Organized Chaos

Saturday Stuff....

2011-01-08T13:27:00.002-06:00

So, it's January 8th and the Christmas stuff is still decorating my house. Suppose I should take it down any day now. Hmmm.... maybe tomorrow. The house always looks so vanilla once it's all down.

Made myself some pretty good low carb pancakes for breakfast this morning using Carbquik Bake Mix which is a low carb baking mix substitute for "bisquik". They looked like regular pancakes, tasted pretty good but had an off aftertaste that is somewhat characteristic of the Carbquik mix. Maybe I'll use some almond flour in it next time to try to minimize that aftertaste and a little nutmeg and see how that comes out. But, overall, they did satisfy my need for a little normal pancake breakfast with butter and SF syrup on them this morning with only 2 carbs in all of it. Hopefully, my BS liked it too.

Rachel went to her friend Lea's birthday party last night. Hard to believe these girls are 17 years old. They've been friends since they were 3 years old and we moved into the Pearland neighborhood. Since our family moved to Friendswood in 2005, they haven't seen each other every day but did maintain their friendship! Lots to catch up on over there.

Now... she's taking a practice ACT test to get ready for the real test in February. Strange to have a child planning for college. It's exciting for her and me....but it's sad for me in some ways too. I'm not ready for her to be leaving us - not sure I'll be ready then either.

John's off to coach the football game - Houston Cardinals - this evening down in West Columbia. This is the semi-pro team he and his friend, Rene having been working with this year. He was just like a kid this morning, getting all his stuff ready and then asking "What time is it?" almost every 10 minutes until the time came for him to go. LOL... funny. Glad he's enjoying it.

I'm timing Rachel... typing this, surfing the internet, planning what I'm going to do for my last two weeks of freedom before going back to work. Hmmm.... what needs to be done around here??

Later!

Low Carb Living.....

2011-01-04T19:32:00.003-06:00

So... it's a low carb life for me from here on out... forever.. to help battle diabetes. I'm still a bit bitter about that right now, but am trying to learn this new way of cooking and living.

Being the over achiever that I am, I tend to very quickly learn about anything that I wish. Lately, it's been diabetes and low carb living.

I've been reading a lot about low carb eating and there is much evidence that says it's actually the way we should be eating as a general way of life. I'm not going to get preachy because gee... it's been there all the time and I sure didn't embrace it before now either. I just hadn't done too much of the research before now, so while I had an overall knowledge that yea, I shouldn't eat all that bad processed food, restaurant foods, fast foods, it's a little different when you actually do some of the research.

So.. the diet. I have accumulated some low carb cook books by Dana Carpender so far. I have Jennifer Eloff's cookbooks in my sites right now as well. I've been stalking several blogs and websites - LowCarbFriends being one of them. Tons of good information out there.

There are some really good low carb foods products available that is making life a little easier during this transition. Many of them are available only online, but some can be found at Whole Foods or Central Market, even HEB has a few.

Alternate Flours - flaxseed meal, almond flour, coconut flour, whole wheat pastry flour, etc.

Alternate Sugars - Splenda, Erythritol, Xylitol, Truvia

Low Carb Pastas - Angel Hair, Spaghetti, Elbow noodles, etc.

Sunday - I made some kick butt wings that everyone in the family LOVED! They were gone very quickly.

Monday - I made a quiche lorraine and a great spinach salad with a wonderful balsamic vinegar dressing. Net Carbs: 15 because I used a regular flour pie crust which had 11 carbs per slice. Next time, I will either do it crustless or try a LC pie crust recipe. Rachel and I loved it the most. Stephen wasn't a huge fan because I snuck some spinach in there. John liked it but probably not quite filling enough for him.

Tuesday - I experimented with a couple One Minute Muffins which were really so impressing and allowed me to have a "bread" for breakfast this morning that was only 2 carbs. One was a flax seed based bread that I toasted and put two fried eggs over to eat. Wow... was good. The other was almond flour based bread that I toasted and just put butter on it. Yummy and sweet. I tried both versions just to be able to compare the differences.

Tonight - I made beef stroganoff with low carb pasta and some really good parmesan spaghetti squash. Net carbs: 16

My goal is to try a good deal of low carb recipes to find ones that please my family and fit in my world for the most part. I'm also happy to add on some carby items for the rest of them when needed. I just want to make sure I can get comfortable with the cooking, have the ingredients I need on hand and have a few go to recipes so that I'm not tempted to eat something I shouldn't on days/evenings when no one feels like cooking! I also will, hopefully, get John in on the cooking part of it. He's sooooo good about cooking and I really love that!! But... we just have to make it low carb at this point.

Not sure yet what is on tap for tomorrow... I'm still on medical leave from the surgery in December, so I have all day (by myself!) to figure it out! I think I may try to make some low carb bread and crackers. We'll see!!

Christmas.... yes, it's been 6 months

2010-12-18T11:21:00.002-06:00

So, I haven't posted in 6 months. Crazy isn't it. Sorry about that.

Life has been whizzing along even without my blogging.

I just haven't been in the blogging mood for awhile now. Haven't felt so good. Come to find out, there is a good reason for all of it.

First, I was diagnosed with Diabetes (Type 2) a few weeks back. Now I know why I've been so extremely tired and lots of other symptoms. My blood sugar has been pretty high for quite awhile it seems >240+. For those with the big D, my A1C was 9.7. For those who don't know what that means, normal is 6 or below. A1C is kind of a running 3 month indicator.

Several of my symptoms I've had for at least 2 years, but thought they were other things even seeing doctors for their treatment, like my recurring eye issues. The supposed best corneal specialist in the city is my eye doctor and he's looked at my eyes for the past couple of years and never once mentioned my issue could be diabetes related. Well... now that my BS are in the normal ranges, my eye issues have all but gone away. So... who knew? We (he and I) thought it was related to an injury to my eye 10 years ago. Good news... since he's been looking at my eyes so frequently, I probably haven't developed retinopathy, which is a permanent diabetes eye complication. That's good.

I found out I have diabetes through trying to find a solution to other symptoms that acted and looked like hormonal problems - thyroid, etc. My hair was falling out, hot flashes and other temperature issues, etc. I decided to go see a doctor to help figure out my hormonal issues especially given I was also about to have the Big H (hysterectomy) which was last Friday, 12/10. While doing all the lab work for the hormonal discussion, found my BS to be 240. And.. that was a fasting BS. Not good. Normal is 120 or below.

The blood work did show my hormones are all out of whack as well, but the first thing to get under control is my BS. In fact, my Gyn would not do the Big H surgery without my BS being under control so she sent me to a internist immediately to be seen (2 weeks before surgery date). Was put on a daily injection med called Victoza. It's not insulin, but rather stimulates the pancreas beta cells to make more insulin as I need it. The shot doesn't hurt... just still have to get over the psychology of giving myself a shot every day.

The other thing I did immediately (even before seeing the internist) was remove all sugar and all the simple carbs (think white... starches, bread, potatoes, corn, rice... boo hoo) out of my diet and began eating a very low carb diet. Trying to learn a new way of eating at the moment and how to live this way forever.

Victoza is also supposed to help you lose weight as it slows down digestion of food through your system so you feel full all the time. It certainly does that for me. I lost 10 pounds in a week and half between it and the low carb diet.

The combo of the two was dropping my BS like a rock. I felt a little lightheaded here and there during this period as it was changing quite a bit so quickly. But.. Dr. was quite impressed that I had my fasting BS down to 100 within a week of starting the meds combined w/low carb. Yea.. I'm an overachiever and had a goal in mind. I needed to have the Big H on 12/10 and just didn't have time to mess around.

So... had the Big H on 12/10 and it went very well. Enlarged uterus, lots of fibroids and excessive bleeding = hysterectomy. Was at Woman's Hospital for a few days where the care was pretty good but the food is absolutely AWFUL. Did I saw AWFUL? I meant ATROCIOUS! Ridiculously BAD. I don't know how they get away with serving food so bad.

Came home after 3 days and am now just healing up at home for the next several weeks. My bed is so much more comfortable then the hospital!! Mom came and stayed for a few days this past week and that was great having someone around to help me. I can move around some, but get tired really easily and of course, am very, very sore. Lots of recorded TV to keep me company right now.

It's Christmas!! I did a lot of preplanning at least to have most all of our presents bought before surgery so just had the wrapping to do. Between my doing some of it in spurts and Rachel helping as well, most all of the presents are wrapped now. YAY!

The kids are going to spend the week with their Dad for Christmas and we'll see them on Christmas Day for dinner! This is the very first year since they were born I won't be spending Christmas Eve and Christmas morning with my children. It's going to be strange and I'm sure.. a little emotional. I'm just not going to think about it too much today.

Mom, Dad are coming in for Christmas and Laila, Justin, Ariane and Stephen are coming on Christmas Eve for dinner. I'll be excited to see everyone!! Love the holidays!

More to come! Need a nap!

Crested Butte & Taylor Park Pics

2010-07-24T12:32:00.003-05:00

Well, we are nearing the end of our time in this beautiful part of the country. It's been so nice and cool and I've enjoyed every single stinkin minute of it! I really wish we didn't have to come back to hot and humid Texas right now... really. Wish I was one of the fortunate ones that could just come and stay here all summer long. Oh well... life is what it is! Luckily, while we will start making our way back to Texas tomorrow, I still have another week of vacation so all is well!!

Here are some pictures of the last couple of days. Thursday we went into Crested Butte and wandered around. Pretty little town.

Yesterday, we went back to the area Travis took us too and had a great time! I caught and released 5 brookies and Dad caught more than that and kept 5. John didn't have quite as much luck as we did yesterday but we think he is at a disadvantage as the fish can see him coming a lot easier! :-) We had a lovely picnic lunch along the river and it was nice and cool. Gotta love it!

Here are the composites of the pictures I took yesterday! Enjoy!

We are going to have a big ole fish fry tonight!! YAY!

Later!

Fishing... Fishing and more fishing....

2010-07-22T12:21:00.004-05:00

We've been fishing! That's what we've been doing.

Our first day was at Spring Creek and while it was beautiful there, we were not successful in catching any fish. However, we did have a lovely trout dinner from some of the fish the boys caught earlier at Quarter Circle Circle Ranch. Yummy stuff!!

Pictures from Spring Creek:

Yesterday, we had our fishing day with Travis. He's the owner of High Mountain Drifter Guide Service. My parents and Perry have been using his guide service for the last couple of years and he's a really nice, cute and good guide!

We wanted to do a walk/fish trip vs a float trip because we wanted to keep some of the fish for eating. Floating around here on either the Taylor or Gunnison Rivers is fun, but is catch & release only so no keeping and eating! So.. Travis took us WAY WAY far up in Taylor Park and probably more north out of Taylor Park really. We think we finally stopped at about 10,500 elevation where there were some absolutely beautiful creeks and beaver ponds and the fishing was excellent.

We all caught a ton of fish. Many were really small and we put them back, but we ended up keeping 19 of them, mostly brookies and one cutthroat. I caught the largest of all!

There was a lot of walking, climbing, maneuvering around holes and creeks, walking through dense areas of willow and who knows what else. I kept having to remind myself there are no poisonous snakes this high up in Colorado because you really couldn't see a lot of what you were walking on or through. Just kept praying there would be no bear just pop up his head while I'm out there. :-)

We are a bit on the tired side today from yesterday's adventure, so we are going to wander our way into Crested Butte to do a little shopping. Later!

Here are some pics from yesterday:

Day 1 - Harmel's here we come!

2010-07-20T07:53:00.003-05:00

This was our (well, my!) first full day in Colorado and let me say, it was quite nice. I can't recall if I mentioned what we did last night (Sunday), but we went to Garlic Mike's for dinner which was really good! Italian (if you couldn't guess) and sitting right on the Gunnison River. Was nice!

This morning, we lazily got up, had some breakfast at the great Holiday Inn Express breakfast bar and packed up. Even gave some lessons on Facebook to my dad AND helped him to set up an account. He's a cool facebooking 72 year now! LOL

Once packed, we hit Gene Taylor's Fly shop to get my fishing license, then the grocery store for provisions, and then made our way to Harmels. We got here about 1 pm and our cabin was ready! This is quite a nice place - not luxurious - but nice. Our cabin is facing the Taylor river, you can hear the river sitting on the porch. It was a bit on the hot side again today at about 87 degrees or so. That's pretty hot up here and remember, there is no AC, so we sat outside in the shade under the porch. By about 4:30, we got our fishing gear on and took the few steps to the Taylor River in front of us. Dad hung out with me to give me some lessons and I had one strike. Nothing else, but I did get some good practicing and I sure did look good! So did John.

Dinner tonight was care of the very popular Harmel's BBQ - steak/crab night cookout. Lots of other folks in a nice clearing with a accordion musician and polka music. Was a fun time! John ate TONS of crab. His portion, mine and Dad's since we only had steak. Picture below of the damage!

After dinner... Dad wanted to learn more about Facebook, so we had a few more lessons and even a funny conversation with my sister, Stacey!

Pictures - most are on my Flickr website HERE and a few below!

Ok - we're getting ready to hit the creeks again today.. fish beware!!

"Stinky Boys" Trip - a few pics

This is apparently the "mountain" they climbed down to get to the creek where they fished one day!

THIS, my friends, is why I don't go on the Stinky Boys Trip!

These are the fish the Great Fishermen caught!

Our cabin at Harmels

This is right in front of our cabin practically!

Great pic of my Dad!

Yea.. that's my man!

Look at me!!

The fishing couple!

Captured these faces last night! Crazy boys.

John's Pile O Crab last night!!

Dancing last night!

Check out the rest of the pics in Flickr! Click HERE!!

Travel Day to Gunnison!

2010-07-18T09:15:00.002-05:00

After a long day of washing clothes, packing, packing and packing, paying bills and doing Band stuff, I went to bed around midnight. Alarm went off at 4 am!! Yea... that's early and 4 hours is really not enough sleep. Up and ready.. off to the airport by 4:30 ish for my 6:15 am flight out of the Big Airport (IAH). Little Embraer plane (really not a fan of small planes) and 2 hours later, I'm in Denver where I'm writing this at the moment.

Waiting for my next flight on an even smaller airplane over to Gunnison. Oh - how I love little planes. Praying for a calm flight with little turbulence.

Just for the record, the temps here in Denver are pretty much the same as in Houston.... forecasted to be 98 - 100 degrees today. Yuck!! Gunnison - luckily, is not quite so hot at about 86 today and getting a bit cooler the rest of the week, with Almont (where we'll be) another 4/5 degrees cooler then that. Thank goodness... hate it when I'm trying to escape heat and just transfer myself from one hot place to another!! Our cabin in Almont doesn't have A/C (I didn't realize this btw) which is not a problem during most of the day and evening when the lows are in the 40's with highs around 80. We'll probably be outside most of the days, so probably not an issue.

Excited to see my husband and dad in just a bit and catch up with the survivalists and see if they managed to catch any fish.

Later!

VACATION 2010!!!

2010-07-16T22:38:00.004-05:00

Finally... vacation has begun! Colorado here we come. Will keep the blog updated with pictures and info along the way.

John and Dad left earlier this week to go to Quarter Circle Circle Ranch for some ultra rustic man time fishing and cooking over coals.

I am joining them early Sunday via airplane for more fun at Harmel's Ranch Resort in Almont, CO.

The kids are not able to join us this time. We're going to miss them on this trip.

Packing... packing.. packing... :-)

More to come!

Wisdom Teeth & Growth Hormone

2010-06-17T06:51:00.003-05:00

Hi all -

Well the little chipmunk has survived the wisdom teeth surgery as did her parents. Although - barely! Just kidding. She did great. Round the clock ice and pain pills for about 48 hours but she's feeling better and more like a human again as of yesterday - 2 days out. Still resembles a chipmunk somewhat though and can't eat anything that isn't mushy yet, but she's getting there. Lots of salt water rinsing, etc going on. All is well and we're on our to passing this mini milestone of life now for her.

Stephen hit a milestone of his own on Tuesday night in the midst of the wisdom teeth recovery. He received his first injection of growth hormone! YAY!! He did VERY well and remarked "That's it?" after the first injection. Whew!! It's a tiny little needle like insulin needles and is given in the fat and not in the muscles. We have to rotate the injection each day to one of 8 different spots on his body. Some he can reach and will eventually be able to do himself, the others are probably more difficult for him to do and will need one of us to help with.

Just a refresher but we've been moving down this path for the last couple of years as his growth has slowed and slowed and slowed, becoming almost non existent. Just for the record, he is 13 years old, 4 foot 8 inches and 79 pounds currently. He's been about that same height/weight for the last maybe 3 years, growing no more than about 3.3 cm/year at this point. Blood work was done and his IGF-1 factor is 120 and a boy in puberty should be around 600. Other tests were involved like bone age scans and growth hormone stimulation testing, all of which shows he's very delayed. The reason... probably a combination of the side effects from the medication he takes plus just a general low production of growth hormone which could be genetic.

We are now trying to get the insurance company to pay for the treatment which, at his current dosage, will cost somewhere in the $50,000 range per year. Likely, that number will be more like $75K or $100K as the dosages are increased for him. Yes... it's a ridiculously expensive medication. If insurance ultimately denies all the appeals, we will have to make some pretty significant life changes to ensure he gets the treatment he needs as this is something effecting his entire life at this point AND we have a short window while he is still in puberty.

Prayers would be especially helpful for all of us... Stephen... the rest of us..... and prayers for the insurance company to do the right thing.

Everyone have a great day! We're off yet to another doctor this morning - Dr. O'Neill - for Rachel's shoulders. One of them is still giving her some problems.

June 14 - Time to Get Back at It!

2010-06-14T08:47:00.002-05:00

I had the pleasure of spending another June weekend with some great ladies at a Scrapbooking Retreat. Marybeth, Laurie, Dallas, Beth, Jana, Bridget. All wonderful ladies. We had a great time being creative, eating well, drinking wine and laughing a lot.

Again this year, I felt like I took my entire scrapbook room of stuff with me and I actually didn't take it all this time! Unfortunately, after I carried all that stuff from the car to the house, I did not have any creative motivation hit me this weekend. My brain has been working overtime on various stresses in my life and just kept distracting my brain during this weekend. It's tiring! I'm trying to work through a variety of stressful situations in my life - mostly work related and family medical related. Just couldn't settle my brain enough to organize pictures and make great (or even half way decent) scrapbook pages. So.. I accomplished one page. :-) YEP! ONE page! Good, huh.

Ok, well before you (or I!) go thinking I'm just a total failure, I switched over to my digital project I've been working on for, oh, awhile now. I'm putting together a book of 2009 pictures and journaling from our lives last year. We did a lot... I took a lot of pictures... and I wrote a lot on my blog capturing it. Imagine that! I accomplished EXACTLY what I had set out to do when I started this blog in September 2008. I had jotted down so many things that I have simply forgotten now that it's just truly amazing. I am so glad I did because it was SO FUN going back and reading them. And that's just from the past year!! LOL

Then.... it brought up the fact that I haven't been good at blogging this year at all. Not at all. There have been many distractions, that's for sure. However, there were many last year too. I think I just lost the focus on why I was doing this for awhile. I can tell you, my little weekend away and working on my 2009 project, brought it back to WHY I did this and helped to refocus me to do it more often. 2010 - will be probably a bit lite, but hey, it's better to start now then not capture anything in 2010.

Brings me to today's information - little miss Rachel is having all her wisdom teeth taken out today - in about an hour. Scares me to death. Why? Psychoanalyzing myself.... (not wise, probably) It's because I have a deep down core fear of dentistry. I can handle all sorts of other pains, aches, surgeries, births. But tell me someone has to do something to my teeth and I am scared to death. My fears.. not hers. Don't think she's worried about this in the least. I'm trying really hard not to project my fears on to her so hopefully, it stays that way. (And she doesn't read my blog until afterwards!). I'm sure everything will turn out just fine as well.

I'll update later today probably with how things went and if I'm lucky, a picture or two!

Whew... I've been gone awhile....

2010-06-06T22:18:00.002-05:00

Perhaps soon I'll change my blog from Easter to summer... LOL!! Yea... it's been crazy.

Anyway.. what have I been doing? Lots and lots and lots. Maybe I'll be able to blog about it all soon.

First thing's first.... I've been spending a fair amount of time learning to use my Lightroom really well. Just came up with this collage of my little nieces/nephew. I think it looks pretty nice!

In other news.... we had a first around here today. Luckily, no one was hurt! A little shook up though! Rachel was involved in her first car accident today. She and a friend were on their way to Galveston (in my jeep.. unfortunately) and while they were traveling down 61st street towards the Seawall, some dude comes barreling out of a gas station without yielding and sideswipes the right front panel of the Jeep! Luckily she saw him and put her breaks on or who knows where they would have hit the car. Everyone is fine...... The stupid dude sped off at 70 mph so he couldn't be held accountable for his actions! Given his car was already pretty beat up, I would imagine he doesn't have insurance either. Fun stuff. Get to fix my jeep now!

Back again soon... hopefully.

Mother's Day 2010

2010-05-09T22:23:00.002-05:00

Happy Mother's Day to all Mom's out there.... my Mom, my sister Stacey and all the other Mom's I know.

I hope everyone had a lovely day!!

I had a great day here in Houston with my family!! Slept late which is always a luxury!

John cooked a nice brunch for me today - eggs, sausage and biscuits. It was yummy with my coffee!!

I spent the rest of the day playing on my computer with pictures I took yesterday of Rachel and Kayla. I'll be posting them soon and I happen to like several of them!

All the kids made sent their Mother's Day wishes!! Ariane texted, Laila called and sent a neat card with our pictures on it from the Dallas Cowboy game last Thanksgiving, Rachel made a pretty card, got some yummy chocolate covered strawberries and flowers, and Stephen made a neat card too.

I feel so loved!!

John then made a special dinner meal for us. What did I request?? The same fantastic meal we had last weekend when we visited San Antonio for Perry's wedding shower - Lamb, potatoes, and brussel sprouts and also a pineapple upside down cake. He added a tomato/mushroom salad and homemade rosemary and garlic biscuits. Boy... was it all absolutely wonderful! I've never been a brussel sprouts lover but I tell ya, John cooks them so well that I absolutely love them. It must be the bacon!! :-) The lamb was just cooked perfectly... and the pineapple upside cake was truly probably one of the best I've ever had!!

I'm stuffed!!! and very loved!!

Here are a few pictures of course!!

Wonderful Cards!!

Beautiful Pictures

Fantastic Lamb cooked by my fantastic husband!

Love mashed potatoes!!!

Tomato & mushroom in vinaigrette dressing

Rosemary & garlic biscuits

Beautiful & Fantastic Pineapple Upside Down Cake

Happy 13th Birthday Stephen!

2010-05-06T17:50:00.005-05:00

THIS young man is now 13 years old today!!! YES... I said 13!! Teenager.

Where has the time gone! You can't possibly be 13 years old!! Stephen - I remember very clearly the night you were born at 10:29 pm after a long, long day. Your entry into the world came with fanfare and excitement and every day since has been filled with it as well. You are a wonderfully bright, very creative, happy, loving, kind and caring young man! I love you so very much and am so very, very proud of all that you have accomplished and continue to accomplish each and every day!!

Another picture of the Birthday Boy!!

Hope your birthday is wonderful love!!

Love,
Mom

Commuting

2010-04-27T08:32:00.000-05:00

Can I just say YUCK! Double Yuck!!
I'm typing this on my blackberry as I sit in this awful Houston commute into downtown this morning! 52 minutes is the expectation this am which is just the freeway part. Add 20-30 for getting to the freeway and then getting off and parking and I should be in my office sometime around lunch time today!!!!

Yes - I know I should not be using my blackberry while I'm driving but seriously - we're sitting perfectly still. Then we inch up a few feet and halt again. If I end u in a wreck, those of you who are just dying to say "I Told You So" have my permission to say it all day long!! I know.. I know ... Not a great model for the kids. DON'T DO THIS KIDS!! They are smarter about it then me apparently, but then, they are happily in school while I'm siting in the commute from H. E. double hockey sticks!!

I think best when driving in each morning - what else are you going to do?? I listen to my favorite radio station - KSBJ 89.3 - and think about stuff. Problem - I forget what I thought about once I hit the office. Can't call too many people this early in the am. All that is left I'd thinking!

Oh goodie - a second wreck on the freeway - now 56 min.

BillBoard Reading -

+ Texas Lottery game is at 191 Million. Drawing is tonight - can't win if you don't play! Go get a ticket or two or three. Please share with your enabler if you win!! What would you do with $191 Millions? (Hint - better hide it quick before the government decides to take 98% of it).

+Tattoo Expo - Houston May 21-23 Reliant Center. www.Bodyartexpo.com. Seriously?? I probably wouldn't be able to stop laughing from thinking about what these tattoos will look on "aged" skin?? Hey honey, that butterfly on your chest isn't going to be in the same place in a few years or even resemble its original form!! People forget these things!! Hmmm. Maybe I should skip my sister's wedding to go see this carnival show! Ha! JK!

KSBJ is talking about proper marital arguing!! Hmmmm ..... Maybe I should listen. :-) t

Later!
MA

April 14, 2010

2010-04-14T22:28:00.005-05:00

Oh man... it's that time again!! Tax time. I hate it. Hate having to give soooo much of the money I work so hard to earn to the government!! I never am one to get any back so I'm usually writing a large check on April 15th. Double darn it!!

I need to update my blog design as Easter has come and gone. Perhaps I'll have a moment to work on that this weekend.

A few notes from the recent happenings around here:

***Living and Dying by Baseball.... that's going to be my memories of these years with Stephen. Playing on two teams is really one too many!! Note to self... don't do that again next year!! Quite literally this week there is a baseball game every single night and in some cases, a practice on Team B after a baseball game for Team A! NUTSO!! Yep.. that's us. Needless to say, keeping up with the homework or cooked meals or anything normal is somewhat scattered at the moment. I'm trying to remember to just enjoy this though because it really won't last that long in the whole scheme of life. I've come to really like sunflower seeds at baseball games though! Seems to be my staple.

***Sick Doggy.... we have a sick puppy. Sugar, our 6 year old Golden, isn't feeling too well. Not really sure what it is at the moment. Thinking good thoughts that it is something treatable but the vet hasn't figured it out quite yet.

*** Stephen's growth - we're still on the trail of making sure we're getting Stephen any necessary treatments to help his growth. He's currently 4' 8 and 79 pounds and just about to turn 13!

Last week we went for a second opinion at UT Medical here in Houston with a pediatric endocrinologist. I have to say, I think it's really interesting (and a little scary) that two doctors can look at the same information and have two totally different ideas of problems and treatments. UT took the same information that Tx Children's had and pretty much said they feel the data indicated he should probably have been on growth hormone treatment a year ago. Texas Children's said he wasn't a candidate. Geez..... very frustrating indeed.

UT took more blood last week and ran some more tests. Everything was normal (thyroid, liver, etc.) except for his IGF-1 (Insulin-like Growth Factor) hormone level which is a mirror hormone for growth hormone (HGH). If it's low, odds are strong the HGH levels are going to be low causing deficient growth. Well, Stephen's was 106 a year ago and is 120 now. It should be somewhere north of 267 all the way up to 359 I'm told. Clearly... he's deficient. What should have happened 18 months ago when the test was first run at Tx Childrens and what will now happen in early May is a Growth Hormone Stimulation Test will be performed on Stephen. This is a 4 hour IV based test where they inject some drugs to try to stimulate and measure his production of HGH over a period of time. If that test shows he's deficient, which we fully expect it probably will, the doctor will recommend he start a growth hormone therapy. This is a daily injectable therapy and will help him grow!! YAY!!! So.. our prayers are that the next test goes well and clearly shows that he either definitely needs the treatment or that he definitely does not need the treatment. We need it to be pretty cut and dry in order to hopefully have it covered by insurance if he does need it. We do not want a borderline situation. It's a really expensive therapy costing between $40,000 - 70,000 a year, so odds of us being able to do it without insurance is pretty slim.

That's it for today! sleep time...

End of March 2010

2010-03-31T21:44:00.002-05:00

I am just having a difficult time believing it's the end of March already! Amazing how time just goes faster and faster right now.

Right now we are spending A LOT of time at baseball fields!! Stephen normally plays on the Little League team in the Spring which he is doing again this year. He also made the middle school team so he's playing on both teams right now. Practice every day after school until 5:30 unless there is a middle school game and then there are a couple of little league games each week, so we are spending 3 - 4 afternoons or evenings a week at one baseball field or another. We have probably about 3 or 4 weeks to go with this kind of pace and then it'll drop to just little league games through about half of May, and more if they make the playoffs. He loves to play and I'm happy he's building these memories, but my goodness..... tough on the parents.

I'm hoping to get my tomatoes planted this weekend. We have to do a little clearing out of the garden area first. We found that some animal had dug a little house into one the beds. Not sure what it might have been though. Would a raccoon do this? We have a neighborhood raccoon that visits our back yard along with several others on a consistent basis. We've come across it a few times and it's a little bit of a shock each time. Wonder if he's living in that garden.

Well.. I'm off to bed now but just wanted to drop in a mid week update!

I love Fridays!!

2010-03-26T07:28:00.002-05:00

Why... o why... do I love thee Fridays? Let me count the ways......

1) Is it because I know it'll mean longer sleep tomorrow morning?

(Um.. well, maybe depending on either a child/dog waking me up too early, but hey, the CHANCE is there and even if I'm not sleeping, I don't have to be anywhere else either so I can lounge in my pjs)

2) Is it because I know work may not be so crazy today?

(yep.. it's just a chance)

3) Is it because the traffic is usually somehow lighter on Fridays as if it knows to give the commuters a break as well? (one can pray right? if I say it before I leave the house, maybe God will have it all straightened out for me when I get to the freeway :-))

4) Is it because it's beautiful here today and the itch to be outside is calling my name?

(time for Jeep driving and gardening)

5) Is it because John and I (mostly John) will be getting the garden ready for planting this weekend and I look forward to the hope of wonderful vegetables?

(can't wait for the tomatoes to grow... grow quick little plants!)

6) Is it because I'll be able to spend quality time with my husband and teenagers this weekend?

(yea, if I can catch up with them)

7) Is it because I need to catch up on a million shows I've DVR'd??

(I'm not sure when I'll ever watch them... truly, I have whole seasons of certain shows I've not even began watching yet!! Don't want to spend time inside when the weather is so beautiful outside!)

8) Is it because I'm looking forward to sipping my coffee and reading a book while sitting on the back porch in this beautiful spring weather this weekend?

(yes, now this will be nice... have to take advantage of these rare days as they come! too soon it will be too hot and humid to be comfortable here even in the mornings)

9) Is it because I may be able to sneak some scrapbooking or photography into the weekend?

(yes, really hoping I can have a little bit of time for the fun stuff this weekend!)

10) Is it because there could be a margarita and mexican food on a Friday night?

(Yep... think that's it!)

Here's to your Friday and whatever makes it special!!

Yea... it's been awhile.....

2010-03-24T21:42:00.002-05:00

I'm back.....updated blog look and all.... life got real crazy all the way around for a couple of months. I was so tired at the end of each day that I couldn't even think about blogging!! Just going to sleep and doing it all over again the next day. It has slowed down a little bit lately so I've been able to catch my breath and catch up on a few other things like my blogging.

Let's see... what has happened over the last couple of months!

The calendar says I turned a year older in February. My family did a great job of making me feel special on Feb 5th !!
Visited Dallas for our National Sales Conference in February
Visited Winter Park, Colorado for a company event - found out tubing on a big snow hill is really fun and not as destructive or painful as skiing. :-)
Working tons and tons... trying to make that sales goal
Tried to keep up with my band volunteer duties... did not do so well there either, but got it done
Visited S. Llano River State Park camping for Spring Break - it was beautiful and peaceful (oh.. and just a tad bit cold)
Attending Baseball practices & games - lots and lots
Bought a really cool single cup coffee maker - really cool. Love a good cup of coffee!
Starting to think about colleges for Rachel.... ok... now that's just really scary... don't want to think about it quite yet as I tend to be on the brink of crying each time I think about it already .... two years ahead
Nursing our 6 year old Golden Retriever recovering from a reaction to some type of bite
Grieving for a friend who lost their only child in a tragic accident
Grieving for a work colleague and praying for his family as he lost his battle with an unknown cancer
Praying for other friends who are battling cancer and other illnesses
I know God is good even though I often don't understand the outcomes
Praying for our country right now and praying there will be a wholesale change coming in November that will send clear messages to our representatives that choose to not listen to the people they represent

I'll be posting some pictures soon of some of these things. I've taken them... they just haven't made it off the camera!!

Time for bed...... and to do it all over again tomorrow!! Baseball for the 4th night in a row tomorrow night!!

It's good to be back.

Visit to San Francisco - Meeting Meirambek!!

2010-01-18T13:08:00.005-06:00

My friends, Terri & Jim, just brought home their adopted son, Jonah Meirambek, from Kazakhstan a couple of weeks ago. They've been working for the past 5 or 6 months to get him home. Lots of trials and tribulations, ups and downs over this period of time - a truly emotional roller coaster - along with much bureaucracy wrapped all around it. They prevailed and welcomed home their son!!

Family Picture!!

Of course, I had to come meet this new addition to the family and take some pictures for them!! They didn't know I was planning to take pictures until I showed up but I brought the camera just in case we had time/inclination to do so. Here are a few more of our favorites! There are many more really wonderful pictures - they are so happy!!

The weekend was really just about visiting with him and them! Baby time.... We didn't really do a whole lot else which was just fine and fun! Weather started becoming kind of wet/cool on Saturday evening and as we speak, I'm sitting at the airport with a 3 hour delay to get out because of weather - rain/wind. So..... I had a fabulous time!!

The one place we did manage to go on Saturday was to their local farmer's market which was incredible - see my pictures below - and to get a manicure/pedicure!! I was just amazed at all the wonderful produce at the farmer's market. Wish we had something like this in Houston - I'd be there!!

It was so wonderful meeting you Meirambek!! You are so happy and a joy to be around! Your smiles just light up the room and you are learning to clap and work those fingers to pick up all sorts of things around you. Crawling is quite close.... but you certainly know how to scoot very quickly to what you want!! It was so fun spending the weekend with you!

Terri & Jim - you all are wonderful parents!! This child is well loved and so lucky to have parents like the two of you. There is much to learn as you settle into your new roles and many wonderful experiences to come as he grows. Parents love to give advice and there are many, many pieces of information that could be imparted, but the most important one is to nurture your own relationship as a couple during this time as well. Don't let that go by the wayside as you take on your parenting role. It's very easy to let that slide. Make time for "date night" and reconnecting with each other often. Even set it as a firm date of the week. Get a standing babysitter and go somewhere - dinner, coffee, wine - for time alone together. Happy families and happy children are built on happy marriages!

Thank you so much for allowing me to visit and have fun with you all. I hope to be able to come out again soon! Love to you all!!

Mary-Austin

HAPPY NEW YEAR!! It's 2010!!

2010-01-01T14:20:00.002-06:00

Happy New Year to everyone!!

We had a very low key New Year's Eve around the Cox house. John cooked the most incredible dinner for us last night. Rack of Lamb, mashed potatoes, roasted brussel sprouts and roasted butternut squash (I love it). The lamb was absolutely amazing!! I think it may now be my all-time favorite meal and usually, I'm not a huge lamb lover. But.. OMG!! It was incredible. We ate the leftovers for lunch today - was perfect. We rang in the new year out on the back porch under the blue moon with a good fire going in the firepit, drinking champagne and listening to all the fireworks going off around us!! Enjoyed it!

Can you believe it's actually 2010!! I can't. It feels like yesterday when the world was wrapped up in the turn of the century into the Millennium. We all thought the world would end and quickly found out at 12:01 am, 1/1/2000, that the world kept on going, nothing blew up, the lights didn't go out forever and the ATM's didn't start spitting out money! Much to our dismay!

Well... 10 years later.... and my how things have changed in my life.

The Past Decade has brought:

Divorce & happily, a New Love & Marriage (John)

Ten more years of growth for both Rachel (16) and Stephen (12)

Happy, healthy & smart children progressing well through school

Greater love for the simple things in life

Greater love for scrapbooking and memory keeping

Great wine and food!

Wonderful trips and tons of great memories

Two Employers since 2000 - Hanover & Wells Fargo

Great work colleagues

Three vehicles - Sequoia, Honda CRV and Jeep Wrangler

Purchased a house all on my own!

Just a small snippet of life over the past 10 years. So much more... not enough time to write it all!!

Ok - so let's continue.

Christmas 2009 was a wonderful time. I will post several pictures over the next few days, but they are all loaded in my Flickr photostream which you can access from the right sidebar.

We spent our Christmas in Boerne, TX with my parents, sisters, nieces & nephew. It was a lot of fun and a lot of food!! One thing we all know how to do well is cook and eat. And man... we did that quite well this year!! I think we just lived life by the meal. :-) Yummy!! Mom cooked amazing things this year including for Christmas dinner, a beef tenderloin with horseradish sauce that was killer!! Double yum! In addition to the tenderloin, we had cookies on top of cookies, dips and chips, kringle, breakfast casserole, brisket cooked by John, potatoes, pinto beans, lima beans and green beans (I kid you not!), ham, Christmas salad, cheese wafers, oreo cheesecake, pecan pie, apple pie, Cakebreak Cabernets and Vueve Cliquot champagne. Whew!!

I leave you with a picture of our family on Christmas morning!! More to come!

Have a happy day celebrating New Years!!

Merry Christmas!!

2009-12-25T07:22:00.003-06:00

Joy - Joy - Joy !!!

Today is Jesus's Birthday!!! Happy Birthday Jesus!! Blessed be the Lord!!

Blessings to you and yours!!

Love,

MA, John, Rachel & Stephen

Christmas Busy but Happy!!

2009-12-22T09:04:00.007-06:00

Catching up a bit on the blog for the Christmas Holiday season. We've been busy little elfs down here. There have been holiday concerts, holiday parties, finals and tests, holiday movies, finding, setting up and decorating the Christmas Tree, Christmas shopping, Christmas puzzles to put together, Christmas cookie and other yummy things to bake and Christmas present wrapping to tackle!! Well... I'm still tackling that one. My trusty Helper Rachel can't really HELP this Christmas with one arm to offer, so most of it falls to me. I believe John had Stephen help wrap the presents for me. LOL...

Kids are out of school for two weeks and are thrilled to be sleeping late!! Last day of work pretty much for the 2009 year is behind me from yesterday so I will be able to catch up on my snoozing as well!!

Oh - before I forget, one tidbit of interesting Christmas knowledge about my 12 year old son this year. He has a fascination with a Christmas Song this year - We wish you a Merry Christmas -musically arranged with farting. Yes, farting. It has begun. The strange fascination that boys/men have with bodily noises. It has been very comical to watch him this year!!

Off to wrap (more)!!

Christmas Trivia 2009

2009-12-12T17:50:00.007-06:00

Thought I'd take a moment to update the blog with a trivia exercise!!

CHRISTMAS TRADITIONS TRIVIA

Did you shop early this Christmas? ummm... not unless you count 12/6 as early. :-) I wish I could get myself into gear and get it done earlier, but it just happens this way almost every year. Maybe someday....

Are you using wrapping paper or gift bags this year? I use a combination of both depending on the size/type of gift... and what I have on hand.

Plans for your Christmas Table colour-scheme? Typically, my table is red and green.

When do you put up the tree? Usually, I try to put the tree up the first weekend in December. BUT.... this year, it'll be the second weekend! :-) Sometimes, if I'm really rockin the Christmas spirit, there will be TWO trees~!! Doesn't even match my friend Betsy who has 10 (YES, TEN) trees in her house.

Is your tree different each year or is it always the same? Pretty much always the same.

Does it have a particular colour scheme or theme? The main tree is always decorated similarly each year... lots of white lights (becoming less and less each year because it's my least favorite part of the tree decorating. We just put lots of our ornaments on the tree --- eclectic bunch of ornaments gathered over the years with no theme.

On those very rocking Christmas seasons when I put up the second tree, it's a Texas Western themed tree with all the Texas and cowboy ornaments. Very cute...

When do you think you’ll take it down? Really hope it's before February 1st this year. :-) ha ha ha.... now that it's a real one, it'll be down by then, but one year long ago when we had an artificial tree, it was still there on my birthday in February. LOL... yea.... i like taking the lights off it worse than putting them on the tree!

A real tree or an artificial one? It's been real ones for the last couple of years. Before then, it was artificial trees until it just couldn't be recovered and reshaped into a normal looking tree again! I like the real ones and the smell the best! No one is sneezing yet, so I guess we can keep doing the real ones for awhile!

Can you remember your favourite Christmas present you received as a child? A little red car

What’s on the menu for Christmas dinner? Not sure yet this year. My mom is cooking and all I know so far is the main entree is beef tenderloin! YUM YUM!!

What’s your favourite Christmas song/carol? Traditional Carol - O Holy Night by many artists, Pavarotti & Linda Eder are two of my favorites. More Modern Christmas Song - I Believe by Natalie Grant

What is your favourite ornament on your tree? I have many favorites... any that bring back great memories.

Have you got an unusual ornament? Not really... they are all pretty normal.

Do you hang lights up outside your house? Yes, we usually put some lights out around the trees and along the sidewalk. Occasionally, I get motivated to put them up along the actual roof line.

What’s your favourite part about Christmas time? Fun times spent with family playing games, putting together puzzles, and hanging out with each other over great meals!

What’s your worst part about Christmas time? The race to get everything done and bought.

Will there be snow or shine? Oh.. how I wish there would be snow on Christmas here. We're more likely to have the shine though. HOWEVER.... I just read on the Sci Guy's Blog at Chron.com that there is a little glimmer of potential hope that could bring cold and snow to Houston on or near Christmas!! That would be pretty cool!!

What would you like for Christmas? Not a lot this year... I've asked for an Epson Photo Scanner and a few other scrapbooking related items. I am so very blessed and really don't have a lot on my wish list this year other then time with my family.

Is your tree topper an angel or a star? Neither actually!! I put some pretty poinsettia's sticks up there. I never have found an angel or a star that I really loved.

OK - Who's NEXT?? I would love to hear from you.

Happy Weekend,

December 5, 2009

2009-12-05T09:11:00.002-06:00

It's certainly Christmas time!! We've even had the cold weather and SNOW to show for it!! More to come on the Historic Snowfall in Houston, TX in a moment....

Yesterday, 12/4 - Rachel had surgery to correct the socket gap problem in her shoulder - this time her right shoulder. If you remember, she had surgery last May to correct the same problem in her left shoulder. I took a lot more pictures then. This time... just one!

Just wasn't in the snapping mode I guess. We made our way up to the hospital at 6 am yesterday and she was home snoozing on pain pills by 10:00 am! She slept most all of yesterday and will be again today I would guess. The doctor said the gap on this shoulder was even larger then the gap on the left shoulder. She's such a trooper though and I'd love to have her pain threshold. She didn't have the nerve block (she didn't last time either). A shot for pain afterwards - not morphine as we found out she was allergic to it last time. Something the nurse said was better with not as many side effects. Wonder why the go to morphine first then? Anyway.... Looks like just oral pain meds are doing the trick and keeping her comfortable right now.

Now... on to the Historic Snow of December 4th in Houston, TX

Wow... we had some snow. Not just a little flurry, but real a real snowfall. It started early on our side of town (South of Houston) and stuck around until about noon and then melted. We had another little snow band come through in the afternoon which dropped a bunch of snow, but none of it stuck around that time. Schools all let out early (not Friendswood!). Companies/cities let employees go early. Not that there was really any need to until later last night when all that wetness on the roads froze over with our 25 degree night.

Amazing for there to be snow in Houston and then even more amazing for it to come this early. First time ever for it to happen.

Check out these pictures.

Our House with Snow

Neighborhood Playground

My Favorite place - Starbucks....

See... we really were getting a good snowfall!! If the ground had been cooler than 70 degrees, we might have actually had some good accumulation!!

Not sure what we're doing today... but it might involve a few things.

FRIENDSWOOD faces DAWSON (our Pearland friends) again today in Football, but this time for the Quarterfinals on the Path to State!! We probably won't go with Rachel's recovery, but we'll be thinking about them and anxious to hear the outcome!!

UT faces Nebraska this evening for the Big 12 Championship on the way to the National Championships!! HOOK EM HORNS!!! Will definitely be watching this one.

Christmas Decorations - need to get them up in the house and perhaps get a tree decorated soon.

Have a great Weekend!!
MA

December 1, 2009

2009-12-01T21:43:00.002-06:00

Happy Holidays everyone!! Hard to believe it's already December!! The next 24 days before Christmas are filled with decorating, great christmas music, events, concerts, and all sorts of other festivities!

My first task of the holiday season was to give my blog a festive holiday update! Let it Snow!! Not that we get a whole lot of snow here in Houston, TX, but we've seen a bit here and there the last few years. The forecasters here today are even saying we might see some snow on Friday! We'll have to wait and see if it actually happens!! I like seeing a little bit of snow. Not sure if I'd want to really have to actually live and work in it regularly though.

Our weather here is so wacky though so we'll be looking at potential snow on Friday and back into the 70's soon thereafter. That's why we always have to have both seasons of clothes in our closets and flip flops nearby. It just doesn't stay one way or another for us in the "winter"!! LOL

Here's the lyrics for a song that gets played here in Houston during this time of year by our wonderful Christian radio station - KSBJ.

http://www.myspace.com/brandedtheduo for the link to the music; look on the right side in the box, may have to scroll down

White Christmases in Houston by Branded

If you dream of horse-drawn carriages
Dashing through the snow;
Before you move to Texas
There's something you should know...

That they don't have White Christmases in Houston.
I've lived here most my life and I should know.
I've prayed and I've pleaded for way too many years
But they just don't have White Christmases down here.

I've heard of winter carnivals in Aspen.
It looks just like a winter wonderland.
But remember while you're freezin' throughout this Christmas season
We'll be down here with Christmas cheer and flip-flops in the sand.

I've seen all those Christmas shows on TV.
Blankets of white powder; my, how grand!
But while you've got snow and holly, I'm feastin' on tamales;
Sittin' on my back porch with an iced tea in my hand.

That they don't have White Christmases in Houston.
I've lived here most my life and I should know.
I've prayed and I've pleaded for way too many years
But they just don't have White Christmases down here.

Hope your December 1st has been happy!

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!!

2009-11-26T10:15:00.004-06:00

Happy Thanksgiving to all!!

I am truly thankful this year for many people, places and things!

Loving family - My husband, John and Rachel, Stephen, Ariane, Laila & Justin
My parents, Austin & Walter, my sisters, Perry & Stacey, and my nieces & nephew - Macie, Holley, Allie & Scott
Thankful for my friends!
Thankful for our health this year and the availability to choose our own medical care. We've relied on access to great doctors and hospitals this year. Pray that doesn't go away with a government run option.
Thankful for our jobs and abilities to earn a living to provide for our family & children without a great deal of worry.
Thankful for our service men and women who are out there every day trying to fight for our country. Praying for their safety and security!
Thankful for coffee, cheese & chocolate!! My favorite "C's".
Thankful for a husband who cooks, cleans and otherwise keeps us organized! (of course, I have to leave extra early for cowboy games in exchange!)

Where are you spending your Thanksgiving today? With whom?

I'm up in Dallas spending my Thanksgiving Day with John, Laila & Justin currently sitting in the 45 degrees with my coffee in Blue Lot 15 tailgating for the Oakland v. Dallas Thanksgiving Day Game. On tap for Thanksgiving lunch is Ham, Turkey, Stuffing, Mashed Potatos and gravy, mac & cheese, and pecan pie! All very expertly cooked/warmed on a Old Smokey Grill. Along with bloody mary's & beer. Game time = 3:15 pm. Yes, we were here at the parking lot at 9:00 am with many, many other people!! After the Dallas game comes the Longhorn v. Aggie game this evening!! Football... bring it on!

Here is a question for you to consider! I am hoping if you are a member of my family, you will join in with answers to this question! However, would love for anyone to join if they'd like.

What are 10 of your most simplest pleasures in life?

Mine -

1) Coffee w/half-n-half

2) Quiet house with taped DVR programs to watch

3) My fabulous MACbook Pro

4) Mobile broadband access

5) Watching the kids march or play ball

6) Sitting outside on a Friday evening grilling & sipping some wine

7) Reading a good book on my Kindle

8) Chocolate Kiss - dark chocolate of course

9) Driving in my Jeep with the top down.... going anywhere

10) Time to scrapbook and write.

Have a Happy Thanksgiving!!

MA & John

Thankful for........

2009-11-10T06:47:00.002-06:00

I am starting off easy with my thankfulness this morning......

Today.. I am thankful for being blessed with loving friends and family members!

Sunday, November 8

2009-11-08T20:28:00.003-06:00

It's been a quiet weekend here at the Cox house! We haven't had a quiet weekend in a long time with all the marching band and baseball stuff that goes on in the month of October. We've been taken a really needed deep breather the last few days.

Coming back from the State Contest at 3:00 AM on Wednesday morning put us all very behind in the sleep category. It took a few days to catch up really. Friday night was a football game with Friendswood defeating LaMarque in the last regular season game and advancing to the playoffs next weekend. Friendswood will be hosting it's first ever playoff game at our stadium. It's a small stadium so this should be interesting!! The good news is all the extra concessions monies that the school and band will get because of it. That's a good thing!!

Trying to find the newly minted 16 year old a car to drive. That's a tough thing to do when you don't know a whole lot about cars. She hopes to get her license sometime this week so geez... here we go right?? I'm really not sure I'm ready for it. No... I know I'm not ready for it. Although... getting her to go the grocery store for that ONE item we need will surely be nice!! :-) I'm sure it just will take her 30 minutes to do that and drive by all her friends on the way there and back.

Updated my blog design with a Fall Design!

Ok - back to the Dallas Cowboys vs. Eagles!!

Have a great week!!

State 4A Marching Band Contest - San Antonio, TX

2009-11-03T22:40:00.002-06:00

Friendswood competed in the State 4A Band Competition today at the Alamodome. I am chaperoning and we left yesterday and rehearsed last night in San Antonio. The Band did great placing 2nd in the State after all was said and done. Dripping Springs placed First, then Friendswood second, then Poteet third.

We are now on the long bus ride home to Houston where we will arrive somewhere around 2:00 am or so. More to come about the past few days - need sleep now!!

Night all!

16th Birthday Report & Halloween

2009-11-01T08:49:00.002-06:00

Just didn’t have time to get to more blogging last night but with all the Halloween preparations and birthday happenings. It was a busy day and evening!

16th Birthday Report

A flock of pink flamingos landed in our yard on Friday bearing a message wishing Rachel a Happy Sweet 16th! They were very cute and a public announcement of her birthday!! They arrived Friday morning and left on Saturday late morning. Unfortunately, Rachel’s schedule on Friday was such that she left for school at 5:45 am and didn’t return home until almost midnight from the Away Football Game. She saw them in the dark at that point. She got to see them for a few more seconds the next morning as I took her back to the school for Band Practice on Saturday at 7:30 am. By the time she got home later in the afternoon, they flock had moved on to celebrate another event! Mom was good though and was able to capture some pictures!

Rachel’s day was a busy one as you can read from above. She started out getting up early to head to Band practice at 7:30 am. I decided she needed a tiara for her special day so she wore it for the most part. I think it bothered her head a bit, but she was a trooper!! It looked so Rachel!

Off to band practice! Only a couple of more days and the Band performs in the Stand Band Marching Contest in San Antonio!! Their show is really, really good. The kids are working very, very hard to make it the best it can be. Hence... the practice on Saturday from 8 - 1 pm (with bus rides to Dickinson stadium to practice as it’s bigger than ours) and again on Sunday from 2 - 4 pm. We (I’m chaperoning) leave tomorrow for San Antonio. GO BAND!!

After band practice, I picked her up and one of her friends, Alex, and we went to Hobby Lobby. The girls want to make some shirts to wear to school on Monday showing their excitement for the State Competition! We grabbed a few items - zebra striped fabric seemed to be a hit matched with pink and purple shirts accented by blue and green paint. Should be quite noticeable!! I’ll take pictures no doubt and share!

From there we returned home (thank goodness) and everyone took a bit of a breather for a couple of hours. Cleaned rooms for friends coming over to spend the night (uh hmm... Rachel), etc.

Her friend, Kayla, brought over a pretty balloon birthday greeting!! Very Rachel - the Disney Princesses!!

Alex came over and everyone got ready to go trick-or-treating!! We were trying to squeeze it all in on this Halloween Day!! So, Rachel, Alex and Stephen all left while it was still light and went out to trick or treat for about 1 hour. LOL... funny.

Halloween 2009

Stephen was Gene Simmons from KISS mixed with a Ghoul. Rachel was a bumble bee and with the crown on her head could have been called Queen Bee! Alex was an Indian Girl! They were funny.

Scary Stephen!

Silly Rachel!

Rushed back home at 7:15 pm so everyone could do a quick change into their really nice clothes and we could head off to a very special dinner for Rachel.

John & I gave Rachel a pretty silver and pearl drop necklace and pearl earrings for her 16th birthday!! Something that hopefully, she’ll take care of and put up for special occasions. It’s jewelry that you can wear forever.

Everyone looked so nice!! We went to Killen’s Steakhouse which is a really small, but very nice steakhouse in Pearland. The Chef was the runner up for being the Executive Chef at the Whitehouse and was offered the job of Assistant Executive Chef. He grew up in Pearland and chose to come back to open his own restaurant and it’s doing quite well. They also have a really nice wine list which I was happy with of course!!

Our guests with us this evening were Kayla & Alex!

All the girls looked lovely. Unfortunately, in all the rush of the evening, I didn’t get several of the pictures I wanted this evening. But, the ones I did, were beautiful!! It was all very grownup! We had some wonderful food and our dinner lasted about 3 hours!!

Picture of the waiter, Chad, with all the girls.

There are more pictures in the Flickr Gallery. Feel free to peruse!!

Off to watch the Dallas Cowboys play Seattle!!

Later!

MA

Sunday, October 31, 1993 - Halloween

2009-10-31T10:36:00.004-05:00

Continuing our story.....

I spent the night going through contractions that were getting harder and closer together as well as reliving the 2:00AM hour as we set the clocks back an hour that weekend. Some time early in the morning, we made our way back to the hospital (Woman's Hospital of Texas) and I had progressed some - enough for them to keep me in the hospital and agree to provide me with an epidural. None of this fast labor stuff... oh, no. Slow and steady like the turtle. I thought it was painful enough and wanted the relief that comes from that wonderful epidural. The anesthesiologist was my best friend. Loved him.

Dr. Leeds, my OB GYN, was not on call for the weekend. Never fear, Dr. Mark Jacobs did a great job and we had some wonderful labor and delivery nurses as well. Everything was going pretty much as it should!

Labor progressed with me happily enjoying the epidural for the most part. It was a Sunday afternoon. I remember the Cowboys were playing someone on that day (Eagles maybe?) during the time I was working to bring her into the world. 3 hours of pushing to be exact. She was just a stubborn little thing. Probably was just so smart even then, she knew it was better to stay comfy and cozy in my tummy then come out in the bright world!! Eventually, at 5:00 pm on the dot, she was born and entered the word crying! I was crying too. We were both a mess. This was a good thing!

Total time in labor = 26 hours (when you count the 2:00 time reset)

Rachel Austin Harlow born at 5:00 pm on October 31, 1993. She weighed 8 lbs even and was 20 inches long. Beautiful baby girl with dark brown hair. Loved by lots and lots of people. Beautiful Baby!

There are only a few truly amazing moments in life. This was one of them. She was here. She was healthy. Everything was good. Everyone was happy.

In the waiting room was a crowd waiting on her birth. They were getting a little rowdy in the waiting room sitting with anticipation! There was a really funny movie made by all the family in the waiting room at this time. I would really like to get it converted from VHS to digital. It was so characteristic of our family with all the funny thoughts & actions. I am so blessed to have such a wonderful family and great friends. God is good.

In attendance waiting with anticipation at the hospital at the time of her birth were my parents, Austin & Walter, Rob’s parent’s - Betty & Tommy, my sister Perry, and Rachel’s Godmothers - Susan & Shelley. Stacey wasn’t able to join us until the next day and she drove all night to get there! Within 20 minutes of her birth, everyone was crowded into our hospital room to meet little Miss Rachel. The nurses had cleaned her up a bit, wrapped her up and put a little pumpkin hat on her head to recognize the date of her birth on Halloween! My little pumpkin. She was passed around from person to person greeting everyone!

Here are some pictures! (click on it to see it in a larger format)

As I go through the pictures from this time, I truly wish I understood more and thought more ahead for scrapbooking. While I have a good many pictures and love them all, there are several more pictures I wish I had now. Reminds me why I am so diligent about taking pictures and trying ot capture the memories. Love them!

Stay tuned for more later.... she’s 16 now!!

October 30, 1993 - One Day Away

2009-10-30T22:34:00.004-05:00

On this day 16 years ago, I was ...

One day away from one of the greatest achievements of my life.
One day away from God showing me one purpose for my life here on Earth.
One day away from being a Mother.
One day away from assuming the responsibility for raising another human being.
One day away from meeting this wonderful little baby girl named Rachel.

Today, we are one day away from the 16th anniversary of this amazing event and my little baby girl Rachel has turned into an amazingly wonderful young lady.

*********************************

16 years ago on October 30, 2009 (Saturday that year), I was pregnant with my first child. I was still pregnant on October 30, even though she was really DUE on Friday, October 29th. I was big, fat, uncomfortable and praying this child would make her way into the world soon. It had not been an altogether great pregnancy. The baby was great and healthy. Her mommy’s system didn’t take too well to all those pregnancy hormones causing a lot of nausea and the resulting praying to the porcelain gods on a very consistent basis. :-)

The day started as any other normal day (except for being 9 months pregnant of course). It was a normal day. No inkling of labor starting. Nothing. Nada. Decided to go take a walk around the Galleria in hopes of jump starting the labor process. Walked... waddled... walked... waddled .... and walked some more ..... ate lunch. Came home and collapsed on the couch. Was tired from all that waddling around the Galleria. Somewhere around 4 pm, I started to feel something. Something that seemed like it got a little more regular. Hmmm... maybe this was the time?? It started to get a little bit uncomfortable too. It would be awhile later (and actually a few years later) when I really understood what labor pain really feels like. This was just baby stuff but heck, I didn’t know that. This was my first!! It was something to me.

I called my Mom & Dad who were at a conference of some kind. Called Perry & Stacey. Everyone was on baby standby just waiting for “the time” and “the call”. We had all sorts of plans and instructions of phone numbers to call to reach everyone. This was the first grandchild you know. A very special event. We have since celebrated the birth of every baby in the same way. Everyone has made it for each one!!

We went to the hospital not long after that to be told it was too early and that I wasn’t in real labor yet. So... home again we go. Mom & Dad & Perry had made it into town by that time and we all met back at our house. It turned out it was real labor - just early labor. More to the story tomorrow.....

For now, I’m enjoying the day before the big event!

Happy 6th Birthday Allie!!

2009-10-30T06:26:00.003-05:00

TODAY is my littlest niece, Allie's, 6th birthday!

Isn't she just a sweet one!!

Sweet & Sassy Allie -

You are such a sweetheart, Miss Allie! Very smart and very happy. John, Rachel, Stephen and Aunt MA wish you the happiest of Birthday Wishes today on YOUR DAY!!

In other notes today........

We are on Countdown for Rachel's 16th Birthday tomorrow..

Friendswood is going to STATE!!

2009-10-25T20:56:00.002-05:00

Friendswood Marching Band placed 1st yesterday at Area F UIL Marching Contest earning them a spot at this years 4A State Marching Contest in San Antonio on Tuesday, Nov. 3. YAY FRIENDSWOOD!! Friendswood received all 1st place votes and their scores were really, really high! They did very very well yesterday.

I'm chaperoning the trip to SA week after next. Long days/nights. We leave on Monday around noon and don't get back until the early morning hours of Weds. Fun stuff!! They have a really good chance at winning.

Laila came in this weekend as well, so John, Laila, Ariane and I went out for a great dinner last night. Laila and I tried to scrapbook today but we got a little bit of a late start and then had to detour to watch the Dallas Game. They won which made for a great evening around the Cox house tonight.

We have a birthday coming up next weekend... Miss Rachel will be turning 16!! Wowzer.... unbelievable!! I'm savoring the last 6 days of the non-driving age of 15. :-)

Have a great week!

Happy Birthday John!!!

2009-10-21T06:47:00.003-05:00

Want to take this moment to wish my wonderful and fabulous husband a MOST HAPPY BIRTHDAY TODAY!!!

I'm so glad and thankful you are in our lives!!

Have a GREAT DAY!! I Love you!!!

Positive Thinking.....

2009-10-17T07:57:00.002-05:00

Today as I was doing my normal blog roll reading, one of my scrapbooking favorites (Ali Edwards) had posted her weekend giveaways. Her sponsors have some of the cutest and most fun stuff. Love it. In order to be entered to win, you leave a comment on her blog and each time it's a little bit different. The topic to comment on today was to leave something positive about you right now.

I made my comment, but it got me to thinking so I'll share that and more about what I am positive about right now.

POSITIVE THOUGHTS

I'm positive that my daughter is going to be turning 16 in two weeks (yikes).
That positively makes me feel old.
I'm positively ignoring that feeling because my mind doesn't think I'm older than 25.
I'm positive my body doesn't agree with my mind.
I'm positive that this weekend is going to be absolutely gorgeous outside for the first time in 5 months.
I'm positive I'm going to have the top down on my Jeep this weekend with the wind in my hair as I travel to/from kid's sports and band marching events!!
I'm positively thinking that UT (Texas) will beat OU today!! :-)
I positively will put about 200 miles on my car this weekend between driving into Houston for a cross-country meet and up to Conroe for a band contest.
I positively was proud of Stephen this morning for running 1.5 miles on a hilly course in 12:54! Best time ever!
I'm positive that my husband bought me a coffee cup last weekend that said "51% Good Witch, 49% Bad Witch, Don't push it!!" ...... hmmm......
So.. I'm positively going to dress as a Witch for Halloween. :-)

More Later!

Have a wonderful weekend!!

Kansas City Adventure

2009-10-12T22:09:00.003-05:00

John and I took a little trip this weekend. John's Birthday is coming up here soon on the 21st of October and for his birthday, he wanted to go to Kansas City and see the Dallas Cowboys play the Chiefs yesterday. So, we planned a little getaway all centered around the Cowboys!!

Neither John nor I have ever been to KC so this was an adventure of sorts!!

The first adventure (and I really wish now that I had a picture) began just getting on to the plane. We were on one of the Continental Express Jets. You know them... the 50 seat plane with one seat on the left and two seats on the right. Little plane. Well... we found out that John doesn't fit very well on an Express Jet. Not only could he not even stand up straight in the aisle, but his head barely fit when seated without touching the lights/air conditioning above you! Not to mention the fact that he barely fit in the seat by width or by length. I felt so very sorry for him and thank goodness, the trip was only 1.5 hours. He really couldn't move. Have to see the humor in there somewhere!!

Planning clothes for traveling is so hard sometimes when you are going from one temperature to another. We left Houston and the temps were around 70 degrees and we arrived into Kansas City to 38 degrees. I wore sandals and kind of a light sweater. I hate to be hot on planes and you just never know what it's going to be. I pulled a sweater out pretty quick once we got there!!

We checked into the Ameristar Casino Hotel which is on the north side of Kansas City. We think that Missouri allows gambling on the rivers... much like Louisiana does. However, we wondered if it must be technically within a certain mileage from the river because the hotel and the casino, while right on the banks of the river, were not on the river. There was a good distance between the two. All the staff refer to the casino as the boat however. Very strange because it isn't a boat. One difference is Missouri doesn't provide you drinks while you are gambling unlike Louisiana or Vegas.

We were quite hungry when we got there so we decided to go to a traditional KC BBQ restaurant that also just happens to be at the hotel! Arthur Bryant's KC Barbeque.

Whenever we asked the locals, they told us go either to Arthur Bryants or to Gates for KC BBQ. So... we did! It was good.

John had the Burnt Ends (I'm not sure what that is) and I had pulled pork. They smoke their meats over Oak and use a BBQ sauce that is more vinegary than the ones we use in Texas. I did enjoy mine though quite a bit but elected for the less vinegary sauce. They gave you a lot of food!! Couldn't even begin to eat it all.

We played a bit in the casino and relaxed the rest of the day. Watched the Longhorns/Colorado and the LSU/Florida games.

Sunday - Cowboy Football Day!! 36 degrees, overcast, light wind - Mary Austin was cold!!

I did manage to talk him into not leaving the hotel until 8 am instead of the 7 am timeframe he had originally hoped for. An hour is an hour in my book. We got into our Cowboys garb and made our way to the Chief Stadium. We still had to wait an hour before we could get into the parking lot and park.

Picture of me getting in the car - so very excited to be in the cold that early in the morning! :-)

This is Arrowhead Stadium. An older stadium for sure, but there isn't a bad seat in the place. When looking at this picture, we were in the right upper part of it - pretty much on the Goal Line. You could see the players and you could see the game without having to watch the TV's which in my mind was pretty good.

Here I am.. posing as a Freezing Person.... which I was. No fakers here. Just so you know what I had on at the game.... hot chilis long underwear, jeans, two cowboy shirts, cowboy jersey, Cowboy Jacket, Cowboy scarf, Cowboy hat, and Gloves. I was still chilly and could have used a few more layers.

Here's John - my handsome and happy husband....where's his jacket you might ask? well... being such a manly man, he didn't even feel the cold!! (Technically, I was wearing his jacket... his scarf... his warm hat. :-)

These were the really nice KC folks who were tailgating next to us in the parking lot. Take notice of how these guys (who are the regulars here) are dressed!!! Blankets... head scarves... major jackets/gloves. My husband... short sleeve shirt. They kept asking him if he was cold. They were very nice folks and shared some of their KC BBQ with us prior to the game.

Warming up with a cold beer! ha ha ha He's showing off his new Bob Lilly shirt. His other one, worn every game for 13 years, finally needed to be retired.

A view from our seats! Miles Austin made the game winning touchdown right in front of us!! YAY COWBOYS!!

As a note - the stadium was probably filled with 50% Dallas Cowboy fans. Lots of Blue were in the stands!!

Luckily - the Cowboys pulled out a win in OT so the rest of the day, the trip home on Monday and the rest of the week will be nice around our house!!

Have a great week!!

MA

Trying to get Motivated

2009-10-09T06:31:00.003-05:00

So.. I've been a bad blogger of late. Have had to play the catch up game from my time spent on Jury Duty but really, have just been tired and not very motivated and not a lot to say!! Although.. I'm sure there were things to say.

This past weekend was fun with my parents visiting, sitting in the rain at band competition, traveling to the Woodlands to watch a cross country meet, and the Sunday recovery from the really busy day on Saturday! I have pictures too!! Ok.. I'll get them out here.

Good thing - today is Friday. We're going to see a lot of rain today and THANKFULLY, cooler temps as this week has been just like July here with the heat and humidity!! YUCK!! Can't wait for a little cooler, less wet air. Have to go through a bit of rumbling thunder and light show to get it, but it'll be here soon.

Friday Night Lights are sort of questionable around here this evening waiting on the storm. But, if possible, we'll be back out watching the incredible marching band (their show really is REALLY good!) and supporting our football team!!

Trying something new here:

TEN THINGS ABOUT TODAY:

1) I will work a lot today!

2) I will talk to my Mom on the phone.

3) My daughter will wear her pretty Homecoming Mum today at school and the game!

4) We will make our pilgrimage to the High School Football stadium this evening, barring any rain.

5) We will watch the Band march their great show (if no rain)

6) It will get much wetter and cooler today! (YAY)

7) Our 90+ degrees and 99% humidity will end today!! (YAY)

8) Stephen wrote an email to KSBJ to ask them to play his favorite song this morning - Wait & See by Brandon Heath

9) My husband is plotting to create the perfect plan for the Cowboy Game on Sunday.

10) I will think about scrapbooking.... but not actually get to do it today!

There you go!

Jury Duty Summons... turned into 4 days on a Jury Trial!!

2009-10-01T17:55:00.002-05:00

So - I haven't been able to talk about it until now.....

I mentioned on Sunday that I was summoned for jury duty for the first time ever in my adult life. 42 years of age and I had never been summoned for this civic duty before now. I was asked to show up at the Galveston County Courthouse at 11:15 am. At that time, all the potential jurors are checked in and then we get to view a video about how important being a juror is to our judicial system. Interesting... ok, so I feel empowered!! :-)

From that point, we are assigned to a specific court. We then go to lunch and come back directly to that court. At that time, we are shuffled around and put in order 1 - 37 in our case. The first time they did this, I ended up as #8 on the panel and that really wasn't good. Would have a high likelihood to be on the jury. Darn it!! Then, for some reason (learned what it was later), they shuffled the deck again and I ended up #21 on the panel. Seemed to be a better place to be because they would have had to strike at least 9 people in front of me to end up on the jury. Obviously... it didn't turn out that way in the end.

The attorneys then go to work asking general questions and then more specific questions if they wish. I was asked two questions specific to my job and John's job. That was it.

The attorneys struck 10 people in front of me so I ended up being seated as Juror #11 on this civil trial. Go figure... first time ever called... get seated!! Amazing.

I won't go blow by blow through the whole thing, but the basic gist of the case was the Plaintiff and Defendant were involved in a Motor Vehicle Accident and the Plaintiff was suing the Defendant (actually insurance co - although we weren't allowed to know that until afterwards) for back/neck pain & suffering, medical bills, etc. They took until Weds afternoon to present the case and all the arguments by the lawyers and then close. The jury received the case to begin deliberation on it Weds at 3 pm. We were there Weds until 6 pm and again today from 8:45 am through 4:00 pm when we finished and had a verdict.

In the end, the Plaintiff didn't really make his case well. He was awarded a small sum of money but nothing like what several members of the jury wanted to award him. I was pretty much the cog in the wheel because the evidence was really not there nor was the plaintiff a very credible witness. I just couldn't get much beyond -0- for the most part. I felt pretty good in the end because after it was all said and done, the Judge came to talk with us. One of the jurors asked how he thought we did in our analysis and verdict, and he basically corroborated everything I had said about the case being weak, not enough evidence, no expert medical witnesses, and a plaintiff that is not very believable. YAY ME!! I really was on the right track!! I thought so and felt a lot better about being as difficult as I was.

Now it's back to the real world and my P.A.Y.I.N.G. J.O.B.!!!! I have tons of stuff to do after this unexpected 4 days off!!

Meme & Poppy are coming in tomorrow to run around with us in our busy weekend coming up. Football Game Friday, Marching Contest Saturday, and Cross-County Meet on Saturday.

See ya!!

MA

Last week.....& Jury Duty!!

2009-09-28T07:50:00.002-05:00

We survived another week. Stress at work. Running around escorting kids every which way.

It was a blessing to get to Friday night. Friday Night Football Game at Texas City - Friendswood won handily.

Saturday - Stephen had a cross-country meet up at Houston Christian High School on the north west side. He didn't do all that well this week because he didn't fuel his body correctly. Hopefully, he'll "get it" for next weekend.

We had a great lunch at Pappas Burger - yummy!!

Then headed home where I turned into a couch potato and watched ALL the shows I had DVR'd all week long. Loved the premieres.... House, NCIS, Grey's Anatomy, CSI, and the new show - Flash Forward. Another week... more DVR'd shows at some point since I don't get to see many of them in real time. :-)

Stephen had a baseball game on Sunday afternoon and did VERY VERY well!! Made a couple of great plays at his 2nd base position. AND .... had a great line drive down over the first baseman's head to get on base. YAY Stephen!!!

For the FIRST TIME EVER - I have Jury Duty today. 42 years old and have never before been called for Jury Duty. Weird huh? So... headed to Galveston (live in the northernmost tip of Galveston County) this morning to see if I get picked. YUCK!!! Best wishes ok... don't have time for a jury, but will do whatever I'm asked.

See ya!!

MA

Where or Where has the Cox Family been? Where o where??

2009-09-20T10:10:00.002-05:00

We’ve been here.

Last Sunday it began as a cough. Then a headache on Sunday night. I went to bed early really hoping that I wasn’t getting sick. Unfortunately, that indeed was the case. Woke up on Monday morning and added fever and body aches to the list of ailments. Yuck!!!

I haven’t been really sick - as in miss work too long sick - in a long, long time. I missed three days of work this week. Really couldn’t get out of bed for very long for three days. By Thursday, I was feeling more human approaching nomral, but still running a low fever. But, felt well enough to work from home both Thursday and Friday.

Felt much better by Friday, perhaps 85%, and even ventured out to the Friday night Friendswood Football Game against Nederland. Friendswood was victorious 42 - 7 I think. More importantly, was able to see Rachel performing in her her football training duties giving water to all those football players and then watch her march in the really fabulous Band show. It was really good. They performed Movements 1 - 4 of their show Converge and it was really good. Can’t wait to see Movement 5 and I hear it’s better than 1 - 4 all together! chop chop kiddos. First competition in two weeks.

Thank the Lord for my husband - he took care of everything and everyone this week while I was Miss Sicky. The kids did their thing... school and activities.

Stephen had a cross-country meet this weekend up in the Woodlands. I don’t have any pictures because I didn’t make the drive up there since they were with their Dad this weekend and it’s a really, really long way up there 6:30 am. However, I hear he improved on his time from the first meet by about 20 seconds which is fabulous! His run was 1.5 miles and he did it around 13 min 30 sec. Very proud of him!! He’s working so hard and pushing through all the new runner aches and pains. Good job my son!! Another race next weekend!

Last night, John hosted his annual New Teacher Meeting (aka Party) at our house. While this sounds all altruistic and such, it’s just an word play to make it through all the work filters and is actually a party for all the teachers.. not just the new ones. Wild party at that. They were here until about 2:00 am folks!! When was the last time I saw 2:00 am with people still awake at my house??? Um.... wait.... I can’t remember. Yea.. that long. As usual, my fabulous, wonderful, and amazing husband did all the prep work for this party - cooking, cleaning, shopping, etc. Me... I just sat here and ate bon bons all day. :-) Ok Ok ...lest you think I don’t do anything.....of course, I helped. :-) He cooked some absolutely fabulous BBQ last night - brisket, ribs, chicken and sausage. As well as his famously good beans. We have tons of left overs for the week which is wonderful as well!! Makes the evenings so much easier.

We had fun watching the Longhorns win over the Texas Tech Raiders!! YAY!! HOOK EM HORNS!! and then proceeded to attempt to play Guitar Hero!! It’s pretty funny watching the older folks playing the teen game. Began with just trying to figure out how to turn it all on and link up the guitars and went downhill from there... LOL

It’s Sunday ... so that means... it must be Dallas Cowboy time..... Dallas plays tonight in their Home Opener at their incredible new stadium against the NY Giants.

John won Week 1 of Football picks! He’s very proud of himself. 1 of many I tell him.... just 1 of many.

Here are a few pictures I gathered from this past week.

Enjoying the first season game!!

Rachel's place for the game.

Stephen's place for the game

Rene was visiting with his boys to watch the game!

Me!

Friendswood's Game Last Friday...

Where's Rachel?? She in the dead center - short one in the grey shirt amongst the big football players. This is her "Sports Training" gig she signed up for this year. You may need to go to Flickr and click on this picture to really see her.

Have a Great Week!!
MA

Football... Band... More Football....

2009-09-13T10:05:00.002-05:00

It’s that time again folks. Time for us to become engrained in both the Friday Night Lights of high school football as well as the Sunday Fun of NFL and the Dallas Cowboys!!

Let’s start with Friday Night Football ..... Friendswood Mustangs vs. Brazoswood

Away game down in Freeport, TX. It was threatening to rain all day and evening but the football game went on and so did the band. I chaperoned this game for the band kids and it was the first game I had attended which is the second game of the season. I was having flashbacks all night long with all the great memories I have from my band days 25 years ago. It’s truly amazing that it’s been that long because it just doesn’t feel like it.

Long bus ride and luckily, the weather was actually pretty nice down there in Freeport with the wind blowing somewhat nicely keeping the air feeling a little cool. Unfortunately, the actual football game was pretty boring the first half with the score at the half Brazoswood 21 Friendswood 0. Halftime was great watching the kids march their show albeit backwards since they were facing the Home side for their show. Second half was better for the Mustangs - scoring 18 points. The game ended with the Brazoswood Bucs winning over the Mustangs with a score of 28 -18.

Football is on tap each and every Friday through the first Friday in November, barring any post season play.

I took lots of pictures of the Band on Friday and here are a few. More in the Gallery.

Miss Rachel

Warming up for their performance!

Storms were Looming at the Friday Night Lights

Football!!

NEXT....... Dallas Cowboy Opening Game today against the Tampa Bay Bucs in Tampa Bay!! Noon game which means John started cooking the Game Day Meal yesterday and it’s been slowly cooking all night. Rene and his boys are coming over to watch the game and we’re all going to be feasting on John’s Menudo and Carnitas very shortly!!

Our special Game Day Cowboy clothing for each of us has been packed away until this morning when it was pulled out and placed very lovingly on our beds for each of us to wear once we have eaten!! No eating allowed in the special clothes according to the Dallas Task Master.

Our family wagering has begun as well and John is telling me the only reason I won last year was because he just wasn’t paying attention last year. I wonder what the excuse was for the year before?? :-) Anyway.... we’re making our picks again for this year with weekly winners and awards (not sure yet what those are, ideas welcome) and end of season awards. Let the games begin!

Back later with pictures and comments from the day!!

PS - The Cowboys thankfully won today so it was a good evening at the Cox House!

One Year Ago THIS Weekend - Hurricane Ike
This weekend a year ago, we were scurrying around every day looking for gas to fuel the power generator. We were living off grilled foods and hurricane supplies trying not to open the refrigerators or freezers very much. We were very lucky to have a generator too!! We didn’t have air conditioning and while Saturday was a miserable day and night without it, God blessed us on Sunday with a cool front that made it very bearable to be without the comforts we are normally accustomed too. We were blessed in that our power came back up on Monday evening and while we had already made the necessary plans to be able to power the TV with generator for the Monday Night Cowboy Game, we didn’t have to in the end with our power coming back up! Luckily, AT&T had their network up and running.

We were blessed to not have any major issues to deal with in the aftermath of Ike. If you’re interested in reading about our experiences with the hurricane, go back through the Archives to September 11 and start reading forward. I went and read them again. I wouldn’t have been able to do that had I not been keeping a blog. I wouldn’t have all those memories written down like I do without it. I’m so glad I started this blog!!

Stephen is a Cross-Country Runner!!

2009-09-07T10:59:00.000-05:00

Stephen has taken on a new sport as 7th grade begins. He hasn’t given up baseball, but at school, baseball is a Spring sport. Thus... he wanted to be involved in a Fall sport as well. Choices - soccer, football, cross-country. He can run for a very, very long time and keep up and he is actually pretty fast. We’ve noticed this in him. So, perhaps cross-country might be a good thing to do.

John thinks it’s too bad he won’t try football... he’s fast enough to run right through a lot of folks. Unfortunately, he weighs pretty much next to nothing and any little bump by one of those big boys would send him flying. I don’t blaming him for saying absolutely not.

He’s been running for a couple of weeks and had his first meet on Saturday. He did very well for his first meet. His feet and knees have been bothering him as his body gets used to running. We also found out (on the day of the meet) that he had taken out the insoles in his shoes for some reason and perhaps, that might have been contributing to his sore feet and knees! Have no idea why he took those out....

Anyway... he did well on Saturday for his first 1.5 mile run. Finished about mid pack. He felt as if he was going to throw up after he was done! Poor thing. He still wants to run again, so it must not have been too awful!!

We’ll have to keep him eating though if he’s going to start running!

Here are some pics from the Cross-Country meet! There are plenty more in the Flickr gallery link on the right. Enjoy.

Happy Anniversary Mom & Dad!!

2009-09-06T11:13:00.004-05:00

On September 5, 1964, my parents, Austin & Walter, pledged to live their lives loving each other.

Where: St. Marks Episcopal Church , San Antonio, TX

45 Years..... Really. Really?? Yes, REALLY.

Let’s see - what has transpired over 45 years?? Well, honestly, I have no idea. That would take my parents sitting down and recalling from their perspective the events of the last 45 years!! My lil ‘ol perspective will appear below. I’m hoping that this will inspire my parents to do some fill in the blanks once they read it because if they don’t, this is all that we will have in the book of knowledge. It’s possible my sisters can do some adding to this list from their own perspectives, but seriously.... fill it in folks.

1964 Wedding of the Year in San Antonio Texas

1964 Living in Austin, Texas in a cool duplex (there are pictures) with a beautiful little dog named Laddie (I think)

1966 Move to Ponca City, Oklahoma (don’t know where or on what street, as I was not quite born yet)

1967 Birth of their first (and most wonderful - I can say that, I’m the one writing) daughter - Mary Austin

1968 Move to Houston, Texas - Prism Lane

1969 Birth of their second daughter - Perry

1972 Birth of their third daughter - Stacey

1976 Move to new house in Houston, Texas - Thornwick Lane
Mary Austin goes to camp for 6 weeks in New Mexico and her family moves to a different HOME without telling her. Came home to new house on Thornwick in West Houston. :-) (I’m certain there is a whole different story there, but that’s how my brain remembers it, and it, of course, is all about me.)

1977 - 1985 Still living in Houston, TX - Endured Mary Austin’s terrible junior high years, followed by the wonderful high school years. :-) (You have to admit, they were better than junior high). Survived going to Stacey’s soccer games and all the band commitments for all of us for many years! Survived health scare with Perry at Texas Children’s. Survived back issues and kidney stones on occasion. Survived many, many, many (how many “many”’s is too many?) long days and nights of homework and projects. Survived cooking meals for 6:30 dinners each and every night. Survived shopping, buying, carting and moving large screen projected TV’s on the NCAA Basketball Championship night because “DAD” just had to have it (even though he didn’t know about it). Survived boyfriends you hated and boyfriends you liked. Even boy friends who liked to come over and play games with the parents. Survived teenagers driving by themselves without tooooooo much damage to physical bodies (either theirs, anyone elses or the cars). Dad changed jobs once or twice in this period (don’t know when, don’t remember where - see the blanks that need to be filled in??). Survived all the changing fashion statements and thank the Lord, got away from dressing all three of us alike!! :-) Didn’t lose the big giant glasses though for awhile. Survived 40th Birthday parties (don’t think policemen really act like that in real life) and graveyards popping up in the front yard. Not one of us EVER went to jail or even came close (unless there’s something I haven’t been told..... is possible.) Survived many of our teenager friends dropping by on Sundays at 5:30 pm in HOPES of being asked to stay for Dad’s fabulous fajitas he served before they became popular in any restaurants. Endured one of us (was that me?) bringing home one cat (Kitty) who ended having another cat (Callie) and both living MUCH longer than anyone would have ever, ever thought. Long after we were all out of the house and gone.

1985 Move to San Antonio, Texas La Casa Blanca on Seidel
Beautiful, unique house. MA went off to college in Austin so while she wasn’t there living life with you in person, you felt it in the pocketbook. :-) (Thank you!) Perry & Stacey still living at home. Became very involved with church at this point. Another opportunity to add facts as I was otherwise preoccupied at this point in life with college at UT.

1990 - Present (yes, that’s 20 years, I know... but breaking it down isn’t real easy as I can’t remember any of the actual years, at this point.)

So.... Mom & Dad move to Corpus Christi, then to Houston, then to the Hill Country in Boerne where they live today.

Daughters - 2 Weddings (financed by Mom & Dad) , 2 Divorces and 1 Second Wedding during this time.

Six (6) Grandchildren born over this timeframe - Rachel (93), Macie (96), Stephen (97), Holley (99), Scott (99), and Allie (03)

Many chickens and miniature horses are raised and cared for.

Many gardens are grown.

Many tough decisions are made.

Finally.... (ok... so that was the abbreviated speed version....)

PRESENT DAY -

45 years later.... living in Boerne, Texas surrounded by friends, family and loved ones!! Retired and enjoying life as much as they can.

Love you both!!

Happy Anniversary!!

MA

Sunday, August 30

2009-08-30T21:07:00.003-05:00

So ... we are just living life and I've not been a very good blogger these days. It was an ultra busy week with everything starting again last week.

Days are really long with schedules such that we are up at 5:00 am every morning and a couple of us out of the house by 5:30 am. Not winding things down at night until 10 or 10:30 pm makes for some very, very tired adults & kids by the end of the week. Rachel's day on Friday was absolutely crazy actually ... at school for band practice by 6:00 am and I was picking her up at school at 9:00 pm after the high school scrimmage game where she had to work in her trainer capacity. Craziness... craziness...... she claimed she wasn't tired but she fell asleep within 1 hour of coming home and sitting on the couch. :-)

So tired that we really didn't do a blessed thing this weekend. The only thing we accomplished this weekend was figuring out how to connect the computer to the TV so we could watch the Dallas Cowboys game that was blacked out here in Houston last night.

New week coming up right now.... parent night at the new school... band... baseball... etc. Good times!!

Will come up with something fun to write about soon.

Bring on the Homework!!!

2009-08-24T21:26:00.003-05:00

Oh.. we're back. We're really back into the thick of things now. School has started yet again in the cycle of life.

John has gone back to work. Not very thrilled. Heck, I wish I had had 2.5 months off work. Geez... and not have 12 Million emails waiting for me when I got back. It's like a fresh slate. I go for two weeks and have 1200 emails to wade through. Somehow.. it's just not the same.

Rachel - first day at Friendswood High School as a sophomore!! 10th Grader!! Truly... I can't really have a 10th grader do I?? Hard to believe. I don't have any pictures of her first day because the sophomores, juniors and seniors didn't have to go to school until almost noon because they held the freshman orientation this morning. So... she wasn't up and dressed when it was time to take Stephen to school. However.. I'll get one sometime this week.

Stephen - different story. He started last week actually, but here are some pictures of his first day of 7th grade at Lutheran South Academy. New school.. new faces.. new experiences. All very good so far! He's running cross - country this fall for sports at school. Fall Baseball begins tomorrow evening with the first practice!!

Note his "spiky" hair. LSA is all uniform too so he looks quite sharp!! He's got his middle school coolness going now (deodorant, gel in the hair and everything!) .

So... we're off on the school races!!! On to Day 2!!

Tuesday, August 18

2009-08-18T08:00:00.002-05:00

Getting ready for school around here. School supply shopping. Clothes shopping. Various Registrations. Picking up of Books, instruments, etc. You name it... we're probably doing it!

Today the kids have their annual checkups and any random vaccinations. I think Stephen may have to have one (I haven't told him yet) and hoping Rachel doesn't. Otherwise, we have to go through that whole fainting thing with her. Perhaps they'll believe me at the pedi's office since she's done it a couple of times there.

Stephen starts his new school tomorrow. He's very excited. Went over there yesterday for Book Day. You don't actually get your Books... but you go through and sign up for all the things you need and then you pay for your books at the end along with everything else... i.e. PE clothes, bible, etc. etc. Expensive days right now let me tell you.

Rachel's registration is tomorrow. How very delightful!

Off to work now for a little bit then take them to the doctor... then work some more... then go to a Band Booster club meeting tonight.

Have a great Tuesday!

We're still here....

2009-08-12T20:34:00.002-05:00

Just catching up with life right now.

Registration for Band happened on Saturday and I've had a lot of work inputting all the names etc. into the accounting system. Takes quite awhile.

Work is busy - went to New Orleans today on business. Luckily, I caught the earlier plane by an hour because as soon as I got in my car in Houston, the skies opened up with rain, hail, incredible lightning and thunder. Could not even see in front of me and watched as the lightening took out several transformers right in front of me. Yikes.... took over an hour to get home from Hobby Airport. Normally, would have taken me 20 minutes.

Stephen has his Middle School orientation on Friday!! Very exciting going into 7th Grade and a whole new school with new people to make friends with. His new school has mandatory uniforms so had to go buy all the goods for him to wear. He's very excited about this year. Prayers for a good year. He starts school in a week - on the 19th.

Rachel doesn't start school until the 24th but she might have well have started on August 3 with Band that is noon - 9 pm most every day. She also decided she's dropping soccer and has decided to be a part of the Athletic Trainers. Apparently, they love her in there so she went up and asked on Monday and voila, she's in. Goes to show how often she's had to go in for ice packs, etc. while in soccer. Why the change? Well, she loves to play soccer and she plays pretty decently, but she's not probably going to ever make a varsity team. She'd be happy to play on a junior varsity team all day long as long she is enjoying the game. However, the soccer coach up at our high school is really a very mean lady - terrible to the girls, uninspiring, awful in my opinion. The things she says and does to these kids is appalling to me and I'm not the one having to live through it, just listen to it. Is it just my kid and this coach don't get a long? No... after some of my own research, it's not that at all. She's just that terrible to the kids and shouldn't even be there. Why is she? 1 guess.... her teams keep winning.

So, she's decided that she just doesn't want to deal with it any more. I have to say I don't really blame her. There isn't a thing she can do to make it better nor can I. Now, she's just going to make friends with all the other athletes while helping them on the training side.... I'm not even sure what it means except that she has to be up at the school now 2 or 3 days a week in the mornings at 5:30 am to be able to help the football players during practice from 5:30 - 8:30 am. :-0 Even earlier than band which is 6:00 am when school starts!!

What's the countdown until she gets a driver's license???? 80 days or so..... :-)

Friday, Friday, Friday.....

2009-08-07T22:16:00.002-05:00

I can honestly say, I've never before been so happy to see a Friday!! Wow.. what a week this has been.

Going on vacation is great .... but really hard when you come back to catch up with your life, both personal and work.

I came back to just about 1200 emails in my work email inbox. That is insane. Not too many of them have I just been able to hit delete and move on! I've made it through about half of them this week along with all the new requests/questions/etc. coming in this week. Holy smokes!!

Stephen had his cardiology appointment this week that we had been waiting for since June. Great news and thank you Jesus, he's just fine. Normal EKG yesterday. The doc thinks his fainting may be due to not enough fluids and the fact he may have something similar to his sisters vasal vagal fainting issues which, while not altogether normal, are not life threatening. His heart is just fine. We can start the meds again which is a good thing for him (and us). However, the tough part is he's grown 2 inches and gained 5 pounds since we last measured him. Off the meds, he's been eating so much better and his growth is showing it. Hard to want to put him back on them, but he will need them for school. It's a conundrum....

If I didn't mention it perhaps in May, I agreed to take on the volunteer position for this year in the Band Booster Club of Treasurer. I may live to regret it. We'll see. This weekend will probably let me know. This is the big Registration weekend where all 250+ families will come through tomorrow and have to check out with me and a few helpers. I've had to prepare lots and lots and lots of stuff in order to get ready for this and then will have to enter and account for it all.

Pray for patience and energy!!

Please pray for John and Rene this weekend. They are over in Piedras Negras for their annual charity football game. It's a bit dicey on the border towns right now so please pray for their safety and a good game.

Later!!

We're HOME!!!!

2009-08-02T21:12:00.002-05:00

Well... we made it home late today from our fabulous trip!! I think we've had enough of each other by now so we unpacked the car and we all went to our separate corners for some alone time. Pretty funny huh!

It's back to reality tomorrow - work for me and band starts for Rachel.

Boys Trip to Nowhere - July 29 - 31, 2009

2009-08-01T08:04:00.003-05:00

As I mentioned in my Blog - all the Boys left the Gals and went off to the Land of Nowhere for a rustic adventure of bonding, fishing and roughing it. You’ve already seen what the girls did while they were out - see that post HERE. We were very civilized and had a great time. The Boys had a fabulous time as well on their rustic adventure.

First up - the setting for the adventure: Quarter Circle Circle Ranch located high in mountains about 50 miles south of Gunnison, CO and not even on pavement. You have to know it’s there to find it. It’s a working horse ranch with parents, two children. They have Palomino horses - 7 roam and are friendly, 2-3 stabled, goats, chickens and geese. They have a booming business in the Fall/Winter for hunting season and have consistent fishing visitors through the Summer as well.

The following are thoughts from both John and Stephen that I gathered while we were driving from Almont, CO to Amarillo, TX yesterday. Hopefully, my Dad and Scott will have a chance to give me their thoughts at some point as well.

Going out together just as boys was a good opportunity for the different male generations of the family to be together, to share the experience of staying in a rustic cabin enjoying the beautiful country and to share a common hobby like fishing. It is an experience that hopefully the boys will look back upon with fondness. We hope to make this a yearly trip.

All the boys - Walter, John, Stephen and Scott - took off from Crested Butte South Tuesday morning in the Jeep packed with our camping and fishing gear. Unfortunately, we arrived too late on the first day to really do much fishing. Instead, the younger boys played with some other boys staying in another cabin while the big boys setup everything and relaxed a bit. John cooked a great hamburger and bratz dinner for everyone and we all just lounged around that evening listening to Poppy tell us great stories.

There is no electricity at these cabins so any light to be had was given off by kerosene lamps. It did rain a bit the first night.

The next day, everyone got up and John made coffee on the wood burning stove early in the morning. Breakfast was simple stuff like honey buns for the boys. Went fishing to Pauline Creek which was about 15 miles away. Drove the Jeep off road a bit and then climbed down the hill to reach the creek. John found himself walking through flowers that bees were visiting and an unfriendly bee decided to sting John to shoo him away! Being John the Great means even when stung, you don’t stop.

Stephen was leading the group down the mountain until Poppy took over the lead. Fishing in this creek was fun. Scott caught two fish today in this creek - small trout. No one else was successful, but we had a good time fishing. Finished our fishing late afternoon and returned up the mountain and back to the cabin for dinner. It rained today too several times. John cooked Bratwurst, hamburgers and beans for dinner today (again). Went to bed early and got up early the next morning.

Everyone took a shower in the outdoor shower (hot/cold water). Went fishing again today at a creek about 5 miles away. It was a windy day fishing there. Poppy caught one fish. Fished there for quite awhile - about 3.5 hours. Headed back to the cabin and loaded everything up for the drive back to CB South.

A few things about the Ranch and Cabins -

Outhouse - there was no indoor plumbing in the cabins - which meant the restroom facilities were in the form of an Outhouse. It was about 50 feet from the cabin. The boys tell us it was clean.

Spring Fed Pond with/Well House - This is where you go with a pail for water for cooking/drinking/storing food items that need to be kept cool. This was a job for the boys who would go with buckets and retrieve the water.

Interesting historical tidbit about this place/water spring - This is where the Ute Indians used to camp during the summertime. After the Ute Indians, it was a stop on the Stage route from Gunnison to somewhere for stagecoaches heading to Gunnison. Wonder if the Wells Fargo Stages went through here?

Milking Goats - they each got to try their hand at milking goats! I think everyone but Scott tried it. Stephen thought it was cool.

Wood Burning Stove - John LOVED cooking with the wood burning stove. But, of course he would if you know him. The MORE Rustic the Better. He says it took a little talent to get it going but apparently, he figured it out as he did set off the smoke/CO2 alarm at one point!!

Kerosene Lamp - Your light comes via kerosene lamp. No electricity. Means... no heat either. John said you would use the wood burning stove to keep the place warm all night long.

Favorites from the Adventure!

Stephen’s favorite thing was fishing.

John loved the isolation part of being out there. He wouldn’t mind it if it had been further away from the main cabin and he’d like to have stayed more days.
He’d like to go and then go on a pack trip. He also found it interesting that the 4 wheeler has replaced the horse as the mode of transportation on a ranch - or at least this ranch. In the time it took for someone to saddle up the horse, the guy just got on his 4 wheeler and rounded up the horses to get in the corral. Interesting, indeed.

PS - Not many fish were caught - 3 little ole fish. The Gals were expecting a whole bushel of fish to come home. Thus, our trout dinner was supplemented with chili dogs!! :-)

*****************************************************************************
Couple of Other Notes:

We made it to Amarillo last night and had a great Mexican dinner at El Tejavan on I40. Highly recommend it.

It’s a lot warmer here than in Colorado (boo hiss)

A Bear visited the CB South house where my sister, Perry, rented and my parents as well as my other sister, Stacey and her kids are all staying. Apparently, that trout dinner we had the other night was a little too smelly in the trash as the Bear ripped open the “Bear Proof” trashcan to get to it. Apparently, said Trash can sits right outside Perry’s window which was OPEN that night so it was a bit scary I hear. I probably would have been a bit petrified myself. Wow!!

We’re off to Dallas tonight to see Laila & Justin, talk scrapbooking, and run by the new Dallas Cowboy Pro Shop.

Day 15 - Almont, CO - July 31, 2009

2009-07-31T07:56:00.004-05:00

River Rafting Pictures from yesterday!!

Yes - it was REALLY cold water.

No - we did not fall in the river although there were a couple of times that it was very, very close. It was a very fun, fun ride. The river has calmed down now from it's originally III+/IV rating rapids. It's now Class II/III+ rapids. Still possible to fall over board but luckily for us - a little less.

We had a great guide named Adam who is Ski Patrol in the winter here at CB.

Adventure thrill loving Rachel rode "The Bull"! She sat up front with her feet hanging over the front of the raft with a guy (Scott from Denver) holding on to her life jacket. She rode like this through a rapid called "The Last Chance". Here are the pics - funny! I'm in the back on the right keeping a close eye on her. She's so adventurous! I am just trying to hang on for dear life.

The Boys all returned from their fabulous Guys Trip to the land of nowhere. It was quite rustic. John is trying to figure out how to talk me into going. HA HA HA HA HA ... shouldn't have brought pictures. I told him perhaps he and Rene should take a week and go up next summer. I'll stay home with my indoor plumbing.

I have lots of pictures to compile and will do that on our long drive back into Texas tonight as well as a post about their trip while I have them captive in the car for a few hours today.

One hint - our Trout dinner last night was supplemented with chili dogs!!! :-)

Off to pack up now to start heading back to Texas!!

MA

Day 14 - Almont, CO - July 30, 2009

2009-07-30T09:02:00.003-05:00

Darn it!! Darn it!! Darn it!!!

This is our last FULL day here in this beautiful country before we start heading back to Texas!! I wouldn't mind this kind of life all the time..... just fishing, playing, relaxing... whatever... all the time!! Hmmmm.... guess I should keep buying those lottery tickets then huh.

Ok - enough of the "Sorry for me" stuff. Below is one of my favorite pictures of this trip (and I have a lot of favorites). This is summer stuff here. Picture of my youngest niece, Allie.

The Stinky Boys are still up in the high country roughin it and should be back later today. I'm sure they'll be stinky when they all return.

I caught a really good size trout yesterday - bigger than all the others so far and we'll see what the Stinky Boys bring home.

Rachel and I are leaving in 30 minutes to go on a river raft trip on Class III/IV rapids. I'm really not sure why I let her talk me into this. It's been a long... long... time since I've ridden on rapids like this. She's very, very excited .... I'm a little bit nervous actually. Just hoping I don't end up in the 40 degree water is all I have to say.

I'll fill you in when I'm back.

Day 13 - Almont, CO - July 28, 2009

2009-07-29T08:01:00.003-05:00

I think Day 13 is Tuesday although I’m writing this on Wednesday early am. The really, really nice thing about vacation is you tend to lose track of the day and date when you don’t have to deal with the real world or wait for the next Friday to come around!! My only concept of the days right now is what day are we rafting (Thurs) and how many more days (only 2) do we have left before we have to head back to HOT Texas!!

Here is the fish count as of Tuesday!

There were two BIG STORIES yesterday! The first is all the GUYS left us GALS at home and went off to a place waaaayyyyyy up in the mountains for some guy time in a very rustic place for a couple of days. Dad, John, Stephen and Scott all left us to head up to Quarter Circle Circle Ranch. Link is HERE if you want to check it out. Not sure where the name came from other than it has to probably have something to do with their Quarter Horse business. It’s about 2 hours from Almont back south kind of close to Lake City/Creede area where we were late last week but higher in the mountains.

Did I say rustic?.... yes....yes, I did. The definition of the word in this case means no electricity and the facilities are in an outhouse! LOL... oh... have fun boys.

The GALS were happily waving goodbye to the boys. We don’t mind having some time to ourselves to shop and eat bon bons. :-) ha ha ha

The second BIG STORY from yesterday is that Rachel caught a good size trout in our fishing expedition yesterday! She’s the only one of the 8 of us Gals left that caught a fish yesterday. We could literally see them jumping out of the water but other than her catch, the others weren’t biting on our flies too much. Was frustrated because you could see the little buggers and you’d put your fly right where you just know they are and they wouldn’t take it. Maybe we weren’t using the right flies. It’s the Guys fault - they took all the good ones .....

Back to the Second Big Story - Rachel’s fish. Catching it was fun.... but oh... cleaning it was more entertaining!! LOL... I have a whole video of this and it’ll make you cry from laughing so hard. Hopefully, I’ll be able to get it to YouTube at some point because it’s both hilarious and gross at the same time. The ONE AND ONLY time we have missed the GUYS was THEN!! No one left at the house - 4 adult women, 2 teenage girls and 2 girl children - had ever cleaned a fish nor did we ever want to. Before the BIG GUYS left, we asked them how to do this and they happily described to us how to clean the fish. Hmmmmm...... One by one all the adults exclaimed they were not touching the fish. We all decided that since Rachel caught it, she should have to clean it!! (Almost makes me not want to catch another one today.... ). And... she did.... while we were all watching, laughing and being grossed out at the same time. Absolutely hilarious!!! (and gross - yuck!).

Whew ... we made it through Fish Cleaning 101!! Yucky.. yucky.. yucky.....

After that experience, we all piled into the cars and headed into Crested Butte for dinner and some walking around the little town. It’s a cute little place with some of the most beautiful flower baskets I’ve ever seen. They are all over the place almost at every store along the way. Very pretty! We had a pizza dinner that was really good at Brick Oven which seems to be the happening place. Lots of young, heathy, attractive people hanging out there.

I couldn’t help but wonder what people do in Crested Butte to earn a living that would even begin to pay for the cost of living there?? I mean come on... it’s expensive to stay... its expensive to eat... its expensive to do anything. Maybe they are all just wealthy trust fund babies. I’m not knocking it - I wish I were!! :-)

So we ate some good pizza and took a stroll along the little town sidewalks meandering in and out of some stores. Eventually fed everyone some ice cream cones which were a happy hit and then made our way back home for a little bit of game playing!

We’re going fishing again today.... not sure whether I want best wishes to catch them or not as I really, really don’t want to clean em. :-) If Rachel were smart, she’d come up with an effective cost for her fish cleaning services as none of the adults want to do it.

MA

Day 12 - Almont, CO - July 28, 2009

2009-07-28T08:53:00.002-05:00

We are TWELVE days into our vacation and we FINALLY got to a real fishing day. And I mean... a real fishing day!! Unfortunately, not long enough but it was successful.

All TWELVE of us made our way following Poppy (aka my Dad) to THE spot for today. We were going to fish some beaver ponds up near the Spring Creek Reservoir. Why this place? Well, a couple of reasons.

1) Not to tough for the kids - they can stand on the side and not have to struggle with moving water while learning to fish.
2) Easier on the teachers in the crowd - aka Poppy and Perry - who were charged with having to teach ALL of us how to fly fish properly
3) Easier on Meme (aka my Mom) to be able to get out and watch us without too much exercise while she’s still adjusting to the altitude

Imagine - the prep work for TWELVE people to go fishing together!!

Ensuring everyone has the correct shoes, clothing
Lunches/beverages have to be packed
Fishing Gear for 12 have to be packed
Everyone has to get in the cars ... :-)
Fishing Licenses for the 6 grownups have to be obtained
Driving to the location
Setup of the Rods (entire section below about this one..... )

We had a great time once we got there!! Truly...

Ok - so a moment about the fishing equipment we are using. Poppy is an avid fisherman and has been for most all of his life. He doesn’t get to fish as much as I’m sure he’d like to but he has enough equipment to outfit seven of us (not including his and Meme’s which are too expensive to let anyone else handle). At least one of his rods is the one his DAD gave to him long, long ago when he was a kid. Poppy takes extremely good care of his stuff. We were all the lucky beneficiaries of his loving care of this equipment. Made you a little scared to put them in the hands of these kids who have no idea how old and meaningful this stuff is.

The thoughts kept running through my head wondering about the number of times this equipment has been touched by not only my Dad and my Mom over the years but by my grandfather perhaps when teaching my Dad long ago. About how many fish have been caught and the fun times had with these fishing rods. It was indeed an honor for Poppy to let us all use his rods! Hopefully, we don’t mess any of them up!! :-)

Dad also brought tons and tons of flies!! Cute little flies that look like ants, grasshoppers, regular flies, nymphs, etc. etc. That’s good he brought so many because we were pretty efficient at losing them. :-)

Setup of the Rods
There is a setup time (a very long time) required in order to fish. One reason these rods have been around so long is that after each and every fishing expedition, you take the whole thing apart (i.e. separate the rods from the reels) and put each piece back into it’s respective box or container for the next time. Even if the next time is later the same day or the next day. Consequently, when it comes time to putting them all back together, it takes a little bit of time. Doing it for 12 people.... a really long time. We thank both Dad and John for going through all the effort it took to put all those rods together and then tie flies on to each one of them!!

While they were doing all the hard work, much of the rest of the crew decided to just sit down and eat some lunch. Seemed like a good plan while we waited.

One by one the rods became ready and eventually enough were ready that we could start learning to fish. Dad and Perry proceeded to teach each of the grandkids, me, Stacey and John how to handle our fly rods!

How did we do, you ask??

I think we were quite successful on our first day of fishing!! Three fish surrendered to our capable fisherman skills yesterday!! :-) John caught one, Holley caught one and I caught one!! Brown Trout - ranging in size from 6 inches to about 10 inches. I’m told they will be yummy when my Dad cooks them on Thursday night. I’m trying not to be skeptical. The only kind of fish I enjoy is one that I can’t taste the fish. :-) No fishy taste for me.... no sir. My Mom tells me that she doesn’t like the fishy taste either and that my Dad cooks it very well.

One interesting tidbit is a story about my Mom and Dad recounted by my Mom yesterday while we were fishing. Mom & Dad spent their first anniversary (so 1965) up in the same Crested Butte area we are in now camping and fishing. They rented a trailer and camped out somewhere around the area. Given my knowledge of my Mom’s love of camping, I would never have guessed that this even occurred. I would have been wrong!! Mom tells me she is convinced that when she first started fishing, my Dad would make sure that she caught lots and lots of fish. That way, she would enjoy the fishing so much that she’d want to come back which furthered what he wanted which was to camp and fish! (He’s pretty smart that way.) Mom says it worked. She really enjoys fishing a lot now.

This is why we are spending time here this summer - time with Meme & Poppy and all the family making some great memories!

I’ve decided that fishing up here is kind of like playing a slot machine. Huh, you ask? Stay with me. Each time you throw out your line (and you do this a lot), it’s a chance to catch a fish. You toss (ok, throw) out your line, slowly bring it in and hope like crazy that a little fishy takes the bait and you get to yank it out of the water (you win!)!! :-) Here’s my analogy to slot machines. Each time you pull the lever (or just hit the button which is way to easy), you are hoping like crazy that your symbols, numbers, characters, etc. line up and you win! The similarity is that in both cases, the winning occurs very infrequently, but you keep gambling. There you go.....

Ok - so now that I’ve written enough for the first chapter of War and Peace.... I could go on and on with some other stores, but it’s time to go fishing again!! I’ll get some more pictures out soon. Takes a while to upload out in the middle of the forest. Amazing it can even be done!

MA

Combo Post! Days 10 & 11 - Lake City, CO - Almont, CO - July 25/26, 2009

2009-07-26T10:53:00.004-05:00

Good morning to all!!

I’m working on a combo post today because we just didn’t have the internet signal the last couple of days to get one up and we were traveling a bit between cities. We are settled again in Almont, CO, which is just south of Crested Butte.

We’ll catch you up though....

Saturday - Lake City, CO

We didn’t get started until a little later in the morning today. Of course, I was up, but the rest of my family was snoozing. One by one the awoke and we waited for the next one, until finally, I just woke John up when the rest of us were restless. We also made a decision today to leave the Texas Resort and stay Saturday night in Gunnison. Why? Good question. While the Texan Resort was OK, don’t let the “Resort” in that name fool you. Not a “Resort” in the way we think of “Resorts”. In fact, our cabin was down right rustic. There is Really Rustic which means - no electricity, no running water inside the cabin, outhouse. I consider that Really Rustic. The only difference between the Texan and that is there was electricity, running water and the bathroom was inside. The cabin .... though.... very rustic. The flooring was simply ply wood with no flooring over it in many places which made splinters in your tootsies a risk when walking around on it. They did have a refrigerator which didn’t work. When mentioned to the owner, he simply said it would take a week or so to get someone out to fix it. So sorry. It wasn’t bad... it just wasn’t great. And not knowing really what I had reserved up in Almont (for certain), I wanted at least one night in a hotel bed with a nice shower.

But.. before we left, we made a great drive up to Engineer Pass which is at 12,000 elevation. Beautiful drive.... beautiful mountains. The weather changed about half way up to cold and wet again today, so my pictures weren’t quite as good as they could have been had it been sunny and blue outside! No worries though... we got some great pics. See below.

One really interesting thing we saw as that almost to the top - in the Alpine Tundra - someone has built a pretty little house that is only accessible by a bridge over a crevice!! Here are the pictures!! I just had to take them because it was so strange to see this house up here. My thoughts of this were wow, you have to have a lot of extra money to build a house WAYYYY up here, only accessible for four (maybe five) months of the year!!

After our trip up/down Engineer Pass, we packed our stuff and drove the hour into Gunnison to stay at a really nice and new Holiday Inn Express!! Call me spoiled. Yes... I am. And it was nice! We had a pizza dinner tonight at a great place in Gunnison called Pie-Zans. The pizza was excellent and not terribly expensive as many of the other places in the mountains were very expensive.

Sunday - Almont, CO
This morning was another leisurely morning however, this time spent at the Holiday Inn Express! Had a great breakfast here and just lounged until they kicked us out at 11:00 am checkout time!! What’s up with that?? :-)

Packed up the Jeep again which is just bulging at the seams right now and headed to the grocery store to pick up just a couple of items. Can’t pick up more than a few otherwise we’ll be sitting on them! Jeep is full. Hit the grocery, gas station and headed up to Crested Butte to hang out with my parents and Perry until our cabin was available for check in later this afternoon.

Perry rented a beautiful house in South Crested Butte for a few weeks. Graciously invited my parents along for the stay as well as my other sister, Stacey, and my 4 nieces/nephews. Perry, Meme and Poppy arrived there on Friday and Stacey and crew to arrive late Sunday evening.

A little wrinkle in the fun this time is my Mom has some lung issues and it’s been getting harder and harder to come up to this altitude for her over the past couple of years. On Friday, when they arrived, her oxygen stats dropped into the low 80’s with some readings in the upper 70’s so off she went to the hospital. They fixed her up with some portable oxygen and she was back home later that evening. She’s slowly acclimating to the elevation but it’ll take a little while. I know she’s not happy about it as it restricts what she can do for now. However, she’s doing better each day being able to spend a little more time off the oxygen without her stats plummeting.

We had a nice afternoon/evening with my parents and Perry. John the Great made a fabulous BBQ dinner of ribs, chicken, corn and salad!! It truly was devine. We didn’t eat until 9:00 pm, but it was wonderful. Worked out that my sister Stacey arrived literally right in time for dinner!! :-)

We played games and just hung out. John, Dad and I went and checked into our little cabin at Three Rivers Resort which is really cute. Really little, but cute and nice. Clean.... comfortable.... coffee maker.... working refrigerator. What else do we need?

It’s Monday when I’m typing this and today... we are going fishing. With a bunch of kids. Likely not to catch a thing with all the noise from the kids. But... we will have fun (hopefully) trying!!

I’ll post pictures from Sunday later today.

PS - Please take a moment and pray for a little baby boy (9 months old) named Stellan. You can find his Mama’s blog on the right hand side under “My Charming Kids”. This little baby boy is currently in the hospital deteriorating rapidly from a heart problem. He and his family need a army full of prayer warriors right now.

MA

Day 9 - Lake City, Friday, July 24, 2009

2009-07-25T09:45:00.002-05:00

We spent our day today up in the mountains fishing and driving through beautiful mountain passes. We visited Dan’s Fly Shop in town to gather our fishing licenses and a couple of items John wanted to get. After that the Jeep was ready to start climbing up into the mountains.

Our first goal was to find a place or two to fish along the way to American Basin on the Alpine Loop which was the goal.

The interesting thing is there is a lot of private land up here along the mountains with clear No Trespassing signs. You aren’t allowed to fish in those waters. You have to find the few and far between public areas to fish which along that side of the Alpine Loop were not very frequently seen. We did find one area that required a walk down to get to the stream - steeper than it looked. The climb up wasn’t all that easy and my seal level lungs didn’t like it much! We were not very successful in catching fish but some interesting tidbits for you from here:

Beautiful little stream
Takes awhile to put all the stuff on the fishing rods so we can go fish
John slipped in the stream while walking over to the other side... landed on his butt.
Stephen tried our patience (and scared the fish away too) by yelling, crying or screaming at some point during the fishing time
Rachel is the official “hook rescue” person.
Rachel almost stepped on a snake that was coiled up in the water..... wonder what kind of snake that was?? anyone??
John had to go in after a caught hook that was too deep for Rachel
John almost caught a fish - alas, almost. The fish took the fly.
The rest of us were just trying not to catch a rock.

Once finished with fishing at this place, we continued on our Jeep ride up the mountains on the Alpine Loop. Lots of ATV’s along here zipping up and down. We were going very slow even though the Jeep can do much more. The scenery is just beautiful along here. We saw perhaps some marmots although they are kind of small. Guess they could have been beavers sunning themselves as we were near some beaver dams, but we’re not sure. We didn’t do the entire Loop but did get to American Basin which was full of beautiful wildflowers. Unfortunately for us, it was raining a bit up there and quite cold. It’s also where we chose to eat lunch so Rachel was making sandwiches in the cold rain in American Basin!! :-)

After we ate, we were going to go a little bit higher along the American Basin road and then changed our mind. In the process of backing up and turning around, the Jeep ended up high centered on a large rock spinning the wheels. UH OH!! Hmmm... what do we do? Well, John the Great, gets out and I get in the drivers seat. From the front of the Jeep, he pushes the Jeep backwards over the rock and uphill no less until we were back onto the regular path (not road as we lost the paved road miles and miles before). More pictures below.

And now.... for the debut of Stephen’s comments to the blog!

Stephen’s Super Sweet Square: My Eye,Fishing and Alpine Loop which includes John
Guess what we did 3 days ago ,we went on the Durango to Silverton train. While we were on the train I got a lot of soot in my eye and I guess I rubbed it around and scratched my cornea three times. Two times on the side and once on the top of my eye. Other than that, my week has been good. today we went fishing. We (mom, me and R) .John was using Poppy’s fly rod and a fish took the fly. We also did a part of the Alpine Loop called American Basin which has the cool flowers and chipmunks and also where John pushed Jeep, by himself, off a rock (How strong is JOHN?)

Day 8 - Lake City, CO

2009-07-24T10:07:00.000-05:00

There was not a whole lot exciting that happened today. John cooked a great breakfast this morning. After breakfast, we went in search of some general information about what to do here and in the area including maps to roads around the mountains on which we can drive as well as some good places for fishing.

We also had to find a clinic to take a look at Stephen’s eye which has not gotten much better. We went to the Lake City Medical Center and as I thought, he had scratched his cornea in three places. So, got some antibiotic cream and went along our way.

Our next stop was to drive the hour into Gunnison to go to the grocery store. Parts of it are pretty, parts of it are really isolated!! We did our business and then proceeded back to Lake City with groceries in hand for the next few days.

The kids went fishing in the stream when we got back.

I guess the exciting news is there is apparently a bear that frequents this area. There was a sighting of him last night (Day 8) as well as this morning about 10 minutes before I’m sitting here writing this blog. One of the guys who works here chased it off this morning from some of the cabins.

Rachel wants to bear hunt. Bet you can’t guess what I want to do!!!

Today we’re going to drive up into the mountains, look at beautiful scenery and wildflowers, and find a nice fishing stream and fish.

Later!

Day 7 - Durango - Lake City, CO

2009-07-23T09:21:00.003-05:00

On the Road Again.....

After our fairly “leisurely” morning, we left Durango (Lake Vallecito) around 11 am and started our way over to Lake City. We stopped a few times along the way - for lunch, for a new lightbulb for my right back blinker on the Jeep, and for some drops for Stephen’s eye.

Stephen’s eye - it seems as if Stephen got some soot in his eye on the train day and I suppose rubbed on it a lot trying to get it out. While there is no soot left in his eye that we can see, the rubbing may have caused some irritation/scratching. Consequently, his eye is puffy, stings and hurts. We’ve tried some lubricant drops and eye wash to help him but it seems to be getting worse. We may have to find a local clinic around to have his eye looked at and perhaps treated if he’s developed a little infection or something.

The drive up to Lake City, CO from Durango takes you West on 160 through Pagosa Springs, Wolf Creek Pass, Southfork and then north on 149 through some beautiful passes way up in elevation like 11,000 feet. Here are some shots we took along the way.

It’s a good thing we didn’t go to Mesa Verde. Have no idea what time we would have rolled into town had we gone there first. As it was, leaving at 11:00 am from Durango, with the elevation climbs and stops, we didn’t arrive there until about 6 pm. Not as short as we had anticipated.

One thing we didn’t have room for in the Jeep yesterday were much in the way of groceries. We’ll have to go back and get them today in Gunnison. We went out to eat last night at a local Italian restaurant owned/run by Czechs. Pasta House (I think). It was good, but very expensive as is everything up here. We went to the local grocery and decided we’d get a couple of items we needed (like breakfast items) and then get the remainder of our groceries later. Everything was crazy expensive. Example - Starbucks coffee - normally around $8.00/lb in Houston. Was $12.00/lb here in Lake City. Crazy.. crazy.

Day 6 - Durango, CO

2009-07-22T09:25:00.004-05:00

Today we rode the Durango - Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad Train. And we rode... and we rode... and we rode some more. In total we rode about 8 hours which is WAY TOO LOOOONNNNGGGGG. We were in the last car on the train which was an open air gondola.

It was beautiful, no doubt. We enjoyed the ride up very much. It was the ride back that felt like an eternity. I would recommend that you find an alternate method back to Durango and just ride one way. The train will provide you with that alternate method, for an additional $36 per person on top of the full round trip fare of the ticket. Nice, huh.

So, yes, it was too long. But, yes, it was beautiful. Here are a few pictures. It started raining closer up to Silverton and rained a good half of the way back and the temps dropped considerably into the 50’s once we were nearing Silverton and with the rain, all the way back to Durango. We had a really nice lunch at a place called Handlebars Saloon & Grill. Yummy stuff.

John ordered Mountain Oysters. If you know what those are, good for you. If you don’t, I’m not explaining right here. Each of the kids and I tried them. Apparently, they liked them. I didn’t. Probably a mind thing. Here’s what they looked like.

It’s cold here this morning and since the only good point for internet is outside, my fingers are cold. Thus, my typing will be short!! :-) John says it feels like there should be a football game today with this fall like weather here!!

We were going to go to Mesa Verde National Park today but after our marathon train ride yesterday, I was overruled when it came to today. In order to go to Mesa Verde and then be up at Lake City before dark, we’d have to be packed and heading out of here by 7 am, which meant up by 6 am. No one else thought that was a good idea today. So... Mesa Verde will have to be a visit we do next time.

We’re heading out of Durango today to our next stop for four nights in Lake City, Colorado at the Texan Resort - and yes, it’s owned by a Texan who went to Rice University!! Good trivial knowledge for you.

Until next time,

MA

PS - Dad, John said he lost the Ted Williams autographed fly. Your favorite. :-)

Here are some pictures from the other day - fishing & Bar D Chuckwagon.
More Train Pictures will come later tonight/tomorrow or whenever we find an internet access point.

Day 5 - Durango, CO

2009-07-20T23:35:00.002-05:00

July 20, 2009

Day 5 of our Great Summer Adventure begins with a Fish Tale!
We tried our hand at fishing today. Rachel was the only one who caught something ... part of a tree branch. We used some worms on normal casting rods for the kids to try fishing with. Not the fly rods my Dad sent with us. They weren’t ready for that one yet. Neither were we apparently! LOL... We found ourselves a little place along side the lake to setup for a couple of hours.

Worms - Rachel will touch them. Stephen won’t. Go figure. Because of that, Rachel did more fishing than Stephen because there was a rule out there yesterday. John put the first worm on your hook. You do the rest.

The fish ate well yesterday and avoided the hooks.

John tried his hand at fly fishing as did I. My first attempt ended up getting caught in the Aspen tree behind us. John and I rescued it. John did better than me - his didn’t get hung up in the tree. However, he did lose a fly (sorry Dad!) somewhere with no fish to blame.

Finished up there and had a little snack at Pura Vida Cafe at the marina. Was pretty good really. Then headed back to the cabin for a little rest/shower before going to the fun event for the night!

Bar D Chuckwagon Dinner Show

We weren’t really sure what to expect here other than my parents both recommended it. We had a pretty good feeling the music would be something John would enjoy and probably we all would like as well, but maybe not as much. Didn’t have high expectations for the food though.

Well, we all were pleasantly surprised. The dinner was really good and the show was quite entertaining and enjoyable for everyone! We would highly recommend it to anyone. John and I both had rib eye steaks that were cooked very well. The kids ate all their meals of BBQ Beef. The only comment is the BBQ is on the more vinegar side than typically we prefer, but it was good still. The beans, applesauce, biscuits were all quite yummy as was the coffee!!

The show was really entertaining. We enjoyed watching and listening to these guys play the fiddle, guitars and sing. Really good and at times, funny which made the kids laugh. They ended the show with a patriotic medley which was inspirational as well as thought provoking for where we are as a country.

The last song was “Proud to be an American”.

And I’m Proud to be an American

where at least I know I’m free

And I won’t forget the men who died to give that right to me

And I’d gladly stand up next to you, and defend her still today

and there is no doubt I love this land

God Bless the USA

Are YOU proud to be an American?
I believe if you choose to live in the USA - you should have to learn English, live by our laws, pay the taxes we all have to pay and respect this country. Respect your heritage, certainly, but respect the country that is providing for your family or go back home.
Do YOU vote?
Do YOU stand up for all that our forefathers and many before us fought to maintain as a country? Our future is being leveraged as money is wasted, taxes are raised, and our country is being socialized. We will be told how to live, what choices we have and don’t have across many different areas. That is socialism my friends.
CARE ABOUT IT. PRAY ABOUT IT.

OK - off the soapbox now and back to the vacation.

Off to ride the train today (Tuesday, July 21, 2009). I'll have to post the pictures later when we return!

MA

Durango (Lake Vallecito) CO - July 20, 2009

2009-07-20T09:30:00.004-05:00

It’s 8:00 am... I’m the only one up. I’m always the only one up first thing in the morning. I live with a bunch of bears who hibernate as long as they possibly can!! It could also be the air up here at 8000 feet which is so cool, feels good and smells good.

So, I’m sitting outside in my pj pants, tshirt and sweatshirt (because it is a little cooler here - YAY) with my coffee at the picnic table in front of the cabin by the big tree which is the one and only spot we can best pirate someone’s unlocked wireless network signal!! :-) It doesn’t seem to work so well from inside the cabin, so sitting outside the cabin is the only option if you want to communicate with the outside world. Note - cell phones still don’t work. Ask the teenager who is devastated she can’t do much texting with her friends and Bryan. Hi Bryan. She tells me Bryan is reading the blog so everyone say hi to Bryan! Everyone: “HI!”. :-)

Back to the peace and quiet that is surrounding me at this moment. It’s lovely. No car sounds. No horns. No morning commute. No kids griping (yet). No phones ringing. No emails to check in my inbox. No Starbucks (oh darn, I like this one).

All replaced with calming, lovely sounds. The lake lapping against the shore. The birds twirping and singing in the tall pine and aspen trees. The squirrels scurrying by. The occasional fishing boat on the lake trolling for fish. The coffee brewing in the kitchen (not Starbucks). Me typing on the computer. THAT’S IT my friends.

Me.... loving life right now.

Later!!

MA

Day 4 - Albuquerque to Lake Vallecito, CO

2009-07-19T21:30:00.003-05:00

We’ve made it to Durango - or rather, Lake Vallecito, CO!! It’s cooling off quite nicely right now at 8:30 pm. Nice breeze going through the cabin cooling everything off. Feels really GREAT!!

While we don’t have cell phone coverage currently, someone around us has wireless service that is not locked!! So... we’re pirating internet usage which is allowing us to have some intermittent wireless service which makes communication with the outside world possible.

The teenager isn’t happy about the no cell phone coverage. :-) She just insists her friends are going to think she fell off the earth!

Not too many pictures today to add to our trip today... Here are a couple!

Electronics Count
As I mentioned on my last post, the Cox family goes no where without some electronic something or another. The game was to guess what types of electronics we brought and in some cases, how many of each of those types.

So far, my sister Stacey, has made a suggestion in the comments from the last post. You are close, Stacey! Not quite it though. But, when thinking about this list - we are way too technologically connected. :-)

Here you go..... so far, we’ve counted 21 items (amended to be 24)

2 laptop computers
1 PSP
1 Flypen
3 cell phones
1 Blackberry
2 GPS devices (car and handheld)
1 Satellite radio
1 Satellite radio receiver
3 Cameras (2 P&S digitals, my 50D)
4 Camera Lenses
1 Video Camera
1 Hair Straightener (for the teenager, cause mine is oh so straight ALWAYS)

PS - amended on Mon as I forgot a couple!! told you I would.
3 Ipods
1 Kindle

I’m not altogether sure that’s all either!!

Ok - we’re done for tonight. Tired really. Hungry too. John the Great is fixing us dinner. More tomorrow!!

MA

Day 3 - Roswell - Carlsbad Caverns - Albuquerque, NM - July 18, 2009

2009-07-18T21:22:00.004-05:00

Hi everyone..... from New Mexico where the cactus are abundant!

We had a leisurely morning today. We also had a little change in plans as we decided at breakfast to go to the Carlsbad Caverns. It was a fabulous idea... just a little bit of a backtrack as it was south of Roswell! (Ten points for you if you already knew that!) Back through Artesia and Carlsbad and then West. Would have been better timed to do it yesterday on our way up but we just didn’t think about it because well... we had gotten up at 4:45 am and the brains weren’t working all that well.

Before we left Roswell, we did make it to the UFO International Museum and Research Center. Up close and personal with aliens. Sometimes, I think I live with a few aliens (and definitely work with a few too! :-). Anyway, back to the museum. It was somewhat interesting. I suppose if you are a UFO nut, you’d probably really enjoy it. We found it interesting but didn’t stay around all day and watch all the videos you can watch. Just enough to explain to the kids what it was all about, buy Stephen a magnet for his collection and a postcard for the scrapbook!

Question: Do you think there really are UFO’s and aliens and that the government covered it up?

Once finished with the UFO museum, we made our way back south along the same tracks we had already come the day before yet this time we went West at Carlsbad about 20 miles to the Carlsbad Caverns National Park. Not sure I had everyone’s buy-in for this stop, but we ended up having a really good time here so I believe we were all happy we made the detour.

Main reason - it was so much cooler inside the cave than outside the cave - 57 degrees. I think that’s it main draw when it’s 100 degrees (like it was today) outside. Yes, the coolness is a benefit, but it was really neat and interesting inside the cave as well. You start down a continuous looping pathway that sometime slopes steeply downwards as you descend into the cavern. We walked down about 750 feet into the cavern which is equivalent to about 75 floors in a building. Just not doing it by stairs, just pathway in the dark mostly with a rail along the way. The climate in the cavern is a consistent 57 degrees but 90% humidity! So, even though it’s cool, the humidity keeps everything (and you) just a little on the moist side!! Of course, that level of humidity doesn’t really bother us Houstonians much, but you should have heard the other people complaining about it!! LOL... Tons of stalagmites, stalactites and tons of other formations. A couple of pictures here ... TONS more in the gallery (just in case you didn’t get enough of limestone formations).

My photography class sure did come in handy as in the dark with little light, I knew exactly what to do with my camera to get a desirable picture - or at least several that we could live with! YAY Karen Russell!! There is only one picture I used a flash for. All the others were captured without flash and it's not as bright as it might look on the pictures. I had my ISO cranked way up to 3200 to get these pictures and using a 50mm lens at f1.4 (wide open). My pics will likely be grainy, but they aren't bad!

Our old friend, Blackie, is back with us for our Road Trip. For those of you who didn’t follow us on our Road Trip 2007, Blackie is our bear friend who came along with us through Grand Teton, Yellowstone, and Glacier. He enjoyed seeing his siblings in real life. We didn’t. :-) He decided to join us on this trip as well. Hopefully, he doesn’t seek out his brothers and sisters in the Colorado clan to come visit.

For those of you wondering just how we did for many, many hours in the jeep with all 4 of us! Well, only a few times did I have to threaten to leave a kid on the side of the road.... or put them on a plane in Albuquerque heading home. Luckily, they think I’m serious. They are pretty smart that way.

Here’s a quiz for you!! Be the first to guess all the types of electronic gadgets we brought along and in some case, the number of each.... there might be a prize for the winner. Then again... there might not. :-) Just for fun. I’ll reveal in a day or two.

Arrived into Albuquerque for the evening around 10:45 pm. John the Great is doing laundry at 11:52 pm. Yes, he’s a dream and he’s mine. :-)

PS - forgot to mention that we went through some incredible storms on the way from Roswell to Albuqueque. The kind where lightning streaks across the sky horizontally and everything! I tried to capture a few pictures of the storm and sun. It was kind of cool watching it. John would probably say not as cool driving in it. :-)

Temperature Check for Today
Low - ?? not sure, we were still sleeping
High - 100 degrees (we weren’t sleeping for this one)

Interesting Comments Captured Today
MA - “Stephen, come stand by your relatives for a picture!” As I strategically placed him by the Aliens picture.

MA - “Duck!” to John as we were walking through Caves and had to duck to go through a tunnel
John - “Do they teach you anything at school?” - upon receiving blank stares from the kids when asking some science questions about stalagmites and stalactites and basic chemical reactions. Yes, they have already forgotten what they learned last year.

Pictures for your Enjoyment

For my friends following from work, I'm even looking out for Mr. Wells here in Roswell!! WFB played a role in the 2002 Dig by storing all the "stuff" in a lockbox in Roswell. Interesting, huh!

Pictures from the Cave - many, many, many more in the Gallery on the right!

Next Stop - Durango, CO!! (and let's hope some cooler temps!)

Road Trip 2009 - Day 2 - Boerne, TX to Roswell, NM

2009-07-17T20:54:00.005-05:00

Day 2 started bright and early with our 4:45 am wake up call courteous of John! Yes, he did wake us all up at 4:45 am and we were in the car pulling out of my parent’s driveway at 5:15 am!! Geez... my brain was not really functioning at that point and thank goodness, John got everything into the Jeep. I needed coffee something fierce and sometime a few years ago, my parents switched from caffeinated coffee to decaf coffee!! Something’s just not right there. Needless to say, my thought about decaf coffee is why bother?? So no help ensued from my parent’s house with coffee. We made our way to the nearest Valero to get coffee because the Starbucks isn’t open at 5:15!! (yes, there is one in Boerne, TX!)

We stopped for lunch at Brantley Lake State Park just north of Artesia, NM. Really a hot, flat, unoccupied state park! We just wanted to find some place shaded to stop for a picnic lunch and that was about all we could find. It was hot, but there was a dry breeze so it wasn’t toooooo awful!

Roswell is approximately 8 hours from Boerne, TX. We made a few stops along our way so it took us about 9 hours with a time change along the way at the border of TX and NM. We arrived into Roswell around 2:30 pm CST and were able to check into our hotel.

The rub about us leaving so early is that we are all so tired we didn’t want to leave the hotel to go do anything! Stephen wanted to swim in the hotel pool so we went swimming and then just chilled until dinner. We had an early dinner and are now just watching some tv and chilling while one by one, everyone falls asleep from getting up so early!!

We’re going to be hitting the UFO Museum tomorrow morning and then make our way to Albuquerque for our next stop!

Temperature Along our Way Today!
Morning - 79 degrees
Afternoon - 97 degrees

We’re not to cooler weather yet... but we’re getting close.

Interesting Comments Captured Today!!
Stephen:
“Did you know you could half-love a pillow?” at 5:15 am this morning talking about the small pillow he brought

“Can I try it?? She’s not going to let me!! Moooommmmm!!! Mooommmm!!!” when complaining about Rachel’s decision to not share her candy

Rachel:
“I’ve never been in the car THIS long!!” (which isn’t true by the way)

“My life is too complicated” when talking about her stomach issues this morning

“I feel bad for anyone who has to wake up this early in the morning all the time!” - 5:15 am comment

Some pictures for your enjoyment ..... more in the gallery on the right!

This is what happens when you go to bed at 11:00 pm and wake up at 4:45 am! Just classic!

Scored some candy!! (although she's not sure which way is up!)

Stephen's candy stash!

New Mexico State Line

Summer Road Trip 2009

2009-07-16T23:02:00.003-05:00

Well hi everyone! We are kicking off my blogging of our Cox Family Summer Road Trip for 2009!! The very happy family you see above - John, MA, Rachel & Stephen - has left our hot city called Houston, Texas, in our Road Warrior - Jeep Wrangler - in search of cooler temps and a relaxing couple of weeks doing fun things like fishing, hiking, and jeeping!

ROAD TRIP 2009

Colorado here we come!!!

Day 1

Day 1 has taken us tonight to to our first night's stay in Boerne, TX with my parents. Mom & Dad graciously allowed us to bunk down here for the night. My husband's grand plan is to get up and be OUT of the house by 5:00 am!! I was hoping to maybe make it until 6:00 am... but no, we're starting off from Boerne, TX to Roswell, NM for Day #2. It'll be REALLY hot along this part of the trip so the earlier we do it, I guess the better. I'm hoping my body will agree tomorrow morning. Perhaps it'll take a lot of coffee to get that done.

So.. we're off!! Pictures to come tomorrow and each and every day afterwards! Come along with us!!

Later,
MA

Our Weekend Visitors

2009-07-13T19:30:00.003-05:00

We’re still here... it’s been a week or so since I posted. The kids have been gone (they come back tonight - YAY) and I took a week off from blogging. Busy at work. Busy getting ready for our vacation.

This weekend we had a wonderful visit from Laila on Saturday. Her friend was coming down from Dallas for a party so she decided to come down as well and visit with us! Always nice to visit with her. We spent sometime upstairs scrapbooking her pictures from her graduation in May. It was sure fun and I think she got the hang of it!! Created some really nice pages on Saturday night and Sunday.

Ariane joined us for breakfast on Sunday morning and it’s we enjoy seeing her as well. Even though we live in the same city, we don’t see her very often. She’s working so hard right now at two different jobs - she doesn’t have a lot of time to socialize!!

Here’s a couple of fun pictures from the visit.

John cooked breakfast for all of us on Sunday morning - waffles and sausage! Made a happy face with the waffles!

Next Blog.... Stephen’s Birthday Party in June....

July 5th, 2008 - Our Wedding Celebration Party at Blanco's

2009-07-06T20:32:00.003-05:00

Hi - it’s me again!

Reminiscing about our wedding a year ago. I posted last about our beautiful intimate wedding. Go see if you haven’t already. It was lovely.

This post is about the PARTY that came the next night!

John & I enjoy a good time so while we wanted our wedding to be special and small, we did want to include our friends and have a great party to celebrate our marriage.

It took us awhile to come up with a good place but on a whim, we called Blanco’s which is on Alabama in central Houston. We go to Blanco’s on occasion to dance to the great music so thought it might be a good venue for party. Blanco’s is a great place for local Texas and Houston live music and dancing. Come to find out, it’s not open on Saturdays and you can rent it out. So... we did!! We called one of my favorite Texas musicians - Jesse Dayton - and arranged for him to play that night for our guests. John called Cantu’s and voila, we had a great catered BBQ meal. All done but the guests!! Very cool.

I have general memories about this evening.....

Lots of Friends!
Lots of Family!
Got to meet Jesse Dayton and listen to him sing. Even spent some time at the end of the evening just chatting with him and his band.
We have a lot of friends who don’t dance (:-)
The BBQ was really good.
The wedding cake from Cake Lady Bakery in Friendswood was really good too!
It’s hot in there when you’re dancing.
Lee Ray takes fabulous pictures!!
We had a great time and lots of fun!!

Slideshow with music by Jesse Dayton for your viewing pleasure.....

MA

Happy July 4th & Happy Anniversary to US

2009-07-04T08:03:00.004-05:00

Hope everyone had a Happy & Safe July 4th Celebration with your friends and families!!

HAPPY FIRST ANNIVERSARY TO US!

On July 4th last year:

We celebrated our marriage and the beginning of our life together! We had a beautifully small and intimate family celebration of our marriage on Friday, July 4th at Villa Capri in Clear Lake followed on Saturday by a wonderfully fun Texas party with many of our friends at Blanco’s. Two days of family, friends, fun celebrating our marriage. It was so very much the combination of our two personalities. We typically like to say, I got to plan the wedding celebration, he got to plan the party!

Here’s a slideshow of some of my favorites from that day! It’s about 10 minutes long.... so enjoy.

My memories of our wedding day!

Family and friends arrived in Houston the day or two before. Terri & I ran last minute errands (thank you for coming in early). We all had our nails done and Chef John cooked fabulous meal that evening.
12 family members staying in our House - Mom, Dad, Perry, Stacey, Macie, Holley, Scott and Allie, MA, Rachel, Stephen & John in the upstairs garage
Other family staying elsewhere locally - Laila & Justin, Ariane
In the morning, we all went to the Friendswood July 4th Parade as Rachel marched for the first time in the high school marching band
It was pretty hot (but not as hot as this year)
Terri & Jim flew in for our celebration and were picking up the flowers in the morning while we were sweating at the parade (good choice)
Had a lovely lunch with everyone at the house - more food than we needed, but when do we not?
Finished packing and headed down to check in to the Four Seasons downtown so graciously provided by Laila as a wedding gift
It had been raining off and on this afternoon. Hmmm... the wedding was to take place outside on a balcony. Not sure about contingency planning here.
God fixed it! (Praise Him!) It stopped raining at 5:30 pm, just 30 minutes before everyone was supposed to start arriving
We arrived to Villa Capri, on Clear Lake
Family & Friends joined us for drinks, snacks and pictures at 6:00 pm.
Everyone looked beautiful! General color palette was light/pale greens with a little pink. Used the cymbidium orchid as the star!
The wedding began at 7:15 pm. John was very nervous. I was nervous, but not as much as He.
Our children escorted us down the aisle.
The music by which we joined each other at the end of the aisle was Bless the Broken Road sung by Travis Cottrell. I picked it because the lyrics were so applicable to each of us as we have both lived our lives on a broken road at times and that all that other “stuff”, well, they were just stops along the way to you.

I set out on a narrow way, many years ago 

Hoping I would find true love along the broken road 

But I got lost a time or two 
Wiped my brow and kept pushing through 
I couldn't see how every sign pointed straight to you  

Every long lost dream led me to where you are 

Others who broke my heart, they were like northern stars 

Pointing me on my way into your loving arms

This much I know is true  

That God blessed the broken road 

That led me straight to you 

Yes He did  

I think about the years I spent, just passing through 

I'd like to have the time I lost, and give it back to you 

But you just smile and take my hand 

You've been there, you understand 

It's all part of a grander plan that is coming true  

Every long lost dream led me to where you are 

Others who broke my heart, they were like northern stars 

Pointing me on my way into your loving arms 

This much I know is true  

That God blessed the broken road 

That led me straight to you 

Married under a beautiful old Oak Tree!
The dinner crowd below clapped as we tied the knot.
More pictures (very important)
Lovely dinner with all of us by Villa Capri - the food was excellent, the service was excellent -we were treatedwell
Beautiful cake made for our wedding by the chef - vanilla white cake, strawberry filling, white icing with chocolate dipped strawberries. YUMMY!
The night was capped off with the most amazing Fireworks show. We know this was God planned because from the balcony, there is a narrow sightline straight out to the lake. Both sides are surrounded by some large, relatively thick trees. We had no idea where the fireworks would go off, but bless Him, the barge was literally straight out on the lake directly in front of the restaurant so the show was magnificent!! We have God to give praise to again for arranging it so perfectly.
It was really & truly quite lovely.

Next post - Memories from the Party!! That was fun!

PS - We went back to Villa Capri last night to celebrate our First Anniversary there with dinner and fireworks!! Dinner was great ... no fireworks though on Clear Lake. We did get to see the fireworks at Kemah!! Beautiful!

July 1, 2009

2009-07-01T19:46:00.002-05:00

July?? Already??? Wowzer... half the year is gone. Amazing how quickly that happens. Seems to go by faster and faster each year.

July 1 is also another meaningful day for me for a couple of reasons.

1) John and I had our first date on the 1st of April a few years back, so we always have a race to see who remembers to say "Happy Anniversary" every month on the 1st. Nine times out of ten, he's first!! Darn him... I need to write myself a note or something to remind myself. The brain doesn't kick in until after coffee and then usually I'm driving starting to think about work. Pooh....He did again today!! However, I'll memorialize it here. Happy First Date Anniversary!!

2) The kids go with their Dad on July 1st usually for a month. While I do enjoy a little peace and quiet and some alone time with my husband, I do actually miss them and all the noise they create. They just have a presence here and when they are here... all is well in the world. Even when I'm fussing at them for something, I know they are home and safe where they should be. Their absence gives me a little glimpse into how my world will be when they go off to college in a few short years. I don't think I'm going to like it much. I do enjoy talking with them and hearing about their days. Being a part of the every day with them.

This year though, while they are off with their Dad on vacation to Washington DC and Virginia right now, they are not spending the whole month with him due to schedules and vacations, etc. So, I'll see them in a couple of weeks.

*************
Switching Gears......

Finally got solar screens put on the windows today ... all 22 of them!!! Can you say expensive?? Yes. Yes, they were. But, I can already tell a difference in that the air conditioner isn't having to work nearly as hard as it has been and hopefully.... hopefully... that will turn into some $$ savings for us on the electric bills. With several weeks of 100+ temperatures, the electric bill is going to be gigantic. Scares me to even think about what it will be. We went with 90% blocking on the windows, so the tradeoff is the house is a little darker. I'll trade darker for cooler right now. We can take them off for winter to add the suns warmth back to the house if we want. Kinda cool.

Other Free thinking thoughts right now.....

Found out from some blood work I had done recently that I am deficient in Vitamin D. Only had it tested because my sister found out recently she is too. It's interesting because Vitamin D is commonly known as the sunlight Vitamin. Most people in the South shouldn't have a deficiency in this vitamin if you're healthy and ever go out doors. 5 - 30 minutes, 3 times a week should be sufficient for Vitamin D absorption. While I'm not outdoors all the time, I get outside enough in the garden and general outdoors stuff that I shouldn't be deficient. So, begs the question as to why am I deficient? What happens when you don't get enough Vitamin D? For starters, without Vitamin D, you don't absorb enough calcium and you end up with bone issues. You can experience fatigue, gain weight, depression, higher rates of cancer. All sorts of fun things. Maybe that's partially why we have such a weight issue amongst my sisters and I? It plays into the metabolic process. Who knows... will find a good supplement and report back any changes. Hey... if it can help me lose weight, I'll be over the moon.

Happy Weds!!

New Blog Design - July 4th!!

2009-06-29T22:58:00.003-05:00

So.. what do you think about my new Blog Design?? I love it. House of 3 Blog July 4th Digital Kit **Cuteness** that I crafted a few of the items into a Header and used their free background that's out there right now.

If you want the free background/header, visit their website (House of 3) and look under Blog Couture!

Preparing for our July 4th Freedom Celebration AND our John and I will celebrate our FIRST ANNIVERSARY!!!

MA

It's HOT, HOT, HOT!!

2009-06-27T09:31:00.005-05:00

Wow - it's hot out there. This is a picture taken of our Garden Thermometer Reading on Thursday, June 25, right at noon (even though the clock is not set right).

Can you believe it!! nearly 112 degrees!! Crazy isn't it. It's 10:30 am right now and it's 107 degrees in the garden.

I was telling someone how HOT it was here and they told me I was wrong. The official temperature was only 101 at Bush Intercontinental Airport. May be very true and I'm still not wrong. Why? The thermometer recording that temperature at the airport is in the SHADE. LOL... yes, in the SHADE. In FULL SUN, where my poor little ole vegetables are and where YOU go when you walk out into this heat to get into your EVEN HOTTER vehicle, is a whole lot HOTTER than the SHADE.

So - if you're a kid out of school, it's SO HOT and you're bored, what do you do?

You make up an excuse to play in the water - how about washing Mom's car? sounds like a good idea.

Maybe threaten to spray your Mama!! :-)

UPDATES to the Ongoing Family Health Escapades

John -

Had his knee surgery on Friday morning (while I was in Minneapolis, mind you). Praise God - All went well. His best friend, Rene, came over and got him to the surgical hospital at 5:30 am and his surgery was at 7:00 am. He was on the way home by about 9:30 am. His meniscus tear is now fixed. However, found a little surprise during surgery. It would appear that John has been suffering from gout (hate when I'm right!) off and on for awhile and the doctor was able to see the crystals that have formed in the joints very clearly (and we have a picture).

I thought that was probably the case when his ankles or hand would swell up unexplainably. I had seen it in a former colleague who was a big football player guy as well and he developed it. But, John being a stubborn male, never really did anything to figure out what it was. It would just go away and all was better in his mind. Clearly not so much. The doctor told him to reduce the intake of several of his favorite items - meat and beer. We'll see how this goes.

Stephen

Stephen is doing fine right now and has no additional fainting episodes other than just feeling lightheaded at times and a general fatigue feeling. He (and therefore we) are actually doing pretty ok with him not on meds. AMAZING!! I was truly scared about taking him off his ADHD meds for very long because he really has the Hyper part of the ADHD along with the Attention Deficit part. It plays in to behavior problems and causes struggles in our family. BUT.. I am so happy to report, that so far, it appears Stephen is managing pretty well from that perspective without it. Maybe we'll learn something new in all this.

As for the Heart issues - we have some good news. Remember I said in moments like this, we start pulling strings with anyone possible as an advocate. I'm pretty good at being persistent as is his dad. We've had a few opinions from our doctors and doctor friends and was really uncertain as to the next steps, the travel that is set for July and a few other items. So, Stephen's Dad, Rob, called his primary doctor who is a VIP type doctor (they agree to maintain a low patient base in exchange for an annual membership fee that is somewhat significant at $1300). That annual fee means you ALWAYS have access to him whenever you are sick or in need to talk with him, no waiting. Pretty nifty if you have the bucks.

Their office called over to Tx Children's to the cardiology department and requested a cardiologist to reread the EKG, set an appointment and advise whether Stephen was cleared to travel. Happened in one day on Friday. To put this in perspective, our pediatrician's group, who is a part of Texas Children's, doesn't move this fast and so far, I haven't even heard from them yet with a number to call to even make the appointment.

Bottomline for now - He's clear to travel and has an appointment with Tx Children's on August 6. Not an urgent issue. We are to keep him supervised and notify if anything were to change. YAY!! Good stuff.

Rachel

I think I mentioned that a week ago we had Rachel in the ER Clinic around the corner from us. She was having some pain in her abdomen that looked and sounded like maybe gall stones, kidney stones, appendix?? something that was an 8/9 on the pain scale for her (and she's a pretty tough cookie on pain). A week ago, nothing showed up on the ultrasounds/CT scans, etc. So, home we go just hoping it goes away. It did pretty much apparently until yesterday, of course, while I'm in Minneapolis and John's had surgery. She had those pains again, but not as low. If they ultrasound of her gall bladder had not been clear last week, I would swear that was what it was given all the history of all the females in our family having gall bladder problems. With it clear, not sure what it could be. The ER docs had said maybe an ulcer or something. Gave her some meds and sent her to bed. Waiting to see this morning how she is feeling. Guess we'll be taking her to see Dr. C early next week as well.

What is it with all these health issues???

My how things change in a day....

2009-06-25T14:52:00.003-05:00

Besides the fact that it's scorching hot here in Houston right now (picture to come of just how hot), we received some news yesterday that has us all kind of sitting back on our heels a bit.

Last week, I retrieved Stephen from camp due to some fainting issues. The pediatrician decided he needed an EKG to check for any heart issues.

On Monday, we made our way down to Texas Children's Hospital for what was basically a 10 second (literally) test. I have to admit, I was a bit miffed (to put it mildly if you spoke to me that day). Had to basically take half a day off, park, wind your way through the buildings to get to the cardiology department, for a test that took all of 10 seconds. I just really couldn't grasp how you can tell much about my son's heart with a 10 second test.

Apparently... you can.

We received a phone call from the pediatrician yesterday with news we were not hoping for, quite frankly. The EKG indicates potential Right Ventricular Hypertrophy issues. Basically, it's possible he has an enlargement of the right ventricle of his heart. Why? no clue How? no clue What do we do about it? no clue. I hate that.

Next steps are to see a pediatric cardiologist for a full work up on the search for the root cause of this issue. This takes way too much time in my little humble opinion. Apparently, they don't consider him critical or urgent (which is good), so we go through the fairly lengthy referral process in Texas Children's which could take 4 - 8 weeks before we see a doctor to even start figuring it out. Hate that too.

So.. what do I do?? Mama Bear kicks into full gear and I start leaning on my friends (and friends of friends) who are docs and see if we can do anything to fast track this a bit. Stay tuned.

For now... until told otherwise, we have to discontinue all his ADHD meds which will really make his and our lives extra fun for awhile and no trips out of town which of course, comes right as we're starting to go on planned vacations.

Things happen.......

Prayers are requested for an outcome that is good and treatable!!

MA

Terrific Tuesday!!

2009-06-23T22:19:00.003-05:00

First ... this is PRICELESS!!!

Rachel won't wash my car on a normal day out of the goodness of her heart. I can't even pay her to wash it on a normal day. BUT... throw in a Band Car Wash and I get a picture of her washing my car!! Coolness!!

Cute picture of her at the car wash!

So.. for the EXCITING news of the day!!

A week ago, the Austin Christian radio station, The River, made a generous offer of 30 Pine Cove Outback student camp spots for this summer. Stephen has so much fun at this camp and loves it a lot. We are fortunate to have the financial capacity to send him to a camp such as this with such a great ministry. My nieces and nephew would love to go a camp like this but my sister does not have the financial capacity to be able to send one kid to a camp like this much less three. So, I decided to write into the radio station and enter their names in hopes of winning a spot for them at the camp. I didn't tell anyone so as to not get their hopes up! BUT.... TODAY... I received a call from the radio station and all three of them got spots at camp!!! Praise God for this!! Everyone is very excited!! We're just working through the logistics, but very soon, the three of them - Holley, Scott and Macie, will be going off to Outback summer camp and having a wonderful time.

Here's a picture of the four of them - the oldest three will be going to camp!! Allie is still too young at age 5.

You all are going to have SUCH A GREAT TIME!!!

MA

Happy Father's Day!!!

2009-06-21T10:03:00.003-05:00

Today is THE day... the day to wish for a Happy Day for all the Fathers out there.

Two very special Fathers I’d like to honor today:

My Father: Walter

My Dad is so special to me and to others. He’s a wonderfully God made man.

Random Thoughts about my Dad:

Loving, kind, gentle, barks on occasion, musically gifted, talented gardener, extremely social, enjoys wine, loves his family, loves his grandkids, passionate about Jesus, enjoys western movies and John Wayne, enjoys fishing, happy in retirement, strict on behavior requirements, has great stories to tell, enjoys reading, has (really) selective hearing and enjoys learning new things.

My favorite memories of my relationship with my Dad

I don’t really recall too much of my childhood in specific memories. Not sure why that is. I remember bits and pieces only. It was a happy childhood, I just don’t have the type of memory that recalls specific interactions I suppose. I do remember though that my “real close” relationship with my Dad didn’t start (from my opinion as I’m sure he’ll say gee, right when you were born MA!) until right around when I graduated from high school. Up to that point, in my mind, my Dad was definitely my parent. I knew he loved me and my sisters. When I was growing up, he said and did parental things more from a behavior/grade modification standpoint. I wasn’t a bad kid, well, at least not too much. There was that junior high time frame which I think my head spun around like the exorcist. But, once out of that awful time frame, I think I did ok in high school. Made good grades, didn’t give my parents too hard a time. They may have thought so, but I was their first, so what did they know. (ha ha) I do know there were plenty of folks who did things A LOT worse than me. I turned out pretty good so they should be proud! :-) However, I do know there were plenty of times that extreme amounts of patience were needed when handling three (3) teenage girls. I’m appreciative of that patience and mercy at times.

But, I digress. Back to when my “real relationship” began with my Dad, outside just the basic parental survival stuff. It seems to me that I crossed some magic line when I graduated from high school. At that point, it seems to me that my Dad decided (in some ways) that perhaps he had done all he could do in raising me up right, and now, our relationship could relax a bit and he could take a step back and let me find my way. He was (and still is) there for me always - good and bad. But something changed at this point that was neat - He would talk more to me about himself, his thoughts, what he did for a living, as well as guide me in conversations about my goals in life, boyfriend breakups and even marriage (and divorce) when it came about. I guess we went from parent rules to parent/friend relationship as I became an adult when I turned 18 and it has progressed wonderfully from there. I really love that relationship a lot. My Dad is fantastic and I appreciate him so much. Love you Dad!

Have a Happy Day Dad!!

My Husband: John

My husband... he’s a great man and a wonderful Father.

Random Thoughts about my Husband:

Cowboy loving, positive outlook, loving, teddy bear, kind, even keel, nature loving, enjoys western movies and John Wayne, traditional views on behavior, barks on occasion, happy, loves football, demands respect, loves his children and family, loves teaching, enjoys dancing and live music

My favorite memories so far

I enjoy watching and listening to my husband interact with his children and mine. He’s very patient when needed, but also very demanding of them when needed. This has helped shape his girls, Laila and Ariane, into lovely young ladies and has made a difference with Stephen and Rachel. I’m not always as patient as he is and sometimes not as rational (i’m sure you’re shocked! ha ha). He brings us back into equilibrium at times. I suppose that’s why he feels so strongly drawn to teaching and teaching in areas where, in many ways, you are also providing some “parental type” support and guidance along with the teaching. He’s good at it and wants to give back to society in that manner. From a parental standpoint, my favorite memories are knowing that I will get his support with the kids and knowing he will require them to be respectful to me and others. He is helping me shape them and for that I’m very appreciative and grateful! Love you honey!

Have a Happy Day John!!

Love to all -

Mary-Austin

Friday, June 19th

2009-06-19T07:20:00.002-05:00

I bet you thought we fell off the earth!!?? Well... we didn't. But it has been an eventful week.

As you know.. we took Stephen back to camp on Sunday. John and Rachel did "stuff" on Monday and Tuesday which included her Physical Therapy and follow up Doctor Appointment.

Her shoulder is progressing very well with flexibility and her doctor is pleased. They started "torturing" her at PT this week as they start moving her shoulder a different way. She's a little sore!

John headed out to the Ranch on Tuesday for a couple of days away out at the ranch living it up rustic style. He loves it. It's too hot, from my perspective, to even think about going out there right now. Not for me, that's for sure. He called yesterday and I actually think it got too hot for them too. They ended up going to Bandera for the day/evening and will be heading home early this morning.

While all this is going on, I'm working my tooshie off this week. Lots of business meetings and tasks I have to accomplish.

Then.. Stephen throws a kink into the week. Not by his own choosing, poor thing.

Received a call from the camp nurse on Weds morning and had to go retrieve him in Colombus, TX and bring him home. He had a couple of unexplained fainting episodes, a little cold and was very, very tired. Took him to the pediatrician Weds evening when we got back to have him checked out. Given how hot it has been here in Texas right now, one might have thought the heat played into it, but the fainting episodes took place within a short time of waking in the morning before the heat and after a good night's rest. One time prior to eating, one time after eating. So, the doctor didn't feel it was related to dehydration, heat exhaustion, or even sugar related. He had an episode a few weeks ago one morning at home that in hindsight, may have been a fainting episode. My kids sleepwalk and it looked somewhat like he was sleepwalking, so that's what I thought it was. It's fairly common for adolescents to faint during times of growth, so maybe he's just growing? That would be a good sign. The other possibility is not so good. It's possible it could be heart related, so the doctor is treating him with caution at the moment until we know if it is or is not heart related. He will have an EKG on Monday at Tx Children's. In the meantime, he's feeling better but still tired. He has a few restrictions right now until we can rule out a heart issue. He can't go swimming, no climbing or jumping, can't go out in the heat and no airplanes for right now. Unfortunately, that means he won't be able to attend the Rice Baseball Camp next week that he loves! Better to be safe right now though.

The end of the week is almost here!

MA

Weekend Favorites....

2009-06-14T22:16:00.004-05:00

This was a busy weekend with lots of stories to tell. Will have to get to a few later cause it's late!

* Los Ramirez Friday night Mexican Food & Margaritas - which was SOOO necessary after a very C.R.A.Z.Y. and stressful Friday afternoon at work.

Saturday
* Up at 7am on Saturday - packed/water garden/pick tomatoes, basil, peppers, feed dogs
* 8:30 am - leave for Colombus to pick up Stephen from Outback Camp
*10:30 am - 12:00 pm - Colombus, TX - Outback Camp closing ceremonies & pack up. Find out he burst his eardrum AGAIN this year. Keeps happening. Another topic to remember to talk to the doctor about at the next check up!
*12:00 - Continue on West I-10 to Boerne, TX with a (not so quick) stop at Bucee's in Luling (CRAZY BUSY)
* 3:00 - Finally getting to Boerne to enjoy time with the Family!! (and wash the camp clothes for Week 2!) Visiting, margaritas, picture taking, eating a wonderful dinner & fantastic desert - Menu: pico de gallo made with our fresh tomatoes & peppers from the garden, BBQ chicken, pork and sausage with baked potatoes cooked by Chef John, Fabulous Heath Bar Pie made by Mom & Allie!

Sunday
* 9:30 - Breakfast - fabulous sausage/egg casserole
* 12:00 - Leave to take Stephen back to Outback for his second week there - he's so happy there!!!
* 3:30 - Deliver Stephen back to Outback!!
* 6:00 - Visit the Dallas Pro Shop because we just HAVE to.... at Katy Mills Mall.....
* 8:00 - HOME ... finally!!!

Pretty much planned a good part of our vacation along I-10 both days!! Mobile Broadband rocks!!

Took lots of pictures - something like 160 or so. Yes, it just happens so quickly.

Favorites below!!

Stephen's Great Certificate - His counselor said the following about Stephen
*Stephen has an aspiring nature, seeking what is great. He is a persistent individual who keeps to the course he starts on. Stephen is a self-starter, applying his efforts to a situation without instruction."

Stephen, his counselor (in green) and his cabinmates -

My Nieces & Nephew aka The Fab Four

Sassy Allie - this is the perfect face

Happy Holley

Serious Scott

Sweet Macie

My Beautiful Mom - love you Mom!

My Handsome Dad - love you Dad!

Love to both sisters - just didn't have pics of them (that they'd want me to use!). It was a fun weekend!

More to come later!!!

MA

We're still here....

2009-06-11T21:17:00.002-05:00

We're still here.. but we've just been hanging out at home this week. Well... perhaps I should clarify. Rachel and John have been hanging out at home doing not a whole heck of a lot. Me?? Well, I get up while everyone else is still sleeping and GO. TO. WORK. You must know that's just really not fair nor does it make me happy to leave everyone else here and GO. TO. WORK!! Make that LONG commute (well, it's a little shorter in the summer usually, maybe 45 minutes instead of 1 hour or so) to downtown Houston and WORK all day long, make my LONG commute all the way back home to find them still doing NOTHING.

Ok.. well.. I guess that's what summer is all about. I only wish I had a SUMMER like the kids ... and John.

Feel sorry for me yet?? Ok, I know. It's just the way it is.

Stephen is at camp... still having fun I'm sure. I've looked for pictures online and have only found a couple of him playing flag football. I just know he's having a great time though.. he loves the OUTBACK camp....

Have a great Thursday!!

MA

Remembering 2nd Grade was Fabulous & Prayer Request

2009-06-08T21:35:00.003-05:00

On Saturday, Rachel and I went to a retirement party for Rachel’s 2nd Grade teacher - Mrs. Fern Hanslik. Mrs. Hanslik is the kind of teacher you ALWAYS remember. She is so special! There are only a couple of teachers throughout your education (if you’re lucky) that have such an impression on your child and you, as a parent. She was so encouraging to the children... made them use their brains and think about what they can give back to the world all while learning what they needed to learn in 2nd grade and more! Rachel enjoyed going to school each and every day in 2nd grade.

The party was really nice and very well attended. Many parents/children came to say hi and give Mrs. Hanslik a hug. It’s only been about 7 years since Rachel has been in her class, but in childhood years, it’s a lifetime. Seeing these kids who were 8 years old in Mrs. Hanslik’s class and are now 15+ years old, was amazing!! Of course they’ve grown and matured - I just keep forgetting it has happened until you see it in person!!

Here’s a picture of Rachel and Mrs. Hanslik in 2002 and one of her and Mrs. Hanslik yesterday!! My how she’s changed.

Here are a couple of other pictures I liked the most.

The rest are HERE in the gallery.

Mrs. Hanslik and Rachel chatting...

They are so beautiful and handsome.... (??, Molly, Turner & Jay)

Rachel and Lea

Callie and Molly - Callie said something funny and I caught Molly making a face!

Hunter, (not sure), Brian, Jacob and Sean

Funny thing... If you came to the party, Mrs. Hanslik gave you homework!!

The homework assignment is for you to send her an email every year, letting her know what you are doing and how you have/are/or plan on changing the world.

She is a neat, neat lady.

**************PRAYER REQUEST PLEASE *******************************
As many of you know, Stephen will be attending a new school in the fall - Lutheran South Academy. The Pastor of the school, Todd Stocker, and his wife, Kellie Stocker, the admissions counselor there, have 3 children at LSA. Their oldest child, MaKenzie (age 18), was killed in a terrible car accident last week here in the Clear Lake area.

While we are not close to the family, my heart hurts for them in their loss. I can only imagine the devastating pain and sorrow to be felt with the loss of a child. And I mean.. only imagine... because I have not and God willing, hopefully will not, experience the loss of a child. Kellie & Todd have a strong faith which has to be the only way to get through this type of situation. Kellie wrote in the obituary (HERE) “We can’t understand it, but we know God ordained all of her days. We know he was in the car with her. She belonged to Jesus and she absolutely knew that,” Stocker said. “I just miss her. I was her mom, and she was my daughter, and she was just precious.”

Please keep this family in your prayers for some time to come.

Summer Camp is Swell.....

2009-06-07T18:50:00.003-05:00

Today was the big day.... the first day of camp for Stephen at OUTBACK ... Pine Cove Christian’s camp for 3 - 9th graders in Colombus, TX. (For more info about Pinecove camps click HERE, they are really, really fun with a great message about God and Jesus).

Stephen has been looking forward to these next two weeks since last summer when he asked us to please, please, pretty please pre-register him for two weeks this summer! It’s THAT much fun!!

What do they do, you ask???

Archery/BB Guns....Swimming....Blog.....Hydroplane....Zip Line.....Climbing Wall...Lake Shalom... Orienteering... Low Ropes... Creation Station.... RC Cars... Horses.... Hockey... Dancing...Pickleball ... Baseball... Basketball... Flag Football...

Worship/Message time.... Good food......

Have fun at THEME NIGHTS - like Jumpin Jivin Jersey Night; Bubble Bash Blowout, Operation Infiltration and more....

I want to go to CAMP!!! He is going to have so... so... much fun.

As usual... I took pictures of course. I’m not overly happy with my pictures and after my photography class (which ended today) I think my problem is I need to slow down a bit, but sometimes taking candid’s don’t let you slow down the action. I just need to get better at putting all the pieces together very quickly I suppose to capture everything the way I’d like. I like some of them...

ALL the pictures are in the Flickr Gallery HERE, but my favorites are below:

The Camp is on Papa Bear Ln - if you think real hard about that, it’s a pretty cool name for a Christian camp....

We got there today at 2:30 ... the gate doesn’t open until 3:30.... we weren’t the first in line at the gate as you can see. Apparently, according to Stephen, you really have to get there early to get the good bunks and get the swim test over quickly before the line gets too long!! So... we got there early.

PineCove is so great!! They sent out the counselors on horses to say “hi” to the kids out waiting to get inside. Their horses are so sweet and calm.

Once the gates open, cars stream in and are met by singing, chanting and jumping counselors all greeting you!! Then, they meet you at your car and help you get the trunks out and will take care of them for you directing you to take just the light stuff and your swimming stuff up to your cabin and get checked in.
(Rachel thought this guy was a cutie)

Doesn’t he just look so happy? He’s been bouncing all day ready to go ....

Rest assured, since we were here so early, he was the first kid into his cabin - Wollogong 3!! He got the bunk he wanted.

Off to the Swim Test ....

Post Swim Test Fun on the Big Slide.....

On our way out I spotted the Camp Store. Just take a look at the menu! I know where Stephen’s camp money will be going....

Just another happy camper picture!!

We’ll see you Saturday Stephen!! Have a bunch of FUN!! I’m so glad you love going to Camp!

Love, Mom

Scrapbooking & Girl Time

2009-06-02T06:39:00.001-05:00

This past weekend I had the pleasure of spending time with a bunch of great gals at a neat little bed and breakfast retreat outside of Rosenberg, TX in Wallis. Marybeth, Dallas, Laurie, Beth, and Susan. We were all there for one thing - scrapbooking. Well, pretty much for scrapbooking although since we’re girls, the chatting, drinking, eating parts are all part of the package! Boys don’t get that....

There are pictures HERE.
A couple of my favorites are here. I didn’t actually take very many pictures this weekend. Just a few.

I have to say I really didn’t know most of these ladies very well. Of course, Susan and I are BFFs going on way too many years to even mention these days. It was really fun to interact and get to know them over this past weekend! Everyone is so fun to hang out with and I really enjoyed hearing their thoughts, struggles and opinions.

We have common bonds in several of us with sons in the Boy Scouts, kids in Friendswood schools, and all of us raising families in this day and age with all the technology and societal struggles that comes along with it now. Not that there weren’t struggles when we were growing up... our lives just have different twists now with the internet, facebook, cell phones, texting, etc. Although, we all decided one very convenient behavior modification that works like a charm is “cell phone confiscation!” Works wonders!!

But I digress... back to scrapbooking.... after all... that’s why we were there, right? Right.

Scapbooking is really universal although most think the term “scrapbooking” means you have to find your creative side, requiring lots of tools and is for people with a lot of time! Most of us scrapbook in one way or another. It may not be with colorful papers, scissors, little squares and ribbons all the time. It a process of capturing memories. That’s it! Simply taking pictures and collecting memorabilia is scrapbooking! Putting the pictures in an album.... box... paper bag. It’s all still scrapbooking - capturing memories that are important to us and to those around us. The albums and layouts we produce just provide an easy place to be able to look through the past (without having to dig through the boxes... ).

Some of us have an addiction.... to the tools... the papers.. the ribbons... the stamps... the cute little stuff.... OK... here we go....

Hi, my name is Mary Austin and I’m a scrapbook stuff addict.... and a photo addict.... and a memories addict....

If you were one of these ladies and SAW the amount of stuff I took with me for this weekend, you would agree with that statement wholeheartedly!! However... it was so cute and so fun and I used most of it. And I think the Cricut got a workout!!

Ok - maybe only a little bit of an addict... but seriously, I just really want to capture the memories and it lets my creative side have fun too.

In the end, it’s just about capturing memories. I feel as if I have accomplished something if I’ve captured that person, event, emotions, or snippet of life in some way that is meaningful to me and my family.

We loved it so much that I’m hoping we’ll get together on Fridays or Saturdays at my house.. in my scrapbook room... and keep the momentum going. I needed that inspiration as I really hadn’t been very creative in awhile.... a long while....

It feels good.

MA

Sunday Updates....

2009-05-31T20:43:00.002-05:00

This will probably be a short update tonight because I'm really tired!!

School's Out!! Kids are thrilled! Not too much time to rest though. Early Band Camp for the next three days for Rachel. Stephen gets to relax a week and then goes to baseball camp at Rice.

Physical Therapy begins for Miss Rachel this week to get her shoulder back into tiptop shape. She's doing pretty well but will slowly start to get full range of movement back in PT. I'm sure it won't be all that comfortable for awhile.

I had a fun weekend scrapbooking with several nice ladies in Wallis, TX. We stayed at a lovely bed and breakfast that is setup for crafters and scrapbookers - Premier Estates. The owners, Sharon and Belinda, of this lodge really makes you feel very comfortable here!

Even though I was messing with lots of pictures and papers, etc., I did manage to snap a few pictures and will post them later this week. Thank you Marybeth for including me and I enjoyed spending time with each of you - Laurie, Beth, Dallas, Marybeth and Susan!! We had lots of good food, wine, coffee, and scrapbooking!! Was even so inspired to stay up until 3:00 am this morning working on some pages. But.... am paying for it now.

Pictures to come.....

School's Almost Out!

2009-05-27T22:05:00.005-05:00

I love him and this picture.... it's sweet, and weird and cool all at the same time. Stephen's expression is great with that little smirk. Took the picture through a link fence in the dugout. The background has all the cool bokeh in it... those funny shaped discs of light in the upper background have a name. I just like the photo a lot.

So.. here we are... almost at the end of ANOTHER school year!! Hard to believe that Friday will officially start summer for the kids! John is out in another week for his summer break. Me... well... bankers don't get summers off. Darn it.

Only 2 more days of school. Well... actually, only one day for Rachel girl and two days for Stephen. This has been finals week for Rachel and she doesn't have one on Friday, so she doesn't have to go to school. Sweet for her.

Big day tomorrow for miss Rachel. Doctor's appointment and assuming all goes well, clearance to get out of the big black sling and start moving the arm and shoulder around. Expect it will be somewhat painful and stiff for awhile. Physical Therapy will start next week for about 6 - 8 weeks until it's back to normal.

Guess we won't be able to call her one wing any more. BTW, that's her "serious" pose. I love her too.

John is going to be a bachelor this weekend and he's looking forward to it...maybe with a little too much excitement! I'm trying to not get a complex about that!! He just seems so happy about it, I'm wondering if I should worry or not. :-) Maybe not. The kids will be with their Dad for the weekend. And... I am heading out of town for a girls scrapbooking weekend. He's all alone and really doesn't know what he's going to do, but he just knows it's going to be great!

Can't you see that smirk on his face....... yea.. I love him too.

I am going to scrapbook my tushie off this weekend. I feel like I'm taking my entire scrapbooking room with me to make sure I have all the stuff I use (or may want to use) . I'm sure there will be lots of fun, coffee, chocolate and wine. Well... I'm bringing all three: coffee, chocolate and wine, so I know at least that will be there. Nothing else really matters!!

I'm sure I'll post something while I'm there.... maybe.

Have a great one!

MA

Memorial Day Weekend

2009-05-24T09:30:00.004-05:00

I’ve been slacking at my blog upkeep lately. May “hem” is in full swing this year with all the sports, banquets, end of school fun, graduation and May also happens to be my busiest month at work. So... lots of time for everything but blog writing!! Never fear though.. I have been thinking about my blog and gathering all the fun pictures to go with the aforementioned activities so I should have enough to keep my blog going for quite some time in the future!!

Let’s start it off..... it’s a long post because while my blog has been quiet, our lives have not!!!

Happy Memorial Day Weekend - the kids went with their Dad to the beach this weekend, so John and I are just having a relaxing weekend and I’m catching up on sleep, scrapbooking, photography assignments, etc.

On to the past week......

Laila Graduated from UT Arlington last weekend!!! YIPPEEE!!! Congratulations beautiful one!!

John and I traveled up to Dallas to be a part of the festivities marking this wonderful accomplishment. Laila & Justin also just bought a new home so it was fun to see their new place and stay with them. Simba, their adorable (but previously very aggressive) Australian Shepherd did soooo much better. He didn’t even hardly bark at me (ok, a few times) once Laila introduced us again!! :-) I’m pretty happy about that and have to say, was a little nervous about it too. I think I may be able to say I’m even a little friendly with him now that I’ve played ball with Simba now. Anyhoo... the house was gorgeous!! Graduation was exciting and Laila looked beautiful and happy. Justin’s parents, Terry & Les, graciously hosted all of the family and friends out to their amazingly wonderful ranch for lunch. There had been grand plans for swimming, volleyball, horseback riding, etc., but the weather did not cooperate that day!! John was the Chef and BBQ’d chicken, made some pasta salad and guacamole! It was a hit and everything went swimmingly.

A couple of my favorite pictures and TONS more in the Flickr Group - Click HERE or on the Picture Gallery link on the right.

6th Grade Band Concert - Stephen & His Euphonium
Stephen participated in the 6th Grade Band End of Year Concert on Tuesday evening at Friendswood High School. There were actually TWO 6th Grade Bands for the first time ever this year. The Band saw 250 kids from 5th grade signup for 6th Grade Band! That’s pretty amazing given the entire class size of 6th grade is only 400. Over 60% are in the Band. Another reference point.... there are that many or less in the ENTIRE High School Band (4 grades). And... for more excitement, over 180 of the 250 are going on into Jr. High Band. Not sure where they are going to put all these kids... but hey, it’s a good problem to have if you’re a band director.

It always amazes me to hear kids play their 6th grade End of Year Concert. When these kids started school a mere 9 months before, they had no idea how to play these instruments at all. Over such a short period of time really as 9 months isn’t all that long, they go from knowing nothing about their instrument, to reading music, learning notes and finger positions, scales, chords, and playing a musical song together as a band that sounds pretty good. I’ve always thought that was amazing...even when I was doing it oh so many years ago. Watching my kids do it has amazed me each time.

Some of my favorites are below, more pictures in the Flickr Set - Click HERE or on the Picture Gallery link on the right.

Yes, the Euphonium is almost as big as Stephen. The handle on the case keeps breaking (school rental). We’ve fixed it at home many times this year, but can’t fix it this time, so he has to carry it differently now!!

BASEBALL 2009 - Little League Minors - The Knights
We have wrapped up Baseball 2009! (Secret yay from Mom!) However, sad for Stephen. He loves playing baseball. He’s improved a great deal this year with some good coaches who were more encouraging than in prior years and overall, I think Stephen has grown a bit in strength and confidence.

The Knights ended up placing 3rd in league play for Minors! Was a great job. The tournament began and was played with groups of 4 teams seeded having to play each other with the overall winner advancing to the next bracket. Unfortunately, the Knights didn’t do all that well in the tournament ending with a 1 - 1 - 1 in their round robin games. So, their season ended last Thursday evening with the Team Party on Friday night at Cici’s Pizza. The one game I missed last Saturday was the game in which Stephen was the hero and received the game ball (of course, I would miss that one game!!). He had a good hit that brought a runner in, but more importantly apparently, he caught a pop fly in center field that stopped the other team from scoring and taking the lead. The game ended in a tie (not a loss) because of it. YAY Stephen!!!

A couple of favorite pictures here, and you know the drill by now.... Flickr Group HERE or Picture Gallery on the right.

Hoping everyone has a safe and happy Memorial Day!!

MA

Sweet Sophie!

2009-05-19T21:05:00.003-05:00

Our sweet little Sophie passed peacefully to doggie heaven today. She has lived a wonderfully long life of 15 years bringing love and joy to Laila, Ariane and John. I know they have many fond memories of her throughout their lives. Rachel, Stephen and I came to know her and love her over the past couple of years. She was such a sweet, calm and loving friend to all of us. We are going to miss her!!

MA

Friday!!!

2009-05-15T12:25:00.003-05:00

It's Friday ... Thank Goodness!!!

I've been remiss this week at keeping up the blog. It's been a busy week as will the remainder of the month of May!! It's like the schools and all activities just press the Fast Forward button to get everything in before the end of May. It's just crazy and we run, run, run. Add a busy work schedule in right now and it's just nuts here. June can't come fast enough!!

A couple of updates:

One Wing .... our pet name for Rachel right now..... is doing just fine with her shoulder surgery recovery. Managing through with one arm through such fun with help from Mom!

Baseball Update - Stephen's team, the Knights, had their final regular season game last night and have placed 3rd place overall. YAY Knights!! The end of season Tournament begins on Saturday... not sure how this one is played. End of year party to come as well and is still trying to be determined.

Laila graduates from UT Arlington this weekend, so we're traveling there to support her and enjoy this great accomplishment!! Look for great pictures to come.

Photography class - going fabulously. I'm only mildly behind which is good and I'm learning a lot of good information.

Have a great weekend everyone!!

MA

Mother's Day 2009

2009-05-10T18:39:00.009-05:00

Happy Mothers Day to my Mom and to all my friends who are Mom’s!

It’s a been a good Mother’s Day weekend around the Cox house. Flowers from John started earlier in the week. Ariane & Laila followed it up with some beautiful tulips delivered yesterday!! Thank you so much ladies! You make me feel very special.

Stephen, Rachel and John gave me two presents that had been on my wishlist.

A Wacom Intuos Tablet

A Slice Scrapbook Die Cutter

Went to lunch today back to the Villa Capri Italian Restaurant on Clear Lake where John and I were married last July and where we spent last Mother’s Day!

We did a lot of work out in the garden this weekend - yes, that includes me too! The weeds (nut grass) has found it’s way into my beds. Weeding is a pain in the batookus!! But, it had to be done before the weeds took over my pepper plants. We also had to put up a structure to put the netting around to keep the birds away from all the fabulous green tomatos that are about to turn red in the next week or two. I’m so excited!! But... I didn’t want to have to fight the birds again so we had to put up a structure this weekend. It’s done!

Harvested two yellow squash and one tomato yesterday and they were quite yummy!!

Saturday night was spent at a Wine Study Session for my friend Michelle who will be taking her sommelier exams this week. One of the four tests involves a blind testing of lots of different wines and she has to identify them to pass the test! So... in an attempt to give her some practice, her good friends gave of their time and taste buds to show up for good wine and food! All in the interest of helping Michelle pass this test this week... yea... that’s it. We did have a great time and I do hope she passes!
Anthony & Sean were great hosts who made fabulous food and have a beautiful place! Check out some pictures below and in the link to the whole set on Flickr.

Michelle

The other pictures are here.....
http://www.flickr.com/photos/maryaustincox/sets/72157617958234868/

Finally uploaded the birthday pictures to Flickr as well. Click here to go to the link or click on the right for my picture link to all the pictures!

Hope everyone has a great week!

Just a great picture of Stephen I couldn't pass up posting!!

Love MA

12 Years Old!!

2009-05-06T19:00:00.005-05:00

Stephen is 12 years old Today! HAPPY BIRTHDAY STEPHEN!!!

I think he’s had a good Celebration today! Rob and his girlfriend, Catlin and her 3 year old son Logan, came over this evening to deliver some presents and have some cake!

We went a little out of order tonight - cake first... then dinner! It’s still cooking but per the tradition of getting to select your own meal for your birthday, Stephen has selected for his birthday meal - ribs and refried beans! Seriously.... those are his two favorite things. Glad it’s only one meal!!

Cake selection for this birthday was a chocolate cake with white icing topped with fudge to go along with what he really wanted which was strawberry ice cream (Blue Bell of course!).

More pictures to come!!

Gifts this year - he’s such a lucky guy
Albert Pujols St. Louis Cardinals Fathead (which is a lifesize wall cling) from Mom & John
St Louis Cardinals parking sign to hang in his room from Mom & John
iTunes Gift Card from Rachel
Set of weights from his Dad
Great Gamestop Gift Card from Catlin & Logan
Fantastic Best Buy Gift Card from Meme & Poppy

The Details of Now

You love everything about baseball
You love playing with the dogs over and over and over
You love to play XBox 360 and baseball games
You love to watch TV shows where you learn something and you love to share what you’ve learned with everyone
You have a great smile!
You are still losing teeth
You are a night owl and love to stay up late
You love to play on the computer and build your own city in Sim City
You are transforming into a handsome young man
We love you dearly!!

Love Mom

Heidi Swapp

2009-05-04T22:09:00.004-05:00

Saturday, Rachel and I took a little outing as she was feeling ok and wanted to get out of the house for a little bit. Saturday was National Scrapbooking Day and one of my favorite local scrapbook stores, By Design Scrapbooking, had a wonderful scrapbook designer in town for the weekend. Heidi Swapp! Her link is on my right sidebar if you want to check her out. Rachel loves her as well as she designs very pink, very divaish type girlie stuff. Rachel wants her room decorated with all the stuff she designs! Heidi was here doing workshops on Friday and Saturday. I didn't sign up for the workshops because of Rachel's surgery. Didn't really know how she would be feeling and if I'd feel comfortable leaving her. But we LOVED seeing her and watch her use all her great scrapbook design stuff. The Invisibles and Masks are just really cool.

We also went out to dinner on Saturday night and with a couple of meds in her, Rachel was a little loopy! She was funny to watch and listen to. :-)

Rachel Update:

She's doing pretty well as long as we keep the pain meds going every 4 hours or so. We've started to ween off of it a bit stretching it out and adding Advil in between. Today was the magic day when we could take off the bandages and she could take a real shower!! She was quite thrilled and felt much better afterwards! I did keep her home today just to make sure we could get the bandages off, the shower and see how she did in general today. Still hurts... but she's going to try to go to school tomorrow.

Baseball Update:

Stephen had a game tonight and they won handily this evening. Stephen did fine. They play their toughest games coming up on Thursday and Saturday! Good luck Knights!!

Have a great evening!

She is so amazing....

2009-05-01T17:59:00.003-05:00

Rachel did fine wonderfully today. Other than the little excitement we had at the beginning, everything else went extremely well. We even have pictures from the doctor of the surgery... weirdness. However, what we know is the space in her shoulder was clearly too large and her shoulder was not being held in there by much. So.. he fixed it. As long as she doesn't move her arm/shoulder in a certain way for the next 30 days, the fix should be permanent.

They did not end up giving her a nerve block after the surgery because she really wasn't in all that much pain. When we got back there to see her, she needed a little pain med and the nurse gave her a dose of morphine. Another learning lesson here as she apparently has a "sensitivity" to morphine. So, the morphine shot was followed by a Benadryl shot to counteract the immediate itching and red blotchiness she developed all over. :-) Several items to remember to tell doctors and write on forms from now on.

That was pretty much it for the pain meds except for the oral meds that were sent home. The Anesthesia Dr. was amazed that she wasn't in a lot of pain after the surgery and seeing from the pictures at how much drilling, etc. he did in her bone, I'm amazed as well. I wish I had her pain threshold. I just simply don't and am a big baby. She's just seems to handle it quite well. Must take after her Meme.

She's been doing just fine at home today as well with just one pain pill every 4 hours and either it's doing the job or she just isn't feeling any pain. Whichever, I don't care. She's comfortable, has eaten, napped and is doing just fine. I'm so relieved!

We're going to have dinner and hopefully, we all will get some sleep shortly afterwards!

2009-05-01T07:55:00.000-05:00

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2009-05-01T07:53:00.000-05:00

Baby girl is all prepped and in surgery now. Isn't she cute??!!

Had a little excitement this morning as we all discovered missy rachel has the vasal vegal reaction. Not quite sure how to explain it but the gist of it was that shortly after they put in the IV, probably 3 min or so, Rachel says "I'm not feeling too good" and she proceeds to lose all color, to drop her heart rate to 0 then 40 and her blood pressure down very low and passes out with a little seizure-like behavior apparently. Nurse asks me if she has seizures and I say "ummm. Not that we've seen before" and the medical folks start jumping. Pop the oxygen on the face and open up the IV fluids and she then quickly recovers. Anesthsiologist tells us it's called vasal vegal reaction and will be a lifetime issue. Explains why a few years ago when she got a vaccine at the pediatricians office, she's fine and we get up to the front to pay the bill and she passes out!! Leave it to her to add excitement to the day.

Because of the reaction, the Anesth. Dr did not want to proceed with giving her the shoulder nerve block they would usually do that would provide the pain blocking for the next day. Dr says they may try it in the recovery room if everything is going ok.

We'll see!!! Waiting time now.

MA

AWESOME DAY

2009-04-29T22:14:00.004-05:00

It was an Big Day for Missy Rachel!! She got her Learner’s Permit today so she can officially start learning how to operate a motor vehicle!! Amazing isn’t it. She was just a baby a few short years back and here she is driving a car. My car. When did I become my mother??

She was so happy today and the smiles could not be contained. She scored a 88 on the driver’s test today only missing 3 out of 30 questions. Pretty good. Of course, I quizzed her on which ones she missed so we could make sure to review them :-). I’m certain she needed to know them to be let loose out on the roads - the HOUSTON roads to be exact.

So what do you do the minute you get your permit? Your mom lets you drive to school. Well, this mom did. I wasn’t even too terribly scared and I actually amazed myself at how calm I’ve been today with my instructions to her while in the car AND how easily she’s taken those instructions without arguing or getting upset. I think the fact that I told her any arguing with me in the vehicle about driving would cause us to cease and desist with the “parent taught driver’s education” and force her to wait until she had 3 weeks in a row with no other activities to take a private driver’s ed course. :-) Amazing what a little motivation will do for ya!

She drove from the DPS office to school. I picked her up from school and she drove home. She drove from home to the baseball fields for Stephen’s practice. She drove from baseball fields to home to mall. She did very well for the most part. Only really scared me once ... as she was making a left at the high school out of the parking lot, she was going a wee bit to fast and I was a little afraid we might run into the poor policeman directing the traffic and the nearest mailbox! However, she recovered and narrowly missed them both! Whew!

That’s our big news around here!!

TAKS for Stephen is over with Math yesterday and Reading today! YAY!! Rachel has Math TAKS tomorrow.

Surgery for Rachel is set for Friday morning early. We report to the hospital at 6:00 am for surgery scheduled at 7:30 am. She’s already planning her 11:30 pm meal tomorrow night since she can’t eat or drink after midnight tomorrow. Her friend Kayla is being allowed to skip school on Friday to come hang out with Rachel. Not sure why she wants to, but they are BFFs and so she wanted to be here.

Right Now

2009-04-27T20:36:00.000-05:00

Trying to come up with the perfect photo organization in albums technique
Behind in printing my pictures that I will need to take with me to scrap at the end of May for Scrap Weekend
Caught between traditional paper scrapbooking and digital scrapbooking
Love all the scrapbooking stuff - both traditional and digital
Enjoying the blog world
Have lots to say... just not enough time to say it.
Trying to keep up at work
Navigating change at work is stressful sometimes
Wishing I could spend more time with the kids but...
Very tired listening to Rachel and Stephen fight every time they are in the same room together
Tired of being ignored by them as well
Wishing for more time with my husband alone
Wanting to spend more time on my investments
Enjoying my photography class...
Considering starting a photography part time business and wondering if I could manage it and if so, how?
Need to go through the tutorial on Lightroom before the 30 day trial runs out in 10 days
Wanting to do more bible studies by Beth Moore
Getting organized to teach Rachel how to drive
Scared that very shortly she’ll be out there driving
Sad that our time we spend each Weds night just as girls when we travel to/from flute lessons is short lived until she can drive herself
Supporting my husband as he gets through the stressful TAKS time at school
Hoping Rachel’s surgery goes without a hitch
Wishing I could survive on less than 7 hours of sleep consistently
I need more time in my days for everything I want to do
Excited about my vegetable garden this year
Still have to put up fencing and trellis’s in the garden
Need some time to catch up on my tv shows that are Tivo’d and waiting....
Have a date with my Kindle2 and a good book every night at 10 pm or so - have a list of books a mile long
Wishing I could retire (win lottery) so I could spend more time on the things on this list...
Tired

There you go.

Monday Notes

2009-04-26T19:14:00.000-05:00

It’s Monday AGAIN.... we keep doing it the same each week.

TAKS
This is TAKS week here in Texas. All the kids have lots of testing this week going on this week. The schools are serious about this stuff and the kids sometimes get stressed out about it. As do the teachers! The results are basically the teacher’s grade on their performance. For some reason, our state believes they can grade the teacher’s abilities to teach children solely based on the outcome of these tests. No consideration (or very little) is given to parental involvement, children’s willingness and motivation to learn, and children’s test taking skills and environment. All of these things drive children’s academic results, not simply the teacher’s abilities to teach. Important yes.. no doubt. But without parent’s motivating their children, holding them accountable, and encouraging them to succeed, you are quite likely to have children who are unmotivated and therefore, don’t see a reason to learn. Makes teaching them difficult at times. Can you tell I’m married to a teacher!!

Rachel and Stephen usually do just fine on these tests and other than making sure they get a good night’s sleep and a decent breakfast in the morning, they don’t stress too much about it.

Baseball Update
Saturday’s game that was cancelled due to the abundance of rain we received on Friday night was rescheduled and played yesterday afternoon. Unfortunately, the Knight’s lost this really hard fought game to the Scrappers 7 - 3. It was a lot closer for most of the game at 4 - 3, but in the last inning, the Scrappers extended their lead by 3 more. Stephen had several balls come his way out in the field to which he fielded well and got back infield. Scrappers had some big bats going on with some big kids. The Knights were hitting but luck was not on their side as the Scrappers fielded them very well. Next game on Friday.

Rachel’s Surgery
Today was the Pre-Op Doctor’s appointment in preparation for Surgery Day which is Friday, May 1. The doctor told us the risks and of course, I had to sign that I understand them risks. What are they, you may ask? Two that he told me - First - risk of infection, etc. as with any surgery and Second - she will have to keep her left hand pretty much resting on her checks for 4 weeks. If she moves it away from the body straight out, the shoulder could end up just like it is again. She can lift hand/elbow up slightly to allow for bathing, etc. but not outward/away from the body. This should be interesting. We’re told the whole process should be about 4 - 5 hours on Friday. We will get a call from the hospital telling us what time to be there Friday morning, but likely to be about 6 or 7 am for all the pre-surgical stuff. The surgery itself should be about 1 hour long and then recovery time before going home in the afternoon. I’ll probably send things to the blog or twitter on Friday.

Rain, Rain - Again....
Here we go again with rain tonight. Maybe I need to start building that ark now. We’re about to get whacked with another strong storm coming through and lots of rain again - we just love April/May in Houston. Lots or rain.

Later!

MA

Saturday Thoughts

2009-04-25T07:34:00.003-05:00

Rain, Rain, Rain.... Lots of Rain
Boy... did we have some rain last night! It was supposed to have been a 20% chance of rain yesterday. Little ‘ol percentage which in Texas just means you might see a sprinkle or you might see a gully washer.

Well... we got the gully washer last night. A strong storm generated strong rain and some small hail and sat over us for about 4 hours. I truly have no idea how much rain we had, but it was coming hard and fast. We had gone out about 7 pm for our normal Mexican food Friday dinner and had picked up one of Rachel’s friends, Bridget, to come with us. When we were going into the restaurant, it had started sprinkling and soon after, full rain. We were purposely being slow at dinner because it kept raining - hard. Rather stay in the restaurant and wait for it to stop then get out in it, but by 9:00 p, it hadn’t stopped. So... we had to get out in it. By the time we got back into Friendswood, some of the main streets were were flooding. Have to say, one really nice thing about the Jeep is it is built to handle water pretty high up, so we were able to navigate through the higher water places that some other cars may not have been. The Jeep and trucks!! :-) Rachel was spending the night with her friend so we got them there and got back to the house at 10 pm and it was still pouring. Continued raining until about 11:30 pm. We’re supposed to have more today I think. I hate to look at my garden because the cilantro here near the house in pots was beat down from the rain and hail. Makes me a little nervous about the tomatoes out in the garden. Hopefully, they are ok.

Baseball games were rained out today .... just means the season lasts longer with makeup games to come.

Driver’s Permit - did not obtain it yesterday (much to Rachel’s dismay). Too many people there by the time we got there to get it done. We’ll head over there one morning next week.

Chili Cookoff Results - benefitting March of Dimes

March of Dimes ....

El Fiasco Chili Team

Our Team, El Fiasco (Me, Ashley, Gina & Kristi and honorary member & chili cook, John) placed 2nd in the Ultimate Chili Cookoff competition yesterday. Officially anyway. I beg to differ and have deemed our team to have placed first place. Why? Here’s why. The name of the contest was Ulitimate . Chili. COOKOFF ....... some of the teams forgot the cookoff part and substituted bought chili instead. The First place winner was chili bought from Goode Company BBQ and the third place winner was bought from James Coney Island!!! The rules did not clearly state that each submission should be an original self-cooked recipe of said team, so I suppose their entries were legit (although not in the spirit of a cookoff ). We do take our chili cooking seriously here. Regardless of the competition (yes, I’m competitive), all the chilis were good and we raised money yesterday with lots of donations to March of Dimes to give a 7 of the chilis a try! (7 teams).

The El Fiasco team came in second on the creativity/name. First place deservedly went to our international group who came up with the classic name of the times- Bowl of TARP. That’s a good one.....

Here’s a link to all the pictures from this event... it was a fun lunch. http://www.flickr.com/photos/maryaustincox/sets/72157617205947043/

A few pics below:

Judges Tastings

One Team....

The chili line.... :-)

Friday & Chili

2009-04-24T06:52:00.001-05:00

You may be wondering what does Friday and Chili have in common?? Well, today is Friday and today is our March for Babies Chili Cookoff at work!! :-) See how I made that connection all on my own. I’m smart like that.

All kidding aside, Wells is a supporter of the March of Dimes through various ways and a lot of it comes through team member volunteering and donations. We have over 700 people participating in the March for Babies walk on Sunday which means they have collected personal donations (or are making them directly). The four members of my family who live in the house will all be walking the 5k on Sunday morning together which will be interesting!! It’s not really a 5K apparently, but rather 4 miles. Not sure why .....

Anyhoo... for the last two months, various groups in our bank have been holding random fundraisers (i.e. bake sales, ice cream sunday parties, beanie baby sales donated to Tx Children’s, pizza parties) in an effort to raise money (from Team Members) to go straight to March of Dimes.

Our groups efforts are also coinciding with a meeting we happen to hold in our group every month that is simply a Team building exercise with a little low key (low budget) fun.

So... what are we doing? We are having a Chili Cookoff - 6 Teams, 3 judges and $5 donations from everyone to eat.

Now... this is where the competitive side of me pops out its head.... you see I have a history here and a legend to continue.

My Teams and I are 2 - 0 right now.

First competition was WII Mario Cart Racing - which I had never played before. We were in pairs and I was paired with grandpa (he is so I can say that) and we WON!! I carried him right on through all the heats and by about the last race, I finally got him going which was good he caught on because we were gonna lose if he didn’t!!

Second competition - Easter Egg Hunt around the office followed by Riddle Solving. My Team was victorious because I can run and know where all the hiding spots are. We found the most eggs.... these eggs had riddles in them. We (as a Team) then solved all the riddles and won again!!

So.. you see... this is the Third competition!! Chili Judging & Name Creativity ..... all for the benefit of March of Dimes...... :-) I’ve enlisted professional assistance (and no, not for me silly, but I know this is what you were thinking!). FOR. THE. CHILI.!! I happen to be married to the guy who makes the best chili, albeit, usually too hot to eat chili, but he can tone it down a bit when he wants. So.. he’s helping me (translation: I get to watch and stir) make the Award Winning Chili for our TEAM!!! TEAM NAME: EL FIASCO (which we stole from John but loved). John pretty much said our team name should be Poco Fuerte (John’s translation - wimpy) because he’s not making it nearly as spicy as he usually does and we’re all wimps because we can’t eat fire-breathing chili!! However, again knowing who are judges are, I know at least 2 of the 3 are not terribly fond of spicy foods. So.... I’m in sales... I’m playing to my audience (hopefully).

Of course, I’m taking pictures..... they will come later!! Wish us LUCK!!! oh.. and that we raise a good bit of money for the March of Dimes today. Cause that’s really why we’re doing it... :-)

Baseball Update
Weds game was another good game. The Knights won!! I only was able to see Stephen’s first At Bat and out in the field. He made some good plays from the field (this other team had some strong bats) and struck out on his first at bat. However, after I left, apparently, he hit a ball through the short stop and back towards the fence which brought in a runner and got him to 2nd base. He scored on that one. I believe he got on base again, but was left out there at end of the inning. Proud of him. He’s starting to show he really can play ball!! Another game on Saturday!

Off to work now... and to serve Chili!!! Just for the record (because who knows who is reading my blog), all the supplies were bought by Team Members at Team Member expense as well as other Team Members purchasing with personal funds. No TARP funds were harmed during these exercises! In fact, we’re just helping out the economy!!

MA

Monday April 20, 2009

2009-04-20T22:07:00.000-05:00

It’s Monday again... they keep coming every week!!

After a very wet weekend here in Houston (we got somewhere around 9 inches of rain here), Sunday was beautifully sunny and cool in the 70’s. Windy. The rest of the week is supposed to be cool at night, warm in the days but not too warm. Upper 70’s/Low 80’s - low humidity. These are the few weeks we get to sort of act like we have perfect weather. Not too far from now, our highs will approach 90’s and the humidity will creep in for the summer. But, for now, we’re enjoying these few really nice days we get!!

MS150 Update -
I don’t have any pictures yet. Supposed to get some. Rachel went about half way on Sunday and her knee started hurting. She’s been struggling with a little tendonitis in one of her knees from running in soccer, and by about half way on Sunday with the 15 mph headwinds, she couldn’t go any more on it. Proud she got that far!!

Baseball Update -
Stephen had a game tonight and had two hits, and two scores. YAY! The Knights won the game too!! Nothing came to him in the field.

Rachel had a Soccer Banquet tonight and John took her since Stephen had a game and I had a work commitment dinner in town for a fundraiser for a client. I hear it was ok - but not great.

Heading to bed... has been a busy day!!

MA

MS150 - Day 1 Cancelled

2009-04-18T10:47:00.002-05:00

For the first time in 25 years, the organizers of the MS150 cancelled the first day. Yesterday, over 11 inches of rain fell in and near LaGrange, Texas which is the spot of the overnight location and camping for the 13,000 riders. The place was just too wet to put everyone. That, coupled with the threat of more severe rain expected today, caused the organizers to cancel Day 1 and start up on Sunday morning in LaGrange and finish Day 2. Not sure how they are going to do it, I don’t think they know either yet. Rachel, Stephen and their Dad are going up Saturday afternoon to the ranch they were going to stay overnight at with the Frost Bank team and Rachel and Rob are planning to ride tomorrow’s leg into Austin. Stephen’s camping trip with Boy Scouts was cancelled as well (which is a good thing) late yesterday, so he’ll be with them as well.

Here’s the current weather and as a Mama, I’m glad they cancelled it. I’m glad my baby girl isn’t out in those storms between Houston- Bellville- LaGrange right now. Very wet and stormy!

Lazy day here in Houston with rain. Gotta love em!!

MA