Official Teenager

We had a milestone birthday this week. Trey celebrated his #13 Birthday, he is officially a teenager. He wanted to try the escape room again. This time the theme was a murder mansion. Pretty much the same crowd as last year, except Derek felt good so joined us along with their friend Zaiden. Zaiden has actually been Derek's friend since elementary school, but Trey has joined their group in online games. Now Zaiden is a friend to both of them.

Hamilton and a Few weddings.

 Hamilton the Musical was finally coming back to Phoenix after COVID and the world being crazy last year.  We bought 4 tickets a few months back, not knowing if our kids would want to go.  They didn't.

Curtis invited one of his employees Kristi and her husband, Brian to use the extra tickets.  When Curtis first asked Kristi if she wanted to go see Hamilton, she declined-she thought Curtis was talking about the Hamilton High school JV football game.  She made up excuses that it was her husband's birthday, etc.  They were busy Thursday night etc.  Curtis said "really you don't want to go? It's really good, tickets are hard to get etc. "  Then it dawned on her which "Hamilton" Curtis was inviting her to.  Suddenly it sounded like an amazing way to spend her Husband's birthday.  We had a fun time.  Kristi and Brian loved it and were most appreciative of the tickets.

Marilyn, Curtis, Kristi and Brian Pengraft

Hamilton Cast

Apparently, October is the time to get married.  We were invited to three weddings in one week.  We went to the first two but opted out of the third.  We were busy that night.

The first wedding was with Andrew and Britny Franklin.  Andrew is Curtis's Real Estate friend from Houston but they chose to get married in Scottsdale.  Very convenient for us.

Me with the Real Estate Wives, Amber and Trica

Curtis with Andrew the Groom

Curtis with his Real Estate Friends, Fred and Kevin.  They cleaned up well.  All they ever wear is shorts and flip flops, Kevin only wears black.

The Bride and Groom Mr. and Mrs. Franklin.  It was a beautiful wedding.  I loved that they didn't accept gifts, they just asked for donations for the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation.  They have friends with twin boys who have the disease.

Wedding #2

A niece from one side of the family married a nephew from another side of the family.  No blood relation, but it was very convenient for all the guests who knew both sides very well.

Jessica Suarez marries Nick Zoccoli, and wears her mother's wedding dress.

Here we are with Andy and Amy Ibach, Curtis' childhood friends.

Andy and Amy Ibach, Gus and Raquel Suarez, Alisa and Mike Zoccoli

The family tree and how this all ties into us.

Gus Suarez, is Curtis' step brother.  Alisa Zoccoli is Curtis' Sister, who is married to Mike Zoccoli.  Mike's nephew Nick (son of Tony Zoccoli), married Gus' daughter Jessica.  All the Zoccoli and Suarez kids grew up together.  I think Jessica and Nick actually thought they were related most of their lives because the families were so intermingled.  Mike Zoccoli officiated the wedding which was very fitting, he did a great job.

It was a formal wedding at the Knotty Barn, with a hint of Disney thrown in.  It was very nice, guests were asked to wear green.

Both weddings were very different but equally nice.

Halloween is Back

Last year Halloween was pretty much a bust is Covid 19. I think for the most part people have just accepted COVID and we are going about our lives. Trey finds his costume inspiration of the Halloween store. We paid them a visit and I told Trey in the past his costume has evolved by the accessory he chooses, The Hat, or Cane or whatever prop he loves that year. He didn't necessarily believe me until he found this.

Trey was all about "Go Big or Go Home" There were other '70's afro's but he wanted the most "afro-ist" Biggest, 1970's hair they had. So we had to find the perfect 1970's outfit to go with it.

Trey went to Trunk or Treat all Disco'ed out. I think his costume was a hit. Then on Actual Halloween, we had some fun Halloween food.

Derek's girlfriend Jocelyn and her younger sister came over. Derek and Jocelyn passed out candy, Trey and Verona went trick or treating and they got some loot. Everyone had a great night. It was nice to see my kids socializing Dax dressed up like Wyatt Earp because he already had the mustace. A suggestion by his friends. He bought the hat at the "Cowboy Store" down the street. It is actually called shoppers. He loves that authentic hat. He wears it every time he goes out for a walk. He says it makes him feel powerful.

Last First Day of School

WOW!! I blinked.  Derek is now a senior and my baby, Trey is starting middle school.  I was able to snap these pictures.  I know they were thrilled to pose for these. They should be used to it by now.

Off to Bogle Jr. High for 7th Grade.

I snapped a pick of Trey at his bus stop.

Derek started the year out at Hamilton High School where he has been since he was a Freshman.  The first three days were great, then he got sick.  We were 10 days in the school year and Derek had already missed seven days.  We just couldn't bear to go through another year like last year, limping through his classes, maybe feeling well enough to go to school. Tons of missing assignments.  We are out of time, Derek is a senior and he needs to graduate.  We decided to put him in online classes through El Dorado High School where he did summer school.  I think he would rather be "in-person" school with his friends, but he knows he needs to graduate.  So far online school is going well.

Extreme Duplication Experience

 Curtis had a brilliant idea for his business.  When he originally moved into his current office space, there were cubicles in the main floor area right in front of a big window area. I always thought the cubes were odd and ruined the space.  

Curtis decided to remove the cubes, build a stage, fill the area with chairs bring in people from his EXP downline and put on an event for the people.  It was a big undertaking, but he pulled it off and it was a great success.  I even made him a sign.

Park City, UT, and ASU Football

 It has been thirty years since I met my lifetime friends in college at BYU-H.  Somehow we got the name Wicked Chicks, I think JJ came up with that name as well as "Painting Princess'".  We really were not Wicked, we were pretty wholesome.

We decided it was time for a reunion.  Park City, UT was the destination as it was pretty central for all of us, and Park City is a neat town.  Robert and his wife live in the area, so they drove over to see us.

We rented Electic Bikes and went on Adventure around Park City

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JJ, Steph, Mary, Marilyn

JJ, Steph, Marilyn, Jamie and Robert Donigan, Mary

Phase2 of this trip:  I was strategic about planning this around the ASU/BYU Football game in Provo Utah,  Curtis had been planning to go to this game for a while with his long-time employee Justin, who is a big ASU fan. Curtis treated Justin and his wife, April to a weekend in Utah for being a loyal employee.  I joined them for the second half of the weekend.

Someone Curtis knew he ran into

Curtis and Justin

Justin and April 

Justin is being introduced to a cougar tail.


BYU beat ASU, Justin and April were not happy about that.




We then went to the Olympic park where the 2002 Winter Olympics were held.
Most people think they need to go sky diving, or bungee jumping for a thrill.  Just go visit Olympic park and get a taste of what Olympians do every day.  It looks pretty fantastic what they do on TV, when you see it up close it is unreal what those human beings can do with their bodies and the heights and speeds they are reaching.

This is the front of the ski jump.  They have turned it into an innertube slide for the rookie tourists.

The tourists have to start on the small hill on the left, then they can move up to the hill in the middle. The small hill was plenty for us

This is us at the top of the small innertube slide/Olympic ski jump.  It was terrifying, I had my eyes closed for that 20 seconds of terror.  I can't imagine what the next hills are like and we were sliding down the bottom half on a tube, not starting at the very top jumping on skis.  CRAZY!!

Justin and Curtis also rode the Bobsled driven by a professional, and slower than what the actual Olympians do.  Their ride was about 60 mph, Olympians are about 75 mph.  They said it was the most thrilling ride they have ever been on, better than any roller coaster.  April and I were happy to watch.

It really is unbelievable what limits the Olympian's push.

It was a very fun weekend, Justin and April had never been to Utah, they loved it and loved park city.  They said it was a 9/10 only because ASU lost.

Las Vegas BYU vs UofA

 BYU was playing Arizona in Las Vegas, I got to tag along. We had a great time.

We tried a new airline called JSX.  Curtis was getting sick of commercial airlines.  Ever since COVID the Airlines have not been fun, flight attendants are CRANKY, passengers are rude not wanting to wear masks, just a cattle call.  Curtis heard about this "boutique airline"  it only holds 30 passengers, you arrive literally 20 minutes before take off.  It was such a nice change for not too much more money.

As usual, we had fun exploring the hotels.  This is the atrium at Bellagio

Here we are at the new Raider "Allegiant" Stadium.  It was beautiful

We met up with our old friends Bracken and Kristen Walker We used to go to BYU games together before we had kids

We went to the Michael Jackson show put on by Cirque du Solel it was amazing.

Our favorite kind of "outdoor" shopping

Best of all BYU beat Arizona, so Curtis went home happy and made the trip worthwhile.  There were soo many BYU fans there.  The concessions didn't sell much alcohol that game but they did run out of soda and ice cream .