Desert Breeze Competition Chandler, AZ

Ho-hum..another skating competition:) Today we went to the Desert Breeze Ice Skating Competition at our own rink in Chandler. Yeah, didn't have to drive so far this time. It was only a one day competition since it was just for "low level" or "low-medium level" skaters. Jasmine must be getting used to this because she didn't complain about being nervous- just goes out there and does her thing. She won 1st again for her "Boots" Artistic program, and she was the only person in her level for Dramatic with the Annie program. We need to change the Boots program again to make it more difficult so she can move up a notch again. Jazzy and Theresa.

Jazzy and AnnaLi who did her Pocohontas program:)

After the Boots program with Amanda Secord- one of Jazzy's skating instructors. She just graduated from high school and is starting at Mesa Community College.

Making goofy eyes at the camera:)

Funniest thing...:)

Jasmine has an account with a website called "Always Ice Cream" for girls. It's an educational/game based site with categories for math, English, other languages, typing, music, anatomy, science, dog breeds, and many others. They have to answer questions, accumulate points or coins, then they can use those coins to purchase items like a house, a business, etc. She also has a virtual rabbit named Belle, a Polar Bear named Judy, and a dog whose name I cannot remember. She has to feed the correct food to each animal or it will wilt and eventually die. If it's not the correct food for that particular animal, it will spit it out:) So, among many other things, she purchased a "toy store" business. Little people come in to buy the toys, and she earns even more coins. Last night, she was starting to purchase the toys for her toy store. She looked at some of them, studied them, and said very seriously, "That is overpriced"!! in the exact same tone of voice in which I have said it quite a few times when we were shopping and couldn't get something we wanted. I never ever ever say "We cannot afford it". I always say, "That is overpriced and we will not buy it right now"- leaving the door open to get it possibly at a later date, and kind of making it sound like it is just our choice not to get it, even though we really couldn't "afford it". When she said that exactly like I said it, I couldn't stop laughing for the longest time. It doesn't sound funny writing it out here, but it was the most hilarious thing I've heard her say in a long time.

Big Surf Waterpark!!

Finally, it opened up!! It really wasn't all that crowded until around 1pm...then masses of people arrived! We stayed around four hours, which was all I could take in the 107 degree temp. The pool(s) are massive with "rides" of all sizes and shapes. One "extreme" slide seems almost vertical to me! Hope and Jazzy had alot of fun going down the slides on rafts and inner tubes. Then... we ran into Matthew from Imagine Tempe first grade. Swam in all of the parts of the pool, went down every slide their size and weight would allow- many times. Stopped for ice cream and a questionable "BBQ"! They were swimming the entire day and didn't want to leave, but I was just getting way to overheated. Just arrived. Going down the slides over and over. I couldn't seem to catch the exact moment when they would come out of the end of the slide. It was so long! Eating ice cream and "barbeque"!.... in that order. Ran into Matthew. Not very happy to be going home:)

Sleepover continued:)

Up promptly at 5AM. Immediately wanted to go outside and ride bikes. That would be fine, but not with our grumpy-a** old neighbors on a Sunday morning. Had them wait until 7AM. We made a fruit salad for breakfast, and they ate around 2 bites then off to the next thing. It was supposed to look like this one in "Highlights Magazine":))) Putting on a play in my office. I still am not sure what it was about!! Literally every minute or so, "when does the waterpark open, when does the waterpark open, when does the waterpark open"! I thought it opened at 10AM, but no... not until 11AM!! By that time, it will already be well over 100 degrees!

Sleepover with Hope...

Jazzy invited Hope Gonzales and Katie Keudden to spend the night tonight, but Katie couldn't make it. Hope is obsessed with our piano/keyboard, and that is all she wants to do:)) She just wants to play the automatic songs and pretend she is playing while Jazzy dances. Then we went to a 3-D movie new release called "Epic"- about the battle between good and evil in the plant world. I thought it was very cute. Jazzy liked it, but Hope was a little scared. It's rated PG because of a couple of sword fights between the plant fairies and the bad guys. So far they have had pizza and wings, as well as Skittles at the movie theater.

First day of summer school....

Jazzy in front of the same tree again:) Actually, the first day of school was June 6, 2013, but for some reason, I had it written down on June 5. Get your act together Mommy. We showed up a day early!! Better one day early than one day late. Today was "meet the teachers day". The teachers are brand new teaching graduates. They look like teenagers to me:) Apparently, they are the "cream of the crop" from various schools around the country, and are doing their 5 week teaching internships. I have all of their phone numbers, and they are all non-local. There are 4 teachers and one teacher-supervisor per classroom which is an average of one teacher per 5 kids- which is great! They have individualized tutoring in the morning from 8-9am, then reading and comprehension, lunch, then math. Done by 1:30 and off to skating, swimming, gymnastics, etc. I feel kind of bad that Jasmine is going to summer school when all of the other kids are at swim camp, skating camp, traveling, and other fun stuff, but her grades were very bad this year- so that's the breaks when you goof around in school all year. Their goal is to have each child improve by at least 25% on their test scores in the next 5 weeks. It's only until July 3rd, so we can handle it. I told Jazzy that if she gets all A's and B's this coming year, we can go to San Diego Sea World. She has been bugging me for a year to go to Sea World- so we'll see what happens with that.

Arizona Science Center....

110 degrees today:(( My plan was to go to the Arizona Science Center for awhile, then to a movie- both of which are in downtown Phoenix. Then I realized that the Science Center has an Imax! So, first we went to the Planetarium and saw a show on the sun, solar system and constellations. Later, we went to the Imax and saw a 3-D movie about a Polar Bear family. Amazing photography. I've seen Imax movies and 3-D movies, but not a 3-D movie at the Imax. They also showed how the Artic ice cap has melted by around 30% just since 1980. There will be no ice cap at all by 2055, so the Polar Bears and all of the other species will have nowhere to go and will probably die off. Don't know what the consequences will be for that. We saw probably 80% of the exhibits at the Center, just because it is too big to see in one day. Then we went to a biology workshop on "bones":) We dissected a bovine femur and the class was taught by high school interns:) The kids were making "bone marrow melon balls"!!!!!!!! Jasmine was enthralled with it, and I could hardly pull her away. Studying a hurricane- relevant right now with all of the tornados that are happening. Playing with a pully.