12:30 Dance Party

A few weeks ago I started 12:30 Dance Party! It goes along with my New Years Resolution to keep stress and worry at a distance. How so you might ask? Well every day around 12:30 I turn on a song with a good dance beat, loud enough for the Community Team to hear and we get up and move! We have fun, and we laugh at ourselves. While this doesn’t take away whatever might be going on that is causing stress and worry it gives us a chance to take a break from it. It’s a two to three minute vacation, a time to get our heart rate up, a time to smile and just be happy we are alive.

Now I have to admit I only have 2 strong supporters, Amnerys and Zatozia get up from their chairs and rock out with me every day. Isulith and Danicia pretend to complain, Piestro closes his door, and if Brasse is in the area she runs away as quickly as possible. However I will not give up unless the boss lady tells me to or HR gets involved LOL.

So I am looking for suggestions, give me ideas on new songs, and I would love for you to join us! Institute 12:30 Dance Party in your work place, in your homes, EVERYWHERE! Get up, get moving, have fun, you won’t regret it

This week is a time of thanks, on Thursday we celebrate Thanksgiving. I have so much to be thankful for, I have a great marriage, two healthy daughters, a job I love, a home to live in, family and friends that love me, the list just goes on and on. Let’s not forget video games! I work for a company that makes them! My family plays SOE’s games, my two daughters play Free Realms like crazy. In fact during their Thanksgiving break they are spending a good chunk of their time playing Free Realms. My youngest is totally jazzed that she received this guy over the weekend from the new TCG expansion Baron Von Darkcheat.

We named her Agency Zoey! I took this screenshot in one of my many houses that Kaylee has bought in Free Realms, yes she still loves blocks for those that may remember that. She really loves cooking in Free Realms too, it’s one of her favorite things to do besides change clothes and run around Seaside.

My oldest spends lots of time playing Free Realms too. Her favorite thing to do is tour homes, she talks to one of her best friends on the phone and they tour homes together. It’s pretty funny to listen to.

My husband plays EQII, he has two scheduled nights during the week and he also raids on Sundays. Generally on Sunday afternoons all four us are in the garage “Man-Cave” “Computer Room” playing video games together. If our neighbors came over they would think we are pretty geeky. I am very thankful for my geeky family.

Writing this has got me out of my funk, and helped me remember to be thankful for the long list of blessings God has given me.

What are you thankful for this year? Also shouldn’t we try to be thankful more often, not just during the Thanksgiving season?

Anyway I wanted to talk about what a wonderful time I had…

On Monday which happened to be Halloween, I drove my husband’s grandma to the airport. She is half of our support system, she takes care of the kids three days a week for us while we are at work so when she found out I was taking vacation, she decided to take one herself and booked a trip to spend the week in Florida with her daughter. If you are a regular Fan Faire attendee for the last four years they’ve made the trip to Las Vegas and entertained my kids while I’ve worked and enjoyed Fan Faire. They really love coming to Vegas. It was nice spending a few hours with her. Catching up on the stuff the kids do during the week when I am not with them and that sort of thing. We got to air our concerns about the girls, work out any issues, ask questions about the way to do homework, or handle any other things that have cropped up in the past couple of week.

I made it back home in time to meet my best friend and we drove up to pick our girls up from kindergarten, they are in the same class. Then we ran some errands until it was time to pick up the 5th grader. After that I drove home, picked up my hubby, the Halloween costumes and dinner items. Then we drove out to my Dad’s house, he needed a ride since they were going to join is for Trick or Treating. My mom was going to come straight from work. Here are my girls in their costumes.

Kaylee my little kitty cat.

Katie the Police Woman, “stick em up!”

The kids got an epic ton of candy which we still haven’t finished off. They had so much fun trick or treating. The night was extra special because this time last year we were trick or treating with my best friends family and their dad was just days away from coming home from Afghanistan.

Tuesday I walked 5 miles with my best friend while we waited for the kindergartners to get out of school. Katie finished her Solar System project for school here is the final product! It wasn’t officially due until November 10th but she turned it in early.

Solar System Project

Wednesday I stayed in my PJ’s all day… I cleaned out my DVR, watched movies and relaxed.

Thursday after we dropped the kids off at school my best friend and I walked 11 miles!

Friday, well Friday kinda sucked It rained so we didn’t get walk again like we planned, then while we were at the gym checking things out my husband called to tell me our car slide into another car due to the rain. We still don’t know the status of my car. We should find out later this week if it’s totaled or not. But since my husband was home on Friday due to his untimely car accident I made him go grocery shopping with me, and pick up the kids with me. It was really nice to spend some relaxing time with him.

Saturday since the weather was clear we walked again, 11 miles again but we did hills! Here is the view from one.

The view from the top

I did want to share how I spent much of my vacation…

Coloring with my girls

It was a great vacation, I got some much need quality time with those 2 gorgeous girls in the above picture. Plus I did get some one on one time with Max our newest family member. She is learning to walk on a leash and I am doing my best to teach her some manners. She thinks Kaylee is a play toy.

Anyway I advise you to take a staycation, it’s awesome!!

We picked up our T-Shirts and our scarves from the Ford booth. In the picture below I am wearing last year’s scarf around my head. One of the booths had whoopee cushions; my kids loved that LOL….

This is us before we ran the 5K: From the left, Monica, Mary and Me.

At 8 AM Pacific Time the run started. Monica and Mary left me in the dust, I didn’t train as much as they did, but I made it through with one of my best times ever in a 5K, 44 minutes and 38 seconds. One thing to note if you throw up during a run, it’s a good thing. I think I pushed myself a little too hard, all through the run, each time I wanted to stop I kept thinking of my sweet Grandma, who passed away in August. She fought cancer for almost 4 years, chemo treatments were harder then this run, her pain was worse then this pain, and so on. So I just kept pushing myself for her and others like her.

This is us after the run… Our faces are really red!!

At 9 AM Pacific time the walk started… There were so many people this time around, it was like herding cattle. Many of us were mooing We didn’t casually stroll our way through it though, we had a good walk. Look at the picture out below, there were so many people on the walk… We had music playing on Mary’s iPod and we sang as we walked and really enjoyed the our time spent with all of the people below who have been touched by cancer.

That’s a lot of people!!

After our second 5K it’s was from for the real journey. My best friend Mary is training for the Susan G. Komen 3 Day in November. She lost her mom to Breast Cancer when we were in the 8th grade so she has done a lot of these walks and runs. This is her 3rd 3 Day. We did a little bit of training with her. We walked up to a restaurant and ate lunch and then walked back to where our cars were parked for a grand total of 14 miles in one day. It was a wonderful day of laughs and talks, remembering those we’d lost to cancer. Monica lost her Grandma the same month I lost mine to cancer.

After I got home and showered I let my daughters go through my goodies. They kept trying to trick their Dad and me into sitting on the whoopee cushion. I can’t wait to do it all again next yet. Plus in 2013 I am going to walk in the 3 Day!

Autumn 2011

autumn [aw-tuhm] noun 1. the season between summer and winter; fall. In the Northern Hemisphere it is from the September equinox to the December solstice; in the Southern Hemisphere it is from the March equinox to the June solstice.

Officially the first day of Autumn, or as some say Fall, was on Friday September 23, 2011. Now if you live here in Southern California we really don’t get Fall weather. It’s sort of an extension of Summer, just slightly windier and more chance of fire. A new change this year is that Fall is CRAZY BUSY! Since September started I feel like I can’t catch my breath at work or at home. At home it’s a school project here, a paper to sign there, the dog needs shots, doctors appointments and a list of other things. At work it’s the usually suspects but hyped up on espresso or something.

I was wondering what Fall means to you? For me, it’s Halloween. pumpkin carving, trick-or-treat, and hot apple cider. I would love to hear what it means to you.

Here is a cute picture I found on Flickr.

Autumn Leaves

Originally uploaded by loveandasandwich.

(This blog entry is over a week old, sorry for the late post)

Sharing Pets…

We have a bit of a farm at the Rekoske home; three cats, three dogs and a guinea pig.  Our oldest pets Xaiver, a 15 year old Black Lab/Great Dane mix and Frank, a 15 year cat, have been with us since they were babies.  Kaylee didn’t want to share either of those.  Xavier is Daddy’s dog; Frank is Mommy’s cat…

Murray, we recently had to give him up for adoption, is a 10 year old mix breed dog.  In the last year he has attacked Xavier more times then I can count.  This past Sunday he seriously injured Xavier and my husband decided enough was enough.  Kaylee didn’t have a fondness for Murray so she didn’t want to claim ownership of him.

Rajah, we believe is about the same age as Murray.  He is a black and white cat and he belongs to Katie.  She adopted him from the Animal Shelter when she was 3 years old.  Rajah loves Kaylee, but he has so much fur and spends too much time outdoors and not enough time grooming himself that he pokes Kaylee when he tries to cuddle.  So she doesn’t want to share Rajah.

Then there is Miley our Chihuahua/Terrier Mix.  She is 4 ½ years old, my husband and Katie brought her home from the Animal Shelter four years ago this month.  I did not want this dog but this dog has worked her way into my heart.  She technically belongs to Katie, but I think Miley gives her allegiance to me .  Miely is not Kaylee’s biggest fan.  Kaylee wants to carry her around and I don’t think Miley trusts her.

We also have Cassie.  This beautiful diva belongs to my mother in-law.  I am not sure how old this cat is but she is all white and acts like she owns the house.  She is only loyal to Katie and my mother in-law.  She is very loud when she doesn’t get what she wants.  My mother in-law inherited her from a friend that past away, so while Cassie may drive us all crazy at times we love her anyway.

Then here is sweet Ziggy, our adorable guinea pig.  You don’t know he is there until you start cutting up some fruit of veggies, or sharpen a knife; then the only way to get him to stop “weeking,” is to give him a handful of fresh fruit or veggies.  He belongs to Katie.  My mother in-law and Katie rescued him from a box in front of a grocery store 2 years ago.  Kaylee can be a bit afraid of him.

Cats…

We adopted a kitten last summer for Kaylee; the poor thing got stuck in our recliner and didn’t make it out.  Then a few months later we heard about a rescue cat, Kaylee and the cat hit it off and we brought her home.  That cat ran out the front down after about 2 weeks of staying with us, we looked and looked for her but we couldn’t find her.  I hope she found a good home with someone else.  So poor Kaylee hasn’t had any luck with pets.

Max…

At the end of July my mother in-law heard from a friend whose dog had puppies.  The mother was half Great Dane and half Yellow Lab, and the father full Yellow Lab.  We love Xaiver so much and have had so many good memories of him with our girls we couldn’t say no, this combo worked out so well for our family for 15 years this had to be the answer to our prayers.  Nana, my mother in-law, took Kaylee as a surprise to pick up her puppy.  The two of them fell in love.  Her name is Max, it isn’t short for anything I’ve been assured, however her middle name is Maxine and her last name is Maxie LOL.

We love this dog; Miley loves this dog and Xavier loves this dog.  The cats not so much, but hey that’s the natural order of things   So Max has been welcomed to the Rekoske farm… She has taken several stuffed animals out to the backyard, some clothing items, and dishes… She has made a bunch of messes and annoyed us in the middle of the night; but that’s what having a puppy is all about.

Xavier, Miley and Max

Monday marked the begining of an era… Okay I am being overly dramatic… My little one started Kindergarten. It is sort of a shock to my system. I mean I know she’s been growing up, I was at her fifth birthday party. But the first day of big kid school, REALLY? I called her after school and she said she had a good day. She made a friend and she likes her teacher.

To make matters worse my oldest is in the Fifth Grade now. I can still remember her first day of Kindergarten. She also loves her teacher and had a pretty good day. What is really cool about her teacher is he was teaching at the school when my husband went to that school, so they can share stories.

I had the back to school blues that night, parents you know what I am talking about? Fill out a stack a papers, sign your name a billion times, go over the rules with your kids etc… UGH we were up past bedtime. Unfortunately we don’t pick our kids up from the sitters until after 8:00 PM, and it took awhile for me to eat dinner, go over all of those papers and get my five year old settled down. Bedtime is always a chore for her.

Hopefully the rest of the week will be smoother.

Okay so know you know how it works let me tell you why I am writing about it. This application has brought me such joy! It’s given me music to work by, to play EQII by, to work around the house by, or just to browse the internet by. There have also been times I just hang out and see what someone is going to play next. Some of the folks I hang with start themes… Play songs that would have played at your Prom… Play songs that talk about fruit… Silly stuff…. It’s a social game, like all of SOE’s games are.

Some fun tidbits, the goal of my group of friends, get the people hanging out in our room to laugh… So if that means playing a Weird Al song out of the blue then we do it. My favorite is to play Sweet Caroline. This is usually when we are doing instances in EQII and in group chat… You can hear 4-5 people sing Buh buh buh during the chorus. Very entertaining. Oh I almost forgot to mention song stealing… When you play a fun song that everyone is singing along to it’s bound to get added to their play list.

Song uploading is also a neat thing this program allows you to do. The other night as my group of friends were logging into EQII my hubby uploaded the EQII theme song. That was really cool to. So I ask you what songs would you load up?

Give me your 10 songs to play your favorite SOE Game to, to work to (if you can play music while you work) to do household chores by, etc…

Have fun with this…

Keep Jamin and Have fun folks!

Today I am attempting to be a little more zen… I made it to work early, before 9:30 AM I had 4 things checked off of my to-do list…. I have had a chai latte and some peanut butter cookies and I am ready to conquer this day!

So today I am hoping to be a little more like this…

Though we do have our final Live Quest run through’s, a Fan Faire meeting, I am helping with our Webcast today, and a whole slew of other projects that I must over see so who knows I may be like this by the end of today….

See you next time!

I have a confession to make…

I am in love. I stay up late so I can spend time with my love. I give my free time to my love. I can’t stop thinking about my love. I think I have a problem…

This started last week, I get to put the cute little plants down and pick the little sunshine’s and then the Zombies attack! EEP!!!

You may have figured out that I am talking about the video game called Plants vs. Zombies. However I am a little bit sad. You see I’ve played so much that I am already at the very last boss in the game. Fortunately for me, the game can be played again and again and there are tons if mini-games and puzzles I can go back and do. So I am not too heart broken.