Israel... 48 hours and counting

Yes, we are alive.  I know you all were wondering.  3 months without blogging... Let's just say, life has been crazy busy.  Here is a snapshot of the past 3 months:

-My entire family came for Christmas and stayed at our house.  It was fun (and a tad cramped.)  We had a great Christmas!

-Ben turned 9 on Dec. 16th.  He started his winter season of Jr Jazz basketball and had a lot of fun.  His last game was a week ago.  He created a really neat komodo dragon out of clay and it was displayed in the school library for a couple weeks.  He continues to be my way too smart 3rd grader.

-Emma's life has been dance, dance, dance the past couple months.  She has had 3 competitions so far and each time she has performed her solo, she has won Queen! (that's 1st place)  Last week she even won the Overall High Point for her division and beat out 14 other girls and got a 6 foot trophy.  Crazy!  Her team is doing awesome.  They took 1st place in all their routines the past 2 weeks and last weekend her jazz routine beat out 30+ routines in the Intermediate division and won the Overall High Point.

-Josh started t-ball on Saturday.  He was so excited to go to practice and use his lefty glove.  Last week I registered him for kindergarten.  It was a bittersweet day.  I'm going to miss my little buddy.  My kids are growing up!

-Jake has been busy trying to finish different phases of a couple projects for work.  He had his 33rd birthday last week and I surprised him and took him to the Melting Pot.  It was the first time we had ever been there and it was very yummy!

-I presented at 3 Gold's Gym seminars and was able to share my weight loss/cancer story.  I really enjoyed doing that and hope they ask me to do it again soon.  I continue to workout 4-5 days a week and am training for the Ragnar Relay in June and the Hood 2 Coast relay in August.  I've been super busy at work with competition season and everything that goes along with that.  I love it despite the exhausting weekends.  Sometimes I feel like I barely have enough time to breathe.  Good thing though is that at night I'm out as soon as my head hits the pillow. :)

And our big news... Jake and I are leaving for Israel in 2 days!  My parents spoiled me, my siblings, and our spouses and bought tickets for us to come visit them.  We have a 12-hour layover in London and then should be in Tel Aviv on Friday.  I'm going to miss my babies and I think it will be hard for me to turn my phone off and disconnect myself from the world for awhile... but at the same time, I need this time away to re-charge and get my mind off of life for awhile.  My sister, Ash, and her husband Chad will be there with us too.  It will be a vacation of a lifetime!