AJ is her own Valentine

Bird Brain

Tomorrow is crazy hat day at LPE, so I set AJ loose with a bucket of puff balls and a foam visor. From right to left: hummingbird (behind the penguin) penguin, sandpiper, turkey & chick, cardinal, blue jay.

AJ was also chosen this week to make the cover for the book their class is publishing for the school library. She is quite an artist.

Jack's 5th Birthday Day

Pics from the Week

Basketball

AJ did NOT want to do basketball... but I made her and my reasons were that she hates being hot (indoor/water sports are the way to go here) and of course she is going to be very tall. So basketball seemed like a good choice... right?

Well, from the start it did not go well. Due to a miscommunication she did not get on the team with a bunch of her friends. I was worried she would be too timid with girls she did not know, playing a sport she had absolutely no exposure to. And I was 100% right. The first few practices were agony. She felt very self conscious and nervous and wanted to quit. Thankfully her coach is probably one of the kindest people I have met, very encouraging and very good at coaching girls in basketball (he has 3 girls–all basketball players.)

After a couple of practices and one (not so great) game AJ began to come around. I could see from her body language that she was feeling more self assured and comfortable, and then all of the sudden... she was good. I mean really good! She was scoring points and winning the drill-games they play during practice. She was picking off rebounds left and right, beating girls to the ball and not backing down. I cannot fully put into words the transformation that has taken place in the last 2 months. She can't wait for practice, she loves the games, and even though they don't officially keep score (of course the parents do) she wants to know who won, who got the most points, rebounds, assists, etc.

And here is the value of sports. Swim team transformed AJ into a competitive, self confident, winning-machine, and I can see that light in her eyes with basketball now. She has made a bunch of new friends (I am now so glad she didn't make it onto the team with her girlfriends) and learned yet again that she can do something hard and scary. Sooooo proud! As a shy kid myself, I know how difficult these things are, and she has come out on top. And Coach Avery... you are the best! And I hope this is the start of a very fulfilling sport for her.

LOVE that girl!!!

Pics from the week

How First Night devolved into a bank heist... Jack and AJ style

We stopped by Walmart to pick up some New Year's hats for the kids to wear to Austin's First Night. So they picked out some cute silver 2010 top hats. So far, pretty normal. Brett wanted to pick up a beanie so we stopped to grab one, when AJ's eyes popped open, "Are those 'robber hats'?!?" You can see where this is going. They quickly negotiated the terms of exchanging the 2010 hats for the robber hats with arguments along the lines of "these are much warmer," "we can wear these all the time," and "we can sneak around." So we walked out of Walmart with two masked heisters in tow.

A couple hours later we were in downtown Austin hunting down a good spot for the parade. We found a nice slice of curb with a big empty area behind it... perfect for the kids to run around and be wild waiting for the parade to start. After settling in a little bit Brett turned to me, "Um... look what that building is." We had unleashed our masked bandits in the entryway to Austin's prominent Frost Bank. Needless to say I nearly gave myself an aneurysm watching our mini burglars sneaking around playing robbers on the bank's front steps.

I've said it before and I know this is not the last time... I've got two of the weirdest kids on the planet. Never a dull moment with those two left to their own devices. The best thing to do is just give them the reins and see where it leads.

Candlelight Service

What to my wondering eyes should appear...

When out on the balcony there arose such a clatter,
I sprang from the bed to see what was the matter.
Away to the window I flew like a flash,
Tore open the shutters and threw up the sash...

and I just barely got this pic of Santa flying away from our building :)



MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYONE!!!

d'oh!

Happy 20th birthday Homer, Marg, Bart, Lisa and Maggie!!!
Let's hope there are another 20 years to come :)

An Impromptu Photo Shoot

I was messing with the "color splash" feature (or something like that) on my camera, and we got some pretty cute pics.

Jack the interior decorator

We finally got our tree up. I got a fake tree (which just feels wrong :) because I can't deal with the mess in the apartment. But I have to say... a pre-lit fake tree is the way to go. I seriously had it all set up in like 3 minutes, then the kids hung all the ornaments they have been collecting from school, scouts, gifts, etc and it is seriously cute! Jack finally got me to get going with the tree when he said on Thursday after school, "I wish we had a tree so I could hang my ornaments." He said it so forlornly like we were never going to have a tree! It broke my heart.

So we went and picked up the tree the next morning. And Jack decorated the whole thing. AJ hung about 2 ornaments and was done, but Jack hung all the rest then spent about an hour re-adjusting them and getting it all just so. He is really particular about some things. Then he gets it all done just right and says (with a flourish), "Now it's time for the star on top!" Uh... oops. I didn't have a star :) He was disgusted with me... I forgot the grand finale.

Capitol Sing-Along

One of my favorite Austin traditions is the sing along at the capitol building. I love it because it is a very simple, no frills, old-fashioned affair. Several hundred people gather together, they hand out song books, and everyone just sings carols for an hour or so. It is the essence of Christmas. People just being together and singing songs from their childhood and enjoying the season. I really love it. This year it was VERY cold, in fact I had to go buy hats and gloves that morning, but it was fun to get bundled up (we don't have to do that around here very often) it made it even more festive. The kids ran around like wild animals and Brett kept busy chasing them all over the grounds and I sang and sang... a really great evening.

Thanksgiving

The Hayes invited us to Beaumont for another Thanksgiving extravaganza. We couldn't stay too long, Brett has been slammed at school the last few weeks, but the kids crammed a whole lot of playing into that 30ish hours. All I ever saw of Jack was a blur running past windows. They had a blast with their adopted cousins, the grown-ups stayed up way too late playing games, and everyone ate some good turkey and fixin's.

Thanks Hayes for another special Thanksgiving!

Who needs CGI? This is for real...

We found this centipede several weeks ago, and I thought I'd post it. When we first saw it, I thought it was fake, but it was oh so real. They don't mess around with bugs here. One of the most disgusting things I have ever seen is a Cicada Wasp. A cicada is a huge insect, about the size of a man's thumb, so you can imagine the horror of a wasp who routinely fights, stings, paralyzes and then flies off to it's nest, carrying the cicada to feed to it's babies. It is truly something to behold. I'm not easily creeped out by much in the animal kingdom, but I have got the heebies on many occasions here in TX.