Happy 4th!

Here we are, just waiting for the parade to start. It was PERFECT... we parked within 1 block of the parade route, 5 minutes before it started. We found a place to sit in the shade, front row, which was great because I forgot to put sunscreen on the girls before we left! Nobody got burnt. (Annie being the only one I had to worry about.)


This one's for my Dad... Marine Color Guard. And a prayer for the safety of our troops and thankfulness for all they do to keep us safe and protect our way of life.



The girls collected more candy than I will let them eat in A YEAR, so we'll enjoy that for a couple of days and then it will disappear.

We stayed up to watch the fireworks and had a great day altogether.

too much work

Ugh! My first day back at work and by 10AM I was seriously considering my other career options! Things are still such A HOLY MESS here that it is starting to get REALLY OLD. We have yet another co-worker leaving, just as we recruited one to start tomorrow, replacing ONE OF FOUR we are currently short! Plus we have two out on FMLA. What a mess. Too much work, not enough bodies to get it done.

And all of this leaves me tired and somewhat depressed and extremely frustrated about not getting to do more stuff with my kids! This also leaves me with a serious lack of interesting blogging material! We get up, have breakfast, drop kids at daycare, go to work, come home, fix/eat supper, go for a walk or play in the backyard if there's time, baths and bedtime. Repeat x4, while longing for the weekend! Life is just too short. But... all major bills will be eradicated in roughly two years and then I will be able to seriously consider part time work. Life was SO much better when I worked 4 days a week!

Vacation - Part 2, continued

Oh my, there are just so many good photos to post! I'm going to put up a few, but follow them over to Flickr to see the whole set. We had a wonderful time on our vacation. Only it was too short!

We visited our FL relatives, the girls played in the pool every day, we ate Grandma Abbye and Grandma's good cooking, looked at all the pretty flowers and lots of other fun, relaxing stuff. The girls played with their cousins one day and really enjoyed that.

And here are some photos to enjoy...

Rebuilding Galveston

An update on Galveston seawall landmarks from KHOU is here.

What's coming back? Murdock's = yes. Construction is proceeding at a rapid pace. Balinese Room = maybe. Some argument about what/how. 61st Street Fishing Pier = yes, later, currently waiting on reconstruction of the 61st Street jetty before they can begin on the pier. Flagship Hotel = no. Paper says it will be demolished. Maybe that means the long-promised entertainment venue will finally be developed though?

Vacation - Part 2

Picking veggies in Grandma Abbye's garden

Beautiful

Vacation Art Project

This was fun... but I definitely recommend doing it in bathing suits! I'm so glad I was smart enough to figure that out in advance. ;-)

This art project became wrapping paper for Uncle Sam's birthday present, which we sent home via Grandma so it actually arrived on time for a change. So here ya go, Sam... photo documentary!

For Moms... the recipe for this paint is super easy - 1 cup of cold water and 1 cup of AP flour. Whisk together, pour into individual bowls and add food coloring to tint. Heavy weight paper would have worked better than the newspaper because it had a tendancy to want to blow and stick to little hands, but overall it was a pretty good project.

Vacation - Part 1

Four-wheeler ON A LEASH for goodness sake! See my Dad out there in his socks?! He is so totally wrapped around tiny girls' fingers it is embarrassing!


Watching the rodeo from Poppy's primo front-row box seats near the roping chutes.


Lots of water for coping with the TX heat wave! Even at 8pm, it was still HOT.


And here they are, participating in the "goat scramble" for the very first time. Mostly there was a lot of running around in the arena dirt going on, but the second night Annie did actually notice there was a goat in the arena and got close enough to touch it. Long after the ribbon was gone, but it didn't matter to her! And Poppy was quite proud to be out there with them.

Time flies

We've been away on vacation and just returned home. I have some great photos to share, and will post them as soon as I have a chance to transfer them from the camera. Have some errands to handle first this morning though.

We had a wonderful time visiting all of our family in Florida. More details to come with the photos.

Also we received some pretty wonderful news while in FL. If you've followed my blog for awhile, you will know that my maternal Grandfather, two of my cousins and I all share our birthday. I just found out that we have yet another cousin scheduled to arrive on the big day this year!

fun times

From today at the water park...



And I took this last week when the two little monkeys were both trying to ride the rocking horse at the same time. They do not fit! There was much sliding off the back end and laughing going on!

There's no place like home...

Just back from a 4 day trip to Kansas City (for work) and it's SO GOOD to be home! I missed my girls.

YEA! New Disney movie coming!

Mommy cards

Ever need to give someone your "mommy information" and thought about there should be another option than digging through your purse for a pen and spare piece of paper?

Well, I ordered these mini cards from Moo and they came today. I think they are just the coolest thing! I put my name, "Abbye & Annie's mom", my email address and my phone number on them. It was just what I had in mind for handing to the Sunday School teacher (in case of meltdown, etc.) or anyone who I'd like to keep in touch with but my regular business cards are also not appropriate for the situation. So check them out. I LOVE mine!

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