Living in Munchkinland

We have had such a busy weekend. Friday evening we had our friends Elizabeth and Beto and their boys over for dinner. The weather was so cold, but we made merry by the fire. We all had a great time. Saturday morning we woke up early and drove to Houston to attend the celebration of Life for Michael's uncle Roy. It was a beautiful service with a gospel choir and a bagpipe! Roy loved Christmas and had many decorations and christmas trees and a wonderful collection of nutcrackers. At the service, everyone was invited to take an ornament of Roy's off of the christmas tree to take home and remember him by. It was lovely. After the service, we drove over to Uncle Roy's house where Michael's cousins Marti and Mark offered to let us each pick out one of Uncle Roy's wonderful nutcrackers. They are so special. We had a nice dinner with the whole family that evening and spent the night in Houston before driving home Sunday morning. When we got home we went straigh...

On Samuel's real birthday, Davis woke me up early to decorate the living room for the birthday boy. He was so pleased and we let him open a present.That afternoon I took a dozen cupcakes to Samuel's school for his whole class. He was also student of the week and his teacher had made him a birthday hat and sign. It was so sweet! He felt so important. That evening we hosted "ranch Happy Hour" and had the whole family over to celebrate both Samuel and his grandfather, Clark. We opened presents with the family and Clark and Sam blew out the candles on their birthday pies. It was a great day to celebrate Samuel and the fact that I also had to take him to the doctor where he was diagnosed with a sinus infection was mere blip on the screen of Sam's special day.

We had a birthday party for Samuel this Saturday. I had won a birthday party at the Hidden Willow Equestrian Center in the Montessori silent auction last May. We went out there for the included lessons on the Wednesday before and to check it out. It was perfect. Sam and Davis loved horseback riding and immediately decided to give up on their hip hop lessons and take horseback riding instead. The gift certificate said the party was for ten people, but it was impossible to keep the list that small, so Samuel ended up with fifteen small guests of his choosing. Each child got to ride a shetland pony and then Kristy, the owner handed out feed sacks for the kids to decorate. Then they made their way with their feed sacks to the arena where there was an obstacle course set up. They jumped in the sacks around it and then ended up playing in two sand mounds at the end of the course. The kids also spent lots of time jumping on hay bales. I made a slab apple pie for the "cake...

The kids' new school has a field trip once a month for each grade. This month, the first graders went to Landa Park in New Braunfels to study trees. Samuel loved exploring the park and his grandparents met him out there for part of it. Friday was Davis' special day, but instead of going on a field trip, we had Indian Day. The kids had researched a tribe and taken an Indian name. Davis was Soaring Hawk of the Comanche people and he did his report on Comanche shelters. The kids all had costumes and the parents all volunteered to put on a day of activities for the kids. We set up a teepee outside the back of the school and put out a buffet table of all the food the Indians would eat. We had stations of beading, carving, storytelling, archery. I got to know some of the other parents better and had a wonderful day. Davis loved it, too. It is one of the more wonderful parts of our new school. After school I brought home a friend of Sam's from school and the kids had ...

We had such a good time last weekend! Friday evening we met our friends at the Railyard for a quick dinner and then all made our way to a Justin Roberts concert at the Methodist Church. The kids bounced around and the band was great, but Davis had his first realization that his dearest girl friends are starting to think he is yucky. It brought out the mama bear in me to see his eyes filled with tears and his friends shied away from dancing with him, but he didn't want me to comfort him. They are growing up and things are changing! It is hard. Luckily, Samuel still danced with me! Saturday morning we faced the rain and went to the Veteran's Day parade. Michael and the boys walked with the cub scouts and I waited at the square in the rain. Right as the parade began, my friend Norma joined me and then my parents came with my nephew Kade and my Gramp! I was so happy he could come as he is a WW2 vet. It was a moving parade. Saturday afternoon we had a soccer game and bo...

Davis and Samuel are doing indoor soccer this November. They have never done an organized sport before and so this is very new and exciting. I had Samuel put on Davis' team which is kids age 8-12 so he is definitely smaller and younger, but I only have to take them to one practice and one game. I am a selfish mother. So far they've lost both games, but they (especially Davis) seem to really enjoy it. I am surprisingly emotionally involved in each game. It's ridiculous, but I'm trying so hard to help them by screaming my lungs out. Embarrassing, but fun, too. I think it is a good experience for all of us.

We spent last weekend at Garner State Park with many of our friends. This was something I cooked up last spring when my roller skating accident made me miss out on the spring cubscout camping trip. We had glorious weather for our weekend with cold nights and bright cool days. There were seven families and seventeen kids and we all got along very well and had a merry time. We had two wonderful evenings of singing by the campfire and the kids rode bikes and explored and we rode the paddle boats. We froze in our tents and made amazing breakfasts and a huge potluck dinner. Elizabeth made a scavenger hunt for the kids that was awesome. Such good times!!! It actually made me like camping!

This year Davis and Samuel went as Ninjas. Michael and I used the kids' luchadore masks and went as luchadores. It was so fun! We had a potluck at Alex and Kyle's house and then walked down San Antonio Street with all of our friends. Sam had hurt his ankle two days before and was on strict doctors orders not to walk on it if we wanted Sam to be able to go camping that weekend, so we pulled him in a wagon and Davis and Michael and I took turns trick or treating for him.

We had a huge flood on the morning of Halloween. The Blanco River flooded our river bottom very fast. It was one of the biggest floods we have ever seen. It was crazy. School was cancelled and even though Sam's ankle was injured, we carried him down the hill to see the river bottom. Uncle Larry says there is a huge cypress tree down there now on it's side. Hank's trailer was taken as well as all our eletric and our bbq pit.