Pina Colada

Summer of 11

2011-12-20T18:24:00.000-06:00

Giggles at our Summer Family Vacation enjoying a S'more without marshmallows...or chocolate

Gosh, it's really been a while, hasn't it? Well, what can I say about our summer except that it was fun as usual, and very very HOT. Nothing out of the ordinary there. Something out of the ordinary that did occur was that my nephew Ron went to Australia on a school-sanctioned visit. The whole family went to the airport to see him off, which I'm sure he just LOVED, haha.

In other news, Giggles discovered her passion for nail polish. The brighter, the better was her motto. Many thanks to our friends and family, who allowed her to paint their finger & toe nails over and over again. Incidentally, Giggles' other motto was "You'll get the color I say you get, and you'll like it!"

No summer is complete without a fun family reunion! We had ours at the Hill Country Resort in San Antonio. Here are some of my favorite pictures.

Me and my boy

Sister #1 with her kiddos

Lovely nieces

Sister #2 and son


Best buds!

The big boys waiting for their turn at the s'mores campfire

Brother & his girls

The boys showing off their swimming skills.

Even the grandparents got in on the action! QT guiding Giggles in her cute wave runner floaty.

Kids played reindeer games...er, I mean Shamu games!

Took in some golf

Summer Days Driftin' Away

2011-07-15T03:00:00.001-05:00

I guess I should start this off by announcing that Pumpkin is now officially a 1st grader.

Can I get a Wooot?!!!!

His class put on a sweet performance for the parents and received some certificates and gifts from their teacher. The following day was the last day of school. Here's Pumpkin standing in front of the school as a Kindergartener for the last time.

QT & I were both very pleased with how well he was reading by the end of school. Sure, we've always read to him and encouraged him to sound words out and read on his own, but a good portion of credit for his newfangled (and highly impressive) reading abilities goes to his teacher, Mrs. B. Oh, I suppose some credit should also be given to the boy wonder himself, haha. Let's not forget him!

So my little savant starts the GT program in earnest in the Fall. What with the looming budget cuts at school districts across Texas, I'm more than a little curious at how things are going to turn out. I'll keep you posted.

All bragging about Pumpkin aside, I should probably also mention that somewhere along the way we acquired a new dog. He was given to us by a dear friend of mine. His name is Kiko, and he's a sweetheart. His birthday falls on the same week as Giggles' birthday; however, he's actually a year older than her. He seems to have gotten into the groove of things around here very well, and the kids LOVE to play with him. He and the cat also seek each other out often....mostly to chase each other and make a lot of noise. Thankfully, neither one seems eager to actually hurt the other, haha.

In the final bit of news, we've already been to Ldo and back this summer. We're scheduled to return for another week or two before school starts. When I return...I mean, IF I return to blog again, I'll post some pictures of us cracking cascarones on each other on Easter and also of our train ride in Austin. For now, it's bedtime. I've got only a few hours left before the little ones show up at my bedside demanding yogurt and cereal.

Happy Birthday, QT!

2011-07-15T02:15:00.000-05:00

He looks awfully excited about his cake, doesn't he?

Museum District

2011-04-25T18:10:00.011-05:00

Afternoon on the town with my favorite little guy today. We rode the rails, ate spaghetti, and looked at geodes. Pumpkin even made a new friend at the park and invited him over to our house (as usual).

Oh, Brother!

2011-04-12T00:17:00.003-05:00

The kids and I had a really long day today, but it was all good.

First off, Giggles and I had some friends over for a morning playdate. The girls had a great time jumping on the trampoline, blowing bubbles, playing with sand, and chasing the dog around. After our playdate ended, Giggles was too wound up to nap so we walked over to our neighbor's house for a late lunch in honor of an Indian holy day (I'm guessing Ramanavami). I sampled a few Indian dishes then high-tailed it to school to pick up RT (my neighbor's daughter), Pumpkin, and AM (Pumpkin's best friend from school).

After about an hour of playing at our house, the kids wanted to walk over to the bridge to watch the critters swim by (the boys were loudly calling the alligators to come out, which didn't work, haha). It was getting close to dinner time by then, and I guess Giggles had reached her limit because on our way back home, she started fussing then suddenly plopped down on the sidewalk and refused to go any further. She wouldn't get up and wouldn't let me pick her up either. She'd stopped crying and just sat there on the floor holding her sippy cup. AM's mom had shown up to pick him up so I hurried over to see them off while keeping an eye on Giggles to make sure she didn't run off (she didn't). Meanwhile, Pumpkin was still riding his bike around so I asked him to run back and make sure Giggles wasn't sitting on an anthill. I watched him walk over to her while AM and his mom drove off. I was just about to head over myself to pick Giggles up when I saw him reach down and help his sister up. Then, hand in hand, they started walking home together; she quietly following him. It was such a sweet sight. I quickly snapped a picture with my phone then just stood and waited for them. When they reached me, Pumpkin said that (Giggles) was ok, but she just needed help getting up. {sniff sniff!}

Naturally, right after they got home, they both got their second winds, and we were off again to hang out with the neighbors and enjoy the beautiful Spring evening.

Happiness

2011-04-04T17:12:00.001-05:00

Happiness is a plate of warm doughnuts on a lovely day in the Spring.

Nite-nite

2011-02-02T00:11:00.004-06:00

I haven't been saying much about Giggles lately, but I need to because she's an AMAZING little spitfire! She's 28 months old and has been speaking in full sentences for a couple of months. She can count to 15, knows some colors (her favorite is yellow), and can recognize random letters of the alphabet (her favorite is K). I took her to a trial gymnastics class, and the kid is a natural! She tumbles, flips, climbs, and even glides effortlessly on the balance beam. I tell you, she's completely fearless! She loves dancing too and still enjoys her weekly classes at Gymboree Play and Music.

She's no longer sleeping in a crib. I took it down a few months ago after she fell out of it. She started sleeping in our room after that, in a playpen, but we had to get rid of that too after I found out that she could climb in and out of that thing like it was playground equipment. I moved her to an air mattress on the floor in our room, and she and Pumpkin slept on that for about 4 days, maybe 2. They kept ending up in our bed so eventually QT was the one sleeping on the floor while the kids slept with me on the bed, haha.

After a couple weeks of that, I decided it was time for her and her brother to move back into their own rooms. I started by completely childproofing Giggles' room (including strapping down all the heavy furniture) and buying her a "big girl" bed. I added a cute chalkboard table, stools, and toy storage bins and threw in some stickers to update her old TV stand, and voila, cute, funky, new room!

Her new bed sits on the floor in a bed-sized niche in her bedroom so it's impossible to fall off in any direction. For a headboard, I used part of a little cottage play house that fits perfectly in the niche. I finished the bed/sleeping niche off with a (homemade) fabric canopy, whimsical animal print comforter, and matching animal pillows from IKEA. It's all very adorable, and both kids love it! They play in it every chance they get. Pumpkin even asked if I could do the same with his bed.

....So off I went in search of ideas.


Pumpkin's old bed

Pumpkin's new bunk beds

My first plan was to somehow transform his bed into a sleeping compartment like those found on trains. But the ceilings in the kids' rooms are pretty tall, and I didn't want to have to alter his nice bed or install PVC tubing or anything goofy like that. I was lucky enough one day to come across an ad for a loft bed that matched the blueberry color of Pumpkin's bed nearly perfectly. Pumpkin had been asking for a bunk bed, and I knew he'd be thrilled even if the end result didn't resemble a train sleeper.

His room was a little harder to do because I ended up moving everything around to get it all to fit right and also took advantage of having my neighbor's electric drill to hang up other prints, lights, and shelves in Pumpkin's room. It turned out great!

Pumpkin absolutely loves his new bed and his finished room! He and Giggles use the top bunk as a reading nook...when they're not on the floor playing with his wooden trains.

And I finally get to sleep comfortably in my own room in my own bed. Ahhh....

Go Fish

2011-01-26T00:26:00.004-06:00

On our way home from school yesterday, Pumpkin was telling me about the snacks they had after recess that day.

Him: "The snacks were colored like Goldfish, but they weren't Goldfish. They looked more like ducks or chickens."

Me: "You had Chickadees! They're like Goldfish. Did you like them?" (hoping he'd say yes and I could start buying those instead of Goldfish)

Him: "They didn't really taste like Goldfish, but I ate them anyway. At first, I put one in my mouth, and I was like (makes a face). Then I put my tongue on it, and it tasted a little better. Then, I put some saliva on it, and it was better. Then, I crunched it around with my teeth, and it was pretty good after that."

I tried to remain quiet, but I was cracking up! Thank goodness he couldn't see me laughing from the backseat or he would've wondered what was wrong with me, haha.

Christmas Holidays 2010

2010-12-31T00:36:00.000-06:00

As usual, we all had a great time visiting the old homestead. As usual, too, we had a very busy December. Now, as you know, I'm no slouch when it comes to using many words where only a few might do, but since a picture is worth a thousand words, I will abbreviate my post by using pictures.

Here, then, is our holiday in living color starting with QT's company's family Christmas luncheon, where the kids and I enjoyed getting our faces painted.

That evening, we traveled to North Houston to QT's brother's house to celebrate an early Christmas with Grandmas T & R.

A few days later, we celebrated Christmas (again) at home with the kids. We told Pumpkin that Santa Claus delivered their gifts early because he knew we were going to be traveling. They were both excited, and they got some good loot too!

After we were done opening gifts and getting dressed, we went outside to enjoy the day. Pumpkin and Giggles were excited to try out their new helicopter cars, I was excited to try out my new camera, and QT was excited to watch the trains go by.

Our arrival in Ldo was mostly uneventful. We arrived just after midnight on Christmas day, opened a few gifts, visited with the family for a bit, unloaded the car, then went to bed. That weekend, we enjoyed the 1st of Pumpkin's various birthday celebrations with QT's dad and family.

The rest of our trip was mostly spent shuttling back and forth between "home base" (i.e. Mom's house) and my brother's house. When we weren't at one of those 2 locations, we were at the park or at the museum or dining out. In this collage, you'll also see pictures of Pumpkin's 2nd birthday celebration at my parents' restaurant. Unfortunately, he had a very painful ear infection on the day of his dinner party so he was a bit down in the dumps. Like a trooper, though, he refused to postpone his shindig. :)

When the Going Gets Tough...

2010-12-15T23:45:00.000-06:00

...the tough go home. This Christmas, with so many amazing deals available online, I decided that I would try to do the majority of my shopping from my computer. As many of you know, it's not always easy to go shopping with 2 little ones in tow. In fact, I'd rank that particular unpleasantness right along with having a tooth pulled, haha. Worse actually...because I can cope with dental procedures as long as necessary, but my ability to cope with meltdowns and whining in the middle of a crowded store definitely has a half life. Besides, I never know what to get QT's parents or mine, and wandering aimlessly around the mall during Christmas shopping season (or anytime really) in the hope that inspiration will strike is more than I care to bear.

Enter Shutterfly. QT and I haven't lived in the same town as our families since before we were married. It didn't really matter when it was just the two of us, but once Pumpkin came along, it became important to me to foster our link with the folks back home. Shutterfly fit that bill for me perfectly. Not only is it a great place to store my pictures, share them with our loved ones, and order prints, it's also very handy when it comes to finding the perfect gift for the person who has everything. With just a few free minutes, I can easily go online and choose a funny Halloween picture to make into a nifty mouse pad for QT or choose 12 pictures from my collection to make into a snazzy calendar for Grandma Tone or order a cute coffee mug for Beautiful Grandma (she loves those) or create an awesome snapbook of Pumpkin's 1st trip to the beach for Grandma Q. So many options! Such fantastic deals! So many Grandmas!

So little time!!

There are just a few days left to have your custom photo gift shipped standard in time for Christmas (a bit more time if you choose 2-day or next day shipping). If you've been sitting on the fence about what to get your loved ones, you'd best hurry along. Free shipping ends tomorrow.

Santa Sighting

2010-12-13T16:33:00.001-06:00

Last Thursday, Pumpkin threw up at school. He's doing much better but still gets a stomachache whenever he eats so I didn't send him to school today either. Instead, I took the kids to Bass Pro Shops in Pearland to check out the Winter Wonderland there. The store was just opening so there was hardly anyone else there besides us and the employees when we arrived. The kids enjoyed the aquarium and riding the elevator over the waterfall and all the cool stuff there is to see. Eventually, we made our way to the Winter Wonderland area, and the kids sat down at one of the coloring tables.

Imagine my surprise when Santa Claus walked in right by our table! Pumpkin was agog. It was like a rock star sighting for the Kindergarten crowd, haha. Giggles maintained her poker face--she didn't know who the bearded dude was, after all. Santa stopped to chat with us, and he invited the kids to go see him at his house to let him know what they want for Christmas. I wasn't aware Santa would be there...heck, we weren't even supposed to be there...so I didn't have my camera. I also hadn't dressed the kids for pictures. Fortunately, Bass Pro Shops takes and prints the pictures for free, and who cares what my kids were wearing. It was Santa, for crying out loud! We even got coupons for free kids' meals at their in-store restaurant, which was cool.

Pumpkin was so excited to finally see and talk to Santa that he decided he'd also write him a letter. There weren't any other kids around (we were the last to visit Santa that morning) so he ran back up to Santa to hand him his letter in person. Then, he colored a picture for Santa and wanted to give him that as well, but he settled for putting the picture with his letter and putting both in Santa's mailbox. Then, for good measure, we went back to say goodbye to Santa when we were finally ready to leave. Santa was a good sport throughout and kept chatting with the kids and waving at them and laughing "HO HO HO!" I'm kind of glad we hadn't seen Santa anywhere else before today because it was a lovely experience for all 3 of us. No crowds, no rushing, no stress. Thanks, Bass Pro Shops.

Pumpkin's Letter

I took pictures of the kids' letters before they "mailed" them. Pumpkin wrote his own letter, and then he and I helped Giggles write her letter (I did the writing, and he suggested a few things, but Giggles came up with the last 4 items on her list on her own). Cereal! HA HA HA!

Giggles' Letter

What Part of Forever Don't You Understand?

2010-12-08T23:12:00.006-06:00

Back in the summer, when the kids and I were squatting at my parents' house in L-do while our house in Denver sat vacant, and QT was living out of hotel rooms all over the country, and our stuff was sitting in a warehouse near Dallas, the 3rd Twilight movie Eclipse opened in theaters. That week, I happened to catch a couple episodes of "Twilight's Got Talent" on George Lopez, which featured stars from the movie performing tricks and stuff. It was pretty funny!

One of those episodes also featured a song from the movie written and performed by an artist named Cee Lo Green. I'd never heard of Cee Lo Green before I saw him on the show, but I was mesmerized. Here was this big ole' tattooed guy with an awesome voice wearing a chain mail helm on his head and accompanied by a sexy all-woman band, who appear to actually be playing their instruments! And...the song was awesome and lovely....and has been haunting me since I heard it that night.

In fact, I loved the song so much that I went out the very next day to see the movie (the first Twilight movie I've actually seen at a theater.) Turns out Cee Lo Green was/is in Gnarls Barkley so I had at least heard him if not heard of him. And the backup band is called Scarlet Fever, and they are real musicians.

Months later, I still haven't gotten that image or that song out of my head. I don't own any of the Twilight movies or soundtracks (and only one of the books, which I bought at a discount store), but because of that song, I am definitely going to buy this movie when it comes out on DVD...and maybe even the CD soundtrack to boot. I just love watching this video. :)

Christmas Cookie Recipe

2010-12-06T20:06:00.007-06:00

I won't be in Denver to attend (my) moms group's annual cookie exchange this year. In lieu of sending over some of my "famous" Mexican wedding cookies, I'm sending over another recipe that is sure to delight. Enjoy the party, ladies!!

p.s. Perhaps this will help to explain why I always found it so difficult to finish my cookie baking every year. ;)
Love and miss you all!

Tequila Christmas Cookies

1 cup dark brown sugar
1 cup (two sticks) butter
1 cup granulated sugar
4 large eggs
2 cups dried fruit (dried cranberries or raisins)
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon fresh lemon juice
1 cup coarsely chopped walnuts or pecans
2 cups all purpose flour
1 bottle chilled Tequila

First, sample the tequila to check quality. Take a large bowl. Pour another 4 ounces tequila in a measuring cup and drink to ensure it is of the highest quality. Turn on the electric mixer. Beat one cup of butter in a large fluffy bowl. Add one teaspoon sugar. Beat again. At this point, it is best to make sure the tequila is still OK. Pour another 4 ounces and drink.

Try another 4 ounces tequila, just in case. Turn off the mixerer thingy. Break two leggs and add to the bowl and chuck in the cup of dried fruit, picking the frigging fruit off the floor. Mix on the turner. If the fried druit gets stuck in the beaterers, shust pry it loosey with a drewscriver.

Sample the tequila again to check for tonsisticity. Next, sift 2 cups of salt or something. Check the tequila. Now shift the lemon juice and strain your nuts. Add one table. Add a spoon of sugar or somefink. Whatever you can find. Greash the oven. Turn the cake tin 360 degrees and try not to fall over. Don't forget to beat off the turner.

Finally, throw the bowl through the window, finish the teqwiuilia and make sure to put the dirty stove in the dishwasher.

Cherry Mistmas! And remember, limes are for wimps!

Turkey Pizza

2010-11-29T22:20:00.004-06:00

Haha, I was just reading my last post. What a wacky dream! Guess that's what happens when you're feverish. Well, thankfully, the shot I got at the doc's office worked, and I was well enough to partake in my own birthday pizza party festivities with the family (and regular doses of Ibuprofen to keep my throat from giving out, of course ;). We all had a blast trying out the Playstation MOVE game that I won online, and everyone danced and sang and ate cake 'til we dropped.

This is the song that Pumpkin and his cousin D danced together. They looked soooo cute! I could kick myself for forgetting my camera. I used my sister's camera to take a few pictures, but I was unable to upload them before we left. Hopefully, I'll get copies soon. The game we played (Singstar Dance) came with microphones and MOVE controllers so that 4 of us could play together at the same time (2 teams, each consisting of 1 dancer & 1 singer). Even the littlest ones were able to play along. Giggles danced a mean Supremes, haha. We all had so much fun with it that I contemplated buying a Playstation of my own to play this game at home, but in the end, I decided against it and left all my MOVE loot at my sister's. The PS is too expensive for one thing, and my kids are really just too young to benefit from having another video game console at home. And really, I'm just not that into video games. But Giggles had so much fun playing that, as a compromise, I decided to look for Wii game titles that the whole family can enjoy rather than just buying games for Pumpkin to use on his own. More on that later.

Thanksgiving Day with the family was nice. Not much to tell. Turkey, bread, potatoes, stuffing, etc. All in all, it was a very nice visit with the family. Not too short, not too long. QT had to jet off to California or somewhere right after we arrived, but he made it back in time for Thanksgiving Day. Thankfully. :)

Bizzaro Dream

2010-11-19T09:26:00.003-06:00

Woke up this morning with the strangest feeling that I wasn't where I should be. See, I woke up in the middle of a weird dream.

In my dream, we were in the cafeteria at Pumpkin's school, and I'd received a packet from the school administration. In the packet was a letter telling me that Pumpkin had passed some sort of test "with flying colors" (which is a highly technical term often used in official school documents, and my 1st inkling something wasn't quite right, haha). Anyway, the letter went on to explain that Pumpkin had been found to have genius tendencies and was being put into a special program. At first, I was very proud of Pumpkin, but upon further inspection of the packet, I realized that what I had been given were detailed class and activity schedules including all his electives already pre-selected for him for the rest of his school career. "In preparation for what?," I wondered in my dream. Right when I was trying to decide whether I should be aghast or not, I woke up.

And I still haven't figured out if this was going to be bad for us or not.

Note to self, remember to keep Pumpkin out of the hands of any super secret government institutions that might whisk him away at first sign of his genius. Oh...and let him build a robot dog if he wants.

Night Sweats and Nightmares

2010-11-18T14:02:00.000-06:00

Strep Throat. As you can guess, my "good" feeling was short-lived. As before, I woke up that morning covered in sweat and feeling mighty cruddy so I once again sent Pumpkin to school with the neighbors while Giggles and I paid my doctor a visit. I opted to take the injected antibiotic rather than pills because I doubted I could swallow the pills anyway, but I just didn't want to wait 10 days to get better.

After my visit, I dropped Giggles off at a daycare then came home and lay down to rest. My neighbor, God bless her, called me in the afternoon and offered to pick Pumpkin up after school. I agreed and lay down again. Next thing I knew, Pumpkin was home. He was excited to finally be visiting Giggles' daycare with me. Don't ask me why, but that boy loves drop-in daycare centers. When we lived in Denver, he often asked me to take him to the one at the mall, haha. After a light dinner, I had enough energy to do a few chores around the house, but all too soon, my energy started petering out so I quickly bathed the kids, locked the dog up, and we all went to bed.

That was Tuesday.

Repeat wash and rinse for Wednesday.

Repeat for Thursday....except I was finally able to take Pumpkin to school myself. I was planning on keeping Giggles home but quickly realized I wasn't quite up to the task after all. Hello, drop-in daycare!

More importantly....tonight is the memorial mass for the daughter of a friend of mine from Colorado. This is a picture of the little girl, taken earlier this year. She and her family moved to Texas a few months before we did, and the little girl died as a result of of an auto accident near their home in The Woodlands. Reportedly, the other driver (the one who caused the accident) was drinking prior to the accident.

My friend and I were in the same mom's group back in Denver, and we, along with about a dozen other moms, were pregnant at the same time with our seconds (or thirds in some cases). She and I hadn't managed to meet up since moving to Texas. We were casual friends at best, but I'd hoped we would see them again at some point and that our daughters could play together every so often. I'm ashamed that the first time we'll say hello again will be as we say goodbye to her sweet baby.

Rest in peace, angel.

This Always Happens

2010-11-15T23:58:00.001-06:00

The day before QT left on his week-long trip to Denver, I started feeling odd. It started with some pressure in my face (from sinuses) and then I started feeling a bit weak. By Sunday night, I was feverish, my throat hurt, and I ached so much all over that I could barely stand upright.

I'm home alone with the kids, so of course I still have to do what needs to be done. Kids need to eat, and they poop, and the dog has to go outside. They both got cereal for breakfast, and the neighbor was able to take Pumpkin to school, thank God. Poor Giggles, all she had to eat during the day was some leftover mac-n-cheese and a TON of Cheerios. Oh, I think I was able to get her a yogurt drink out of the fridge too, haha. I was too nauseated to eat, but I forced myself to drink water and eat a cracker every so often. After we picked Pumpkin up from school, I made myself drive to Whataburger to get the kids some food. I was in so much pain, I wanted to cry, but I was afraid they wouldn't get to eat otherwise.

They gobbled down their food, but later that evening, Pumpkin asked me if I felt "good enough to make us something like dinner?" My poor babies! I have been so useless all day. After dinner, and as soon as I could rationalize it, I bathed the kids, took the dog and the trash out, and put everyone to bed, myself included! It was about 7:30 by the time I was done, and Giggles fell asleep instantly. Pumpkin, on the other hand, was up for a while. I think he was worried about me. In his prayers, he asked God to make his mommy get better, and when he saw me shivering uncontrollably, he scooted closer in bed to help warm me up and then offered to bring me another blanket. So sweet!!

It's nearly midnight now. About an hour ago, I woke up completely drenched in sweat. I literally flicked a bead of sweat off of my forehead. Ugh. I realized that I felt better, not quite as achy, so I guess the fever must have peaked after we fell asleep. I debated just going back to sleep, but instead, I got up and showered. And, I really do feel much better. I'm even able to sit at the computer, ha! Going back to bed now.

Making Pizza

2010-11-12T20:40:00.000-06:00

The kids and I made some pizzas for dinner today as a surprise for their Daddy.

This is the cheese pizza. The other was pepperoni.

While our pizzas cooled, we enjoyed a Black-eyed Peas video on Pumpkin's computer. Check out the cool light-show speakers I got at Target.

Earlier this week, or maybe it was last week, we were outside coloring with sidewalk chalk, and Pumpkin thought it'd be nice to draw something special for me...on my car. It's cute. Sadly, the rain washed it off yesterday.

To The Pain

2010-11-11T20:11:00.002-06:00

Chock full of energy one day, I decided to tackle some heavy lifting around the house, and I somehow managed to seriously injure my right foot. Perhaps it was when I slammed the ladder down on my (previously unremarkable) bunion. Who knows. It's a mystery. Anyhoo, I'd been taking a Zumba class at the neighborhood exercise center since we'd moved here, and I didn't return to finish the week thinking I'd take a couple days off and return the following week. WRONG.

So wrong. By the end of that week, my entire foot hurt so much that I was hobbling around barely able to put shoes on, much less walk in them. Even my other foot had started hurting by then since I was basically hopping around on it all day trying to stay off the injured one. In desperation, I ordered some weird rubbery foot pad on Amazon and felt stable enough a few days later to attempt to continue my ambitious organizing/unpacking project. DUMB - SQUARED.

While carrying a box and overcompensating for my still unhealed foot, I twisted my back. ARGH! With back pain, I would normally just pop a few pills and keep going, but as luck would have it, I was all out of meds. And I hadn't yet found myself a local doctor. So, I had to drag myself (and Giggles) to a clinic near our neighborhood, talked to a nice doctor, and got my drugs.

All that happened the week before Halloween. Believe it or not, I'm still not able to walk properly on my right foot. I'm walking well enough around the house, but I'm still using the weird rubbery foot pad thingamajigy to go out because I'm afraid of ending up stranded at the grocery store halfway through the bread aisle and not being able to get back to my car.

So...I'm feeling a bit bored and restless. I've already watched Seasons 1 & 2 of The Closer (on DVD). I've already watched a movie (Date Night, which was surprisingly funny), and I've already read a couple of new books and even reread a couple of old faves. I look forward to regaining my mobility SOON. Next week will be the true test because QT's going out of town for the week.

Ladies and gents, I proudly introduce...

2010-10-18T13:36:00.002-05:00


our puppy Rusty! (with Giggles)

My Little Golfer

2010-10-14T23:17:00.002-05:00

Pumpkin was very excited when he learned that our new neighborhood had its own golf course. When I found out that they were offering semi-private golf lessons for kids, well, I had to enroll him. He was excited to go, of course. He chose golf over soccer and basketball and all other sports being offered in our neighborhood.

In fact, he loved his golf lessons so much that after only his 2nd lesson, he started asking for his own "gear." (that's golf clubs for those of us not in the know ;). So I got him his own set of clubs...er, I mean, gear. And he looks so impossibly cute carrying his little golf bag around, hehe. He's really excited about playing golf and can't wait to go out on the real course. I tried explaining to him that neither his dad or I play, but he is insistent that his dad can take him. It's sweet how he thinks his dad can do just about anything.

Whoop!!

2010-10-12T18:37:00.000-05:00

I just found out that I finally finished paying off my undergraduate student loan. Literally. Just. Found. Out. Purely by coincidence that I found out too or I would've just kept right on sending payments every month without realizing. I think my loans may have automatically gone into deferment the first time I enrolled in grad school so I'm sure I missed out on paying at least for a semester or two, but I started paying again once I realized what had happened. My point is that I've been sending my little $40 to whomever for almost as long as I can remember. Well, knowing what many of you know about my memory, it probably is as long as I remember and then some, haha.

Our New Life

2010-10-10T17:55:00.000-05:00

Just thought it was time for me to actually say something about our new lives rather than writing outdated stuff. A few posts back, I wrote that our beloved dog Sunshine was killed while staying at my parents' house. I still miss that dummy, and I know the kids do too. They both still talk about him at random times throughout our days. The good news is that Grandma T just got the kids a new puppy. The bad news is that it is going to take the better part of a year to get this puppy remotely close to being as well-trained as Sunshine was. Still, I'm excited to meet the little guy. He's staying with Grandma T until we can pick him up.

Of course, Pumpkin started Kindergarten this year. He had a rough first week. Turns out a little girl at his table teased him all week long about (of all things) his water bottle, and she apparently had all the other girls at their table joining in the teasing too. Probably about all sorts of stupid, inconsequential things, but it mattered to him. I didn't even pick up on it until the weekend. We were at Target, and I started wondering why Pumpkin was being so insistent on getting a new water bottle. When he finally told me, I nearly blew it off as no big deal until he quietly admitted that the girls' teasing made him "feel bad." That week, another little girl told him on the playground that she would only be his friend if he would get a better haircut because his was "dumb" or something like that. WTH?

I miss his old school where we never encountered problems like these. Unlike last year when his class was 90% boys, girls in his class this year far outnumber the boys so I'm starting to wonder whether all this drama is because of the girls (y'know, a girl thing). From where I'm standing, it sure seems to be. I asked his teacher to move Pumpkin away from the mean girl and place him at a table with at least one other boy. She did, and he seems a lot happier now...even though it turns out he's now at the table with the girl from the playground. {sigh} Thankfully, she doesn't seem to bother him as much though he still says she's not that nice.

Every so often, I ask about the other little girl, and he says that he never talks to her, even on the playground. My goal now is to get him to understand that he can still be nice to that little girl even if she isn't nice herself.

Update(s) Below

2010-10-01T17:25:00.002-05:00

I'm slowly but surely going back in time to post "updates" on our move from Denver to Houston. Here in our new house, I'd finally gotten my computer hooked up, Internet going, etc. A couple days later, I decided it was also time to finally upload all the pictures that had been accumulated in our cameras all summer long plus the pictures and videos from my camera phone. As (bad) luck would have it, not 2 days later, my computer experienced a memory fart, and all those beautiful pictures and funny videos were lost forever. I went on facebook to save some of the ones I'd posted there, but it was a fraction of what I lost. Sadly, my absolute favorite videos of Lys and Pumpkin dancing at the local HEB are among the missing. I never sent them to anyone else because the files were too big so the only place they'd existed was on my phone...and now nowhere. Oh well. I'm bummed, but what can one do.

Anyway, if you're tuning in now, please scroll down and start where our countdown to Houston begins. That's where I'm doing most of my updating these days. Soon, I may even actually start posting current stuff. ;)

Day 60: Moving to Texas

2010-08-10T01:10:00.000-05:00

We closed on our new house today! Pumpkin is very excited about it, and we're all looking forward to finally settling down again. Sadly, we'll be doing so without our constant companion Sunshine. He was involved in a very unfortunate incident at mom's house and died while we were in Houston for our closing appointment.

Pumpkin handled the news surprisingly well...leading me to believe that he really didn't get it. I fully expect him to bring it up again at many random moments to come. We'll likely look for another dog sometime after we've fully settled into our new house, but Sunshine was one-of-a-kind and will be sorely missed by the kids and by us. :(

Day 40: Visit from our Friends

2010-07-13T14:09:00.001-05:00

Shortly after we arrived back in Texas from our packing trip, our really good friends from Colorado surprised us with a visit. It was really great being able to introduce them to our family and show them around town. Pumpkin was delighted! Their visit coincided with the monthly wine dinner held at my parents' restaurant so Jan and I left our munchkins with my nieces and nephews at home and enjoyed a fun (and boozy) night of laughs and prizes sans kids. Soooo nice.

Day 6: Cooking Class

2010-06-17T16:59:00.000-05:00

We arrived in Texas and hit the ground running! The girls were signed up for a cooking class so I signed Pumpkin up to go with them. He wasn't the minimum age for the class, but I figured he could handle it. Plus, his older cousins would be there to help him out if necessary.

The girls told me later that an older boy was teasing Pumpkin on their 1st day, but they "took care" of the problem. Hehehehe. It's nice having someone watching out for you. ;)

Day 2: Moving to Texas

2010-06-13T20:11:00.004-05:00

Day 2: Barring any more unplanned trainspotting stops, our goal is to actually get out of Colorado today. Last night, we took a detour to see the RBBB Circus Train in Colo Spgs. Then this morning, we decided to visit the Pueblo RR Museum on the spur of the moment. We saw some pretty cool trains including this CO-WY loco and an experimental levitated train (TLRV) from the 70's. Picture of that one to come. :)

Sep 29, 2010: As promised, here are more pictures of that weird floating contraption we saw in Pueblo.

Day 1 of Leaving Colorado: The Countdown to Houston Begins

2010-06-13T16:22:00.005-05:00

Day 1: Who knew it would take us 3 hours to clear out of our hotel suite? And that was just the precursor to vacating our own house. It was past dinnertime by the time we were ready to leave. We were so tired after packing and cleaning that we could've just stayed in town 1 more night. We decided, instead, to drive a bit further out and spend the night in Pueblo & be that much closer to our destination.

We're Movin' Out

2010-06-05T17:05:00.003-05:00

After a month of madness and mayhem, the movers arrived to pack up our stuff and lug it off. In a span of 3 days, everything that had made our house a home was gone leaving only an empty shell behind. And our cars, which we weren't moving to Texas right away. It was weird. Much weirder than it felt when we left Houston. I think knowing that we would definitely never be moving back to Denver contributed to the general feeling of weirdness...and overall sadness.

That weekend, we had a farewell party with our mom's/play group. I'd started the playgroup when we first arrived in Denver, and since group activity was no longer what it had been when our kids were younger, and we were leaving, I'd decided it was time to pull the plug. So, the farewell party was as much for the group as it was for us.

Back in the Saddle Again

2010-05-22T16:05:00.001-05:00

We've been back in Colorado since Mother's Day. We flew back, and our trip went surprisingly well. The last time I flew anywhere with the kids, Giggles went on as a "lap child," and she was squirmy and restless and kicking the seat in front of us the entire flight. Since she does very well in her car seat, I thought that it might help for her to have her own seat on the airplane too so I elected to buy her a ticket rather than take her on as a "lap child" this time. Of course, taking a car seat on board meant I'd have to lug it around with us during our layover at DFW. It was going to be worth it in my opinion. It didn't even matter that the bathrooms nearest our gate at DFW were closed for repairs or that I had to tote said car seat and a full backpack while pushing Giggles in her stroller past 20 gates to get to the next closest bathrooms when Pumpkin suddenly announced at lunch that he had to go potty. And never mind that I ended up changing Giggles' diaper in the airport lounge because I was afraid to take too long at said bathroom in case our flight left without us. In the end, all that hassle was well worth it because both kids behaved impeccably during our flights. In fact, they earned praise all around from flight attendants and passengers alike, and they were even given a couple of fabric sticker airline wings as a prize for their good behavior when we arrived at DIA. Sure, her seat cost me an extra $300, and I still haven't regained feeling in my left arm from holding a car seat aloft while jogging through the cavernous DFW airport. But I'd do it again in a heartbeat!

Anyway, once home, Pumpkin jumped right back into school, and life has kinda sorta gotten back to normal for the time being. Yesterday, Pumpkin had an appointment at the Children's Hospital Dental Clinic to repair half of the approximately 9 cavities he'd been diagnosed with at his last dental check-up. He was given a sedative called Versed, which was supposed to relax him as well as cause him not to feel or even remember any pain. Well, it didn't work. The doctor told us that Pumpkin behaved well and was very cooperative during his procedure, but when we got home, Pumpkin was able to recall everything that had happened including that he had been in so much pain that he nearly cried. My poor baby! Did I mention that Pumpkin tends to be a bit high strung. Most likely, he was too anxious during the procedure for the medicine to work properly. And, he still has to return for the 2nd half of the procedure in a few months. Hmm, guess we'll cross that bridge when we come to it.

For now, we're gonna concentrate on wrapping things up at home. Pumpkin's last day of class is on Thursday, and his end-of-year program takes place on Friday. The movers arrive the following Wednesday to start packing up our belongings then return on Friday to pack up the trucks and head out to Houston. "It" is getting closer, and I still haven't given myself permission to think too hard about leaving. Soon.

Welcome Back, Kiddies

2010-05-15T23:51:00.074-05:00

Surprisingly, when I asked Pumpkin if he wanted to go back to Colorado and return to school, he said yes. I'd have bet money that he would've elected to stay in Texas and be with his cousins until we actually "moved" to Texas. I would've lost. Anyway, I was glad that he wanted to return because he was able to spend some time with his friends before we had to go for good.

Shortly after we arrived back in Colorado, it snowed! It wasn't quite enough to go sledding, but I made sure to take the kids outside to play since we are not likely to have an opportunity like this again once we move. We didn't see any of our friends right away, but we ran into a few of them at a community fair we attended in nearby Beacon Point so that was nice. Thinking about it now, I suppose the reason we didn't immediately jump back into things (or call any of our friends) was partly because I felt a bit weird that we were only going to be seeing everyone just to say goodbye. As stated so eloquently in "The Gilmore Girls" (and I'm paraphrasing) there's nothing good about goodbyes. They should be called badbyes!"

In honor of our upcoming move, we celebrated by eating Texas-shaped sandwiches.

The Low Down

2010-04-22T16:28:00.011-05:00

It's been nearly 3 weeks since we arrived in Texas for our quarterly month-long visit. I haven't posted much because it seems that we haven't really done all that much, but in fact, we're "going" from morning to night, mostly staying busy playing, going out, or just hanging around with the gang.

Pumpkin mostly hangs out at his cousin D's house all day, every day, M-F. I finally just started leaving his bike there so I wouldn't have to keep toting it back and forth everyday from "our" house to theirs. One fine day during our 1st week here, I took the 3 kids (my 2 & D) to the lakeside park in D's neighborhood. Being a weekday, the park was pretty much deserted, which was both eerie and cool. The boys really wanted to go down to the lake to throw rocks, and of course, Giggles being Giggles, she walked right into the lake up to her knees just because she could, haha.

My kids are loving it, but they really just aren't used to this much hoopla. Two weeks ago, after we'd been here just one week, Lis had a dance competition in Houston so the "neighbors" and the Grands were all gone for the weekend. At the same time, my brother and sister-in-law went to Dallas for a concert, and my other sister and her fam were in San Antonio for my nephew's medical appointment. Leaving me and my kids home alone for the weekend. I'd planned to go to Houston for the dance-off but changed plans at the last minute. Instead, I took the kids to a local Earth Day festival, which we all enjoyed, then we came home and all 3 of us took a nice, long nap!

Last week, I drove to San Antonio to attend a librarian conference with my sister and her librarian buddies. I'd heard her talk about these conferences before, and here was this great opportunity for me to finally go to one too. Whoop! Neither kids nor rain nor...more rain was going to keep me from the conference.
Bonus! ~> Not only was I able to crash with the ladies' in their hotel room(s), but one of my sister's friends was also able to snag me a free admission pass for the conference from one of their vendors. Whoop whoop! I had a lot of fun hanging out with my sister and her friends, and I made off with some EXCELLENT free books and loot! And, I even got to take a picture with Super Scholastic Girl, hehe.

This weekend, Lis and her fam are headed back to S.A. for another dance competition. I don't think we'll join them there either. I'd kinda like to, but I understand hotels are sold out because of Fiesta. There's a hay ride or something going on in town this weekend, a fund-raiser for autism. Perhaps we'll do that instead.

Anyway, in other news, QT was recently promoted within his company, and we are moving back to Texas! Yee-haw and Whoop-de-doo!! Pumpkin is thrilled...as are all his cousins (about the move, I don't think they even realize it's tied to a job promotion, haha). QT and I are pretty excited too. We always planned to return, and it's much better when someone else picks up the tab. ;)

Even more exciting is watching Giggles continue expanding her repertoire of words and signs and just learning more each day. It turns out...she...likes...to..dress up! Beautiful Grandma bought her a new outfit with a flouncy skirt, and Giggles immediately had me put it on her...along with about half a dozen hair bows, haha! And the other night, she was crying but was instantly placated when B.G. offered to paint her fingernails, haha. Oh my!

2010-04-19T12:09:00.002-05:00

Headphones!

Test Posts from Texas

2010-04-12T17:22:00.004-05:00

Pumpkin is LOVING this blanket of the Texas flag! We've already requested one of our own from Grandpoo, who bought this one.

And this one was not taken in Texas. It was taken shortly before we left Colorado. This is a picture of Giggles' first time ever riding in a "big girl" car seat.

Easter with Friends

2010-03-29T23:34:00.017-05:00

Thought I didn't post any pictures or blog about it, last year, we celebrated Easter with our good friends (let's call them the Rrrs). The Rrrs accompanied us to the Colorado Railroad Museum for a train ride and egg hunt a week before Easter then came over to our house on Easter Sunday for a lovely lunch and an indoor egg hunt (b/c it was actually too rainy to go outside). This year, we, once again, met up with the Rrrs for an Easter outing...this time with my mom's Bible study group. Each of the moms pitched in some Easter eggs and yummy treats for lunch, and we all had a wonderful time. The day was beautiful so we hung around at the park for hours. Needless to say, the kids had a blast (and were nice and exhausted by the time we got back home).

And The Hits Just Keep Coming

2010-03-29T00:35:00.010-05:00

In November, I told y'all about dear friends of ours who were facing possible foreclosure of their home while their little girl Avery fights infant leukemia. They managed to raise enough funds from good people such as yourselves to stave off foreclosure for the time being, but they're nowhere near out of the woods yet.

Before I go any further, I'll go back a bit and tell you about some of the things they've gone through since Avery's diagnosis. For starters, the entire family came down with H1N1 for which they had to take Tamiflu, which is unbelievably expensive. They've also had to deal with bronchitis and strep, and they were unable to spend last Thanksgiving with their family because of a case of mono. Both Avery and her older sister Emily were wearing casts on their legs at one point because of injuries received in separate incidents. Melissa's mother, who has been helpful and instrumental in the way only loving grandmothers can be, fell and broke her hip, was hospitalized, was diagnosed with ovarian cancer, underwent surgery, was hospitalized again, etc. Meanwhile, Kelvin (Avery's dad) had to take a job out of state because he couldn't find enough work here so my friend Melissa was left alone to care for their 4 kids, take Avery to the hospital for her treatments, and even help care for her mom, who lives about an hour away. Even their fairly new dishwasher broke down and had to be replaced! Talk about bad luck...this is country song bad!

As I said, the hits just keep coming. The latest: Their home was burglarized! Three nights ago while the family was at home sleeping in their rooms, these brazen thieves broke a window in Kelvin's truck, used his remote to open the garage door, entered my friend's home, and made off with thousands of dollars worth of tools and Melissa's purse, which had her ID, ATM card, cell phone, Avery's prescription card, the babies' WIC checks, and all their April grocery money! The bastard scum went into little Avery's room where she slept and even raided the family's freezer and stole their roast beast!

The problem now, of course, is that Kelvin is unable to work without his tools, and there is no telling what the insurance company is going to cover or how the family is going to get by in the meantime. I thank God that no one was harmed....though I'm left to wonder why bad things keep happening to this wonderful family and hope and pray that this will be it for them for the rest of their natural lives...and also that they win the lottery. :)

I'm reposting the slideshow from November in case any of you would like to do something to help my good friends and need to know where to send your donations.

(Here's the slideshow. To see the full screen, click on the little square within a square below the video.)

P.S. If any of you know Oprah, please ask her to give me a call so we can chat about the Spicers. ;)

Midnight and All is Well

2010-03-25T01:02:00.001-05:00

A couple of weeks ago, we held a small gathering at our house to celebrate QT's birthday. No jello shots this time, but there were still plenty of laughs to be had by all. Unfortunately, as our guests started leaving, one of the kids started coughing...a croupy kind of cough. Nooo!

I called my friend a few days later to ask after her daughter, and it turns out the girl, who suffers from chronic respiratory problems, was put on steroids and missed about a week of school due to that virus. That very evening, Pumpkin started up with a croupy cough of his own. Even though it was just a mild case of croup (cough, runny nose, hoarse voice, but no fever), I kept him home from school the next two days to be on the safe side. He seemed fine by Saturday so he and his dad went out to visit the model train store, have lunch, and just enjoy some guy time together. I guess somewhere along the way, Pumpkin must've been exposed to an allergen because, that evening during dinner, his left ear suddenly started getting red and swollen. It was also hot to the touch, and Pumpkin complained that it hurt when I touched it. Then, just as suddenly, it went away! So we gave him a bath, loaded him up with Zyrtec, and put him to bed, same as any other night. A few hours later, at around dawn, he started coughing terribly then he sprang up in bed crying and gasping and grabbing at his mouth.

As luck would have it...or perhaps by God's good graces, I'd decided to have him sleep with me in my room so that I could keep an eye on him so I woke up as soon as he did. I'd also (again, by sheer luck or what-have-you) read up on the latest in croup treatment after we'd put the kids to bed so I knew exactly what to do. I "calmly" gathered him up and ran downstairs and out the front door with him to breathe in the cold air, which is what the "experts" said was the best thing to do (one study found that hot bathroom steam didn't work very well after all). And don't worry, he didn't get resfriado. We didn't actually stand around outside in our pajamas. I held the door open, and we sat on the sill, and I covered Pumpkin with my coat, which fit like a full-size Snuggie only warmer.

Once he was all nice and medicated and breathing easier, I noticed that his left eye was swollen and puffy. Was it mere coincidence that it was on the same side as the ear that had swollen the night before? I think not! Might this weird recurring allergy have something to do with the sudden worsening of his previously mild croup? In my reading, I came across something known as spasmodic croup, which is a recurring fever-less croup that appears to be triggered by allergies. It seems odd that I hadn't heard of this before, but it seems to fit.

So Pumpkin missed school again on Monday and then again on Tuesday because I'd kinda sorta re-injured my back when I carried him down the stairs. And then on Wednesday, which was to be his last day of school and the day of his classroom Easter party, school was cancelled on account of snow. Darn!

You'll be glad to hear that Pumpkin is doing better. In fact, we all are. I haven't yet attempted to go anywhere with the kids that might require any heavy lifting of strollers or pulling of loaded wagons, etc. Perhaps tomorrow when the weather is nicer, we'll try leaving the house. Or not. Whatever.

In other news this month, we visited the Zoo, celebrated QT's actual birthday, went to the park, and played with mice and dogs. Here are some pictures for you to enjoy.

Boo Boo

2010-03-10T20:53:00.030-06:00

When I walked into Giggles' room this morning, she covered her eyes with her hands and said "Boo Boo" (as in Peek-a-boo). She often starts the p-a-b game when I walk in to greet her in the mornings, but since she couldn't say it for herself, she'd wait for me to say peek-a-boo before uncovering her eyes. Today marked the first time that she's ever actually said "peek-a-boo" to me, and it was sooo cute.

She's talking more and more every day. She says teta (bottle), Sunshine, Dada, Mama, No, Drink, Sit, papa (eat), ball, bowl, cat, bird, fish, thank you, and more. She's still working on getting Pumpkin's name, but she tries. It's sounding better and better.

Last week, we ran into a photographer friend at the park, and he snapped these beautiful pictures of Giggles playing on the slide. I think he captured her personality well in the pictures, but especially so in the one of her crinkling her nose and gnashing her teeth (below). That's totally her! I'm just glad she wasn't wearing her usual attire of dirty food-covered clothing that day, haha.

In less happy boo-boo related news, I decided, on the spur of the moment, to take the kids and meet up with some fellow moms and their kids for dinner at our local Chick-Fil-A last night. As I was tidying up the kitchen before leaving, I accidentally smashed Giggles' finger with the refrigerator door. Augh! At first, she was shaking and kicking and could barely make a sound, but when she got her lungs back, oh man, did she let loose! My poor little baby. Wah!!! As I rocked her and calmed her down, I started wondering whether we should just stay home after all. I bandaged her little finger up where it was bleeding and convinced myself that we should go ahead as planned. Then, just as we were walking out the door, Pumpkin inadvertently poked his eye with a toy he was holding and, of course, started to cry. Oh my gosh....I'm heaving a big ole sigh just thinking about last night's misadventures. What a weird night. I seriously wondered whether God or the Universe was trying to keep me home last night, ha ha.

BTW, you'll be happy to hear that her injured finger looks great today as does Pumpkin's eye (that was doubly injured yesterday, but that's another story).

Got a Minute?

2010-02-26T00:22:00.002-06:00

I do.

Kids are asleep, QT is out of town, and I'm all alone for once with no distractions of any kind around me...well, excepting the toys all over the family room and the dirty dishes in the sink, there are no distractions! Also, Giggles is now able to climb onto the sofa, and she made off earlier this evening with the remote controller for the cable box. So it's just me and my netbook...at least until I locate that remote.

Anyway, for those of you who are wondering, I took Giggles to the doctor today. Not so much my idea as that of the nurse on the Nurseline, but I think I may either be in the market for a new pediatrician soon or just start following my own advice from now on. It's happened more than once to us that the nurse on the phone will tell me one thing (for ex: a child under 2 who's had an unexplained fever for 24 hours or more should be seen in the office right away) and then I am told something entirely different by the provider who sees my child (ex: sure, we can run tests but it's too soon now. Come back in 2 days if the fever isn't gone yet b/c right now, we just can't tell). Seriously. Do I look like I'm made of money and have nothing better to do with my time? My kids' health is worth everything and anything to me, but this feels more like I'm flushing money down the toilet for all the good it does them. I was pretty steamed about it this morning, but I'm over it now. Plus, I'm getting tired.

So I'd best wrap this up. Giggles seemed fine today after she woke from her nap, but her temp was 101 when I checked her at bedtime. I've got some serious thinking to do tomorrow (take her in or risk waiting until Monday). Oh, and Giggles apparently has a heart murmur. Thank goodness she has a well-child exam in 2 weeks.

Pumpkin is doing great, btw. He's really gotten into his new computer game Trainz. He can sit at the PC for hours playing that game. I'm impressed that he figured the game out all by himself (and it looks complicated), but I'm not so sure it's good for him to be on the computer all day so I signed him up for karate classes. Tonight was his first class. On the way home, he told me he didn't like it because they "do everything too fast" but when told that the instructor would be working 1-on-1 with him next week to teach him all those moves, he seemed mollified and kinda sorta indicated he would go again next week. Only time will tell if he will actually want to go when the day rolls around. I'll keep you posted.

Goofy Kids

2010-02-23T23:29:00.004-06:00

Today, Giggles woke up from her afternoon nap with a fever of 102.5. So here we go again. And, of course, QT is out of town...because it seems this kind of thing only happens when he's gone. Oh well.

Last night, I made a video of the kids while they were having dinner and goofing around. What a difference a day makes sometimes. Hopefully, Giggles will be back to her crazy self in no time. Until then, here she is (with Pumpkin) in all her crazy glory.

Wow, that dude in Austin...

2010-02-18T16:04:00.006-06:00

Crazy. But, I read his manifesto, and not only is it (mostly) well written, it's also quite persuasive...and very angry.

Anyway, on the school front, Pumpkin's preschool teacher told me a cute story when I went to pick him up today. Apparently, at recess, Pumpkin was surrounded by 5-6 girls all of whom were insisting that he was her friend and "the best." In the car on the way home, I asked him who the girls were...thinking it was probably some of his little (girl) friends from our playgroup. (It wasn't.) His answer "Umm....I don't really remember their names." ......Goodness me!

While all this was going on, Giggles and I were entertaining some "little" friends at home at our 1st-ever baby playdate especially for Giggles! It was lots of fun. All the little girls (and one boy) who came over also have older siblings at home, and it was just so cute watching them play together without their sibs around to knock them down or speak for them, haha. As usual, Giggles took a few minutes to warm up to the visitors, but she was laughing and yelling away with the rest of them in no time. She also really seemed to enjoy the yummy snacks because she didn't stop eating pretty much from the time everyone arrived until it was time to go pick her brother up from school.

Sad to say, but I didn't even remember to take out the camera until the playdate was about over so I have no pictures to show for it. INSTEAD, I'll leave you with a lovely collage of Giggles taking Mousie (and her brother's Nintendo DS) for a ride in her red coupe.

I love that last picture! It looks like she's saying "Get that camera out of my face already!" hahaha

Moving Right Along

2010-02-16T02:27:00.002-06:00

Gosh, it's been so long since I updated with much about the kiddos. Well...for starters, they're both growing like weeds. Clothes that fit Pumpkin over the holidays didn't fit anymore by the time we got back from Texas. As for Giggles, some of her 12-mos size clothes are too short/small, but the next size up is still just a bit big on her so we're in that weird midway point and trying to make the best of it.

Pumpkin is reading! Sight words, I think, but he's able to sound out words too though that takes him longer obviously. And get ready for this: Giggles is talking! Or trying to anyway. I can make out the words: drink, cat, down, cracker, and car. She also makes specific sound combinations when she's calling her brother or the dog, and though the sounds she makes each have the right inflection and the appropriate number of syllables, they don't really sound much like the real things yet. But she's getting there for sure!

That's Right, You're Not From Texas

2010-01-29T14:43:00.007-06:00

The kids are loving this song lately. When we play it at home, they both go nuts and start running around the house like lunatics. Here's what happens when we play it in the car.

In other news, I very ambitiously checked out about 8 books from the library a week and a half ago including one that I'm supposed to read for my book club meeting next week (Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen). We're allowed to keep borrowed books for 4 weeks, and I thought I'd be able to manage it easily. But then, I got an email from the library that the Dan Brown book I signed up for months and months ago finally came in for me!

When I originally signed up for The Lost Symbol, I was #215 on the list, haha. I picked up my book but didn't start reading it right away since I was already in the middle of another book. Then, I got another email from the library letting me know that the Anna Godbersen book I signed up for (also last year) had also finally come in! Since I'd already read books 1 & 2 in her Luxe series, knew them to be fairly easy reads (since they're YA lit), and was excited to find out how it all ends, I rushed over to the library, picked it up, and started reading it that very same evening....once again, putting aside the Dan Brown that was still patiently waiting to be read...as well as the Gruen that I needed to read for book club.

Well, next thing I know, I've got another email from the library letting me know that The Lost Symbol is due back by Saturday, Jan 30th. WHAT?!! I hadn't even cracked it open when the email came so I quickly polished off the Godbersen and the book that I'd put down to read the Godbersen and started on The Lost Symbol. I even tried to renew it, but there are still people waiting for this book so I wasn't allowed. And tomorrow is Saturday. And book club is on Wednesday. And I'm on, like, page 25 of 528 of The Lost Symbol. Good thing the library has a generous late policy, and that after tomorrow, they won't open again until Wednesday. Hehehehehe (that's my sinister laugh)

So....Our Christmas Trip

2010-01-15T15:49:00.000-06:00

Yeah, it's long gone. QT said he was going to guest blog about our annual holiday trip, but he's been busy and/or out of town so I'm just gonna forge ahead without him.

So Christmas was fun, as usual. We got home, celebrated, had a birthday party, ate a lot, laughed a lot, sang, and came back to Denver.

We took loads of photos, and I made a few collages to make it easier to post them. I'm even skipping right over our night out watching Vic's band play and day out with the kids at the Children's Museum as well as photos from our trip back when we stopped at a railroad museum and played at hotels because there's simply too much.

Speaking of photos, the Times ran a front page photo of me and the kids enjoying the Christmas village at the Mall. Plus, Grandpoo and Beautiful Grandma took out a billboard on Shiloh with a birthday greeting for Pumpkin along with a giant picture of him so, even though we were only in town for a couple of weeks (at most), we got exposure all over the city! Pretty cool, eh?

Here, then, are my collages:

This is of Pumpkin's pre-party celebration with the fam at Cousin D's house.

Here are some pics from the actual birthday bash!

And here's our homegrown New Year's Eve celebration complete with Singstar:

Instant Day Brightener. Just Add Dogs.

2010-01-11T14:14:00.007-06:00

Picture of Sunshine and Lily having fun on Rainbow Road.

Christmas at Home

2009-12-20T10:54:00.000-06:00

Since we always end up traveling for the holidays, we've never enjoyed a Christmas morning at home with our kids. So this year, we decided to try something different. I told Pumpkin that I sent Santa Claus a letter explaining our predicament and got special permission from him to open our own gifts a few days before Christmas Day. I explained to Pumpkin that we were only opening the gifts we gave each other, and that they still had to wait until Christmas Day to open whatever gifts Santa brings. Pumpkin was soooo excited!

Friday night, we dressed the kids in their new Christmas pj's and put them to bed. Then, QT & I stayed up for a few more hours wrapping gifts, assembling toys, cleaning up, and getting food ready for the next morning. It wasn't so bad. We were probably in bed by 2:30 AM at the latest.

In the morning, well...I'll let the pictures tell the rest of the story. Even Sunshine got a gift (and loved it!) as you'll see. Merry Christmas Everyone! We're looking forward to the nice, warm, Texas weather. :)

Click here to view these pictures larger

Pumpkin's Christmas Program

2009-12-18T19:16:00.010-06:00

The song is 'Tis Christmas.

Here's Giggles watching her big brother. Enraptured. Good snacks too!

Pumpkin's BFF came to see him perform, and he was just delighted.

And, finally, here's a shot of the 4 of us after the show.

Last weekend, on a whim, we decided to take the kids to the Railroad Museum to visit with Santa Claus and ride the trains. It was nice to be able to spend some time outside after the cold weather we recently had, and both kids seemed to really enjoy themselves. Pumpkin even agreed to visit with Santa to let him know that he'd written him a letter; however, Giggles wasn't too thrilled with the meeting.

Letter to Santa

2009-12-08T18:42:00.006-06:00

This is Pumpkin's first-ever letter to Santa. I helped him a bit with the wording whenever he asked, but mostly, he composed and wrote this letter by himself. And, because his sister is still a baby and unable to write, he wanted to include her in his letter so that Santa would know what to get her. He even signed her name to the letter. Awww....he is SUCH a sweet brother.

Key:
Norfolk S. Locos = Norfolk Southern Locomotives
Baby Movie = Baby Einstein DVD

p.s. That line about his sister having been good...I'm not sure if that's entirely true, but I don't think Santa will count it against him. ;)

I'm Just Phoning It In Now

2009-12-06T00:58:00.007-06:00

We just returned from watching the Christmas Parade of Lights in downtown Denver, and I realized that I haven't even posted pictures from our Halloween yet. Pre-Halloween parties, yes, but nothing after that. Here goes then.

Mario, Wario, and Giggles cruising through Southlands Mall on Halloween day. Notice that Giggles is holding a beaker--already following in her daddy's Mad Scientist footsteps! We actually went there to get lunch. In the 2nd picture, Giggles is doing a pretty good job of coloring her kids menu.

Halloween Night. Super Mario takes his dog, the Court Jester, for a walk before we head out trick-or-treating. Pumpkin had a blast being Super Mario. When other kids recognized him, they'd call out "Super Mario!" and Pumpkin would reply very nonchalantly, "Hey" and kind of even give them subtle little wave or point with his finger. Very cool. Very The Fonz.

In case you're wondering why there aren't pictures of Giggles in her costume, it's because she was down for the count by about 5PM, well before any trick-or-treating had started on our street. Better luck next year.

Now for this last picture...we took the kids to a birthday party the following day at a roller skating place, and Pumpkin insisted on wearing his Super Mario costume from the day before. SInce the costume was already in the laundry hamper, I put together a "disguise" for Super Mario to wear to the party so that he could attend without attracting too much attention from the paparazzi. His shirt is still red, only this time, it's striped with blue! Ingenious, no?

Please Help!

2009-11-28T14:13:00.009-06:00

Y'all might recall hearing me talk about a good friend of mine whose baby daughter was diagnosed with leukemia last year (was it really just last year?!!). Well, the baby, who is now 2, is hanging tough and doing much better, but the family still needs our help.

My close friend Melissa had to quit her job to care for her little girl throughout all her hospital stays last year and this year. Meanwhile, Dad hasn't had much luck finding work as a contractor. I guess it might be because of the current economic situation around here, where the zip code that abuts ours was recently reported to have the highest rate of defaults and foreclosures IN THE COUNTRY! Anyway, the family has been struggling to keep their heads above water, but unfortunately, their situation has not improved much since all this began, and they are now in danger of losing their home. They need all the help they can get. Please take a look at the slideshow below and give what you can. They have been through so much already.

To see the full screen, click on the little square within a square below the video.

To read more about Avery, click here to visit her Caring Bridge site.

Update: Click here to read a related article on the Denver Egotist, where their tagline is "Helping Denver Suck Less, Daily." Well said. :)

Another way to help!
Click here to visit the C.O.L.E.S. Foundation website and cast your vote for Avery in the Christmas Cash giveaway! Families must qualify to enter the contest, and the winner receives a monetary prize to help them out for the holidays.

Birthdays Galore

2009-11-25T12:40:00.007-06:00

This month, Pumpkin and I took Giggles sledding for the first time. Getting there proved to be a bit of a logistical challenge because the sidewalks were dry, but the park was covered with snow so I couldn't pull them there in their sleds, but I also couldn't pull them all the way in the wagon because it wouldn't make it. I ended up having to load both kids in the wagon, carry 1 of the sleds, and have Pumpkin pull the other sled behind him. By the time we arrived at the park entrance (1 block away), I was beginning to think it might have been a bad idea to try this on my own, but I persevered.

I parked (read: abandoned) our wagon at the park entrance, and we proceeded from there via sled. The park entrance is shady, and thus very icy and slippery, and I nearly fell once or twice, but we finally made it to the hill. Giggles was very excited to be out in the snow, but unfortunately, her cute little snowsuit didn't quite stand up to the elements as well as I'd expected. Before I realized what was happening, the feet on her little suit had gotten soaked, and Giggles' own feet were very, very cold. Thankfully, a friend had brought her kids over to sled with us so I was able to leave Pumpkin with her while I rushed Giggles back home to change her into some warm, dry clothes. And yes, I had to pull her back to the park entrance in the sled, then transfer her over to the wagon, then walk home as quickly as possible without slipping, then shuck our wet clothes and boots at the door, then dry and warm her up, then rush upstairs to find new clothes, then dress her, then pull our coats back on, then load her back up in the wagon....well, I'm sure you get the picture. Needless to say, I was a fried and sweaty mess by the time our sledding adventure was over that day, haha. But it was fun!

November was also a busy month for us birthday-wise. We celebrated mine in the usual style (as per QT's incredible planning), and we celebrated friends' birthdays at the usual spots (Chuck E Cheese, kid gyms, Chuck E Cheese, etc), and we ate lots of cake.

Updated Video of Downtown Laredo

2009-11-12T19:38:00.000-06:00

The picture quality wasn't coming out that great so I fixed the video up a bit. Consequently, the link in the previous post no longer works. Here's the new one.

Ajua! Viva Laredo!

Costume Parties, Downtown Laredo, and More!

2009-11-10T18:40:00.002-06:00

Last year, I decided that, rather than go home for Thanksgiving, we'd go for Halloween instead from now on. By the time Halloween rolled around this year, though, I'd changed my mind and had decided to stay and enjoy all the cool goings-on around here instead.

Fortunately, Pumpkin and my family prevailed, and off to Texas I went with my kiddos. Unfortunately, Pumpkin came down with croup again shortly after we arrived, but he healed rapidly this time and a good time was had by all. (BTW, thanks again, Lulu, for helping him get better. Love ya!!)

I took the kids' warm weather costumes with us to Texas, and Pumpkin got to use his more than once, which was neat. To start with, we had a costume party at my parents' house the day after we arrived in Texas. It was really, really last minute, but it worked out great! Everyone wore a costume, we all pitched in with fun Halloween food, and the kids had a blast goofing off together! Here are some pics from that night. Pumpkin was a soldier, and Giggles was a ballerina (thanks again for the duds, Oz!).

Joining us were a princess, a corpse bride, some sort of death, a ghost, a dog, Dona Florinda, a medieval knight, a pig, a jockey, a ketchup bottle, a camper from Camp Rock, and a transformer. Oh, and my brother, the red grinch who stole Halloween. ;)

Pumpkin spent most of the party on the trampoline at the house next door. ;)

A couple of days later, my sisters and I (and mom, and Coach Vic, and the boys) went on a Haunted Historic House tour that was being presented via trolley by the Webb County Heritage Foundation (pictured above). I think the boys were expecting something slightly scarier, but we all agreed it was a fascinating tour nonetheless. Below are pictures taken before the trolley arrived for us.

Wednesday, Grandma Toni took the kids to Peter Piper Pizza while I enjoyed lunch with a girlfriend at La India Packing Company. Yummy mole! Mmmm.

On Thursday, I took Pumpkin and his cousin D downtown to ride the free trolley just for kicks. We hung around the plaza for an hour, but the trolley never materialized! While we waited, we walked over to QT's grandparents' old house, which was sold about a year ago to a development company that's hoping to revitalize the San Agustin Plaza area downtown. I believe the house was never officially designated an historic property; however, repairs could still not be undertaken without approval from the Historic Building department. Their backyard had a stone wall that is supposedly the last remaining structure from a Presidio that stood here back when Laredo was still under Spanish rule circa 1700's. It looked to me like whoever bought the house was doing a nice job of fixing it up. Seeing it anew made me wish we could've done that ourselves, which is what QT had wanted to do.

After that, we headed back to the plaza, where I finally found out from the doorman at La Posada Hotel that the trolley had stopped running some months before, probably due to lack of funds. Well, pfffttt! Rather than call it quits and go home, the boys and I took off on a short shopping spree in the downtown shops. They picked up some nice loot then we headed out to visit the Lamar Bruni Vergara Environmental Science Center at LCC, site of the former Fort McIntosh and home to many an historic building of its own. There, we saw alligators, bobcats, foxes, raccoons, turtles, fish, and a javalin (um...I think that's wild boar in English, but I'd have to verify). They also had some interesting displays on the Rio Grande River watershed that Pumpkin and I enjoyed...though D perhaps not so much. ;)

Later that day, Pumpkin accompanied his cousins Van and Cass to a trunk-or-treating event at their school. They attend a private school, and I've gotta say, those private school parents hand out good loot because Pumpkin came home with a big bagful of all his favorite candy!

In between our running around, we ate most of our meals at my parents' restaurant and the afternoons and evenings hanging out with my sibs and their kids. Friday afternoon, my brother, his wife, and little D drove us back to San Antonio to catch our flight back to Denver. The boys played their Nintendo DS's all the way there, and I'm glad Pumpkin got to spend his last couple of hours in Texas playing with D, who's become a really good friend to him this year.

The Price of Negligence

2009-11-04T22:10:00.004-06:00

We found out today that Pumpkin has 9 cavities! I think they said 9..maybe it was 7. I can really only remember 5 of them, but either way, it was a lot! At least 5 or 7 or 9 more than I would've expected. Four of them are where his molars touch, which boils down to 2 for the price of 1 since those 2 cavities end up affecting 4 teeth,

Because there are so many cavities to repair, Pumpkin will need to be sedated for the procedure. Because he has a history of RAD, the procedure can only be done in a hospital setting instead of at the dentist's office. So, the cost of our negligent parenting is whatever the cost will be for the hospital room, the anesthesiologist or whoever does the sedation, plus of course, the dentist herself. I'm still paying off the hospital bill from when Giggles was born, and now this. Damn.

My Favorite Things

2009-10-24T18:00:00.004-05:00

This was Giggles' first time traveling via airplane. I rue the day.

Downtown Denver Outing

2009-10-23T20:33:00.001-05:00

My Pumpkin and his pumpkin

Just for fun, we invited some friends to join us for lunch in downtown Denver. Naturally, we rode the light rail because...well, what else would we do? The day was so nice that we took a short stroll after lunch. Then, we boarded the free Mall Ride for a spin "around the block" before heading back home.

Halloween Recipes

2009-10-21T21:15:00.004-05:00

I'm posting this for the fam, but everyone's welcome to use these recipes! I got them from various sources.

MUMMY DOGS
INGREDIENTS
1 can (8 oz) Pillsbury® refrigerated crescent dinner rolls or 1 can (8 oz) Pillsbury® Crescent Recipe Creations™ refrigerated flaky dough sheet
2 1/2 slices American cheese, quartered (2.5 oz)
10 large hot dogs
Cooking spray
Mustard or ketchup, if desired

DIRECTIONS
1. Heat oven to 375°F.
2. If using crescent rolls: Unroll dough; separate at perforations, creating 4 rectangles. Press perforations to seal. If using dough sheet: Unroll dough; cut into 4 rectangles.
3. Cut each rectangle lengthwise into 10 pieces, making a total of 40 pieces of dough. Slice cheese slices into quarters (1/2 slice cheese, cut in half).
4. Wrap 4 pieces of dough around each hot dog and 1/4 slice of cheese to look like "bandages," stretching dough slightly to completely cover hot dog. About 1/2 inch from one end of each hot dog, separate "bandages" so hot dog shows through for "face." On ungreased large cookie sheet, place wrapped hot dogs (cheese side down); spray dough lightly with cooking spray.
5. Bake 13 to 17 minutes or until dough is light golden brown and hot dogs are hot. With mustard, draw features on "face."

Pumpkin Shaped Ham-n-Cheese Sandwiches
INGREDIENTS
1 box (15 oz) refrigerated pie crusts
6 oz sliced Black Forest or Virginia ham
8 oz sliced extra-sharp Cheddar, Swiss or Gruyère cheese
1 large egg, lightly beaten
PREPARATION
1. Heat oven to 425ºF. Line a rimmed baking sheet with nonstick foil.

2. Unroll pie crust and cut each of the two crusts into 12 pumpkin shapes with a 3-in. pumpkin cookie cutter. Using a 2-in. round cutter, cut 24 rounds from the sliced ham and 24 rounds from the sliced Cheddar.

3. Put 2 slices each ham and Cheddar in the center of each of 12 pumpkins. Brush beaten egg around edges.

4. Top with remaining pumpkins, carefully pressing on edges to seal. Using a spoon, make ridges on pumpkins by pressing into tops in a few places. With a small knife, pierce ridges in a couple of places to vent.

5. Place on prepared pan. Brush tops with beaten egg. Bake 10 to 12 minutes until light golden.

Bewitching Brownies
INGREDIENTS
1 box (1 lb, 6.5 oz) brownie mix, prepared and baked according to package directions
Violet, red and white tube decorating icing
1 can (16 oz) vanilla frosting
1 can (16 oz) dark chocolate frosting
Wilton jumbo confetti and Halloween confetti sprinkles
White fondant

PREPARATION
1. Cut prepared and cooled brownies into eight coffin shapes, using a 3-in. coffin-shaped cookie cutter. Using a 2 1/2-in. round cookie cutter, cut six brownies into rounds for vampire faces.

2. To decorate coffins: Pipe on rim of coffins with violet and red decorating icing. Pipe "RIP" using white decorating icing.

3. To decorate vampires: Spread top of circles with vanilla frosting. Pipe on hair and eyebrows using the chocolate frosting in a pastry bag fitted with a #3 tip. Use jumbo confetti sprinkles for eyes and Halloween confetti sprinkles for pupils. (You can also pipe on the pupils with some of the chocolate frosting.) Using fingers, form fondant into ears, nose, and fang shapes; attach to face. Pipe on mouths using red decorating icing.

Ghostly Shepard's Pie
Ingredients:
1 lb ground beef
1/2 C. chopped onion
1 bag (12 oz) frozen mixed vegetables
2 C. diced tomatoes with Italian herbs, undrained (from 28-oz can)
1 jar (12 oz) beef gravy
1 3/4 C. water
2 Tbsp. butter/margarine
1/4 tsp. garlic powder
1/2 C. milk
2 1/4 C. Potato Buds mashed potatoes (dry) or any other dried potatoes
1/4 C. grated Parmesan cheese
1 egg, slightly beaten

Directions:
1. Heat oven to 375°F. Spray 12-inch skillet with cooking spray. Add beef and onion; cook over medium heat 8 to 10 minutes, stirring occasionally, until thoroughly cooked; drain.

2. Set 12 peas (from frozen vegetables) aside for garnish. Add remaining frozen vegetables, tomatoes and gravy to beef mixture. Heat to boiling. Reduce heat to medium-low. Cover and cook 8 to 10 minutes, stirring occasionally, until vegetables are crisp-tender.

3. In 2-quart saucepan, heat water, butter and garlic powder to boiling. Remove from heat; add milk. Stir in dry potatoes and cheese. Add egg; blend well.

4. Spoon beef mixture into ungreased 2 - 2 1/2 quart baking dish. With large spoon, make 6 mounds of potato mixture on top of beef mixture to resemble ghosts. Place 2 reserved peas on each mound to resemble eyes.

5. Bake 20 to 25 minutes or until potatoes are set and mixture is thoroughly heated.

Green Goblins
Ingredients:
6 C. Kix Cereal
1 package marshmallows (about 40 large)
3 Tbs. butter or margarine
4 drops green food coloring
Wax Paper
Nonstick Cooking Spray
1 package circus peanuts (you need 2 per goblin)
1 can Pillsbury vanilla icing
assorted candies

Directions:
Put Marshmallows and butter in large mirowave-safe bowl. Microwave on high power for 2 minutes. Stir and microwave 1 additional minute. Remove from microwave and stir in green food coloring.

Place Kix cereal into your cauldron...I mean large bowl...
Pour marshmallow mixture over Kix and stir well. Let cool for 3-5 minutes.

After mixture has cooled slightly but is still moldable, spray hands generously with cooking spray (otherwise you'll get VERY sticky!). Scoop out 3/4 C. of the mixture and shape into a firm ball. Place on wax paper to harden. After the Goblin Bodies are set (about 30 minutes), place on top of two Circus Peanut candies. Your Goblins are ready to decorate.

Spiderweb Cheese Pizzas
INGREDIENTS
1 pkg (10 oz) prebaked mini 8-in pizza crusts (we used Boboli)
1/3 cup pizza sauce
2 (1 oz each) mozzarella string cheese
3 large pitted black olives

PREPARATION
1. Heat oven to 450°F. Place crusts on a baking sheet; top with sauce. Pull cheese into thin strips; place on pizzas in the shape of a web.

2. Bake pizza for 8 to 10 minutes until cheese melts. Cool 3 minutes.

3. Cut off one end of 2 olives for spider heads. Halve remaining olives lengthwise. Use one half for body; cut remaining pieces into strips for legs. Assemble spider on each pizza.

Spooky Spinach Dip in Cauldron
INGREDIENTS

[u]Dip[/u]
1 cup sour cream
1/2 cup mayonnaise
1 tsp dried basil
1/2 tsp black pepper
1/2 tsp garlic powder
1/2 tsp salt
1 pkg (10 oz) frozen chopped spinach, thawed and squeezed dry
1/2 cup chopped scallions
1/4 cup shredded carrots
Wilton leaf green icing color (optional)

[u]Cauldron[/u]
2 refrigerated breadsticks (from an 11-oz can)
Wilton black icing color
1 round loaf pumpernickel bread
1 pkg (8 oz) cream cheese

PREPARATION
1. To make Dip: In medium bowl, combine sour cream, mayonnaise, basil, black pepper, garlic powder and salt; mix well. Stir in spinach, scallions and carrots; blend well. Tint green with icing color if desired. Cover and refrigerate 2 hours or overnight for flavors to develop.

2. To make Cauldron: Heat oven to 350°F. Unroll 2 attached breadsticks from package of refrigerated breadsticks. Twist and form into handle shape. Insert toothpick into each end and bake as package directs. (You can bake the remaining breadsticks as well and serve them as an accompaniment to dip. Make sure to bake them immediately after opening the package.)

3. Remove to rack to cool completely. Paint handle with black icing color. Cut top off bread and hollow out to form a bowl. Insert handle into top of bread bowl.

4. In a small bowl, tint cream cheese black with icing color. Transfer to ziptop bag. Snip 1/2-in. hole from one corner of bag. Pipe around top of cauldron. Spoon dip into top of cauldron. Serve with Pumpkin-Shaped Tortilla Dippers and raw vegetables.[/quote]

This came from [url=http://www.x-entertainment.com/halloween/2006/september28/]X-E's 2006 Halloween Countdown[/url]. It may not be pretty, but the article is hilarious!

To make this pizza, use a Boboli crust and cut the top an bottom to make it look more pumpkin-shaped. In the picture, he used pepperoni, green peppers, yellow peppers and black olives to decorate. I used more orange cheese and fewer pepperoni on top.

For smaller bite-size or kid-size version of the pumpkin shaped pizzas, use English muffins in place of pizza crust. Green pepper for the stem, orangey cheese for color. Cut pepperoni and/or yellow peppers into triangles and half-circle pieces for eyes and mouth.

KITTY LITTER CAKE

This one's very realistic looking, haha.

INGREDIENTS
New kitty box
new kitty box scoop (both totally worth buying for this cake!)
1 (18.25 ounce) package German chocolate cake mix
1 (18.25 ounce) package white cake mix (or vanilla for more flavor)
2 (3.5 ounce) packages instant vanilla pudding mix (or you can use chocolate for a"used" kitty box)
1 (12 ounce) package vanilla sandwich cookies (I use nilla wafers)
3 drops green food coloring (optional, but does make a big difference)
1 (12 ounce) package tootsie rolls

DIRECTIONS (put a bib on a kid over age 1 and have them help!)
Prepare cake mixes and bake according to package directions (any size pan, whatever cooks quickest).
Prepare pudding according to package directions and chill until ready to assemble.
Crumble sandwich cookies in small batches in a food processor, scraping often (or give it to a small child in double ziplocs and a wooden spoon). Set aside all but 1/4 cup. To the 1/4 cup add a few drops of green food coloring and mix.
When cakes are cooled to room temperature, crumble them into a large bowl. Toss with 1/2 of the remaining cookie crumbs, and the chilled pudding. You probably won't need all of the pudding, you want the cake to be just moist, not soggy.
Line kitty litter box with the kitty litter liner if desired (liner not necessary, but does make clean up easier). Put cake mixture into new and clean box.
Put half of the unwrapped tootsie rolls in a microwave safe dish and heat until softened. Shape the ends so that they are no longer blunt, and curve the tootsie rolls slightly. Bury tootsie rolls randomly in the cake and sprinkle with half of the remaining cookie crumbs. Sprinkle a small amount of the green colored cookie crumbs lightly over the top.
Heat 3 or 4 of the tootsie rolls in the microwave until almost melted. Scrape them on top of the cake and sprinkle lightly with some of the green cookie crumbs. Heat the remaining tootsie rolls until pliable and shape as before. Spread all but one randomly over top of cake mixture. Sprinkle with any remaining cookie crumbs. Hang the remaining tootsie roll over side of litter box and sprinkle with a few green cookie crumbs. Serve with the pooper scooper for a gross Halloween dessert.

Jack-O-Lantern Layered Mexican Dip

Serves: 10-12

Ingredients
1 - 16 oz. can of refried beans
1 - 4.5 oz. can of chopped green chiles
1/2 cup sour cream
1/2 cup mayonnaise
2 avocadoes, peeled and diced
2 Tbsp. fresh lemon juice
1 cup Stonewall Kitchen Black Bean Salsa
4 scallions, chopped
2 cups shredded orange cheddar cheese
Blue corn tortilla chips, triangle shape
Sliced black olives, drained
Directions
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
In a greased deep pie dish, spread the refried beans and then layer the green chiles.
For the next layer combine the sour cream and the mayonnaise and spread over the chiles. Continue layering the avocadoes, lemon juice, Stonewall Kitchen Black Bean Salsa, scallions, and cheddar cheese.
Bake for 20-30 minutes until heated through and bubbly.
Decorate top of dip with three tortilla chips forming the eyes and nose of the jack-o-lantern. Use the sliced black olives to form a mouth.
Serve hot with additional tortilla chips.

SKELETON DIP

Assemble skeleton with your favorite veggies and serve with any dip of your choosing. SUPER EASY!

Edible Eyeballs (recipe card is the next picture)

Pumpkin Patch

2009-10-19T21:10:00.000-05:00

A few weeks ago, after our family photo shoot at Star K Ranch, we met up with some of our friends at a pumpkin patch north of Denver. It's the same farm we visited last year, only this time, we forgot our camera! Fortunately, we found a disposable 35mm camera in the truck and were at least able to capture 24 images from our outing on film. Unfortunately, the camera had languished in the glove box for who knows how long so the picture quality was not that great to say the least.

Since QT made sure to avoid the barrel car ride this time around, fun was had by all...except for those friends of ours, who failed to heed his advice and rode the barrel cars anyway. Ouch!

Snowing Again

2009-10-08T19:15:00.001-05:00

See Sunshine out there?

The Queen of All Wild Things

2009-10-04T09:36:00.000-05:00

We waited until Beautiful Grandma and Bapu could come for a visit to have Giggles' 1st birthday party. Our theme was, naturally, Where the Wild Things Are, and Giggles was, naturally, the Queen of All Wild Things.

We had a handful of little friends over, and our neighbor across the street held a Kindermusik session with us. Very cute. Lots of fun. Here are a few pics.

And, what was Daddy doing while the Grands and I prepared for this epic party? Oh, yeah, he was on a "business" trip.

I'm a soldier.

2009-09-29T23:36:00.006-05:00

Pumpkin attended a schoolmate's Army-themed birthday party today. I couldn't go so his friend's mom offered to come get him so that he wouldn't have to miss the party. At first, Pumpkin didn't want to go (no surprise there), but he seemed to be having a great time when I showed up 2 hours later to pick him up. He had on camouflage face paint and was wearing a personalized dog tag (so cool!). At home later that evening, I asked him to smile for the camera. His reply? "I'm a soldier." No smile. So unbelievably cute!!!

In other news:

Here are some pictures from a week or two ago of Giggles enjoying her birthday cake and the resulting bath she needed afterward. I thought I'd posted them, but after scrolling down a bit, I realized I hadn't.

Here are some other random pictures from the past couple of weeks. 1-2. Pumpkin and a friend at the park behind our house. 3. Giggles enjoying a ride at Chuck E. Cheese. 4. Pumpkin, Giggles, and a friend taking a stroll at the local outdoor mall. 5. Giggles and a male admirer. (Actually, I think he was really just admiring her stroller toys. ;)

Fisher Price X-Ray Machine

2009-09-25T15:56:00.006-05:00

Just kidding. These are real. Since Labor Day, Pumpkin has been having problems with allergies. He's been coughing for the past few weeks and has lately begun having chest pain too. Between him and Giggles, I have already been to their pediatricians' office 4 times this month (twice in this week alone), and the month isn't even over yet. On Wednesday, we finally got to see Pumpkin's primary doctor, and he decided to get a chest X-ray and also do some blood tests to find out exactly what Pumpkin is allergic to that's causing all these problems.

Naturally, Pumpkin balked at getting anything done, but when it was all over, he thought having X-rays of his body was the ULTIMATE coolest thing ever. He called his dad, who was in Wyoming, to tell him about his X-ray pictures. He also called his Grandpa and Grandma in Texas and even had me send them a picture of his X-rays via text messaging, haha. The nurses let us have the extra copies of his X-rays to bring home, and Pumpkin couldn't wait to show them to his dad when he returned from Wyoming.

Fortunately, his X-rays showed no problems with his lungs; however, they did show a sinus infection, for which Pumpkin is now taking antibiotics. I don't know if this will ultimately clear up the cough or not. He just started the meds so we'll have to wait and see how it goes. He went back to school on Thursday, and then went out to lunch with some friends afterward. He's having fun at his new school, and I'm very glad (and relieved).

In fact, he talks about school all the time now, which is something he rarely ever did when he was at Ricks. The cutest thing, I find, is when he starts laughing while telling me about a funny book they read in class. I'm very glad that he feels so comfortable at his new school already. I don't know if I'd mentioned it before, but there are 12 boys in his class (and just 2 girls). While this situation can't be pleasant for his teachers, I'm glad, for his sake, that he'll have so many boys his own age with whom to play this year. :)

Day at the Zoo

2009-09-20T12:54:00.012-05:00

Unbelievably, QT had never been to the Zoo with us before, but we finally rectified that yesterday. Pumpkin was soooo excited that his daddy was going with us to the Zoo. He kept asking QT if he was going to stay there with us or if he was leaving. Yesterday also marked the first time that Giggles has really noticed the animals at the Zoo so it was especially nice having QT there for that. We arrived late in the afternoon, and most of the crowds had gone by then, which was nice. Unfortunately, the ticket booth had closed by the time we made it around to the rides, but the nice clerk let us on the train for free (without tickets). All in all, it was a pleasant enough 1st Zoo outing for QT.

QT was trying out a new camera he got for work. Here are some of his pictures:

Here's Giggles clapping at the giraffes.

Giggles' Big Day

2009-09-13T10:50:00.002-05:00

We celebrated Giggles' 1st birthday at Red Robin with a good friend of ours and her kids. We took a small cake with us, and the nice folks at RR came out to serenade our little girl. Naturally, she wasn't afraid of the loud singing and clapping in the least. Our server was also nice enough to present Giggles with an ice cream sundae. She enjoyed the whipped cream but balked at the coldness of the ice cream, haha. Afterward, we came home, napped, and goofed off with Sunshine. All in all, a very nice way to celebrate. Enjoy the slideshow!

Click here to view these pictures larger

Giggles Goes Shopping. Pumpkin Goes to School.

2009-09-09T15:33:00.010-05:00

On Monday (Labor Day), Pumpkin went to a friend's house to play, and we headed to Babies R Us to pick up some supplies for Giggles. While I ran around gathering the items we needed, QT & Giggles ran around doing some shopping of their own. (Yes, we forgot her shoes at home, but at least she was wearing socks this time.)
Here she is checking out the merchandise and making her selection.

QT was also able to record this cute video of Giggles "shopping." Hint: Watch it to the end to get to the "surprise."

The following day was Pumpkin's 1st day of school. Unfortunately, he woke up coughing and feeling a bit of pain in his chest so in addition to making sure he had a nice, hearty breakfast and re-checking that his school supplies were in order and feeding Giggles and taking the dog outside and...well, you get the picture...anyway, in addition to all that, we also had to put a nebulizer treatment together for him. Consequently, we didn't have much time left over for taking pictures. We did get a few at school and at least one of him in front of the house ignoring Dad. ;)

And just for fun, here's a pic of the kids playing together. (wink, wink)

Labor Day Picnic

2009-09-06T00:37:00.013-05:00

We spent Saturday afternoon at the park having a picnic with our friends. It was great! The weather was warm but nice, and we had the park almost all to ourselves. The kids had a blast running around and jumping on the Bounce House that we rented. The moms enjoyed hanging out and chatting, and the dads enjoyed tossing the football around and just plain goofing off. All in all, fun was had by all. :)

Below are pictures of Pumpkin and his friends Amira, Blake, Cole, Olivia, Sarah, Meredith, and Victoria on the playground, in the bounce house, or patiently waiting in line for their turns on the bounce house.

In the block below, Giggles is in the bounce house (bouncing, climbing, crawling, & sitting) and also chilling out on the picnic blanket and with the I boys.

Below are scenes from our picnic. Guys grilling, playing football, and swinging?? Friends chatting, eating, and hanging out. Kids on the playground. Etc. Etc.

Hog Heaven

2009-09-01T16:42:00.009-05:00

Aside from me, Lys, his beautiful Grandma, and possibly his baby sister, Pumpkin has had 2 big, or should I say little, L-O-V-E-S of his life. Both girls are older than Pumpkin, intelligent, tall, and exotically beautiful with dark hair, dark eyes, the works!

When he returned from Texas a few weeks ago, we invited some friends over and had ourselves a little Texas party complete with Texas movie, Texas music, Texas-shaped waffles, and Texas-style grub. His two favorite girls were both here as well as another island beauty that's slowly but surely moving up the ranks. (She likes trains. 'Nuff said.)

I forgot about my camera and didn't take many (read: any) pictures until the last of our guests were leaving. Here's Pumpkin, apparently in hog heaven, saying goodbye to his 2 favorite girls in the whole world...aside from me, Lys, his beautiful Grandma, and possibly Giggles. You know how it is.

Giggles Update

2009-08-31T14:21:00.002-05:00

To start things off, here are Giggles and Pumpkin enjoying a ride courtesy of Daddy.

My giggly little girl is getting around better and better and just plain doing more every day. And, she's full of surprises!

Yesterday, the kids and I went over to a friend's house to visit, and wouldn't you know it, the toy that most attracted Giggles was (drum roll please)....a baby doll with its own pacifier and crib. Giggles would clamber into the toy crib and try to give the "baby" its pacifier. So cute!!

Week before last, she started eating more regular food and also drinking water from a sippy cup. Finally. I think she'd actually been ready to do these things for a while; however, her parents had simply failed to notice that she was getting older and more able, hehe. So, now the kids and I might enjoy a nice breakfast of cheesy ham and eggs or some oatmeal with yogurt and fruit or bagels and/or muffins or bread with jam. For lunch, she'll have bread and chicken or turkey...all of this in just-barely-visible-to-the-eye pieces, of course (meaning she's graduated from the microscopic pieces I used to give her). She also enjoys finger foods like Gerber's wagon wheels or veggie crisps, which are like Cheetos but made with veggies. She also still eats #3 baby food from a jar. Lately, she's been sampling Earth's Best "My First Soups." Her favorite so far is Butternut Squash Bisque.

Last week, Pumpkin and I were in the kitchen after breakfast, and I happened to glance over to the family room. Something totally incongruous caught my attention, and it was a few beats before I realized what I was looking at. It was my baby girl STANDING on the arm of the sofa with her little leg stretched out as if about to walk right off! Talk about a heart-stopper! I don't even remember what I was holding in my hands, but I dropped whatever it was and raced to family room to (hopefully) catch Giggles before she leapt from the sofa. (I caught her.)

The following day, I was in the office, and Giggles was playing on the floor behind me. Next thing I knew, she was standing on top of her brother's desk chair, happy as a clam. This time, I decided not to rescue her from the chair. I figured the fall from his chair is a lot shorter (and less harmful) than the fall from any adult-sized piece of furniture in our house. Sure enough, she fell off the chair. She cried. I picked her up. She stopped crying. She moved on to other mischief. Lesson not learned.

As I sit here typing, she has once again clambered onto her brother's desk chair to watch him construct the Transcontinental Railroad on his Lionel Trains Trans-Con! PC game. Perhaps I misspoke and she did learn a lesson because, this time, she's sitting on the chair instead of standing on it. I'll take it. Anyway, the two of them look so cute sitting together at their little desk.

It's Been Crazy (but fun)

2009-08-24T21:46:00.011-05:00

As usual.

I apologize for not posting anything in a while. As you've read by now, Giggles started walking a few weeks ago, and she is literally all over the place now. On top of that, she's not napping as often or as long as she used to either. Might be teething or the cold, which has been sticking around since last week. So, yeah, it's been a bit crazy here and there.

So what's new, you ask? Hmm...well, Giggles had her 3rd haircut today. It's kind of weird getting used to the way she looks all over again, but I think she's probably more comfortable now that she's not as shaggy.

We went to a birthday party this weekend at one of those bounce places. QT took Giggles on the big kid slide a few times, and she LOVED it! We forgot to pack our camera, but fortunately, we were able to borrow one from a friend. I'll post a pic from the party as soon as I get them from her. Hopefully, we were able to get at least one good shot. BTW, here's a picture from a birthday party we attended the week before. It was held at a splash park, but we didn't pack swim clothes since it was (supposed to be) a bit chilly. Turns out, it wasn't chilly at all, and Pumpkin ended up getting wet in his regular clothes, which then proceeded to get chilly once he got out of the water. So, here's Pumpkin enjoying himself at the party clad only in his skivvies. Well, that, his shirt, and his Pumas, of course.

For his part, Pumpkin seemed to enjoy himself very much at the party though I confess that I'm starting to worry just a bit about him. Over the past few months, I've noticed that he develops very close relationships with his peers. However, it seems like he can be "close" to only one child at a time, and then he gets so attached to this child that he wants to exclude all others from his life...er, I mean, play. What worries me is that Pumpkin seems lost whenever his special friend is not around. Is it normal 4 y/o behavior to want to cling to one special friend at a time at the exclusion of all others? I simply don't know.

When he was in school, he'd often tell me that he spent the day playing by himself because everyone else was already playing with their own friend (as in, "Kid 1 only plays with Kid 2, and Kid 3 only plays with Kid 4, etc etc). When I talked to his teachers about it, they said they hadn't seen that. According to them, Pumpkin got along well with all the kids in his class and was able to fit in with whatever playtime activity and with any group of kids. So I'm left to wonder whether this is for real or another one of those things that is more anxiety (on his part) than reality (like the infamous gym time-out episode that never happened). He believes it enough to cause himself real concern even though there isn't anything actually there. I'm concerned enough that I'm considering calling his doctor, but I'm not quite there yet. I'd like to do some research on my own first, but I don't really know where to begin...except the Internet. Oy.

Anyway, other than that...or should I say, despite that, Pumpkin is enjoying the remainder of his summer vacation. He's got his new DSi (a story for another time...grrr). He's got his best dog. And he's got me, which reminds me...

Last week, QT stayed home with Giggles while Pumpkin accompanied me "into town" to run an errand. He behaved very well on our errand, which involved much waiting in line, so I offered to take him out to dinner afterward. To a "real restaurant" as Pumpkin would say. He picked Johnny Carino's, and we had such a nice time! It was like a little mini-date, just my baby and me. He even insisted that we sit on the same side of the table so that we could hug and kiss and hold hands, LOL! It was really a wonderful treat for both of us. We may even start doing that on a regular basis.

And She Let Out a Mighty Roar

2009-08-13T00:25:00.022-05:00

Here's a picture of Pumpkin showing off his new Pumas, which make him run really fast, and a few more of him and Sunshine goofing off.

And here he is below with his adoring baby sister. :)

The Big Heist

2009-08-12T13:43:00.004-05:00

Today, Giggles took a glitter crayon away from her big brother and then RAN as fast as she could to get away from him. LOL!!! He had to chase her down in order to take the crayon away. It was hilarious! She does something similar whenever I catch her trying to go up the stairs. It's like a game. I say "Where are you going!?" and she starts to huff and puff and giggle while climbing the stairs as quickly as possible...ostensibly to get away from me before I bring her back down, haha.

So, as you've probably surmised, she's definitely walking now. Further and further every day. She's still unsteady on her feet, but she can cross an entire room, stop, stand, turn around, and take off again before finally falling on her tushie.

I wish I'd gotten this morning's crayon theft on camera. It was precious. I'll see if I can get her to recreate it when she wakes from her nap. And, on that note, I'll be off. My time is limited so I'd best eat my lunch before she wakes.

Giggles First Steps

2009-08-05T18:13:00.005-05:00

Giggles took her first steps while we were on vacation with the fam in Silvercreek. It's tough to get something like that on video so we don't have anything from that weekend, but we were able to catch her on camera taking a couple of steps on Tuesday as the fam got ready for their return trip to Texas. So, although not technically her first steps, the ones we caught on camera are still among her first dozen. ;)

Here, too, is a collage of Giggles enjoying the fresh air on the Georgetown Loop, the scenery at the Lebanon Silver Mine, in a mine cart, and chillaxin' with a teta in one of the miners' cabins.

Today's the Big Day!

2009-07-29T12:00:00.008-05:00

Today, my little Pumpkin comes home!!! I'm so excited. :)

I'm also very nervous...the most nervous I've been since Pumpkin's odyssey began 2.5 weeks ago. I feel like I might puke...or cry...or both.

Today, they (meaning Pumpkin, my parents, and my nieces & nephews) have to travel by car 2.5 hours to San Antonio to catch their flight to Denver. My sister and brother-in-law are driving them to S.A. in 2 separate cars in order to accommodate everyone, and they'll continue from there on to Dallas to take their goddaughter back home. (She spent part of the summer with them.) Obviously, with so much traveling and so many people involved in this trip, anything could go wrong. I pray that nothing does. In fact, I'd greatly appreciate it if y'all would pray along with me for safe travels for my family and my boy.

******Six Hours Later******

Reunited and it feels so good!

The day after the family's arrival, I took the kids to the Zoo while my parents stayed home with Giggles. I meant for them to get a break, but as it turned out, Giggles apparently refused to nap. Still, on her own, she's infinitely easier to deal with than dealing with 6 grandkids at the same time so it wasn't a complete waste. At least, they said they enjoyed their afternoon at home. Maybe they were just trying to make me feel better....Nah!!!

We Start 'Em Young

2009-07-27T16:24:00.000-05:00

I'm referring, of course, to their (our) indoctrination into all things Texas. Texas flags, Texas cookbooks, Texas mugs, Texas keychains, Texas maps, U of Texas, etc etc etc. I mean, what other state can boast a state-shaped waffle maker?!!! Oh, ok, you got me there. If you had a rectangular waffle-maker, I suppose you could technically say it was a Colorado-shaped waffle maker. Hmph.

Anyway, these pics were taken during our trip to Houston. Our vacation within a vacation. At Buc-ees to be exact. This summer, we went to Houston because we wanted to take Pumpkin to Space Center and also to ride the new and improved train at Hermann Park . He loved both activities! We also spent some time at the hotel pool and putting green and having fun with friends and family.

Crazy Girly

2009-07-26T01:19:00.004-05:00

The big news is that Giggles stood up unaided this past Friday. She stood twice and only lasted 2-3 seconds upright each time, but she did it! So far, she hasn't shown any inclination to do it again, but now we know for sure that it's coming.

Then, earlier today, the 3 of us (sniffle--there should be 4)...anyway, the 3 of us were playing in the living room, and she crawled off after Sunshine. I stayed in the living room, and I could hear her nearby. Next thing I knew, she was on the stairs! She ended up climbing the stairs all the way to the top! I was right behind her the entire way, but she didn't need my help. She didn't stumble or falter or anything. Just climbed on up like she'd been doing it her whole life. (all 10 months of it ;)

No telling what's coming next with this crazy kid! I'll keep you posted. Meanwhile, enjoy this short video of Giggles playing with Sunshine.

Another Birthday, Nintendo DS, and Water Fun

2009-07-25T01:37:00.002-05:00

Click here to view these pictures larger

Alyssa Bday Slideshow

2009-07-24T23:54:00.003-05:00

For Lys' birthday this year, we enjoyed a Mexican Fiesta! Since some of us weren't aware of the party theme until the day of (A-hem!), we weren't able to acquire a decent Mexican blouse to wear to the party. But there were some who did. And, my sister Chela was kind enough to get a blouse for Giggles too though Pumpkin had to make-do with wearing a "Backseat Driver" shirt, which we thought was still appropriate for the birthday theme, hehe. (just kidding!)

The following pictures are from the party and also from the subsequent family carne asada held every Sunday at my parents' house. After the carnuk, the girls put on a thrilling "show" which we all watched with bated breath (as evidenced in the pictures). Giggles spent quality time with her Grandpa and her cousins (notably Ron the punk). Happy days!

Click here to view these pictures larger

114 Hours

2009-07-24T23:12:00.003-05:00

I fear my son is having a harder and harder time being apart from us as his "vacation" stretches on. He's been exceptionally whiny and/or cranky the last few times I've talked to him on the phone. Earlier this evening, his (paternal) grandfather went to pick him up to take him out for pizza, but according to my mom, Pumpkin burst out crying and saying that he didn't want to go!

I guess, in a way, I understand...I think. He's probably exhausted and feeling all out of sorts by now. My mom tells me that he's become a "chicle" and barely lets her out of his sight anymore. Compare his current behavior to that of his first week in Texas without us, and there's a marked difference. I feel so bad for him that I almost started to look up last-minute airfare to go get him, but I held back. The cost of booking a flight all the way home is prohibitive under most circumstances but especially so at the last minute, and I'd need to buy 2 tickets. Not to mention, the ticket he has for his trip from San Antonio to Denver next week would pretty much go to waste once you factor in rebooking fees. So no go. He and I will both have to make do without each other for a while longer. 114 hours to be exact. Hang on, baby. :(

216 Hours and Counting!

2009-07-20T17:30:00.007-05:00

Goodness, how time flies! We've been back from Texas about a week and a half, and I still feel slightly exhausted. Of course, this may be because I went to sleep so late last night, and Giggles woke so early this morning so perhaps I can't blame today's exhaustion on our marathon trip.

I meant to post pics from our trip as soon as we returned, but it turns out, I haven't updated this blog since before we left so I'm going to remedy that first and work my way to our trip. Warning: these go back a bit so please be patient. BTW, I also (finally) posted pictures from our Memorial Day ride on the Rio Grande Scenic Train so check those out too when you get a chance. Ok, here's May 2009:

1. Pumpkin's last week of school was one party after another. In the 1st picture, Pumpkin appears to be discussing water slide physics with his friend Reese (y'know, acceleration, displacement, velocity ;). In the next picture, he's preparing cards and end-of-year gifts for his teachers and classmates, and in the final picture, he's playing with BFF Amira at Westlands Park. Happy times!

BTW, if you're wondering about the title of this post, it refers to the number of hours before Pumpkin returns from Texas! He was having so much fun with his cousins that he elected to stay behind when we returned. Lest you think we simply left him there without a thought, my parents were already planning a visit up here at the end of July so he'll be flying up with them.

2. Giggles: With Daddy and having a bath prior to our Texas trip.

Percy Jackson and The Olympians

2009-07-12T20:18:00.004-05:00

I just wanted to tell y'all about a fun book series I read during my sojourn in Texas. It's called Percy Jackson and the Olypians. The first book is The Lightning Thief, a rip-roaring ride, which I hear is to be made into a movie soon.

Incidentally, I'm feeling half & half about that. The only movie I've ever seen that mirrored its print version and didn't ruin it for its readers was The Princess Bride, a movie I still love to this day! The Harry Potter movies were also pretty good at keeping in tune with the books, but for obvious reasons, the studios had to cut out a lot of the book details in the movie versions so....half & half. All other movies that started as books that I've ever seen didn't go nearly as well. I guess we'll see.

Anyway, if you're looking for something fun to do this summer, pick up The Lightning Thief and read it! I promise you won't regret it. And, if you're not a "reader," don't worry. This series is written for grades 5-9. I'm sure you can handle it. ;)

Heat Wave

2009-07-01T09:42:00.004-05:00

This was not a good day for a power outage, but that's what happened. Heck, it was probably due to this heat anyway.

It took the utility company about 4 hours to restore power. Consequently, we spent the afternoon at my sister's. It was a tiring day.

Giggles Makes A Mess

2009-06-28T22:31:00.004-05:00

Hard to believe, I know.

Grandma's out of town, and Giggles has been busy strewing toys around the living room, tearing into the newspaper, and taking every single tissue in the house out of its box! On the plus side, after a crazy week, she's back to sleeping like a champ!

Pumpkin is also doing much better after his most recent bout of croup. Last week, he woke one night (4 AM actually) with a croupy cough, rattling breath, and chest pain. For the next couple of hours, he and I alternated between sitting in a steamy bathroom, lying down in the living room, which is much cooler than our bedroom, and chatting on the phone with our pediatrician's afterhours nurse line (well, I did anyway). The next morning, I took him in to see a good friend of mine, who's a Nurse Practitioner at an ENT clinic, and she was wonderful! She loaded us up with samples of Z-Cof and Pulmicort for the nebulizer and a prescription for steroids and antibiotics. I borrowed my niece's nebulizer and some of their Xopenex since our supplies were, um, left behind in Colorado (for which my friend gave me a bit of a scolding, btw), and we were on our way.

Unfortunately, Pumpkin missed his last 2 days of swim class because of all this, but his lovely teacher, Miss Bede, invited us to return this week free of charge to make up the missed classes. Now, how thoughtful is that?!! :)

I still don't know exactly what Giggles' problem was last week, but I attribute her odd behavior to teething...and perhaps heat and noise. I don't recall if I'd already mentioned, but she has 4 new upper teeth coming in right now. I figure she's been pretty uncomfortable lately, which may account for her waking at all hours of the night and crying nonstop over the past week or so. And when she wasn't cranky, she was unusually quiet, which as y'all know, is not like Giggles at all. So it's good to see her back to her giggly, playful self.

With everybody out of town this past weekend, the kids and I have all gotten some much needed rest, thank goodness. I honestly don't know if I could've lasted much longer at the rate of sleeplessness I was going (see previous post). ;)

Baby Offer

2009-06-26T05:32:00.001-05:00

Used baby free to good home. Cute as the dickens. Lungs work great. Crib included. Must pick up now!

Today's Temp

2009-06-25T18:18:00.002-05:00

Typically, I've found that the reading from the car is a bit lower than the "official" reported temp readings in town so it's probably closer to 108 today. Guess the nice weather's over.

In other news, Pumpkin and Giggles are both feeling better. They've both had low-grade fevers over the past few nights, and they've both been fever-free all day today. So that's good news. Especially for Pumpkin. He's still on nebulizer treatments until his croupy cough is completely gone...all cough actually. Might take a while. Giggles, on the other hand, is back to her normal rabble-rousing self. She had me worried yesterday because she was unnaturally quiet and still. Everybody who knows her who saw her yesterday commented on how quiet she was, haha. Gotta run now. Tonight is Pumpkin's last night of swimming class, and we're having a pizza party. :)

Weather (Text)

2009-06-17T19:11:00.002-05:00

It's 7PM and a balmy 98 degrees outside. At the pool, this is downright chilly!

I forgot to mention that the wonderful rug in the pictures came from my brother's office. From his storage actually. It used to be in his house. He lent it to Mom while we're visiting so that Giggles could crawl around the living room without hurting herself. The older kids seem pretty happy with the rug too, and it seems that they all end up playing on it at some point throughout the day. It's cute.

Pictures! Finally.

2009-06-17T18:19:00.001-05:00

Click here to view these pictures larger

Tuesday

2009-06-17T11:54:00.003-05:00

Except, I think it might actually already be Wednesday.

Anyway, here's all the news that's fit to print. At the very last minute on Sunday evening, my sisters and I decided to enroll our kids in a week-long summer camp that was starting on Monday at the Imaginarium (formerly the Laredo Children's Museum). I thought of putting Pumpkin in the same class with his older cousins. I actually think he would've handled the content matter just fine, but as soon as I heard the instructor say "ancient Rome," I knew he'd be better off with the other preschoolers. QT & I have introduced the concept of countries to him before, of course, but I don't think Pumpkin has any idea what ancient even means. And that was just in the first 15 minutes on the first day of the class! Now, if she'd said "Very Old Rome"....well, maybe that would've been a different story, hehe.

He seems to be enjoying himself regardless. As a preschooler, his lessons are much shorter than those of the older kids, and he also gets more playtime so I don't think he's minding it too much (being w/o his cousins, I mean). He still gets to see his cousins during shared playtime and at lunch. I also paid a bit extra to leave him there an extra hour after preschool camp is over so that he could stay until his cousins' class is over.

In the evenings, Pumpkin is taking swimming lessons with Sofia, my brother's daughter. The classes are being given by my brother's neighbor, who is a former well-known dance instructor here, and Pumpkin's doing great with her. He's taken to the water like, well, like a fish to water. Yesterday, he even jumped in the water and dunked his head TWICE. All on his own. To be fair, I don't think he meant to dunk his head either time, but he also wasn't upset when it turned out that way.

In between camp and swimming, he just runs around goofing off with whoever's here. Usually Lissa. By the end of the day, he's so tired that he can barely finish dinner, and he slurs his words like a little drunken man. Last night, he told me that it was his bedtime already. Poor baby. Unfortunately for him and for me, Giggles picked last night to wail, scream, and generally carry on like a mini-banshee. The noise kept Pumpkin awake, and I finally just took him into my parents' room to sleep. Even though he could barely even walk by then, he still didn't want to leave Giggles behind because she was still crying. What a good boy!

Giggles...well, she's a handful. No surprise there. She's crawling all over the place. She pulls herself into a standing position in her crib, in the living room, and pretty much wherever she happens to be. I'm afraid she'll be toddling soon. Since hardly anyone here has carpet in their homes, we brought a walker for her to use here, and she tears around in that thing. So far, so good. The only things that have been broken are those I dropped while attempting to baby-proof my mom's living room so that Giggles wouldn't knock anything over. LOL!

I finally took some pictures at swimming yesterday. Now to figure out how to post them from a borrowed PC. Tomorrow, we're going to a birthday party! Busy busy. Stay tuned!

Saturday

2009-06-13T11:55:00.002-05:00

Baby's asleep, and Pumpkin went out for breakfast with his grandparents. I'm stuck here with no Internet and no computer. Hometown newspaper's very thin. I already read the whole thing. I finished my latest book last night while waiting for Pumpkin to return from parents-night-out event at the kids museum that he went to with his cousins. It's too hot to sit in TV room, and way too hot to do laundry. For obvious reasons, I can't go in our room to finish unpacking, and I can't leave the house either. Hmm, what to do?

I'm gonna need lots more books.

Toothies!!

2009-06-11T23:06:00.003-05:00

BTW, I completely forgot to mention that Giggles has 2 new front teeth! They're so cute and tiny. I wish I had a picture to post, but those little suckers are barely visible to the naked eye as it is, and the subject herself moves about a mile a minute so there's no way I could ever capture the little toothies on film. Perhaps when the teeth are a bit bigger, I'll show 'em to ya.

Giggles also suddenly started standing in her crib!!! Coupled with the new front teeth, this is so monumental that it deserves a triple exclamation point salute!!! Here it is again in case you missed it: !!!

She pulls herself up and stands there for a long time. In fact, I don't think she falls. Rather, I think she simply sits back down when she's done standing. LOL

I've been very lax so far in taking pictures of any of our daily activities, but I'll try to remember to take the camera with me wherever we go tomorrow.

G'nite!

Day 3

2009-06-11T22:39:00.002-05:00

Today I cleaned out our closet and unpacked. Mostly. Well, a bit. Giggles was very sleepy and since the kids and I are sharing a room...I must stop unpacking at naptime. I also did some laundry, went grocery shopping, and took Pumpkin to a trial swimming class. It was 108 today, but it cooled to a more respectable 103 by the time swim class began. I'm already fried, and my night's just begun.

Thing 2 has been bathed and fed and is now sleeping, but Thing 1 is still out back playing with his cousins and his cousins' cousins (are they 2nd cousins?). No telling when I'll finally get him to come in for a bath.

This is going to be a looong month.

Text Message

2009-06-10T23:05:00.005-05:00

We arrived in Texas in time to attend Lissa's 9th birthday party. It was a Mexican fiesta and lots of fun! I'm thinking of using the same concept for my upcoming 40th bday only with more tequila. ;)
Well this is my 1st try with text-blogging so I'll keep it brief. More later.

Memorial Day

2009-05-24T09:58:00.005-05:00

I received an email from the Rio Grande Scenic Railroad in Southern Colorado a week or so ago. Apparently, they were running a promotion for their opening day weekend (this weekend). All seats on all trains on Memorial Day weekend would be $18.78 in remembrance of the year the route was begun. This is a big discount from the $50+ the seats usually run.

Well, as we're supposedly in saving mode right now, I read the email and promptly ignored it. But I didn't delete it. More telling still, I kept coming back to it. Finally, after a few days, I decided to mention it to QT to see what he thought about it. Surprisingly, QT liked the idea. He even booked our hotel room himself!

That morning, I'd taken the kiddos to the park so, by afternoon, I was scrambling to get ready for our last minute trip. We ended up leaving the house at 6. Because of traffic, we didn't make it into Pueblo until many hours later and didn't get to sleep until sometime after that. Still, the next morning, we were up bright and early for the last leg of our trip into La Veta.

The train trip itself was fun enough, I suppose. Pumpkin and QT loved it. Of course. There isn't much to do in Alamosa, which was our destination that day. We just had a quick lunch at a pretty lousy Mexican restaurant then we reboarded the train for the return trip. We picked up extra passengers for the return trip so it was a bit noisier than the way over but still not too bad. All in all, a very nice and relaxing way to travel. I'm looking forward to our next scenic train ride.

Mother's Day Redo

2009-05-18T20:23:00.013-05:00

The day before Mother's Day, I came down with strep throat. I guess I'd had it for a few days because I felt completely awful by the time I landed at the Urgent Care Clinic. Needless to say, my Mother's Day this year was remarkable mostly in how lousy I felt...and, of course, in the lovely card and gift Pumpkin made for me at school...and the beautiful flowers my goddaughter Lis sent me. At least, QT was able to postpone his departure until Monday so that he could go shopping for groceries and get the house in order for me before he left.

To make up for it, we decided to have a Mother's Day Redo the following weekend. Before we could get to that point; however, QT first had to go out of town on business for almost the entire week leaving me home alone with the kiddos. And, to liven things up even more, Pumpkin also came down with strep throat the day after QT left...though, in light of symptoms that I only came to understand afterward, I have to say that he'd probably had it at least as long as I'd had it only with less severe symptoms thank goodness.

For our redo, Pumpkin wanted to take me out for some ice cream and glow-in-the-dark mini-golf. As usual, QT did his best to ruin our morning by getting all grouchy on us, and I contemplated just leaving him behind, but in the end, I didn't say anything. Well, I didn't say anything about wanting to leave him behind. I had plenty to say about his grouchiness. Believe me.

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I forgot to mention that Pumpkin performed in his school play last month! They did Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, and Pumpkin's class sang (and kinda sorta danced) in the opening numbers. It was really cute though Pumpkin appeared to be starstruck by the older kids that appeared on stage with them, haha. I will try to post a video clip, but I have the same problem I had with his last school video. That is, our Video Camera does not transfer videos easily onto the computer. I'll give it a try sometime when Giggles isn't yelling for me from her room. In the meantime, here's a picture of Pumpkin all duded up for his big number. Plus, a few more pics too just for fun. :)

Going in Reverse

2009-05-04T00:46:00.019-05:00

Hooray, Giggles is sitting!!

She'd started sitting up a few days earlier but still needed to lean on something in order to stay upright. (see above: kids playing in the crib.) Then, one day (April 23rd to be exact), I sat her up, and she stayed up on her own! QT was out of town when it happened so I sent him this picture (left) taken on my cell phone (my camera was out of reach, and I was afraid to leave Giggles unattended j.i.c.).

That's the big news, but there's more fun stuff to report. A few days before our sledding outing, Giggles had her first baby playdate at home. I invited a couple of friends over who have babies of about the same age as Giggles, and we let the babies "play" together on the mat while us moms hung out and gabbed. Of course, Giggles being Giggles, she immediately started rolling over the other babies, but fortunately, both boys are bigger than Giggles so no one was hurt.

And, the week before our playdate, QT, Giggles, & I accompanied Pumpkin to his school, where I showed Pumpkin's classmates how to make cascarones. Pumpkin was so excited to have all of us at school with him. He helped me write our project on the daily board then stood beside me in front of his class as I explained to them what we were going to be doing. I explained to the kids how we break cascarones back home, a practice which everyone over here always finds unbelievable, haha. The kids thought it was cool, but in the end, we thought it best to have the kids break the cascarones against the wall rather than on each other's heads. Just to be safe. [p.s. Rollie Pollies is the name of his class.]

I have to add that the kids in his class are SOOOO cute! I've always professed not to be "into" kids that much, but I've found that I just love to watch Pumpkin and his little classmates in action. They're just amazing and so intelligent! They're like tiny little adults but with 100x the energy, haha. I will miss this when he gets older, I think.

The Dog Yeller

2009-04-20T19:10:00.001-05:00

Actually, she's calling Sunshine, who is just outside the frame, but he doesn't appear to be listening to her.

Sledding with Pumpkin

2009-04-20T11:04:00.009-05:00

It was such a pretty day out yesterday that I decided to take Pumpkin and our neighbor's kids sledding at the park behind our house. It was such a spur of the moment decision that we didn't even grab our jackets (though all the kids were at least wearing their gloves since they'd been making snowmen prior to our leaving). Luckily, QT was able to run over from the house to bring me my gloves, a jacket, and a bottle of water to drink (b/c I didn't want to have to resort to eating snow to stay hydrated, haha).

We had lots of fun! Here's a video montage of our sledding adventure:

BTW, I love that youtube now allows us to put borders around our videos. Looks great! Thanks, youtube. :)

p.s. If you'd like to take a look at the original video w/o background music, you can find it here.

Spring Break 2009

2009-04-18T18:11:00.017-05:00

Let's rewind a few weeks and review our trip to New Mexico.

We traveled first to Albuquerque, where we spent a day at the Biopark (Zoo, Aquarium, Beach, & Botanic Garden). There's a train that connects all the parks and another train that runs within the Zoo so, naturally, our first order of business was to ride all those trains. Pumpkin was so proud of his wristband, which enables the wearer to unlimited train rides within the Biopark, that he wouldn't even let it get wet whenever he washed his hands, hehe. There's also a G-scale railroad at the Botanic Garden, but unfortunately, we dallied too long with the zebras and camels and didn't get to see the garden railroad that day. Instead, we spent the last hour on our tickets exploring the Children's Fantasy Garden, and we made plans to return another day just to see the garden railroad. Because we'd promised Pumpkin after all...

The next day, we braved the icy roads to get back to Santa Fe because we had tickets to ride the Santa Fe Southern Excursion Train. We arrived at the depot with barely 2 minutes to spare, but as it turned out, all our rushing about was for naught. The outing was canceled due to the snowstorm that had blanketed the area the previous night. Sure, we were bummed that our excursion was canceled, but we were still happier than if we'd delayed our trip like we'd been considering and gotten stuck in Denver instead. As we hung out at the historic depot pondering our next move, what should arrive with a loud blast of air but the New Mexico Rail Runner Express! Turns out, one doesn't even need advance reservations to ride the NMRRE. You simply board and pay during the ride. Sweet!

In a nutshell, we drove to Santa Fe, left our truck at the depot, took the train to Albuquerque, strolled around downtown Albuquerque on foot, took the train back to Santa Fe, picked up our truck, and drove back to Albuquerque, where we had a nice reunion at our hotel with our dog Sunshine. What a crazy day! Believe it or not, we actually had a lot of fun. Pumpkin was beside himself with joy at riding the Rail Runner so that made it all the better for QT and I.

On our last day in Albuquerque, we packed up, checked out of the hotel, and returned to the Biopark. It was such a pretty day (compared to the previous one) that I opted to stay in the truck with Giggles, Sunshine, and a good book while QT and Pumpkin checked out the garden railroad. Dog and baby both napped the entire time so, believe me, fun and relaxation was had by all! After the guys returned, we headed back downtown for a late lunch then walked Sunshine to the park across the street before hitting the road back to Santa Fe, where we planned to spend the night so that we'd be that much closer to Denver when it came time to return home.

The next day, in Santa Fe, we took a quick driving tour of the sights, had some lunch, then hit the park at the Railyard to let Pumpkin and Sunshine work off some energy before heading back to Denver. You can see some pictures from that outing clustered with pictures from our last day in Albuquerque (above).

As usual, we stayed a bit too long at the park and, as a result, didn't roll into our driveway until well past midnight. I don't recommend that! Yuck. We were all exhausted, but it was a great trip regardless.

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What struck me most about both Santa Fe and Albuquerque was the resemblance of their historic districts to that of my hometown of Laredo TX. Laredo, which was once also under Spanish rule, has its own charming plaza complete with a raised bandstand, sidewalk vendors, a really cool historic hotel, and a very old church (now a cathedral). If you walk around the area, you'll even find plenty of those distinct, low-ceilinged shops lining the streets. So, visiting these 2 cities felt more like a homecoming to me than a new discovery, which was still very nice. I definitely plan to return and soak it all in again.

Originally built in 1767; present structure, third on site, dates from 1872. Was elevated to the rank of Cathedral on Aug. 9, 2001. Part of the Webb County Heritage Tour. On San Agustín Plaza in heart of old Spanish section.

Baby's "1st" "Solid" (aka: nearly liquid rice cereal)

2009-04-12T00:23:00.004-05:00

Giggles started eating "solids" this week while QT was away for a few days in New Mexico. I had to pass the time somehow while the kiddos and I were on our own so I decided to finally take a few minutes to let Giggles try some rice cereal.

She seemed to really enjoy it! I think, in this respect, she's got Pumpkin beat. I don't recall him taking to cereal as easily as Giggles seems to have done. By the 2nd day, she was already eating all her serving with minimal mess. By the end of the week, she was able to finish double the amount she'd eaten the 1st day.

A Video

2009-04-07T01:13:00.002-05:00

All this technology is going to kill me one day. I just can't keep up anymore. I took this short video of Giggles playing in her crib and posted it to facebook, but I just realized that I never posted it here for those of you who don't "facebook." Egads! And it's a cute video too! So, here it is...a bit late but just as cute as the day it was taken. :)