my surprise

This post is long overdue!

A few or 10 days ago my doorbell rang in the middle of the day.  Strange.  I got to the door in time to see the UPS man getting back in his truck.  I hadn't ordered anything.  DH didn't tell me he ordered anything.  I opened the door to find a small package from PurlSoho.

I knew who it was from.  There is only one person I knew who would order something for me from PurlSoho, my old roommate, K!

I quickly opened it to find something wonderful that I will totally enjoy and I would never buy for myself.  The perfect birthday present.







A shawl pin and an orange one at that!  Isn't it lovely!  I'm keeping my fingers crossed for a cold winter so I can get use out of it. 

09-18

It's our anniversary. We spent the morning at the zoo with the kids.The nature center guy, Victor, was terrific.He gave me my own account I got 550 points for my purple furry sand dollar!We dropped the kids off at the grandparents.We drove all over Dallas looking for a place to eat.
The place we decided on was closed (Louie's on Henderson).We ended up at the Katy Trail Ice House, which was good. I took a nap while DH did the kids' laundry. That is a great anniversary present. 
It was a nice day.

High Mileage

I've been anticipating this moment for about 2 weeks.   I finally hit it on Monday evening.  I've been driving the  minivan since Memorial Day 2005.  70k miles in just 6 1/4 years.  Hopefully that means the van will have plenty of life left in it when A starts to drive in 5 more years.  Of course, it means I've got at least 5 more years of driving my old minivan. 

It sucks

I bought my pretty purple Dyson vacuums years ago.  I lived in my first house so it has been at least 10 years.  I bought it before Bed, Bath & Beyond excluded it from it 20% off coupons.  Bargain!

I loved that vacuum.  It got so much gunk out of my carpets.  It was fascinating and disgusting all at the same time.

I loved that vacuum so much I actually went to my sister's house to vacuum all of her rooms and show her how gross wonderful it was.

However, recently, I have been disappointed in my Dyson.  It didn't suck as well.  I would run the vacuum over things like popcorn kernals in the carpet and it wouldn't pick them up.  I suspected it was just getting old.  I didn't want to spring for a new one.  It is too pricy for something that doesn't last forever.

The last time I vacuumed, I flipped it over in frustration, convinced something was stuck or clogging it.  Something had to be wrong.  In tipping it this way and that, I happened to find a tiny little slit in a hose on the underside of the vacuum.  It was so tiny that I couldn't find it again when I went to show DH.  I was almost convinced I imagined the slit.   I finally pulled the hose off the vacuum and turned it around until I found the hole again.

I ordered a new one a few weeks ago and it finally arrived.  Today I vacuumed.  One room.  The playroom.  It is a big room. It is the room where the dog's cage lives and where he lies in the doorway watching us walk around him.  It is where the kids' play and eat popcorn and do crafts with little bits of string and paper.

What a difference a hose makes!




Look at all that disgusting dog hair and dust and dirt. Isn't it cool!  I can't wait to vacuum the rest of the house.  Okay, really I can.  I hate to vacuum.  But at least I'll get the thrill of the Dyson again.

Happy Birthday

Today is DH's 41st birthday.   He's spending it at charity golf tournament.  We didn't know when he would be home and we're a busy family, so we celebrated yesterday.

After church, the kids and I did some birthday shopping.  Afterwards, we went to the Ballpark.  It was a good day to attend a game. It was Patriotic Rangers hat giveaway day. There was a nice tribute in honor of 9/11. Plus, the Rangers won. Even better!





SIL & family ended up coming to the game too.  B was excited to sit with his cousin at the game.  It was strange to be at the game with just two kids.













Instead of the dot race, they had Legends of Texas race.   Sam Houston, Stephen F Austin, Davy Crockett & Nolan Ryan raced around down the 3rd base line and up the 1st base line.





After the game we had PeiWei to go, lemon blueberry cake from Whole Foods and opened his presents.

Since DH got randomly bought me tennis balls for my birthday, I decided he needed rackets for his.  We got one for everyone so we can enjoy some family tennis time.





We also continued the tradition of random food gifts.  The kids picked out bubbly fruit water, york peppermint patties, gum, ding dongs and a bag of hot fries.




I hope DH had a nice time celebrating #41.

Cicada

The holiday weekend was fine.  Other than A's tournament, we didn't do much.  Just the way I like it.

Reality hit on Tuesday morning which felt like a bad Monday morning.  The excitement of school has totally worn off with B and it is a struggle to get him up, out of bed, dressed & fed by 7:30am.  I have a good 10 minutes leeway but if we don't leave by 7:30 then I hear it from A about how awful it is to get to her locker and get her books and not get stepped on and have teachers yell at her for being late.  I strive for 7:30.

Back to Tuesday, B was not being most cooperative.  Things were definitely off.  I had a meeting at the school at 8am so I had to be ready also.  While in the shower I heard the beeps of a door being opened multiple times.  Not a good sound.

Once dressed, I stomped out to finish getting them ready to school.  As soon as I emerged from my room B came running up yelling, "Mom, you gotta come see and bring your camera."

That is music to my ears.  Who cares about being late to school when there's something interesting to photograph.  All frustration at the morning was gone and I went outside.   It was definitely worthy.




Cicada





I had never seen a cicada emerge from its shell before. It was definitely cool. A was impatient and it was time to leave so I had to quit taking pictures. I'm sad that I didn't get to watch it inflate it wings and fly away. At least I have something to look forward to, next time.

Volleyball

A decided to try a new sport this season, volleyball.  Despite the havoc that it could wreck upon my already busy schedule, I couldn't say no.  How could I say no to exercise, learning a sport and fhaving un with friends.

Of course, I also know the nature of sports at our school.  There a subset of parents, and therefore their girls, who take sports quite seriously.  A who has never played volleyball before is on a team with girls who have played club and in summer league and had private volleyball lessons.  Unfortunately they didn't make the D1 team.  These parents and girls are upset about being on a D2 team with girls who can't play.  I worry about her and handling the pressure of sports when she just wants to have fun.

This weekend was the preseason tournament.  She played her first volleyball game ever.  They lost the first game to a team who ended up going the championship round.   They won the second game in two close games.  They went to the championship of the "losers" bracket.  It was a good match and went to  a tie-breaker.  A served the final point of the second game that kept the match going.  The girls won 15-14 in the tiebreaker.  They earned a trophy and a pizza lunch at school on Tuesday with their coach!

Here's a video of A serving:





I'm proud of A.  She did a great job in her first games ever.  She handled with grace the pressure from the other girls when they lost last night.  And most of all, she had fun.

Good things

I am done with the heat.  It has been so hot for so long.  A cold front is suppose to come through and cool things off into the low to mid 90s.  Isn't that sad when the low to mid 90s is a welcome change?

I decided I needed to think of good things to get my mind off of the heat.  Here it goes.

• Medicine seems to be helping with J's mysterious stomach aches so mornings are going much better around here. 
• J's soccer practice was last night.  I never got the message so instead of spending two hours outside for both boys' practice, I got to leave after one hour!  I'm still hot and sweaty but at least I got in the cool air sooner. 
• I found the box of caramels that my sister sent for my 40th that I hid from the kids and from myself.  I didn't want to eat them all in one day and my "only eat two a day" rule wasn't going so well.  I need to find a new hiding place so I don't finish them off tonight. 
• J does not have a math test tomorrow.  Instead of struggling with getting him to study after a long soccer practice and praying to get them to bed by nine,  we are showered, jammied and watching the Rangers to see if we can find Daddy on tv. 
• It's almost the weekend and it's a long weekend so maybe we'll have a chance to relax.  Of course, A has a volleyball tournament so we're already booked for Friday & Saturday.  But I can dream!