The Cox kiddos

Okay this blog is mainly pictures. But they were so fun, I had to share.

We had a "birthday picnic" for my mom's birthday tonight at the West Jordan Veterans park. We all brought our own meals, spread out a blanket & had a good time. My brother Chad wanted to go back to the hospital to see Kelsey and my mom & Kelly went along. After Kalie & her family went home, we stayed and played. KJ and Joe played Frisbee, while Andee & I took Garrett, Lauren and Caleb all throughout the playgrounds. Man we were exhausted. But we had such a good time and got to take some silly photos in the process.

That Lauren is such a ham. Anytime a camera shows up, she either wants to take the picture or decide what faces we get to make.

These kids are just a blast to hang out with. Enjoy our silliness!!! (sorry, there's a bunch of pictures. I hate slide shows...they take too long to download!)

LAUREN!!!

Aww, cute girlies

Silly face!

Lauren wanted us to do "scary" faces....we tried, okay?

With Lauren behind the camera we tried scary faces again. It worked, I'm scared.

Lauren is quite the photographer. We're center & everything.

CALEB!!!

He wouldn't smile.

He made my ride along. Yeah, my legs hurt from trying to keep myself up! Not an adult toy.

Caleb took a turn taking photos. He's still learning!

GARRETT!!!

(he didn't want his picture taken, so this is all we got)

We got Popsicles from the ice cream man.

This is supposed to be Dora?!?!

And Spongebob. Wow, they should really work on those!! hee hee

And of course pictures of me & Andee. Lauren is the best

photographer. She picked the faces!!

What a good night. Thanks Chad & Amanda for letting us be apart of their lives this week. Its been a blessing to get to know them and share in their joys. We're serious about the BIG sleepover. When Kelsey's better its gonna be a part-TAY at the Blackstroms!! We love the Cox Family!!!

Kelsey

My sweet niece's condition is progressing in the positive. I was delighted when I heard good news today. I was over at my brothers watching their kids today and I was lucky enough to be there when Amanda returned from the hospital.

They have taken Kelsey off her paralysis medication and have taken out the machine that was pumping her blood. She started moving her fingers and toes, even tried opening her eyes!!! Amanda said she was holding her hand and felt a squeeze!!

I know it isn't a full recovery, but its such a relief to hear she's reacting well to her antibiotics and possibly moving her extremities. There is more to come and I'm anxiously waiting. I just can't wait for the day where I can sit and talk to her again. They are going to keep her sedated and on a ventilator (sp?) to help her lungs. So its still a waiting game.

Chad & Amanda have stayed so strong through this ordeal and I admire them so much. It was an honor to help them out today. Their kids are a blast to play with. I had my nephew Jesse as well and him & Caleb were ALL over the place. Lauren stayed close by me and loved hide-n-seek. Garrett is the "man" of them all and enjoyed his senority! We played out in the water and he had the best aim with his water gun...the other kids really enjoyed that!

I love those guys!! Thank you Chad & Amanda for letting me come to your home just to "hang" all day. It was a good day.

Kalie posted about Kelsey today as well and it inspired me to share some cute pics. I have an adorable niece - such a teenager! I'm anxious for the future and only hope it continues to stay positive. Good luck Kelsey, stay strong! LOVE YOU!!!

My mom and Kelsey at "Love Bunco 2005"

This was at Andee's bridal shower. She "stuffed!"

Her "self portrait" face

(Plus her new haircut. That was a fun day!)

She's so stylish, I love it!

June is over...Wait, what???

I can't believe it has been 4 weeks since my last blog. That is so unlike me. I'm a weekly blogger. I guess I felt nothing in my life was "blog worthy." Well I'll play a little catch up.

June...well let's see. I worked. Changes were made at work that has required some adjustments. Um, Father's Day came around. Celebrated with my dad and family. Then the last weekend in June my family went camping up at Strawberry. My first camp out of the year. We had a good time, lots of card games and Scrabble. I got dirty, didn't shower for 2 days and was eaten alive by mosquitoes. (Not my idea of a good time, but my sisters made it fun!!)

Okay what a good catch up. That small paragraph was my life in June. See now why I didn't blog?

Now we're in July and so many things have happened that are blog worthy. First, my 13 yr old niece, Kelsey. Unfortunately she got real sick last week and is currently in the PICU up at Primary Children's Hospital. She is progressing, thank heavens. She was put in a medically induced coma last Friday so they could do some extreme blood work and she'll stay in that state for a few more days. I was able to go up and see her with my sisters and parents yesterday. It was so hard to see that poor girl surrounded by all this intense machinery and tubes coming out of everywhere. I just felt so helpless. I made her a silly fleece blanket in her favorite color, pink. It seems like my efforts to make her feel comfortable are useless, since she's in a coma, but it sure looks warm and comfy on her lap.

Read more about her condition on my sister-in-laws blog. They have been posting updates about her progress and information about what happened as well. Please read. They can explain it better than I ever could. www.twogetherfourever.blogspot.com

We are praying for her and trying to help Chad and Amanda out as much as possible. She's a sweet little angel that doesn't deserve this heartache. I can only hope things get better and she won't be in that dreaded hospital much longer. She's got a long road ahead of her.

Of course Independence Day was last weekend. Friday night my sister Jessica, performed at the Real Salt Lake game with her drill team. So we all got to watch the soccer game, awesome half-time events, David Osmond sing and the fireworks show. I didn't watch much of the fireworks, because Kalie and I were too busy watching this little guy, my newphew Jesse.

Mouth open and everything. Man he's cute!!!

Saturday I had to work for a little bit, but I met up with my Dad & Nancy afterwards to go to the South Towne/Sandy annual parade. Lots of candy and water guns. Pretty fun. Then we had dinner together and separated to go to different firework events. Joe and I met up with our friends Alex & Haliee and saw the West Jordan show. A little sad and disappointing. The show started 15 minutes late and only lasted a short 13 minutes. Kind of a bummer, but good conversation took away from the disappointment.

Then yesterday was full of excitement. Joe and I had breakfast with Ciara, Mitch and their adorable little Evie. So nice to catch-up and laugh together. We need to do that more often C!! Then it was up to the hospital to spend some time with Kelsey and her parents. After bawling my eyes out, it was time to head back home and prep for a get together I was planning with more friends. Joe cleaned up the backyard deck and I bought party lights!!! We had a good time.

So there it is. Today is the 6th of July and already more excited than June. We have a trip down to Pine Valley with the Snow fam over the 24th weekend. We're gonna do family photos, so the WHOLE Snow Clan is going down. Kalie & Jesse and Robyn & Jarron. We're excited to have their families enjoy our traditions.

Hopefully more blogs to come. Come on Elizabeth, hop on my band wagon!!

Happy Birthday Moffitt!!!

This post has taken forever to get up - many computer problems. But I literally have 1 minute before today is over and this HAS to post. Errors and all.

Today is my friend Elizabeth's birthday. The big 25!! I just wanted to put together a blog as a tribute to her and our friendship over the past five years. And of course, I have pictures!!

Elizabeth and I met in beauty school and were a hit from the very beginning. Our friendship has outlasted every single one of our beauty school friends. (I only remember a select few!) Beauty school was a blast on its own, but Elizabeth really made it overly exciting. We were also friends with another Elizabeth, so with two Elizabeth's around I had to uncomplicate things and I started calling this Elizabeth by her last name, Moffitt.  Most of my family STILL call her that, even though she is now married and never uses her maiden name. In fact I think there are a few in my family that don't know her real name - my bad! Although I've tried to get rid of that habit, I'll always know this sweet woman as Moffitt.

Man we had some good times in school.  Many lunches on Saturdays at Chili's (where we became Soda Sisters), many theory classes we slept through or never made it to because we couldn't get out of bed!! Many hours of goofing around when we should have been perming those mannequins! Plus all the jokes and laughter we had with fellows students and our favorite instructors, Ruby and Myra. 

Although we lost a few friends after we moved on from school. Liz, Amber and Grace...bummer. I stole Moffitt away from Grace...and let's just say she wasn't too "gracious" about it! Hee hee. We still have good memories.  Like this picture was taken at my surprise engagment celebration. These girls made breakfast for me to celebrate my engagement, although I didn't notice the big sign CONGRATULATIONS ERICA & JOE hanging on the wall for almost 30 mintues!!! I was a little dense.  But here we are, playing with the camera. 

Here is Liz, Moffitt, Amber and Me! We always had such a good time.

Elizabeth was also there for me when I was planning my wedding. Dress shopping, cake tasting, reception center hunting. She was fabulous!! She was my right hand man and really got me through the tough decisions. Nancy, Elizabeth and I had such a blast with all the little details. I couldn't have done it without her. Thank you Elizabeth!! Even though it wasn't your job or your duty, you never complained when I wanted to talk wedding stuff and gush about how excited I was. You were just amazing!!

Here we are on my special day! Man we've changed since then!

And these are my girls. Ciara, Chandra and Elizabeth. They took me out to breakfast before my wedding.

Over the course of our friendship, she has really become a part of my family as well. Either I pick good friends or my family is just freakin' awesome, because they've always excepted my friends like family. Chandra, Ciara and now Moffitt have just fit right in with my family. All the bridal showers, baby showers, fiestas or just for fun, they've always been included. Here are a few of our famous self portraits!

This is us at Andee's bridal shower

Midnight showing of Twilight!

On my birthday at the tattoo place

We have changed so much over the past 5 years, but we've stayed such close friends. I can only hope our friendship just continues and continues. We meet for lunch every Monday and continue our Chili's tradition from back in beauty school. I love our Monday adventures. Chili's and ROSS!!  Plus we've shared friends as well. I've come to know all of her childhood friends and I've been lucky enough to be included in their lives as well. Weddings, birthdays, girl outings. They are a lot of fun and I'm excited I get to share them too.

Well Elizabeth, I hope you know how much I love you. I can't tell you how many times you have been there for me...even just listening. Which you do A LOT of, because I'm always gabbing!! Thank you for being such a great friend. We've had some good times for sure.

Happy birthday friend. I hope you had fun at the Bee's game with everyone and I hope you enjoyed your day. I can't wait to celebrate with you on our Monday. LOVE YA!!!

Memorial Day

Today is a great day of remembrance and recognition.  Of all the people in our lives or the ones fighting for our freedom. Not only the ones that have passed on, but the ones that still affect our lives each day.

Joe and I have met some incredible people throughout our adulthood.  So many friends and family that support us and help make us the people we are today.  This wonderful memorial day is about celebrating them.  Thank you to everyone.  That includes you, the one reading my blog. My thoughts, hopes, desires and silly rants. It includes each person we talk to on a daily basis. The friends and family we don't get the chance to see all the time. We feel so very blessed to have you in our lives.

We also want to recognize the people we have lost. My dear grandma that passed away in March. I loved her so much and she really did have an effect on my adulthood for sure.  She was an amazing woman and I feel so bad she had such a rough time over these last few years. I know you are happy where you are grandma - I love you!  Keep on square dancin'!!

Also our friend John. Its been a year and 3 months since he left our lives. Joe has dealt with this sadness and has started the healing process.  It was hard to lose such a wonderful, outgoing friend.  We went to the Salt Lake cemetery this afternoon. What a beautiful day it turned out to be.  His headstone was there; we hadn't seen it before. We sat and talked about good times we had and all our poker nights.  We also talked about the exciting things that have happened to us, that unfortunately John has missed out on.  A part of Joe left with John.  But things have been really good for us and we were lucky we got to share in John's short life.

So many headstones and graves at the Salt Lake cemetery. Its huge! Many families and visitors there this afternoon.  Its sad to have people leave our lives so soon.  But they are needed elsewhere. Today I am also thinking of all the people I know who have lost someone.  I hope today was a celebration for them as you are to us everyday.

We love you all.  Thank you for reading and make sure you tell that special person you love them, every single day.  Embrace your family and friends and don't ever take ANY moment for granted!!

American Idol

Oh my gosh was tonight so much fun?  I'm a newbie to the American Idol excitement; I started watching religiously towards the end of last season.  I was so excited when Murray's own Archecutie was getting closer and closer to the finals!!  I made it a point to watch this season in its entirety!

I'm definitely a watcher, not a voter.  I let the rest of America chose my idol.  I DVR both shows during the week and indulge myself every now and then.  I even catch a few of my favorite songs (i.e. Heartless, Mad World and any song by Danny Gokey) on the American Idol website.

This year, as the same with last year, I really didn't care who won the show. I mean if they are really talented and popular, they'll become famous either way. Look at Clay Aiken, Katherine McPhee, Chris Daughtry and David Archecutie! There was SO MUCH talent this year. I couldn't believe how good everyone actually was.  There have been some re-airs that I've seen that just make me giggle.  I can't believe some of those previous contestants actually made it to the top 12. (Like Kristie Lee Cook last year....uhh!!) This year I was a fan of Alexis, bummer she went home so early and Megan Joy...however she never picked the right song. I mean come on, Rockin' Robin??? Oy!  She should have embraced Norah Jones or Corine Bailey Rae.  But my huge favorite was the Gokester!!  Danny Gokey and his sexy, raspy voice was just killer.  He gave me goosebumps!  I was hoping that sometime during the season he would pick a song by Bryan Adams...but Anoop beat him to it and say 'Everything I Do'.  Danny would've killed that song.  Of course I was bummed out when he didn't make the final 2, but Adam and Kris are both so amazing...it was hard to see anyone go home.

However, I must say I'm glad to see Kris Allen win.  I honestly thought Adam would take the title by a long-shot. But if you think about it, Adam is a HUGE entertainer and no matter were he fell in the competition, he'll make it big. Broadway, rock concerts, super-bowls...he'll make it. Kris was the underdog and I think if he didn't get the title of American Idol, he wouldn't have done much.  He needed that recognition to boost that career.  I'm excited to see what he has in store.

I was blown away with the finale this year.  A bevy of rock gods and famous artists showed up...(plugs in tow!!)  I loved the Black Eye Peas, Cyndi Lauper and Keith Urban.  I almost died when my Gokey was singing 'Hello' by Lionel Ritchie. Are you kidding? That was FABULOUS!!! However it rocked my world to see KISS on stage again in all their glory...and outfits!!  Did you see it??  Spandex, makeup and the platform shoes!  It was a time warp and so freakin' amazing!! Then to top the night off, Kris and Adam sang with QUEEN!!  My all time favorite group was there jamming to 'We Are the Champions'.  Who isn't more amazing then Queen??  RIP Freddie Mercury.  

The show tonight just altered my entire universe. Music is just so uplifting and exciting. It always puts me in a good mood anyway.  Plus to see someone come from nothing and then 13 or so weeks later, are up on that stage singing with some greats like Rod Stewart, Queen Latifah, Santana and Lionel Ritchie!!  You gotta be kidding me!!

Well congrats to Kris Allen for becoming the next American Idol. I'm so excited to hear all the singles that come from those fantastic contestants.  I might have to buy tickets to the American Idol tour.  Anyone selling 'em?  I'll pay top dollar!!! ;)

Thanks for reading my rant.  Yay American Idol!!!  Next up...So You Think You Can Dance!!!

Choppity chop chop!

I've been "growing" my hair out since last July and I recently decided to chop it off again.  Its pretty much the same cut I had a year or so ago.  My best buddy and former manager, Aaron, took care of me.  I went in for a trim and came out a new woman!

The weather has been so beautiful lately and I've had so many clients (including my sisters) that have come in and wanted short cuts for the summer.  I guess I feel like I need to be apart of that group. 

Plus its easier, healthier and so much more fun!!  I put some bright colors in it last week; the day before doing a presentation at a beauty school.  (I just had to have "hairstylists" hair for that show!!)  Believe it or not, but it really helps my business. Especially with the newbies (girls fresh out of school). Having fun/funky hair promotes salon attraction and attention. And right now, I need to freshen-up my staff with some newbies!! Grabbing their attention is exactly what I needed! 

I think this look is more "me" anyhow.  The fun, crazy, upbeat Erica I used to know.  I'm dippin' back into that!!

Everyone should get a new summer do.  It really does make you feel better!!  **Thanks Aaron and my new stylist Megan, for cutting & coloring me.  My hair is hot again!!!**  Its only been a week & 1/2 and I already feel like a completely rejuvenated Erica!!

(Its hard to tell from this photo, but the cut is asymmetrical; this being the long side. Plus it has bright orange and blonde pieces)

If you're thinking of a new summer 'do' - call me and lets make it happen!!