My Family's Trip to Crystal Beach

The weekend before Christmas, we went down to Crystal Beach. Crystal Beach is near Port Bolivar. From Galveston, you can take a ferry or you can drive to east Houston and go the long way around. For the drive down there on Friday night, we took the long way down, stopping at a McDonald's for dinner. One of the doctors that T works with has a house down there that he let us borrow.

We awoke Saturday morning and had a relaxing breakfast. At about 8am, right across the front lawn, two helicopters flew in and landed. They were very noisy! But we enjoyed watching them land and take off. Z was scared of the loud noise.




After we go ourselves together, we went over to the beach. You are allowed to drive your car on the beach, so we drove right up. The weather was mild, so we got out and played on the sand. Z is learning baby sign language. He knows the sign for cat, which is to trace whiskers on your cheek. Except he has translated that to tugging onto his ear. When we were on the beach, Z saw a seagull. He didn't know the sign for seagull, so he used the sign for cat to let us know he saw a seagull!

E loved the beach of course!

After we had been there for a while it started to rain, so we decided to take the ferry to Galveston. The plan for the day was to drive around and look for houses for sale, then have some lunch and then go over to Moody Gardens.

We found a wonderful place for lunch. The kids enjoyed themselves and we met another family that had a daughter from China. After lunch we went to the aquarium at Moody Gardens. E is standing infront of the seal display. They were absolutely huge and would swim infront of the glass in a rythmic, OCD kind of way.

We then saw the penguin exhibit. As you can see, E is almost as big an an emperor penguin!

The last part of the aquarium is a tunnel where you are surrounded by water. Check our the shark above E's head.

There was also a theater like place that had the aquarium behind the curtain. E wanted to put on a show for me. Here she is doing ballet.

At Moody Gardens we went to see the Festival of Lights which is a walking tour through many, many, many sets of Christmas lights set to music. it was lots of fun.

My Kids' Singing Christmas Cards

My mom sent each of my kids singing Christmas cards. They really love them. Here is a photo of the kids enjoying the cards at the same time.

My Daughter's Field Trip To Pump It Up

E's school had a field trip today to Pump it Up. Thursday is not normally a day that E goes to school, but we were allowed to join her field trip with her class as long as I stayed there. We had a great time. Zachary slept through most of it. Two classes are pictured here.

My Daughter's Christmas Ballet Show

As most of you probably know, E take ballet lessons. Last week the class had their Christmas show. The show consisted of demonstrating some of their ballet skills (too previous) and a singing and dancing version of Rudolph The Red Nosed Reindeer. The performance was simply too cute. Notice how in the first picture she is sitting like a ballerina.

My Elfed Children

Our sister E, Elfed our children.


Check out the link below: http://www.elfyourself.com/?id=1285466072


It will take FOREVER to load, but it worth the wait. It is absolutely hysterical.


Once you've watched that you have to watch our video below.




Last night I showed the Elf video to the kids. E absolutely loved it. She shrieked with joy and started to dance, imitating the elves on the screen.


Z was intrigued at first. Then he pointed to the computer screen. Then he started to DANCE. He stomps his feet and turns around in a circle. Now whenever there is music, he likes to dance.

My House

Here is a photo of the front of our house right after we finished putting up the Christmas lights.

My Daughter's Love for Her Brother

I think this photo says it all. This was taken just after we finished putting up the Christmas lights. She is sweating in this picture because it is about 75 degrees outside. I asked her to love her brother and took this picutre.

My Blog Request

Our sister, E, requested I put this video on the blog. T taught Z how to come down the stairs. Z previously knew how to go up the stairs, but not how to come down. So T taught him how to come down the stairs.

Note that the sound Z makes as he comes down the stairs; it is part of the package. He doesn't come down the stairs without the noise.

One of E's and Z's favorite past time is playing on the stairs (always when there is an adult present of course!).

My Christmas

Many of you probably don't know this...but the time from October 1st to the beginning of January is my absolutely favorite time of the year. When October 1st comes, all the Halloween decorations come out. Then on November 1st, all the Thanksgiving decorations come out. Then on December 1st, all the Christmas decorations come out. It is really my favorite time of the year.

This year, we've been so busy that I really haven't had time to stop and enjoy what's going on. Having two kids is so busy and takes some adjusting and I feel like I'm constantly running three days behind my life. But now that we have Z's baptism and E's birthday behind us, and Tim is back in town, I feel like I'm caught up on all the things I need to be caught up on and can finally enjoy the season.

We just put our Christmas lights up. Here is a photo of our front porch.

My Son's Second, Third and Fourth Words

The other day, Z said "cheese". We were taking a photo of him and we were saying cheese and he said it too. Now anyone besides his parents wouldn't know that the sound he was saying was "cheese", but we know, and that is all that really matters.

Word two: Also, the other day, he said "kitty". Now I'm not really sure he said kitty. It sounded like kitty and he said it multiple times, immediately after I was saying it to him, but he hasn't said it since (he has said cheese a few times after that). One of the reasons that he probably hasn't said it again is because he has sign language for kitty.

Word three: Down. Tonight at dinner, each time he knocked his sippy cup down, he said "down". Again, if you're not his parents, you probably don't know what he is saying...but I had a witness...my dad says it was down too. Dad says he said up too, but I don't agree with that yet.

Z does baby sign language....he can do the following signs....more, please, eat, milk, all done, kitty, dog, and frog (just about). We're working on fruit now, b/c he loves fruit.

My Bucket Head Boy

Last spring, we (T, J, E) went to Seaworld. We had a great time and got a bucket full of popcorn that we ate as we watched Shamu. The bucket has lived in our house. It usually holds matching blocks. But sometimes it becomes a hat for Z. He absolutely loves to wear it on his head. In fact he is doing it right now again as I type this. He can put it on his head by himself. Then he will walk up to you and show you how proud he is of himself for doing it. And he just looks so darn cute! I know you'll agree.

I can't have a picture of Z without a picture of E. We love to play with (clean) laundry. When the laundry comes out of the dryer, the kids love to lay down on the floor and I pour it out on them. Z in particular likes to fall right into the pile. E found some of T's pants and put them on and was walking around the house.

My Kids' Visit to Santa

Here is our pictures from our visit to Santa. Our Santa lets you bring your own digital camera and take some pictures. So we have the picture that we bought and the ones I took.

E was not scared, but got very quiet when Santa asked her what she wanted for Christmas. She said a yo-yo. I figured that Z would cry and he did. This picture captures him just as he is realizing that I'm not there with him. I think in the picture that we bought, he is all out crying.

When I was a kid, my parents took me to Santa every year. And for each year I went, I have a picture of him holding me from the time I was a new born until I was in grade school. So I want to have that for my kids.

It was T's birthday yesterday. He is now in a new demographic 35-49. He is on a hunting trip with friends and having a great time. This is the second time he has gone hunting. My dad is visiting from out of town and we are eating our way through our town, one restaurant at a time. We went to a FABULOUS steak house last night and really enjoyed ourselves.

My First Video on the Blog

Here is a video of E and J playing HoneyBee, a game E got for her birthday, where you have to jump over the rotating bee. The kids had a great time with it. Just click on the play button or the video picture to start the video.

My Daughter's 4th Birthday

E's 4th birthday party was lots of fun. The kids ran around for an hour, then we had pizza and cake in the party room, and then they played for another half hour. We have two truly pooped children.

Here is the party room...(the before picture)



Here is dad, cousin J, E and Uncle C up in the Safari Stop playground.





Here is Z at the bottom of the slide. Even though he was really too small to play on the equipment, he had a good time.

Here is E enjoying her party.

Z and E doing what they do best.....having fun and playing together.

Here is E and me coming down the fast tiger slide. E went down the slide on my lap and as you can see, the slide was so fast that it was a bit out of control, but very fun.

Here is a pic of T and cousin M.

The Mc boys (that's Z's head in the front).

E and A playing in the tree.

Pizza time in the party room!

The birthday cake. Silly me, I thought that E would like the "shimmering butterfly" theme, however, Spiderwoman (not Spiderman) won out. Note that she wore her Spiderwomen costume to the party.

Here is a great shot of the birthday girl and her cake.

Enjoying the birthday cake!

My Ballerina/Construction Worker

I think the picture says it all.

My Son's Baptism

Z was baptized on Sunday. It was really great. As you all know, the wait to actually get matched with Z was over 18 months. A lot of that time I spent thinking about Z's baptism.

Our pastor M, is a very good friend of ours. We were very, very happy that he was able to do the baptism for us. The other pastor in the pictures is R. She is also wonderful.

Here is a photo of the four of us before the service. We are all dressed in our Chinese silks to celebrate Z.

Here are a few photos of the actual baptism.

Z didn't even cry when M held him or when he poured the water on his head.

The actual baptism.

After the baptism, we went to our favorite Chinese restaurant for lunch. T's parents were there and the Mc family joined us. We had a private room. Our waiter was impressed with our Chinese outfits and spoke to Z in Chinese.

Z is really learning to use a spoon and fork now. Sometimes he will only eat if he gets to hold his fork/spoon.

The children had their own table.

Then we went home and had a cake to celebrate. We watched the video of when we actually got Z. All in all it was a great day.

My Daughter's Birthday Party

We celebrated E's birthday this weekend. We made her a chocolate bear cake. She decorated it herself (with a little bit of help).



Here is E blowing out her candles.

And the beautiful four year old (almost).

My Family's Thanksgiving

Well here we are celebrating Thanksgiving. We, of course, have so much to be thankful for. Z has joined our family this year and E remains healthy. We are very, very thankful for both of those things.

Here is E enjoying an orange on Thanksgiving morning as she helped me make the cranberry sauce.




Here is Z and his dad playing after desert this evening.



Here is a photo of our beautiful Thanksgiving table before we sat down to eat.

We fried two 15 pound turkeys! They smelled delicious and tasted juicy!

T and I as he carved our turkey. We couldn't help ourselves and picked at it at he carved.

Here we all are sitting down to dinner. Z didn't wake up from his nap until just a few moments later.