She did it!

Zoe received her email today!
We were so excited and couldn't believe she had made it in! Because of her young age, she was only eligible for 2 of their 6 programs...one in Irvine, Ca. and one in Alabama. Unfortunately, the dates of the Irvine program overlap with school, so that wasn't an option. She was accepted into the ABT 3-week program that is held at the University of Alabama.

She couldn't wait to get to dance to talk to the girls that had auditioned, and share the news with Miss Nicole. Some girls made it in, some were wait-listed, and some didn't make it, but there was lots of screaming, hugging, suport and excitement in the air. While at dance, I had Joe go out and pick up some flowers and an ice cream cake, and make a few signs to celebrate!

It was a fun evening although we were full of mixed emotions...incredibly proud that she had made it in, but also a little sad due to expense of the program and the travel costs involved. Zoe is spending a lot of time in prayer that somehow this can happen! For now, we are just feeling blessed that she is on the right path with her training and know that one of these years, she will be able to attend! Congratulations Zoe!

Sick...

It has been an interesting couple of weeks around here, and poor Cooper has been battling a horrible flu. It started last week, and came on hard, he even had to miss a day of school. By the end of the week he was doing much better, but the weekend brought on the worse case of bronchitis he's ever had. That, combined with his asthma, and he has had a rough week. He had to miss another 3 days of school, which he has never had to do!

He's spent lots of time with his nebulizer...
Spent hours and hours watching the sports channel on tv...
and many days of lots of medication...

He has finally turned a corner and is slowly getting well again. Now it's time to catch up on a ton of school work, and get back to normal!

ABT Audition!

About a month ago, Zoe decided she wanted to do her first audition for a dance summer intensive program. Over the holiday break Miss Nicole was offering an audition workshop for the dancers that were interested in attending. They went over technique, tips, what to expect, different program options, etc. That motivated Zoe even more! We did have to discuss that we were just doing this audition for the experience though, not to actually attend a summer intensive. These programs are held at different locations throughout the country, last from 2-5 weeks, and are quite costly. I definitely think she will participate in the next few years, but I'm just not ready for that for her yet!

The American Ballet Theater (ABT) audition in California was being held at CSU Long Beach. We decided to go to Mimi and Gramp's house the night before so that we didn't have to drive as far in the morning. It also gave Mimi a chance to come with us and be a little more a part of Zoe's dance world! She was also our photographer of the day.
I think Zoe was feeling a bit anxious about the audition and wasn't "in the mood" to take pictures! Mimi told her that she would appreciate it one day!


We paid her audition fee, filled out the paperwork, and submitted her photos.
I pinned on her number, and again, she wondered why Mimi had to take a picture!
After meeting up with some of her friends from Dunamix, they all went into the studio to begin their audition. They were lined up in rows and then divided up to split into different rooms.
Unfortunately, we weren't able to watch any of the audition, so we went to coffee with some of the other moms, and tried to calm our nerves for our girls!
After the audition, the girls were full of smiles! They all thought it went pretty well and were feeling a bit more confident.
I love this group of girls!
On our way out, Zoe let Mimi get one more picture in front of the Performing Arts Center so she could remember where her first official dance audition took place!
Results will be sent out in 8-10 days, so we will see what happens!

Detective Work...

Thursday turned out to be a plain old bad day! While teaching, Joe called to say that he had been notified by our credit card company of possible fraudulent activity. I checked my purse in my classroom and discovered that my wallet had been stolen. I was devastated, angry, and sad all at once! Another teacher temporarily covered my classroom and Joe and I immediately went to work making phone calls to get cards canceled, and making lists of everything that was in my wallet. Throughout the day I was able to get everything canceled, call the police to make a report, and get to the bank with my passport id to get some cash.
I was extremely determined to figure out who this was and find them. I'm not sure why I was so intense about it, but I just felt so incredibly violated, that I wasn't going to let them get away with it. I started making phone calls and figuring out what to do. I started with the information from my credit card companies, and contacted the stores where the purchases were made. I met a deputy at the stores and we looked over surveillance video and got pictures of the suspects. At this point, the deputy I met with had little interest in pursuing the case, so he just let me take the photos and video home with me. It made me sick to my stomach to watch the videos, and see them smiling while they were shopping with my stolen cards. I got so caught up in the detective work, it was my mission to get them caught! I went to work spreading the info to as many people as I could and asking for help wherever I could get it. Through phone calls and an email, I was contacted by a lieutenant, who decided to have another deputy meet me for a more official report. Deputy Askins ended up sitting with me for almost an hour over going over every detail of what happened, what I had obtained, and what he could do to help. I did tell him that I knew this was a low priority case, but he was determined to do everything he could to follow up all leads. That ball rolled quickly from there and with lots of fantastic investigative work and questions, he had names, addresses, and search warrants on the suspects. I couldn't believe how quickly and efficiently he was working. Saturday night just after 9pm he called to tell me that the suspects had been arrested and were in custody. Evidence had been confiscated and they were being charged with multiple felonies. I felt an immediate sense of relief and satisfaction. My stomach had been in knots for almost 3 days, and it felt good to know they were caught. They have been linked to several other school thefts and fraudulent credit card use, and I am happy they won't be able to do it again.
Although I wish the circumstances had been different, I learned that I enjoy a little detective work. I also know that I can't stand people that have no regard for others. Maybe I should have gone to the police academy! For now, I am focused on getting everything in my wallet replaced, new ids and cards, and following the case as it progresses from here.

People's Choice Awards...again!

I was thrilled to be able to attend the People's Choice Awards again, as a seat filler, with my posse of girlfriends. We met up at Joy's house and had a caravan up to the Nokia Theater in L.A. Before the awards we enjoyed a nice lunch at Yard House, and talked about who we were excited to see.

It is always a strange feeling to check in at the parking structure and wait in our long lines with the other groups of seat fillers. It is good people watching though, and we enjoy checking out the outfits that others have put together for the night!
Our group was pretty low key compared to some others, but we were ready for our "Hollywood Night Out"!
Once inside, we were happy with our first seats! We were in the center section about 20 rows back.

Once the show began, so did the chaos. Most of us got split up, some were moved to several different places throughout the show. I was lucky enough to move up to the 7th row center, and got to stay in that seat the whole time. I was right behind comedian Kathy Griffin, and 3 rows behind the incredibly handsome Matt Bomer (my favorite guy from White Collar!) Wish I could have taken some pictures, but one of the ladies in charge of the seatfillers was sitting next to me and was very strict on no cameras!
Thankfully Jenny was able to get some shots from her seat!
Kaley Cuocco was this years host, taking over for Queen Latifa. One of my favorite moments of course was seeing Robert Pattinson accept his award for the movie he did this year, Water for Elephants. I love being in the same room with him!

Betty White is turning 90 this month, and it was fun to see her get an award...she is quite a lady!

I also loved seeing Faith Hill perform. She is absolutely gorgeous in person!

The night concluded with tons of confetti shooting through the theater.

We had a fun day, with lots of chit chat and laughter! Hope I can keep up this new yearly tradition!

Dance Photo Shoot

After a long day of traveling back home, we quickly got Zoe ready and went to the dance studio for a photo shoot. She will be doing some summer intensive auditions soon, so she needed a few shots to submit. Although she was exhausted, she had a lot of fun, and was excited to be able to take all her shots on pointe!


She got to change and do some fun poses and jumps too.
Glad we were able to make it to the shoot!

Last Day!

We left it up to the kids to decide what park they wanted to go back to for our final day at Disney World. They both agreed that Animal Kingdom was it! We couldn't wait to go back to see more animals and explore the trails.

We got a much closer look at the giraffe and lions today, and saw a ton of gorillas!

We rode Expedition Everest again!

The Lion King show was awesome and full of amazing acrobats.

We ended the day with our last ice cream and did a bit of souvenir shopping before heading out of Disney World for the last time.
They got Disney gift cards in their stockings, and they were both anxious to pick up a few things. Zoe got a necklace and earrings, and they both decided to start a collection of Disney Vinylmation Mickeys.

Since we were back to the room early enough, we headed out to the pool for some resort fun before packing up our suitcases.

We had a relaxing evening since we had to be up at 2am to get to the airport for our early morning flight.

We thoroughly enjoyed our week at Disney World. It was exhausting, but so much fun, and many memories were made!!

Back to Epcot!

We headed back to Epcot this morning to explore everything we missed on the first day. We were anxious to ride Test Track and Soarin. These turned out to be some of our favorite rides!
We did some more exploring in Future World, and saw a few more shows, including the old 3D Captain EO show with Michael Jackson.

Time to head back to the World Showcase to explore the rest of the countries.

Joe's niece, Michele, from New York, happened to be there at the same time, so we met up with her and spent the afternoon and evening together. It was so much fun getting to see her!
Our first stop was China...
Zoe mastered the art of plate spinning!
Coop got pretty good at walking the dog...

Then we moved on to Norway...

Next up was Mexico...
We couldn't resist the sombreros!

We stopped in Victoria Gardens, Canada...

And moved on to Italy, where we took a brief stop for some chocolate.

We ended the afternoon in Germany...

The kids thought it was so cool for their name to be in this sign (which is exactly where the name came from)...

That ended our day in Epcot, and we drove over to Downtown Disney to have dinner at the Rainforest Cafe. I must have been pictured out, since I didn't get a single picture of dinner. It was so great to enjoy the afternoon with Michele.