Ficker Family

July the 4th is a favored holiday in my family.  When I was a kid, we would always visit Logan Utah and my uncle would by hundreds of dollars worth of fireworks and shoot them off.  I loved it.  My new family doesn't have any set traditions to speak of but it is still by far, one of my fav things to celebrate. 
This year we decided to head up to Soda Springs Idaho.  This would be the second trip we've done there for the 4th since the boys were born.  We stayed in town for the parade so the kids could get a truck load of candy and have their teeth rot out. 
Right after the parade, we headed south with Joaquin's cousin, Stacey, her family and Joaquin's Mom and Jerry to spend the day at Bear Lake.  It was a hot summer day with beautiful, huge gray and white clouds in the sky far in the distance.  We stayed for about 4 hours.   We played in the sand, made sand castles, ate a ton of greasy food.  It was a blast.  Well as the day went on, those pretty clouds got real close, started sprinkling and we decided it would be a good time to start slowly packing up and heading back to our car.  No big rush, we kind of chatted a bit, taking it slow. 
All of the sudden a HUGE gust of wind hits the beach.  And by huge I mean, umbrellas and shade tents went flying.  Then those little sprinkles start turning into big rain drops.  I start getting nervous at this point, hurry and check for twin A and B.  Joaquin and I both spot Brock but can't seem to find Everett.  I look up to the see if I can see him with my mother in law and Jerry but all I see is them, no Everett.  My stomach starts to turn, my heart starts to race.  Those rain drops start turning into hail.  I look to Joaquin with my eye's full of tears and he's asking around but no one has seen Everett.  He turns to me and yells, "Stay here with Brock! Don't leave!"  I do as I'm told and just start praying.  Praying that nothing had happened, praying he hadn't flown away or that if by chance some random family had found him, that he wouldn't be scared and that they would be taking care of him.  So many things start rushing through my head and all the while hail starts coming down harder and harder.  I have Brock wrapped up in my arms with a towel over his head.  He's crying, asking where Everett is, I'm crying, telling him I don't know but Daddy will find him.  He's scared, I'm scared and I know Joaquin is scared. 
I can't really remember the timeline of things after that, I know Joaquin ran back and forth a few times, one time telling me that he had talked to Jerry and he said he thought his Mom had Evie.  Well that put me at ease but then Joaquin hadn't actually seen him so I asked him, "What do you mean he THINKS?" My heart starts to palpitate and I start crying.....again.  So Joaquin runs back over to the parking lot, and runs back again to report that he had found his Mom and Everett hiding in the bathroom.  He then carries Brock to our truck and I slowly follow after him.  It had been so stressful and scary in those 10-15 minutes that I couldn't walk real fast and had started having some pains in my stomach.  I eventually got there and saw Everett, gave him a hug and cried a little more.  Sheesh, am I hormonal or what?
So what really happened to Everett?  Well that little boy hates the wind and hates rain.  So I think what happened was he felt the light rain start to fall and he took off as fast as he could with Toni and Jerry.  Once that big gust of wind had hit the beach, he was scared.  Toni said sand got in his eye and he started to cry so she dropped everything she was holding to pick him up to make him feel safe.  Well a woman in the bathroom heard his cry and told them to come inside the bathroom for shelter and to wait out the hail. 
I was so thankful that nothing more had happened and that it only lasted a few minutes.  I really did think while all this was going on, this must be a tiny sliver of how people in the south must have felt when Katrina (or any other hurricane) hit. 
I'm afraid to say, I think Everett is scared of any storm clouds.  Anytime he see's big gray clouds, he asks us if there's going to be a storm.  We constantly have been telling him he's safe and he doesn't need to worry. 

T-ball


Had a visit from one of my best friends from high school. Such a blast.

Here I am, back in this amazing world of blogging. I was being asked why I haven't blogged in a long while and I really had no real reason and so now we're back.

It is a little overwhelming to figure out where to start up again, especially since its been 6 months. So I thought I would just start with what's happening now, rather than back date.

Summer time is here and the living is good!!! So much is happening. I'm obviously knocked up again. That's not really new news. I'm about 21 weeks along. We are so busy now that summer has arrived. Which I wouldn't have it any other way. We've been camping twice. Our latest trip was up at Ponderosa park in McCall Idaho. We had an absolute blast. We went during the week so no one was really there. We had an entire beach to ourselves for half a day. It was heavenly. I loved every moment we were up there. I can't wait to go back.

Another fun activity we started up this year is t-ball. That keeps us busy two days a week. The boys weren't too excited about it at first but now that they are understanding how to play, they have become more and more into it. At their first game they would both just stand in the field and either watch the ball roll by them, Everett, or dance around and make screeching monkey sounds, Brock. But they both have improved a lot and I'm really so proud of both of them. At their last game, they really got into it.

This summer is going to be busy with visitors and camp trips. It is going to be a summer to remember.


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Location:june

Our month in December was busy and exciting and full of the Christmas spirit.  We started listening to Christmas music in October and there wasn't one day Everett would let me listen to anything different.  If I did put something else on, he'd ask, "Mom, is this Christmas music?" and if I replied no, he'd always ask to have it put on.

The boys turned 4 this December.  We had what was suppose to be a little party but then ended up getting way out of control with all the people we invited over.  Our house really isn't set up the best for having a lot of company.  We didn't realize that until we had around 35 people in it.  Now we know.  I think the boys had a good day.  Next year I will plan a little bit of a funner birthday party for them.  Maybe go somewhere and have it at a jump house or something.  This year it was just crazy and didn't really end up being a party for them at all.  It ended up being a get together for adults and kids.  I felt a little bad about it but they have plenty more birthdays to come.  And I think we made up for it with how fun and magical Christmas was this year.

So this year for Christmas we decided to go with some friends of ours and go hunting for a Tree.  When they said that, I thought they just meant that we would drive up to someones tree farm, drive around, pick out a tree and we would get to cut it down ourselves.  Well, I was sorely mistaken!  We drove up into the wild mountains and hunted.  The other 3 families whom we were with were able to find beautiful trees right near the road.  But not the Ficker's.  We hiked all the way up a mountain and crossed a ravine before we found our tree, all the while pulling two little boys around with us.  Now, this wouldn't have been so bad if I had worn the appropriate shoes.  I didn't know we were going on a hike so I wore my knock off Uggs.  I was wearing the equivalent to slippers in the mountains.  It was horrible in that aspect of the adventure.  Joaquin was getting mad at me because I was complaining the entire time about why we are the only family coming all the way up this mountain, and why he was dragging all three of us with him and about how badly my feet and ankles were hurting me.  As a side note, the boys were having a blast.  Well, Everett was.  I was holding Brock's hand and I was grumpy so I think that may have made him irritable too.  So after a what seemed like 3 hours but was probably only 15 minutes, Joaquin said stay here, I'm going to run over and look at these two trees.  He leaves me on the side of the mountain and literally frolics over to these two trees.  He's jumping over tree stumps and rocks like he's 10 years old.  Finally he yells for me to bring the boys.  He found our tree.  So I stumble over to where he is, and with out even really looking at the tree, I say "Good! Lets cut it down and go!"  I am over this! And he did.  It actually was a blast despite my bad attitude and we'll probably do it again next year but I will be better prepared and equipped.  Upon driving home, Joaquin tells me, I could have been out there another hour or two looking for the perfect tree.  He's such an Indian boy in his heart of hearts.

Another one of the highlights of the month was finally getting to meet Santa Claus.  He flew over to our local Cablea's for some unknown reason so we drove over to meet him.  They were so excited to see him in the flesh.  They were quiet and sweet and sat on his lap.  He asked them what they wanted for Christmas and Brock told him he wanted a remote control airplane and Everett didn't say anything.  Ha!  But Santa told him, he would bring him a surprise.  Which he did.

So much joy and fun happen this month for Joaquin and I.  I feel like having kids gives you an opportunity to feel the magic of Christmas all over again, through their eyes.  I loved it.