rain, rain go away!

The youngest Smith graduated from high school last week. Gilbert High has played "home" to all 7 siblings. For the last 18 years there has been at least one of us roaming Tiger Hall, but on Thursday the legacy came to an end. Sam and I chose to support Natalli by attending her graduation ceremony. This usually involves extremely uncomfortable heat, and sun in your eyes (since there are never any seats left on the shady "home" side of the stadium). This year Someone thought it would be funny to throw an Arizona blizzard at the 800+ graduates and all their supporters in the stands. We sat for 3 hours in pouring rain, and not hot summer rain. This was bonafide freezing, wind blown rain. Never in all my years as an Arizonan have I witnessed rain fall for more than 10 minutes, max. I'm almost positive this night set a new world record (I'll have to look it up in next years Guinness). Despite the down pour, the genius in charge opted to let the 12 speakers, and 4 musical numbers perform as planned. This was no doubt the same guy who chose to use speakers from what looked like his home stereo, instead of the conveniently located stadium loud speakers. We didn't hear anything all night. A few grads walked off the field before the diplomas were handed out, luckily Natalli had an umbrella to shiver under. Another world record was set that night, they read through the grad's names faster than ever before. What usually takes 2 hours of the program, was done in a whopping 30 min! We joined the remaining crowd and rushed the field immediately after the last grad's name was read, give or take a few, we couldn't make out the mumbling. Everyone ignored the Principal's plea to "please return to [our] seats for the remainder of the program". The crowd decided it was over right then, and we couldn't have agreed more!
This was our view

mexican mother's day

Last weekend the Smith family crossed the border for our annual Mexico trip. We were excited to have Sam's brother and his family join us this year. After surviving the ride down, with no A/C and one seat short, we were ready for a weekend of fun and food at the beach. Once we crossed the border my mother was kind enough to "translate" every spanish sign she saw into english for us. My favorite was the llanteria which, according to mom, means "galloping horses". Hmmm and all this time I thought it was just a tire shop. One of the rules in Mexico is that you have to get up when the sun does, maybe because the instant it rises your tent becomes unbearably oven like. Even if you can stand the oven, the screaming/talking of children can for some reason penetrate the sound proof tents. It's ok though, because you have to get up early in order to find sea creatures in the tide pools. This year the creatures consisted mainly of hermit crabs. I did capture a bright orange starfish that was thoroughly mauled by children all weekend. You can imagine our excitement at the tide pools one morning when my mother screamed "I found some sort of glittery jelly fish, and it's ALIVE!" Here is a picture of the miraculous discovery. Shhh, we won't tell her it's really a fishing lure.

We welcomed a new treat to the beach this year, mangoes on a stick! Despite being allergic I ate at least one a day, resulting in a very itchy rash on my face. Don't worry it's almost cleared up now. Thousands of burritos, tacos and popsicles later we still weren't satisfied. The one thing necessary to complete a Mexico adventure is a trip to the "dirt mall" (which is now paved and lovely) to get some fresh CHURROS!



Mother's day fell on the Sunday we left for home, the sibs gave our mother a clever card and a gift cert. to her favorite place, Gecko Grill. She eats there once a week at least. Sam surprised me weeks earlier with a new video camera. Most of you know what this means...

celebrity look alike

During my usual blog stalking I noticed many people comparing pictures of themselves and/or loved ones to celebrities. I admit, I've gone to the site with confidence that I would be directly matched with all of Hollywood's finest looking women. You can imagine my disappointment after being completely blindsided with the results that yielded mainly men, with top bragging rights going to Lucille Ball (post I Love Lucy). The truth shall set you free, right? In order to prevent any readers from becoming covetous, I have opted not to post my look-a-like results. However, I've been meaning to post my own comparison involving Landon. With all this celebrity matching, and a recent post by my sis-in-law Erica I have been re-inspired to do so.

Bonus points for naming Landon's celebrity twin.

the worst

Well the worst thing that could possibly happen, happened! Actually, I'm sure there are worse things, but this is still pretty bad. MY CAMERA BROKE! That's right, broke! It still takes pics and everything seems to work, except the focus. So everything ends up blurry. This is very depressing because I carry my camera with me everywhere, and usually find very interesting people/things to capture. Until we get it fixed I will just steal pictures off the Internet to illustrate our family happenings. Since moving down I have had the opportunity to teach a dance class at my sister, EmmaLee's dance studio. It has been so much fun to get back into dancing again. Today the girls performed at the County Fair. Talk about memories! Not too long ago it was me and my friends on the stage performing. Besides the gimlets trying to run the sound equipment, the show went pretty smoothly. Afterwards we enjoyed all the fair had to offer... or at least tried to enjoy it. We only lasted about an hour once the show was over. Just enough time to choke down a very deceiving corndog, and go on one ride. It was hot, dirty, and extremely overpriced. Not to mention the flocks of Carnies pestering you to throw darts and other objects in their impossible games for the chance to win dirty, flea infested stuffed animals. Apparently anyone can work there, no brain, no limbs, no problem! Now that's the kind of person I want setting up and operating life threatening rides. Not exactly how I remember the Fair, I guess the "magic" dies with age... or maybe it was never really magic. Here's hoping the State Fair will actually deliver.

paul potts

For his birthday, my parents gave Sam tickets to see Paul Potts in concert. Lucky me! About a year ago Sam showed me this amazing video of a silly looking man on the show Britain's Got Talent. Sam and I both fell in love with his story, and his awesome talent. The concert was such a great experience, we got to go with my parents, and my aunt. The music was truly moving and I remain in awe over the talent and humility of this strange little man.

need a laugh?

easter

This year we were able to attend (my cousin) Melinda's annual Easter Picnic. Some of the festivities included great bbq, egg hunts, sand volleyball and my favorite, treats! For those not so familiar with my family, the striking model above is my mother. She works as a school nurse, so she had the whole week off for spring break. We started the week by eating out for multiple meals each day, but by Wednesday decided to sit down and create a menu so we can take turns cooking dinner each night. We lasted two days, which yielded very delicious meals, and by Friday were back out to eat for date night. We will try this cooking thing again next week. It was fun to gather Easter supplies for all the grandkid's baskets with her. We went to Dollar Tree thinking we'd knock it out for a few bucks and failed miserably, spending over $60. Landon went on his first Easter hunt and with a little help found some great prizes. Sam spoiled me with DVDs, candy, and some makeup from Sephora. I got Sam another controller for the PS2. I know I shouldn't be encouraging this behavior, but at least now he won't have to play his video games alone.