Visiting the cousins over Thanksgiving in Iowa. We miss you all! 

Christmas in Mitford-I mean B- Texas

We just got back from spending Christmas in B_ Texas with Ray's folks. B_ is a very small town. Ray's parents live about a block from the local Catholic Church. Christmas Eve Day Father Andrew, the parish priest, blasted Christmas music from speakers out of the church from about 6:30am to 11:00pm or so. We could hear it clearly in Ray's parent's house all day. Emma and I went to midnight mass with most of the family and Emma sang in the childrens choir with 6 of her 8 cousins. As I sat in through Mass I looked at the people in the service and wondered what motivated each of them to come to church so late on Christmas Eve. For some they have probably done it for so many years it is just part of their tradition, some looked very serious and worshipful and some looked antsy and figity. The church was decorated very beautifully and felt cozy. I felt like I was sitting through a scene in one of the Mitford books. About 8 kids did a nativity play before the mass which was very moving. This caused mass to start late so we didn't get home till after 1:00am even though the singing and play began around 11:30pm. Emma fell asleep after singing with the choir and it was like walking with a drunk person when we finally tried to walk home after the mass. The Christmas Choir consisted of about 9 kids ranging from about 9-17. They had been taught by my niece to sing the carols in all different parts... it really was amazing. If in their hearts they were there to praise God I'm sure God was as blessed and pleased with their effort as we were to hear their sweet voices. I got to have my traditional cheese and jalapeno tamales and this year they were absolutely dreamy! I tried a dessert tamale...it wasn't my thing. There were bean and beef tamale but I love the cheese ones so much I didn't even try the others! Thank God they are a once a year tradition because I'm sure these had enough lard to take a year off my heart. I got to spend some time looking at old pictures with Ray's mom. It was fun to hear her stories about growing up in Monterrey, Mexico. Gabe, Emma and Julia had lots of fun with their cousins. I was so excited to see Ray's sisters new house. They are painting and will move in shortly I can't wait to see it all finished. All in all we had a great visit and a lovely family Christmas.

Julia in some of her new Christmas getups!  

Emma's new haircut! 

This is the picture we ended up using. Not as good of Ray and I but better of Emma. 

This was our second choice Christmas card picture. Actually it was my 1st choice, but you couldn't see Emma as well. 

I'm getting old....or bored

Today I found myself doing something I've never done before...reading the obituaries from the town I grew up in! Granted the father of my best friend from high school suddenly passed away this week and I started by reading his....but then I went through all the obituraries posted in the last year for this one funeral home to see if I recognized anyone!...Now back to www.youtube.com not so depressing and doesn't make me feel old just nostalgic....Whitesnake, Def Leppard, Guns and Roses, Poison, Chris de Burgh (Lady in Red), Air Supply, Foreigner...I'm back in high school instantly...did we really think that music was good? And the hair...OH MY

What the Hell!

Hell seems to be coming up on a regular basis on my blog...you know of my postings in the past month it has been the topic 50% of the time!....something else to make you say hmmmmm.

On Hold in Hell

I am on hold with a psychiatrists office and the song on the other end says....

"Your in Hell
Keep right on walking and you might get out before the devil even knows you are there"

Thank God I'm not paranoid or delusional!

Lyrics to my new favorite song totally catchy!

Newsboys - Breakfast

Hold the milk, put back the sugar
They are powerless to console
We’ve gathered here to sprinkle ashes
From our late friend’s cereal bowl.
Breakfast Clubbers, say the motto
That he taught us to repeat:“You will lose
it in your gym class if you wait til noon to eat”.
Back when the Chess Club, said our eggs were soft
Every Monday he’d say grace and hold our juice aloft
Oh, none of us knew his checkout time would come so soon
But before his brain stopped waving, he composed this tune:

WHEN THE TOAST IS BURNEDAND ALL THE MILK
HAS TURNED AND CAPTAIN CRUNCH IS WAVING FAREWELL
WHENTHE BIG ONE FINDS YOU MAY THIS SONG REMIND YOU
THAT THEY DON’T SERVE BREAFAST IN HELL

Breakfast clubbers, drop the hankies
Though to some our friend was odd, that day he bought those pine pyjamas
His check was good with God
Those here without the lord,
How do you cope?
For this morning we don’t mourn
Like those who have no hope
Oh rise up, Fruit Loop lovers-Sing
out sweet and low
With spoons held high
We bid our brother “Cheerio!"

WHEN THE TOAST IS BURNED AND ALL THE MILK HAS TURNED AND CAPTAIN CRUNCH IS WAVING FAREWELL
WHEN THE BIG ONE FINDS YOU MAY THIS SONG REMIND YOU
THAT THEY DON’T SERVE BREAFAST IN HELL

Just let it go!

I think our fore fathers had it wrong...we haven't been endowed with the unalienable right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness....it should be life, liberty and the pursuit of holiness...Big difference! I know I know...I just need to let this thing go....Tonight I'll be helping Emma make the Pharoh Hatsepshut out of a two liter bottle...I'm sure that will lend itself to a future blog. In the meantime...ONE MORE TIME let me hear you say...."We hold these truths to be self evident................." Come on you can do it!

Homework

I am stressed out to the MAX and here is just one tiny tiny reason why....Gabe and thereby I have to memorize the following...What they heck were our forefathers thinking? Why couldn't they just have said the following (see my edited version below)

We hold these truths to be self-evident:- That all men are created equal;
that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights;
that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. That, to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed; that, whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or abolish it, and to institute a new government, laying its foundation on such principles, and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness.

Its obvious that all people are equal, that God gave us rights like life, liberty, and persuing happiness. That to make sure we are given these rights, governments are formed by the people and for the people with these rights. And when any form of government messes with these rights, it is the right of the people to change or get rid of it, and form a new government based on and organized for their safety and happiness.


Now honestly what would you rather memorize?

ARRRGGGGGGGGGGGGGG

The last of my dream vacation

Still More Casa Luna

CLICK ON THE PICTURES TO MAKE THEM BIGGER!

And More Casa Luna

More Casa Luna

Plannin my next vacation

I don't remember how I came across the B&B in San Miguel de Allende Mexico, but revolution or no revolution I am going to go there in the next five years. Check out these BEAUTIFUL rooms! Go to their website at www.casaluna.com and let me know how many rooms to reserve...if you want to go with me!

Our prissy princess 

Juju ready for Fall Festival 

Hallucination Movie

Just follow the instructions at the start of the movie. Full screen is better but try to get it as big as possible. Look away at the end when it says look away. This lasts 1 minute and 39 seconds...don't get bored stare for the full time...make sure you are not doing any heavy lifting or driving for at least 15 minutes afterwards!

Praise the Lord!

Bernie, my brother in law, got his "halo" off today and moved up to a soft neck brace!!!! They told him that he had a complete break of his C2 vertebrae. It is a miracle that he is not completely paralyzed!!! He sounded GREAT! We are so thankful that his and Katelin's healing is going so well after such a horrible wreck! I feel like doing a happy dance!

STRIKE

I haven't been on strike!!! Things have been going on that were not blog worthy in my life....you know boring overwhelming...LIFE. School has started again and my kids are off and running. 1st and 4th grade...they LOVE it! Great teachers this year...what a blessing! Thursday I will finally start having my new floors put in my house...hopefully some pictures will shortly there after appear here on this blog...although I'm not sure yet how as I STILL haven't found my digital camera's memory card! There have however been small joys in the past three weeks....I've found two new Kashi Bars that I love!...Cherry Dark Chocolate and Pumpkin Spice Flax! I've read some good books...just mindless fluff...mostly Jane Austen spin offs...oh and I've discovered the joy of using lavender fabric softener in my wash...which caused me to wonder...what is the point of fabric softner? Is it just to make the drudgery of doing laundry a little more fun? It has made walking around our neighborhood at night a little more fun as we drip through 25+ days over the average 102.5 degrees...neighbors are using some kind of good smelling fabric softener or laundry dryer sheets and it smells good when we go past their house. Now if I could only get inspired about lunch! I'm hungry but nothing sounds good!...What I'd really like is lunch from a Antique Mall tea house somewhere! :)

My Cutie Patuti

Crack Me UP! 

Sticker Shock!

Today I bought school supplies at Wally World for a 1st grader and a 4th grader! Total bill? $130.00 and I still have to get contruction paper, copy paper and 1 back pack! OH MY WORD! School is expensive already and we have to get this and uniforms in addition! Granted my kids go to private school, but I've seen the public school lists they're not much better and the city public school went to uniforms this year too! I only remember my parents sending me to school with a new lunch box, and I'm not sure that was every year, at least in elementary school! No wonder our generation can't save any money! My parents 1st house cost 8 or 9 thousand dollars, my first house? $90,000.00. Gas when I started driving was less that $1.00 a gallon, I have no idea what it was when I was a kid! The cost of going to the doctor and healthcare are through the roof...SOMETHING HAS TO GIVE...and so far its been the saving capacity of my generation. No one I personally know is living life large, okay maybe you Bec :), and trying to save and live with the future in mind is getting harder and harder. Okay I'll climb off my soap box and go shop another clearance rack!

Fall Fun

This picture montage was from this past Thanksgiving in Missouri 

All about Emma

I learning to use Picasa2. Cool free photo software. 

Hmmmmm

Today my Dr. called and said I have Rheumatoid arthritis. Doesn't sound fun and I'm against all things that aren't fun!

High Hopes

I had high hopes this morning when I woke up that today would be a good day. Then I went to make coffee and I didn't have enough La Vida Dulce to even make one pot! OH WOE! Hope DEFERRED!

Word of the Day...

dysleptric (adj)

To purposefully make a bad choice.

As in: King David was being dysleptric when he married Bathsheba.

Goal: Use this word three times in a sentence during the day. Come back and post people reactions here on this blog.

Today's blog posted in honor of John and Dena Culpepper and to smart alec's everywhere and those that love them :)

My New Nephew!

Welcome to the world Samuel James McConnell, born on your grandpa's 65th birthday. Ain't you sweet! I want to tuck you under my chin and snuggle! Love you tons already!

Here's your Sign...and mine must be on again!

My friend Kellie swears I have a sign on my forehead that says:
"If you are weird and have slight or majorly off balance opinions that you'd like to share come talk to me".
For a while the light must have gone out of my sign because I hadn't had any of these "weird" encounters for a while, but then came Blackmon Mooring Steamatic...who I must say did a lovely job extracting water from my flooded house but who's hiring criteria must include the ability to talk the bark off a stump! I have heard more random chatter on the most wide ranging and totally useless topics...such as opinions on why a 20ish year old guy should or should not continue to write romoantic literature, whether same said guy should continue to date a girl from a halfway house...whether said girl should change her lifestyle or not...whether said girl was capable of changing or not...what was the correct proceedure for taking soggy carpet from the house; roll by roll or wait till there was pile and then remove the pile. Then I heard the opinions of a slightly older father of 5 on what to do with sexual perverts, what to do with the Middle East, (oddly enough the solutions were similar) how to raise pit bulls and rotweilers and how to raise kids (again solutions were similar), today I got to hear about salary caps in football and baseball, about the ungodly perspective of Toyata entering the Nascar arena and the positives of driving around picking up fans from previously flooded homes verses driving a forklift.

I think I'm going to get a tatoo that says..."I see your lips moving but I don't have a clue what your saying" maybe it'll counter a little that sign that I can't seem to turn off!

We are moving AGAIN

Okay not really but almost...

I'm getting new flooring in my entire house....

Oh I think I forgot to mention that it is 12:30am Friday morning and the reason I am getting new flooring in my entire house is because while we were at my parents swimming this past evening the toilet overflowed...and overflowed...and overflowed.

The guy just left after giving us the estimate on the clean up...$5,000.00 (give of take a couple hundred). That figure doesn't even touch putting down the new flooring! The "extraction team" (two littleish guys) are here right now to take out every stich of carpet, pad and tack strips and then set up 14 really loud fans for 3 days give or take a day or 2!...Did I mention it is 112 degrees here in Texas (they say there is a cold front coming this weekend and it will actually drop to the low 90s) and the water extraction is going to raise the humidity in our house considerably over the next couple of days :)

So once again we get to move every stick of furniture in our house...

To show you my state of mind I sat here tonight and contemplated selling all but 20 of my 5 bookshelves of books...if someone had come to the door and offered me $1,000.00 for them I would have let them take them with out a second thought...I'm still wondering what half price books would give me for them...

I don't think I've mention yet that God is good, not that the following list is proof its just to remind me...Bernie (Ray's brother) is alive, Katie (Ray's niece) is alive, we have food to eat, a roof albeit a hot and humid one over our heads, we have insurance, we have a God that promises not to give us more than we with His Spirit can handle, we don't live in the area that was just hit AGAIN with a tsunami, we don't live in an area that is war torn. Yep God is good, and I would have to say that regardless of my circumstances, but I will practice saying it tonight in my frustrating, exhausting, wearing me out, can't believe this is happening, there goes our financial buffer and any traveling plans for the rest of the year kind of circumstances.

By the way if anyone is calling me tomorrow...use my cell...I probably won't be here. If I am I won't be able to hear you over the fans anyway or as seeing it is 1am and they haven't finished one room yet...I may be sleeping.

Breakfast

I used to love breakfast....these days it just seems to be getting something in to protect the lining of my stomach from the massive amounts of caffine to be dumped in it! :)

New Favorite Quote

I'm reading Girl Meets God by Lauren Winner...here is my favorite quote so far....

"There are a few people out there with whom you fit just so, and, amazingly, you keep fitting just so even after you have growth spurts or lose weight or stop wearing high heels. You keep fitting after you have children or change religions or stop dyeing your hair or quit your job at Goldman Sachs and take up farming. Somehow, God is gracious enough to give us a few of those people, people you can stretch into, people who don't go away, and whom you wouldn't want to go away, even if they offered to." (p85)

Hummm My Blog is getting boring

I should post some picture of my house as we are slowly unpacking boxes...but...I haven't found the box yet that has the disk for my digital camera in it! Oh a happier note I've been sent a sign as to how to decorate this new house. It's going to be expensive but when your given a "sign" you must obey, right? This past week I got the "late summer 2006" Pottery Barn catalogue...besides being the most beautiful catalogue ever did anyone else see my "sign" on page78? The Hanna Quilt is personalized with "Lara"...I take this to mean that I need to do my patio like the patio's in Pottery Barn, and my bathrooms like theirs and heck I just need to start over from scratch! Just to show you I'm going to include some pictures that I took to Lowes to get color swatches to match so I can paint my new house these colors... The light blue will go in my bedroom, the dark blue on the wall/walls in my living room, the coral in the 2nd bath and green somewhere I don't know yet...the dark blue may eventually go in my kitchen too who knows....look and dream

I'm exhausted!

I go to bed and wake up tired. Yesterday was my final board meeting for the wonderful Fort Worth Metro Chapter of AFP. I was sad but relieved! I would love to have tons of energy to be working on finishing laundry, hanging pictures, organizing 2800 square feet of stuff in to 1700 square feet but I just want to sleep! ...I think I'm going to go take a nap!

If....

If your whole body were a hot air balloon, would you stop eating spicy food?

Define spicy?!?

Sometimes its the little things

My books are on their shelves.

I have DSL.

I've had my first and second cup of La Vida Dulce in my new house.

Boxes are piled high and my dryer doesn't work yet so laundry is growing by the minute....


BUT LIFE IS GOOD. :)

Saying a pray for Ray's brother Bernie, who was in this car wreck yesterday in between Grinnell and Des Moines Iowa. He has a broken neck and lots of other injuries. 

More Daddy Daughter Dance Pictures

Getting ready at the salon. Posing for Mommy. Waiting for Daddy

Daddy Daughter Dance Beauty

This is Emma ready to leave for the 2006 Daddy Daughter Dinner Dance.

Hangin out with Mommy's best bud, Miss Kellie

One more of our baby just to make the grandparents happy! :) 

In the spirit of the old what can you find in the this picture game from Highlights Magazine...how many bad habits can you find in this picture that JuJu has picked up from someone that shall remain nameless? 

Just like big sissy! 

My little Hollywood Hippie