Baby Bunnies

When we got home from spring break, the bunnies were still in our backyard. They were definitely bigger. I made the mistake of checking on them while the dog was outside. While he was very good with learning the "no bunnies" rule, temptation was too great.

I leaned over the nest to snap a picture.


Frankie came running up. The bunnies got scared and ran! Frankie got one in his mouth and took off. I yelled (or screeched as A said) "Frankie, no bunnies!!!!" He stopped and threw the bunny out of his mouth. It took off running.

We took Frankie inside and then checked on the bunnies. We found one by the fence, one in the sandbox and the other under the ladder of the playset.  I tried putting the bunnies back in the hole, but they were too scared and ran out again.




The saddest part, one of the bunnies was paralyzed from the waist down.



You can see how the bottom half of the bunny is much smaller. I was worried that Frankie may have done it when he first found the nest. After a bit of google, I found out that it can happen from trauma from a predator, accidentally from a parent or even a parasite. Poor bunny!

The next morning the bunnies were back in the nest and one day later they were gone.  I hope they are all safe somewhere far away. I'm trying to plant my garden and don't want it to turn into just rabbit food.

First Grade Auction Project 2013

I helped out with the first grade auction project this year. I love pinterest, so many ideas. After some discussion, we decided to combine two of them.

Fingerprint art:



original source

And notecards from kids art


original source

I worked with another mom. We decided to do two different shapes, cross and dove. I came up with the outlines for the projects. The other mom, who was a teacher in a previous lifetime, went into total teacher mode while executing the project with the kids. I was the "clean the fingertip, coordinate the paint, keep kids moving" helper person. It went well, very well.

She got the originals to the printers to have them made into notecards and then I framed them.

I forgot to take pictures, but here are the ones of three of the four projects I took with my phone to send to the other mom.







She sent me a photo of the original proofs of the notecards. They cleaned the edges before they printed the real cards. Hopefully the project will turn out well.

Spring Break 2013 Part IV

After the late drive home from Galveston/Houston, we all slept in on Wednesday. It was a lazy morning but we decided to go have some fun in the afternoon. After a quick lunch at home, we headed to the Arts District downtown. The kids hadn't checked out Clyde Warren Park yet. The weather was gorgeous and everyone else had the same idea.










A ran into a girl from school. While the boys played on the spider web, I chatted with the mom while A hung out in the sun with her friend.  After a bit, we headed next door to the DMA. They changed their membership policy. Now it is free to join as a "friend". We went ahead and joined as a partner so we could go to the Marc Chagall exhibit. A and I want to go back with S#5 to the Cindy Sherman exhibit. The boys didn't get much out of looking at the art. B's opinion of Chagall was "he likes naked people." Both boys were incredibly embarrassed by the well endowed Polynesian statues. J said "that is just wrong." B did like the minecraft art.




After the museum, we checked out the Farmer's Market. Aside from the smoothie place, not much was going on. Reminder, Wednesdays are not the day to go to the Farmer's Market. I think that is the second time I've done that. On our way home, we stopped to Central Market, ate lots of samples and picked up some dinner.  The kids decided on sushi.










A & J talked B into trying wasabi. He survived. They all liked the california roll. The other tuna thing was just so-so. DH was lucky and got to eat it for lunch the next day.

Spring Break 2013 Part III

S#2 and S#4 came down to Galveston on Monday to go to the beach. Well, we tried to go to the beach. After an hour of sitting in the very windy cold weather, we packed up the gear and headed back to our friends' house. They live on the bay side of the island on a canal. It was warmer and less windy there and much more tolerable than the beach. The kids fished and kayaked and we cooked burgers and hotdogs and hung out all day.











The kids found tiny jelly fish in the canal. They are see-through so very hard to capture on film (or on sd card) but I attempted to show them in black and white. You can kind of see the amorphous blobs where there are dark circles at the bottom of the bucket.

Tuesday we headed to Houston and met S#2 and S#4 and families at Houston Space Center.



On the tram ride 


Oops, didn't get A in the photo. She looks so happy that I included her 


Mission Control 


The Orion project (Space shuttle replacement) 


the cousins (with an old man photo bomb)


The rockets on Saturn 


DH for size 


Space food 


Dancing colors 




Space Helmet 






Touching the moon 


The dreaded climbing place 


About the time we finally let them go in the climbing place, I was done with Houston Space Center. Unfortunately for me and my headache, it was another hour before we left. At 5pm. Not a good idea. The Space Center is south of Houston and we were in the middle of rush hour. It took us an hour and half to get out Houston. Then we had to drive home to Dallas. It was a long, long. long ride but it was good to be home.

Spring Break 2013 Part II

The weather on Sunday was atrocious. The morning started out okay. The boys took advantage of the bit of sun for some kayaking.





As the weather grew progressively worse, we decided to go sightseeing and check out the submarine and destroyer at Seawolf Park.

First the Cavalla









Second the Stewart











It was a good day considering the weather.