2011 (Quickly)

How do I wrap up the last year? Hhmmm, how about in pictures? We lived in North Carolina and met our new-soon-to-be sister in law, Shannon.. who made us a delicious dinner:


Left our place in NC, and drove across the country:

Finished potty training Deano:

Gavin and I continued racing:

Lily got her first real -at a salon- haircut:

Lived in California for the summer and visited family:

Had swim lessons:

Took the family to Disneyland for the first time:

Took the family to the Exploratorium in San Francisco for the first time:

And then sold all of our worldly goods to move out to Hawaii:

Where we now happily reside:

That's the simplified version. Happy New Year!!!

Woops

Last night the Tooth fairy didn't come to pick up Gavin's lost tooth. I don't know what she was thinking... but I told Gavin that maybe Tuesdays are her nights off, and then I gave him a cookie with his breakfast.

Big News

Ok, you've been waiting for this 'big news' so here it is. I am officially a part of the Hawaii Air National Guard. Crazy, I know but I even have proof (thanks for the pictures Sylvia!)
I have signed my contract and I am now an E-3 ATC (air traffic controller).

During my contract signing I was lucky to have not only Dad and Sylvia there, but also my big Brother:

Here I am about to swear in:

And... if you need a little more proof.... here I am actually signing my 6 year contract:

The only thing left to do is pass my basic military training (boot camp) and tech school (learning how to be an air traffic controller).

So, what else is going on? Well, being that I am a part of the military now, I am about to delete my Facebook account. So if you would like to stay in touch please email me, 'comment me' on this blog, or Facebook message me so that we can exchange email addresses or phone numbers, yadda yadda, before I delete my account in mid April.
In conclusion, how crazy is this? I just have to say that it is pretty surreal and I can't wait to see what the future has in store for the Mockett clan!

Taking a break

There of LOTS of big changes ahead for the Mockett family... details soon!
But for now:

I will be taking a short break to put my plans into action. Once everything is finalized and set I will update you all. See ya in about 2 weeks!

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complete chaos

Total, utter and complete chaos. That is the entire upstairs of our home right now. Brandon and I finally bought some 'grown up' bedroom furniture to replace our garage sale hodge-podge, and in the mean time it looks like a level 5 hurricane has gone through our entire upstairs. I was going to take some scary before pics, but lucky for you the camera is dead.
So let me explain why everything is so crazy... The babies' room has broken down dressers that barely work, so those are trash, and because tonight is trash night they are gone tonight. Get it? We have two dressers in our room now, and one is big and beautiful that the little ones will share, while one is medium and Gavin will get it. So right now I have half of my stuff all over the place, all of the kiddos clothes in a plastic tub, and Gavin's room is always a disaster. Did I mention that the delivery isn't until Saturday? But tonight is trash night, so tonight it begins.

Distractable me

This is why I take forever to turn in a tiny bit of homework. I do the correct 'distraction' technique of giving the kiddos a project to work on in a quiet area, and then I sit down to do my reading or homework at the computer. But then what happens? The kids sit and work intently on their projects until I have submitted my assignment? Nope. They are too silly and I just want to participate with them and have a good time. They have crazy and funny ideas with their projects and even though I am neglecting my assignment, I wouldn't trade this time for all of the A's in the world.

(however if my professor happens to read this- I will gladly take all of the A's that you want to give me!)

5th Anniversary Surprise

For our fifth anniversary I decided to show Brandon 'how it's done', and I went all out with the planning and surprises. For a few pain staking weeks I held in this really cool secret... it nearly killed me holding back on letting Brandon know that I was able to get a limo with the luck of some store credit that we had. I also was able to finagle a babysitter and find a nice-ish restaurant that we'd never eaten at before. So when the big day came I was about to explode with excitement; and all that Brandon knew was that we were going to dinner and that he had to be ready no later than 7pm--or else.

In this picture I am all dressed up ready to go, with the kiddos ready to head over to the neighbors house for a few hours :

And here he is still getting ready at 6:48pm or so.

Of course by this time I am dying to tell him what is waiting out our front door, but he is still working on tying his tie perfectly.

Here we are after I finally got Brandon out the door:

Of course we couldn't go without letting the kiddos take a ride around the block:

They super loved the 'star lights' in the ceiling of the car.

But wait! That's not all! I also snuck into the limo a very fancy bottle of champagne--the very same kind that we had after our Vegas wedding.

Yeah, I am pretty proud of my self. But wait! There is even more! I also planned a fun game of laser tag before dinner. It was awesome! Me in high heels and Brandon playing sniper in a black light room against a bunch of 8 year olds. Completely awesome!

Then we were off to dinner. What else but steak and lobster?

MmmmHmmm! (no veggies for me tonight!)


And for Brandon:

How could we resist a little shared dessert?

Great night! Happy #5 to these Mocketts!

Snow Day 2011

2 big snows in one winter! Some of us love the snow, and some of us like it for a little while... then are ready for some hot chocolate and a warm bath.

Gavin's crystals

For Christmas this year Grandma Chris got me a crystal making set. These are rocks. The rocks will grow into crystals when you add the chemicals to them. We also added dye to the rocks and chemicals.

This is a picture of me putting the rocks into the containers.

I observed the crystals when they were growing. Some looked pointy and some looked smooth. It took 4 days to grow. Isn't that a long time?

My favorite crystal was a pyramid looking one. It was completely clear.

Thanks Grandma Chris!