New addition to the family...

Welcome Aron!

Our family is growing, but only in the animal department....no more babies from this mama! Last week Bryan was given the opportunity to join the K9 unit for the Alameda County Sheriff's Department. Yesterday morning Aron officially joined the clan. He is a 3 1/2 year old German Shepard from Czechoslovakia. Aron will start going to work with Bryan next week. In a few weeks he and Aron will go to dog school for a month, after that they will be certified to patrol the streets of Castro Valley. We have a very bilingual family now considering Sierra (our 3 year old German Shepard) speaks German and now Aron speaks Czech. Chris is already learning a few Czech words. He is more then excited about having a new dog in the family, he has not stopped talking about him yet! We are very proud of Bryan and excited about this great new opportunity he was given.

The kids Father's Day pictures

For Father's day this year I took the kids to get some pictures for Daddy. They were so well behaved and actually cooperated with me. Which for my kids is huge. usually it is a regular three ring circus when we try and do anything like this. Enjoy the pictures.....the are precious.

Chris & Dani's Birthday Party

Here are few of the great pictures my friend Shannen took at the kids party a few weeks ago. Chris and Dani had a great time with about 30 of their friends.....yikes (that was a lot of little people.) Dani enjoyed her first taste of cake and tried with all her might to lift the whole thing up with both hands. Chris was a great big brother and gladly helped her blow out her candle and eat her cake. Both of our kids are blessed to have such great kids that they will be able to grow up with and call friends!

Tahoe Getaway

After a fun birthday party for the kids (pictures to come soon) we went to Tahoe with Bryan's family for a few days. The kids had a great time running around in the trees, on the beach at Lake Tahoe, hiking around Emerald Bay and hanging out around the house. Turns out Dani loves the beach and Chris was a huge fan of hiking in the mountains.

having some good laughs with auntie brooke

classic self portrait

dad & chris and what is left of "big tree"

dani enjoys her first bite of ice cream

fun at commons beach

did you say something mom?

i think i look better in the hat mom

all four of us enjoying the view at emerald bay

Trip to the pool

Yesterday was spent poolside with the Benson's in Moraga. Dani enjoyed her first time in the pool while Chris and Hailey had a blast running around the kiddie pool. It was the perfect way to spend a very hot day.

I really don't think you can get much cutter than this!

She is ready for the pool

Happy 30th Birthday Alison.

For those keeping track, yes Alison did turn 30 last month on April 8th, but we needed to wait a little bit so she could celebrate with her good friend Sara who turns 30 this month. Last Friday we gathered at Superfrank's Fun Adventure with 75-80 of our good friends and family to celebrate. What 30 year old wouldn't want to spend their party playing dodgeball, air hockey, wack-a-duck, and skeet ball. This was a perfect fit for Sara and Alison.

The birthday girls!

Our AMAZING cake!

Everyone loves sparkling candles.

Sheree, Alison and Joanna (friends from church.)

Krista and Ali in an intense air hockey game.

Alison, her mom and sister Amy

Krista, Alison and Amy....these girls have been friends through it all for 2 decades now!

Fun at the Asparagus Festival

Yet another benefit to living in T-town is that we are close to Stockton so we can go to Annual Asparagus Festival. The kids had a great time walking around and then enjoying the dozens of different bounce houses. This was a dream for Chris...he did not know what one to jump in first. Believe it or not we were able to get him out of the houses long enough to go on a few rides. Dani just hung out with us while we walked around watching everyone munch on their deep fried asparagus and washing it down with asparagus margaritas.

A little ghetto in our life.

I don't know how many people are aware of the massive city wide event that takes place in Tracy twice a year. This is a day that the town comes together....we all seem to end up sharing items we never thought we would share. Trash Day. This is not any ordinary trash day....no, this is the day when you are allowed to put anything (and I mean anything) out on the curb and they will come by and pick it up. I think we were a little shocked the first year we lived here butt his is quickly becoming a day we look forward to. Not only can we get rid of all the random things sitting on the side of the house, but also it is sheer entertainment.

For our neighborhood the trash gets picked up on Fridays, this means the fun begin Thursday. People are slowly starting to move things to the curb, as this process begins the creepers emerge. These are the dozens and dozens of people that will drive though the neighborhoods with pickups, vans, trailer and box trucks looking to see if one mans trash can become another mans treasure. So last night Bryan and I started to go through the house, the yard and the garage to see what we could add to our pile. The first things to go out was our old BBQ. Chris and I were in the yard cutting flowers while Bryan took the BBQ to the curb. In the time that it took Bryan to walk back in to the yard we heard a strange squeaking noise. Bryan peaked over our side fence to see our neighbors little girl quickly dragging our BBQ back to her dad sitting in a lawn chair in their garage. Classic, this thing was not on the curb for more then 2 minutes before it got snatched. Later that evening we even saw him testing it out in his gargae to see if it worked. Well the rest of the night we spent dragging things one by one out to the curb. All night there was a steady stream of people driving by with their trucks to see what they could find.

This morning I was getting the kids ready to leave when I noticed something in front of another house on our street. It was our BBQ, but it looked a little different. Seems as though the neighbors that took it did not need the whole thing, so they just took the parts they needed and put it on the curb....but not theirs. I guess they did not want to seem rude so they put it in front of the house that was vacant next to them. Only in Tracy can you get entertainment like this. I think the best was seeing things that we put in our pile in others peoples piles as I drove down the street. Would you call that buyers remorse maybe? Who knows! All I know is that Bryan and I have decided that we really do need a little bit of ghetto in our lives, Tracy gives us just the right amount!

This is what was left of our poor BBQ

fun pictrues of the kiddos...

Chris doing a little sleep reading....notice the giant drool mark.

Modeling moms sunglasses

Pretty girl and her bow


I think I like this park thing.

Here is the scooter king doing a little one foot action

I love the stroller!