Happy Birthday Mom & Dad!!

Here's wishing Meme & Poppy a wonderful birthday weekend!!  Meme's birthday is today, February 28 and of course, I was going to say she was turning 29 again, but then what would they make me??  Poppy's birthday is tomorrow, March 1!    Hopefully, there are special birthday dinners occurring at their house tonight and tomorrow night (I want to know the menu) complete with a yummy birthday cake!!  We'll be seeing them both next weekend to celebrate their birthdays AGAIN in Wimberley back the Blair House Inn!!

Our Saturday has been busy so far.  Stephen had his ISEE examination this morning.  It's a skills assessment examination as the last piece for the private school application we've made.  Three hour test with essay!!  Stephen said his head hurt when he finished!!  I bet it did.  Told him to get used to it because he'll see that type of test environment with the ACT/PSAT/SAT and other types of testing in his life!!  He felt he did really well with the math portion and ok with the reading/writing portion.  I'm told we'll be able to see the scores on Weds evening.  So... stay tuned!

Rachel had a soccer game this morning at 10 am so she had to be at school at 8:45 am.  Since I still have not been able to master cloning myself,  John was the designated driver for her event!!  I went to the game to watch her play though after dropping Stephen off.  She played goalkeeper for the first half and mid field for the second half.   It was pretty cold out there and the wind was very strong.  The ball didn't go where it normally would with the strong wind blowing it southward! They were victorious and won 2 - 0!!  YAY!!

After arranging for the kid pickups/dropoffs at home, I went to the 3 area scrapbooking shops for the Houston Area Scrapbook Round-Up.    Lots of fun things to make and 20% off everything everywhere!  I had fun doing that and picked up a few item I needed!!   My next goal.... print off some pictures and to get creative soon!

Rachel had a few boys over today that were on her assigned team in Biology and they had a project to finish they have to present on Monday!  Rachel managed to pick a team where she's one of two girls with 4 guys and the other girl couldn't come today.... hmmmmm...... anyway, they were nice young men.  They worked on their project for about 3 - 4 hours to get it done (with a little foozball in between!).  

We're having a mexican dinner tonight at our favorite restaurant - Los Ramirez - with the family of one of Rachel's friends, Bridget.  They are new to town and we offered to introduce them to our favorite mex place around here!  That'll be fun!!

Later!

MA

We have a Tenderfoot amongst us!

Stephen is now an official Tenderfoot Boy Scout!  He received his Tenderfoot ranking as a Boy Scout this evening at the Court of Honor!!  Tradition is for a parent to stand up with their child while he receives a new rank award.  The parent then receives a pin to commemorate the work going into the ranking and the Scout receives the patch to wear.  The Troop Master typically grants the rankings to each Scout.  So, here we are in a picture with Stephen, me and the Scout Master, Mr. Holcomb.   Congratulations Stephen!!

The other fun for the last several days has been the hectic finishing of Stephen's Science Fair Project which is due tomorrow!  Here's a picture of the finished project.

I have to say, I'm just tired of science projects.  When we lived in Silverlake (Pearland), the elementary school there started science projects in Kindergarten!  Yes... kindergarten.  They weren't really tough projects, but they were projects.  In Kindergarten I think she had to research an animal and make a poster.  Each year after, the projects progressed in difficulty until by 4th or 5th grade, they were doing some seriously good projects.  Rachel was pretty good at them, but they really take a lot of work from parents to help the child finish it.    The good thing that came from starting them so young, is by 5th grade, I really didn't have to help much any more and certainly now, with her in 9th grade, I'm not required much to participate for Rachel.

Stephen's a different story.......

In our current school district, they don't start science projects until 6th grade, so this is Stephen's first science project ever.  He chose to do a project to determine which window coverings block the most heat between sheers, curtains, solar screen and solar film.   It's an interesting consumer project.  The winner is the ugly reflective solar film on the windows!!  Truly... doesn't look good, but it blocks a ton of heat.   Mom had to help pretty much all the way around on this project with helping to setup and guide the time consuming experiments to using all my great scrapbooking equipment to help make letters/labels for the poster!!  I'm glad it's over!!  

That's if for tonight and I'm pooped!!  Unfortunately, it's 10:00 pm and Rachel's due to be returning to the school in about 15 minutes from soccer games across town in Katy tonight!! 

Later!

MA

I just love a great wine!!

Wine Corks!

Our Hostess - Michelle

My dear friend, Michelle, is studying to be a Master Sommelier which requires lots of classes, examinations and pretty tough blind wine tastings!!   So, in preparation for a big exam to come in May, Michelle had a really fun Ladies Wine Tasting Friday night at her place!  There were 10 of us and we each were assigned a certain grape varietal and region to bring with a price tag at $20 or so.  I was assigned a favorite of mine, the Pinot Noir grape and asked to bring one from either the Santa Barbara, Sonoma valley or Washington regions.  One of my favorite regions for Pinot in Sonoma is the Russian River Valley so I found a nice $35 bottle at Specs for us to try - Renteria, 2005 Russian River Valley, Ranch Road Pinot Noir.  2005 was a pretty good year too so the wine by all accounts should be pretty good.

Ok - so there were 10 wines!  We had an Australian Shiraz, CA Zinfandel, Napa Cab, Cal Syrah, Washington Merlot, Argentine Malbec, Tempranillo from Spain, Gamay from France, and two Pinot Noir's - one from New Zealand and the one I brought from CA.  All covered up in paper Specs bags!

So.. no... I really can't distinguish wines very well I've learned.  My palette is not all that distinguishable.  I also learned last night that after about 3 tastings, I can't smell them much anymore either!!  (That's why the pros spit it all out... but hey, I can't do that unless it's really, really bad!!)  So - how did I do in the tasting?  Well, I relied on the fact that I know what wines I tend to like the most and that was how I approached picking them out.  And surprise... I did pretty well managing to identify 4 of them!

So - my favorites and the ones I'm going to go looking to buy a few are the following:

Summers Adriana's Cuvee 2005 Cabernet Sauvignon, Napa Valley, CA 

Martino Old Vine Malbec 2004 Mendoza, Argentina ($20)

Renteria Ranch Road 2005 Pinot Noir Russian River Valley, CA  ($35)

If you want to taste some really nice wines and not spend a ton of money, those three above are really, really nice.  I liked some of the others as well, but those three were my favs!

Michelle's husband, Tom, brought out a really good bottle of Pinot - Kosta Browne!!  Wow ... it was good!!  Thank you so much for sharing it with me!!

The ladies I met Friday night were all fun and really sweet people!  The world is so small that even in this little circle of 10 people who are friends of Michelle, I end up working with one of them and having worked with another in a past life!  Funny how that goes isn't it!   Jennifer and I did a double take when I walked in and we realized we were at the same party - we work together! Alejandra came up to me at some point as she knew me from some where and we figured that out and that was fun!  It was fun to see Joy who I had meet at a wine tasting with Michelle, meet Christy (and hear her amazingly interesting stories of a shared employer at one time), Sanna, Amy, Katie, Merilyn, and Arati! 

This is Jack!! Michelle & Tom's baby!  He's a real character!!  Check out the pictures of Jack's attempts to get a treat.  He's hillarious!

Michelle - I'm ready for another tasting!!  

More pictures are in the gallery (you may have to click on the gallery to go to Flickr to look - it only posts the first 20 pics!!)

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Other pictures in the gallery are from Rachel's last soccer game and then Rachel got a hold of the camera last weekend and was playing!!  Pretty fun to see what she came up with taking pictures around the house!!

 

Have a great Sunday!  We're going to start working on the garden prep today!!

Love, 

MA

Happy Birthday Macie!!!

Today is my niece, Macie's, Birthday!!!  YAY!!  

I hope your birthday is extra special today.  Love from Aunt MA, John, Rachel and Stephen!!!

xoxoxox

We're getting there...

So, it's Weds.  Middle of the week.  It's the only day of the week where we don't have any commitments out of the house in the evening!  That'll be nice tonight!!

Last night was Bible Study with Beth Moore!  She's just so amazing.  God sure has entrusted her with a spiritual gift that is touching so many people.  We're studying about our Inheritance and what that means to us.  I'm don't think I've put together all the pieces in my head that she has mentioned, but it's starting to resonate.  She talks quickly and with passion, you just have to hang on and listen!!

We're in a weather pattern that I just don't care for around here.  Temps in the upper 60/70's, muggy and misty wet.  YUCK!!!  Just feels like everything sticks to you. My friends/family in Central Texas are praying for rain, so I hope some of this gets to you!

Have a great Weds!

MA

Not Me! Monday!

Welcome to Not Me! Monday! This blog carnival was created by MckMama. You can head over to her blog to read what she and everyone else have not been doing this week.

Ok - so I thought I'd give MckMama's Not-Me Monday Carnival a twirl... see what I can come up with anyway.

As I mentioned on a post last week, Rachel had her first "date" on Friday night.  I most certainly did not consider taking a picture to commemorate this event for scrapbooking and forever!  That would have earned me some serious ignoring from my oldest child and I certainly wouldn't want to ever do anything to embarrass her.  :-)   I most certainly did not tell her that the next time she wouldn't be so lucky!!  No, not me!

I have the most wonderful husband who, for Valentine's Day, certainly did not take my order for a homemade dinner and make it to a T and then let me sit on the couch with my computer while he slaved away cooking it!!  Of course, knowing he was doing so much work, I most certainly did not just sit around like a Queen drinking wine and munching on cheese & crackers!! No, not me!

I know I did not wear my favorite pair of jeans for several days in a row because I was just not too lazy to wash them!! That would be just really yucky and smelly and just so not cool. No, not me!

And.. of course, I most certainly did not stay in bed a few extra minutes one (or three) morning(s) last week trying to come up with a reason to justify staying there all day.  And while not thinking about reasons to justify staying there, of course I was not thinking about ways to become a millionaire so I could stay there indefinitely. No.. of course not me.  

While working on my (umpteenth) school science project for a child, I most certainly did not curse the person who ever came up with the idea of science projects and all the mess that goes along with them for the p.a.r.e.n.t.s!  No, not me!!  I most certainly did not keep putting off Stephen desires to work on said project until the last possible day (Sunday) because it's just not how I wanted to spend my day!!!  No, I have NO selfish tendencies, not me!

Ok - so perhaps not so bad for my first Not Me, Monday!!

Have a great evening!

Mary-Austin

Happy Valentine's Day

Hope everyone is having a fun Valentine's Day!!  It's low key around here today.  John cooked a fabulous dinner and we're just hanging out!!

Hope everyone had a good one!

Mary-Austin