March Madness

I love this time of year!  I love the intensity, the Cinderellas, the feeling that maybe this year could be THE year.  I love that any team could potentially win any game.  I love the overtimes, the buzzer beaters and the brackets.  

For the past twelve years or so, my family has made March Madness a big event.  We take off work for the first round (second round - however you count it).  We watch basketball all day and eat wonderful food.  We spend time together and make memories.  We fill out brackets and tease each other.  It's a time that I look forward to every year.

This year, Joel and I started celebrating March Madness early.  In May we will celebrate our fifteenth anniversary, but since May is a difficult time for us to get away, we decided to do something that we've been wanting to do.  We left the kids with the grandparents and we went to Las Vegas to the Pac-12 basketball tournament.  It was so much fun!  It was great to spend time alone together, to watch every single tournament game, to eat at restaurants that don't have a kids menu.  We had such a great time!  As much as we love our children and are thankful for them, it was so refreshing to have time without them.  And the kids didn't miss us one bit!  They were having way too much fun being spoiled by their grandparents.  

In the midst of all the madness, I've even been able to write a little bit.  I'm fairly certain that I'm way behind schedule to get three books written this year, but I'll definitely have book four written by fall of this year.  It's been interesting to write as we watch basketball, as the kids play around us, as people are cheering and yelling.  You'd think it would be distracting, but I love it.  As I'm writing this, basketball is on the TV, people are chatting, I can hear the kids' show playing in the next room and dinner is being prepared.  I love these people and this chaos.  I love this madness!