coupe all by himself and doing quiet an amazing job. It's farther along now, so we'll add more pictures soon.
This is why we need to get the coupe done soon!!! The chicks are not chicks anymore. They are about three times the size they were when we got them and definitely need some space!
This is our last big project right now - the garden! Yeah, I think we've planted just about everything we can think of that will grow in the Fall/Winter season: lettuce, spinach, cauliflower, broccoli, swiss chard, beets, radishes, snap peas, butternut squash, sweet onions, red onions and maybe something else I'm forgetting :) Isn't this the cutest garden ever. I love the little flower boxes that Daniel built! So cute!

Monday, October 12, 2009

Mind Games

Well, there is this really cool machine that measures the brain waves. They make it fun by letting you compete against someone to see who has "stronger" brain waves.

Rope Climbing

At the Arizona Science Center, they have this exhibit where you can basically feel different types of resistance, by climbing various ropes. So here's all of us, minus Abigail, showing off our stuff! My favorite was watching little Lilly pull herself up, all by herself! Look at those guns!

Notice that I'm on the "harder" rope :)
Here's Daniel climbing the "hardest" rope! My hands really hurt after attempting to climb it.
Michael looks so focused!
Here's LaDawn!!! We had to stop and reminisce about how we hated climbing ropes in elementary PE. Neither of us could do it (must be a Cox thing). So we definitely were fulfilling some suppressed wishes of long ago. :)


Arizona Science Center

We had family from Tucson in town last weekend and we had sooo much fun. We spent the day at the Science Center, which has got to be one of the funnest places in the world for kids - (and big kids too)!
Upon arriving, we realized that there was an "Aids Awareness" campaign happening right outside of the Science Center. We saw these divas and had to take a picture. They loved it!
This is my sweet niece Abigail - who is nine!
She's the one in the silly video posted earlier.
Lilly got a great ride while we scoped out the area for lunch.
I had to include this picture not only because Lillian looks so cute, but because of Mike who is in the background. He's on his phone, as he was a lot of the time, playing Fantasy Football! Don't get me wrong. He was thoroughly entertained by many of the exhibits, just really into his football game.
This one was so cute of the girls checking out the Robots exhibit. Abigail loves Star Wars - so this was perfect.


Monday, September 28, 2009

My silly niece!


So this is my niece Abigail, who lives in Tucson. She was part of a talent show at school and my sister LaDawn recorded this! It was so funny, I had to pass it along.

Chicks meeting the Dogs

New Addition to our Family

Six to be exact!!!



We haven't named them yet, being that you can't really tell them apart :)

Daniel surprised me last week (we had been talking about getting them in October) with our new arrivals. They are so cute. He and a friend (Chris B.) are going to build the coupe. Daniel's so excited about this project. He went to a class offered by City of Phoenix about how to raise chickens for eggs and care for them. Plus we've asked two family members about their experiences with raising chickens. When I told my parents about the chickens, their main concern was with how the dogs were going to react. Well, we took a little video of their reaction...

Thursday, September 17, 2009

Vein Surgery

Okay - so either I'm extremely sensitive or that was the worst pain I think I have ever felt. Let me back up. I have varicose veins. I had them checked out a few months ago to see if I have a "dysfunctional valve" creating the bulging vein. And yes, three out of the four valves are not functioning. So, I scheduled the vein surgery (Endovenous Laser Therapy- EVLT). They informed me it would be "uncomfortable." Yeah, the biggest understatement of my life! They gave me a Xanax and Viacatin before the surgery to help relax and calm me. I felt a little loopy, but not much different than usual. Then came the prep. No biggy - they scrubbed the area clean and prepped my leg with a beautiful purple marker, marking where the vein was. Then the doctor came in - Dr Pain, I mean, Dr. Pang :). He told me I would feel a few pricks where the needle was numbing some areas of my leg where the needles would be inserted (picture included). Ouch, but tolerable. Then he informed me he was going to put the needle in, with the wire. Holy mother of $%#@##$!!!! I could not believe how bad that hurt. The three staff just worked quietly. Then my blood pressure started dropping, I could feel I was going to faint. (I usually do when I give blood, so they prep me by tipping the chair back to help the blood flow.) My hearing was going and the room was getting black and I felt like throwing up. I told the doctor and he had them check my blood pressure. I heard him say, "Tip her back on the table." Then he had the assistant check my bp three more times, each time tipping me back further. He said, "I don't want to go up any further, let's stop here below the knee." Finally, I could hear again and the pain was horrible. He asked if I wanted to proceed, informing me that it was my choice, but that they were ready to start the laser. I asked, "How much longer???" He said, "Two minutes." "Okay." He said, "Let me know if you feel this." It started and immediately I said, "Yes, it kills." So he stopped, put a few more shots in my leg, then tried again. "Yes it still hurts." He shot me up once more and tried one more time. "No, I don't feel it now." He completed that part of the surgery, stitched me up once where I was bleeding a little too much (picture included) and then said to have me wait in the room until my bp was back to normal. I forgot to mention that they had put a turnicate on my leg to inflate the vein a little when marking it, but did not release it during the procedure, probably contributing to the pain. When I asked him later why it hurt so bad, he said it was because my vein was small - due to being dehydrated and that my bp dropped because of a reaction I had to the medication. I think it was due to hurting so freaking bad! So I asked a friend of mine who had the procedure done and she told me that the first time killed, but the second time, it wasn't as bad because they shot her leg up with a lot more pain killer. I don't know. My favorite part of it was when Daniel walked in and was told that there were some complications and that they didn't finish the procedure. I told him in Portuguese how badly it hurt. He smiled and asked in Portuguese, "So, do you really want to have children?" I said, "No, we can just adopt." Classic.

Okay -so this is a horrible picture, but I love that Toby is in all of these.

This is my leg where you can see the purple markings where the procedure was supposed to go up to - there's a little "x". However, he stopped just below my knee.

This is a picture of the bandages, nothing too exciting.
This is me being brave to see what my leg looks like this afternoon.
Not nearly as bad as I thought it would be.

Here's the little stitch they had to make by my ankle.
There's a little bruising, but not too bad.

Wednesday, September 16, 2009

Tula through the ages

Well, Tula turned one a couple of months ago and I just had to post some before and after picture, along with some funny ones in between. She is a sweetheart and we love her to death, except when she gets in the trash. :)

Here she is after we just got her - like a fluff pup.
(For those of you who remember that brand of stuffed dog!)

Here Tula after getting groomed for the first time. Daniel freaked me out saying that she had ran away and he was out looking for her. He had really just gone to go pick her up. Not nice! But she did look adorable!

Here's Tula and her first, well, period. We got her some "doggy" diapers. They have a hole for the tail to go through. It was so funny watching her walk with them on. I love the look on her face, "Are you kidding me???"

We have these pillows the dogs use for beds. We just moved them into our room and had not put them down yet. However, Tula was not going to wait, as you can see in the photo.
Still, if we could all be as comfy as she is, then life would be good.

This is the latest picture I have of her. She cracks me up just chillin on the ground and the way she puts her feet up on the water cooler. She does this all the time now.
I love dogs - they are so funny.

New Hair

Okay - so nothing too exciting... but I did go brunette. This is a first for me. Let me know what you think... I've also attached some other pictures of different hair. You can vote :)

This is my friend Erica - she came over on Friday and helped me with my hair. Even though she has no formal education in regards to hair, her experience makes up for it. (She's my friend who is constantly changing her hair! I love it!)

Here I am, sporting my new hair. I didn't do it - other than blow dry it. But it's kind of fun. A lot darker than I expected. (It is a wash-out kind, so it will lighten up as the weeks go by.)

And I don't know - but I'm really loving this look. You'll have to tell me what you think :)


Arcosanti

Some of you may have seen these pictures on Facebook - I seem to post more things there nowadays - so sorry for the delay here on the Blog (Jessie - hint, hint, hint) :)

This is at the entrance of Arcosanti. It's just off of I17, on your way to Flagstaff.

Of course, you all may recognize this hunk of a man - my sweet hubby. (Is it just me, or does that face remind you of Steve Martin on Dirty Rotten Scoundrels "Excuse me, may I use the bathroom?")
This is one of the amazing views at the site.
Me on our cozy bed, in our cozy room. No ac - just a fan, but it was really nice weather at night and only got up to about 85 during the day.
So this is us in the dining area. Great food and it's all made fresh. They use to have more of an agriculture project, but with the economy, they've downsized too. However, the food was yummy and healthy.



Saturday, July 4, 2009

Independence Day!

Independence Day in Safford Arizona!
We spent the weekend with our Friends
(Michelle and Noah Webster, and their son Lawrence.)

The beautiful sky - on our way down from Mt. Graham!


The lake on the top of Mt. Graham.
(Daniel took this shot- he's got a great eye!)

Daniel and Melissa
July 4th, 2009
Mt. Graham, Safford Arizona




Saturday, June 20, 2009

Family Dinner

Our Family got together while Brent and Amanda were in town. We of course went out to dinner at Tia Rosa's - a delicious Mexican Restaurant in Mesa. Lots of fun!


The Cox Boys
(Jeff, Phil, Jared, Brent, Max)

The Cox Girls (minus one)
(Colette and Melissa)

Brent celebrated his 40th (a few weeks before) and we had to celebrate again! I mean, 40 years only happens once, right?

Sunday, May 31, 2009

Daniel's Surgery

Well, some of you may have seen Daniel hobbling around on crutches. This is for good reasons - he just had knee surgery. He found out about a month ago that he had a torn meniscus (this is a cushion area in your knee). Not sure how it got torn, but it would have continued to get worse. So he opted to get surgery during his school break. We decided to head up to Vegas to have our friends dad perform the surgery - Jeff Grondell. What an awesome family. We met them a couple of months ago and just really love them. They were so kind to let us stay in the "Grondell Hotel" while Daniel was recovering.
So this is Daniel on day 1, right after the surgery. He's pretty drugged up. How else could he be smiling?
This is Daniel on day 3, when his bandages came off. The surgery required three small incisions: one for the fluid, one for the camera, and one for the tools. Since we don't live there, the Dr. taped the incisions. Pretty cool, huh?





On our way home, we got stuck in some crazy traffic. The Hoover dam is always slow, but this time it was ridiculous. The dam itself is looking pretty cool. They are constructing a new bridge and it is crazy looking.

Well, after the dam, the traffic picked up and we thought we were well on our way. Boy were we fooled.
There ended up being an accident a mile up the road and we were stuck waiting for another 2 hours. I took pictures as proof. We filled up the tank before leaving about 12:00 noon. This is the milage (17.7 miles) and this is the time the road started moving again (3:16 pm)!



And this is what Daniel looked like, sitting in the back seat during this lovely wait.



We finally made it home about 8:00 pm safely! We were happy to come home to our sweet pets and Daniel's parents and grandma were here waiting to greet us. They had cleaned up the entire house (inside and out), concerned that we wouldn't be able to. It sure is nice to have parents (in-laws) here, I must admit.