Dan found the following article on Forbes.com which made us so proud of our home town university! In case it's not super obvious, we love The University of Michigan especially when it comes to football. So this article just made us beam with pride and we had to share!

Here is the link to the original article or just read on!

Champion Factories

There is a school of thought that holds that champions like Super Bowl LXII quarterback and most valuable player Eli Manning are born, not made. How else to explain the fact that his older brother, Payton Manning, was the Super Bowl LXI quarterback and MVP? But the Manning brothers should thank their alma mater as much as their mater and pater. Eli's college days at the University of Mississippi and Payton's at Tennessee helped direct their natural talents and prepare them for the big leagues.
By their fruits ye shall know them: The National Collegiate Athletic Association's most consistently successful programs function as pipelines to the various professional sports leagues. To identify the top professional athlete-producing schools, Forbes.com's Kelly Nolan examined the current rosters of every team in the National Football League, Major League Baseball, the National Basketball Association, the National Hockey League and Major League Soccer. She noted the college affiliation (if any) of each player, totaled them up and computed our Top 10 ranking.
The biggest champion factory is the University of Michigan, which produced 68 current roster professional athletes. (Michigan's archrival, Ohio State, placed second with 62.) Among Michigan's alumni are 21 hockey players, including Dallas Stars goaltender Marty Turco; three baseball players, including Chicago Cubs pitcher Rich Hill; three basketball players, including Dallas Mavericks power forward Juwan Howard; and 41 football players, including New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady.

Football powers dominate our list, for several reasons. First of all, football teams are significantly larger than those of most other sports, so any non-weighted aggregation of pro athletes will contain more football players than, say, basketball players. Also, the NFL operates no minor league system like that of Major League Baseball; nor does the NFL allow its teams to draft players directly out of high school. The college football teams effectively function as farm clubs for the pros. Case in point: Miami, which earned the No. 3 spot on our list largely on the strength of its gridiron program. (The Hurricanes currently boast 50 alums in the NFL, more than any other school.)
Other schools succeed with a more diversified approach: No. 4 UCLA scored well in four of our five sports categories. (The California-based Bruins are laggards in ice hockey.)
Unsurprisingly, no Ivy League team made the list. But many of our champion factories enjoy excellent academic reputations. (Achievement, perhaps, is contagious.) Only a few of them are private institutions--the majority are large state universities that compete in a wide variety of sports, but place a special emphasis on football.

That's certainly true of Michigan. The Wolverines have won more football games than any other program in NCAA history, including the first Rose Bowl game back in 1901. Among their many star players over the years was a future president, Gerald Ford. Their most prominent current alum is Brady, who may be on the brink of leading New England to an undefeated season.
Tom Brady may have missed bringing the Patriots to victory in 2008, but he does have three Super Bowl championships under his belt. He learned how it was done at Michigan, as Brian Griese's backup on the undefeated 1997 team that won the Big 10 title, the Rose Bowl and a share of the national championship. Besides Brady and Griese (who currently plays for the Chicago Bears), at least eight other members of that storied Wolverines team are still in the NFL, including Heisman Trophy winner Charles Woodson, who plays for the Green Bay Packers.
Still, Michigan would not have topped our overall list if it were just a football school. The Wolverines only rank fifth among all colleges for alums in the NFL, but they are No. 1 as a contributor to National Hockey League rosters. The Michigan teams that won the NCAA hockey tournament in 1996 and 1998 are still represented in the NHL by Turco and other alums.
Michigan's men's basketball program last won a national championship in 1989, but its famous Fab Five came awfully close in the early '90s. The Five, who comprised an all-freshmen starting line-up during the 1991-1992 season, made it to the Final Four before losing to Duke in the championship game. As sophomores, they returned to the championship games only to lose a heartbreaker to North Carolina. Then it was on to the NBA, where two of the Five (Juwon Howard of Dallas and Chris Webber of Golden State) are still pursuing championships.
As for Brady, he didn't win a championship during the two seasons he started for Michigan, but he won two bowl games. His last college game, the 2000 Orange Bowl, offered a forecast of what was in store for the NFL: He passed for 369 yards and four touchdowns while leading the Wolverines over Alabama in overtime.

Abby and A Beautiful Sunrise

A couple of mornings ago Jake looked out the window and said "mom look at the sky, it's purple". It was purple and pink and beautiful.

Abby, my artsy, inquiring child quickly ran to see the "purple" sky. She grabbed the camera and said don't worry mom I will get a picture. She ran outside at 7 am, which is totally a normal thing for her, and I didn't think another thing about it until I downloaded the pictures today.

I was looking at this one and wondered where did you take this one from Abby??
That's right from the roof! She climbed the tree and got on the roof to get a good shot!

She totally cracks me up!

Utah Trip (continued)

I can't believe I forgot to mention this. When we were heading onto the plane from SLC back home we were taking forever to get through security. Even longer than you would think it would take a family of six including one year-old in a stroller to get through. So finally one of the security guards comes over and asks if the back pack (which belongs to Jake) was ours. "Yes", we said. He said "who does it belong to", we looked at Jake (who is 7, and looks very innocent) and said "it's Jakes". The security guy then says "does he have a toy gun?" Then I remembered seeing the toy gun at grandma house and I felt really stupid and said something like "Oh, Jake did you bring that with you!" After a big ordeal, they had already called police, because "they

have to call police whenever a gun is involved" we were finally getting our things back. Except for the gun, they had to keep that. I am sure all the people behind us were so glad they picked our line :)

The culprit

The funniest part about the whole thing is the gun got there just fine going through security at the Detroit airport--no problem! It makes me think all those fun security checks are so worth it!

Other fun things I didn't mention in my first post about our Utah Trip. I was trying not to remember some of these things!
A cute little one year-old with a nasty little ear infection while flying (ear pressure makes them very unhappy) as if flying with a one year-old is not painful enough. A grumpy lady on the airplane right in front of us (I cannot for the life of me figure out why she would be unhappy about sitting in front of us?), but still she was a grump! ER visit (6 am) proceeding a night full of crying (at our friend's house, who just watched our child all day and all night) and no sleeping by me at all that night. Dan missing a lot of his conference because he went to the ER with me. We waited for 45 minutes for an ER doc to come and see us. Finally Dan just used there otoscope and looked in and diagnosed an ear infection. We walked out of the ER and thanked them for there equipment (still hadn't seen the ER doc, and we were the only ones there!) What really could he have told us that the otolaryngologist missed? Dan called a prescription in and we went and got some antibiotics.

While at Snowbird skiing I thought I had lost Abby and had ski patrol out looking for her. I ended up finding her (or rather she found me and flew by me and right into the little pit where you get onto the lift!). They stopped the lift helped her out and I said, "thanks you can call off ski patrol now I found her" . They looked all surprised and said "oh, this is her" I was glad I hadn't waited for them to find her! Right about this time it started snowing REALLY hard and the lift stopped working and the lift was the only way out of there. Dan was back with Andy waiting for us with the car because we had already taken so long finding Abby. I was so tired and we needed to hurry to make it down the canyon and to our dinner on time. So me and Abby and Jake started hiking out. After about 15 minutes and complaining and hiking halfway up the hill--the lift started working again! Great! So I said "should we keep hiking or go ride the lift up and ski back down". They said they wanted to keep hiking so we hiked about 5 more steps and they both said "let's go ride the lift". Well, Ok then I got my ski's back on after some work getting all the snow out of my boots (from hiking up the mountain). Then after another 10 minutes of helping Jake get his boots into his skis and Abby having made no progress to get her skis back on and me about ready to seriously lose it. I decided to ski down and ask the lift people to get me the heck out of there. They ended up snowmobiling us out one by one! It was pretty embarrassing but I was just happy to be getting out of there. Jake said that the snowmobile ride was his favorite part of the day!

Utah Trip

We had such a great trip to Utah. We enjoyed so many fun things from skiing to St. George!

We flew in to SLC and immediately met up with our great friends the Fisher's (except for Peter--we missed you) and went to dinner at the Mayan. That was the only time I pulled my camera out the whole trip. Actually it's probably a good thing because the pictures I took are seriously lacking.

Abby, Madeline, Mitch, Jake and the blurr is Tyler. Sorry about the bad picture, it was seriously the best one I got.

If you haven't been to The Mayan restaurant in SLC you should really check it out. These pictures do not give it justice, but it is really cool. This is the big pool of water that live divers jump into from big tall cliffs.

Here is one of the talking parrots at the Mayan. (Abby took this one she figured out how to focus the camera)

We stayed two nights with the Fisher's and Nicole was so sweet and watched Estee for us while we went skiing all day on Friday and then watched everyone while we went to a fancy dinner. We always have such a great time with the Fisher's and Nicole was on her own this time. I totally miss having long conversations with Nicole, but it was so fun to see her anyway. The kids all had a great time with her kids too.

Dan then went up to his conference at Snowbird and the kids and I headed to Logan to see family. It was a blast! Here a shot of me and two of my sisters Jill and Josie. Thanks to Josie for taking it!

Before leaving Logan I dropped all the kids off at my wonderful in-laws for a fun two days with grandma and grandpa. I headed for Salt Lake to get Dan and fly to St. George. It was 72 degrees. We loved it there. I sat in the pool OUTSIDE the first night and thought about my poor friends in Ann Arbor in the 10 degree weather. It was a fun and relaxing two days with no kids and warm weather.

We then flew back to SLC and had a FUN dinner with a great group of friends from med school. It was so much fun to see them all. We are all pretty much at the same stage in life and it was fun to hear about what everyone is doing. Sorry no pictures I forgot to get out the camera.

Then we had one day left in Logan and decided to spend it skiing at Beaver Mtn. and with family. It was probably the best day skiing ever! Perfect blue skies and perfect snow. We love Beaver Mtn. it is rarely crowded and prices are still pretty good and the snow and runs are good. Thanks to Grandma for watching Estee all day while we skied. Then we had one last family party dinner and it was so fun to see everyone! What an amazing fun time we had. I did not want to come home I was having way too much fun!

Love those Mountains! This is Snowbird from our day of skiing there.

Esther's and Apples and Fall

I found these adorable pictures and just had to post them. This is Estee with her best friend Esther (she calls her da-do).

Have you seen two cuter baby girls ever??

We went to the apple orchard, which was so fun and the apples are so yummy right off the tree. This is also Estee's first time eating an apple whole. She LOVED it, it was so cute she kept guarding it, like I might take it away from her.

And just because I am so sick of the freezing weather here in Michigan I thought it might be nice to look at pictures of the fall her in MI. It is by far the best season here and makes me think "I like living here". I haven't thought that for a few months. So heres to the wonderful Michigan fall weather!

Happy Valentines Day!

Happy Valentines Day to the loves of my life!

Dan--What I fell in love with and what I still love is his sense of humor. He always make me laugh and I have lots of fun with him.

Andy--This is the nicest 12 year old on earth. He is so nice to everybody he meets and makes friends very easily because people just want to be around someone nice.

Abby--She is so much fun. I love shopping, talking, baking, or just hanging out with Abby. She has the best sense of humor, way beyond her ten years!

Jake--He has always been my little buddy, and he always aims to please. Jake is just pleasant and I love hanging out with him.

Estee--Oh, Estee, she is sweet. She is 18 months and I just pulled her off Abby's desk where she was standing eating Abby's pennies and fingernail polish. But, she will grow out of that soon. I love her sweet little face and cute little spunky personality. I also love her scowl she gives to most people. She is a joy and I am glad she is here in our family.

Guinea Pigs

Cute little members of the family or annoying poo machines?

Ohhhh, he is kind of cute. This is Socks the bully of the cage.

So, I have been feeling a little guilty lately about saying that I want my Guinea Pigs to die. Let me explain. In this house of ours with four children I am the only one who feeds, cleans up after, or it seems even looks at the Guinea Pigs (OK, I take it back Estee is always trying to feed them, but it's really not helpful). When we first got a Guinea Pig he was showered with attention and food by all members of the family (Ok, maybe not Dan--he's never really been a fan and didn't want to get them). Then the attention dwindled and I felt like he (or she can't tell for sure) was lonely. So, we got another Guinea Pig so "Socks" would not be lonely. Now came the problem of "Socks" being mean to "Scruffy". Socks thinks he rules the cage because he was there first. He seriously hoards the food and water and squeaks at Scruffy when he tries to get some. We would have to take Socks out the cage and let Scruffy eat, then put Socks back in. After a while Socks began to get a little nicer but, he still really needs to chill out.
Here is Scruffy peeking through his little house; he is adorable and harassed constantly by Socks.
What I have failed to mention yet is for the last three years I have been cleaning up the little rodent’s poo! For a long time it was weekly that I would clean out the cage (which I lovingly built for them), now it's at least every other week. Unless, of course someone is going to be staying with us then I will clean it out of fear of being reported to The Humane Society. But the main point is I am so sick of cleaning up after these cute little balls of fur. And, I'm not going to go into details about how they refuse to walk on the leash I bought them, won't run in the ball I got them (they are lazy), and all that poo they poo, they actually EAT! We also had to move them into the Laundry room so I could keep them and their poo away from Estee while she is at the stage of putting everything in her mouth (I am sure I don't need to explain why that is a problem).
So, you see, it is not out of meanness that I say I want them to die. I know when they die they will go to Guinea Pig heaven and run in grassy fields and eat all of the green stuff they want without being squeaked at. And there cage will always be clean and I won't have to do it. :)

See my poo! Isn't it disgusting!

Happy things

1. My sister' Julie's finger being OK. She got a bad infection in her finger and it got so bad she almost lost her finger a couple times. She just had a second surgery on it on Tuesday. After talking with her she told me the surgery went really well. So well in fact that they didn't have to do the skin flap thing they were going to that would have connected the two fingers together. Then she would have to have another surgery to cut them apart when it was healing good. The surgeon also said he could for sure save the finger. We are so happy. We really hoped the surgery would go well, and it did. Yeah!

2. Andy's straight A report card. He is a great kid and always gets good grades. But, he worked to get no A-'s and he did it! Go Andy!


3. Great friends. I love my friends and I love that when it seems like I am helping them it turns out to be a huge blessing for me! Thanks great friends!

Gordon B. Hinckley Tribute

My sister, Josie sent this to me. After listening to President Hinckley's funeral today I was especially touched by this tribute to him. He truly lifted up all around him and I am so thankful for his wonderful life.

Poor Fish

Well, the good news is:

The fish are alive.
I showered this morning.
Fish can live for at least two minutes out of water.
Finally put the new rug in the boy’s room.
The fish tank got cleaned out!
No school today--snow day.

The bad news:

If Jake leaves his dresser drawer open it works as great step stool for Estee to climb up to see the fish.
Jakes dresser drawer was filled with fish water for at least three minutes (until it all leaked out).
At least 20 different stuffed animals have fish water on them--not sure how I will clean them (maybe no one will notice if they disappear one at a time...shhh)
I drove to the recycle center on the very snowy roads. The roads are too snowy for kids to go to school but not for me to take the old rug with fish water on it to the recycle center.
No more showering while Estee is awake.
No school today--snow day.

Magic and Sorad still swimming (for now).