Visitors

My baby brother Chad, my sister in law Kayce, and my one and only niece, Amy, surprised everyone by coming in from Hawaii (where he's stationed) to spend Christmas with their families in Texas!

  

 We saw Kayce and Amy last year, but it had been a couple of years since we've seen Chad!

This would be "The Amy" picture! My first name is Amy, my aunt's first name is Amy, my Mimi's middle name is Amy, and then we have our little Amy!

Sweet cousins! I loved having them running around together!

We were happy to have them here for a couple of days! I didn't want to see them go!

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

We've got somethin' to bark about...

Meet our CHARLIE!

 The newest member of our family!

 He's about 2-3 years old, 15lbs. of preciousness! Very affectionate!

We drove to Pearland/Houston to pick him up from our friend Laura at the Meadowlake Pet Resort. He layed on my lap the whole two hour drive home.

 He's houstrained. He scratches at the backyard when he needs to go out.

He played so hard when we got home and even took a walk, which he did very well with his leash. He went to bed early! Everyone fought over who he would sleep with, so we all camped out in the living room. I think he took turns sleeping with all of us.
He follows us around the house. So good with the kids. He's smart. He loves to cuddle.
We look forward to our life with Charlie!

Christmas Season Catch-up

We've been pretty busy with Christmas festivites and I've hardly taken any pictures.
I do have all of my Christmas shopping done, but no Christmas cards...maybe I'll send out New Year's cards?
Anthony was off from work all last week. The kids were in school, so it was just us two,which never happens. We shopped, went out to eat, and even took in a movie. It was so NICE!
We had a Christmas party here at our house for Anthony's employees. Good time.
Carli had her class party. I made jingle bell necklaces for her classmates. That's always a fave! We filled that cute bucket that Rose made, with fun stuff along with a gift certificate for a massage! It was a fun time! I enjoyed being back in the class room, helping and watching the kids!
The kids are out of school now for THREE WHOLE WEEKS! I can't believe we're half way through the school year! Where has the year gone?

A year

I really can not believe it's been a year that we have lived here. I think back and read all of my blog posts from this time last year and I think, " How has it been that long?" I also can't believe that Anthony was already living away and had started his new job, I was at home with the kids, going to work myself, packing, all during the busiest time of the year! Yes, it was crazy, but I knew then though, I would have to take it one day at a time, not think ahead, make lists (oh I how love and depend on my lists)-just stay in the moment. But yes, there of course were "overwhelming moments". I still prayed and told myself I would get through it...and I/WE did! Thank God for my blog. No matter how busy, late, or tired I was, I blogged everyday. I'm so glad I did! I can go back and read/see what we've gone through.Cause sometimes, those moments are a blur.
We're all settled in, finding our own niche (some taking longer than others) and getting use to being back here. We do still love and miss our old town- everyone and everything in it. It was a fabulous eight years! So good to us!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY DEYANIRA!

Happy Birthday to my best friend of 17 years and God Mother of my children!

1995-Deyanira with Sam and me with Austin



Have a fantastic day Deyanira! We love you so very much!

Breakfast with Santa

Saturday Carli, Tyler, and I went to Carli's school for Breakfast with Santa. The food was yummy, the crafts were fun, the hayride was cold! bikes were raffled and the cakes were auctioned. There was Santa, but Carli had NO desire to go near him.

                                           

Elf TYLER

Tyler's school's eighth grade choir along with the school's eighth grade band, toured a few of the elementary schools on Wednesday to perform for the kids.I of course had to go to two of the schools to watch him! One of the schools was the one Austin went to Kinder-second grade. We loved that school and the people in it. It was so wonderful to be there to see everyone after TEN years! Especially my heart warming visit with Austin's kindergarten teacher/my friend. The second school was CARLI'S SCHOOL!!!
Tyler was Santa's elf. Look at how stinkin' cute he was! They did a great job and he had a blast! Especially the parts about lunch time. In one of our shopping centers, there are a few restaurants. The teacher said they could pick which one they wanted to go to and just meet back at the bus at what ever the particular time was. So him and some friends walked over to Wings and More...he felt so grown! His other favorite part was being at Carli's school!
Carli talked for a week to her teacher and friends about her Tyler coming to sing at school. She was over the moon! She was so giddy and silly when she saw him! At one point, Santa and his Elf walk into the crowd to shake hands. OH MY WORD! Carli acted crazy in love with Tyler! Like he was a rock star! Then at the end when Rudolph came out, some of the singers went and picked kids from the audience to come up and sing his song. Well, of course Tyler went and picked Carli. She would not let go of him-stayed hugging him! She was so proud that HE was HER brother! And who wouldn't be?! He did WONDERFUL and IS WONDERFUL!

BFF's BIRTHDAY TRIP!

Deyanira and I both celebrate our birthdays in December. So we decided to make an annual bff birthday trip. Just us two, celebrating our birthdays. We were beyond excited! We've been friends for 17 years (Austin and Sam were 8/9 months old) and we never get to get a weekend away. We went to our favorite place, San Antonio! Our hotel was on the Riverwalk. All we had to do was walk out of the hotel door and we were already at the Riverwalk!
The weather was actually nice, everything was decorated for the Christmas season, the food of course was to die for, the laughter was non-stop, and conversation was wonderful. It truly was the best time!

                               

It's beginning to....

look a lot like Christmas! I say "beginning" because we only did the inside of the house. Tomorrow we do the outside! This year the tree decorating actually went faster. It may have had something to do with this adorable five and a half year old fashionista demanding willing to help me!

The pics aren't too good, they're taken with my cell phone.

Shopping Party

Last weekend some of us girls got together for a Christmas Shopping Party! Each of us set up booths in my home, with merchandise we sold or made. It was a lot of fun, food, and laughs!

Happy Thanksgiving!

A Star is Born!

As I talked about in an earlier post, Austin had been attending Young Life. Well to add to their wonderfulness, YL had a talent show for the kids. I was extremely sad that I couldn't go, since I had been out all week with a serious back sprain. Anthony and Tyler did and they were blown away by how awesome Austin did! He wasn't nervous or shy one bit! He never even practiced! Just got the microphone and sang along with The Backstreet Boys' "I want it that way"
He told us when he got home, "When those people stood and clapped for me, I wanted to cry" He refers to himself as a "Star" now.
This totally makes my heart melt! Special Needs means so much more, He TRULY IS SPECIAL! So kind hearted, precious, and full of personality!
Austin was in heaven! He always says he's always wanted to be on stage and sing!
I'm very thankful to my sweet Tyler who took pictures and video on his IPOD!
REMEMBER, on the video, scroll down to the bottom of this page first to pause my music, then come back up here and play this video. you have to listen real close to hear him.

AUSTIN

Austin has been attending Young Life once a week. It's not on a night with all of the high school kids, it's on a night where it's with Special Needs students, and not just students, but young and old adults. You should click on this link HERE to read more about it. It is wonderful! Austin loves it! The A&M students are so precious and love all and are so great with them! The YL leaders also come to school once a week and hang out with them.Something you don't realize is that yet another challenge with special needs kids, is church. It's hard finding a church with a program just for them. And in service, is he understanding the sermon? Likely not, He sure does love the music though. I was quite excited that he knew the songs they sang in Young Life! Well, YL, to us, is helping fill in that gap. So now, he's involved with something else and not just his sister and brother.They go for an hour and a half. Have refreshments. DANCE! Play games. Here he was playing a game (blowing q-tips through straws aiming at a turkey.). And a sermon...a wonderful sermon with props, perfect for their understanding.He's also involved in Special Olympics. This season it was bowling. We traveled out of town last weekend for Region games. Fun Day, complete with an "athlete village" where there was tons of food and game for all!

HAPPY BIRTDAY MIMI!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY MIMI! WE LOVE YOU SO VERY MUCH!

Ladies Night Out

Tuesday night, I went out for a ladies night at church. It was for the start (a couple of weeks early) of the Advent Season.Me, Mary Louise, Aunt Dee, Mimi, and Mrs.Anderson (sure wish it wasn't blurry!)We had desserts...man, there were so many yummy treats!

Now, the musical we saw was by Minnie Pause and the Hot Flashes! They're a group of ladies that come together to sing and laugh at the experiences of dealing with life's ups and downs by trusting in God.They were so great! So funny! Beautiful voices! We laughed a lot! It was quite a different take on the Advent season, for sure!Click HERE to see their website. They're also on Face*book.
Here's a video. Not from last night. They have two different acts. The one we saw was a Christmas spirit one.