Because Cancer never sleeps

Our Relay for Life walk was this weekend! Last year Jen asked me if I wanted to walk with her, (even before my mom died) but we were going to be on vacation during the walk. Lots of things happened and we decided to postpone our vacation so we were able to walk! In the meantime since my mom had passed away from cancer, I was determined to do what I could to help raise money for research. Her cancer was really rare and I do believe that any money I can raise to go to research of any cancer means less death because of it. So I called in the troops and we filled Jens team, Jenny's pennies! None of us had any idea what to expect because this would be our first year (minus Jen and her mom).
Our 24 hour relay started Saturday morning at 9am and ended Sunday morning at 9am. Hours and hours went into preparing for this day. Each member on our team tried to raise $100 as a donation. I'd like to thank every person who gave $5 and more to me. I really do appreciate your generosity. Trust me when I say that every penny of your money is going to the most amazing cause EVER!
Our theme was "More birthdays, Less Cancer". We signed up to do a bake sale the day of to raise extra money! So guess who did all the baking?? Friday night was CUPCAKE HELL, as I like to call it! :) I started baking at 4pm and Crystal and I didn't stop until 11pm that night. We baked 100 cupcakes. Frosted, decorated, bagged and tied with a bow! 8 dozen chocolate chip cookies, bagged and tied with a bow. Brownies, rice krispy treats, cut and wrapped.... we had our work cut out for us! If it wasn't for Crystal pushing me at 10:30 that night to finish I would have given up, that was a lot to take on! Thank you Crys, I couldn't have done it without you, and it was totally worth all of it!

Up early Saturday morning to head out to Murrieta to start our relay. We meet up with the team, set up our camp and bake sale. LOVE these girls (and hubby) for taking this on with me and being part of it! I made us shirts with my moms picture on it, after all, that's why I was there in the first place. It was going to be a day to celebrate, remember and fight back!!


Last minute, my niece Hailey was able to join us! Can't tell you how much it meant to have my sister there with me too! Her and I have gotten so close in the last few years and to have her support all the time and someone to talk to who knows JUST how I feel all the time is pretty amazing.


Opening ceremonies started at 9! The event took place in a park with a great arena! We heard some amazing stories from survivors of cancer.


Our super cute hard work!


YUMMY for a great cause!

The 24 hour relay was held in the park with a really great track around it! It was concrete and super easy to walk on. Almost all 24 hours they had music playing, DJ and bands, contests and fun stuff going on. Hearing stories from the survivors was really amazing. I honestly was very selfish signing up for relay. I wanted to walk for my mom. That was my goal. In meeting people throughout the day and hearing their stories, it REALLY hit me. There was more to cancer then just my mom dying from it. There are so many people who battled it and won. I can't be that i was that selfish to think I should only be walking for my mom. Hell, 10 years ago my dad battled cancer and won. My grandmother had breast cancer and won, my sister had cervical cancer and won, my aunts and cousins and friends have had so many cases of cancer and beaten it! Cancer really wasn't a thing in my life until it hit me with full force. Took my best friend, took my mother from me.... but it has been a part of my life for a long time. I walked today in honor of my mother, but also in honor of every person I know who has had cancer in some form or any of my friends or family that it has affected. The survivors who were present got to take the first lap around the track. Watching these people pass us by, it really just hit me. As soon as the survivors passed us our team got out on the track and started walking.... walking and walking...

The day was warm but not to hot, there was a really cool breeze. After a few laps around we'd take a break for a few and sit in camp, relax, focus on the bake sale, just enjoy the day!

The day went on. Lap after lap we walked. Talking to each other, sharing stories, enjoying each other's company. Each lap you passed a station where you took a bead so you knew how far you were walking. Hours went by and we looked down at our beads and realized that we had gone 5, 6, 7 miles... what? Already? We walked that much already? It was an amazing feeling. Bead after bead, mile after mile... the sun was about to go down! Here were some of our totals...

Melissa had 20 miles!!!!!

Victor had 17 miles!!!

Crystal and I had 15 miles!!

Jacquie, Aja and Hailey had 12 miles!!

Victor was in the lead until Melissa started to get competitive with him... after 17 miles Victor was done and Melissa finished out at 20 miles! Girl, I am so proud of you, we didn't even have to roll you out on a stretcher! I walked 15 miles!!! 15!!!! In 10 hours! Can you believe it? I really still can't believe it honestly.

As the sun went down the Luminary bags were brought out. You could buy these bags for a $10 donation. They were had decorated from Children and volunteers with your personal message on them!
This is one that I purchased from Me and Jac.

This is one that Jen purchased for mom.

Since starting at El Pollo Loco I've meet some amazing people. One of the ladies I work with, her mom passed away last year of cancer as well. Her and I hit it off and have a lot in common. She reminds me so much of my mom. My mom would have loved her! Linda is a dear and kind person, I bought a bag in honor of her mother who she also misses very much!

At 9pm that night they asked everyone to stop walking, (which was a god send) because after 10 hours of walking, 15 miles, we all needed that break. The ceremony at night was really amazing. We gathered around the arena, all 600 people. There were more stories, plenty of crying and a great slideshow! People who survived, people who were gone. We had 6 pictures in the slideshow of us and mom. They had a beautiful display of the word HOPE.

Everyone got to hold a candle and light it with a moment of silence to remember.... it was such a wonderful feeling, sad, emotional but healing... all at the same time.

A lot of fun bonding time with my Hailey!

With my whole team and my hubby. I love them all!

The bags were lit and as it got darker their glow was beautiful and peaceful!

I really can't thank everyone for their love and support. I had people donate money that I haven't talked to in years, but cancer effects everyone. One of the survivors said that anyone can say, oh I'm sorry you lost your mom, I'm sorry so and so has cancer and they can feel bad for you. But it really takes someone getting involved with something like this to really try to change things and make a difference.

Mom would have been so proud of us all today.

Happy Earth Day!

So I have to say.... my friend Jo is so amazing and today is HER DAY for sure!! She is doing so much to help the Earth and "Go Green". Some day I hope to be as good as she is! I will think of a great list and try to do better this year I swear!!!
Last year on Earth Day it was my friend Jeremy's Birthday so we meet up with him and his family at his house and then walked over to the stadium for the Angels game! My little baby girl took her first steps that evening (you probably recall reading my blog about it)! Amazing that a year later she's so much more grown up and kid like!!

April has been a crazy, crazy busy month! Work has been super busy to, but I LOVE it just as much as the first day I started! This weekend is our Relay for Life!!! Going to be so much fun! I am walking in honor of my mom! I made really cool shirts for most of the team with my mom's picture on it. A few Luminary bags were bought in honor of my mom. The bags are pretty cool because they are personalized with your message. Can't wait to be there and see them in person! This weekend will be long, it's 24 hours of taking turns on out team walking. It will be very emotional because the whole weekend will be about people who have lost their battle to cancer, survivors of cancer and all around awareness of it. There is a slideshow at night where we submitted pictures of mom, that will of course bring me to ball my eyes out as well. I am glad that their will be a lot of people there that will be in my same shoes and really be able to understand how Cancer affects people. I am proud to say I will have several people by my side to walk in Mom's name as well! Victor, Jacquie, Melissa, Crystal, Jennifer and a whole team of people. This weekend will be a lot of fun, it's like camping with a bunch of friends. Smores and all. But most of all I think this weekend will be great in the healing process for us. Cancer affects everyone in some kind of way, almost everyone I know has lost someone to it or knows a survivor of it. This weekend we walk for every one of those people! Pics and stories to come, gotta get busy baking for our bake sale!

Cousins

Since Victor's mom watches Alana part time during the week we thought we'd take the kids off of her hands for the night. We BBQ'd, watched movies, had Ice Cream Sundaes. The works! Since it was so nice on Sunday we took the kids over to the park before bringing them home! Alana loves her cousins so much, she is so bossy around them and they do whatever she wants them to do, it's pretty funny!

Alana and the boys!


Alana and Celia




They wanted to climb the tree so I let them and then stuck Alana up there. She was so excited to be so high up there and maybe a little unsure. Lately she's been really good at smiling for the camera and saying cheese, but for the life of me I can't get her to look at the camera most of the time!!

Happy 30th Birthday Jen!!!

I've known Jennifer since 2nd grade! We are friends that go waaaaaaaayyyyy back! She turned 30 on Friday and threw herself a nice Fancy Schmancy Birthday Party! We had such a great time dressing up and having fun!

Me and Jen


Jen and her niece Raven.


Jen set up a cute little station to take Poloriod pictures at. Happy Birthday Jen!!


Jen and her boyfriend Joe!

Me and the Birthday girl!

My 3 bitches!

Me and me sester

Jen's big 3-0 cake!

Jen and her dad, brother, sister and niece. Jen, I LOVE this picture of you guys! I'll print it out for you!

Happy Birthday girly! Welcome to the 30's. I'm so glad we reconnected after so long, I don't know where I'd be without you in the last year. Thank you for being such a great friend! Love you!

P.S. I made a slideshow for Jen's birthday that included 700 pictures!!! Not kidding! And within those 700 pictures were some crazy pictures that surfaced from when we were younger.... blog about that coming soon!

Vampire Weekend

No, Vampire Weekend isn't a weekend getaway full of Twilight fun as most people think it is when I say it. It's a band! About 5 months ago we bought tickets to go see Vampire Weekend, it seemed so far away when we bought them and finally April 14th was here! So Crystal, Victor and I headed out to Pomona to the Fox Theatre for a great concert!

Our seats were assisgned and on the balcony... the line to get in was wrapped around the building all night so we decided to wait out the lines in the little mexican food place around the corner.


Me and Crys before the concert

We even sat outside of the theatre and thought how crazy the lines were, and then as it got closer to the time for them to go on stage we decided if we were ever going to get in we should get in the stupid line. It moved pretty fast, when we got in and up to the balcony we found out that those assigned seats we had waiting for us weren't really assigned... it was all first come first serve!! UH!! So all that sitting and waiting outside, we could have been in that stupid line. We ended up with seats at the top, which wasn't all that bad, but barely found 3 together!

No westside.... Vampire Weekend!!!


Music was great, company was great! Another great concert under my belt!!

Smart girl!

Alana is getting to smart for her own good! I work with her all the time on colors, shapes, letters, numbers, songs... you name it, she's learning it... I'm home with her (part time now) but my goal is to make her a smart girl!! Looks like it's working so far! She'll be 2 in June, which is coming all too fast.... but she can count to 10 and we are working on 10 in Spanish too (with Grandma's help). This bilingual girl is something!! She first counts fast to 10 then again but misses 6. She's too funny!

Farewell my good friend

It's so sad for me to say that my good friend Anda moved to Austin Texas this week... As I am SO happy for them because her husband got a great job there... I am so sad that my good friend and her little man are farther from me now. Alana and I drove out to LA to see them the night before they were taking off for Austin.

Monty is such a sunshine of a baby! He is full of smiles and is so loving! I am going to be so sad to miss out on this being so close. You never know what you have until it's gone. Shoulda spent more time with him while they were here... story of my life right?

I guess at some point we'll be making a trip out to see this little man!

Anda is going to be new to Texas with her first little guy, anyone in Austin need a few new friends? :) Miss you already girly! November can't come soon enough!!!

Happy Easter

Happy Easter to everyone! We had a great day! Alana woke up and got to see her basket with all kinds of fun stuff in it! This is the same basket that my mom bought her last year and filled it for her, so I thought I'd try to carry it on for as long as I can. It's hard for me to let go of these things my mom has given her, because there won't be anything new from her. So we will make the best of out what we have of her! (These are also her ears from last year)


Of course the first thing she opened were the crayons and her Toy Story coloring book! I think the first movie she's sat through so far has been Toy Story. She's in love!


She grabbed her new bubble machine and we headed outside try it out!


She loves her bubbles!

As did Roxy! She tried to eat them as Alana blew them all over the yard.

Our Easter morning at home was fun, but it was time to head to grandmas for the afternoon.

The sun was shining and it was so beautiful out! Little on the cool side, but a great day! This is my new favorite picture of my two favorite people in the world!

My Loves!

Alana had to bust out the bubbles at grandmas too!

Then it was time for the Easter Egg hunt. Alana had a lot of fun collecting them!

She was a proud girl finding eggs

She sat down to count her eggs and eat as much candy out of them as she could.

Alana doesn't eat much sugar, candy or soda, so today was a fun day of candy for her! She even shared with Daddy.

I think she had TOO many jelly beans in her mouth.

Me and my mother in law! This woman is amazing and does so much for us. She means the world to me! I really am the luckiest girl EVER to have such great in laws that I LOVE so much!

Great Easter Sunday today! Alana had one message for you before you go! Thanks for stopping by, hope you had a great Easter weekend!