Wordless Wednesday

Vacation Week

Addison and me playing in the water at Galveston.




Ready for the Riverwalk boat ride. (They were NOT impressed!)




Bryson and Jackson at the Texas Ranger Museum. Addison slept in her stroller the entire time!





Our little family on the Riverwalk, right outside our hotel.





Kecia and me being goofy while waiting to see Shamu.





at Sea World. Can you tell the boys had on their fake smiles?

At the Alamo. Again, they were not impressed.

Breon

Drew following suit.

The kids were great all week. They got along so well and made some great memories together.

Wow, where do I begin? We had such are great week on vacation. Our good friends, Breon and Kecia and their girls, went on vacation with us. We headed down to San Antonio for the week.

Our first stop was in Round Rock. We went to Round Rock Donuts. They are home to the TWO pound donut! I had a lemon-filled donut and it was oh so good!

Once in San Antonio we ate dinner at County Line Barbecue. It was so yummy! The next day we went to the San Antonio Children's Museum. It was all hands-on. Drew and Breon even got in on the fun! (see the pictures with the cow!)

We then headed over to the Alamo. You would have thought we were torturing the kids. They definitely didn't appreciate the history of the place. They did have fun in the gift shop, though!

After that, we went to El Mercado and had lunch at Mi Tierra. The food was great, but the service was not. We had fun walking around el mercado and buying some souvenirs. That evening we went swimming in the pool at the hotel. We may have eaten dinner someplace, I don't remember!

The next day was Sea World. The kids rode some rides and we saw a couple of shows. Then some thunderstorms rolled in and they closed all the shows and rides. We took the opportunity to go feed the dolfins. This was a lot of fun touching and feeding the dolfins. We spent some time seeing the sharks, also. Breon ordered pizza for dinner and we just hung around the hotel.

On our last full day, we kind of did our own thing. After a yummy breakfast at a little hole in the wall place, we took the boys to the Texas Ranger Museum. It is located inside the Buckhorn Saloon which is the oldest saloon in Texas. The boys enjoyed walking around looking at all the "cowboy" stuff and looking at all the animals that were hung on the walls. After the museum we took the boat tour on the riverwalk. Drew and I enjoyed it. The boys were hot and tired and didn't fail to let us know about it the entire ride! We went back to the hotel to cool off in the pool. For dinner that night, we went back to the restaurant that we had breakfast at that morning. Kids eat free at dinner, so how could we resist?! After a wonderfully home cooked meal, we all splurged for dessert. They had wonderful pies and cakes there. Addison and I had the best chocolate pie I think I have ever eaten!

The next morning we ate breakfast at the Guenther House. The man who owned the Pioneer Flour Mill once owned that house. It is right next to the flour mill. They had wonderful pancakes, waffles and the best cinnamon roll I have ever eaten. Yes, even better than Cinnabon! We even got one to go! While we were waiting for our food, a man approached us and complimented us on how well our kids behaved during the long wait. This always makes me feel proud when people go out of their way to compliment our kids.

Once in Houston, we stayed at my dad's house. He made some yummy fajitas for dinner that night. We planned on going to Galveston the next day.

The kids had a great time in Galveston. I wasn't sure how Addison would do, but she did great. She enjoyed playing in the sand and water. She even floated in her little floatie for a little while. The boys had fun finding sea shells, catching jelly fish and playing with a little hermit crab I found. We stayed about five hours and decided to go back. Drew go a ticket on the way back to dad's for an expired inspection sticker. (I just had to throw that in!)

Dad grilled chicken that night and we had a yummy dinner. We left the next morning. We stopped in Bryan to see my cousin, Damon, and my Aunt Pat. We ate lunch in Hearne at the Dixie House Cafe. We stopped at the Nike store in Hillsboro and Drew even let me buy a few (or 10) things! We got home around 4:00 that afternoon.

We had a great trip with great friends and great food! Could you tell I really enjoyed the food? I only gained 1/2 a pound. I was able to run 5 of the 7 days we were gone, so it could have been worse!

Now we are ready to get into the swing of summer. I plan on playing with my kids and enjoying my time off. Drew is teaching summer school, but he will have fun with us when he gets home each day!

Bryson is scheduled to have surgery on his lip next Tuesday, June 16th, so please keep him and us in your prayers. Now I'm off to enjoy the rest of my day!

9 year old wisdom

Bryson: Mom, I know why they invented schools.

Me: Why?

Bryson: So we could learn to read and so we could pass the TAKS test.

Wordless Wednesday

Rough Week at Home

Last week was a busy week. This week was just plain rough.

Last Saturday night Addison busted her lip on the coffee table. It was bound to happen sometime. I heard the awful noise and immediately reached for her. I just remember saying, "Lots of blood. There is lots of blood." Drew ran for a towel. Jackson started crying, "She's dying. She's dying." Bryson was saying (and crying), "Oh, no. She's going to die. She's going to die." Addison was SCREAMING. (My kids are very dramatic!) There was blood on me and Addie. I don't think she got any on the carpet, thank goodness!

She finally stopped bleeding and settled down after several minutes. I couldn't tell if her tooth went through her bottom lip or if she bit her lip. Either way, she was cut on the inside and the outside of her lip. I knew from past experience when Bryson busted his lip, that they wouldn't put stitched on the inside of a lip for fear of infection. The outside had just a small cut.

I really didn't think too much more about her lip until Wednesday morning. She woke up very cranky and nothing would make her happy. Even Elmo failed to bring a smile. She didn't eat breakfast and cried when she tried to drink from her sippy cup.

When I picked her up at Miss Linda's that afternoon she said Addie had been horrible all day. She cried and whined and was cranky all day. I took her home and gave her a bath. I noticed that she was drooling a lot and was barely moving her mouth. My grandparents were on their way over to visit so I knew we were just going to have to make the best of it.

I looked at her bottom lip and she had several canker sores on it. I thought she might have a virus, lingering chicken pox in her mouth or hand, foot and mouth disease. My grandparents had already asked if they could keep Addie and Jackson on Thursday, so this worked out well. I didn't want to send her back to the babysitter's house if I thought she had a virus. They stayed with them and she didn't eat anything that day. She just cried if she tried to eat or drink. Her lip looked swollen, too.

Drew stayed home with her on Friday and I convinced him to call the doctor. The doctor wanted to see her so they went that afternoon. She didn't eat that day, either. She has lost two pounds since she was in there for the chicken pox a couple of weeks ago.

The doctor thought that when she busted her lip last Saturday her teeth caused some abrasions on her lip that had turned into canker sores. He gave Drew a prescription for some medicine that would take a couple of day to get filled and would have to be put on a dry lip. We would have to dry her lip with a piece of gauze and hold her lip for 10 seconds with the medicine on it. Uh, yeah, right. It took 4 people to hold her down just to look in her mouth! We decided to give her Motrin and Tylenol and put some canker sore medicine on it. Since she hadn't really had anything to eat or drink in two days, Drew forced her to drink some water last night. She wasn't really happy about it, but she did it. She only drank about 4-5 tablespoons, though.

This morning he made her eat some cereal and eventually she began to feed herself. She is acting more like herself now. She isn't as cranky or irritable and seems to be getting better.

Let me just tell you that when Addison isn't happy, nobody is happy. Man, that little girl has a mighty temper and a humongous attitude. I know it will serve her well one day, but right now it is rough! I am glad she is feeling better. I don't like it when my kids hurt and I can't do anything aobut it. She is on the mend and hopefully we are too!

Wordless Wednesday

Week in Review

Wow! It has been a long time since my last post. We have been very busy around here. Things are finally starting to settle down, so I decided to take some time to post.

Last week was the week of field day. In the life of an elementary PE teacher this is a BIG deal. I feel like it has to go off without a hitch. I do feel like I am being critiqued all day long by teachers, students, parents and administrators. This may not be the case, but this is how I feel. I really stress out about field day. This stress starts about a month before the actual day and last until it is over. The day went well and I had several sweet e-mails telling me how much fun people had. I am always glad to get positive comments. My main goal is for everyone to have fun and for the kids to get wet! That is all they want, right?

My little sister, Pily, came up from College Station to help and my wonderfully amazing husband took off a day of work to help, also. I just couldn't do it without them. They are my support, emotionally and physically. Thanks for helping me! I love both of you very much! Same time, same place next year!

After field day Drew got me and Pily a gift certificate to get our nails done. So, after we worked it out in a kickboxing class on Saturday morning, we went and got pampered at the nail salon. Then we went to Old Navy and Sam Moon. Sam Moon was CRAZY! There were so many people there. When we got home we both took naps. We woke up to a steak dinner made by my wonderfully amazing husband. Could you have a better day than that?

On Sunday, Kecia and her girls let me tag along to the last day of King Tut at the Dallas Museum of Modern Art. It was pretty amazing to see all the artifacts. We had a great time together. We came back to our house and had left over steaks! They were still very yummy!

Monday began another week. Only two weeks of school left before summer break! I took all my classes outside on Monday and enjoyed the beautiful weather. It was just perfect. I went to Keno last night and saw some of my favorite people in then world. I just love hanging out with them and feel blessed that they let me join their group about five years ago.

Today Bryson's class went on a field trip to the Dallas World Aquarium. I took a personal day so I could go with him. It was fun being mom today. We had fun walking around looking at all the animals, birds and fish. We even got to see the manatees. After the field trip Bryson and I stopped by Sam Moon on the way home. I bought Addison some bows, barrettes and two bags to take on our trip to San Antonio in a couple of weeks. When we got home I took an hour long nap and woke up to the smell of bacon cooking! Drew made pancakes and bacon for dinner. We have since taken baths and are ready for bed!

So, as you can see, we have been busy. I will try to not go so long between postings. I would hate to disappoint the four people who read my blog!