Anniversay Fun - 16 Years!

Luke had an opportunity to attend a conference for week, in Irvine, the week of our anniversary. I was all over it when he asked if I could take off work and go with him. It worked out well. We were only away from the kids for almost 72 hours and we came home on our anniversary.

Grandma and Grandpa Hogue were up for the challenge and they came to stay with the Hogue tag team. They arrived Tuesday after school and Luke and I left to head down after feeding the kids some dinner. We ended up leaving the hotel around 10pm to find a place to eat. We drove to Newport Beach and found a Cheesecake Factory. Four glasses of raspberry lemonade at 11pm is something I don't recommend by the way. :) I can never go wrong with the Sheila's chicken salad though. It's my fave salad of all time. We thought we'd be rushed to check out because they close at 11pm, but surprisingly the waitress was very laid back and didn't make us feel that way.

Wednesday morning Luke left early to head downstairs to his meetings. He was going to be busy all day so I ventured out to Costa Mesa, which was only a few miles away. There was a bakery I had been wanting to try, called Black Market Bakery, that I follow on IG. (I ended up eating lunch here all three days, it was that good.) Their BLTA on croissant was the best I've eaten. The reason I came in was their caramel pecan cinnamon roll and it was as good as I had hoped. Amazing!

 After eating lunch at the bakery I headed over to South Coast Plaza. I meandered around and eventually inside Nordstrom's a nice gal at the Clarins counter asked if I wanted to sit down and get my make-up done. I never turn that down and just told her to make me look 21 again. She did all of my skin care before the make-up and I really enjoyed the hour I was there chatting with her. After leaving Nordstrom's I walked back to the car and headed back to the hotel.

The finished product. Wa-la. 

Don't think I look 21, but that's ok.

 Luke was out of his conference by 4:30pm so we headed out to Claim Jumper for dinner.

Thursday was more of the same: Make up and shopping. :) I had my make-up and skincare done at Sephora this time and the gal was super nice. After make-up I did more shopping before heading back to the hotel. We drove to Newport Beach, which is 10 minutes away, for dinner at Great Maple. I had a salad and Luke had a burger. It was really good and I loved the atmosphere. We sat outside and people watched since it's inside Fashion Island.  

After dinner we went to the movies to see "The Martian." It was one of those theaters where you reserve your seat when you buy the ticket. The seats are like large recliners that rock too. They also have a chef on staff and you can order food to be delivered to your seat! Have I died and gone to Heaven!? We thought the kids would definitely LOVE this....especially Tubbs. I had to snap a photo of us before the movie started. My husband does always look this angry, but he's actually in a great mood. :)

Guess what I did Friday morning before we left?
That's right. Had my make-up done again. :) What can I say...I can't get enough. I think I just need to move-in to South Coast Plaza.

Friday was our anniversary. 
16 years! Hard to believe. 
I like his little smirk below. I sure love this guy. We have definitely aged 16 years, but I can still remember hearing his voice for the first time, like it was yesterday. 
He really is my best friend. My snarky, funny, cynical best friend. I love the life we have created together and all of our many adventures. I am glad we stick by each other through it all and honor our commitment to each other. I am looking forward to many more years to come.

Before we left Friday we had lunch at Black Market Bakery together, but this time I got a fried egg on the BLTA. So good! Luke tried the BLTA too. I really loved EVERYTHING i tried at this place. All of their sandwiches looked so good and their cookies were deee-lish too. It's a good thing I don't live nearby.

We got home later than expected Friday because there was a fire on the side of the road, just south of the Grapevine. Traffic was backed up for 30 miles. In Castaic we took a potty/soda break and hung out for 30 minutes to avoid burning gas in traffic.
When we did eventually get home we got to spend 30 minutes with the kids before Bubba left to stay the night with his buddy Alex. We took Tubbs and Wiggy to pizza for dinner and then some fro-yo for dessert. Wiggy made us the message below on her light board for our anniversary.

While we were gone Grandma and Grandpa had their hands full running all the kids around to their practices, games and activities. 

 Craft time with baby pumpkins

 Wiggy's Class went to the School Garden for the first time this school year. Grandma and Grandpa got to go along.

 The girls playing their devices while watching the football game at Warren.

 Bubba the ref

 Wiggy and her friends playing during the football game.

Thank you grandma and grandpa Hogue for taking good care of the kids while we were away and keeping up with all of their stuff! We really appreciate it. XOXO
 

September Activities

September has arrived and the kids are getting into the swing of things. All three kids are playing soccer. Bubba's practices are Monday/Wednesday evenings and his games are either Tuesday or Thursdays at 5:30 or 7pm. Tubbs' practices are Tuesday and Thursday evenings at 7pm. His games are on Saturdays. Thanksfully Miss Wiggy's team practices on Saturdays for 30 minutes before they play. All the kids are loving soccer and aside from the busy schedules, we enjoy watching them play. Bubba's team hasn't won a game yet, but Bubba is doing good for his first year. Tubbs' team is doing really well and has only lost two games so far out of six. Wiggy's team doesn't keep score, but they dominate every opponent. They only play five on five and it's very entertaining to watch. Wiggy is getting more agressive and no one can get the ball past Wiggs when she comes up to try and stop the ball.

 

Bubba got his braces off. It's been a LONG three years and we are thrilled to have them off. I may be more excited than him.

 Krispy Kreme Donuts opened IN Bakersfield the day before he got his braces off. So on our way back from the orthodontist, we stopped by and picked up a dozen HOT donuts. The kids were big fans!!

 Tubbs's friends invited him to a USC football game one Saturday night. Tubbs was so excited to watch a college football game. They left around 3pm and didn't get home until almost 2am Sunday morning.

 Wiggy picked up her birthday masterpiece from Color Me Mine.

We believe Tubbs has an OCD with cleaning. 
Legitimately. 
I need a clean house. It's a necessity. I think I may have passed this on to poor Tubbs. We thought it was funny at first, but this boy really does need to sweep and mop almost everyday. He asks us if he can vacuum or sweep and if we say no, he pretty much melts down. I bought some cleaning supplies from Norwex, which included this dry/wet mop....so this boy was loving it. We are fans of Norwex.

Tubbs is doing a Derek Carr football camp that lasts 7 weeks. The camp has practices on Tuesday evenings and scrimmages on Saturday afternoons. He is also playing on the school flag football team. They have 1-2 games a week after school and they practice before school most mornings. Bubba is refereeing the flag football games at Warren on Mondays (and sometimes Thursdays) after school.

 I had three moles removed and sent in for biopsy the first week of July. Two of the moles came back abnormal, so I needed to have them cut out. This photo was two weeks after the procedure, when I had the stitches removed. Now I need to go back twice a year to have moles checked.
 

We ordered a new sofa sectional on Memorial weekend. It finally arrived the last week of September!! We are so excited. In July we started selling or donating other pieces of living room furniture. We were down to just the leather sofa for two months. The new couch arrived just in time because we were ready to freak out on Ashley Furniture.

 Everyone likes laying on the chaise part of the sofa and napping.

 The kids' school photos for the 2015/2016 school year.

Last SD Game of the Hogue Season

We originally were going to go to two Padres games Labor Day weekend, but considering the traffic and outrageous cost for hotels, we opted to wait. The kids had earned a ticket for an exclusive autograph signing at the Sept. 26th game, so we decided to head down to this game instead.
We left early Saturday morning and got to SD by noon'ish. We got in line in front of the stadium at the Padres store. and they began processing everyone from the official invite list around 12:30. We didn't know whose autograph the kids were going to get, so we were making our guesses as we waited in line for the next hour. At 1pm the line was ushered into the park, out onto the field leading behind home plate and into the Padres dugout. As people walked past us leaving, they were saying it was Matt Kemp. We were super excited now.
The kids were allowed one item to get autographed. Matt signed all the kids' hats, but he also signed Wiggy's jersey too. We thought that was cool. When he saw that it said "Mrs. Kemp" on the back he laughed and as he signed it said, "okay, okay!" Mr. Kemp...you are a cool cat.

After waiting in the sun for an hour and getting the autographs we headed over to Cheesecake Factory a few blocks away, where I proceeded to drink way too many glasses of raspberry lemonade. My kidneys were not happy with me. I could practically hear the stones swimming in sugar. Ha ha.
The game started at 5:40. We were able to upgrade our tickets, so we were field level. We played the Arizona D-Backs and we won! It was a great way to end our season. The Pads didn't play as well as we'd hoped, but we had a great time going to all the games this season. We made a lot of memories for sure and I really hope we are able to do some games next season.

 On Sunday morning we grabbed some breakfast and then Luke thought it would be cool to drive the kids down to the border. We got off at the last exit and drove around. We could see the two HUGE Mexican flags waving and the fence separating our two countries. The kids really liked it. Luke and I don't have our passports, but maybe when we do we can take the kids over sometime.
Next stop.....Grandma Strickland's house in Linda Vista. 
Aunt Thelma and Uncle Dennis met us over there to visit for a little but. My grandma is 96 in October. She's had a hard time lately. She was just out of the hospital two weeks before we were there. She couldn't see us real well and slept in her recliner a little while we were visiting with Thelma and Dennis. She didn't know who I was when I got there but I think after a few minutes she remembered me.

 She really enjoyed hearing the kids and she asked them questions. I wonder what she was thinking when she saw them. I don't know if she knew really who they were or if she thought they were someone else. My Uncle Jim passed away when he was a few years younger than Tubbs, so I wonder if she saw any similarities. She did hug them and hold their hands. It was very sweet to watch and I wondered if this was going to be the last time I see her here on this earth. She seemed so tired and weak. She's on oxygen now 24 hours a day.

 Bubba told grandma he wanted to be a professional baseball player. She is still quick witted and sarcastic. She says exactly what she thinks. She told him to dream big and something else sassy. It made me laugh.

 We were thankful to end our trip with a visit with our SD family. We love them very much and hope grandma continues to get some energy back.