walkin' in the woods

Guard dog

So this morning I'm in my bedroom folding clothes, trying to put a dent in the literal mountain of family laundry when my dogs start barking.  I opened the back door and shouted for them to hush.  Well, a short while later the barking resumed.  Normally our alpha male Willy provides the loudest and most insistent barking,  but this sounded different.  Spot, our kinda crippled one spoke up, and this time with great persistence.  Irritated, I opened the door again to reprimand him, and here's what I saw:

That's right, one large snake, and one half-crippled dog refusing to let it out of sight.  Willy stood guard by me and C3 at the back door, and I'm telling you Spot WOULD NOT budge from watching that snake.  Observe.   I guess he decided to get comfy since he'd already alerted me to the danger.

I called Hubby in a panic and he agreed to come straight away.  Funny how the shovel of death loomed RIGHT beside the snake's head already!  My hero swooped in and mercifully murdered the snake.  Consequently I showered my puppers with loads of love, praise and Milk Bones.  Hooray for guard dogs!!!

Happy b-day, Hubby!

So last week Hubby celebrated his 39th birthday.  If you know him, you know that unassuming describes his personality perfectly.  Ordinarily a positive trait, this becomes problematic when one tries to celebrate for him!   I prefer to sound a trumpet, shout to the world that on this particular day a wonderful and marvelous and amazing person entered the world!  Not so, however.  We enjoyed a quiet dinner at home (Deluxe Chicken Breasts).  Hubby requested fried chicken, and I have never attempted to duplicate MiMi's skills in that area.  I produced a reasonable hybrid.  Also, Hubby requested a cherry cheesecake for his cake - another item that I cannot succeed in baking.  (Believe me, I've tried).  I bought a Cheesecake Factory cheesecake from Sam's and some toppings at Kroger.   That night I also had a cold, so I felt like I failed miserably at making Hubby's day special......

I just want him to know on his birthday and every day how fortunate I am having him in my life.  He is smart, strong, laid-back, competitive, a believer, competent, reliable, fun, the best dad in the world, a brilliant engineer and incredibly motivated to care for children, house, home, cars, yard, bikes, garage, etc.  I love you, Hubby!  You deserve way more than I could ever give you.

He let the kids help with opening gifts.

Wearing a new golf shirt they got him, which C1 proclaimed as "a boring gift."

Lots of love from the chirrens!

Laughing because when he extinguished the match, he accidentally blew out the candles!

He got it this time.

B-day celebration for a little buddy

So technically C3 doesn't turn 5 until the 18th.  Since he took off this morning with MiMi for the sand castle-building contest in Port Aransas,  we decided to honor his day yesterday.  I simply cannot believe my baby turns F-I-V-E in a few days!  I'm also choosing to actively ignore the fact of his starting kindergarten in the fall.  No matter how I protest, my children continue growing!  I know sometimes I gripe and moan at the many difficulties of staying home and raising my babes, but for all the money in the world I would not trade my position:  right here, watching them learn and grow daily, drinking in every moment of their fleeting childhood.  My heart overflows with treasures stored!!! 

  
Giving us the "I'm five now" hand signal

Ooooh, Legos!!!

Spidey books....he also got some John Deere books.  We all love reading!

5 candles on his chosen strawberry cake.  He loves strawberry ice cream, too.

Enjoying watching us sing "Happy Birthday".  Notice the Legos nearby - he didn't want to part with his new pirate cannon.

Ready to blow out the candles....

He's blowing with gusto but not extinguishing anything!

C2 steps in to help.....

Which made C3 very mad!  We had to re-light the candles so he could try again....

SUCCESS!  It's a good thing...notice the nearly spent candles....

Easter weekend

He is risen!  I'm so thankful we serve a mighty Savior who conquered the grave, aren't you?

We spent a busy Easter weekend with family.  We started off in Montgomery at Lisa's place for the annual egg hunt and huge meal.  Hubby, Kevin, Stephen and Matt took a long cycling trip that morning while the girls put together the feast.  After the egg hunt and meal, I took a little shopping trip with Melanie, Megan and Lisa.  These visits always pass in a whirlwind and go too fast for me.  I love catching up with everyone and sometimes that proves challenging with the sheer numbers of little people in our midst. 

Anyway, on Sunday after church (Governor Rick Perry attended our service!) we headed to Hilltop for dinner and visiting with Hubby's folks.  Though hail woke me up that morning at 3:00 followed by scattered rain, the day cleared nicely and Hubby took C3 for a little bit of fishing.  The low water level at the lake must bother the fish because the boys did not catch much.

Happy Easter all!

4th grade character cafe

Each grading period, C1 and her classmates must produce an IRP (Independent Reading Project).  Usually the kids choose a fiction book, but for February the teacher insisted they pick a biography.  C1 really wanted to choose Annie Sullivan, the fantastic and life-changing teacher of Helen Keller, but we could not find an age-appropriate biography on her.  Instead she defaulted to Helen Keller. 

For the project finale, the class presented a character cafe.  They dressed up as their historical figure, presented answers to a list of 10 memorized "strong" questions and then provided yummy snacks for classmates and guests.   Good times at the elementary school, good times indeed. 

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Second grade presents a living history museum

I'm pretty sure this event dates back to March (catching up, you know!)  Anyway, I love C2's second grade teacher for many reasons, but especially because she always challenges the children.  A perfect example?  The living history museum.  This method of a student "becoming" a famous person, researching their lives and then presenting a script to guests is popular in 3rd grade, as C1 could attest.  Mrs. Latham felt that her 2nd graders could benefit from this type of study and benefit they did! 

I help out in C2's class each week, and so enjoyed watching the students work on this project.  They rose to the challenge and obviously felt so proud of themselves upon completion. 

C2 practiced faithfully to memorize her facts on Helen Keller.  Ask her today and I bet she could still recite them!  We set up the museum in the library.  Each child had a floor "button" to push to activate their character.  C2 was nervous (butterflies in stomach and heart racing) but did great! 

Preschool Easter egg hunt

So today C3's preschool class held their annual Easter egg hunt.  We enjoyed sunny weather for the "blink-and-you'll-miss-it" hunt.  C3 started a little slow, freaking out because he could not remember the maximum number of eggs each child could collect (12).  I convinced him we'd figure that out later and remarked that he better get busy lest all the eggs disappear to other kids' baskets!  He managed a great haul, and declared the golden Play-Dough-filled egg as his favorite.  On a side note, I purchased him a Spider-Man Easter basket this year to complement his current superhero phase.  He liked the basket, but remarked only later that he would've preferred a Batman basket.....I tried!!!  Happy Easter everyone.

4th grade musical

So each spring our elementary school's fourth graders put on a musical.  This year C1 participated in the program, called "We Haz Jazz."   I'm sure she will always remember that I made her dress up a bit for the musical.  The information sheet we originally received instructed kids to wear "nice" clothes.  On the day of the show, however, C1 insisted the music teacher said they could wear jeans and a nice shirt.  We argued, but I insisted that couldn't be right, and being the quintessential rule follower I forced her to wear a dress and sandals.  Of course we arrived to find everyone dressed casually and I had to apologize profusely that C1 suffer such "horrible" embarassment.  I figure this episode will prove the first of many arguments to come over clothes.

We enjoyed the musical immensely, and couldn't get the songs out of our heads for days afterwards.  Enjoy the pictures!

Remember me?

I'm not even sure anyone still visits my blog, as it hasn't been updated in nearly two months.  My elementary school yearbook deadline of 3/30 commanded a ton of free time, but that's finished, so it's time to get back on the blogging horse!!!  Incidentally, I told the PTO I'm DONE doing yearbook.  Four years and four yearbooks is enough.  And besides, C3 will start Kinder (sniff, sniff) in the fall, so I'm going to try my hand at another job - PTO treasurer.  I'm looking forward to the change and challenge.

New topic:  books.  During a long-ago trip to Katy for a C1 soccer tourney, we found ourselves with a little time to kill between games.  We asked around and found a Barnes and Noble nearby where I enjoyed a little browsing.  I talked Hubby into buying me some books for Valentine's Day.  I'm just now getting around to one of the books:  Personal History by Katharine Graham. 

Admittedly I don't get out much, so I was unaware that Katharine's family has a long history of ownership of the Washington Post newspaper.  Although the book's vocabulary forces me to keep my dictionary nearby while reading, I find the story truly compelling.  The author provides readers with many intricate details on every aspect of her personal/work/social life, all the while turning an introspective lens on herself.  In any case, the book is challenging, interesting and chock-full of eyewitness accounts to many significant events in U.S. history.  I think you would enjoy this book and I recommend it.

January birthdays recap

So this post arrives a little late, but in the spirit of catching up I decided to go ahead with it.

A slideshow of January birthday festivities follows:  G's party in SA, C1's lunch at Cheddar's and K3's party here at the house.  I hope everyone had GREAT birthdays.  I know we sure enjoyed celebrating with all....