Nicolas's Swim Meets

Smile!!!

Swimming Breaststroke.

Swimming Freestyle.

Ribbons from 2/18 meet.

Hi everyone! It's been a little crazy here this month. Nicolas had double ear infections

on the night of his 2/13 swim meet. We just didn't know it until he spiked a fever

Saturday afternoon. SURPRISE!!!!

With that and birthday parties and Vince being on "call" for 5 days, we're ready to bid

February goodbye.

He did pretty good for being so sick. Here are his times.

- Butterfly, 25 yards. 34 seconds. 2nd place!

- Freestyle, 25 yards. 25 seconds. 2nd place!

- The IM, 100 yards. 2.40. Incredible being sick, 2nd place!!

- The IM is 25 yards doing the Butterfly,

- 25 yards doing the Backstroke,

- 25 yards doing the breaststroke, and

- 25 yards doing the Freestyle.

He has been training real hard on his IM. It shows!

He also did 2 Relays w/ 3 other team mates but, came in last on both.

The other meet was this past Thursday. We had him only swim 2 events because of his ear infections.

- Butterfly, 25 yards. 43 seconds. 4th place.

- Freestyle, 25 yards. 23 seconds. 2nd place!

He beat his own record for the Freestyle by 2 seconds!! We are so excited. We are still " giddy" over this. He has one more "Home meet" in a couple of weeks then we go to Conferences. His coaches has taken a real liking to him. So much, that they are personally working with him.

Alot of these kids don't really take this seriously, but he does. He is really working his butt off.

The coaches are real impressed with that and so are we. We really hope he sticks with this. It has been so much fun watching him grow into this strong, confident,determined and fun-loving little man. We are so proud of him. We can't say it enough. We have one more birthday party to go to and then we should be done with

birthdays for awhile. On Valentines day, Nico gave me 2 beautiful cards and chocolate. He

going to make a wonderful husband someday. Ha! Ha! Vince made a beautiful disc of us

through the years and ending with.. " I love you and I want to spend the rest of life with you!"

Other things too, but I keep that just for us. We gave Nico a book that we could record us

reading the book to him. It's called " All the ways we love you." So that was nice. The rest

of the day was spent watching T.V. and playing games.

We hope all of you had a great Valentines as well.

Happy Valentine's Day

Hi everyone. I know it's been awhile since I posted anything. Things have been

pretty crazy around here lately. But, I wanted to let everyone know about

Nico's last swim meet. We survived the water main break from this past weekend.

We also had a little scare with my back problems. I was having problems with

my bladder. I wasn't able to pee. The doctor fears the remaining discs are deteriorating

faster than expected. The fear is that a nerve could be pressing against my bladder or a nerve is pressing against something that it effected my bladder. I could see a surgeon & do a couple of very painful tests to

maybe find out what is happening or just keep going the way we have been & hope for the best.

We are still talking about what will be best for our family. We'll keep you posted.

O.K. now about Nico!

On 1/21, Nico had a swim meet against the Boys & Girls Club.

It was a small group this time so it didn't take as long. Because of that, Our kids, So. Milw. Sharks, swam just about all of the races. Nico swam 5 races which is alot for a meet his age.

Also, he was swimming against kids that were older than him. So, it was an interesting

meet. For the very first time, Nico swam the I.M. O.K. that is the Individual Medley.

Which is swimming 4 different kinds of strokes back to back, 100 yards.

The stroke you start with is:

- the Backstroke, then the Butterfly, then the Breaststroke, and the last one is the Freestyle.

He took 1st place with a time of 2:19!!

The second event was:

- the Butterfly, 25 yards, with a time of 26.79.

He took 1st place!!

The third event was:

-the Backstroke, 25 yards, with a time of 23.87.

He took 2nd place!!

The fourth event was:

-the Freestyle, 25 yards, with a time of 19 seconds.

He took 3rd place!!

The last event was a Relay. 4 teammates swim this event. Each one swims a stroke twice or 50 yards.

Nico swam the Backstroke, 50 yards. The team came in 2nd place with a time of 2:44.72!!

These meets are so much fun. The best part of this is that Nico is having a great time. He

has another meet on Friday, wish us luck!

We would love to hear from you, so reply if you can. Take care & stay warm.

Happy Valentine's Day!!!

The end of 2009

Happy New Year everyone!!!

We had a great Christmas. On Christmas eve, the boys & Montana

built a snowman, or should I say Vince built it & the dog & Nico

played. This year was our 1st year at hosting Christmas dinner

for Vince's family. WOW!!! That is all I can say about that. We served cornish hens which were good. Vince's sister's kids were

SO excited about christmas that they could hardly stand it.

That was cute to watch.

Nico got everything on his wish list and more.He is into science this year, so he got alot science kits.Montana even got a present from Santa. Vince and I got cool things as well. He got a lawn mower, tools, and a Snuggie. ( HA! HA!) I

gave him a engraved card & money clip. He gave me a "one of a kind" Mickey Mouse pendent.The ears have our anniversary stone and the face is a diamond. He got many,many kisses for that one.

Christmas night, we went over to my dad's house. My brother and his family were there. We don't get to see my family a lot, so it was nice to all be together at once. Nico and our nephew, Mason are the best of friends. It was fun watching them play together. It was a really great day all around.

We hope you and your families had a great Christmas too.Let us know how your Christmas went.

Time to get ready for the new year!

Lots of love to you all.

Wilderness Resort visit

Hi everyone. Over the weekend we went to the Wilderness Resort in the Dells.

We had fun. We went to all 3 waterparks & played miniature golf. We went to

their Wave pool which was interesting. It was the first time Nico was every in

a wave pool. But Vince stayed with him the whole time and they were playing

" Super hero's" against the waves. Of course the waves won. Sunday night, I

got real sick. I had a bad ear infection and I was throwing up. So we had to leave

earlier then we planned.

It was a nice get away after all the running around and the stress of Christmas.

Well, that's it for now. Take care.

I wanted to share this pictures with you.

I took these on the day of that blizzard some of us had.

We have about 8 squirrels that live in a tree we have in our front yard.

We like feeding them & watching them play. But we think we created 8

furry monsters. If we don't feed them when they want to eat, they come on

our big bay window sill & look in & tap on the glass. Honest to god!!!!! The first time

that happened, Montana went crazy & we couldn't believe what we were seeing.

It gave us a good laugh. That's for sure.

The above picture of Montana watching the squirrel from the inside, I finally

got a picture of her doing that. She does that all the time. She loves playing

with them, and the squirrels love teasing her. We must have gone though

3 bird feeders this year because they keep jumping on them

and breaking them. The birds are never amused by this.

Who needs T.V. when you have a show in your front yard to watch, right?

Nico is sick again. He has double ear infections. We couldn't believe it.

Enough with being sick already. We just want to be healthy and

stay that way. Vince and I are O.K. Tonight is Nico's swim team awards party.

All of us are pretty excited. It should be a fun time.

Also, I wanted to give you an up-date on my back.

I'm having new symptoms. Sever pain is shooting all the way down to my toes.

This is most likely caused by the next 2 discs above the fusion. They is no more

cushion left. Which means it's bone on bone. It means I

could be looking at more back surgery in the near future. Now, that doesn't

mean I will agree to it. My pain is pretty brutal at times. Other times it's

unbearable. I use my stupid cane more often these days now. My doctor

is trying to keep me as comfortable as possible. Having the pump plus

other pain medicine, it's all we can do at this time. Right now, there

is nothing else to try. We try to keep smiling and stay positive

for Nico's sake but I can't lie. It's very hard. I know in the

long run, we will beat this disease. It's the "when" that's hard.

Vince and I are grateful for the love and the support you give us.

It helps alot.

Well, that is it for now. We send our love & wish all of you a very

Merry Christmas!

Nico showing off his ribbons.

Our little swimmer!

Hi everyone. We hope your Thanksgiving was nice. Well, as everyone knows, Nico is on the South Milwaukee Swim team. He had 3 swim meets this year. So, we would like to brag a little.... His first meet was on 10/9 @ Riverside High school. He competed in 4 strokes.
- Backstroke: 30.74 & he took 3rd place.
- Freestyle: 25.7 & he took 5th place.
- Breaststroke: 43.72 & he took 4th place.
- The Relay: 1 minute & the team took 3rd. place!! Pretty good for his first time competing ever!

His second meet was a home meet on 10/23. He competed in 3 strokes.
- Backstroke: 26.7 & he took 4th place.
- Freestyle: 24.95 & he took 4th place.
- Breaststroke: 46.39 & he took 6th place. Not his best stroke.

His last meet for the year was on my birthday, 12/2. This meet was also a home meet. He competed in 3 strokes.
- Backstroke: 30.66 & took 3rd place. He is 9 seconds away from breaking the record!!
- Freestyle: 24.91 & he took 4th place.
- Butterfly stroke: 36.55. This was the first time he ever swam the butterfly stroke in competition before. He took 1st place!!!

It was the best birthday ever!! We are so proud of him. He has worked really hard to get to were he is now. The coaches have been working with him on his weak areas because they think he his a good swimmer. They hope, as we do, that he keeps going because this could turn out to be something awesome! O.K. I'm done bragging. Christmas is here & so is winter. We are crazy busy every weekend now until Christmas. That's the only thing that we hate about the christmas season. The consent GO,GO,GO. We would love to just sit back & relax a little but I guess that is what the day after christmas We hope everyone stays safe & happy thur the shopping season.
A lot of love to all of you.