Cross Country Begins!!!!

Cross Country started today!!!!  We have missed it.  Austin didn't run last year, but now we are back!  The team is pretty big.  Austin is really enjoying it this year.  He is kind of the nice kind Uncle to all of the underclassmen.  It is funny to see him take this role, because it is the same role that his brother took on when he was a senior.  He has had an interesting season so far.  Let's see, so far he ran during a storm and a flash flood, and he had a run in with a rattle snake.  Pretty good so far.  Today was a rough day to run.  It was over 100 degrees when they had the meet.  I was really worried that Austin wasn't taking in enough water!

This year the kids have a new course. Yep, it is a true cross country course.  Finally!  It is a little bit over a 5k!  The new course does give a person some new photo opportunities!

The heat really took a toll on Austin.  It was rough.  Not his best run.  I don't think anyone had a good run.  We did win the meet.  We got a perfect score.  I think the team is off to a good start!

First Day Of School....We All Survived!

Today was the first day of school for us here in Vegas.  I feel like the summer went by too quick! I am not one of those mothers who looks forward to summer break being over.  I love having my kids around, and I dread the start of school. You know, projects, homework, sports, and everything else that goes with school.  Plus we have to deal with Don's school too!  It is crazy.  Well, there was nothing I could do about it, the first day of school came!  Here are my happy high schoolers headed off to seminary.  Austin is so happy about his seminary teacher!  It will be a good year.  Aubrey' seminary teacher was changed.  She will love her new class.  They both have amazing teachers.  Austin came home and already talked about how spiritual today was in seminary.  Oh we are off to a good start! 

You can tell how much Austin loves pictures!

Ian went to school later.  He had a hard night.  He was so upset.  He just felt like Aubrey and Austin wouldn't have time for him anymore now that they are both in high school.  Oh it was an emotional night.  He even asked me to walk him to his dot and pick him up.  I felt like we were regressing back to kindergarten!  When we got to the school and he found his friends, he took off.  He was totally happy and he had a great day.  He loves his teacher!  It is hard to believe this is my last time I will drop a child of mine off at elementary school!

After school we took the group photo.  Austin is a senior, Ian is in 5th grade, and Aubrey is a Freshman.  Wow, lots of changes this year.  It is hard to believe.  I am down to two schools.  I love the kid's pictures!  Oh Austin.  I give up, this is just how my pictures go.  He thinks this is the last picture I will take of the first day of school with him in it.  Oh no!  I know where there is a great BYU-I sign to take a picture of him standing by it on his first day of college!  Silly boy, I will always find a way!

Well, we are off.  Another school year begins!

End Of Summer!

We spent a lot of time at our community's pool.  It was a great way to beat the heat and have some fun during the summer.  The younger kids love it. 

They jump in!

Do a little synchronized swimming.

The kids organize these crazy races!

Then they celebrate!  Well, kind of!

The kids also relax in the hot tub!

When summer was coming to an end we did a lot of shopping.  These boys played along very well when it came to the girl's stores.

Austin had a fun time at work this summer.  I can't say where he worked, but he had a good time with these people.  I am sure you can tell where he worked by looking at the picture.

There he is working.

It was a good summer, all things considering.  We had a good time and now it comes to the end.

Another Quilt

My girlfriend Tonya made me this t-shirt quilt with all of my marathon shirts.  She does this as a business too.  Her web page is here.  When she told me she wanted to make me a quilt after I was diagnosed with breast cancer we decided that this would be the best one.  Tonya has a need to "wrap people in her love" with a quilt when they are going through breast cancer or other difficult times.  She is the one who helped me make Zach's t-shirt quilt.  I had saved all of the shirts and the handprint shirts I ran in and gave them to her.  One day she called me and told me to stop by and see some ideas she had for the quilt.  I walked in her house to see all of my shirts cut up.  After I left her house I fell apart.  I cried all the way home.  I just felt like that was the end of my time racing and doing marathons.  I felt like it was an end of my past life.  It was hard.  When I got home, Don reminded me that it was going to be ok.  This wasn't the end, there would be other races to run and maybe there would be another marathon.  At this time I hadn't gone back to running.  I had developed a strange fear of running.  I was scared of making myself sick or hurting myself.  After doing some research and talking to my oncologist, I decided to go back to running.  I wasn't running my crazy miles or running very fast.  I just wanted to move my body.  So I now run three to four days a week with 2 days of lifting weights.  It has made me feel so much better.  I can't run during chemo week.  My body just doesn't have it in me.  So maybe, maybe, I will be able to race again.  I don't know if I will be able to run a marathon, but I want to run a Ragnar.  Then one day Tonya came over with my finished quilt.  I loved it!!!!  It is perfect.  I love how it has pink zebra print!!!!  Pink for breast cancer and the zebra print makes it tough!  It is so warm and cozy.  I am going to call this my BBC quilt, Before Breast Cancer.  Someday I will have her make me an after breast cancer quilt with my race shirts from the races I do after I am cured.  Thank you Tonya, you will never know how much this means to me.  It got me through a tough time, and helped me deal with some feelings I was going through!  It also gave me the strength go, get out there and run.

Now for an update.  I am just plugging along.  The tumors are shrinking fast!!!  I feel good.  I still don't get sick, just sleepy for that one week.  Please, Please, Please, know that we appreciate all of the wonderful notes and acts of service!!!!  I know that prayers are being answered!  It is through my family's prayers, a sweet missionary in Russia, and all of your prayers that I am making through this!!!!  Thank you!  I used to pray that I would be able to handle this and that the chemotherapy would work, and I know my prayers are being answered.  Things are good, and I am thankful for all of my blessings!  

The Olympics!

The 2012 London Olympics are over.  Yes, it is time for the Brasier family to get our lives back to normal.  We will leave the house now, get some sleep, and socialize with other people.  It was a great Olympics.  We loved them.  Thank heavens the Olympics only come every two years!  So now we have to share our thoughts about the games.  So many wonderful things happened.  So many wonderful stories.  I am sure we are missing things!

First, the opening ceremonies.  Hmmm, what can we say?  We all have mixed feelings about them.  Parts were great, but some parts were strange!  Like, why are you focusing on this strange.  This is what Austin thinks the opening ceremonies should of been like.  He thinks they should of had Dr. Who (This is a show about time travel on the BBC) come down during the opening ceremonies and "time travel" to the two other times that London held the Olympic games.  The first time because they were suppose to be in Rome but a volcano erupted and the Olympics were moved to London.  The second time, they reinstated the games after WWII.  We all know what London went through during WWII, so this is just amazing. Then focusing on modern London getting them back again.  I have to admit, I liked his idea.  Ian felt they should just have Beatles Love perform and call it a night!  Anyway many great things happened at these games, here are just a few things that stood out to us.

For the United States it was definitely the year of the woman.  Female Olympians from the US out numbered their male teammates for the first time.  The US women earned more medals than women from any other nations and more medals than the American men.  The men did great too, but this was awesome.

Our girls gymnastics team and Gabby came home with the gold.

We love our Women's Soccer Team.

Watching the Women's basketball team was like watching the best of UCONN basketball!!  Taurasi kept us laughing, but in the end, she was emotional getting that gold medal.

What can you say about these two ladies, Misty and Kerri?  We will miss this team. 

We did win a bunch of gold medals in track, rowing, shooting, and the Women's water polo team won gold too.

It is always fun to watch Michael Phelps.  I have to say I really enjoyed him during this Olympics.  He seemed more relaxed more humble.  He became the most decelerated Olympian and retired.  The kids said to us after his last race, "What will the Olympics be like without him?"  Yes, we will miss him.

I don't care that Lolo Jones didn't win a medal.  I still love her.  I love this quote she gave about her personal life, "It isn't hard to find dates.  It is hard to find a date who has high morals and is willing to wait."  There we go!  She is a champion in my eyes!

Think what you want about Usain Bolt, but you have to admit he is amazing!  And yes, we love his antics!  He cracks me up!  We have to admit that we were really impressed with him that when he was giving an interview to our American reporter our national anthem started to play.  He stopped the interview and asked the reporter if this was her national anthem.  She said yes and tried to go with the interview.  Bolt stopped her and told her she needed to pay respect to her anthem and then he turned and stood very respectfully while our anthem played for one of our sprinters.  That's class. 

There were many firsts.  Like Oscar Pistorious who ran for Australia.  He was the first double amputee to run in the Olympics.  Hmmm, this might be the beginning of something! 

Also the first Saudi Arabian woman competed in the Olympic games.  I hope that she is setting example for other girls in her country!  I am sure this is just the beginning!

So now we look to Russia and the winter games. 



Happy Anniversary!

Yesterday was our 24th wedding anniversary.  We already celebrated our anniversary in Salt Lake, when we took that quick little trip up there to pick Aubrey up from EFY.  So, today we kind of kept things simple.  We decided to go to the temple and then go out to get something to eat.  It was a nice and quiet way to celebrate.  Don still gave me some roses.

We also realized that we didn't have a good picture of the temple that we were married in.  We don't really remember what happened to our old one.  I think it just broke and it might have had something to do with my two sons.  So we had been looking for a new picture.  I had found this one and thought that it would be wonderful.  It took a while for it to grow on Don.  This year for our anniversary we decided to get it.  I really like it.  It looks good in our front room. 

I was shopping with the kids the other day and they saw this movie.  They are obsessed with this movie.  They totally love it.  So they wanted me to get it.  I told them, no.  We don't need it.  We just don't buy things.  You know, all those common things moms say to their kids when they want something.  Then they came up with a plan.  They told me we could get it for Dad, for his wedding anniversary.  O.k., now how can I say no to that???  So the kids got Don this movie for our wedding anniversary. I am sure he is so thrilled!!!

I am so grateful for my husband.  This summer has been a rough one with me being sick and all.  Don has been amazing through this whole ordeal.  He has stood by me and been the biggest support during this time.  He is constantly positive and is always right by my side.  I know I am so blessed. It is hard when you go to the oncologist and the doctors and nurses tell you stories of women who don't have that support and are basically on their own dealing with cancer.  I can't even imagine.  Don is an amazing husband!  It has been a great 24 years, and I am sure there are MANY more wonderful years to come!

The Tender Mercies Of The Lord

I have written about how grateful I am for the many blessings that have come my way during this time in my life.  I do believe in the many tender mercies the Lord has blessed me with.  I think this video explains what tender mercies of the Lord are.  Enjoy.