Saturday, November 29, 2014

There Was Turkey

Thanksgiving was a success since I was able to get multiple dishes on the table without incident, and so far, nobody has reported food poisoning. 
Jason also fried 2 turkeys without burning the house down, so again, success.
Unfortunately, I was unsuccessful at taking any pictures.

Wednesday, November 26, 2014

We've Got to Calm Down

Jason's birthday yesterday was definitely one for the books.
As in, one of the most uneventful birthdays ever.
 
We ate Mexican food and sang Happy Birthday.
I know, totally out of control.

Monday, November 24, 2014

Pancakes and Such

This Weekend:
 
JR had his last 3 of 7 opera shows. (Thank goodness!)
 
Kyle and Reed had their end of football pancake breakfast at the Houston Racquet Club.

(They were the servers for awhile.)



We went to the Camp Olympia DVD premier (JR was in it 3 or 4 times) at Dave and Busters and got all 3 kids signed up for summer camp.
 JR will do 3 weeks and Kyle and Reed will do 1 week at the end of JR's term.


And Jason and I celebrated his birthday at dinner with Grandpa Gary and Granny Buffie. 
Mary Lou Retton sat at the table next to us.

Friday, November 21, 2014

You Get What You Ask For

The 5th grade had their DARE graduation today (stay away from drugs and alcohol).
They sang two songs and JR had a speaking part it one of them.
 
He said when they were learning the song they listened to a recording of it.  He asked if he could have the speaking part, so the music teacher said sure and gave it to him.
 
He delivered his 2 sentences like the actor he is.
In fact, you'll hear the audience of parents start giggling and then clapping after he finishes.
(And no, I didn't start the clapping I was still videoing.)
 
The whole video is only 57 seconds long, so just hold tight a few seconds before JR's big line.
 

Thursday, November 20, 2014

I Feel Like This Too

Reed's soccer player he drew looks a little beat up around the eyes.
 

I feel the same way when it comes to this never ending, never winning (okay, one win) soccer season.
 
The season was supposed to be over Sunday, but it was raining.
Instead of just ending it, they rescheduled the game for Friday.
 
Have mercy and just put us out of our misery already!

Monday, November 17, 2014

We Might Be Bad Luck

So if you keep up with basketball then you might know that the Houston Rockets are 9-1.
Guess when they had their 1 loss?
Last Saturday night when we went to the game.
Oops.



 
The boys loved it, even Kyle (who hardly even looks at baseball games).
They liked watching the game, the cheerleaders, the dancers, the mascot, and most of all the guys that shoot the trick shots off the trampoline.
 
When Kyle started telling me he wanted to play basketball when he grows up I tried to explain that he might not be tall enough...turns out I misunderstood.  He actually wants to be one of the trick shots off the trampoline guys...or the mascot.
 
And if you're wondering where JR was in all this, well, as they say, you have to suffer for your art. He was at an opera dress rehearsal.
 
And speaking of the opera, it got a great review in the Houston Press.  The kids even get a mention!
You can read it here.
 

Friday, November 14, 2014

Fashion Fabulous Friday

 
When I was in school, field day was competitions with ribbons for the winners...and the PTA sold snow cones. If you were wondering, I always won the potato sack race. I actually practiced at home. (Hummm, sounds like somebody I know named Reed.)
 
The kids have been at a few different schools, and nobody does field day the old school way anymore. Now they just play games.  Dressing up has become a big part of it too.
 
Reed's class color was purple.
Here's what he wore.

Kyle's was gray, with a team name of The Superstars.

(I did not make this sign.  Some kids brought extras.)


Reed's class got really in to it.


And won the class spirit trophy.

JR's class also won for 5th grade as The Jalapenos (they wore white shirts with giant felt jalapenos pined all over them) but I wasn't allowed to attend 5th grade field day.

Wednesday, November 12, 2014

A Gingerbread Man with a Shoe Problem

Last night was the orchestra dress rehearsal for Hansel and Gretel. 
The whole family plus JD (who's been a friend so long he seems like family) went to see JR. 
 
We decided not to buy tickets to the show and only going to the orchestra dress rehearsal for a few reasons:
1. There are 7 shows.
2. Tickets cost up to $63 a piece.
3. JR is in the show for about 4-6 minutes.
 
JR is one of the kids who has been turned into a gingerbread cookie by the witch. The kids come on stage in cookie costumes, and Hansel turns them back into kids with the witch's magic wand (he now has it since they threw her into the oven). 
 
To show they are becoming kids again they take off their cookie costumes on stage (while they are singing) and have their German "kid clothes" on underneath. 
They look like this.

 In that process, JR's shoe got tangled up in his costume,slung out, and then he couldn't find it. (He did eventually.)
I guess he's in good company with his wardrobe malfunction since Gretel's petticoat slipped completely off her body and fell to the floor while she was singing.
 
 
JD knew a couple of people in the cast (besides JR) and here are JD, JR, and JD's friend he went to graduate school with who plays the Sandman and Dew Fairy. 
She looked very beautiful in a very slinky white dress as the Dew Fairy...I'm sure all the men in the audience were hoping she'd have a wardrobe malfunction.



Monday, November 10, 2014

Hu-LA

The kids had field day last week, and one of the competitions was a hula-hoop marathon. 
I had no idea Kyle had such hula talent!
 
After Jason saw this video he told Kyle, "I'm sure your mother is going to claim that you got that from her."
I quickly responded, "Claim?! I am an awesome hula-hooper; he did get it from me!"
 
 
Kyle and I are the only ones in the house that can do it, obviously Jason and the others are just jealous.
 

Sunday, November 9, 2014

Playing a Bad Boy

A few weeks back I read in the kids' school's newsletter that Memorial High School was having auditions for The Best Christmas Pageant Ever.  The high school kids would be playing most of the parts, but they wanted to cast a few elementary/middle school kids for the younger kid roles.
(7 to be exact, with 5 of those being female parts.)
 
JR freaked out when I told him, and started preparing a new monologue specifically for this audition.
 
I wasn't sure how many kids were planning on auditioning, but auditions started at 10 and the first available audition slot I could get for him was 12:15, so that right there tells you there were quite a few.
 
We got the cast list yesterday, and JR was cast!
 
He'll be playing Leroy Herdman. (If you know anything about The Best Christmas Pageant Ever then you know the Herdmans are the bad kids that take over the Christmas Pageant.)
 
His practices start tomorrow, and he couldn't be more excited to be a 5th grader in a high school show! (I'm pretty excited for him too.) 
 
Here he is with a little celebratory Dairy Queen.
 

Friday, November 7, 2014

Wednesday, November 5, 2014

This is Way Better

About this time 2 years ago I voted in Colorado.
Not one person (not a single person) I voted for won.
 
(I also voted against legalizing marijuana and you know how that turned out.)
 
It's pretty disheartening to have all your candidates lose.
 
Last night was so much better!
Everybody I voted for won.

 
And also a plus, if I was still in Colorado, I'd have a Republican senator.
I like to think I must have sprinkled some of my magic, conservative dust while I was there.

Monday, November 3, 2014

You Won't Believe It

You aren't going to believe it.
Kyle and Reed's soccer team finally won a game.
I can't believe there's a team out there as bad as theirs!
 
In case you were wondering, this makes them 1-5.

 

Sunday, November 2, 2014

Costumes

Since the kids couldn't wear their Halloween costumes to school they didn't really seem to care what they were.
 
They were super excited to trick-or-treat, but the costumes weren't that important.
 
I found this costume for Kyle awhile back and knew he would love it.  It's the only new one this year.
 
Reed wanted to wear JR's Cub Scout uniform.
He got tons of compliments on his "costume".

 
And JR wore his pirate costume from the Disney Cruise.
 

 
 
I took Grandpa Gary and Granny Buffie's dog, Abby, to school pick-up dressed in her Halloween costume (she's a ladybug). 
I had a car make me roll down my window at a stop light to tell me how cute she was, and then she caused a near riot when the safety patrol almost came to blows trying to crowd around her to pet and ooh and ahh.
 
 
As for Jason and me, we went all out on the costumes. I wore my standard Halloween pumpkin hat, and Jason wore Kyle's Marine hat that kept flying off his head when he'd take off running to a house to trick-or-treat.


I did try and get Jason to pick me up in the middle of the street like Richard Gere did Debra Winger in An Officer and a Gentleman  (I couldn't resit the opportunity with him wearing the hat) but, um, it was a no go.