So it’s been a little while since the last time we gave an update on all things “Desert Dwelling Smith” and about a hundred times longer since I was actually the one putting fingers to keyboard. 

First of all, Happy New Year to everybody and we hope that 2010 is full of health, happiness, and success for all of you.

And now for the update …

Christmas for us was a good one.  We spent Christmas Eve with Lisa’s family at Gary and Bonnie’s house where we were able to see Lisa’s Uncle, his wife, and their son Cameron (who we hadn’t seen in far too long).  Christmas morning at our house was fun, as it always seems to be every year.  Braelyn was surprised with a handful of treats from Santa and we were able to just take our time and relax together as a family … for a few hours at least … we ended up hosting Christmas Lunner at our house with about 20 friends and family with a fun potluck, bocce ball tournament, and a fire outside on the patio.  It was cool to have so many good people come together and just enjoy each others’ company.

Lisa, Braelyn, and I packed up and headed home to SD for the week between Christmas and New Years and were fortunate enough to see lots of family and friends while we were there. 

We took a family trip (my Mom, Dad, Devyn, and Kyleigh along with L, B, and me) to the Wild Animal Park which Braelyn absolutely ate up.  We took the safari tour, heard Lions roaring, got to touch an African Boa Constrictor, got mooned by a handful of Gorillas, fed Ducks, rode the Carousel, and about died from heat exhaustion (the forecast called for something near 60 degrees but ended up roasting our fully clothed selves with a very January-esque 85).  It was a good family outing as none of us had been there since Devyn was in Middle School (10 years ago at least).  Braelyn also decided she wanted to get her face painted … pretty darn cute in my biased opinion.

My parents hosted a New Year’s Eve open house and we were able to see Aunts, Uncles, Cousins, Friends, and Neighbors … all of whom we haven’t seen in too long … it was awesome to get caught up.

Braelyn and her Gramma Sheri spent some time baking cookies, playing in the front yard, and playing with lots of toys … Braelyn enjoyed having her little cousin following her every footstep for the week too.

Since we’ve been back to reality, Braelyn continues to keep us busy with her dance/gymnastics classes, swim classes, and play dates with her friend Esteka.  We also had another fun annual excursion with Jack and Betty (Lisa’s Gpa/Gma) when “Disney on Ice” came to town – Braelyn hasn’t stopped talking about it nor has she quit pretending to skate around the house.

As this is a rare update with me as the author, I’ll try to give a recap of some of my job/role changes since the last time I posted:

After spending 2009 away from our Major League team for the first time in 5 years; I was running around scouting High School and College players in preparation for the Draft as well as covering and reporting on a handful of Minor League teams in case trade opportunities were to arise and/or to gauge our interest in Free Agent acquisitions.  I really enjoyed my time and was able to earn a more involved role within our scouting department.  2010 will see me covering 21 professional teams (5 Major League, 16 Minor League) for trades/free agency as well as seeing some of the top amateur players in the country as we prepare for the Draft (it sounds extremely similar but it is different, I promise, though it’s hard to explain).  Long story short, lots of travel, lots of writing, lots and lots and lots of baseball … and lots of opportunity.

I’m just enjoying every minute of the off-season right now since my time at home runs out on April 8th.  Braelyn is such an incredible little girl and Lisa, with very little help from me, sets such a wonderful example of what a caring, loving, genuine person embodies.

Long winded I know, but at least I hope you feel caught up.  Best wishes to you and yours …

Matt

It’s about that time for our annual Tolmachoff Farms pumpkin patch visit.

This year the set up was much better than the last few years and because we went earlier in the day, it was cooler and less crowded.  Braelyn enjoyed petting the animals and picking out her perfect pumpkin but she did not enjoy the chicken that was following us around the entire time.  It was hiding in the corn by the pumpkin picking area and jumped out right above her which prompted her to run and yell and have uncle Chris pick her up the rest of the visit!!

We also went in the corn maze this year which started off to be quite simple and ended up with us lost and going around in circles for 25 minutes.  It was funny and we ended up escaping by plowing our way through the middle of the corn and then finding the exit path   Braelyn was also brave and big enough this year to ride on the ladybug train which was pulled by an ATV down a trail next to the corn maze.  She was proud of herself that she didn’t get scared or dizzy when it went around in circles.

We are excited to be going to Disneyland next week and we will have lots of pictures and information to report about the trick-or-treat party at California Adventure. 

We hope you are all picking your “perfect pumpkin” and celebrating the beginning of the fall, holiday season.

Love to All!!

Swimming in September, wearing cool shades, crocs and NOTHING ELSE

Wishing you all this type of fun and happiness!!!!

Happy Saturday Afternoon!

Our family just got back from lovely (and HOT!) San Diego so, I thought I would share all of our fun times with everyone   Because we were gone for a whole week and packed a TON of activities into that time, I decided to make a list of all of the adventures and fun times we had rather than writing paragraphs about each one.  I also have a bunch of pics for everyone to enjoy so…. here we go….

THINGS WE DID/PLACES WE WENT/PEOPLE WE SAW

(These are in no particular order!!)

1. Kyleigh’s 1st Birthday Party

2. Legoland

3. The Sea Life Aquarium

4. Dinner with Sara and Emma

5. Dinner downtown and the show, Wicked

6. Time with family

7. Time at the beach

8. Matt’s Birthday

9. Time in the water (to cool off from the ridiculously HOT weather!)

I will leave it to you all to figure out which pictures below came from which of our destinations   We hope you enjoy the rest of your weekend & hope to hear from you soon!

Love,

MLB Mama

Hello everyone!

We have been enjoying the summer and having Matt around a bit more now that the draft is over. He only works about 5 days a week now, like a normal person, so he gets to join in more activities with us which is nice.

We took Braelyn to the Museum of Contemporary Art in Scottsdale this past week for the “Dog Days of Summer” Family night. The kids got to look at 3 of the exhibits, including William Wegman who photographs the Weimeraner dogs in costumes. They also had a puppet show put on by the Great Arizona Puppet Theater and an art project for the kids. At the very end of the evening, they turned on the fountain outside and had bubbles, juice and popsicles for everyone. It was really fun and Braelyn had a great time looking at all of the colorful exhibits and she really loved being in the water with her Barbies. I love finding unique things like that to do as a family!

We have also been in the pool EVERY DAY and Braelyn is getting a little bit of a tan Today she was swimming as a noodie and sporting some very cool shades!

I also wanted to show everyone how good Braelyn is getting with her writing and drawing. The picture she has drawn is a self-portrait and she wrote her entire name WITHOUT HELP (except for letter N) this morning! She is getting close to reading now – she knows all of her lower case letters and the sounds they make and she has been practicing sounding out letters to spell words. I think the next step is recognizing words and then reading. I am trying not to push her because I want her to enjoy it so I am letting her tell me when she is ready.

We hope all is well with everyone and we are looking forward to hearing from you and seeing you all soon!

Love,

MLB Mama

Hello everyone – it’s been awhile! We have been really busy with traveling this last month and it hasn’t left me much time for writing and blogging. We are home now and I wanted to share some things from our latest trip since it is so fresh in my mind.

Matt and I took our delayed anniversary trip which we were initially supposed to do for our 4 year anniversary last fall. Due to some unexpected circumstances, we had to push off the trip to this summer & we are glad that it worked out.

We spent 5 glorious days in Whistler, British Columbia, Canada and we now remember why we love it so much! The weather, the views and the people make is such a spectacular place to visit. We had sunny, warm temperatures in the high 80s/low 90s which is heaven to us at this time of year. The skies were blue without clouds and you could see the surrounding mountain ranges, lakes and trees forever. We got to be outside everyday whether we were walking, hiking or listening to live music in the village and it was such a nice change.

The first day of our trip was Canada Day, similar to July 4th here in the US so there was a local parade and people were singing the national anthem and dressed up with red, white and maple leaves. Since Whistler will be hosting the 2010 winter Olympics, the mascots and torch were there at the official opening of their Olympic store.

Thursday we decided to be adventurous and we took an ATV ride up to the top of Blackcomb Mountain for a yummy waffle breakfast. The view from the top of the mountain was breathtaking and made us appreciate what a beautiful place we were in. We also went through a mud pit, saw a deer and fawn and a bear sitting on the side of the mountain. Bears are a pretty regular thing to see in Whistler – I have seen one each time we have been there for the past 12 years – but it is still pretty amazing to see wild animals in the “wild”. He just sat on the mountain munching on grass and plants and was completely unaffected by the noise or the fact that 8 people were staring at him taking pictures.

Friday we took the ski lift to the top of Blackcomb Mountain and hiked for a couple of hours back to a lake that was partially frozen and surrounded by snow, even though the temperature outside was about 70 degrees. Matt hiked without his shirt and I was wearing a tank top but there was still several feet of snow on the ground and thick ice on the lake!

After our lake hike, we took the new gondola built especially for the Olympics – the Peak to Peak. This gondola takes you from the top of Blackcomb Mountain to the top of Whistler Mountain in 11 minutes which is REALLY fast. It is however, also REALLY scary as there is NOTHING below you but a creek and trees and you are VERY high up in the air. The engineering is as such that there is no support stations between the 2 peaks so you are just kind of hanging out there in between 2 tall mountain peaks. All I can say is that I am thankful that it was only 11 minutes and that I did it for the experience but won’t be doing it again When we got over to Whistler mountain we took an open-air ski lift to the peak for some amazing views of the whole valley. We also got to eat a yummy BBQ dinner at the lodge and listen to live local music.

Saturday was our last day to eat, shop and appreciate the time we had together. After lunch, we got into our rental car (which we hadn’t driven since our arrival! In Whistler when the weather is nice, you can walk everywhere and Matt calculated we walked about 5 miles each day!) and drove back to Vancouver to stay at a hotel near the airport since we had an early morning flight on Sunday morning.

We had such a great time and it was a much needed vacation for us away from all of the realities of normal life. We got to sleep in and do whatever we wanted with no schedule and no time commitments and it was really nice to be able to do that for a few days. My parents and grandparents took care of Braelyn and Casie for us up at the cabin so that we could get our time together and we really appreciate it (as always) and it made it easier for me knowing that she was in a really fun place so she wasn’t worried about us not being there.

We hope you enjoy the pictures but I must say they do not do justice to the true beauty of Canada. If you ever get the chance, VISIT because I haven’t met anyone yet who hasn’t absolutely loved being there!

Have a good week!

Love,
MLB Mama

HI!

Just a warning: Get ready for PICTURE OVERLOAD

We have been so very busy the last few weeks and have captured it all on film! 

My cousin Sara and her daughter Emma came to visit last week and we had so much fun with them catching up and showing them our usual hang outs (The Zoo, park and Museum).  Braelyn was really happy to get to know her newest cousin and was constantly touching her head and cheek and giving her kisses.  She was a little leery about sharing her toys but for a 3 year old who is used to ALL the attention, I think she did rather well. 

Matt had off for a day or so and was able to join us on the visit to the Zoo/Aquarium where we spent 1/2 the day and had lunch near the shark aquarium.  It was a little bit warm but we managed to escape into the indoor exhibits as the temperatures got too hot. 

The Children’s Museum in downtown Phoenix is one of my favorite places to take Braelyn.  We have an annual pass so it’s great to just pop in for a couple of hours to get out of the heat.  It has some of the most creative, hands-on exhibits I have ever seen and it is entertaining even for kiddos that are Emma’s age because there is so much going on.  There is a kids grocery store, pizza kitchen, flower garden a “noodle” forest and lots of other cool exhibits.  It has been 5 years in the making and they are always adding new features and activities for the kids to do.

Matt has had a bit more down time lately so he and Braelyn have been bonding a bit more and spending some more time together.  When I sat down to write this blog and go through the pictures, I realized there were quite a few of them together so I thought I would put together a little collage since he is on the road right now (for 12 days) and would probably like to see some pictures to remind him of home.

I have been keeping extremely busy between entertaining guests , taking Braelyn to all of her activities and working with Casie at her training classes to become a therapy dog plus trying to maintain my workout schedule and some sanity as well.  My mom had back surgery 2 weeks ago and I have been trying to help out a lot at my parent’s house too. 

Braelyn is still enjoying her art class where just this week she made a clay family (from L to R – Me, Braelyn, Matt and Casie is the one with the red face!). 

She also passed the test to move up from her Goldfish swim class to a Jellyfish class.  Uncle Chris says she is the youngest Jellyfish as most are 4YO and that she will probably be in this class for awhile since it requires them to swim across the entire pool and do a lot of floating and turning over by themselves.

She is still doing dance classes and I am going to be switching her to a different class for the summer so she can be with her friend Esteka.  They are doing a Princess themed summer dance recital in mid July where they dress up like Princesses and dance to Disney songs.  I will keep you updated on dates for that as it should be VERY fun and funny!

Matt is still plugging away at the amateur scouting side of things.  The high school season is ending soon and right now he’s away on a pro-scouting coverage back east in Washington DC and Delaware.  When he returns, they will be prepping for the draft which is the first week of June and then after that we are taking a much needed vacation to Whistler, Canada over July 4th.  We aren’t sure what exactly his assignment will be after the draft and school years are over, but he does have some additional pro coverages in August and the Dbacks are running a scout team that he helped put together as well as a summer league team so I’m sure he will be working on those things as well. 

Casie continues to be such a good puppy for us.  Now that she has finally recovered from all of her ailments and is obedience trained, she is a joy to take with us wherever we can.  I will be starting agility (obstacle course work) with her in mid-May and we are taking the classes with my cousin, Lauren and her dog, Levi.  We are looking forward to it.  I also take her to weekly group training classes through my dog trainer which help her get better socialized and used to all different people, noises, situations, etc.  She is only 7 months old but does everything on command and will stay and listen until we let her go.  Everyone remarks how well behaved she is and because she is VERY smart, it has been pretty easy to train her.

I think that is all from our neck of the woods.  We look forward to hearing from you!

Love,

MLB Mama

P.S. Here are some miscellaneous pictures – didn’t think you’d seen enough!!

Hello All!

We hope you had a great Easter Here are some recent pictures of Braelyn and Casie. Not much new to report here. We will have some pictures and video of our upcoming visit with Cousin Sara and Baby Emma next week. Hope all is well!!

Just wanted to send out a quick note with some pictures and video (thanks to grampa Tom for the pictures!)

Braelyn is really loving her “goldfish” swim class.  She can now float on her back ALL BY HERSELF and then roll over onto her tummy.  She can also jump in from the side, swim around Chris and then back to the wall, as well as swim underwater to Chris in the middle of the pool.  When she is able to roll from her tummy to her back unassisted, she will move up levels to the “jellyfish” class which Chris also teaches.

Braelyn and Casie also LOVE their newest outdoor toy -- the Bubble BBQ, sent over from San Diego from Gramma Sheri.  They enjoy jumping up to pop the bubbles together and chasing them all over the backyard when they blow in the wind.

I was able to catch some of the antics of the bubble play on video -- hope you all enjoy this as much as we did!  Have a good week

We have been busy these last 3 weeks and hope you are all doing well!

First off, Braelyn started an art class and dance class right after her Birthday. She loves the art class and painted a dog and cat figurine (which Casie promptly took out in the backyard and ate!!!!) and made a horse and rose out of clay which are still surviving The class goes in 3 week cycles so she is off from that right now and during the next session will be sand art, more painting and other messy stuff!!

The dance class is a combo tap, ballet and tumbling which has not gone over well. She likes the tap but she says that the ballet music makes her “too sad” and she cries during that whole portion. Since it is close to her nap time, I thought maybe she was overtired too which added to the sadness. This week we are switching her to a combo jazz and tap class in the evening with the hopes that she will be well rested after her nap and that the music will be more upbeat!

We also had Casie spayed 2 weeks ago and have been on the constant “puppy patrol” trying to keep her calm so she doesn’t rip her incision. This is hard with any puppy but add in the fact that she is a Golden Retriever, extremely excited and feels perfectly fine despite her incision and that makes for a very tough job!! The vet did a great job with her and said she was a model patient and got lots of attention from the vet staff When we brought her home, she was wearing a pressure bandage and full body gauze suit to keep her from getting to her stitches. It only lasted about 2 days and then she had bitten a hole in the sleeve so we had to put her into a tank top to keep her covered!

She and Braelyn are proving to be best buddies and Braelyn is always laying down next to her in the hall, hugging and kissing her and asking me to take pictures. I obliged her……

Finally, I had to include this last photo because the circumstances around it were so funny The other night my grandparents were here and we were all downstairs at my parent’s house playing in her playroom. She looked at my grandpa and said “Grampy, would you like to wear this hat because you have a bald head!” All of us started laughing and she made both Grammy and Grampy wear hats and take a picture with her.

I hope to have some video of her dancing soon to post, as well as several other songs that she can sing. She is establishing quite a repetoire and will probably soon be singing in shows at Disneyland because of her liking for princess ballads!!! I also hope to have a post from Matt soon telling you all about his new job and how it is going after the first 2 months or so.

Because Matt isn’t going to be traveling as much this season, we probably won’t be getting out to see everyone as much as we’d like, but we are thinking of you all and hoping that things are going well for you during these difficult times. Take care!!!!

MLB Mama