30 Day Challenge

After yesterday's post, it was not a difficult decision to take part in the 30 Day Challenge going on over at Adventures of Z-Man and Mark. So, I'm keeping track of my progress and hoping that I can drop some of the pounds that are contributing to my pregnant appearance.

I could really use your support during this time, so if you have a chance, please send me messages that say things like:

Put down the doughnut!

and

NO CHIPS, you fatass!!

and

That pizza will make your arms even fatter than they are!

You know . . . inspirational messages that that are really going to get my attention. As a real motivator, I'm considering posting pictures and stats, but I'm not committing to that quite yet. Anyone have any other idea as to how to keep me accountable?

Brought a Baby Back

I came back from a whirlwind trip to Vegas yesterday. (More on the trip later). I was at the house when our TCU nannies brought the kids home from school. The nannies look like this:


I was worn out from Vegas and an early flight home and wearing yoga pants and a clingy gray t-shirt with flip flops. As I was talking to the nannies, Luke ran up to me with excitement, placed his hand gently on my stomach, and asked, "Mom! Are you going to have another BABY!?!?"

I closed my eyes and took a deep breath before answering him, "No . . . I'm not having a baby . . . I'm just fat."

The TCU girls looked embarrassed and amused. I felt embarrassed and amused. Luke was disappointed and responded, "Awe-uh!"

I squinted my eyes at him and asked with surprise, "Do you want me to have another baby?"

He looked hopeful and said, "Yeah!"

I shook my head. "No. I'm not pregnant, but I am reconsidering my outfit and will be starting a diet immediately."

Luke ran on. I groaned. The girls giggled.

I am currently on a diet and I intend to lose this food-baby ASAP.

Professional Motherhood

And here it is! The moment you've all been waiting for (or not) . . .

My first guest post! Whoohoo! Click here to read it!

Thanks to my sweet friend Angie who invited me to appear on her blog Professional Motherhood. We're totally kindred spirits. As you can see, even the names of our blogs match!

Have a great weekend everyone!

Friday Blessings.

Apologies for my absence. I had a migraine on Wednesday and depositions all day Thursday. On the bright side, I will be guest blogger very soon and that has made my week! I'll keep you posted on that one. Other than that, all I can ask is that we all take a moment to praise Xenu and Tom Cruise for blessing us with Friday! Amen. (Do Scientologists say "amen"?) Bah, whatever.

Conversations that Surprise

This conversation took place several weeks ago, but it is fitting for our anniversary today.

Luke asked me out of the blue, "Who is your best friend?"

Without thinking or looking his way, I answered, "Daddy."

Luke responded with surprise in his voice, "Really?"

Still almost oblivious that I'm in the middle of a conversation (I think the television was on and I had probably had a couple glasses of wine), I answered nonchalantly, "Yeah."

Luke became more interested and asked with suspicion, "Have you been dating Dad?"

I finally looked at Luke and entered the conversation with a smile, "Not exactly. I married Daddy."

Luke then asked, "When did you marry him?"

Caught off guard, I gathered the years together and finally answered, "Um . . . almost 14 years ago."

He contorted his face in shock. And then he killed me with, "And you still like him?!"

Laughing, I responded with a nodding head and the sputtered words, "Yes! Very much!"

Pathetic face

The second day of school started without a hitch for Luke and Evie. They were thrilled to be going. Unfortunately, their little brother was less than thrilled about being left behind. He insisted that he wanted his uniform and wanted to go with us to school. He even grabbed his diaper bag so he could go with us. Poor baby cried his little head off when I finally made it out the door (after snapping some candids).






Poor Lindsey had to lock the door because he kept trying to escape. As we drove away I saw her holding his flailing limbs as he cried is eyes out. It was so darn pathetic that it was cute. And then I received these texts from our dear Lindsey.



On another note, my office smells like a florist because today is our wedding anniversary.


Fourteen years together and blessed with three beautiful children and lots of good friends. What a wonderful life we are living. You may congratulate us on our accomplishment!

Crazy Eyes Don't Lie!

Those crazy eyes prove that Kindergarten was a hit!

Yay Evie!

And, I want to add that my au pairs have been absolutely wonderful. They are cheering Evie on today and that means so much to us! You guys are wonderful! Thank you Rosie (who is cheering us on from Australia) and Lindsey (who generously gave us two more months of her life out of the kindness of her heart). Blessings abound.

Bleepity Bleep! I'm old!

So it started today!
My little, precious baby girl started kindergarten today.
Good God, I'm old. When did all this happen?

From this.

To this.

And this.

To this.

Friday afternoon we picked up school supplies and bought school uniforms. They were in pretty good spirits.


Saturday morning, we went to a Kindergarten Popsicle Social at the park across from the school. I insisted that Evie go it alone so she could really meet other students. She was ridiculously shy and hid her face in my stomach most of the time. She played a little bit though. (Yes, she wore the same dress both days. I never said I was a good mom.)



Sunday, I spent the entire afternoon and part of the evening at parent-teacher meetings and then I had to go purchase some last-minute school stuff, such as shorts for under Evie's dresses and other obvious things that just slipped my mind.

This morning they rolled out of bed and reluctantly got dressed, although I think they were actually pretty excited.

They posed for pictures in front of the house and then climbed into the minivan and chatted all the way to school. (By the way, a mom at the school tried to convince me to buy a bigger bow than this. Apparently big bows are all the rage right now. I'm actually not sure how she's holding her head up under the weight of this bow.)

We walked approximately half a mile from our parking spot at the school to their classrooms. (I'm not exaggerating here.) As we made our way into the school, Evie kept asking, "What am I going to do in Kindergarten?" I'm not sure what kind of specifics she was looking for, but I insisted, "You're going to have fun! Look at how excited everyone is to get to school. That's because it is so much fun!" Another parent that was walking in front of me, turned around and gave me a look that said, "Nice lie, Mom." I winked and said slowly as I nodded my head, "It's going to be so, so much fun! You'll love it." She appeared unconvinced.

And the big smile she had from in front of our house was replaced with this look of apprehension in front of her classroom.


She looks like she just got arrested. I will have to compare this picture to her first mug shot. (Oh God help me if she ever has a mug shot!) She whispered to me, "I'm scared, Mom." I said, "You'll be great, baby. No need to be scared." Then I pushed her gently into her room and called, "I love you!" before taking off down the hall with Luke in tow.

Then I dropped Luke off in his classroom. He was less apprehensive, but still a little nervous. I'm sure he'll be in full swing by the end of the day, but he sure looked pissed about actually getting into his classroom.



So, I'm proud to report that there were no tears at our house today - from me, or from the kids. I guess it's possible that Evie cried after I pushed her into her room, but I'm hoping that she had a stiff upper lip.

I'm so blessed to have such wonderful children!

Our Adopted Panther Pride

Do you guys remember how Luke got to adopt a football player named Big Chocolate last year? You can read about it here and here. It's all about allowing younger students that feed into the local high school to adopt a football player. We had this great kid last year named Dominique (whose nicknames were Big Chocolate/Sexy Chocolate/Blindside), I still keep in touch with him and his mother on Facebook. He is currently playing football at the University of Dubuque. (Angie - you need to go see him play for me!). He's such a great kid. So kind and polite and sweet to Luke!

Anyhow, we enjoyed it last year so we're doing it again. This year Luke adopted Ben. Here is his picture from the Roster.

And here is his picture with Luke.
(The sun was bright behind me)

We didn't get to stay for the whole thing last night, because I had yet another meeting to attend last night. Still, we plan to attend the games and support all our football players. I love high school football and it is so much better when you can cheer for someone on the team.

While we were waiting to meet Ben, the kids conned me into getting them a SnoCone and hotdogs.

SnoCones

Evie doesn't like snocones or popcicles so she threw hers away.

Hot dogs

Sadly, some cheerleaders, watched in horror as George dropped his hotdog on the sidewalk and then picked it up and finished it off.


I thought one of them may have even gagged a little. I looked up at the sound of several high-pitched, "eeews." I shrugged my shoulders, looked down at George, looked back at the cheerleaders and said, "Don't judge." Their coach--clearly a fellow mother--nodded her head in agreement with me.

Here are said cheerleaders with George in the background.

Looking forward to a fun season!

Champagne Thursday

It's Champagne Thursday, friends!

And I am soooo ready for it!

New Blog for your Pleasure!

Found a fabulous new blog today called What the Bleep Happened to My Rump Roast!

Oh my, this lady has my number. She cooks exactly the way I cook . . . or just the way I wish I cooked . . . oh, hell, let's be honest, I don't cook and we all know it.

So, anyway, I fell in love with her Meatball recipe and she won't be able to get rid of me now. I'm reposting her meatball recipe (giving her all the credit of course), and I'm highlighting in bold my favorite part of the recipe. Seriously, I've got to meet this woman.

How to Make Meatballs in a Pinch

2 pounds ground beef or ground turkey
1 cup bread crumbs (fresh is better, but out of the box will work in a pinch)
1/2 cup finely grated parmesan, or 1/4 cup parmesan out of the green can
2 heaping tablespoons dried basil
2 heaping tablespoons dried parsley
1 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt or 3/4 teaspoon table salt
1/2 teaspoon black pepper
1/4 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes
1 tablespoon garlic powder or 2 teaspoons of already chopped garlic out of the jar
2 eggs
1 tablespoon of olive oil

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees
2. In a small bowl, mix parmesan, bread crumbs, basil, parsley, salt, pepper, red pepper flakes and garlic. Pour a glass of wine and take a sip because wine makes everything more fun.
3. Put beef or turkey in a large bowl and add bread crumb mixture to it. Mix well with your hands and when everything in combined, roll meatballs in your hand about the size of a golf ball.
4. Spread oil on a cookie sheet (with sides is preferable) and cook in oven for about 30 minutes. The size of your meatballs will determine when they are done, so give them a little longer if you made larger ones, or take them out earlier if you made smaller ones.

I must try this recipe soon!

Educational, if not fun.

We went to the Fort Worth Zoo on Sunday afternoon. It was hot, but we managed. The kids love the zoo. Luckily it is basically across the street from us. We could walk there if we wanted to. But we don't. Ever. Never.

It's great to have yearly passes to one of the best zoos in the nation. I can't tell you how wonderful it is to have a zoo right there, but I fear that my children will grow up thinking that everyone has a zoo across the street. They see zebras, giraffes, hippos, tigers, bears, apes, flamingos, penguins, and numerous other animals on a regular basis.

The beauty of living here and going whenever we want is that we don't have to cram the entire zoo into one visit. We ask the kids, "what animals do you want to see today?" and then we see those animals and go back another day to visit different animals. It's quite nice, particularly in this insane heat.

So, here are some pictures (on my iPhone again) from our most recent visit.

The Zoo's newest exhibit: MOLA (Museum of Living Art).

George posing on a statue of Bluebonnet ("Bonnie") - a baby elephant born at the zoo.

Evie posing on Bonnie.

Feeding the fish - our favorite part I think.

Standing under the misters. Felt good!

Posing on the Komodo Dragon statue.

Posing on the kangaroo statue.
Do you see a trend?

It was a great day. Especially since the day before we took them to Fort Worth's Oakwood Cemetery - one of the older cemeteries in town, filled with historical founders of Fort Worth. There are even tours on Halloween called "Ghosts, Gamblers, and Gunfighters." So cool, but not to the kids apparently, even though they ran through there and tried to open every single mausoleum we came across. It looked like they were having an okay time and not at all traumatized by the activity. That evening, however, they complained that they had had a bad day because - and I quote - "All we got to do was see dead people." Perhaps my title as Mom of the Year is yet again in jeopardy.