Did you know we do not own a television? This is why we go to my sister Amy's house to watch football. Of course we love visiting with her. But football or any sport in a house with your family is much more relaxing than in a restaurant.

During half time we played soccer. Her new house has a great yard for the kids to run around in. Alyssa has just learned to walk and does not like the feel of the crispy crunchy dormant grass on her hands. When she takes a spill its entertaining to watch her battle with...put your hands on the grass to push yourself to standing again, or just sit here while everyone else plays.

Of course Aunt Megan comes to the rescue.

She is in position to throw it back in bounds like a real soccer player!

And....she threw it over the fence!

And Keith had to go get it!

Just kidding.

That was all Amy's doing.

She has started with a soccer club and was showing Keith how she can punt the ball.....over fences!

But the kids do have fun throwing and kicking the ball, especially Cash.

P.S. I am proud of Amy for picking up a new sport. It can be intimidating to try something new. 

Happy Birthday Jackson

 Happy Birthday to my nephew Jackson who turns 8 today!

Jackson, please tell me what's your favorite food now that your palate has matured 8 years?                                             "Macaroni and cheese and pizza"

 If this stays the same, his cooking future will be easy as pie... I mean pizza.

Coincidentally he has also "lost 8 teeth". One for each year, but not per each year....that would just be nuts.

Jackson, what would you NOT want to be when you grow up?

"A janitor"

  Fair enough, I don't think anyone likes chores

 

I asked Jackson what the most comfortable place in his house was, thinking surely he would say the couch or disclose a hiding spot away from his sisters. But he said...

"My bed"

And last but not least if Jackson could do ANYTHING he wanted for a whole day, he would...

"Go to Sebastion's house"

I am interested to see how he answers these questions in a few years.

P.S. I also stumbled on this little gem, what a cutie at 7 months!

Happy birthday Jackson, we will see you on Sunday. Hope you have a great day and win at put put.

Maybe Maple

The next home we have I would like to have trees that change colors, leaves that fall mostly all at once and are crispy crunchy under your feet.

I think fall colors on trees are absolutely beautiful and while I love my old oaks I find myself driving around Houston in fall/winter months jealous of all the yellow, orange, red and purples I see on trees and plants.

I also think I would delight in raking less often. I always dive into raking energetic and motivated, about halfway through I am ready to throw in the towel. The wind(or cash) is blowing over my piles and leaves continue to fall rapidly from the trees, this can be a little less than encouraging.

But why do I love crispy crunchy leaves?

Well, besides the fact that they are just more exciting to step on and hear the crunch, they break down more rapidly than oak leaves. This makes them great for composting....

Which we do

With joy.

P.S. This is a great way to weigh down the leaves so they don't fly away as you wheel them around the yard. Yuliya and Cash are willing to help you out and sit on your leaves for rides in a wheelbarrow.

Side note: I made a fantastic grilled cheese with sauteed onions inside dipped in pesto sauce last night. Still marveling over how great it was. What did you have for dinner last night?

Last night

Last night we went to get the car washed....
But it was closed at 5pm?

Last night I forgot to buy milk....
So we had dinner at Los Cucos. The first time to eat out on a week night in an extremely long time. They had a playground though!

Last night a cold front moved in...
When we started playing on the playground, it was warm, humid and windy. It was chilly and windy when we left, making us say brrrrrrr all the way to the car.

Last night Yuliya wrote an apology letter to her teacher....
A short one yes, but an apology none the less. She was put in timeout yesterday for not listening to directions. She ended up writing it twice because once we were done I realized the paper had one of Cash's scribbles on the back of it. Having her rewrite it was very reminiscent of writing lines as a child....oh how I do not miss that.  How do you handle these situations? Getting in trouble at school. I would love to know

Last night cash pooped in the potty...
ALMOST in the tub. But my tiny 2 year old looked up at me with his big brown eyes holding his rear and said..."It's coming momma."  So I took him out of the tub and plopped him on the potty.

Last night I lost my voice...
Because sometimes I get a little too animated when I slip into Dr. Seuss' characters.

Last night I sat in bed with a basket of laundry....
And did NOT fold it. :)

Today I will buy milk, wash the car, make dinner and fold laundry. Sometimes its nice to give yourself a break.

Happy Birthday Head

Happy Birthday to my closest friend, Heather. I won't tell you how old she is,even though it's younger than me.(gift #2)  I have left her Christmas present at my house all month, so she gets it today as well her birthday present (gift #1 and #3)

About Heather:

• She's promised if my water broke in public she would walk behind me so no one knew. Twice.
• She holds my hand when I am scared
• She knows what I'm thinking at any given moment.
• Eaten ice cream in the dead of winter almost daily because I craved it
• She's very artistic, good at drawing and making things(like her momma) she even did this super cute christmas bow hair do in my hair this winter :)

• She is a fellow foodie
• She has the fattest cat (yes Heather I know you want me to say big boned)

• And last but not least....I think she would make a great bus driver. Happy Birthday to Heather the best bus driving, animal loving, mini marveling friend I have.

A day downtown

One day we decided to park at Mai's and take the train to the aquarium. Sam and Cash love trains. Sam is an authority and Cash is just now developing the love, so they both enjoyed riding on one. The aquarium is a few blocks off of the stop so we ventured through the city a little.

It was a perfect chilly day, just warm enough to have fun.

Playing follow the leader they made their own way through the city. It may have taken a little longer than a normal path but it was far more entertaining.

Everyone posing in front of a statue

Sam shows us is booboo

As is typical, once all the big kids clear out Cash gets to conquer the statue.

We found a few neat fountains we never knew existed

Ran around while I stood in line for tickets

I loved the starfish. I have never seen any quite so fat!

I never knew they had a tiger exhibit in the Aquarium Downtown. It was pretty neat. Yuliya loves "touching" the animals when she can, she also does this at the chimp exhibit at the zoo.  This tiger was really neat pacing the length of this window over and over again. A few minutes after sitting down a small baby and her father came to the glass next to us, suddenly the tiger narrowed her pace to just in front of the baby. When the dad and the baby were ready to go he picked her up and...

The tiger went berserk, she jumped up on her hind legs and clawed at the glass as fast as she could.

The dad, baby and tiger repeated this once more to "test it out".  The tiger repeated her actions each time.

So the question is...

Was she protecting the baby? Or was it her food?

P.S. sorry the picture of her jumping turned out so crummy

Smokin Hot

Last weekend Keith and I went to my sister's house to watch the Texans play the Bengals.

Alyssa was there and she wanted to share food with us, only we were eating spicy jalapeno cheddar.

But she insisted....

So we had no choice, we had to capitulate and give her the cheese(Keith cut out all of the jalapenos)

Every time she had a piece she did this...

Hot!

Ah.. need some milk.

More. This is her staring at us after she pointed to the cheese and said "mo" (more)

She is quite the ham, her routine had us cracking up. Needless to say I think she has a thing for spicy food. Or she will do anything for a laugh. Thanks Alyssa and Aunt Amy! Want to repeat again this Sunday?

Just a little more...

We all love gifts right? They are even better if they are for no reason or unexpected. Like when I come into work and my very best friend has brought me breakfast. Or when one of the kids makes me a "choo choo train" that he is so very proud of. When we get home from a long day and there's a package waiting there...even if you ordered it yourself but just forgot about it. (I love mail, I fully support post offices and wish mail came every day, not just Monday-Saturday.)

Most gifts though come from people we know and care about and/or who care about us.  So a while back I started leaving notes in and around places/things for people I might not ever meet or connect with. A gift to a stranger hoping to at least make them smile. As part of my personal new years goal...I am going to step it up as well as.... ask you to leave a few too.

So this is what I do.

When I have down time I write a few of these suckers.

(This is part of my and Heather's latest guerrilla messaging)

Then I leave them in places like this.

 and this

 And even for the sleepy parents reading to their children

I imagine them being read and hopefully they will make their readers smile to themselves or have a moment to be a little more introspective. I hope receiving a gift from a stranger provides at least some of them with at least a moment of happiness.  I know it would put me in the moment to find one. It's not that difficult...I believe in you. Feel free to email me pictures of yours :)


The best way to cheer yourself up is to try to cheer somebody else up. ~Mark Twain

Did you know

Heather's mom, also known universally as "Momma"  happens to be very talented in knitting, crochet, and jewelry making. She recently made me these wonderful little house slippers! They are so soft and comfortable they welcome my feet with a perfect hug. My feet are so thankful to be protected from the cold winter hardwood floors that pave my house. Thank you so much for my new slippers, I absolutely love them :)

Also I heard, if you throw a wish around a blog it's more likely to come true. So here I go...

*I wish I knew knit*

(In conjunction with a new years goal as well, see)

 

P.S. It's difficult to run and turn on wood flooring with booties on. I bet I look like a cartoon, but it's fun. It has inspired a whole new game with the baby birds.

Winter rain

It flooded across Houston yesterday, here are a few photos of what we saw from our office.  

Above you see a red chair in the intersection. I work off of Harwin which is laced with a plethora of shops, a bulk of which carry furniture. A fair portion of those furniture vendors have certain pieces sitting curb side to draw customers in to view merchandise.Only....when it floods we seem to have a variety of couches and chairs floating down Harwin.

 

See the picture at the bottom left for what this intersection normally looks like

The dog park we take Soldier to is also a lake, but I am still very happy for the rain. It started raining over night sunday/monday and did not stop until afternoon. Anything to move us out of the drought. Sorry to all that lost their cars to the flood yesterday.

Enjoying the lights

After Christmas we decided to drive around and check out the lights Houstonians had adorned their houses and yards with

Have you ever seen the Christmas lights in River Oaks?

They make you feel like a kid in a magical world

I highly recommend it.

There's also the tree in Sharpstown Keith and I dubbed "The Tree of Death" . I realize I've never done a great job at capturing the complete charm of this tree, not even a full shot of the tree itself, but I can explain it to you. :)

It's a full grown magnolia taller than any of my 37 year old oak trees

EVERY branch is decked with white lights on it all the way to the leaves budding off making each leaf look almost golden.

There are massive ornaments on it, some are the size of my hand and some are bigger than a basketball. Big and small they all hang on clear string or wire giving off an appearance of floating with the tree (I like to stand directly under it and look straight up, hence the tree of death)

Red bows garnish the branches and ornaments.

A field of poinsettias glowing a deep red from the light above hugs the trunk proudly 

And last but not least, there is a great star perched right at the very tip top of the majestic magnolia

I am in awe of this tree...can you tell?

He found an ornament he could touch. :)

Happy Saturday

What are you up to today?

Me?

I'm going to search out sweet potatoes at the farmers market to plant in my garden and check out Wabash for egg laying chickies. I hope to bring one home in the next month or two.

For now I will leave you with this....

I loved this post and recommend it. 25 Rules for Mothers of Sons  by Team Studer.

and

This picture of Yuliya's 4th birthday party last March

Why?

Because I just figured out what we are going to do for this year's birthday, and my wheels are turning!

New Years

So readers,


I am interested to know

What was your goal last year?

Did you stick with it?

What is your goal this year?

Leave a comment or email me(they are for my eyes only)

Mine is to make a difference, something Keith and I have actually talked about a lot. I want to make a difference in my life, community, and even further. I know it's kind of broad but its a whole year worth of a goal and I figure what's the harm in NOT giving myself a limit...right?
There are quite a few ideas running around up here and I do promise to share them from time to time. Right now it requires research for some of the things I have in mind  (TOP SECRET)stay tuned!

Secondary goals...don't worry they are just as important....

1. Harvesting in the yard, grow food again, hopefully bring home a chick this spring and learn more about being self sufficient (canning, making household necessities, ect)
2.Strike a deal with these bangs...it's time we come to a truce and learn to get along

3. Learn to knit

So, Happy New Year, I am excited to hear your goals and....Let the games begin!

Parenting

How do you get two four year olds and a seven year old to stop talking about robots and eat dinner? Well...the same way you get your toddler to stay in his seat at a restaurant......

Promise them mammoth sized cookies!

Look at that face in awe, although he only ended up eating the m&ms. Silly kid.