San Antonio

One thing I forgot to write in my Padre post: When Gabriel had just turned one, we took him to Padre for the first time. Halfway through that trip he started walking on his own. This trip, Joel's constant stream of baby babble started turning into actual words. So one kid walking and one kid talking makes for some pretty powerful memories of a place! Joel woke us up the morning we headed to San Antonio with a loud, "APPLE!".

I have to brag about how well these boys did in the car on our trip. We brought Gabriel's practice drum so he could play in the car. He made up countless songs, music and lyrics, from that back seat. All of them Rockin, of course! Joel is so well trained that when he started to get sleepy, he would just quietly hum to himself until he fell asleep. You just can't ask for better kids than that.

Gabriel begged us to stop at the crazy, quirky, giant souvenir place on the highway back to reality. He didn't want to go in, just see the King Kong up close. I love the picture below. The sky is beautiful and it looks like a real dinosaur.

The trip was exhausting. We could see our hotel in San Antonio but couldn't get to it (what is with that crazy highway system?) Went to Chili's for dinner, Target for diapers and then tumbled into bed.

We got up to head to Sea World in the morning. I was surprised at the size of the crowd at that time of year until I realized they were doing their Halloween thing.

Here's Gabriel feeding a seal lion, which is in the picture before this one. We saw the silly show with the otter and the walrus, then made our way over to the Killer Whales.

They take my breath away.

Penguins! Joel had fallen asleep and was getting really banged up in his stroller, so Jav carried him for awhile. I thought it was so cute that when we got to the Penguin house, he sat in a cool (albeit fishy-smelling) corner with his baby asleep on his shoulder, just like a daddy penguin would have.

One complaint I have about Sea World (besides the ridiculous prices for everything) is the food selection is awful. How can a place like that not have anyplace that sells quesadillas or grilled cheese sandwiches? (The only two foods Joel will eat out). We decided to leave to find someplace we could all eat, even though we could have stayed much longer. We detoured through the Sesame Street amusement park on the way out. Jav took Gabriel on his first roller coaster trip. And Joel and I stood in a long line to ride the Elmo merry-go-round. He was sweaty, cranky, and hungry, but still managed to shout out "Melmo!" everytime he saw him.

Two boys who have had enough of Sea World!

That night we went for an early swim before dinner in the hotel swimming pool. It wasn't heated and was REALLY cold. I told Jav that Joel would probably scream bloody murder if we put him in that water. He proceeded to make a liar out of me and splashed and swam around for about 45 minutes. I guess Sea World inspired him to swim like a fish. Gabriel and I had to get out because our teeth wouldn't stop chattering. Wimps!

That night was a big Ranger game, so we ordered pizza to the room and had a pizza picnic on the floor. It was a great ending to our fantastic, memory-making trip.

Now, I have to try to get caught up on everything else that's happened in October and November.

South Padre

Aaaaaaahhhhhh. The beach. Well, at first it wasn't so relaxing. I don't know if everyone is this way, but it takes me at least a day to get used to the hot, sticky, sandy, salty mess that is the beach. And then I embrace it and love it again. Joel didn't like it one bit until the last day when it was finally cooler and cloudier. Gabriel loved it from the moment we stepped off the walkway into the sand. He loved riding the waves on the Boogie Board.

That last cloudy day was so much more fun. We each took a kid and walked way out on the sandbar to wave jump. The waves were bigger that far out, and Gabriel got a little scared. Then Gabriel and I made a volcano in front of our sand castle while Joel and Jav played soccer behind us.

We always had so much to carry that I would send them on ahead to look for a good spot while I finished packing everything up and would go down 10 minutes later. My first moment of the trip that I will hopefully always remember is walking down the beach boardwalk to find my three men, and seeing their silhouettes with the ocean behind them. And then Joel would spot me and run as fast as those little chubby legs could carry him to meet me. Love those boys more than I can put into words.

We finally learned that the easiest way to REALLY get all the sand off of us before we went back to the condo was to take a detour in the pool. It was really refreshing.

We would have lunch and then nap time for everyone. Except that we had the rotten luck of having workmen putting a new floor in the condo above ours. I can't describe the noise level. They were using a jackhammer, for gosh sakes! They would start working at 10 and finish up around 4. The first day nap time was a disaster. The only thing that made me feel better was that Jav took the boys to run some errands and I got to sit BY MYSELF and READ A BOOK. This never happens at home. I luckily had a great book club book, "Major Pettigrew's Last Stand." I couldn't put it down. The second two days we came up with a better nap strategy. We turned on the fan for the A/C, the bathroom vent fan, and ran a humidifier that we found in our storage closet that we had left last year. It worked! Successful naps in the cave.

After nap we would regroup and head down to the pool. We were thrilled for the boys to get to practice their swimming. I'm feel so proud/lucky that neither of them have ever been afraid to get their heads wet or put their ears under the water. Joel finally conquered his bad habit of opening his mouth every time I tried to put him underwater. Progress! I did so much swimming I was afraid I'd be sore the next day. But nope, nothing. Gotta love that stress free workout for your muscles! Then we would get a movie started while we got cleaned up to keep the boys occupied. We'd have dinner, then go back to the beach. This was my favorite part of the day. One day we built a gigantic sand castle, and Gabriel kept running to fill up the bucket to get water in the moat (pictured below). It never held any water, it just sank back down every time. What is the trick to that? The next night we took a flashlight and looked for crabs, at least for the 2o minutes we had before the flashlight batteries died.

Then we'd go back to the condo and watch the rest of the movie we started before dinner while we ate ice cream. Man, do I ever love vacations. That first night was the first time we had ever watched a movie together (Monsters Inc.), all of us, from start to finish. These days were so fun, but every night Gabriel would get a little home sick for his bed.

Snacks on the beach. Yum!

After having a thunderstorms on and off during our last afternoon, we decided not to do the pool and instead decided to treat ourselves to dinner out (as long as beer was served, we figured we could get through a restaurant meal with Joel). We headed to a typical souvenir shop on the island for t-shirts and one toy for each boy. Then onto Port Isabel, a funky beach town that I just love even better than Padre, to have dinner at the Pirate's Landing. Jav and his family always used to eat there on their vacations because it was one of his mom's favorite places to go. An example of Port Isabel's funkiness is that they had alternating decorations on each major corner of the main drag, going from El Dia de Los Muertos (skeletons riding bicicles), and traditional Halloween decorations. Very cool. Wish I would have thought to take a picture.

How good can you get? The bay, the bridge, and a salty dog pirate all in the same shot.

Joel cracked us up by starting his 2-year-old version of sparkling dinner conversation with a little girl sitting at the table behind us. He just talked and talked and talked to her! She was around 5 or 6, and loved it. Both boys were pretty well behaved and the food was good. How can you go wrong with a place that serves french fries for the kids in a paper pirate ship?

We walked next door to a funky ice cream shop that was run by the coolest girl, someone you would only meet in a funky beach town. I wanted to stay and talk to her for awhile, she was so charming. We told her that we were remembering the last time Jav and I ate at Pirate's Landing a freak cold front had blown in that day and even though the temperature was still in the 60's, the wind chill was like 30-something. She agreed that the wind off the water could be bone chilling cold. She also told me that almost all Europeans, Mexican nationals, and South Americans ordered pistachio-almond ice cream (my favorite that I had ordered). How cosmopolitan of me!

We then took our ice cream and walked over to the Port Isabel lighthouse. Here is some history. G & J loved running up and down the huge hill that it sits on. My second lovely moment that will be burned in my brain forever was to see them as the sun was going down behind them. We just had to take some pictures.

Aye Matey! Cap'n Gabriel is after ye!

When we got back to the condo, it was too late to make one more evening trip to the beach. We were all a little sad about it. We have definitely made some wonderfully happy memories in this condo. It's very bittersweet to see it go.

Next, on to San Antonio!

Road Trip Day Two - Fredericksburg to S. Padre

We left Fredericksburg by 6, so there weren't very many people driving in town. Gabriel shouted out at one point, "They are all going to work, and we are going to the beach!" Yeah, that's what I'm talking about.

We had hoped the boys would fall back to sleep in the car, but they were just really grumpy. It was such a relief for all of us to reach San Antonio and go to breakfast at Taco Cabana. We sat on the patio and just let the boys run in the completely fenced off area while we enjoyed our breakfast tacos. It was at that stop that I realized that THIS is the way to travel on a long trip with kids. Just make sure they have some time to run around every two hours or so and they'll stay happy in the car.

One of the things I always look forward to on road trips is stopping for Chai at Starbucks. I don't usually treat myself at home because of time and expense. After breakfast Jav was sure we'd still see that beacon of a green and white sign while driving on the outskirts of San Antonio. After the houses started getting farther and farther apart, I gave him my Kevin face to let him know that I was worried he had been wrong. (Kevin, Steve Martin's oldest child in Parenthood, has anxiety issues and has this tormented look that he gets when his anxiousness reaches a peak level.) Finally we are driving through farmland again (thankfully, green farmland, making us think they had more rain between San Antonio and Corpus). But no Starbucks. Then through the outskirts of Corpus, where there are some really busy, fast food restaurant-filled exits, where Jav was certain there was a Starbucks. Nope. That was when my dream of Chai died.

We stopped at McDonald's for lunch, and they had a really cool play area with these giant instruments:

We hung out for an hour and a half. Plenty of stretch-your-legs time.

It was between Corpus and Harlingen that Jav saw a huge orange and white bird fly right over the car. We determined later that it was a falcon. After the turn-off for Padre the trip really starts to liven up again. Jav and I had our annual argument over how long that stretch of the trip is. I thought it was around two hours, but he claimed it was only 45 minutes or so. He was right. (Man, does it seem longer!!!!) Gabriel loved going past the giant souvenir shop with the life-sized dinosaurs out front. The owners have now added a giant King Kong in the back. Somewhere on this stretch Joel, having exhausted all of his toys and patience, just yelled out his scariest roar sound out of pure boredom. The rest of us almost came out of the car!

Gabriel also surprised us by asking if "everyone else" would be there when we got to our room at the beach. We asked what he meant, and realized why he was confused. We had told him that we weren't going to have his big birthday party the weekend after his actual birthday because we were going to the beach instead. He thought that everyone we were inviting to the party was now joining us at the beach! He didn't seem too disappointed, though, when we told him it was just going to be the four of us. When we started across the giant bridge to the island, a pelican flew out of nowhere and we ended up following him all the way across the bridge. It was as if he was welcoming us back!

After we unpacked the car, we headed to the grocery store to stock up for the week. After all that shopping we were hungry so we brought dinner back, ate, and then headed out to the beach. The temps for the first four days of our trip hovered around the upper 90's (ugh) still. So after dinner was a perfect time to go. Gabriel was so very excited to say hello to the ocean again. Joel wasn't sure. He would get really nervous and shake all over every time he could feel the undertow tugging him back out to sea.

We went back to the room and everyone slept really well. Even though I get nervous about it, I usually end up loving all of us sleeping in the same room. It's just so cozy and safe-feeling.

Road Trip Day 1 - Fredericksburg

We left Saturday morning by 7. I had wanted to leave by 5, but my body just wouldn't let that happen. We weren't but 8 blocks or so away from the house when Gabriel shouted out, "This is a fun trip, isn't it?" So funny. We stopped for our only big breakfast of the trip twenty minutes from home in Burleson to eat at Denny's. The kids don't really eat breakfast other than yogurt, waffles, bananas and dry cereal, and were bored before we even got our food. We realized that it wasn't worth the stress of trying to entertain them while we waited, but at least it tasted good for the five minutes that we were inhaling our food! When leaving, Jav took Gabriel to the bathroom and when they pushed the lever to flush, water started spraying all over Gabriel. He was literally soaked when Jav brought him back to the car. I know when I want to stay fresh and clean, a Denny's toilet shower is just the thing. So icky. We changed his clothes, washed his hands, and were on our way. What're you gonna do? It's a road trip!

We slowly made our way south, stopping to let Joel run (literally RUN) at certain gas station/convenience store stops that had big parking lots. One in Meridian has a particularly pretty field with a view and an almost vacant lot next to it. Perfect for standing far apart and letting Joel and Gabriel take turns running to us. They finally both fell asleep twenty minutes from our destination, of course.

A sideways shot of what I looked like most of the trip. I drove a little on the way home. More about that later. The thing I was dreading about this trip was having to see my beautiful state of Texas after falling victim to a drought for the last year. I tried to prepare myself, but it's just so awful actually seeing it compared to imagining. The Hill Country is supposed to be the hardest hit area other than West Texas. We saw no water in creeks, streams or tanks. Nothing. The Brazos was so far down I think you could have waded across at some points. The vultures appeared to be thriving, however.

And here is the reason for our sideways detour to Fredericksburg, minus a few people. This is my Uncle Robert and Aunt Lou. He is the last surviving sibling of my grandmother. We spent many fun summer trips to Fredericksburg staying with them, in the same house they are in today. He turned 90 this year, she is 88. They are both in excellent mental shape. Uncle Robert has some pretty severe physical things going on, especially affecting his circulation in his legs. He can barely get around, which just kills me to see because he was always so active. He played in amateur tennis leagues up into his 70's. He has a somewhat strong hint of a German accent, which I love to hear. She bakes, and is the one who made the homemade brown bread that I've written about before. They are such sweet, sweet people and I want to take every chance I can to visit them.

I'm so glad my boys have met them and heard my stories. Gabriel will remember them. I'm not sure about Joel. One neat thing that happened was that Jav had to take them in the backyard for a little while because Joel was going crazy. When they came back in Gabriel had counted the cement stepping stones, and I told him that was one of my favorite things to do as a kid. My cousin Laurie (their oldest daughter) visited for a short time also.

This picture means SO much to me. It's the oldest member of my family with the youngest. I get really sad sometimes that my grandparents never got to meet my boys, and vice versa. This is the next best thing.

Jo Jo and Daddy. The boys loved motel life. Eating in the same room we slept in, two TV's and one of them almost always on. Heaven! One of the strangest memories I'll have of that first day was just before going out for dinner we happened to catch Bye, Bye Birdie about halfway through on one of the movie channels. We'd never seen it, but were curious about it because of Ann-Margaret's song from I guess the beginning of the movie. It figured heavily in one of the Mad Men episodes, so we sat down to watch a little of it. Excuse me, kids, but What The Hell? Is it supposed to be funny? Does anyone from the town realized that their Idol can't really sing? We just didn't get it. Dick Van Dyke was slightly entertaining, but that was it!

We decided to drive by the Herb Farm where we got married, even though it was closed to visitors other than Bed and Breakfast customers. I wish we hadn't decided to do that. I was devastated to see what the new owners have done to the place. The entire wildflower field that used to have the big windmill in the middle is gone. The space where we had our ceremony is gone. The only garden with herbs growing in it left is the one by the storefront next to the parking lot. Every inch of space is covered with a tiny bungalow type bed and breakfast. The windmill sits in the center of all the buildings. So wrong. The bungalows are so close together you don't have any privacy.

When Gabriel was 6 months old or so, we took him there and took pictures of each of us holding him at our favorite spots, and had hoped to do the same with Joel. We had even entertained the idea of hiring our photographer, who lives in Fredericksburg, to take some pics of all of us there. Now we never will get to do any of those things, and that thought made me start bawling in the car. Sometimes I hate change, especially when the changes RUIN someplace that really had a special spark.

And that ends Day One. Tired. Bed. Sleep.

Road trip blues

A couple of months ago I began suffering from Road Trip Blues. We did not have an opportunity to go on vacation all summer, and the day-in, day-out routine was wearing me down day by day. I got a craving for traveling somewhere, anywhere. I didn't care where we went, as long as we were moving farther and farther away from that humdrum routine.

I started daydreaming about road trips taken as a kid with my family, and all the little things that made them memorable.

Big breakfasts. I used to be a big breakfast every day kind of girl, but middle age metabolism and healthier habits have reduced my breakfasts. But on vacation, I want to eat at least one HUGE breakfast. Eggs, bacon, hash browns, biscuits. Don't care how many calories or what the fat content is. Bring it on.

To continue the breakfast theme, my grandparents would always stop at a diner in Hamilton, TX (which is about halfway to Fredericksburg), to have coffee for them and cokes for us. We would also all split a gigantic cinnamon roll, which I remember being the best thing I'd ever eaten. Sadly, the place isn't there anymore.

Two more places that we used to stop with my parents don't exist anymore either: Stuckey's and Nickerson Farms. One had a red roof and one a blue. We would sometimes stop for lunch, or sometimes just to explore all the chotchkies on sale next to the restaurant. Matching sheep salt and pepper shakers, tons of items with chickens on them, those fascinating things that Moo when you turn them upside down, crossword puzzle and coloring books. My brother and I had our favorite items: the quiz books that came with a magic pen that uncovered the answer when you swooped it across the page. Those books would keep us occupied all the way to Colorado.

Later on, as a solo adult traveler, I became enchanted with road trip mix tapes, cheesy local radio stations, and fountain diet cokes (they taste better while on the road, I swear). And these days, as a passenger with kid/s in the backseat, I love sleeping in the car (sleeping ANYWHERE) and reading more than three pages of a book at one time.

All of these things were flying around my head, but I didn't think anything would come of my daydreaming. But then, Jav told me we may have sold the condo, and a contract was pending, and we started talking dates and could we do it? We didn't have a for-sure close date, and were hesitant about planning a trip when we didn't know the sale would go through. But then Jav started talking "Sea World" on the way home, and he had me. I was going to get my road trip after all! More to come.

Soccer!

Gabriel surrounded by his teammates, Nicholas, Ethan, Josiah and Jonathan, and in front of his coaches, Coach Ryan and Coach Allie.
Game face: Go sharks!

Gabriel started soccer a month ago. Jav and I have always looked forward to the day we could stand on the sidelines and cheer on that boy at something. Gabriel had a skills class in soccer back in April and May, so we thought it would be a good sport to start out with. We signed up at the Y, which I love because of the diversity of kids and parents. His coaches are two cute TCU sophomores, Ryan and Allie. At first I thought they would never figure out how to coach this age, but they seem to be figuring it out pretty well now. The first few games were a challenge to keep them headed towards the right goal. Luckily the refs have decided to let them play for the same goal the entire game.

The challenge for me has been to keep my mouth shut. It's been waaaaaayyyyy tougher than I expected to see other kids running faster and trying harder than my kid. It's really hard to not nag at him to try harder or fun faster. Sometimes we just can't help it, but when we slip up like that he seems to slump even more into himself and completely stop paying attention to the game. I have to remind myself that he just turned five, this is his first sports experience, and I don't want him to get a bad taste for it this early. I told him I wanted him to have three goals every time he plays:1) listen to the coaches and play for your team. 2) Do your best, and c) Have fun! We were having a little trouble with that second requirement. Then we missed the week we went to the beach, and were concerned that he would be even more disinterested when we got back. We took the soccer ball on the trip, but the only taker Jav had for kicking it on the beach was Joel, who played with Daddy for about 20 minutes.

Something that DOES seem to help Gabriel is getting him outside in our backyard to practice. Not just kicking the soccer ball or stopping it, but running. We play a strange version of Duck, Duck, Goose and chase each other all over the yard. I think it's really building up his stamina. Tuesday he had a much better practice, and was laughing and having fun the whole hour.

We were really thrown for a loop today, however, when Coach Ryan asked if Gabriel would play for the opposing team. They only had three players show up and if he didn't switch teams the game would be forfeited, which of course no one wanted. Coach Ryan seemed to think that Gabriel could handle it over all the other players, which surprised me because of Gabriel's previous lack of focus. But I talked to him and explained that we really needed him to help out the other team, changed his jersey from red to blue, and sent him over to the other team's coaches. They were so sweet and applauded him. I ended up being the confused one, because I wanted to cheer him on, but also wanted to cheer for the Sharks. The other parents said they would forgive me this one day.

Well, I've got to hand it to Gabriel. I'm not sure if he was playing well to impress his Tia, Tita and Tito, who were sweet enough to come to the game, or if he just all of a sudden "got" it. He was totally into the game for the first three quarters. He not only was running after the ball or the group of kids around the ball, he finally was not afraid to try and take it away from another kid. Of course, the first goal he scored EVER was for the wrong team. But then he had a great assist, and once took the ball all the way down the field only to miss getting a goal by inches. The fourth quarter he was just plain tired (they all were, with no available subs to come in for them). He stopped watching the ball and was just running wherever the wind took him, and talked with his original teammates. But that didn't matter. We were SO proud of him.

Earthquake!

Jav and I were going about our normal post-kids' bedtime things. He was paying bills online and I was moving around laundry and addressing Gabriel birthday party invitations (more about the big birthday boy later). I was walking from the living room into the hallway and felt the weirdest sensation of the whole house moving. I also heard things rattling. It was only for about 2-3 seconds, but the hair on the back of my neck stood up and I got cold chills all over. I went into the bedroom and asked Jav, "What the heck was that?" His eyes were wide and he pointed to our TV armoire and said, "I don't know but that whole thing moved."

We decided it might have been a gas well explosion. Other things flew through my head, like airplane crash, huge tree branch fell on the house, or earthquake. Although that last option flew back out of my head pretty quickly. I also thought about the Space Shuttle mission that exploded over Texas We checked local stations to see if there was breaking news, but nothing. About 30 minutes later, I realized Bones was nowhere to be found. He's usually bugging us to go to the garage for the night by that time of night. He was under Jav's desk and wouldn't come out for another hour.

We found out this morning that there was an earthquake, 2.5 on the Richter scale, the epicenter of which was near Waxahachie. WOW! I knew it! And as cool as it was to experience it, we were sobered to think about what it would be like to experience a quake measuring 9 or higher, like Haiti and Chili did.

On a lighter note, when I told Gabriel about it, he asked if "those two moles were making the earthquake". We checked out a book from the library a while back called "Earthquack" about farm animals feeling the ground shake. At the end of the book, it turns out that there was no earthquake, only a couple of moles digging some tunnels. So I explained that no, it wasn't moles. It was big chunks of the earth way down deep banging into each other. This happens all of the time, and we usually don't feel it.

But we felt this one, my friend.

Spying on the neighbors

A few weeks ago I was out doing my nightly rounds of watering and birdbath filling, when I heard a strange cry of some kind. It sounded like a bird, but one that should have been making noise during the day. It was coming from somewhere beyond the farthest back corner of our yard. I went back there and stood for awhile, waiting to hear it again and try to figure out what it was. Sometime over the next couple of days, I heard what I thought was a duck quacking in the same spot. Hmmmm. Then I realized it wasn't a duck, but a chicken. Jav heard it too a couple of times. We assumed it belonged to a family living next to our neighbors directly behind us.

Then Sunday I noticed those same neighbors, directly behind us (we don't know them very well), shooing something out of the back door into the yard. I thought they might have gotten a dog. Later in the day, Jav came to report that they had returned home from somewhere, got out of their truck and walked over to the side of the yard and greeted something. So he also wondered if they had a dog. Or something. I started thinking about the fact that they've been doing alot of yard work over in that corner recently. I mulled it over in my head so much that my curiosity finally got the best of me. After dinner I went out back to check the water dishes and nonchalantly made my way over to the corner and peered through our fence slats to see what I could see.

I reported back to Jav and Gabriel that I saw a shovel and a big pile of dirt, some type of box or feeder with holes in it up off the ground, and a pile of hay. And I faintly smelled a barnyard smell. Now my "Hmmmmmm" turned into a "Aha!" Something is definitely going on back there. Gabriel seemed really interested now, so I asked him if he wanted to walk back with me one more time to see if I could see or hear anything else. I never really stopped to think about the fact that I was teaching him it was ok to spy on the neighbors. At this point I just wanted, beyond all reason, to find out what was going on back there. We had warned Gabriel that he couldn't make ANY noise until we got back inside. We meandered around the yard a bit to make it look good, then headed back to the fence. I found a knothole just right for Gabriel and told him to try to see something. He was peering and all of a sudden got a weird little look on his face. I said, "Do you see anything?" He said in the most excited whisper I have ever heard, "YES". I said, "Really? What do you see?" He said, soooooooo excitedly, "A chicken!" I almost shoved him out of the way to see, and caught a glimpse of two beautiful heirloom type hens, one white and one spotted black, pecking the ground.

We ran back, laughing quietly, to the house to report to Jav. I can't believe these neighbors would try such a thing, they didn't seem like the type AT ALL to me. I have to say I am impressed and a little jealous. I would love to do it, but I have no idea how to even get started, to say nothing of the fact that I think there's a city ordinance against it. We are now wondering if they have to have a rooster back there too. Jav's going to try to talk to them if he catches them outside, just to let them know we are cool with it and ask if maybe the boys can come to visit and see them up close one day. Maybe we can even score some fresh eggs some day! But I relay the story because it will be one I will always remember, how gleeful Gabriel and I were to have discovered the mystery, and how much fun we had doing it.

Busy Labor Day weekend

This may be one of my very favorite pictures, ever.

This Labor Day weekend was a really fun, although exhausting, one. We started our journey Saturday afternoon by stopping at the mall to buy a new washing machine. Ours kicked the bucket the weekend before and we've been taking loads to our parents' all week long. Then Bennett, one of our two friends from the neighborhood Moms group, had his 4th birthday party at The Little Gym. We had never been there, and it was a great place for kids to romp around and have a great time! Bennett has his back turned in this picture, and sitting right next to Gabriel is our other neighborhood friend, Harper. She spent two days with us a couple of weeks ago when her mom had to start back to college before her Mommy's Day Out started back. I'm going to invite both of them to Gabriel's party, whenever we decide when and where we're going to have it!

Our little climber especially seemed to like the fact that he could go anywhere and we wouldn't be fussing at him to stay on the ground! The kid has no fear, whereas his older brother always errs on the cautious side. On a side note, I just walked in from doing some things outside to find Joel DANCING with both feet in the cats' water bowl. Water sloshing everywhere and his big brother belly laughing so hard he had tears running down his face. Which will inspire a repeat performance, I'm sure. Sigh.

Sweet picture of Bennett, his mommy Allyssa, and little brother Lachlan. We really like them, along with Harper's family, and hope they decide to stay in the neighborhood ever after the kids start grade school. It's so sad that we get great families that are just starting out, then they start to realize that the public schools are out of the question. Then realize that private school is too expensive. So even though they love this neighborhood with all of its mixes of people and beautiful houses and trees, they move. Something we are also going to probably wrestle with one day.

4:30 is a bit of a weird time for a birthday party, because both boys filled up on snacks and cupcakes, but Mommy and Daddy were really hungry by the end of it. We decided to take advantage of the boys being tired and went to Mercado Juarez for dinner. Good decision! The whole family slept until almost 8 the next morning.

Our fun Sunday activity was to try out Legoland for the first time. Our friends at church, Sonya and Matthew, have Aidan, who is about to turn four, and Seth, who is three months younger than Joel. We have always wanted to do something with them outside of Mass, and we finally got it pulled together. We didn't realize they were bringing Seth so Jav and Joel stayed at home. But I'm glad because Legoland is a ZOO. I just don't know if a 21-month-old needs to be there. There are many older kids running around and parents not really watching them. It was a cool place for my almost 5-year-old, though. I caught him a couple of times just staring everywhere, not sure where to go next. A little overwhelming! But he and Aidan had a good time. I was very proud of Gabriel for taking the "older kid" role and sticking with Aidan, even when Aidan seemed to be a little afraid to do something. He was very sweet. I tried to get some good pictures of the lego miniatures, but they don't really do them justice.

Dirk Nowitzki must be proud to know he has a Lego statue.

The Ballpark in Arlington.

Cowboy Stadium. I like it much better smaller, rather than bigger. I wish Jerry Jones' ego could shrink to this size!

Monday was our first really cool day after this brutal, awful summer heat. I opened up all the windows. The boys went out after breakfast and didn't come inside until lunchtime. I washed all the outside windows, something I've been needing to do for about a year. I'm not sure if surviving through this heat/drought makes us stronger or takes years off of our lives. Maybe both? But it was so nice to finally be outside and not be just drenched with sweat within two minutes. As soon as the boys came inside Joel started laying on the floor with his head down. This should have been a sign, but I just thought he was tired. But then he couldn't sleep and I noticed his cheeks were flushed. He had a fever. Of course. We've been all summer with nothing, but get him around a passel of germy kids and whammo.

Gabriel started back to school the next day. I can't say it's been a great summer. The weather and our loss of Molly made it one that has been pretty tough. It had its fun moments, but for the most part I'm glad to see it go.

The bigger picture

My husband never really paid much attention to nature before he met me. I don't think he really noticed birds, and probably killed the insects that he did notice. He was particularly not fond of spiders. Which makes this little story all the more compelling.

The lightbulb in our laundry room burned out a few nights ago, and neither one of us has had the extra energy it takes to pull a kitchen chair over there to clean off the light fixture and put a new bulb in. Last night I finally said something to Jav, and reminded him about cleaning it out since there were alot of dead bugs inside the light. He replied that he had been putting it off because of the spider that has spun a web all around the light. He said that it was such a clever place for a web, since we get moths in from the garage at night all the time, and he didn't really have the heart to tear it down after all this time.

Excuse me, but who are you and what have you done with my husband?

I agreed to try to very gingerly change out the lightbulb the next day, which was today. Jav stood below me and watched, and while I was carefully trying not to scare the spider, Jav said, "Oliver. That's a good name". I replied, "Yes. Yes it is." I looked to see if this was for the kids' sake, but they were no where to be seen. So I said, "Oliver, I'm really sorry about your web, but there's a whole bunch of it left that hopefully you can piece back together when I'm done." I gave the fixture to Jav and he just stood there looking at it, and I said, "You don't really want to clean it off, do you?" He shook his head. "OK, I guess it will be ok to put it back just like this." Oliver was obviously a little freaked out and stood hunkered down to the side while I finished re-attaching the light.

I checked an hour ago, and he seems to have moved back to the web like all is back to normal. Which Jav was happy to hear.

I have such a strong belief that all life on this earth is life given from God and therefore should be valued. It's not that I won't kill something, but it has to be something harming me or the ones I love before I'll get to that point. And now I guess my husband has seen the light and feels that way too, which makes me so very happy. It probably makes Oliver really happy too!

The problematic drum teacher

NOTE: I am posting this because my husband thought I was a bit hard on Mr. W. So I agreed to drop the picture and the first name in case any of the five people who read this blog or a random person flipping through blogs might happen to know Mr. W. I wouldn't want to be sued for slander or anything.

Mr. W., Gabriel's drum teacher for the past two and a half months, might be prototypical of what you would find a any given music/instrument store around the country. Burned out rocker who never made it big in ANY of the countless bands he has graced his presence with. Slightly chubby, mass of frizzed out hair sticking out from under his baseball cap, and dresses like he never quite matured past the age of fifteen. Mr. W., master of mediocrity with dozens of instruments, but claims his specialty is drums and especially guitar.

All of this I expected. I also expected, and was told, about the problems in teaching someone so young. The short attention span, the fact that some days will be good and some bad. That Gabriel won't retain much from the lesson and it's up to me to get him to practice the tiny pieces of infinite wisdom that Mr. W. has tried to relay in our 30 minutes.

So that is one problem, that the infinite wisdom doesn't seem all that great. He has Gabriel do alot of counting, and moving drumsticks from one drum to another. I'm sure all of that improves coordination. At first he had a music book that he was trying to get Gabriel to follow, but Gabriel didn't get it and now the book is gone. I can tell that Mr. W. is making this up as he goes along. He takes every opportunity to let me know how cool it is that we still have Gabriel in classes, because every other time he started teaching someone this young the parents yanked them back out after a month. He thinks Gabriel is progressing, albeit slowly.

My other problems with Mr. W. stem from his manic depressive behavior and totally inappropriate comments that he throws out here and there. He likes to brag about all of his years of martial arts, and how he sometimes used those skills when raising his stepsons ("I always ask them if they wondered how I could hit them in the face without it hurting - I was trying to teach them something, not hurt them.") He asked me last Monday if we had watched the Summer Slam the night before. And I said, "Isn't that a wrestling match? No, we don't really watch wrestling in our house." I think he only asked me so that he could tell me how important wrestling is in his house. And maybe argue with me about why people hate or don't understand wrestling. The worse thing that happened was when we were going through the week before we lost Molly, and I stupidly told Mr. W. that we were having a rough day at home because our dog was sick. He said, "Growing up in the country we had to learn how to shoot dogs at a young age." And started to tell me some stories on that subject. Luckily Gabriel was already piddling around on the drums so I don't think he heard anything. But the most awful part was that I didn't react to this, the awfulness of it and the total inappropriateness of it, until I was back home telling Jav about it.

I have vowed never to return to Mr. W. at least 4 times.

But the thing is, Gabriel loves his lessons. Mr. W. is a big kid. He makes Gabriel laugh all through the class. He repeats the same corny jokes every week. And Gabriel loves him. And after the music book disappeared, I have to give Mr. W. a little credit for figuring out exactly how to get Gabriel to focus during most of the lesson. Gabriel's reward if all goes well during the first 25 minutes of class is that he gets to jam with Mr. W. while he's playing his guitar for the last five minutes of class. I could try to find another place that gives lessons to a kid his age. I could try to find someonewho's had more experience with getting through to kids. But I wonder if Gabriel would have as much fun as he's having with Mr. W. He keeps wanting to go back for more.

How can anyone compete with a jam session at the end of each lesson?

Namesakes

I have never shared with anyone the story of how Jav and I came up with Gabriel's name. Many months before I became pregnant we were headed down for a long weekend at South Padre. The drive gets to be a little tedious pretty quick after you get through San Antonio. We decided to go through the alphabet, letter by letter, to find baby names we both liked. Which turned out to be difficult. By the time we got to "G" we only had agreed on two or three names. I was having trouble thinking of names that started with "G". Then I remembered we had just watched The Motorcycle Diaries, based on Che Guevara's motorcycle trip through South America. And I THOUGHT the lead actor's name was Gabriel. Jav said he liked the name too, and it moved to the top of our boy name list and stayed there. And the rest is history.

However, the actor's name is not Gabriel, but Gael. Still a very cool name. But I don't think we would've even considered it as a possibility. A little too different. I think I must have gotten confused due to the actor's full name, Gael Garcia Bernal, being so close to Gabriel Garcia Marquez. So Gabriel is named after a Mexican actor names Gael by way of a famous Columbian author named Gabriel. Oops.

Later on, once we were officially pregnant and thinking seriously about names, we also liked it because it translated to Spanish, and because it was biblical. It translates to "the strength of God". Gabriel was one of the archangels. Gabriel's middle name was Jav's paternal grandfather's name, Valentin. Which I think is beautiful. We really debated about it, worrying that he might be teased. But then decided we needed to give him a strong enough character to not pay any attention to such silliness. I haven't seen many pictures of Valentin, so don't know if Gabriel favors him or not. Sometimes Jav picks up on a personality trait or a way that Gabriel moves that he says reminds him of his grandfather. I wonder, though, if we look for these things a little harder BECAUSE he is named after him.

Joel was not even on our list of names at first. At some piont we added it, but I didn't pay much attention to it. I liked Zachary, and Jav liked Nicholas or Benjamin. We narrowed our list down to 10 names, and were going to decide and start letting family know by labor day weekend. Sometime over the summer, I woke up one day and realized I really liked Joel. I haven't known many Joels in my life,which made it more appealing. I mentioned it to Jav and he said he was still thinking. By the beginning of August we both loved it and never looked back. It was derived from Hebrew, just like Gabriel. It means "The Lord is willing", or "the will of God". It translates to Spanish. It is a strong name, and suits him perfectly.

Joel's middle name is Terrell, after my paternal grandfather's first name. I didn't get a much of a chance to get to know my grandfather very well. He died of a heart attack when I was eight years old. I called him Pawpaw. The things I remember come from the times my brother and I stayed with he and my grandmother when my parents went out on Saturday nights. He was quiet and gentle, with a warm smile, curly hair, glasses and a big round face. He had strong hands and would let me ride "horsey" on his legs while we watched Hee Haw, Porter Waggoner, and the Grand Ole Opry. He was the calm steadiness to my grandmother's frenetic, never ending energy, a pairing that sounds a little too familiar in this house now.

And he is the only person, on either side of our families, that Joel resembles.

Seems we may have hit the nails on the heads in choosing both names for both boys. Hopefully they will be happy with them too!

Rain Baby returns!

OK, I know it's a coincidence. Probably.

But yesterday afternoon, while in a desperate state due to weathering day after day of drought conditions and 105+ degree weather, I decided to ask God something. Not for rain specifically, but to invoke the power of my Rain Baby again.

When I was pregnant with Joel, we had the wettest summer in my lifetime. Then after he came out, we had more snow that winter than we had ever had. But after that he lost his powers. I've thought about it a couple of times during this drought, but not seriously enough to actually do anything.

Joel and I had the house to ourselves yesterday afternoon, so I sat him on my lap. I started my chant, Rain Baby, Rain Baby, please come back.... I rubbed his head, his back, his tummy and feet. I hugged him and lifted him high above my head. I swung him back and forth, my chant growing louder and louder. He, of course, loved it and was laughing uncontrollably. But I was very serious.

Then, early this morning, Joel finally decided he'd had enough tossing and turning for one night and cried enough to get me out of bed. While brushing my teeth, I heard a sound outside and thought it was wind. But on my way down the hall to get Joel, I glanced outside the back windows and saw it. Beautiful rain, slow and steady, glistening in the lights. Hallelujah, praise to the heavens!!!

I picked up Joel and went to the back porch. We pulled out a chair and sat and breathed it in. We listened, we laughed, I came close to crying with blessings of thankfulness and humility. But I was mostly filled with wonder about the power of the Rain Baby.

I will remember this morning for the rest of my life.

Swimming!

Here's a clip of Gabriel's last swim lesson a week ago. The quality is terrible, the beginning is all over the place because I'm holding Joel in my lap. But my son is swimming, on his own, in the deep end of the pool. And if I hadn't cut it off, we could have seen him stop and take a breath on his back, then continue swimming all the way to the other side. I am so very proud of him!

The screamie meamie

That would be Joel, of course. The loudest 20-month old who can clear out a space around our table in a restaurant faster than you can say, "let's just sit at the bar!"

He has natural rhythm, maybe even more than Gabriel, and has some fierce dance moves. Gabriel loves to dance, but still dances like a toddler boy - no arms, stiff hips, mostly feet. I guess that's how alot of adult boys dance too - hee hee hee. Joel moves his arms very gracefully, stopping just shy of showing us his jazz hands. He loves to squat waaaaaaaayyyyyyy down and lift his arms up on the ending note of a song. Drama. You could even call it interpretive. I told Jav he just might end up on Broadway. Or as a mime. Boy, did that get me a look. Which got him a "we would be ok with that though, right?"

Joel has just started singing too. He sort of hums along with the melody, not really in key but perfectly in rhythm. He picks up the drum sticks as soon as his brother puts them down. I caught him today playing rhythms of threes, alternating from the drum to the cymbal. I'm not making this up.

I'll hear one of them playing one of our three keyboards (toy, electronic, and upright), and think to myself, "that's Gabriel" because the touch is very light, no banging, and very exploratory. It's usually Joel. When I think about money that will need to be spent in the future, I can't help but think we need to foot the bill for music lessons for both of these boys. They seem to drink, eat and breath music. Which makes me very proud!

His incessant babble continues, but is starting to sound more like real words. He's learned to say "NO" very emphatically to any question, whether he means it or not. Gabriel finds this very amusing and loves to keep asking him questions that he knows that Joel should be answering "yes" to. "Do you want ice cream for dessert, Joel?" "Nnnnnnnnoooooo" (He says it, of course, very dramatically.) If he's been playing for awhile and hasn't seen me, he starts yelling "Mama" over and over again, and wanders through the house until he finds me. Then he gives me a big hug and a belly kiss.

Here he is, just being Joel.

Nightmare come true

This summer is the summer I always hope and pray we won't have. Triple digit temps for day after day, very little rain in our area and nothing over most of the state. Ponds and streams have dried up and now lakes and rivers are feeling the stress. Water levels in Fort Worth are quickly approaching 75%, which means rationing will begin soon if things don't change. And our area is better off than most of the rest of the state where they haven't had significant rainfall since Halloween last year.

Ugh. Worrying about this kind of summer has given me panic attacks during past summers. Luckily no summer that I can remember recently ever panned out to be that bad. But this one is another story. It's weird, but once you're in the middle of it, survival instincts kick in and you just have to get through it. We must press on.

So that means I'm on a new drought exercise program. I go out around 9pm every night and change out all the water dishes. I've added several new ones. We have two big bird baths, several large bowls on the ground, and 8 small bowls scattered all over the yard. I check the bird feeders, because I'm feeding them much more than I would be if we weren't going through this extreme heat. Then I water flower beds and pots if they need it. Then I start working on whichever area of the yard seems to need attention that week. Last week I deep watered the east side of the house after discovering we had several photinia bushes dying and a crepe myrtle in very bad and wilted state. This week I deep watered our holly bushes out front, because the sun is now hitting them dead on for some of the day and they are turning yellow.

I can't help but notice the reduction in bird population, not just in parking lots of businesses we frequent, but even in the neighborhood. I see birdbaths just sitting there empty and I get so angry. Why have one if you are not going to use it, especially in this weather? I also can't help but think about strays trying to survive in this, and farm animals having to get through it day after day. I know that ranchers are having to sell livestock over the whole state. Of course I think about people suffering also, people who can't afford air conditioning in their houses or cars, mothers with infants sitting on unshaded bus stops in the middle of the day, crews working out the hot sun.

But I can't save them all. So I just concentrate on our yard, our little ecosystem. Which is doing pretty well. I've seen all of our regular birds, plus our majestic woodpecker a couple of times, and a beautiful red hawk at the backyard birdbath. The hummingbirds seem to be visiting the nectar every once in awhile. I see toads soaking, lizards making their way to the water dishes, and wasps taking a quick drink. The plants are hanging in there, but only because of my watering efforts. I've had to dig up my pot of impatiens and my cannas from the ground. The elephant ears and calladium may be next. So all that will be left is the lantana (which feed the very infrequent butterflies) and the turk's cap in the ground, and the sweet potato vine, salvia and rosemary in pots.

It's physically exhausting to run errands with both boys, or to have Gabriel's swim lesson at 5 pm at the hottest part of the day. But the mental strain is taking a toll as well. Is this how people in the northeast feel with day after day of freezing temps and snow on the ground for weeks at a time? There doesn't seem to be an end in sight and that leaves us all feeling hopeless.

But we must press on.

Teachers, good and bad

We haven't had a laptop or desktop working for two weeks because our modem (router?) went kaput. Time to get a little caught up on what we've been up to.

Joel and I have been attending a Mommy and Me swim class at the downtown YMCA. The first class was great, and reminded me of the Emler Swim School class that Gabriel and I took when he was the same age. Unfortunately, the instructor for that day was just subbing for our regular one. His name is Alex. He thinks he is cooler than cool and about 22 years old. Maybe. He spent the first class talking. His information was good and helpful, but I was a little irritated that he never got in the water and tried to meet his students face to face. Now we have two classes out of 6 left and he has yet to get in the water. He watches us Moms do our best to follow his sparse suggestions from the side of the pool. Give me a break. We are basically paying for the use of the pool every Saturday morning. I remember alot from that class at Emler, so I'm doing ok on my own. So well, in fact, that I think Joel is getting close to swimming on his own, but he still won't be anywhere near 10 seconds like Gabriel was at the end of his class. I guess you get what you pay for, but sadly Emler now only has a location in Southlake, and I'm not making that drive. Sheesh. At least Joel is having fun.

On the other side of the teacher spectrum, Gabriel had his first week of two weeks of swimming sessions with Mr. Bryan, who he took from last year. Mr. Bryan might just be the best teacher of anything I've ever seen. There are two kids in each 30 minute session, of comparable age and swimming level. This year Gabriel is with Kate, a 4-year-old spunky cutie. They are both making amazing strides every day. Gabriel is getting almost all the way across the short length of the pool on top of the water, swimming well underwater, jumping off the diving board (!) and starting to learn arm strokes. The jump in maturity level between last summer and this one is enormous. Last year our class was in the morning, this year we got bumped to 5pm since we didn't sign up quickly enough. Jav was worried that Mr. Bryan would be tired from teaching all day. But there is NO difference. This man is truly amazing. He is positive even about problems, he constantly gives them confidence, and he knows how to get them to have fun. There is no greater joy I have felt as a parent than watching Gabriel excel at something he had trouble with before, and have so much fun doing it. I've been on a high all week.

Saying goodbye

It's just so hard. After a gut-wrenching couple of days we had to say a sad goodbye to our sweet Molly. Our last three days with her were hard but also wonderful. We all got to spend tons of time petting her, and telling her how much we loved her. But we also had to watch her pain get gradually worse, until the last day she couldn't take more than a few steps without stopping to rest. Dogs are so loving and she wanted to be right in the middle of wherever we all were, so even though I was trying to keep her in one place resting, she would always get up to be wherever we were (I guess where I was is more accurate). We grilled burgers that Saturday night, and she hobbled out to the porch in 103 degree weather to be with Jav and wait for her samples that he always gave her. When she was not on her feet, she seemed perfectly fine. We would wonder if we were making the right decision, until she tried to get up again and we knew we were.

The vet was at church when I called him, but being the wonderful person that he is he agreed to meet us at the clinic. Molly LOVED going up there, and I had been distraught thinking that we might have to take her to a strange place with people she didn't know. But she was wagging her tail just like always and happy up the end. Jav and I, though, were despondent at the thought of losing her. It seemed like she went from being fine to not being fine so fast. I kept getting almost angry thinking that she probably would have had a good two years left if this had not happened. But it did happen. I guess most people who end up with cancer and their loved ones feel that way.

I've been through this before, and know that the first week is the hardest. I keep expecting to be in her favorite spots: under the dining room table, waiting just outside the kitchen while we eat, in the hallway while the boys played with their cars. She would come in every morning with me to get Joel up, and would be in Gabriel's room every night while we were putting him to bed. I can't stand to come home and realize that our big sloppy greeter isn't here anymore. I don't like to look in the backyard and remember seeing her lying in the sun, or grazing like a big cow. I want to reach down when I'm just waking up and pet that head. I want to feel that big tail all of a sudden gently whipping my leg while I'm watering outside. All of it just hurts.

I'm trying to take comfort in the fact that for the last five years I've been home, and not working. We got to spend SO much more time with her because of that. And this past weekend I spotted a quote that has helped me more than anything:

"Don't cry because it's over. Smile because it happened. "

I just love that. But my goodness I miss her.