The First Sleepover

Last night, M had one of his little kindergarten friends over for a sleepover.  It was loud, raucous, and a lot of fun.  The highlight of the evening was giving the boys (and tagalong L) a couple of glow sticks and setting them loose out back after dark.  

Authentic, hand-crafted sign designed to keep girls out.

The boys slept in the tent that we have in what should be our formal dining room.  (Wait.  You don't have a tent up in your living room?)  Over the course of the evening and in to the wee hours of the morning, I discovered that kindergarten boys giggle and shriek exactly like little girls.  Go Figure.

My Kids, the LARPers

The other day, I overheard this interesting exchange between L and M.


M to L:  Let's play Star Wars, you be Qui Gon and I'll be Darth Maul.  I'll use the lightsaber, you can use your unicorn.

...grunting and swiping that results in L crying...

M to L:  Ok, Ok,  You can be Darth Maul now.  I'll be Obi Wan.

L to M:  NO!  I'll be Darth Vader.  You be Obi Wan.

...grunting and swiping that results in M stalking off angrily...

Alas, no pictures of the kids in battle.  This is from 12/2010.

Snow Day in Texas

When I went to bed last night, I kind of figured that the kids would not have school today, and sure enough after a night of fitful sleep (due to the sound of sleet hitting the windows), I woke up at 5:00am to find that M didn't have school today.  I turned off my alarms and snuggled back in to bed and sure enough...not even 10 minutes later, M was in our room.  He was up and ready to go.  So much for sleeping in on a snow day.

After living in Ohio and Kentucky for a while, I'm not all that amazed by snow.  The kids, however, were harping on me incessantly all morning to go out and play in the snow.  I'm not sure what they thought it was going to be, but I tried to explain to them the difference between full-on snow and the weird sleet-ice-trace-amount-of-snow combination that we had going on.  In any case, I made them eat lunch first and then we went outside to explore the winter wonderland.

Snow Eater Extraordinaire 

Ice Stomper Extraordinaire

Looking for more snow to eat.

A bright sunshiny snow day!

Snow ball fight!

February 1, 2011

July 16, 2010

My Budding Ansel Adams

For Christmas this year, we got the kiddos some digital cameras.  They've been messing with ours for quite a while, so we decided to surprise them with their very own.  L's camera is one that is designed for little hands and big drops, while M's is a little more grown up...in that it has a zoom feature and a flash.  Here's a sampling of what M has deemed worthy to photograph.

L, dressed for Valentine's Day, on December 30th.

Me and a not-so-happy L.

Thunder and assorted dolls.

Close-up of couch pillow - probably could've done without the flash.

M's Lego treasure trove.

You can see from the pictures that we've been hanging out indoors lately.  It's been a bit chilly here, but once it warms up, we are planning on going to the neighborhood park to take some nature pictures.

Oh What a Week it's Been

It's been just a bit over a week since my last post and I'd like to say things have been pretty carefree and easygoing around here, but alas, things have been quite the opposite.  Shortly after I posted "Preschool Pro," I went upstairs to gather the items that the kids need for swim class.  When I went into M's closet to retrieve a swim suit I noticed that the closet was humid and wet, which wasn't good since Colleyville, and a large swath of Texas, had just been subjected to Tropical Storm Hermine.  Apparently Hermine wasn't content with just hitting our roof, rolling into our gutters, and watering our lawn for free.  She wanted in, in a big way.  Pretty much every item of clothing in M's closet was, in one way or another, wet - some were dripping, some were damp, and some were just too close to clothes that had been contaminated with roof-attic insulation-sheetrock rainwater.  I grabbed pretty much everything out of the closet (we got the rest later), threw down some old towels, and then wrangled the kids out of the house to swim class.  Later that evening, after the kids were asleep (M's camping in the guest room for time being), Steve and I assessed the situation.  As if the saggy ceiling, dripping water, and mysterious growth isn't enough, it turns out that we had placed a stack of M's baby pictures and my baby book (from the 70's!) on the top shelf of the closet - pretty much directly under that ominous looking ceiling.  Uncool Hermine.  Uncool.

The ceiling in M's closet - 9/8.

Here's Steve doing his best to dry out Matthew's pictures and my baby book.

We took this the very next night.  It appears to have gotten bigger and I think I heard it laugh at us, too.

Flash forward a week and a day.  We're pretty much where we were a week ago.  Sigh.  Apparently we aren't the only ones in Texas dealing with water issues.  We have confirmed appointments for a number of people to come out tomorrow to look at our, shall we say, situation.  Hopefully we'll be able to get the ball rolling on getting this fixed.  In the interim, we've made M's room off limits and have taped a tarp over the offending area of the ceiling.  I just braved exposure to whatever it is that may be growing in there to snap this picture.  

Lovely, right?  It's definitely laughing at us.   I'll keep you posted, I have to go sanitize my lungs now.