Fall break?

Last Sunday, Sara went to Sebastian's home for dinner and to meet his family. His brother, Sergio, made dinner. She had a wonderful time meeting them all. They were fun and welcoming.

Sebastian's siblings

Sara, Sebastian, Melissa (Sergio's girlfriend), Sergio, Samantha and Sabrina

Samantha, Sabrina,  Polo (aka Leopold, his mom's boyfriend), Amanda (his mom), Sara, Sebastian and Sergio

 Sebastian's sister, Sabrina, is an artist. She showed Sara some of her drawings and designs.

Sara got to meet his beloved dog, Misty.

This week was fall break for my kids. Sara and I still had school everyday. The kids played with friends and ran around the neighborhood all week. They played some sand volleyball at the park. They had a great break even without mom. I missed having time with them. They are my favorite humans!

Tuesday, Sebastian came over to my parents house for dinner, in between classes. He was helping Sara study her scriptures.

My mom is such a cutie!

Sebastian, king of the jungle gym!

While it's true that I love Sara and Sebastian, the reason I have so many pictures of them is I'm at school with them all week. I see them more than the rest of the family. They are not the favorites. Mom's don't have favorites.

Tuesday evening, we went to see Brynn Wilde open her mission call! She is going to Lisbon, Portugal. She reports to the Provo MTC February 13th.

Thursday evening was my Glendale Community College Choir concert. I performed in the Chamber Singers and the Concert Choir. Sebastian performed in the Jazz Choir and the Community Choir. The Concert and Community Choirs performed Sunrise Mass, by Ola Gjeilo, together. It was a ton of fun to sing all 30+ minutes of it!

After the concert, we got to meet Sebastian's family. They are absolutely delightful! I'm sure we will be seeing more of them in the future.

These are some of my best friends at school. Brigham and Lucas are basses and I stand right next to them in class since I am the 1st first soprano. We have a ton of fun together!

Brigham Fish, Lucas Miles, Me and Sebastian

I love these guys! They are so sweet to me and treat me like I am just a regular college student, not an old lady.

Another one of the my friends from the bass section, Josue Villanueva.

Some of my favorite ladies!

Johari Flowers and Megan Williams

This is Justice. He was in English with Sara last year at Shadow Ridge. He is in several of my classes this year, including English. 

We snapped this shot before saying goodbye to Amanda. It really was a pleasure to meet her. She is beautiful and so sweet.

 Friday morning it was Sebastian's turn to perform in our studio class. He performed a German piece and a French piece. He did an excellent job on both. I was so proud of him!

Later that afternoon, we took him to the Phoenix Temple. He had never seen one of our temples before and was eager for us to take him to one. We sat in the lobby, talking and reading scriptures. He is excited to get baptized and be able to enter in past the lobby. It really is such a place of peace and learning. I love the beauty of the temple!

They are so cute together!

Daniel and Laney left in the morning to go to the Tucson Temple with the youth from our ward. Daniel had a nice nap on the way there.

Rich drove down to Tucson with Susanna and Andrew later in the afternoon. The ward arranged a family campout after the temple outing.

The moon was beautiful!

Camping with Daddy is the best!

Lincoln Giguiere found a stick bug.

Saturday morning the group went to Karchner Caverns. The tired the super amazing living caves there. They all loved it!

My cute babies!

They enjoyed all the displays and learning about the caves.

Saturday, while they were gone, Sara and I did some Goodwill shopping and homework. We had a fun time as usual.

Sammy and I had a video call. I miss seeing his face around the house, like I do all of my kids who have moved out. I loved every minute with him!

Saturday night, Rich, Sara, Makaila Lundquist and I went to the GCC piano recital to hear Sebastian and Lucas perform. They did a fabulous job. Lucas improvised an incredible five minute piece. It was awesome. Sebastian played a beautiful piece and the performed a second piece. He accompanied himself while singing an Italian art song. He melted all of our hearts with his gorgeous voice. He did wonderfully!

Sadly, I didn't get any pictures at the recital. We spent over an hour talking after. We sat around enjoying the weather. It was Rich and I, Sara, Sebastian, Makaila and a school mate, Thomas, who also performed. It was a lovely evening.

I love Arizona skies!

Sammy went on a hike last weekend and got some awesome pictures!

Sunday evening, Sebastian met with the missionaries to learn about our faith. Andrew's girlfriend Lauryn joined us too. We love Elder Hatton and Elder Packard!

Freddy and Sebastian attempted some crazy duo push ups. They did several!

Andrew found a gecko!

Sara has been behind on sleep. Wednesday evening she took a long needed nap! She finished her honors accelerated history class and she is SO HAPPY about it!

Andrew had a nap next to her. They are such great buddies!

Thursday we didn't have choir because everyone in Gilbert is on fall break. It was a good thing for us because Laney had her school musical theater performance. It was Halloween themed so Sara helped her with her hair and make up. It looked great!

I only got blurry pictures of the performance. Laney did a fabulous job being animated and dancing with enthusiasm!

 Here she is with one of her best friends, Luv Crump.

We have had some of the most beautiful sunsets!!!

Friday, I had my first performance in my studio class. I sang Bel Piacere from the opera Agrippina by George Friedric Handel. I was so pleased with how it went. I was all kinds of nervous through out the week before, but when I actually got up to sing, all my rehearsing and experience came together. I felt really good about it!

Sebastian took Sara and I out to celebrate my performance. We went to Cafe Rio. He had never been there before and he loved it! We had a fun time talking and enjoying the cool weather. They are so happy together! And adorable!

The girls asked Daddy to come out and play poof-square with them. They made it up and had a ton of fun playing it with him.

Saturday morning, Susanna and Daddy went to the Beals Ranch to help with collecting wood and clearing up old branches and such. They got to see some new piglets too. It was a wonderful experience!

Another glorious sunset Saturday night! I love our Arizona skies!

Saturday night, Sebastian sang the National Anthem at the Glendale Community College homecoming game. He did a great job! His best friend, our friend as well, Lucas Miles joined us there and spent the evening with us.

After he sang, we went to the boba shop across the street to see the art on display there. Sara was invited to have a piece hang there. She painted the lovely coral and yellow freesia flowers.

Then Sebastian, Lucas, Josh Jordan and his date Chelsey, and Freddy's girlfriend Sara Magill all came over to play! There was some Thai curry eaten and some Jungle Uno played. There were also many manly feats of strength; all kinds of pull ups, push ups, 40 lb arm curls, and all sorts of strength poses. It was pretty hilarious!

We ended with some tribal dancing!

Then Sara and Sebastian sang with the ukelele, Lucas took the love languages test and we all talked and giggled.

Lucas plays the piano beautifully! Everyone had fun improving together. 

We talked until the wee hours of the morning and then Lucas and Sebastian crashed on the sofas since they were so tired. I didn't want them falling asleep on the drive home.

Today, I spoke in church on kindness and then taught a Sunday school lesson on loving others. It was a pretty wonderful experience and I was glad to have Jessi and my parents there to share it with me, as well as my sweet family. I love the people in our church family too! We are surrounded by amazing people!

Susanna didn't make it to church today. She wasn't feeling well. She has three huge and painful cold sores as well. She has slept almost all day and is feeling much better now. She and Laney have been spending time together every day this week reading scriptures together. They have been getting along so much better and are really starting to be best friends.