mountains....

seth's family cabin is in running springs. when we had those really bad fires here the fire came super close to the cabin. this is us in front of the cabin and if you look closely behind us all the trees are burned. it is scary how close the fire came.
tanner, hayden, and i chilling in snow valley's lodge

2 days after christmas we headed up to the mountains to spend a few days in the family cabin. seth and isaiah went snowboarding. isaiah did great..i hung out with tanner and hayden in the cabin and then went to meet the boys for lunch at the lodge. our friends the wenster's came up for one night and brian took megan and lauren skiing. we had a great time.

christmas.....

tanner was determined to see santa, so he slept on the couch. seth ended up moving him late that night, in the morning he goes "why am i in my bed? i wanted to see santa"
christmas tree before all of the gift opening

the boys and micah in their matching pj's

the fam on christmas morning

we had such a wonderful christmas this year, i think the best ever. with everything that has been going on with seth's job we never got caught up in the 'i wants' of christmas. it was a time where we focused on jesus' birth and family. what a blessing.

christmas eve we went to our favorite restaurant yen cheng with family (us, mom, dad, katie, shane, micah, shane's parents, seth's mom, stepdad, and sister).it was great that we could all spend this special night together. then on christmas morning we had brunch at our house with my parents, katie, shane and micah. it was micah's first christmas, it was fun watching him open his gifts. he loved the wrapping paper. isaiah got a few new wii games so everyone had fun playing the wii all afternoon, especially the new 'guitar hero'. tanner and hayden enjoyed spending the morning playing with their new transformer guys. that was their favorite gift. the transformer guys that come in a 2 pack and are only $6, gotta love that !! all in all it was a fantastic christmas.

annual friends christmas party....

every year for christmas we get together with my high school friends for our annual christmas party. we have been having this party since the christmas of 1992. we used to meet at sheryl's parents house but as we got older and we all started to have our own houses the locations has changed. pretty much every year we have it at the oliva's, one year it was at our house. each year it is the same thing, we do a potluck dinner and then a white elephant gift exhange. it's always fun to see which white elephant gifts have been recycled from years past. the one gift that keeps making it's ways year after year is sarah's foot cast from third grade (so gross!). it has been such a blessing being with my friends through so many stages of life. when we first started having this party we were all 15, within this past year the majority of us have turned 30!! that is so crazy. i love these friendships and cherish each and every one of them. we have all been through so much together (dating, marriages, babies, divorce) and still manage to all be the best of friends. even if we don't all hang out in a group all the time, when we are together it feels as if we are 15 again. i love you guys and look forward to many more years together.

christmas blessings....

1) our Lord and Savior came down to earth as a baby
2) seth got a job (yeah!!!!!)
3) our family is healthy (even though we may have to hold it together with stitches)
4) we have people who care about us. i don't think i have ever had a christmas with less stuff but more love was felt.
5) this christmas, Jesus taught us to care more about giving
6) trader joes and all it's yummy goodness
7) our family; nana's, papas, grandma's, grandpa's, sissy's and aunti's you know who you are... merry christmas and we love you.
8) our friends; to the runners, photographers, botanists, welders, loan officers, soccer players, insurance sales, old people taker carers of?, electricians, catheter sales (ouch), teachers, dirt movers, lawyers, marketers, graphic designers (i hit like 10 of you there), pastors, and even mac users, you know who are...the holidays would not be the same with out you. thank you so much for your love and support.
9) the zas, zaiah, bing; T.J, tan, bong; smooshie, the smoosh, stinkin' smooshie, sweet sweet babiesh, boing. chistmas would not be the same with out the bing, bong and boing. let's talk blessings.
10) whoever this secret santa is... you rock. no really, you rock.
11) mark driscoll because the holidays need truth and it needs to be spoken truthfully. mark does this http://www.marshillchurch.org/
12) the bible - the blessing of the christmas story... amazing.
13) now stop reading this and go buy some streaming media hosting, seth sells it and he needs commission. :) www.streamingmediahosting.com

by the way seth snuck on my blog and wrote this, can't you tell? he meant all of it though.

secret santa....

someone out there has been our 'secret santa' for the past 4 days. we have no idea who it is! every morning (for the past 4 days) we have come outside and found a present on our front porch. the first present was labeled "the 12th day before christmas". every day since then there has been a count down. last night we recieved "the 8th day before christmas". it was a gingerbread christmas tree kit. we put it together tonight as a family. it was so much fun! the boys enjoyed eating the frosting and candy. i am surprised we had any left to put on the tree :). whoever you are 'secret santa'....thank you so much! this has been such a blessing for our family and so much fun!

the perfect gift.....

last night isaiah was in his first play at church. for those of you that know isaiah you know that he is our little actor. he was in HEAVEN on that stage. he did such an amazing job and we are SO proud of him. thank you so much to everyone that attended. it meant the world to us and to isaiah.

family pics...

this weekend by good friend and neighbor took family pictures of us. michelle is such a talented photographer and i am so thankful for her beautiful pictures. thanks michelle!

GNO...

on the first monday of every month i get together with my friends from highschool. we have all known eachother for 18 years. last night gina hosted at her house. we always have fun laughing and just having good girl time. we have all been friends for so long and have been through so many stages of life together. i look forward to another 18 years with these great women.

friends.......

A friend loves at all times, and a brother is born for adversity.

proverbs 17:17

i have always known that God has blessed me with amazing friends, but i cannot even begin to tell you how truly amazing they are. through our trial of seth being unemployed they have been such a support for me and my family. i want to truly with the bottom of my heart thank ALL of my friends for all your support, prayers, and encouragement. i love you all and am thankful that God has put each of you in my life.

Thanksgiving

my aunt sissy and smooshie

Every Thanksgiving we go to Tuscon Arizona to visit my aunt, uncle, and cousins. I look forward to going every year. I love spending time with my family in Arizona. I grew up going to my Aunt and Uncle's so I love it that now my kids are enjoying it just as much as I used to. Our first day out there we went to Old Tuscon. It is made to look like the old west and they shoot movies there. Our favorite part was seeing where they filmed 'The Three Amigos'. Thursday we enjoyed the day eating outside cause the weather was gorgeous. And my uncle made his famous smoked turkey out on the smoker. Friday Seth, Isaiah, and Tanner went shooting. This was Tanner's first year going. He was excited to finally be going with the big boys. When he got home he goes "mom I got shot in the neck". Luckily that is not really what happened. He was standing a little to close to my dad while he was shooting and a shell casing flew off and landed on his neck. He did get burned and it will probably make a scar, but he is really enjoying telling everyone that he was 'shot in the neck'.

the boys hanging out with the actors in 'old tuscon'

smooshie.....

smooshie: (smelling my face) mommy you don't smell like mushrooms you smell like santa
me: thank you?! i hope that is good.
smooshie: yes, santa smells really good.

10 minutes later in the bathroom at the restaurant....
smooshie: ewww (holding his nose) it smells like mushrooms in here.

good thing i don't smell like mushrooms.

I am thankful for........

1) God's provision
2) my husband
3) my three amazing boys
4) my mom and dad for their love for us and for their wonderful relationship they have with my boys
5) katie, shane, and micah
6) sissy
7) the most amazing, loving, and giving friends that you could ever imagine
8) trader joe's (this may sound funny, but i really LOVE this place)
9) sheparding a child's heart : the parenting study we are taking at church
10) our church
11) a house in old towne orange
12) MOPS
13) running
14) prayer
15) chocolate chip cookies (yeah, i can make them again)
16) what God is going to do in our lives
17) the best neighbors in the world
18) MOM's In Touch ( my new prayer group where we pray for our little guys while they are at school)
19) Dreyers slow churned ice cream (low fat, but doesn't taste like it, LOVE that)
20) seth and all the laundry that he has done while being home , i am spoiled

i married well :)

for those of you who don't know my husband was laid off 4 1/2 weeks ago. this has been probably one of the hardest times of our lives. it has taught us so much about trusting in the Lord and about giving EVERYTHING to HIM. seth has been so strong, faithful, and diligent through this very hard trial. everyday he gets on the computer and looks for jobs. he has sent his resume out to so many places that we have lost count. he has been on numerous interviews and many we are still waiting to hear back on. i have yet to see him sulk or feel sorry for himself. i think i am doing enough of that for both of us. today i came home after picking the boys up from school and seth had steamed cleaned all the area rugs and carpet in our house. he had also taken the slip covers off of the sofa's and washed, dried, and put them all back on. right now he is outside cleaning all of our windows and screens. what a wonderful husband i have. he has faith that God is going to give him a job. he has been so incredible through this, and i have really seen that i have married such a wonderful man. i am married to a man of God.

my prayer:
dear lord, please bless seth for being so faithful and diligent. please bless him with a job that will be able to support our family of five. thank you for teaching us about patience, trust, and perserverance. thank you for being our provider and our comforter. please help me to be a good wife and mother and to support seth and to be strong for my family. help me to be patient through this very stressful time. thank you lord for my husband and my family. we love you.

thanksgiving, cousins, and legoland

this past weekend was my nephews bday. so we went out to temecula to celebrate his bday and to have our thanksgiving dinner with seth's side of the family. saturday night we had a wonderful feast at rick and michelle's house. thank you grandma cindy for a great dinner :) then sunday we were off to lego land to celebrate spencer's 5th bday. for those of you who don't know my sister n law has 3 boys also, so it is always fun and chaotic when we are all together. the boys had a blast spending the weekend with their cousins.

Halloween 2007

wolverine, indiana jones, and captain america

this year the boys had fun trick or treating through old towne orange. there were tons of people out and they got tons of candy.

Isaiah and Tanner's school Halloween Parties

Isaiah's second grade class
Tan's pre-school class

Tanner the Photographer #2

Every time I download pictures on to my computer I find a ton of pics that Tan has taken. He loves to take pictures and is gettting pretty good at it. Here are a few of his masterpieces.....

Salmon dish

I have been trying to get my family to eat more omega 3's. I am not a huge salmon eater but I have been trying to find different recipes so me and my family can eat it. Seth and Isaiah actually love it, but it is me and the other two boys that I need to make it for. Here is a recipe that I found on allrecipes.com , it was so good. I actually really enjoyed it and tanner and hayden didn't even know that they ate salmon :)........enjoy!
I
NGREDIENTS

1 cup uncooked long grain white rice (i used brown rice_
2 cups water
2 1/2 tablespoons garlic oil
2 (6 ounce) fillets salmon
salt and pepper to taste
1/2 teaspoon dried dill weed
1/4 teaspoon paprika to taste
2 fresh tomatoes, diced
1 1/2 teaspoons minced garlic
1 teaspoon lemon juice
3 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley
1/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese
2 tablespoons butter
4 dashes hot pepper sauce (i did not use the hot pepper sauce in case it made it spicy)

DIRECTIONS
In a medium saucepan, bring the rice and water to a boil. Reduce heat to low, cover, and cook 20 minutes.
Heat the garlic oil in a skillet over medium heat. Season the salmon with salt, pepper, dill, and paprika, and cook in the hot oil 1 to 2 minutes on each side, until tender enough to break apart. Break salmon into cubes with a spatula or fork. Mix in the tomatoes, garlic, and lemon juice. Continue cooking until salmon is easily flaked with a fork.
Mix the parsley, Parmesan cheese, butter, and hot pepper sauce into the skillet, and continue cooking 1 to 2 minutes, until well mixed. Serve over the cooked rice.

I'm back!

For most of my adult life I have been known for my cookie making skills. Maybe the Lord wanted to humble me because for the past year and I have not been able to make a good looking cookie to save my life. They have tasted good but they would turn out flat. So the other day I did a google search (love googel) 'how to make cookies so they don't turn out flat'.....low and behold I got the answer....cold butter and 1/4 cup more flour then the recipe calls for. It was amazing, my cookies turned out beautifully. So I don't get too proud again, I give all the glory to God!!! :)

Treats in the Streets

a really happy flash, wolverine, indiana jones, and baby yoda (my nephew)
isaiah put this costume together all by himself, i think he did a pretty good job

wolverine, all the little girls that we went with were scared of him

Every year the Thursday before Halloween the Orange Plaza shuts down the streets and all the store owners sit outside their stores to hand out candy. My kids look forward to going every year. This year we had Indiana Jones, Wolverine, and Flash. At the last minute Hayden decided that he wanted to be Superman instead of Flash, but the only superman costume he has are pajamas and they were dirty. As you can see he was not very happy, so I did not get a pic of him alone. I did force him to be in the group photo with his brothers and cousin but he was not having it. ha, ha, ha,... oh the joy of kids :)

They Scored!!

On Saturday Isaiah and Tanner each scored their first goals of the season. They were both soooo excited! Tanner was pretty shell shocked afterwards, we kept yelling "TANNER YOU SCORED!!" and he was like "i did????" ha ha ha.........when Isaiah scored he immediatley ran off the field and gave me a huge hug. I of course started crying cause i thought it was so special that an 8 year old boy would want to hug his mom after a goal....i know i know i am a sap.

punk rock brothers

VPE had their annual school carnival and the boys had their hair colored. We had a great time at the carnival. Isaiah got to throw a pie at his principal's face, he was pretty excited :) Tanner and Isaiah got to get in a ring with a bunch of kids and have a huge silly string war. I think that was the highlight of their day .

my baby nephew micah

last week my nephew micah came over and ofcourse the boys had to dress him up....ha ha ha so cute!!

Isaiah Turns 8!!!

We just celebrated Isaiah's 8th bday. We had a really great day. We started the day with our traditional breakfast donut. Then 4 for of his buddies from school came over and we took everyone to Wild River's. It was the last day that the park was open so it was not very crowded at all. Our family met us there also which made for a fun filled day. After Wild River's we let Isaiah chose any place that he wanted for dinner. He chose to go to In N Out, which of course got no complaints out of us. Seth's family, my parent's, and some good friends joined us for dinner. I think over all Isaiah had a pretty great day!!!........Isaiah is such a joy to have in our family. After 8 years he still enjoys dressing up every day. Right now his fav is Indiana Jones, but it is always changing. He loves to be around his family and friends, draw, act, play soccer, ride his scooter, swim, surf, play the wii, and dress up. He just tried out for the Christmas play at church. He is really hoping to get a part. If he does I think it will be so great to see him on stage, his is such a natural, it really is amazing. Seth spent a lot of the summer teaching him how to surf. He did a really good job, and became super comfortable in the water. Isaiah has a heart of gold. He really cares for people, especially his brothers :) I hope their bond is forever. We love you Isaiah!!!

Tanner's first day of preschool

I know this post is almost a month late, I just had not downloaded any of my pictures yet. This is technically the second day of pre-school cause poor little Tanner had the stomach flu on the first day. Tanner is doing GREAT in school. I had the privlege of working in his class last week and it was so fun to see him in a class room setting, anwering the teacher's questions, following directions, and interacting with his friends. One of the days he was the leader and he was so proud. He stood in front of the class, held the american flag, and with his right hand over his heart yelled "ready begin!" as loud as he could. His teacher looked at me with an amazed look and said "wow, he sure has come out of his shell". Last year you could barely hear him when he spoke. Love you TJ!

should i have another one??

today my nephew was over (he is five months old) and tanner and hayden were playing nicely with him in tanner's room. so i go "tanner, do you think mommy should have another baby?" and he goes "no, then you would have more messes to clean up and there would be too much whining ." ha ha ha, he's right!

a beautiful heart

tonight i was putting the boys to bed and isaiah goes "mom, tanner said that the birthday party that he went to today was better then mine"....so i go "tanner, that's not nice, tell your brother you're sorry for saying that", so tanner apologized and they went to bed..........about 5 minutes later i hear tanner crying, so i go to his bed to see what is wrong with him and he goes " i feel really sad that i hurt by best friend's feelings" first of all i think that it is so wonderful that he is calling his brother his best friend, and second that he feels sad that he hurt his feelings. he wasn't crying because he got in trouble, he was crying cause he knew that he had made is brother sad. i was so overcome with emotion that i started crying too. so i said " tanner i am so thankful for the heart that God gave you"....

happy 32nd bday to my hubby!!

yesterday was seth's 32nd bday. on sunday we went down to san clemente with some friends and family and then last night we went to 'lucille's bbq' in brea. i let the boys go to target and each pick their daddy a gift. hayden picked out a 'flash' shirt, so seth wore it last night. isaiah and tanner picked out running clothes. we had a great time. happy birthday seth!!!

soccer season

soccer season officaly began in the beasley household this past weekend. we have two beasley boys playing this year. so now our saturday's our filled with games, and i love it. tanner is playing boys u-6 and his team name is 'white lightning'. isaiah is playing boys u-8 and his team name is 'demons' (not our first choice for the name but the coach picked it and we did not really have a say). both boys are doing really well. isaiah has really blossomed into a fast little forward, and tanner is really agressive. i had the privlege of referring tanner's first game, and let me tell you it was really hard to not be bias. every time our team would score i would clap my hands and scream and then i had to go 'oh wait i am the ref, i probably shouldn't do that'. but it's so hard when it's your kid out there . we are looking forward to a good season.

Tanner the photographer

tanner loves to take pictures. the other day he got a hold of my camera and when i downloaded the pictures i found about 20 pictures of hayden. ha ha ha....also, i found one that he took of his bed after he made it all by himself. what a good boy :)

Disney Half Marathon Sept. 3rd, 2007

On september 3rd i ran the disneyland half marathon. it was my very first half. my goal time was 2 hours but i ended up running 2:15. i was very happy with my time considering i was the very last heat to go behind 14,000 people and it was 90 degrees out with 85% humidity. i don't think i had ever been that sweaty before in my whole life. i had a great run, and i hope to do another one soon.

isaiah's first day of second grade

isaiah started second grade today. i can't believe how old his is getting. time has flown by so fast. he was so funny about me taking this picture. last year and the year before i took a picture with him in front of his class room door. but no not this year. we had to be out on the street where no one could see us, and i was definatley not allowed to be in the picture...ha ha ha...and he is only 7! what will it be like when he is 13????

camping at san clemente state beach

for our last summer outing we went camping to san clemente state beach with our good friends the clark's. it is always fun going with them cause they have three boys the same age as our boys. 6 boys running around!!! we had so much fun.