Beautiful Girl

Annalise agreed to be my model for an afternoon a couple of Saturdays ago. We made a special day out of it by going to the salon and getting a snack together before hitting the beach. I've been struck recently by how fast time seems to fly by and I wanted to capture my little girl while I still had one.

Yes, my girl is growing up and showing me every day that she can take care of herself. About a month ago, she found herself in a bind. She was very brave about it and she took matters into her own hands. She had a ponytail in her hair that she wanted to take out, but when she wound up with some tangles in the rubber band that were hurting her, she realized she was stuck. She thought through what I would do if I were helping her and she remembered me using scissors from time to time to cut out stubborn rubber bands. She got the scissors that I had used and she cut the ponytail out. As far as she was concerned, the problem was solved.

Along the day, John and I found clumps of hair laying all around the house in odd places. We were calm at first but after the 7th or 8th clump was found, one hidden in her art supplies, we left a message with the triage nurse at the doctor's office on a Friday evening. We braced ourselves for terrible news about a rare disease. I got out the brush. John asked me not to do it, with a genuine fear in his eye, but I held my breath and combed carefully through her hair prepared for it all to fall out in my hands.

As I brushed, I noticed a distinct pattern to the clumping. All pieces on the floor seemed to be of the same length and when I looked closer, they seemed to be coming from one section of her head. I put the brush down, snuggled her close, and promised that she would not be in trouble if she had cut her hair but I told her that I needed to know. She tearfully fessed up to what had happened. When the nurse called back, we told her the good news, and she giggled and said, "Poor little girl!"

She's healthy and I am reminded again how lucky I am. I hug her more than ever now. We did, however, have a fashion issue to solve. When we took her to the salon, we were told that the only thing they could do was to give her bangs. We agreed but when they were cut, Annalise took one look in the mirror and looked right at us and said, "I look Horrible!!!!" The stylist thought she was just being cute, but it was genuine disgust coming out of my daughter with that sentence. I promised her that she looked beautiful but she wasn't ready to believe me. Yet.

It's taken some time, and while she still hates her bangs, she believes me that they'll grow back. She's promised not to cut her hair again, and she is content with pushing the bangs to the side for now. My joy is seeing her keep her confidence and poise, not letting the trivial things bother her, and watching her patiently grow them out! It's a good story to have so early because I can't find a woman out there who has not cut her own bangs (and regretted it!). I consider her lucky because at 6 years old, my little one has already experienced and recovered from this traumatic rite of passage.

First Newspaper Appearance

Justin's been playing football for a few years now. His first season was on the Flag Blue team with the Panthers, his next season he played Tiny Mite for the Portsmouth Patriots, and then he returned home to play on Mighty Mite Blue and Junior Pee Wee Blue Panther teams. This season they have achieved the ultimate in youth football...A SPOT IN THE Q BOWL! They take the field this Saturday to play for the Championship. Below is a newspaper article that was printed yesterday in the Eastlake Times.

Undefeated Eastlake Faces Otay Ranch in 2011 Super “Q” Bowl

This year Eastlake’s unbeaten Panther’s Junior Pee Wee Blue team (ages 10 and 11) will face Otay Ranch Blue (10-1) at this year’s Super “Q” Bowl, sponsored by San Diego’s Youth Football & Cheer (SDYFC).

The winner will be crowned the best team in the conference and possibly San Diego county, as SDYFC is arguably the most competitive youth football league in San Diego.



Less than three miles separate the two Chula Vista football teams but for two hours a day, four days a week (San Diego Youth football mandates teams switch to 3 days per week after Labor Day) both teams have tirelessly practiced from July to Mid-November to successfully reach this milestone.

Led by first -year head coach, Clarence Freeman, the Eastlake Panthers come into the “Q” Bowl championship confident having beaten Los Toros Bulls last week 31-0.

However, the championship game should be a good one as it will be a rematch from Week 8 when Eastlake Panthers barely beat Otay Ranch 19-15.

Good luck to both teams.

2011 Super “Q” Bowl
Event: 2011 Super Q Bowl (Jr. Pee Wee Division)
Date: Saturday, November 19th
Time: 12:00 PM
Location: Southwestern College
Cost to attend: $10.00 adults $5.00 children 6-14
Head Coach: Clarence Freeman
Eastlake Panthers Blue (11-0) vs Otay Ranch Broncos Blue (10-1)

Q BOWL 2011 @ Southwestern College
Mighty Mite-Balboa vs Skyline 10:00am
Junior Pee Wee-Otay Ranch (Blue) vs Eastlake (Blue) 12:00pm
Pee Wee-Del Norte vs Balboa 2:00pm
Junior Midget-Coastal vs Skyline 4:00pm
Midget-Menifee (Red) vs Steele Canyon 6:00pm

Happy Birthday Papa

We have a very strict rule in our house: "If Papa does something, we should probably not do it ourselves." It's a good general rule of thumb for them to follow in terms of behavior because it often guides them in the choices they make. For example, they can ask themselves on the playground before jamming their fingers in a friend's nose, "Would Papa do this?" If the answer is "yes" (he would), they're supposed to choose not to do it.

On this special day, however, we thought a tribute to Papa would be appropriate. The kids practiced and negotiated terms with me in order to make it authentic. I gave in on almost everything they thought of, but I did ask them to change "jerk" to "nerd" so it doesn't rhyme as well as they would have liked. Mom's fault on that...

Enjoy! Happy Birthday Papa!

"Top Gun" kind of day

One of the perks of Navy Life is access to Breakers Beach on Coronado Island. It's usually a quiet, family-friendly place so I like spending afternoons there with the kids. When we went down there last week with John, it was a whole new experience! There was a ton of activity in the air and I felt like we were in a scene straight out of Top Gun.

Here comes a Hawkeye on final approach.

The handoff - right in front of the Hotel Del.

Annalise plays in the sand with PT going on at the water's edge.
She will continue ignoring the handsome men in uniform...

I don't know that anything else needs to be said.

We spent the day in the sand having a good old time. I'm sure you wouldn't believe me if I told you that there was even a volleyball game as we were leaving. Yes, there was. Sadly, it was no Maverick or Goose, Ice or Wolfman, but it was still one for the books.

Remembering 9/11

Daddy and his little athletes at the starting line.

Annalise on the trail - just starting out.

Crossing the finish line.

Nana and Mom enjoying a hard earned iced coffee after the race.

It was 10 years ago that life changed so drastically for all of us. I still remember very vividly the events of that morning as I'm sure so many others do. What I remember just as clearly are the days after; looking for my friends, trying to get from Dallas to San Diego, and driving across the San Francisco Bay Bridge 9 days later listening to George W. Bush declare War on Terror. I was with my boss at the time, a prior sailor himself, and I remember him saying, "Well, that certainly shakes things up a bit!"

I was in Michigan the next March when we invaded Iraq, Justin was 9 months old, and John was deployed to the Persian Gulf. I usually had email communication with him but with all of that going on, email was obviously cut off. I held our son in my arms that day in Grandma T's living room and I said a quick prayer that my family's part in this story would someday make sense to me. Grandma was with me and, in her aging mind, she connected with me again even closer than she ever had before. She worried with me as she remembered her own experience waiting for my Grandpa, a deployed Navy Sailor, to come home safely from WWII.

Life has changed for everyone since that day. For my family, it has meant that the word "war" is a part of our daily life. I no longer consider the connection of 9/11 to what we do today, but when I look back, I can see how much a part of who we are is driven by that event. I also realize how lucky we are that the impacts to our family are merely inconvenience rather than true sacrifice or loss.

We have moved on since September 11th but my husband teaches me often that it's important to stop and remember in order to learn and move forward. I'm not sure what I had planned to do in order to honor the 10th Anniversary, but it likely would have passed without much acknowledgement had John not chosen to remind us all how important it is to honor and remember. In that spirit, we participated in the Travis Manion 9/11 Heroes Run which was created to "honor the fallen by challenging the living."

Justin got to run the 5K Trail Run with his Dad and they crossed the finish line far ahead of me. Justin amazes me with his will to face any challenge on the football field so I'm not sure why I was so surprised at his amazing run, but I was. I learned a lot about my daughter that day - specifically that she is very competitive yet retains her flair for the dramatic at all times. There were several points where she would sprint ahead, leaving me in the dust, only to stop and have to rest because she was "soooo tired!" I coached her along until one point close to the end when she stopped to tell me, with huge tears in her eyes, that she didn't want to finish. I was afraid for a minute that I had pushed too hard, but imagine my shock when she hit the gas pedal a second later to chase down a Grandpa who ran by saying, "Come on little girl - you're not going to let ME beat you, are you?" She finished strong with a smile on her face one pace in front of John and Justin who came back to cross the finish line with her. She also finished several paces in front of the friendly Grandpa who gave her the kick in the pants she needed.

There's no doubt that life has changed for me and this country since the towers went down. I'm thankful for those who have sacrificed so much greater than we have in order to keep us safe. I'm thankful that my gifts in life walk safely and freely by my side every day. I'm so happy that my family stopped to honor and remember and that we will continue to do so in the future.

Little Fish

ICE CREAM EVERYWHERE!!!

Starfish


Swimming and Dunking

I'm not sure why, but Annalise has always had a healthy fear of the water. She's never been a fan of having it in her face and it's generally a bit of a fight to wash her hair in the tub because she needs to be absolutely certain that there is ZERO CHANCE that a single drop of water will even venture near her nose, ears, or eyes. Yes, I know, I should have been running water over her face as a baby in the bathtub, but I didn't, so she's had to overcome the challenge herself.

We've been working hard on getting her to be happy in the water this summer and we started out with a life jacket, paired with a Nemo inner tube, and a death grip on me whenever she went in the water. Eventally, she got brave and she became comfortable in the water on her own with just her life jacket. Through playing in the water with a ton of friends, she's gotten even braver and I've been trying to talk her into putting her face in the water. No luck so far...

I'm not sure what happened today, but I think she just decided she was ready to give it a try! I asked her if she wanted to play "starfish" (which I had seen another mom doing) and as a starfish she was 100% on board with floating on her back with her ears in the water. She says it's peaceful under the water without all of the people screaming all over the place. (Huh - maybe I should try living under the water?). After Starfish was over, she said she was ready to dunk under the water with me. I've been bugging her to try for months so I was a little surprised when she asked me! She held on to my hand and went completely under. I came up pretty quickly to check on her and there she was...hanging out below the surface! We started the day with her holding her nose but, as you can see, she's ready to try blowing "nose bubbles" and now she's rockin' it!

Hanging Lake

Jasmine roughing it at the bottom of the trail.

Self Portraits never turn out as amazing as I imagine them to be. This is me in front of one of the waterfalls at the bottom of the trail just as "sweat fest" kicks in.

One of my favorite spots on the way up

Another favorite near the top

The kids on the hike with Patty

The amazing...Hanging Lake

I remember my very first hike in the Rockies with an amazing amount of detail. It was a fairly difficult hike at the time and I remember feeling like I had found the top of the world when I finally made it to the top. There was a gigantic green lake with two waterfalls flowing into it that seemed like a scene from a movie. I was with two other stinky boys at the time, so I remember playing in the water and dreaming that I was a mermaid princess living in a magical land while they annoyingly duked it out with swords and grenades off to the side. I remember a tree had fallen into the lake and I pretended that it was my bridge to the other side of the world. I've always held that picture in my head and I was anxious to return to show it to my own kids.

The magic was a bit different this time around but it was a day I'll remember for a long time. We got to the bottom of the trail and discovered that we could not bring Jasmine with us so I started out enjoying a spot in a shady waterfall at the bottom while Jasmine explored around us. I was sad not to go up but honestly very happy camping out where I was. Mom hiked part way with the kids and then had an attack of the guilty conscience and came back down to get me. She left the kids with "Ms. Patty" who is a wonderful woman blessed with the patience needed to get through a tough hike with my kids.

I started up the trail on a mission to catch them and I immediately started the sweat fest and the heavy breathing that comes with high altitude. I was a bit embarrassed by my condition given that I had recently run a marathon and it didn't help that my young kids were miles ahead of me! I took some deep breaths, kept going, and relaxed to the sound of the waterfalls winding through the trail. I expected to run into the kids about halfway up, but I never did. I knew they were in good hands, so I sat back and enjoyed the hike. It was a full hour of peace in my childhood mountains all to myself and I enjoyed every second of it. I would have liked to share it with them, but I have to admit that it might have been tainted with periodic rantings of "get your hands off your sister!" and "yes...you do have to keep going or I'll feed you to the wolves" had it turned out the way I had planned.

When I reached the top, there they were, sitting quietly on a rock enjoying a snack. The lake was just as I had remembered and I knew why my brain has refused to let go of the experience after all of these years. It was nature, pure and simple. It was beautiful. I know that my kids did not have the same experience I did, but sometimes that's OK. It's still my lake, my memory, my peace, and my story. From time to time, a mom has to remember her own childhood and embrace the experiences that shaped her in order to be a better mom in the end. My kids will likely remember this day because they got to hike with a new friend and they'll remember the beauty when I prompt them mercilessly. For me, it was a lesson. My kids will always love me and I will always love them, but we might not always have the same journey, stories, or dreams, and in the end that's maybe just the way it's supposed to be.