swinging

lately the boys have really enjoyed swinging and playing on our backyard swingset.  or maybe i should say monstrosity.

see?

above photograph courtesy of this photographer:

noodle has recently learned how to pump his legs and swing without any assistance from mom and dad and it's been revolutionary on all accounts!

the simple pleasures of life.

love it.

up to lately

spring has definitely sprung around here.  we are taking claritin by the heaping teaspoonfuls, we have rediscovered our backyard playground (and dirt), we can sit outside on the weekends and sip our morning coffee (can you say heaven?), and we spend just about the same amount of time outdoors as indoors (except when it's raining or the winds blow us down the block!).

we LOVE this time of year.  and the funny thing is, we are less scheduled, but i feel like we have been more busy.  doing what i'm not sure.  maybe creating this adorable little caterpillar for burrito's class.  isn't he the cutest?  burrito had to come up with things around the house to create whatever insect he wanted.  i helped a bit, but for the most part, he did it himself.

we've been spring cleaning and getting the major "work on the house" bug.  it's been far too long since i've painted something!  we've updated the bathtub fixtures in the boys' bathroom, we added a "rain" showerhead in our humongous shower, we cleaned out flowerbeds and put in fresh mulch, we're sprucing up the yard and about to lay some more st. augustine sod....

oh yeah, and we almost bought a different house.

yep.  sounds a little crazy, i know.

truth be told, i have a little addiction.  i like to look at houses for sale online.  all. the. time.

so when i saw this cute and retro mid century house just blocks from our church in fort worth, we knew we just had to go and take a look.  we called up the listing agent, and she showed us the house on a sunday evening.  it had rained most of that day so we were only able to check out the inside, but we liked it.  it needed some work and was a little cozy but had great potential.  a few days later we went back with my parents and my dad, the unofficial house inspector, quickly pointed out some problems.  without going into all the details, because the seller was not willing to help with any repairs nor help with closing costs, we decided that it just wasn't the right move for us.

so after about a week of angst, we felt good deciding not to pursue it.  it was cute though.

looking at houses makes me wish that i could be a real estate agent.  except i don't want to work weekends.  but i seriously love looking at houses.

so that's what we've been up to lately.  i seem to have really fallen off the blogging bandwagon.  i haven't blogged nor have i kept up with blogs lately.  maybe if i stop looking at houses, i'll blog more!  ha!

outdoors

a jedi party

the weather has been so beautiful lately, after an unusually cold and wet winter, that i haven't been inside to blog lately!  not to mention, this past week was a whirlwind of birthday celebrations, the last being a jedi party with burrito's friends from school. 

the party was held at skatetown, a local skating rink (the only one i know of around here!) which was a new adventure for me.  i've always done parties at home or at a park, but i took what i thought to be the easy road this time.  i've learned though, that there is no easy road when it comes to planning a birthday party, especially if you like to do a lot of extra stuff like i always inevitably end up doing!

so the birthday party at skatetown is such a deal.  reasonably priced for 10 kids that includes everything but the birthday cake!  sounds easy, right?  well, burrito wanted a star wars party, and when i got online to search around for some fun party ideas, i ran across this.  a pattern to make jedi robes!  i don't know about you, but i loathe party favors.  i hate buying, giving, and/or receiving them.  if i'm real sneaky, they usually get dumped in the trash about 5 seconds after getting home from a party.  they are usually just junky toys that break in about 1 minute anyways!  so last year i made batman shirts with attached capes for party favors.  they cost just over $5 to make and brought priceless joy to my boys and all the other boys we invited to the party.  so when i saw the jedi robe idea, i knew i had to make them!

now don't think i am some sewing goddess because i totally am not...i just happen to be the daughter of the sewing goddess!  ha!  i provided the vision, material and thread, and she did the sewing.  and i personally love them.  and the fact that the boys wore them while roller skating, makes me think they really liked them too!  they too, probably cost just over $5 to make...so much better than the average party favor, don't you think???  i did purchase glow necklaces (think: light sabres), and those were a hit as well.

i killed myself once again making burrito's birthday cake (and was therefore frustrated that it was a little messed up after someone was not so gentle with it at skatetown....guess that's just my perfectionism coming out!).  it was not technically hard, just squeezing out all that icing made my hands hurt!  but nothing compares to the green chevy tahoe cake he requested for his 4th birthday so i guess i shouldn't complain!  burrito loves darth vader so we included him fighting luke skywalker on the cake, along with some glow in the dark stars.  i had to remind the boys that the stars were not edible! 

i'm a little surprised that darth vader didn't blow over after this!  he was intensely blowing out that candle!

and noodle surprised us with his tenacity for roller skating.  he is very athletic but not so coordinated so we didn't know what to expect but he did great, especially when using these little helpers! 

and i love how he always sticks his tongue out when concentrating!

it was a great party but we were all exhausted by the end of it.  thanks weston, grayson, nicolas, andrew, and ryan for coming to the party!  happy 6th birthday burrito!

Happy 6th Birthday Burrito!

i simply cannot believe that 6 years ago today i became a mommy.  my little burrito is growing up.  it makes me want to vomit and i'm not kidding when i say that.  it just goes by way too fast!

i can remember every detail about having him and that's saying a lot because my memory is terrible!  it was a monday and i worked all day long and on my way home (a 45 minute drive) i felt a little weird.  but really, when you're 9 months pregnant, you never feel normal!  i went home, ate dinner, went to bed around 10:30 and about 10 minutes after that, i sat straight up in bed because my water had just broken.  i was due on april 22 but it was april 5 so i was not mentally prepared but totally excited! 

we drove to the hospital, i got all hooked up and still no labor pains.  john parked himself on the couch and promptly fell asleep.  i began reading a book and within 30 minutes i was experiencing some serious contractions!  i received an epidural sometime after that and was told to "rest."  right.  like how do you rest when you are about to give birth to your first child and you've got the blood pressure cuff going off every 30 minutes???

i felt some pressure but was assured that was normal and the nurse did not come back until after shift change the next morning.  when they did check on me, you should've seen the nurse's face!  i think burrito must have waved at her or something because quick action ensued!  i probably could have delivered him hours earlier but no one came to check on me.  anyways, with a couple of pushes he flew out with a nice conehead and LOTS of hair!

oh the memories!  so the celebration started on saturday with our little family birthday party.  we had chocolate cupcakes and opened presents before easter egg hunting!

and as you can see in the following pictures, there tended to be a theme to the birthday presents.

legos and star wars are the hot thing right now.  and that first lego set alone took 4 hours for john and i to complete.  the legos of today are definitely NOT the legos i had as a kid....much more detailed and intricate!

burrito's teacher at school does a great job celebrating each child's birthday.  we had to make a poster to share with the class that included pictures of him growing up and a word of encouragement from us to him using the letters of his name.  we picked scripture verses to encourage him to hide God's Word in his heart and to love and follow God.  burrito gets to share a little something on the poster with his class each day.

doesn't he look cute at the front of his class?

and today for his actual birthday, noodle and i took a cookie cake to share with his friends at school.  this is an overhead shot so the white part at the bottom of the cake is the "6" candle (it looks a little funny in the pic!).

his class was so sweet to sing to him and celebrate and love him today.

and then to top off the big birthday, we let him pick where he wanted to eat for dinner.  where did we go?

IHOP! (and just in case you haven't heard, kids eat free here from 4-10p for the month of april!)

he ordered chocolate milk (of course!) and the create-a-face pancakes!

and when we got home, noodle gave burrito a star wars lunchbox and new water bottle for school.

happy birthday burrito!  we love you!

easter 2010

we celebrated easter this year on saturday at my parents' house.  we also had john's parents, brother and grandmother with us.  the weather was glorious!  i couldn't resist a little photo op while the big boys were hiding the eggs in the front yard. 

when we heard the signal that the eggs were all hidden it was an all out run to grab the most!  fortunately the boys somehow managed to end up with just about the same amount of eggs.

burrito, noodle, and cousin porkchop looked so handsome in their matching easter shirts.  however, the excitement was just too much for porkchop and he resorted to this during the big hunt.

but we did manage to get a shot of the three of them after going through the loot.

and here are burrito and noodle this morning before the easter service at church.  so handsome, if i do say so myself!

and i couldn't resist taking a picture of john, nonna, burrito and noodle too!

praying you and your family celebrated our RISEN LORD today as well!

Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.  1 Peter 1:3

easter eggs

while we try to do a good job teaching the boys the true meaning of easter and to reflect on the enormity of Christ's death on the cross, we do also do some of the traditional easter things too, like dye and hunt easter eggs.  i always have these great expectations of the boys really enjoying and expressing their artistic abilities when decorating the eggs...and then am quickly disappointed when they lose interest five minutes into the affair.  our eggs are pretty plain and basic but we still had fun doing this together.

tomorrow is the big easter egg hunt at my parents' house, which was once my grandparents' house.  the boys will be hunting and finding easter eggs in all the same places i did as a child.  it just makes my heart swell.  i love being a mom!