Tuesday 22 December 2015

Quick before Christmas

 Elena went to a Frozen birthday party.


 Have I mentioned I *LOVE* the view from my front windows.  I do.  So very, very much. I no longer feel claustrophobic in my own home.  It's a nice feeling.  
 The windows face the sunrise.  And Elk Mountain and the Medicine Bow Range.  Love, love, love, love it!

 Jubal was helping Leo one evening when Leo was taking down the banister so we could move the piano up. That was sad.  Not only did our wall suffer significant damage, so did our piano.  I'm hoping it's just cosmetic though and not anything worse.  Sniff.


 I only post this awful picture because of how truly terrifying it is to be up on that ladder.  I'm not scared of heights, but I no longer feel as athletic and limber as I once did, and the ladder seems not very sturdy when you're up that high.  Anyway, we managed it.
 I think this was after sanding the ceiling once I scraped off popcorn ceiling.


Elena built a snowman.  Sebastian went out after this picture and they built a whole family.
 So the second week in December was CRAZY!  We had three elementary concerts, and Sebastian, Elena, Isabel, Ana, Leo and I spoke in church and sang a musical number.  Yeah, music isn't our strong point, but the kids did great on their talks.

I missed a picture of Isabel but I taped the whole thing.  Anyway, that's all for now.  I've more walls to paint and Christmas to get ready for.  Chao.

Sunday 6 December 2015

I forgot a lot.

First of all my friend Karen sent me this picture of her kids and mine, one of the last days she drove them to school.  I seriously started to cry.  We really left behind some awesome friends in Katy.  Karen made each of my kids an activity bag to keep them busy on the drive to Wyoming, it was so kind and unexpected, I really was overwhelmed.


We made it! We're in Wyoming with only a minor mishap in Denver when I didn't give my kids their usual doses of dramamine and Isabel threw-up all over the back seat and floor and Elena (Elena was distraught). But luckily I had all my cleaning supplies in the back of the van from cleaning out our rental house, including life-saving Odor-ban. I love that stuff. Good times. (Facebook steal). 


We spent the first week in Wyoming in a hotel.  I really like Hampton Inn by the way; they have delicious breakfasts. The kids watched a lot of tv, and after our first day of getting complaints from other guest things went really well. There was a really nice lady who worked at the front desk who was so kind to my kids--she gave them chalk and coloring sheets and candy, and Isabel gave her hugs every time she saw her. Then she ended up living four doors away from us and showed us a picture of a bobcat on her driveway. Isabel asks if she can go visit her almost every day.  I spent most of the days after we bought the house, painting, sanding and cleaning, but I did take an afternoon to swim with the kids, and one night we had a pool party and had pizza and ice-cream down at the pool and I made Leo take a break from working at the house to enjoy it with us.  Then the movers came a couple days later, and it was really crazy just unpacking and all of that.
The kids were awesome and spent over an hour pulling down wallpaper, and then another 45 mins the next day working on it too. Ana pulled up carpet in the foyer and living room with me, and the little kids also pulled out all the staples in the living room and dining room.  I couldn't believe that Sebastian, Elena and Isabel did such a good job.  They only missed a handful of staples.


Showing off their awesome carpet.  And here's the boys' carpet and apricot room.  I told them it was tiger carpet.  Now they're going to cry when we tear it up.
Ready for my only before and after shot????

Before.

And after.  I have never felt more like my mother than when I finished unpacking our food storage.  Plus, I think it's a modern day miracle that all that fit in half of our bedroom before in Houston. Well, the clothing totes were up in the attic, but all my sewing stuff was shoved in the same small space as well.  Crazy.

Of course on top of all the craziness of moving, we had multiple injuries as well.  Which I just got the bill for this lovely ER visit, and I have to say, I miss our old insurance very, very much.  I won't be taking my kids to the ER ever again, I can glue their heads together myself, which is all the ER doc did for Sebastian's lovely head wound.  Another day I was worried Jubal broke his foot because he pulled down a heavy coffee table on top of it and he was limping for a couple of hours.  It was really sad.  And worst of all, the same day, Nicolas pushed Jubal down the stairs and he rolled all the way to the bottom and hit the cement.  I have never seen Leo so mad at one of our kids before.  We could tell Nicolas felt really bad though (you know how kids look when they realize they just did something terrible), and he came out and gave Jubal hugs, and has never done anything like that since.

I forgot that while I was in Utah for Thanksgiving I went with my two sisters and their husbands to a Jazz game.  It was Leo's first NBA game and he loved it!  It helped that Jazz crushed the other team.  Then we went out for Crown Burgers afterward, which I got a gyro and it was delicious.  And fry sauce. Yum, fry sauce.  


Just barely, Leo's work had their Christmas party for the families--they rented out the movie theater and gave popcorn and pop to all the kids and a little stuffed animal and we all got to watch The Good Dinosaur.  I spent the first half in the foyer with Jubal. And Leo spent the second half in the foyer with Jubal.  
And fuzzy pictures, I know, but they were from my phone, and I just snapped these because the kids look so adorable in the hats my sister Amy gave us.  Nicolas always wears the zebra, and Jubal always wears the lion.  So cute!  And that is all I can remember right now. Good night.