Rain, Rain Go Away - Spring Break Part 2

Our stay in San Antonio durning Spring Break was planned out - so I thought, until it started raining on and off for a couple of days.  But, no worries, we stayed busy during those rainy days too.  First of all, per Carson's request, I mean supplication, we enjoyed bagels for breakfast one morning!  We also went shopping, got haircuts, watched more TV than usual and enjoyed an afternoon at the Children's Museum.

Enjoying yummy bagels

Shopped until they dropped (which didn't take long)!

Ah, amazing what a haircut can do.

They loved "grocery shopping at HEB!"

     

They enjoyed making humongous bubbles too!

    

5, 4, 3, 2, 1, Blast Off! - Spring Break Part 1

We started our Spring Break on Saturday, March 21st by going through Galveston to see the damage from Ike.  Even after all these months, we were able to see debris everywhere!  It is crazy and sad to see the damage.

Galveston 6 months after Ike

The ferry is always fun!

For lunch, we went to eat at an excellent Mexican restaurant called, Lupe Tortilla.  I highly recommend it.  Their beef fajitas and their tortillas are out of this world.

Finally, we made it to our destination, the Space Center.  It was super crowded, but fun.  We were able to see a live feed of one of the astronaut in a space walk working on the space station.  We saw moon rocks, played with some displays and saw the craziest people ever dive.  

Moon rocks!

By the time we left the Space Center it was dinner time, so we went to eat at Niko Niko's.  Yummy Greek food. And then, we went to the Apple Store to buy another Mac for the practice. 

We ended our day with some Starbucks.  Always a good way to end the day!

The next day, we tried the Astronauts' ice cream we bought at the Space Center!  Yea, Dave and I thought it was disgusting but the kids liked it. 

Time To Go Back Home!

Okay, so I think is time to go back to Beaumont now.  We had two wonderful weeks here in San Antonio. The first week, we got to spend a lot of time as a family.  Dave and I also had several opportunities to spend some alone time, which was nice.  The second week, I took advantage of and started preparing for Luke's 3rd birthday party, which is quickly approaching.  

We were able to do quite a bit.  In addition to the things I already blogged about, we also enjoyed the following: 

We went downtown to an amphitheater to see a Mexican Folkloric Ballet.  

We went to the zoo with Dave.

The kids and Dave played a lot of basketball.  Games like CAT and Around the World.  Carson challenges every time, where as Natalia will never challenge.  Man, did Carson enjoy every minute of that.  Natalia always has such a hard time loosing, but she hung in there.  

When I came outside, I noticed that Luke was getting hit with the basketball way too often.  The basketball hoop was right next to the sandbox, where he was playing.  Nobody thought about moving the basketball hoop.  LOL.  They would just laugh every time they hit Luke with the basketball.  Poor kid.  Then again, you would think that if it bothered him that much, he would have moved or at least say something.  Luke is just a though little guy, I guess!

Oh, let's see, what else did we do?  Oh yea, we went on a "Nature Walk", as Natalia calls them.  It was the perfect day for a little hike.  The kids were so into catching bugs and looking out for snakes.  We saw several deer and a whole bunch of bugs.  

  

  

I also attempted to potty train Luke.  Ha, what a joke!  Not even close to being potty trained. I'm so mad at myself because I believe that he was ready to be potty trained last November.  He was already letting me know when he wanted to go, but with moving out of the house and all that construction project, I just pretty much ignored the whole thing and now, I wish I would have worked with him.

I've tried this week.  He gets to play with my iphone while he sits on the toilet.  We even have Wall-E calling my cell phone!  You should see the kids' little faces light up when they see Wall-E on my phone screen.  They get so excited.    Wall-E sounds so much like Dave, it's amazing.  But then again, Dora and Barney also sounded like Dave. Geez, I wonder why?

Anyway, we had great times here in San Antonio, but enough is enough.  It's really time to go home.

This time, we only broke an old chair and messed up the bed's comforter in our room with a marker.  Yea, I think my parents would also agree that it's time for us to go back to Beaumont.

Thanks Dad and Mom for everything.  We appreciate all you've done for us!  

Oh - Thanks DAD!

I think, somehow, we are going to forget these three trumpets here in San Antonio when we go back to Beaumont.

Can you blame me?????

 

The kids spent most of the day at the Market with my Dad and Mom on Friday, while I was at work.  Well, you know how it goes, whatever the kids want, they get.  So...to make a long story short...the kids ended up with these lovely trumpets.

The Great of 808

Dave, Bryan, Mark and JPat

These four guys are so blessed! They have been friends since college. It's so awesome how they ended up as roommates at A&M for the majority of their four years of college. Their apartment number was 808. So, they were known as "The Great of 808". They are all from Southeast Texas, although some of them didn't know each other until they got to college. Four strong Christians holding each other up throughout their college years. How awesome is that!

Mark Fittz got his degree in Architecture and later obtained his masters of Architecture. He and his wife Michelle have a four year old, Micah and Arianna who is 2. They gave up the "All American Dream" left a very good job and their life in Florida to become missionaries in Honduras. They now work with CAM. You can read more about their ministry here.

Bryan Holmes is an awesome Christian guy. He graduated from A&M with a bachelors degree in Construction Science. He has lived in several countries as a project manager with CBI. Finally, he decided to follow God's calling and became the Young Life Director in the Woodlands.

Jpat Ivey is an attorney in Katy, Texas. As many of you know, he married Hetal and have two beautiful daughters, Hannah and Sarah. He got a Political Science and a teaching degree from A&M. --I hear he was the best teacher ever!

Dave graduated with a degree in Biochemistry and then went to dental school in San Antonio. And that's how I met him (more about that later).

So once a year, all of them make an effort to get together as a group. On Sunday, we met in Beaumont at Bryan's parent's home. Bryan's mom, Ms. Peggy, smoked chickens. We always look forward to those smoked chickens - they are delicious!

It was nice to see everybody again. We had a great time!

Daddy is Here!

You can tell by looking at what we had for dessert:

Daddy prepared this 

yummy banana split for dessert!

And, this is what we usually have for dessert:

I mean, don't get me wrong, I love option #1!  

So, it's always so good to see Daddy.

"No...me no Dog Dog"

Dave has always loved to play with Luke by calling him "Dog-Dog", since Luke has always liked dogs, but doesn't like to be called "Dog-Dog". And that's where Daddy finds the humor. Well, I don't think Luke thinks that being called "Dog-Dog" is funny! Everytime Daddy calls him Dog-Dog he says, "No Daddy, me no Dog-Dog, me Luke." Last weekend, Daddy kept calling Luke "Dog-Dog." Luke left the room and came right back with his dog and said, "No, No, No, me no Dog-Dog. Dadda, this Dog-Dog (showing Daddy his dog), me LUKE!"

Going Back to Guatemala

Today marks a week since Tia Lety and Nia Naty went back to Guatemala. I don't like saying good-bye, especially when I don't know exactly when I will see them again. The kids really got attached! I mean c'mon, wouldn't you? The kids got 100% attention from both of them. If they wanted to play basketball, then my aunts would play basketball. If they wanted to play "catch me", well...guess who was running after them? Yup, my aunts! If they wanted to play hide-and-seek, then there were my aunts looking for them and acting as if they couldn't find Luke, even though the only part that my aunts couldn't see was Luke's head (as long as Luke can't see you, he thinks you can't see him :0)). If Natalia wanted to color (which she is really into coloring right now), one of my aunts would sit with her and color. Natalia also loved the fact that they would fix her hair however she wanted it. Have I mentioned how much Spanish Natalia got to speak? Seriously, that's all she spoke to them. Carson and Luke understand a lot more, but only know how to say a few words in Spanish. Oh, how I wish I would have taken pictures of all the things they did together, but for some reason I didn't think about it, until now.

My aunts were here for one month and honestly, I don't know where time went. Time flew! Since they were going to have to leave the house at about 3:30 a.m. on Friday, my aunts and the kids said their good-byes on Thursday night. As you can imagine, Natalia cried and cried...and cried. Carson wanted some one on one time with each aunt and even let them hold him (a first). His eyes filled with tears, but didn't actually cried. And Luke, well, I don't think he really knew what was going on. Natalia requested to be woken up at 3:00 a.m. the next day to say good-bye again. I wasn't too sure about waking them up that early, I was afraid they weren't going to go back to sleep, but we did anyway. The kids said good-bye again and went right back to sleep.

In the morning when Natalia and Carson woke up, oh it was so sad to see their little faces...

I even fixed Natalia's hair however she wanted that morning to help her feel better.

Look at CarCar's face...so sad!

We really enjoyed having my aunts here and hope to see all the family, that we have in Guatemala, soon.

Ready or Not, Here I Come

The kids love playing hide-and-seek with Papi. As soon as he gets home in the evenings, he eats dinner and then it's time to play hide-and-seek before the kids need to go to bed. ~I'm sure that's something the kids will never forget!