13 for Tuesday Morning

1.  Ana's team is still undefeated.  They're pretty happy about that.

2.  Elena has hand, foot and mouth disease.  She came home last Tuesday with a fever and hasn't been back to school since.  Yesterday she actually ate some solid food again, so I'm hoping she'll be okay in a day or two since Nicolas took only two days to recover fully once he started eating again.

3.  Having sick kids is not my cup of tea.  Elena's a bit overdramatic all the time, but with her being so miserably sick, she's been weeping and wailing and moaning and groaning.  And not quietly either.  It's like fingernails against a chalkboard to hear her.  I have a tough time being empathetic while hearing that.

4.  Isabel and Sebastian have been doing good in swimming lessons.  They love going and are excited for swim team to start.

5.  When Leo realized last night how long I'll be spending at swim team practices for the next month and a half, he asked very concerned, "How are you going to survive?"  I think I need to pull out the crockpot so I don't have to worry about dinner.  Anyone have some good recipes or site to recommend?

6.  Leo has a job interview tomorrow!!!  For a job in Greeley Colorado!!!  I'm so excited! No pressure, Leo, no pressure.

7.  I had an "epic fail" class last Thursday.  I must prepare better this week.  Sigh.  I was teaching centered, lapped, and invisible zippers.  And I completely messed up the lapped zipper.  I have no idea what I did wrong or how I typed up the instructions wrong, but I told the class to throw those instructions out.  That's seriously how bad it was.  Then I was so nervous, plus rushed (Leo was at home with the sick kids, but he really needed to be at work) that I inserted the invisible zipper backwards.  Errrr.....  It was an awful class, several people left completely confused, and here I had promised that zippers really weren't that bad.

8.  Nicolas is so adorable (since he's happy again and not sick and wanting to be held 24/7).  We have a bright yellow car that Leo commutes in, and now every time Nicolas sees ANY yellow vehicle he starts yelling, "Daddy! Daddy! Daddy!"  He gets so excited--I just want to kiss him forever.

9.  I love my new tablet or slate or whatever you call it!!!  Seriously, love it!!! I've been spending most of the swimming lesson time transferring stuff from my day planner to my tablet.  And I downloaded some apps.  Yes, I know I'm years behind the times, but I felt cool.  :)  Hee. Hee.  Yeah for the Gospel Library!  And actually I bought my first app yesterday.  It's called Paprika, and it's a recipe organizer, menu planner, and shopping list app.  I love it!!  I have all the ingredients for the usual dinners I make listed in my day planner (so if I was out and about and decided what to make for dinner, I'd know what to buy), and this does all that and more and no more bulk of carrying around a big day planner!!

10.  I've been harassing Leo to harass his relatives for pictures and information for a photo album I'm making on Shutterfly for his grandparents.  It's going to have a family tree with all their descendants and then it has pictures of each of their kids and grandkids and great-grandkids.  It's not been a fun task for Leo.  And he has to do it, because I don't speak Spanish.  Anyway, the other day it was open on the computer and the kids were looking through it.  Isabel came across the page of Sergio Fernando, Leo's cousin who is a bullfighter.  She started kissing the screen and said, "Oh, he's SOOOO handsome!  I want to marry him."  I think it was the clothes that won her over.  ;)  But once again, I am seriously worried for when she's a teenager.  I won't trust her around any guy with tight stretchy clothes.....

11.  Also, we found out that one of Leo's cousins named her baby Geronimo.  Seriously, why were we thinking Oliver for this baby?  Or even Lorenzo??  We should definitely follow suite and name our boy Geronimo!!!

12.  In other news, I had a major pity party a couple of weeks ago (which led to eating of a lot of chocolate) because I am so ginormous this pregnancy.  I already weigh what I weighed when I delivered the last two.  And I'm only seven months!!!  Aghh!! Just thinking about it makes me want to break out that last bag of Cadbury eggs I have hidden away.  I think that's part of the problem--you know, eating a bag of Cadbury eggs everyday for the last two months.  Also, I haven't been exercising--in all my other pregnancies I exercised regularly.  And I've been eating non-stop--I'm seriously hungry all the time though.  Sigh.  Anyway, I had a major pity party because none of my maternity pants fit and I have to wear ted hose this time around--nasty varicose veins and all--so I went and bought three pairs of light-weight maternity pants and some sandals (to match the pants of course!) Only I couldn't decide about which ones to keep and Leo hated the sandals (too gladiator-like apparently) so then I returned them all except one pair of linen pants and bought DNA tests through Ancestry.com instead with the money, and I'm going to test his grandparents.  Hee. Hee.

13. After the non-sick kids and Leo returned from church on Easter  (just after I posted last) they hunted for their Easter baskets.  And everyone was really excited--love that!  But I didn't take any pictures!  Oops. Anyway, the little kids all got Schliech toys--Isabel and Elena, fairies, and Nicolas and Sebastian, knights.  Sebastian played with the knights the whole rest of the day, so I think that was a success.  They also got the Complete Tales of Beatrix Potter.  I really like those books.  Very fun.  And Ana got an egg with a note from the Easter Bunny explaining that her new soccer ball didn't fit in her Easter basket and it was coming through mail--yes, I forgot to get one till way late--anyway, she was super excited and has since received it and loves it!

The end.

I forgot!

15.  My friend sold us their Galaxy Note (like an iPad) for an extremely generous price.  It's my early birthday present!  So once I've learned to use it better, goodbye to my large and cumbersome day planner.  So exciting!

A long two weeks

 1.  It's been kind of a miserable two weeks.  Sorry to be such a downer on Easter.  Ah well, here's hoping the next two will be better.

2.  I've been really busy, with appointments, kindergarten registration, Isabel had tests to get into the TWI Spanish program, and stuff like that--I REALLY don't like being busy.  And next week Isabel and Sebastian start swimming lessons in the early afternoon.  Hopefully Nicolas handles his nap schedule being postponed okay.

3.  Our computer died.  I took it to the Apple store and they cleaned up something and that helped for one day and then it died again.  It was making weird chirping noises, and we couldn't access the desktop, it froze and basically was useless.  Luckily--or through Leo's prayers for my sanity more like it--it lasted long enough for me to prepare my sewing handouts for that week's class.  They take a surprising amount of work to prepare, because I try to be as concise as possible when explaining something, but still make it completely clear what the steps are.  Anyway, it lasted just that long and died to a non-usable state.  Leo took it back to the Mac store and they reinstalled our whole system.  ONLY in the process of this happening we also discovered that our external hard drive that we had our Time Machine backups on was corrupted and completely unusable as well.  So we have NONE of our programs--Adobe suite (I CAN'T LIVE without you!), Microsoft office suite, Mac Pages, ITunes, IPhoto and the whole Mac suite are all gone.  Because I learned my lesson last year, I still have all my files, pictures, videos, family history etc, because that is backed up on still another external hard drive.  However, we'll probably need to buy Disk Warrior or something similar to check through all those files, to make sure none of them are corrupted.  I think we've just being passing the same corrupted files to our computer each time it dies when we reload our stuff.  Anyway, we bought another external hard drive and sent it to my parents so they can do a Time Machine backup of their computer and then they'll mail it to us so we can get all the programs I can't live without back.  :)  That's happy at least.

 4.  Leo is my hero!   He got my automatic ruffler on my sewing machine to work.  Seriously, I finished 2 hours worth of ruffles in about 10 minutes!  Amazing!  It took me almost an hour and half just to pin the ruffles on the skirt.  That's how many ruffles I'm talking about.

5.  Despite all the time saved with the ruffles, I did not finish the girls' Easter dresses in time for Easter.  They are now officially Spring dresses.

6. The main reason I didn't finish the dresses is because of this little man.  Nicolas had a low fever on Wednesday, which is usually my day to finish hand sewing things.  I sew and chat with my friends while the kids play at playgroup at the park in the morning for 2-3 hours.  And then I sew while the kids play at the park during Elena's soccer practice in the evening.  I usually can get a lot done.  However, all I did this past Wednesday was hold Nicolas the. entire. time.  Poor boy.  I wouldn't normally have cared at all except I did want to finish the dresses for Easter.  Anyway, Thursday was pretty much the same with me holding Nicolas 24/7.  Literally 24/7.  Then on Friday his mouth broke out in sores all over and he's hungry and tries to eat but he can barely manage bread.  It's sooooo sad.  I think he has Hand, Foot and Mouth disease.  We've been giving him bread and milk and pedialyte frozen pops, and while I've been able to finish the dresses during his naps to the point where Isabel's only needs buttonholes and Elena's needs some--well, a LOT--of hand sewing, I haven't been able to work on them at all when he's awake.  Right now, I'm typing this during his nap while the rest of the family is at church.  

7.  I did make Easter cupcakes for FHE on Monday.  Megan--you inspired me!!!  We took some to our neighbors too.

8.  Friday the kids decorated Easter eggs, but I forgot to take pictures.  Last year I remember their interest only lasted 20 minutes and I spent another 30 minutes decorating them.  This year was much different, the kids spent quite a while dying them.  Only I had bought some decorations last year after Easter that I quickly regretted as it involved me applying the decorations instead of them because they were too difficult and fiddley.  Oh well.  They had fun.

9.  Ana went to her first stake dance on Friday night.  She said she had fun.  That's all she told me.

10.  Saturday morning we went to a pancake breakfast and Easter egg hunt at the church.  The YW were doing it as their fundraiser for girls' camp.  They also had a silent auction and bake sale.  Ana made a little girl's apron for the auction.  I wish I would have a got a picture of it, it was really cute.  She also made a cake for the bake sale.  My little kids were enthusiastic about meeting the Easter bunny before and after they met her (one of the YW) but not at all during.  Hee. Hee.  They went cautiously up to take a picture only after a lot of encouragement.  And we practically missed the Easter Egg hunt!  Note to self, 15 minutes late is too late when it comes to an Easter Egg hunt.

11.  Leo finished the gallery shelves and they are up on the wall!  I really like them, although the wood is much darker than the rest of the wood in the room.  I think the day I stained them it was too hot and humid and I used a stain that had the stain and polyacrylic finish in one and it just gooped up instead of spreading thinly.  If I could have got a thinner coat (I did in some places) the wood would have matched much better.  I'll never buy the stain and finish in one again, I just think it works and looks so much nicer when you do the steps separately and you have so much more control over how much stain you're using.  Also, kids blowing dandelion seeds around recently stained wood does nothing for your finish.  Trust me, I know.  And it's worth it to buy expensive brushes instead of the $1 ones, because trying to pick out bristles doesn't help the finish look nice either.  Anyway, they're done and up on the wall and despite the problems of staining and restaining them, I like them a lot!

12. Isabel's been sick too, but with a cough and fever, no mouth sores yet.  I really hope none of my other kids get sick.

13. The nice weather of Houston is officially over.  Yesterday I went out to water my flowers, (my roses and poppies are blooming!  I love it!)  and I was bitten 7 times by mosquitos.  Eight months till we're mosquito free again.  :(

14.  Okay, I couldn't end at thirteen on such an unhappy note.  In good news, Leo heard from a company he would really like to work for and is now in the application process for a job in Denver!  Yeah!  We thought it was Evans, CO first, which would have been nicer, but still Denver is much, much closer to family, which is why we want to move anyway.        :)

Sunday's 13 (doesn't have the ring of Thursday's 13, eh?)

 1. Having Ana and Elena both in soccer is killing me.  How do you do it Megan?  How?!?!?  And in a month swim team starts which will mean 3 HOURS every night of practice M-F, split between my kids.  Good thing it only lasts a month and a half or I may die.  Elena sure is cute in her soccer uniform though, and Ana's team is undefeated so far!

 2. Ana was playing with Sebastian's hair before church.  He didn't get to keep his mohawk, we're mean, eh?

 3. Elena's to-do list.  The first item is Fold towels.  So cute. 

4. Nicolas has realized that Elena and Isabel and Sebastian all sleep together every night.  (Sebastian is scared of the dark and came in our room every night, so we let him sleep with his sisters and that has helped a lot--helped so that Leo and I aren't woken up!)  And now when we tell the kids to go to bed, he follows his brothers and sisters and climbs up there with them.  He's pretty insistent.  But we usually don't let him stay.  Last night we did though.  It was so funny, he went to the bookshelf, grabbed a book and took it with him (on non-school nights we usually let the kids take a book to bed with them).  He was really good, despite being the last one to fall asleep.  When I checked him on him, he was just thumbing through his book.  Silly monkey.

5. Nicolas LOVES Sebastian's balance bike.  We bought Sebastian a new bike at a garage sale. It has training wheels, but he's not strong enough to pedal it yet.  Anyway, we let Nicolas sit on the balance bike--that's all he could do at first.  And he WOULD NOT get off.  He just sat there for 30 minutes.  He now manages to inch along on tiptoes.  He "rides" it for an hour at a time.  And yells frantically if anyone else tries to ride it.  He has also added "ike! ike!" (Bike! Bike!) to his vocabulary.

6.  Okay, another Nicolas story.  Sorry, he's just so adorable.  I love it!!  He started this week running and kicking a little soccer ball.  I mean, he kicked balls all the time before, but now he can run, kick it and keep running, and keep kicking it.  Our friends told us to videotape it because the footage will be great for news stories when he's the next Leo Messi.  Hee. Hee.  He spends almost all day playing with balls, and has played with the little basketball hoop we have more in one week than Sebastian has in an entire year.  So funny how different they are.  Sebastian is going to be our artist.  I've had two or three people comment to me at church how they're amazed at how well Sebastian colors.  I need to post some of his drawings, eh? 

7.  On Friday, Leo and I spent the whole morning doing yard work.  Then I spent the afternoon baking these beauties. And Leo continued working in the yard.  The chocolate cake has pastry cream in the middle.  And it's a cream cheese cranberry-raspberry tart.  So good!  I love baking.  Why can't we have cake and pies every night for dinner?  Then I wouldn't have the mental agony of deciding what to cook and then having to make it.  It would be a pleasure instead.

8. Friday night, we had five families and the missionaries over for a hot dog roast.  It was beautiful weather.  And it was so much fun.  The older kids all disappeared to play games in the front yard.  The younger kids all played on the playground and ate a bajillion roasted marshmellows.  I sat and talked and ate.  Love it.  :)  One of the best parts: Isabel coming out in her black velvet cloak (yes, she has one) and standing by the fire in the dark. She just needed a pot of bubbling brew to complete the spooky look. We were all laughing pretty hard.

9.  I made up the muslin for Isabel's dress last night.  It consists of four patterns pieced together.  It worked beautifully.  I can't wait to start sewing tomorrow!

10.  While we still haven't bought a new couch for the living room--I found the perfect one last week and they never replied to me at all! And I emailed 14 mins after it was listed on Craigslist. Ruff!--I had Leo and all the men at our house on Friday night move the desk and piano for me to make room for the couch.  I assured them that it was NOT my intention to have a party just so I could have my furniture moved, but I don't think they believed me.  There was some comment said about scheming women.  Anyway, I really only thought of that afterwards, but oh well.  However, Leo thought we should have left the piano where it was, and now I'm starting to think he was right.  Maybe we'll have to have another party. ;)

11.  About 3 weeks ago, I had Leo make me gallery shelves for our living room.  I then stained them only to find that the color (antique Walnut) was not right--too light.  So then I bought mahogany and put that on over it hoping to darken it without going too red.  It was really red. And Leo tried to help me stain two, only he's never painted anything before and didn't realize you can't have drips.  So that needed sanding.  I called my Mom and made her look at pictures of my living room, because by this point the 2 hour project promised by Ana White had taken, well, three weeks and I was considering just painting them black.  Much faster and easier than sanding and re-staining right?  But she confirmed what I already thought--it needed to be stained.  And she told me it was oak already in my living room--I thought oak was lighter?  Anyway, I went to Home Depot where there was way more options of stain, and found Mission Oak--it matches perfect.  My mom is a genius!  And last night I sanded them all down.  Elena helped me without even being asked.  She's a really good worker.   :)  Hopefully, by next weekend I'll have them up on the wall, and pictures to show you all.  Although, now I'll have to track down some picture frames and paint those black.

12.  I found dark chocolate Cadbury mini-eggs at Target.  One more reason to love Target!!!

13.  I must end now to start the last session of conference.  Adios!

 

Sorry

No Thursday's 13 today.  I'm too tired.  Lo siento.  Maybe by Saturday.