U2...With or Without You!

Tuesday Casey, Kandace and I got to attend the U2 360 concert at Rice Eccels Stadium. We have had the tickets for over a year, or I should say I got the tickets for Steve, Casey and Kandace last year to attend the concert. But then the concert was cancelled and rescheduled for May 24th, just one week after Steve's knee replacement surgery. Unfortunatley Steve was not up to going to the concert and I got his ticket by default. So Tuesday night, we got a couple of "Babysitters" Tineke and Margaret to come and stay with Steve while we headed off in "Blueberry" to the concert.

We were there with thousands of other crazy fans. You could feel the excitement in the air. Here are Casey and Kandace waiting for the concert to start.

Casey just LOVES it when I make him take pictures with me...can you tell?

So when we got there we found out that they had closed our section of seats due to restaging and they "Upgraded" our seats. Well when we went to find our "Upgraded" seats they had moved us from row 14 to row 57. Kandace was not happy and grabbed the tickets and said she was going to go talk to them. We didn't think that we would get anywhere, but when she came back we had seats in the middle section on row 16...now that is an "UPGRADE". So, we really did have sweet seats!

The FREY started the concert and they were so amazing!

Oh....me taking more pictures....Casey was just so thrilled, can you tell by the look on his face?

The FREY finishing up their gig. After the FREY there was a change of stage to setup for U2. This is a picture of the camera crew climbing into their seats for the concert. It looked like a fun carnival ride.

Here we are, waiting for U2 to come out and start the concert. Once the sun went behind the mountain, it got COLD, but at least we didn't have any rain!

And finally the concert started....here is "The Edge" playing the guitar. The start of a great night!

The concert was completley sold out! This is a shot of the 360 screenn showing not an empty seat in the crowd.

Bono treating us to " A Beautiful Day" one of my favorites!

Bono and Adam Clayton...."With or Without You"....Made me want to be "WITH" Steve! I felt bad he had to miss this great concert, but I will make it up to him and surprise him with new tickets sometime soon!

And before we knew it U2 was doing their encore and the concert ended. It was such a fun night, great music, great company and perfect....a little cold....weather. Thanks Casey and Kandace for such a fun night! Steve keep up with your Physical Therapy so we can go to another concert soon!

Running with Angels...2011

Running with Angels is one of my very favorite races that I do each year. Of course I don't like to run a race alone, so I always have to talk one of my kids into running with me. Lucky Kandace got to run with me this year, she also ran with me in 2009 so she knew how lucky she really was to run this race!This is a traditional picture we take every year in front of the ARCH. I have a picture here with Courtney and Cameron too, so I had to get one with Kandace!
There were more people at the race this year than I have ever seen before. Everyone is finding my favorite races to run and joining the fun. This is me and Kandace at the start line, you can kind of see the start arch in my sunglasses. COOL!
Running in the gardens. It was so beautiful! Not a cloud in the sky and after rain for a solid week we appreciated every minute of sunshine among the amazing garden path.

More of the beauty in the garden, this is the BIGGEST reason I love to run this race. However, there are alot of hills and the final hill at the end nearly killed me this year. I finished the race in just 33 minutes, not too bad since I couldn't run this past week. After I finish, I always head back and run my kids in.

And this is where I caught up with Kandace to run her in. She was walking pretty fast!

I made her stop for a quick picture so we wouldn't have to come back for pictures. She was in a hurry to see how fast she could walk the course.

Kandace....booking it to the finish line. Are the gardens so amazing?

She did it! Kandace walked the course in 49 minutes! Awesome job Kandace!

After the race we walked around the gardens for a few minutes and took a few shots. Doesn't Kandace look great!

And here I am, not sure what is going on with my crazy hair, but the flowers look good!

And a final shot of both of us before we leave. It was a great start of our day. After the race we came home and helped Steve for a little while, then worked outside in the yard for a couple of hours. When we came in, Kandace said "Mom and Dad are Killing Me" They wake me up early for a race, and work me all day long....AGHHHH! That's the breaks when you are the only kid left at home I guess! Let's see what torture I can find for her next weekend! :) Love you Kandace!

Mother's Day, MTC, and Birthday make for a busy week!

I must say that this Mother's Day will be one of my favorites. It all started at 8 AM when we got a SKYPE call from Courtney in Russia. She looks fantastic and had such a glow. We were only able to talk to her for 30- minutes because she was at a members home and there were three sister missionaries that needed to make SKYPE calls to their families too. It was the best way to start my Mother's day. Cameron had arranged with us to call at 9 PM because he had meetings he needed to be to. He surprised us and called at 6 PM, just as we were sitting down to eat. This time he was prepared with his own food, and ate a doughnut while he talked to us. I LOVE this picture with him, I just wish we would have thought to get the camera out for Courtney's call. We has such a wonderful time talking to him. This is his last call home before he heads home in October.

Elder Leavitt sending the Love to his BIG BRO and Sista!

Another thing that I really LOVE about Mother's Day is my kids make me all the foods that I love for dinner. This is Kandace and Grandpa sneaking the shrimp cocktail before dinner...busted!

Kandace and Steve making a feast of salads, yes I LOVE salads, so I love that they make sure we have plenty of choices.

Casey showing off the yummy marinated salmon that he made me. It was the BEST salmon, and I enjoyed every bite! I must say I have trained my kids right, because every since I can remember they have made me a fabulous Mother's Day meal, and every year it gets better. I really do have the BEST kids, sorry to tell all you other Mothers out there :(

Wednesday we took Sister Orton to the MTC. Doesn't she look beautiful! She was soo nervous, but stayed clam. We left early so we could stop and have lunch, then we went up to the temple and took a few pictures before we entered the grounds of the MTC.

One final shot with Mom and Dad at the MTC. It flooded back memories of when I dropped off Cameron and Courtney, so I could feel their pain. Audrea will be an amazing missionary and I am soo proud of her and her choices. Her Mom and Dad have done an amazing job rasing her!

Finally, Yesterday was Casey's 26th Birthday so today we got together to celebrate this great occassion. He asked for new wheels for his skates, which are almost as much as a car tire. He was pretty excited for his new wheels! Can you tell!
Blowing out the candles, before the house burns down!Steve singing In his best Opera voice "Happy Birthday to YOU!"And the traditional ICE CREAM cake. He requested chocolate cake and cookie dough Ice Cream. I think we are done with birthdays for a few weeks, when in June we will celebrate Kandace's. Such a busy week, and I didn't even post our couples motorcycle ride. Maybe I can do that this week some time. Have a great week everyone.

PRE Mother's Day fun!

Saturday, May 7th was a day full of family fun! It all started with our annual support of RACE for the CURE. I have been doing this for the last four years, and this year I talked Kandace into going with me. So here we are as the race begins. Check out all the people behind us. They were expecting to have 22,000 people at the race. It was a perfect day to be out supporting this great cause. I have supported my friend Jenn Jewkes the last four years, who lost her battle against Breast cancer a couple of years ago. Here are her sons Joe and Sam who come out every year with their family and friends to also support the on going battle against breast cancer. I couldn't believe we found them in the crazy crowd. Jenn is the reason I started attending this event. she was such an amazing person, and she would be soo proud of her sons for still continuing their support!
Kandace and I had a fun time reading all the team names on the shirts, here are a few of our favorites.
"We support our Boobs, STOP the war on MY RAQ"
Watch out for this guy gals...there really is a "Boobie Bandit". One of our favorites shirts we didn't get a picture of it was a black tank top and on the front there were two HOT PINK hand prints on the boobs and on the back it said "Save second base"! Really, you should all join us next year for the festivities just to read the great team shirts you see.

Just a view of all the people there, the crowd really goes all the way to the mountain. So crazy!

The finish line is at the Gateway. This is just a sign we saw in the crowd as we were walking around looking for Vicki. So true!

Even the men get into supporting the ladies! Mystery men in the crowd.

And here we are at the end of the 5K. We had such a great time talking the whole route and enjoying the great spirit of the whole event.

Oh, and I just had to take a picture of this team shirt while we were waiting for Vicki to walk in the survivor parade. This said "Team Cameron" Grandmother, Mother, Sisters, daughters and Grand daughters. This was for you Cam.

I kept calling Vicki to try and meet up with her, I was walking to meet her and she called and said "I'm in the parade" so a few second later she walked right by me. Doesn't she just look so HAPPY! What a cute sister I have!

This is the survivor parade, just to give you some idea of the amount of people that were there to support these ladies.

Okay, here is me and Kandace again...do you notice anyone in the back? Thanks Tony for making our picture so funny!

Another guy supporting the ladies. He had pink and black stripe tights on too! It was just so much fun to be there. So after the parade I had plans to meet my other sister Linda from Orlando and her family that are here staying with us. She is taking her daughter Audrea to the MTC on wednesday. We met at the Salt Lake Temple to do a session.

Sisters! We don't see each other enough, so when we do, we love spending time together. The Orton's. I really LOVED hanging out with them for the afternoon. I made them take a few pictures. There were so many brides that we didn't even try to get a picture in front of the temple.

And the flowers on temple square could not have been more beautiful! It was the BEST "Pre Mother's Day" I have ever had! Thanks to my great sister's and daughter, who when I got home from the temple took my shopping for a "Hot new outfit", but that is my next blog entry for Mothers Day.