Life experiences

That's what I feel like I've been doing lately, is feeling every emotion there is to feel...ever! For example, all in one day, I visit my dad's cemetary with the family and cry, then later that evening I find myself dancing at a concert with friends. I felt guilty that night, guilty having a good time when earlier that day, I was grieving over losing my dad. I then realized that this is what life is about. I suppose it never has to make sense, we live, experience it, and then we move on with our days. I know my dad wouldn't want me to miss out on "living my life". I can hear him saying, "why are you crying, this is life, now go on and enjoy yours!". I miss him.
Sophie randomly says "papa" and points up to the sky still when I ask her where grampa is. I know it's unlikely that she'll remember him when she gets older, so I know the only thing I can do is keep talking about him and what he meant to all of us. I'm hoping Katie will remember him. I thought I had a great memory, but Katie surprises me with things that she can recall. She sleeps with a little teddy bear that used to sit on my dad's computer desk, and she told me tonight that she was taking care of it for him.
Speaking of Katie, we are so proud of her. She was chosen as "knight of the week" at her school, which means that she had exceptional behavior, therefore had her picture taken to be in the school newspaper, received a "star student" pencil, and will be the teacher's helper this week. It's called "knight" because her school's mascot is the knight. She is making many friends, learning many things, and I am extremely proud of her. Now if only she and Sophie would stop shouting when they're together. Well, if Sophie would stop antagonizing Katie and stop pulling her hair and hitting her, it would be great. Sophie is a whole different story. I think it's the 2nd child syndrome, I should understand it really well since I was the 2nd child. Basically gets away with LOTS of things.
I took a 2 hour nap today so I'm still wide awake at 1am. I have to wake up early tomorrow to make Katie's lunch, get her backpack ready, and take her to school. That's our schedule M-F. I actually look forward to it. After I drop her off, I go straight to the gym 5 days a week in the morning, get my workout in for an hour, come home and go on about my day. I have been busy with work. I sold 10 shirts in one day which overwhelmed me at first, but it keeps me on my toes. The only downfall is that I haven't organized my time very well during the mornings with Sophie. I'd like to do more playdates with her, but my time is mostly spent at home working or running errands with her. That is on my "to do list". Spend my time more efficiently and get Sophie involved with other children her age. I plan to either join another mom's group or sign up for a mommy and me sort of class.
Another thing on my list of things to do is that I have to sign up for a course to get more continuing education hours for my certification. I need 3 hours of ethics, and the nice thing is that it is available online. I am proud that I am continuing it.
Need to wake up in less than 6 hours so I'd better go and wind down.
Goodnight!

Stu's Birthday

Stu's 39th birthday was spent having lunch at PF Chang's and then treating ourselves with italian gelato at Paciugo. Mom wanted to take Stu out for a nice birthday lunch at Watters Creek the weekend before his actual birthday, and we enjoyed it! He got his Wii and was a happy man. On his actual birthday, I made him shephards pie for dinner....tried making a traditional british dinner for him. For dessert, Katie and I made his favorite chocolate cake, and played Wii for the rest of the day. It was a relaxing day for daddy, and he enjoyed it!



Sophie peed in her carseat and she had to sit on Katie's art smock we had. Daddy trying to console her.

The consoling didn't work

At Pacuigo enjoying the gelato

Yummy!

Katie's Birthday Bash and Kindergarten Fun (or Trauma)??!!

Wow, it's been 5 weeks since it says I last posted. I believe it because the time is passing by without a second to waste. I'll have some more time to post now hopefully, now that Katie has started kindergarten. Today was her first day and I'll write more in depth of what happened as I also want to blog about her birthday party too. I'll have to add pictures another day since it's past midnight and it'll be my 2nd day of waking up at 6:45am to get Katie up and ready and off to school. Usually I'm waking up around 9am, so this is a somewhat of a shock to my body!

One thing I found out about myself is that I am horrible about organizing. I already knew this about myself, but my gosh, I am really bad! I have been planning Katie's party for 3 weeks, and why is it that I was still up till 1am getting things done?? I had so many "to do" lists going, but somehow something did not go right. I spent too much time making those lists, and not organizing my time getting them done. I know many people can't understand why it would take 3 weeks to plan a 5 year old party, but I enjoy it even though it is a lot of hard work. I think it's different if I had a job, otherwise I wouldn't or even couldn't put a lot of time and effort into it, but I have the priviledge of staying home with them, and I want to do whatever it takes to make it special. Speaking of jobs, I take that back....I do have a job. I am fortunate enough to have my business so that I can still purchase things without breaking into our budget. I have made an effort to be responsible for any purchases that aren't necessarily needed. So all the clothes for the kids, eating out, presents for any occasion, and so forth I take care of. So I'm very proud of myself in that I was able to cover all expenses for Katie's party. That for sure eases the stress on Stu. It's also very gratifying for me as well. So, these past couple of weeks have been so hectic with orders that I had to get done, getting the party planned, and getting Katie ready for school. So needless to say, the house looked like a tornado hit it, but Stu is great in helping me clean the house. He is awesome actually. So awesome that he is staying home this Saturday night with the kids so that I can go see Depeche Mode in concert with friends. It's been about 20 years since I saw them last. Scary!!! Gosh, am I that old?? It's so sad that kids in high school now a days have no clue who that is. LOL
Alright, I'd better start heading to bed since I have to be up in 6 hours. Hoping I get the chance to blog about school later this week. It wasn't that bad, however there were a couple of things I wished we didn't have to experience. Lets just say that some parents are rude in the car pool lane and that they need to get a life! With that said...goodnight :)

Our Summer

I already posted quite a few pictures on facebook of our little beach vacation we had this past weekend, but here's a couple more that I didn't add. The kids absolutely loved the water. Katie's favorite was jumping over each wave while holding our hands and building sand castles. The first day we spent on the beach, we got a bit burnt (even with loads of sunscreen), so the next day we didn't go out to the water until the sun was just setting. We ended up getting out there later than anticipated, and before we got there, Sophie fell asleep in the car. She slept in her stroller the whole 2 hours we were there. We were there until 10pm! There were so many other families out there so we felt safe. The hotel we stayed at was beautiful. Very historic and clean! The ride was a little over 5 hours each way, which wasn't as bad as we thought. Thank goodness of the dvd feature in the van, I don't know what we would've done with Sophie. I think we watched Barbie and the Nutcracker 5 times. Poor Katie was yelling, "I'm tired of Barbie!!". I didn't think I'd ever hear those words out of her mouth!

One of the best parts of the vacation was being able to spend time with just Katie. Since Sophie's been born, we haven't done anything really special with just Katie alone. Sure we go out running errands with just her, or Stu will take her to those home depot workshops...however, one special moment I wish I captured on camera was this....

Stu ended up taking Katie for a walk around the hotel while Sophie was napping. After about 30 minutes, I left my mom with Sophie and went around to look for them. Down from the balcony, I saw the two of them sitting at a table eating cheese and crackers, Katie having orange juice in a glass, Stu drinking beer, and both of them listening to the man playing the piano in the lobby. It was adorable. Katie just loved it. I know she felt special. Later that night, Stu and I planned on going to dinner by ourselves, but decided to take Katie with us. I'm so glad we did. It was such a memorable time, and the best part was that she was on her best behavior!

A little scared of the seagulls

Summer activities at home

She was proud of the little circles she made

Reading on the new beach towels grandma got them.

One thing I forgot to mention was, it was so great and relaxing not having the internet or talking on the phone for those days we were gone. I was surprised because I thought I'd be wanting to get online to check my sales, email, facebook. etc. But nope, I was fine without it and I was happy. However, once we got home, I had to check my emails and sales. I'm sure Stu would have loved to check on his orders, but he was a trooper without his computer.

Our Chuck E Cheese and Japanese Hibachi outing

We had a nice family outing last Sunday by taking the kids to Chuck E Cheese and then to
Jin Beh, which is a Japanese hibachi restaurant. The kids love to ride rides and play games at Chuck E Cheese, and Katie hit the jackpot on one of the games and won 250 tickets. I call her our lucky one because she's won the jackpot on several different games at different places. She was so proud of herself. Sophie was just content riding the carousel. However, when Chucky came out, she was scared and wanted to hide.
We've taken Katie to a hibachi grill before but she was around 2, so she doesn't remember it. This time around, she had a great time and thought it was the greatest thing to see our chef throw the egg up in the air and crack it. Sophie on the other hand was a little timid and wasn't sure what to think of it. At one point, the fire was so hot that I thought it scorched her eye brows! So... for the rest of the night, all Sophie talked about was how scared she was of Chucky, how hot the fire was, and how she ate rice at the restaurant. Hmm, maybe it was a nice outing for the 3 of us, but not Sophie?
After the restaurant, we went to Target and let Katie buy a hula hoop for herself using the money that grandma has given her. This was her first time to buy anything with her "own" money, and she was so proud.

So happy on the carousel

Whoo hoo! Look at all the tickets!

Look at those calves on daddy!

Guess who's on the carousel still.

Having fun at Jin Beh

V E G A S

Beautiful fountains at the Bellagio

The Atrium at the Bellagio

Cute bears made out of flowers (their vests)

Ladybug all made out of flowers

The Paris hotel, where we stayed



One of the lions at MGM

New York New York



Thought Katie would love this picture, and what do you know....she gets tickled pink each time. I had to stand in line to get this picture in front of the m&m store. The things you'd do for your children

The view from the Eiffel tower at night.


Watching the dancing fountains from the Eiffel Tower. Just breath taking....now for the real Eiffel tower

Just like a post card

One last view of our hotel before we head back home

Our Summer

Katie has finished preschool and will be going into Kindergarten in August. It'll actually be on her 5th birthday that she starts school. It'll be one special day! We have been swimming, having lots of playdates with friends, and Katie is becoming a great reader. She's in phonics classes and it's helped her a lot. Sophie's temper has evened out a bit more and is so much better in the car. So much so that we're thinking of taking a 5 hour car ride to Galveston (the closest beach to us). Sophie is addicted to Elmo and Barbie dvd's and chewing gum at the moment. She's a little quwerky but we love her and she makes me laugh so much.

Here's some great pictures I've been wanting to share.

Here's an example of Sophie being funny. Wearing Katie's backpack that's almost as big as her!

All the ducks lined up in a row

Speaking of ducks, here's some hanging out with us while having a picnic

Home Depot workshop making an organizer thing for Father's Day