An Art Filled Weekend

This weekend was the annual Texas Clay Festival. This is a fantastic festival for anyone who is a potter or interested in pottery. It features potters from all over Texas. There are lots of demo areas and everything imaginable made out of clay. I could easily have spent all weekend there. But, with two little guys who are much more interested in playing than looking at a bunch of things they aren't allowed to touch, we only spent a little time at the festival, most of which was actually in the kids tent messing with clay. For the first time I did not bring home anything and that is only because I didn't have enough time to look and narrow down my selection. It was worth the drive (about an hour to a town called Gruene) just to get the inspiration to go back to my wheel. There was also an added bonus of lunch at the Gristmill.

The art festivities continued on Sunday when we met Steph & Michael for the reopening of a gallery here in Austin called Arthouse. Very cool place. The main exhibit was glass bottles that had been reformed and made into dishes. Sounds kind of weird and the picture in the paper didn't do the exhibit justice. It was just really well done, really neat. Of course the boys sniffed out the kids craft room. They have a knack for finding the project areas wherever we go. They seemed to like the gallery too.

As for the rest of the weekend, lots of the usual playing and watching football. I curled Sunday morning, lost my game by about 1/2" on the last rock thrown. Heartbraking, but that is the best way to lose. Way better than being completely thrashed by the opponent. I'm still looking for my first win of the season. Technically we won a game, but at the time we agreed before starting that the outcome would be a draw no matter what.

I finished Alex's halloween costume. He will be the best looking chef ever. I'll post pictures when I get them.

Tucker's leg is healing, we are midway through week 2 of 12 in the crate. He gets his staples out this week and hopefully that means the end of the cone of shame.

The boys recovered quickly and fully from their illnesses, good Alex seems to have returned and that's about all I;ve got for you for now!

What a week - blah.

Alex got his first stomach virus last Thursday. He was sick enough that he wasn't even upset about missing school. We thought we were out of the clear and were celebrating the fact that none of the rest of us got that nasty little bug when...

Ben got croup. Fortunately it wasn't a bad case. Nights have been a little rough, but he is almost better. Just to be on the safe side we took him to the doctor. In doing her routine exam she discovered that he has a nasty ear infection.

Then Tucker injured his leg last night. Turns out he blew out his cruciate ligament. The only cure is a very expensive surgery. It's very unfortunate that there is no health insurance for pets.

For a house where people/animals/things virtually never get sick, it's been a nasty week.

Oh and Alex has decided that it's time for him to take a little vacation and be replaced by his evil twin Horribly Fussy Grumpy Alex. I really hope it's a short vacation, because mama is REALLY short on patience right about now.

Ok - so I'm done grumping.

Home Depot Kid's Workshops

Home Depot does a free Kid's Workshop on the first Saturday of each month. It's a fun little project for the kids to do (with help from mom & dad if necessary). Mike had been taking Alex off and on for about a year. We decided that Ben was finally old enough to join in the fun. In truth he is still a bit young, but he does pretty well. So in September we all went for the first time. The boys made little stands that held a couple of flags. The project for October was toy fireboats. The projects are always wooden and involve nailing, sanding, glueing, sometimes screws too.

The fun part about October's project was that they had firemen and paramedics on hand to show off their stuff to the kids. There was a firetruck in the parking lot the kids could go on, they got little fire hats and they got to see a first response helicopter up close. We actually were right there when the helicopter landed.

All Home Depot's do this every month so if you have kids check it out sometime.

This and that...

I got so far behind that I think I just didn't want to play catch up again and everytime I thought about updating this blog it was just too disheartening. So I didn't update it for a long time.

Nothing super momentous that hasn't already been mentioned in another post happened during the past couple of months. The weather turned nice a couple of weeks ago and has simply been gorgeous. We usually don't see this until the end of Oct. or early Nov.. The windows are open and we spend far more time playing outside than inside. I went to the park 3 separate times on Tuesday and 4 times Wednesday. Each time we were there for a good hour or so. Alex decided Tuesday that he wanted to try riding his bike again. He is doing great, we're not ready to give up training wheels yet, but at least he is comfortable riding in general. Ben too has figured out how to get the tricycle moving on it's own. We have a little bike that is his size and I think it is about time to get the tires inflated and let him go.

So why did I pick today to update the blog. Mostly it's because I have the time. Alex seems to have caught some little bug, he is a bit under the weather today. It's a movie watching day. Ben is content to sit and watch movies all day too. So that leaves me with plenty of time on my hands. I've been semi productive in folding laundry and doing a little cleaning. Mostly I've been wanting to stay close to Alex. The boys never get sick so it's hard on me when one of them isn't feeling quite up to par. Anyway I've got to do something to fill the hours today. It's not quite noon yet and it has been a LOOOOONG day already.

My gardens have had an interesting fall. In early September tropic storm Hermine paid us a visit. Actually a rather extended visit. The storm remained formed and as a tropical storm that sat and churned over top of us for about 2 days. All total we got upwards of 15 inches of rain. That actually killed a couple of my plants, but the rest are now happy. My prickly pear bloomed out of season a week or so later. The basil that is normally fried and toast by this time of the year is huge, in fact I need to make something with it. My tomatoes and peppers are trying for a late surge as well. It's nice having pretty things growing.

Speaking of gardening/landscaping we finally put a path in the front yard. It was starting to wear from everyone walking through the yard, now it is officially a nice stone path.

And that is pretty much what's been going on. I'm working hard on halloween costumes. Hopefully I will have them done with time to spare although I'm not counting on it. Perhaps that is what I should be doing while the boys are vegetating!

School!

Alex is in preschool now. It was a big decision on my part to go this route, but now that we have, it was definitely without a doubt hands down the right decision. He is so happy and loves every minute of it. We found a great little preschool called Hope Children's Center not too far away. He goes Monday - Friday from 9 - 12. While I had not planned on a 5 day class for him, it has worked out well. He has a lovely teacher named Mrs. Tuttle. Hearing him talk reminds me very much of elementary school - line leaders, door holders, snack time, music class, etc.

It's a pretty cool little program he is in, he gets music twice a week, spanish and science each once a week. Lots of play time and TONS of art projects!

Anyway, he is a happy camper. Ben is enjoying some time to get to be Ben without having a big brother always after him. Sometimes Ben wants me to play with him, mostly he likes to spend those few hours by himself flipping through books. I offer to read the stories to him but he almost always tells me no, he wants to do it himself.

Anyway, school has been a smashing success for everyone.

Big Ben

And you thought this post was going to be about my Big Ben :-)

Actually, it is about my Ben, but I couldn't resist the picture. Plus it makes me yearn for a trip to London, such fond memories.

It seemed to be a weekend of firsts for Ben. All of it just makes me realize that he's not a baby anymore. I wonder when, or rather if, I will ever stop noticing all of the "first" things the boys do. Anyway, to make a long story longer...

At the farmer's market Saturday, the apple guy gave the boys some apples to munch on. It occured to me that was the first time that Ben ate an apple straight off the core, without mommy cutting it up. He was so happy!

More importantly, Ben is out of the crib and into the bottom bunk. We decided it was time to reclaim our room and he is definitely more than ready for a real bed.

Finally, NO MORE PACIFIERS! The one and only condition for sleeping in the "big boy" bed was he had to ditch the pacifiers. Like Alex we had a little withdraw for a couple of days but he is fine without them. I am happy to be rid of the plugs.

I should note that today is Oct. 7. I started this post nearly two months ago (Aug. 16 to be exact.) For an update, the sleeping arrangement is a big success. The only drawback is that Ben is now up early, sometimes earlier than Alex. But they have gotten into a routine and things seem to be working out just fine. It is staying darker a little longer in the mornings so they tend to sleep just a few minutes later. It's also been nice and cool at night, again perfect sleeping weather. We've got our new bedtime routine worked out and Mike and I really enjoy having our room back to ourselves.

Lessons

We are at the start of birthday party season. For some reason just about every child I know out here was born between August and November. We get invited to A LOT of birthday parties, I mean tons, as in just about every weekend, sometimes multiple parties in one weekend. I think I mentioned before that these parties are NOT my favorite things to do. But, I go to some, occasionally. This past weekend was one such occasion. It was for a little girl named Neve and it was her first birthday. The party was at a place called Music Together, it's one of those places where you can take your kid for mommy & me music classes. The party was actually really well done and very nice. The kids got a nice music class where they could sing and dance and play instruments, they also got to do an art project. Of course there was cake and lots of other food. The biggest draw however was the window washing. Smartly, the owners of this particular establishment are well aware that kids can't stay away from windows. Instead of dealing with the constant fingerprints on the glass they set up a little window washing station for the kids: spray bottles of water, little squeegies, towels, and a drying rack with clothespins for the towels. The lesson here was a big one for mommy - what a smart idea! And yes, Ben & Alex have been washing windows at home all week.

The bigger lesson from the party was not for me, but rather for Alex. He didn't actually get to go to the party. Weekends seem to be his favorite time for major catclysmic meltdowns. He was warned all day Saturday that if behavior didn't change, there would be no party. It didn't change, he didn't get to go. Mike stayed home with Alex and I took Ben to the party. Alex completely understood why he stayed home. He did make the best out of it and while he said that he missed going to the party he was glad to get to stay home with daddy by himself. Of course it didn't hurt that a goody bag was sent home for him. Interestingly, Ben was ridiculously shy at the party. He wouldn't let me put him down until the very end - and that kid is HEAVY! He would close his eyes whenever anyone looked at him, thus becoming invisible. The crazy part of all this was that there wasn't a single person there that he didn't know and hadn't spent lots of time with. He really does shadow Alex.

Which brings us up to the last bit of the day. Alex will start preschool in September. Yeah I know it's kind of a big shocker to some. But, after much agonizing thought this is the decision that Mike and Alex and I all came to together, and we are all very happy about it. Alex is definitely ready and excited beyond words for school and I am hoping that he will learn some much needed skills for kindergarten. I'm not concerned about academics - he's so smart, but socialization and listening to other adults, interacting with other kids, etc. I guess that's all I have to say about that for now. I'm sure there will be more to say after he starts.

Did you know...

Did you know that you can leave comments on my blog? Here's a fun little game to play. We're all so caught up in "life" and can't seem to take more than a few minutes (at best) to check/reply to email as a way to stay in touch. In short, letter writing is a dead art, well it's rapidly dying anyway. So the game is this: you leave a comment on my blog and email me (christina@gilsbachdesigns.com) your real mailing address and I'll send you a REAL handwritten note. OK, this is not an original idea, it is in fact passed on from someone I know. It's all part of the "inky letter" movement. Want to join in, send someone you know a REAL letter, let me know how it goes.

A Sunday Summary...

Here it is Sunday again, and time for another weekly round up. Had a pretty fun week with the boys, I felt like we were out and running all day every day, so much so that I forgot most of what we actually did. I know it involved the requisite play dates with friends, rough housing, trips to the grocery store, just our everyday routine. There were a couple of things of note though, so here goes.

1. Otosclerosis. By now I think just about everyone who reads this knows what I'm talking about. But, for kicks and giggles I'll explain anyway. I finally decided to get my hearing checked by an ENT. The upshot of that was that Mike got to stay home and play with the boys for the morning while I sat in the doctors office going through LOTS of various hearing tests. The other plus is that I now know why I can't hear. Otosclerosis - the stapes bones have deteriorated and don't function properly anymore. The good news is that it is fixable and that my auditory nerves are just fine. So, when I get the problem fixed I should hear great. The down side is that it is going to require surgery to fix the problem. Two surgeries actually, one for each ear, about a year or so apart. The left side will be fixed first because it is the worst, that is scheduled for Aug. 26. When all is said and done I will have prosthetic bones in my ears - weird, but hey, hopefully I'll be able to hear (although I really don't think I'm missing much now...)

2. Peaches! We got about 8 more peaches off of our tree. There was an offshoot of the tree that had a bunch of peaches on it that never ripened. I expected them to simply wither and fall off. Apparently not. It would seem that since the peaches from the main trunk of the tree all ripened, the tree then dedicated it's resources to this little offshoot and matured the rest of the peaches. We would have had more, but I didn't realize they were growing so I didn't do anything to keep the squirrels and bunnies away. Alex & Ben were the ones who discovered the second crop of peaches. They saw a squirrel take one at breakfast one morning.

3. Farmer's Market - The Cedar Park farmer's market that opened earlier this year just changed locations, now it is just 5 minutes from our house. It's in the parking lot of the mall Saturday mornings. While this isn't the most glamorous of locations aesthetically, it has been wonderful for the market itself. There are no size constraints and there were tons of vendors. We got eggs and peaches, and a couple of other things this week. I love that it is so close to home and so nice!

4. Finally, I'll leave you with this video of my little Ben. I'd like to thank my friend Lori for lending me her daughter's ballet recital outfit:

A Sunday Summary

Thought I'd take a few minutes and summarize the past week or so.

1. Friday Alex decided that he wanted a new mommy. Long story short, he did something he wasn't supposed to do, I called him on it and he got mad at me. This led to Alex calling Mike at work and telling him he wanted a new mommy. Later that same afternoon, he was again in trouble so I sent him upstairs to calm down. He got very quiet, very quickly. About 10 minutes later he came downstairs all happy and excited. He had been coloring and he drew a picture of me. It's very cute and I guess he couldn't be too mad if he was drawing me.

2. Happy Birthday to Me! Thanks for all the birthday wishes. It was a rather uneventful day, but nice not to have any plans or commitments. We had lunch with Steph & Michael (thanks for the spice of the month, totally awesome gift!!) and then spent the rest of the day doing nothing. Alex was in a right rotten mood most of the day, but that's OK too. No cake, but I did make some "birthday cookies". Kind of wishing I had made a cake...

3. Projects! I FINALLY finished the curtains for my friend. It took me a ridiculously long time, but they turned out beautifully and she is thrilled. Now it's onto the next project, reusable sandwich/snack bags. Just something silly I thought about playing with.

4. After who knows how many months (6, 8, 12???) I finally got my hair cut. It's still long and doesn't look any different, but hey, it's something that I've been trying to get to for months now.

5. We're going to a movie tonight, just Mike and I. He bought tickets earlier today, crazy how expensive they have gotten - $19 for 2 tickets. Now I remember why we don't do this more often.

6. Looks like I'm back to cleaning my own house. Oh well, I should be doing it myself anyway. No excuses now.

7. I'm about to start my 27th or 28th novel of the year. I'd love to get 50 in by the end of the year, but I don't know if that will happen. I'm keeping track, maybe at the end of the year I'll list some of my favorites.

And, I guess that's about it. Thanks for visiting.

Really Knowing Mommy & Daddy

The boys never fail to amaze me. Alex is so attuned to everything we say and do (hopefully this won't scar the poor child later in life). So, today...

In the car Alex told me that when he & Ben got big they would get a rocket and fly us to the moon so that we could look at the stars. He said that he and Ben would fly the rocket and that Mommy & Daddy would be the passengers. Alex then told me that we could take some toys and stuff for the trip. He said Daddy could take some of his models and that I could take some books & pens. The thing that amazed me in all of this is that he knew our hobbies, knew that Mike likes to build models and that I like to read & work puzzles (hence the pens). Anyway, maybe not much to anyone else, but it certainly did strike me.

Conversation with Alex

In the car on the way home from the gym today:

Alex: I've got lots of stuff to do today.
Mommy: Yeah, what do you have to do?
Alex: Coloring, playing play-doh...
Mommy: Anything else?
Alex: Smelling flowers. Lots of stuff to do. Busy day.

Mommy's Job

Ben and I had a conversation about work today. It went something like this:

Ben: Where is Uncle Michael?
Mom: He's at work.
Ben: Where is Aunt Stephanie?
Mom: She's at work too.
Ben: Are they working at home?
Mom: No baby, they aren't at home. They have to work in an office.
Ben: Oh OK, like daddy goes to work in an office?
Mom: Yes, like daddy. You know, mommy works to. Do you know what mommy does?
Ben: Yes.
Mom: What does mommy do?
Ben: Mommy does curling.

There you have it, my official job is curling.

Skunkles, Peaches, & Super Heroes

We have a skunkle! In case you are wondering, I will now enlighten you as to what exactly a skunkle is. At breakfast a couple of weeks ago, Alex said "Mommy, there's a skunk in the yard!" Being the good mom I am, I said, "Sure honey, whatever you say. If he comes back again be sure to tell me." A few minutes later, Alex is all excited, "Mommy, the skunk is back!" This time I got to the window to see the "skunk". As you know, everything is bigger in Texas. What we have is a HUGE squirrel that is half black and half brown. The squirrel's head and top half of the body are very black and the lower half, including the back legs and tail is just normal squirrel brown. But the thing is just abnormally large for a squirrel. The coloring is what confused Alex. Anyway, we dubbed the critter the skunkle. He makes a regular appearance in our yard in order to eat our...

Peaches! Yum! For the first time we actually have an abundance of peaches on our tree, not so many that we are overloaded, but enough so that every day we can go pick a couple of ripe ones and have a tasty snack. I think the end is near though and this weekend I will probably pick the last batch. Total, we've probably gotten close to 30 or so peaches. Hard to say for sure because we eat them as fast as we pick them.

And finally, I'm going for mom of the week award. Somehow or other the boys and I were discussing super heroes on Monday and they, mostly Alex actually, decided that they would like some super hero capes. I let the kids pick the fabric all by themselves and I stayed up very late Wed. & Thurs. making super hero capes. They are very happy though, so I am happy!

Hi!

Well, hello! How are you? Me, oh, I'm fine, thanks for asking. Yeah, it does kind of look like I fell off the earth here. No, no reason really. I just haven't felt much like enlightening the world about our lives. Sometimes it's just kind of like that. But, today I am feeling a bit more like sharing. I may have to cut this short though, it's in the middle of nap time and I expect that my little munchkins will wake up soon.

I last left you with pollen, nearly 2 months ago. I had in mind to do a nice little post all about babies shortly after that - baby birds, baby dogs, baby fish, people babies, but I never got around to it. Long story short, we had a spat of babies popping into our lives for a bit there in the spring. We had a nest of baby cardinals, so fun to watch. We saw the eggs, watched them hatch and then watched as they left the nest a short time later. I know I commented on our fish, George & Gracie, and their babies. The first batch of babies resulted in about 4 or 5 that have survived the trials of our tank. There is currently a second batch of babies - probably about 70+, we'll see how many of those survive. Baby people - I had the honor of watching a 2 year old and then a couple of weeks later a 3 year old as their mommas both had new babies. Those were both middle of the night deals too - but, all went well. The new babies are darling and that is that. Finally, baby dogs. Yes, I asked Mike (quite randomly at that) if we could get a puppy. Mostly I think it was just to see how he would react. No, we are not getting a puppy. Yes, it is a COMPLETELY mutual agreement. But, I do have a friend who recently adopted a great dane puppy - so so sweet!

Garden update - wow is it fun to eat stuff I've grown! We pretty much devoured all the spinach and kale already. As soon as my tomatoes are ripe they are eaten right off the plant, still sun-warmed (they are cherry tomatoes) . Same for the strawberries. I dug up my first potato, will dig the rest up this week. The corn is almost ready as well. The herbs make an appearance almost daily in my kitchen, I have to be careful or I will decimate the plants. I did have some caterpillars devour all of my dill and parsley, but I think those plants served a good cause so I won't complain. The peach tree is so full of fruit it's branches are touching the ground in places. I imagine and hope for a good harvest by month's end. My sunflowers are blooming - I even have a red one this year and I finally replanted the front bed. It's been a very successful growing season.

We've been doing plenty to stay busy. The boys are just insane, but I love it (most of the time, sometimes they totally drive me CRAZY!) Pretend school seems to have ended. Really there isn't much to say there, I think the other moms were simply too busy with newborns to participate anymore. I'm OK with that though, it just gives me more time with the boys and more freedom. We've found a new (new to us that is) museum to frequent. It's on the UT campus, has all of these really great fossils and dinosaur skeletons and is absolutely perfect for kids their age. I am glad to have found it now that summer is here, a nice cool place on a scorching day. Which brings me to the weather. We had an amazing spring, much cooler than in years past, with plenty of rain too. But, it is June and that means that the cool weather is gone until October and it will be 90+ for the summer. We'll have 100 degree days starting this weekend.

Oh, I almost forgot, Alex has a new found love for his bike. Back in February and March he started to ride a little bit, but suddenly gave it up and wouldn't touch it. Last week I talked him into a ride again and now he wants to ride every day. We've had a few falls, one pretty good skinned knee and a slightly skinned elbow, but he's still riding. By this time next year, I bet he won't need training wheels any longer. Ben loves to ride too.

Finally, I'm going to leave you with one last run down of todays events. I'm getting hot you see and I want to get something to drink. It's hot because our AC finally died. There are 3 guys working hard to get a new one installed. I caught a scorpion this morning and relocated him to the greenbelt - yay me for not smooshing the little guy. The check engine light came on in my car today, that's my job tomorrow, hopefully it will be nothing. Yuck to all the silliness of the day!

Alex is awake so I'm going now, thanks for stopping by!

Pollen

I tried to capture some of the pollen in pictures so I could show you how intensley yellow EVERYTHING is right now. The pictures simply did not do it justice. There is no point in washing the car, in an hour it will be yellow again. It's like walking on a rug of pollen. Any hard surface looks like a child took yellow chalk and scribbled over it so completely covering anything that was blank so that everything would be the same pollen yellow. The dog lays on the back patio and when he gets up he is yellow. The windows are open and the furniture is yellow. My keyboard is yellow. And it's only just begun, this will last well into May. At that point, maybe my eyes will stop itching :-) Oh yes, and after the pollen, then the worms will come out of the trees, but that's a story for another day. In the mean time, if you live here in Austin, you know that to say everything is yellow is not an exageration. I do love my live oaks, they do more for temperature control in the summer than anything else. The pollen is a small price to pay for their beauty. So, I leave you with this lovely image of pollen...

Easter

True to form, Easter turned into a holiday that stretched over a couple of weeks instead of just one day! I guess that's part of being a mom and being active in mom's groups. Pre-Easter we did two separate easter egg hunts and passed up about 3 others. We also dyed eggs in the park one day (which turned out to be a good thing because we never got around to doing it at home). The easter bunny did come Sunday morning and the boys were thrilled. We bypassed the traditional hot cross buns, I made ebelskivers (stuffed pancakes) instead. Steph & Michael came up for lunch. Again, we bypassed the traditional foods and dined on grilled shrimp, fresh fruit, and a nice salad. We had another easter egg hunt and spent the rest of the afternoon just enjoying the beautiful weather.

For the record, you have to leave a window open the night before easter so that the easter bunny can get into the house. It's nice to leave him a carrot too.

Geocaching

A couple of weeks ago the boys and I had our first geocaching adventure. We had a blast! Geocaching is basically like a treasure hunt for grownups, or anyone actually. The gist of it is that someone hides a container with stuff in it somewhere, then s/he logs the coordinates of said container on the geocaching.com website. Then anyone can go and find the container. You don't actually take the container, just sign the log book and swap some token that you brought for something in the cache. Then you replace the container exactly as you found it so someone else can join in the game. Kind of silly I guess, but just plain fun if you like to be outside. The caches range in size from teeny tiny to large ammo boxes. You use a gps to find the cache. The GPS will get you pretty darn close, within a couple of yards or so typically, then you have to search. Some of the finds are ridiculously easy, some are much more difficult.

Anyway, on our first geocaching adventure we went to this undeveloped park. It was a really beautiful area, and spring is just gorgeous here this year. We found 3 caches, one of which was actually pretty well hidden, we almost gave up on it. The boys had a blast, the scenery was fantastic and in general it was a really fun day.

One of the very cool side benefits of geocaching is really discovering the area around you. We were walking in an area that used to be a riverbed, the evidence of prehistoric people was all around us. We found a geode, tons of rocks that had obviously been used as tools or in the tool making process. I even found 2 arrow heads. It was so much fun looking through all of the rocks, I could have spent hours doing that. The boys loved walking in the woods, listening to the birds, picking flowers, and playing with bugs. They are excellent hikers, bushwhacking with the best of 'em! They got really excited about the "treasures" that we were finding too.

We had so much fun that I decided to introduce Mike to geocaching as well. Last weekend we found another park with a bunch of hidden caches, he really had fun too.

Anyway, there are about a gazillion caches hidden in and around the area here so I should never be bored! The closest cache to the house is only .2 miles away, so somewhere in the greenbelt behind our house. One of these days I'll go check it out! It's kind of fun to think of all the ones that I have surely walked by but simply never knew about.

Meet George, Gracy, & Alfred

This is our aquarium. It is ~50 gallons and so far has been lots of fun.



There are 3 inhabitants right now: George & Gracy are convict cichlids, and Alfred is a pleco (algae eater). We actually got the fish from one of my friends. Alfred we had planned on taking, but George & Gracy turned out to be the only other fish we could catch. I think I mentioned before how ridiculous it was trying to catch them. Anyway, I thought you might like to see some pictures.




George & Gracy are a mating pair. Not too long after we got them, just a couple of weeks actually, Gracy laid a bunch of eggs. We watched them, they hatched after a couple of days and there were no babies to be seen. Just this past week Gracy laid another batch of eggs, these have hatched and from what I can see there are at least 4 or 5 of the fry that are alive at the moment - we'll see if that lasts. It's been quite ineresting watching the whole process. Cichlids, particularly the kind that we have breed at the drop of a hat. If we're not careful, we could end up with tons of fish!

It's Spring!

This is one I meant to write a couple of weeks ago. Spring actually came to Austin a few weeks ago, beautiful weather, I think we even hit 80 already. In the fall, we prepped a large garden in the back. We piled a bunch of compost on and let it sit and break down all winter long. When it came time to plant, we had a beautiful base in which to do it. The back garden will be our vegetable garden. So far, I have transferred my herbs to one section, and planted some corn, potatoes, strawberries, cauliflower, broccoli, spinach, kale, and a couple of pansies. (Alex picked the strawberries, pansies, and kale). Everything is growing beautifully, I am so excited. I also planted my sunflowers in their traditional bed. They are sprouting and it promises to be another banner year for sunflowers.

Our peach tree is in full bloom at the moment, if we can avoid a late season deep freeze and hail storms we just might get some peaches this year. We haven't done anything in the front yard yet, still waiting to see what all comes back.

I still have many more things that I want to plant, some more herbs, tomatoes, peppers, transfer my bay leaf tree form the pot to the ground, start some verbena seeds, well you get the picture. Still lots to do!

Other signs of Spring in Austin: the trees dropped all of their leaves the past couple of weeks - yes it's a little backwards from most places who get leaves falling in the fall. I saw the first blue bonnets of the season this week, can't wait to get some pictures. Finally, as is true to springtime in Austin a nasty cold front blew through on the first official day of spring, complete with thunderstorms and gusty winds. We avoided freezing temps last night, might not be so lucky tonight. I have to go cover my veggies so that I don't lose them. The spinach is looking quite beautiful, I would hate for it to die off. Fortunately, this batch of cold is not supposed to last.

I'll leave you with a picture of my peach blossoms:

Curling

I'm going to use curling for my excuse as to why I haven't spent more time updating this. While it is true that I only actually get to curl once a week, I have spent alot of time just about every day for about the past month doing curling work. The olympics were huge for our club this year. We held two open houses in honor of the games. The first was on the last day of the olympics and the second was a week later. We (the curling club board members) were thinking that a combined turnout of between 50 and 60 people would be a success. In actuality, we took 410 people onto the ice the first week and then 452 people the second week. It was insane, but everyone had a great time and somehow or other we managed to make it work. So as not to bore you with the details I'll just say that this led to an incredible amount of work for me. While it has kept me busy and from doing more fun things like updating this blog, it has been exciting knowing that so many people want to try this very cool sport.

The Texas Open Bonspiel is coming up again in just a few weeks. I'll be heading to Houston in mid-April to play again. I'm on the same team as last year, maybe we will again score a big win! There are lots of people from our club going so it should be a great weekend, although I will miss Mike and the boys immensely.

Finally, and this is the best curling news of all so I saved it for last, our season has ended. OK, that's not happy news, but it ended on a GREAT note for me. My team had the best regular season record so we earned the number one spot in the championship game. It was fabulous to win the season. Today was the championship game. To put it mildly, we totally walloped our opponents. The game was over after 4 ends, we were so far ahead it was crazy. Our opponents only scored 1 point the whole game. We scored MANY more :-) So, in my first season ever as a skip I won the regular season and the championship game. I'm floating pretty high right now. I am already looking forward to September and the start of our next season. Hopefully I have secured my place as a skip. This is, without a doubt, the coolest game ever!

Dress Up

I think every kid likes to play dress up. The only problem with having two boys who don't really have any other male friends to play with is that when the dress up clothes come out, well you can just imagine. So, here it is, I'm going to let the pictures tell the rest:



I will actually point out that these tutus came out after Ben got very upset that he couldn't wear the frilly little purple bathing suit :-) Oh and Alex was very clear that this was his "prince" costume. The girls we were playing with were princesses.

According to Alex...

"Birds fly away so they don't get eaten by creditors."

I LOVE my boys, they make every day so much fun!

Some Pictures

I thought I'd share a couple of pictures of the boys, because I always intend to but I never do. So, here goes nothin'

Bazaarvoice

I'd really like to post about Alex's birthday and Disney World but I also really want to include pictures. The camera is currently on the dresser about 3 or 4 feet away and well, I'm just too lazy to get out of my comfortable chair to get it and upload pictures. Instead I am going to enlighten you all to the company called Bazaarvoice that is now Mike's home away from home.

If you want all of the details on when it was founded, exactly what they do, all of that stuff, you can check out their website (www.bazaarvoice.com)

I think I mentioned that Mike's first week was a scavenger hunt of sorts, a great way for him to meet people and truly learn the ins and outs of the company. Bazaarvoice has a "Serenity" Room, pretty much what it sounds like, big comfortable massage chairs, dim lights, soft music, a way to get away and relax. No, apparently Mike has not been in there yet. They also have a game room with every imaginable game console currently on the market, enough guitars from guitar hero et al. for about 5 different bands. Nope, Mike hasn't been in there yet either.

Then there is the never ending Bazaarvoice buffet. The day I went up to see Mike's cube there was some function going on where they had ordered enough pizza to feed all 200+ employees lunch. I have never seen so many pizza boxes in my life - not even in a pizza restaurant. Crazy! The buffet is seemingly endless, dozens of bagels, Tiff's Treats (it's a local place that makes AWESOME cookies & brownies, an endless supply of catered lunches, and one day even an ice sculpture with a shot luge through it (yes they were offering employees vodka and tequila shots at 9 a.m. apparently). That doesn't even include the apparently very well and fully stocked kitchen. In short, Mike really never has to take food. I think now I know why they have the fitness reimbursement plan - they have to do something to encourage their employees to work off all the food!

Then there are the quarterly meetings. The last one was at the Alamo Drafthouse, complete with the Bazaarvoice Band - exactly what it sounds. Employees were allowed to order anything off the menu (alcohol included) all day long, all at the expense of BV. Apparently they have outgrown the Alamo though and will be moving the meeting to the Salt Lick, a barbecue place in Dripping Springs. They will be busing the employees down there and one of the requirements for finding a new space for the meeting was that alcohol had to be allowed.

BV also has a "bizaare team" whose entire job is to think of ways to make the work environment fun. For valentine's day everyone got a carnation and apparently there was a poetry contest. They brought in one of those money boxes for people that won awards at the last quarterly meeting - they got 30 seconds in the box to grab as much as possible. They bring in masseuses periodically for free massages, the list just goes on and on and on.

Mike also said that there is an ergonomics specialist that comes around and watches you work, then helps rearrange your cube to make it as comfortable as possible for you.

So, that's some of the "perks" of bazaarvoice. It's no wonder they were ranked as the number 1 place to work in Austin last year. Now it's time for me to go get my Kiddos, because I'm not sure what they are into.

I should be cleaning

for you see, tomorrow is my little man's 4th birthday. I know I'm a day early in celebrating but I just can't help it. All of the kids birthdays have been fun and special in their very own way. I think I am looking forward to tomorrow so much because for the first time, so is Alex. This year he is very much aware of his birthday, how old he is, how old he will be, his party (or lack thereof, but don't tell him that...), and everything else. He picked out a cake for me to make, it's going to be a lemon cake. I will actually make it today so it is done on time. I don't have a great track record with birthday cakes. Daddy is out and about doing some last minute shopping. We are on the hunt for a toy school bus, who knew they were so hard to find??? As for tomorrow, well I will try not to have any expectations, that way the day should go smoothly. We'll put up some decorations after the boys go to bed tonight so it should be a fun and festive day right from the start.

We had a little unexpected pre-birthday celebration today, with a funny little twist. As we were out and about it ran into lunchtime, which so often happens to us on Saturdays. We ended up at a restaurant for lunch and the waiter overheard us talking about Alex's birthday and how it was his very last day of being 3 ever. The waiter then said, ah, that's good to know and with Mom & Dad's permission can we bring Alex some cake. Of course we accepted the cake. So they come out with all of their restaurant hoop-la to make a big deal of our almost 4 year old's special day. Initially Alex was very excited, then he started bawling. We finally got him calmed down only to discover that he thought if they gave him cake today then he wouldn't get any tomorrow for his REAL birthday. Now, the tears could have been easily avoided if mommy and daddy had clued Alex into what was going on. No, we decided it would be a nice little surprise to get this special cake after lunch. Stupidly, we have learned nothing in 4 years of parenting, Alex is NOT a child that likes to be surprised. Anyway, they also gave Alex a card and a certificate for a free meal, so all is well. Alex even managed to say thank you to the waiter for the special cake and the card. Mike and I had a good laugh over it all.

So now I really should go and clean the house and make a cake and all of that other fun stuff.

Oh yeah, happy valentine's day :-) That kind of takes second fiddle to the big birthday!

Survival

This is a post that I have thought about for quite some time, but true to form, have never gotten around to until now. Again, I can't believe nearly a month has gone by since the last update, arrgghh! I swear I think about this all the time. Anyway, the point of the post. Initially I was going to do this after our very hard freeze and several nights of temps in the teens. It was going to be about the gardens or what was left of them. So I might as well do that now. Wow, even stuff that should do very well here in TX took a very hard hit. Only time will tell what exactly comes back this year. My aloe plant is brobably 50-75% gone, I lost my big avocado plant (which I had started from a pit of an avocado I got at the grocery store). The prickly pear cactus, this is the really sad one for me, the gorgeous cactus out front is by far the worst one now. They all kind of bent over and the small ones have mostly recovered but the ones of any size are just all but destroyed. In the back large hunks have broken off, these pieces are now piled around what remains of the original plant. They will take root and grow again. The one in front though, I just don't know what to do with it. It's worthy of a before and after picture, but I don't have that to post. I really don't know what else in the front garden is truly dead and what will come back. Some of the plants had gone dormant earlier but it is too soon to tell if they actually survived the cold or not. I lost most of my geraniums as well. Some of the herbs survived, the lemon and oliver trees are fine.

Anyway, enough of the garden, the title of this post seems to reflect our current state of being as well, in a good way. Mike is officially back at work, this is week 2 on the job. He is very happy, and while it started off being rough for me, I have settled into his routine and am well, surviving, just fine thank you very much.

OH Yeah, and we went to Disney World for a week. We had a blast, it was amazing, the boys were in 7th heaven and it really could not have been a better week. More on that later!

Ups and Downs

Of course I thought that with the start of a new year I would get a fresh start and update you all more frequently. Fortunately for me I don't make new year's resolutions so I didn't actually break one. And, at least it hasn't been a whole month since the last update, although it sure as heck feels like it. It's been a mentally taxing month. I won't say busy because truthfully we haven't been that busy. We had a great visit with Mike's parents at the end of Dec./beginning of Jan. While it has only been a week since they left, it feels like months. I'm sure you are just dying to know what has been occupying us so much that I can't find a few moments to update this silly little blog. Mike got a new job, that is a big relief. He will be starting at Bazaarvoice on Jan. 25th. He opted to delay his start date by a week in the hopes of enjoying a couple of weeks at home with us. We *thought* it would be nice and relaxing. Sadly, he started feeling poorly on Friday, and has been doing his darnedest to fight off a cold. Alex got pink eye and a secondary eye infection last Thursday. He is still on antibiotics for a few more days to clear that up. Ben looked like he was getting the beginnings of pink eye over the weekend but we managed to somehow or other hold that off. The pink eye kept us from going back to pretend school on Monday. We were going to go back today, but well, today is a whole other story, worthy in fact of a separate paragraph!

Today, well, both the boys were up last night LOTS. In our efforts to enjoy quality time before mike starts working again we had to rearrange some things in our schedule and Lillian,the cleaning lady, could only fit us in at 8 this morning. Normally not a big deal to be up that early. But, Ben was just not wanting anything to do with it. He was screaming and crying over everything this morning. Mike goes to feed Tucker and calls upstairs that we have no hot water, the water heater crapped out and there is water all over the garage. So I decide to take the boys to breakfast so Lillian can clean uninterrupted while Mike tends to the water heater. I think Ben is settling down a bit, he is at least quiet in the car. At the restaurant we are waiting for a table and Ben decides that is the time to barf all over me. Poor little guy just wasn't feeling well this morning apparently. So now I take barf covered me and Ben back to the car to go home. Alex, well, at least he decided to be a very good, super awesome, big boy today and didn't fuss at all! Ben managed to make it home before ralphing the last little bit of his banana up. So now we are home I am trying to find breakfast for Alex, trying to get Ben cleaned up, myself cleaned up, Mike is still cleaning water out of the garage, Lillian is still cleaning, and oh yeah, we were supposed to get back to pretend school. Fortunately, it seems that whatever was bugging Ben's tummy this morning was just a one time thing. He still has banana puke in his hair because we have no hot water to clean him up with, and he still isn't 100% ok with baths. I smell like bananas too, because I can't get a shower yet. So right this very minute, Lillian is still cleaning, the pest control guy is here to keep us pest free for a few more months, and the plummer just showed up. I'm hungry, the boys are happily watching Curious George (yep it's going to be a day for movies), and at least I have the right attitude of it could be a lot worse! At least this all is happening today as opposed to next week when we will be out of town.

OH, and did I mention the earthquake in Haiti? Devastating news for anyone to watch, thankfully Pat & Ed are OK. We have not heard from them since Wed. morning, but that is to be expected.

OK, so it really hasn't been so bad, just so many things to think of and do before Mike goes back to work.

Maybe tomorrow I'll do a happier post :-)