Children's Barnyard

We have not been to this in a few years, and the children really enjoyed it yesterday! We were so blessed to go with a group of our very good friends!

Goats

 Sheep

 Baby chicks (I think the favorite of all the children...at least mine!)

Allia was so sweet carefully picking up the chicks and handing them to the younger children who wanted to hold them but couldn't pick them up on their own.

Pigs

Miniature Horse...the children enjoyed this animal because he was eating all the hay they handed him. So they were all walking around scooping hay off the ground to feed him.

Full Size Horse

Ahhh, the John Deere Tractor...can you say boy magnet?

The whole group!

Mmmmm, the ice cream sandwich treat at the end (this was how I convinced Stephen to leave the tractor! Luckily he knows what ice cream is!)

Sweet helpers

I am always thankful that the oldest in our family are girls...today Stephen hasn't been feeling so well. I think he has a cold, and when we were picking Gloria up from dance at noon he looked ready to conk out. So Allia started stroking his hair in the car, and she and Mariana made an elaborate plan to put him down for nap right when we arrived home. We came home, I served Gloria lunch, and they did it.  Stephen went down peacefully and happily with them, and by the time I made it upstairs to check on him he was already fast asleep!!! What great helpers!

Crazy Daddy Games

We try to do something fun and unusual as a family on Sunday to set the day apart as special for the children. Last week, it was hide and seek (good family fun!). Today after lunch Austin decided to create this wild jumping game where the children jump off the couch into a pile of couch pillows (which are usually not allowed to be on the floor!). They had great fun, as you can see!

The Sound of Music

Austin and I took the older two girls to see some friends of ours in the Sound of Music (my all time favorite movie!) this afternoon. They did a beautiful job! Here are the girls afterwards with Johnathan (Freidrich ) and Stephen (Rolf).

Soccer Saturday

Here we are with soccer again! I was at Allia's game this morning, and they played an awesome game. It was quite a match but they came out on top with Allia making an awesome pass to her teammate who then scored a goal in the last 10 seconds of the game! Here is the shot of her playing goalie in the first half (the photo is deceiving...she did make the stop, so no goal scored). Austin is going to Mariana's game, and I could have gone too. But I have to stay home to get ready for our special afternoon outing today. ;)

And unfortunately I have no photos from Mariana's game, but she made her first ever goal this week. Yay, Mariana!!!

Treats and play

The children received a surprise package of treats from Lito and Lita yesterday. So exciting!

 

And poor little Stephen is having a tough time. He wants to play with the girls but usually destroys whatever they are playing with, which invokes a fight. But here is sweet big sis Mariana playing with Cooties after nap with him. He was so tickled and kept calling her Mommy!

Woohoo

I am super excited. Austin found a bench seat for our Suburban. We have been looking for over a year because ours has captains' chairs in the middle, and this baby will max out our seating. Which would mean if we have another child after this one we would have to upgrade to a big white passenger van. Now we have a whole extra seat so we can keep the Suburban for several more years. I will post a photo when he returns (he had to go out of town to a salvage yard to get it!). :)

He did a great job! It cleaned up really nicely and matches the color of our other seats really closely (a blessing because the seller originally described the seat as "brown"). Austin was even able to see the vehicle it came from to be assured that there was no damage to the area (it was a front impact-only crash). So glad to have an 8-seater now!

Little cuties

It is all of 60 degrees this morning, and the girls broke out their heavy winter coats! Too funny. (Of course you may notice Mariana is wearing flip flops!). They sure look pretty though. :)

And this little guy is really blossoming with his speech. He is now speaking in two and three word phrases and occasionally short sentences. Here he is showing off his new shoes. This is one of his popular phrases this week. "My's new shoes." I love the "my's" instead of my or mine. He tends to add an S to the end of a lot of his words for some reason. Super cute!

Oranges

This boy eats oranges and raisins like I have never seen! He can eat one large orange, and occasionally more, in one sitting! Every morning for the last week he has asked me for an orange.

And just for fun here is a video. He actually speaks a little more clearly but he is talking with his mouth full. ;)

Soccer Saturday

We had to split up this morning for soccer, and Gloria and I were at Allia's game. Her team played beautifully and won 11-3!

Go Aggies!

I am SO excited that we have a flagpole and Aggie flag to fly for tomorrow's game. My very sweet sister sent me some birthday money, and we have really been wanting a flagpole and American flag, so I used the money to purchase that. Austin put it up last Saturday. But I didn't have enough money left for an Aggie flag, figuring it would be pretty expensive. Well, I was right, except that my deal seaker hubby found this one on clearance at one of the bookstores for $10. Amazing. All the others were over $40! Thank you my wonderful husband (and sister too!). Go Ags!

Ah, paper dolls

I needed to do some cleaning this week but had one big stumbling block...toys. Everywhere. Every room had toys scattered all over the floor except for mine and Austin's bedroom which has officially been declared a toy-free zone by necessity. So I made a decision. I would organize, sort and lock up most of the toys in an armoire. Then, when the children want something I can take it out on the condition that the other toys that are out are picked up. Brilliant, right? One problem. The creativity of children abounds. I had not even announced my plan yet but had most of the toys closed away and the ones I was still organizing stored up high. Not finding any toys readily available for play (I say this, but there are a few things I am leaving out like the dollhouse), they resorted to their own devices...making paper dolls. This started last year when one of the girls received a paper doll kit for her birthday. They make whole families of dolls with clothes, shoes, etc. (Dig the one with the Aggie shirt in the photo!) The result? LOTS of paper dolls and LOTS of paper scraps. Everywhere. Ahhhh...paper dolls. Can you say backfire? I do commend their creativity though. :)

Home Depot?

Wowsers....we always go to Lowe's unless forced for some reason to shop at Home Depot. This began many years ago because the people were just super helpful here at our Lowe's and super, well, rude at Home Depot. I was actually griped at and hung up on by the Home Depot store manager once when reporting a problem by phone...and I promise I was being as cordial as possible! Anyway, I just received this link from AFA regarding Home Depot and their support of the gay community. Some of the other floats in the parade were just plain filthy and disgusting. Scary. Glad we like Lowe's better anyway, but if we didn't we sure would switch now!

Little boy with a balloon

Mom and Dad have been sending the children these giant punching balloons, and Stephen loves them because he can actually throw them up high and catch them (can't do that with a ball yet!). So cute.

Republican Debates...

through the eyes of a child...

Austin: (explaining why we are listening to all these people talk) Mariana, what country do we live in?
Mariana: TEXAS!

as we were putting them to bed...

Allia: I like the woman in the white dress, and that man....the one....

Me: Herman Cain?

Allia: Yeah! The 9-9-9 guy! And...the one that looks like Fr. Brian (aka Rick Santorum)

REAL Popcorn!

Mom and Dad have been emptying out all their unused kitchen appliances and bringing them to our house. We recently inherited this air popcorn popper that I grew up with. I have so many memories of watching the popcorn pop and drizzling it with butter. YUM! They even brought us some sea salt! Way better than the microwave stuff. And it was so fun to watch the children enjoying it.

Reading together

 Stephen climbed up in Allia's lap while she was sitting in her reading corner and handed her this book. It was so cute. The video is below. The book is in Spanish, so Allia was sort of translating/going off memory to read it to him in English.

Anima Christi

Allia was recorded praying the Anima Christi (Soul of Christ) prayer by a friend of ours who runs the local Catholic radio station! For those who are not local, during breaks between programs, they play clips of families and/or children praying for the listeners and the station. So Allia is now praying on the radio! (My voice starts by saying, "Allia's prayers fly straight to God.")

Pumpkin Patch

We made our annual trip to the pumpkin patch today after Gloria's dance class....now that our high temps are mostly under 90 degrees! The children had so much fun picking pumpkins and even generously offered to let me pick the big family one. ;) Stephen just kept squealing "Puh-kih". It was soooo cute. He received many extra mommy kisses because I just couldn't help myself!

National Night Out

 Sno cones...yummy!

 Fun with neighbors

Little boy enjoyed having his own sno cone and even threw a fit because he couldn't have seconds!

More Soccer photos

 I just discovered that one of the moms from Mariana's team set up a website where she posts all of her photos...and she is one of those mom with a professional camera taking photos the whole game. So here are more soccer photos of Mariana...

Mariana and her buddy, Keelyn, chatting it up on the sidelines (Keelyn actually has auburn hair but it looks more brown in this photo).

"Run, Mariana" That is what Austin and I constantly yell during the games...and sometimes it works!

Happy to be running through the parent tunnel at the end of the game...there is just something really cute about a girl running with her pony tail swinging behind her. :)

Piano Recital

Before

All the students

Our Godson, Andrew's first performance and the first one to play today


My camera randomly switches modes when it thinks it senses your finger nearby, so I was only able to catch half of Andrew's song. He did a great job though!


Allia was more nervous than usual today (maybe since so many of her friends and family were there watching this time) but she did a good job on In the Hall of the Mountain King.


Richie's Solo of Riding the Hobby Horse

And here we have a comparison:


This is the Duet in practice




This is the Duet with Nerves. Really, they did a great job. The first half of the song was so perfect! We were all very proud. :)

The bow (they look so serious!)

Weekend fun

 Lito and Lita came in for a visit, and of course there are always gifts. Stephen really likes this dog from Toy Story.

Then, of course, we had soccer Saturday...after Austin, Lito, Uncle Matt and Tia Nana ran a 5K together. Looks like they had fun!

Here are my soccer girls.

Mariana's team was up first this morning. They did great, winning their game by one goal. She actually made some good ball contact this time. Yay!

Allia's field is much bigger, so it was tough to snap a good photo, but her team played well and ended up in a tie. She also made ball contact this time. Yay, Allia!

Stephen has really enjoyed his "Tito" time. They are good buddies.