For the first time in our 6 years of living here, we went to the Cedar Park Fourth of July celebration at Milburn Park (2 minutes away). It was huge: bouncy castles, petting zoo, face painting, shaved ice, food booths, human ball-running (see picture) and at the end, fireworks!
June 2010 - In a nutshell: Madison's first dance recital, Family trip to Disneyland and Newport Beach, Wanda runs the Ragnar Relay
Madison took a ballet/tap class this year and had her first recital on June 5th. Her class is so adorable - they are all so little! It's such a cute age. And look how proud she is standing next to her Daddy.
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We traveled to Anaheim, California, on June 9th and met Dave there (he was there for work). We spent the week at Disneyland and also visited Layne (my childhood friend) and Johnny Gehris in Newport. Their girls are 10 and 12 and watched ours while the four of us adults went to dinner after playing at the beach. The girls still talk about Brooke and Taylor's guinea pigs. Layne and her girls came up to Disney one day with us as well. They are sweet kids. Loved hanging out with them all. Oh, and Layne's pregnant - due in October. More power to her. I. am. done. :)
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Layne and me. We've been friends since we were 2 years old. She lived 2 houses down from me on Wind River Circle in Huntsville, Alabama. Who knew 35 years later, we'd hang out in Newport Beach with our families?
This is our team of 12 that ran the Ragnar Relay/Wasatch Back. Natalie Anderton enlisted me for the adventure and it was awesome. I flew to Salt Lake straight from Anaheim late on June 16th, and Dave kept the girls. June 18-19th, 2010 - 188 mile in 36 hours. Each person runs 3 legs of 4-10 miles each. I was the first runner and ran 8.5, 8.0, and 5 mile legs. It was HARD to run in the mountains after training at ground level, but I finished. The last 5 miles ran at 5 am were brutal. But then I was the first one done. Yippee! Our van of the Tawanda 12 team was me, Natalie Anderton, Janelle, Julie, Sarah, and Jevonne. We had a great group of positive, powerful women. Love 'em.
Me at the starting line in Logan, Utah. The route was absolutely gorgeous - and such a perfect time of year. Cool in the mornings, warming up by noon, cold at night - perfect for running. We ran the back routes all the way to finish in Park City, Utah at the Canyons Resort (where Dave and I own a property). Me and Nat spent the night in the hotel and then she took me to the airport the next day. Bye Utah - thanks for hosting such an awesome race!
June 5, 2010 Mackenzie successfully completed first grade. Her teacher was "nice, but also a little mean," and she wasn't Kenzie's favorite. But she was an excellent teacher and Mackenzie learned a ton. Her reading is excellent and her math skills have increased greatly in the past 9 months. Bye First Grade!
Mackenzie and her best friend Meredith going to the bus stop.
May 21, 2010 Dave and the girls took me to the Cheesecake Factory for my birthday dinner. Then I took it easy that night b/c at 7am the next day I was flying to New York to meet Wendy, Karalee, and Baldwin for the weekend!!! There was just one problem - the next morning my alarm didn't go off. I woke up at 6:04 am and instantly freaked out. Luckily I had packed everything the night before and I raced out the door to the airport, realizing it was very unlikely I would make my flight. I got there at 6:30 am, valeted the car, and ran to the security gate. Lo and behold, there was no wait, and at 6:37 am I was at the gate ready to board. I even had time to buy a water bottle. Can you say CRAZY!?!?! Us girls had a great time in New York. We hung out with some friends of Karalee's and went to some amazing restaurants (since she's in the restaurant biz, she goes to NY all the time to research things). We visited the Guggenheim and walked the city. We didn't have time to see any shows but we still had lots of fun. Our hotel was very hip and we met a lot of interesting people there. It was a fantastic trip and I am so glad I made my flight!
Last March 2009, I went and took an aptitudes test for career-changers at the Johnson O'Connor research foundation. I needed some direction to figure out what I was going to be when I grew up. I learned a lot of interesting things, like I have a high aptitude in spatial analysis, that led me to re-think actuarial work as a career. I was pointed to it in college but said there was no way I was going to crunch numbers in the back room of some insurance company with a bunch of fellow math nerds. After my aptitude test, however, the counselor said she'd recently spoken with a college grad going into actuarial work and the industry had changed. There were finance-related actuaries and consulting actuaries, etc. It really made me think. So, I tried to contact a local actuarial consulting firm to see if I could talk with someone about the work. No luck. All the messages I left weren't returned. Then I decided I'd check if UT here in Austin had an actuary dept. - they do. So I called the head of the dept, Jim Daniels, and asked if I could meet with him and he was very kind. We met and he gave me a ton of great information and several referrals to contacts in the working world that I could call. Lo and behold, then with his backing, one of the partners from the local firm returned my email. Toby Tobleman from Rudd & Wisdom set up a time I could come in and talk to him about the profession. We met, talked for 2 hours and really hit it off. Then he set up a lunch for me with 2 of his younger associates who told me all about the testing process (there are many tests to become and Associate (5+) and even more to become a Fellow (8+) and they are all brutally hard). Usually once you pass the first 2 exams you are considered 'hireable' in the industry. So I decided to attack this challenge head-on and started studying for the FM exam - Financial Mathmatics and Economic Theory. I started studying in June of 2009. And on May 19th, 2010, I sat for my first actuary exam - and passed! WooHoo!!! It was the hardest test I have ever taken. Having an undergraduate degree in economics and having become a stockbroker in 2003 both helped a lot with this test. I barely passed, but after months of studying, hundreds of hours devoted to the material, and a whole lot of praying - it all payed off. I can honestly say I deserved to pass. I am just so glad the test agreed with me. So now, I'm off to study for the Probability exam. If it weren't for the stress of possibly failing the test, the material I'm studying is actually interesting. That's a good sign, right?
May 2010 - Mackenzie had to do a project in her Quest class (a class for kids with high creativity and vocabulary) on bats. She was assigned the 'big brown bat - eptificus fuscus' and had to do a huge poster and then present her information. Dave and I both were there for the presentation along with Madison. She did Bat Bingo and did a great job speaking to the class. Madison was a little hard to contain, but other than that things went great. Way to go Kenz!
May 4, 2010 I got to go with Mackenzie on her class field trip to Innerspace Caverns. There were so many parents that wanted to go they had a lottery to see who could attend. This year Mackenzie is in Ms. Peters class and we have an unusually high number of involved parents. Every activity I go to the classroom has almost as many parents there as kids. We had a great time going through the cave and afterwards sifting for rocks. I drove separately and zoomed home afterwards to get Madison from a friend's house after pre-school.
Jharna, Avery, and Mackenzie
Meredith, Mackenzie, and Bella
