I am the Most Awesome Mom of the Year.

Yes. It is true. I know it is still early in 2012, but I have declared myself the most awesome mom of the year.  I think you will agree with my awesomeness when you read what has garnered me so much, well, awesomeness. 

This all started back in December, 2011. The boys were on Christmas break and we decided to head over to Dallas to go the fancy mall. (I call it the fancy mall because they have one hallway that has all of the fancy, expensive stores; i.e. Versace, Oscar De La Renta, Gucci, etc. One of these days I want to actually walk into one of these stores, but I'm afraid I would look so completely out of place. Anyways, I have completely gone off on a tangent so back to what makes me the most awesome mom of the year.)

We went to the fancy mall because they had a special train display for Christmas that I had heard was really fun to see. Here is a picture of the boys in front of the train display. 

The train display was interesting, but not very big so we didn't spend a lot of time there. That of course means there was more time for shopping. This fancy mall has one of our favorite stores in it called the Paper Source. So we head to it and this is were my journey to the most awesome mom begins. 

Connor found this package of mustaches that he really, really wanted. There was one for each day of the week. Even though it was only a week before Christmas, Connor gave me his puppy dog look of "pleeeeaaaassse mom" and I bought them for him. 

This is what they look like:

These are not just any ol'fake mustaches, no they are Stylish Mustaches! (My particular favorite is Thursday's, The Weasel.) Connor was so happy to have these that he opened the package as soon we left the store and walked around the mall sporting the Monday Herostache.

So you are now thinking well this is a nice story Christie, but why does this make you the most awesome mom of the year? Because of this: 

On the way home from the fancy mall, Connor said he wanted to wear one of the mustaches for his spring school pictures. And here is where I get awesome! I told him if he can keep one of the mustaches nice and not used, he can wear it in the spring pictures. He doesn't believe me. So his older brother piped up and said "Connor when we get home write a contract and have her sign it and then she will have to let you." Those older brothers can be such instigators at times.


As soon as we get home, Connor quickly drafted the above contract and had me sign it right away. He hung the contract up on his magnetic board and picked Sunday's Hollywoodstache to keep special because we all know that is the most appropriate for a Spring Picture Day.


Well that contract and Hollywoodstache hung up in his room for a long 3 months. He was determined to call my bluff and see if I would really come through and become the awesome mom I was destined to be. And in the middle of March, Spring picture day finally arrived. Connor brought me the contract and Hollywoodstache with the picture order form and gave me that look of "is she really going to let me go through with this?" After looking at all of the information for a couple of minutes of uncomfortable silence, I said, "Let's go pick out a Hollywoodstache appropriate outfit!"


I emailed his teacher explaining that I had indeed agreed to this Hollywoodstache picture and I also included a note on the order form for the photographer as well. That morning Connor went off to school all ready to have his Hollywoodstache properly documented through the School Spring Picture Day. 


We finally received the pictures this week. And I must tell all of you moms out there that if there is any way you can get your own Most Awesome Mom award and have your kid wear a fake mustache in a school picture, please do. It is so worth it! He is so proud of this picture. 


So without further ado, I will now present you Connor in all of his Hollywoodstache Spring Picture Day Awesomeness: 

And here it is cropped in a little closer so you can fully appreciate the Hollywood mustache. 

Connor picked out his own clothes for the picture. He knew that he needed something dapper to go along with that stache. 


So that is my story of how I have wrapped up the Most Awesome Mom of 2012 already. I let my child wear a fake mustache for school pictures. 


(Full Disclosure: Spring pictures are not published in the yearbook and I did not allow him to wear the mustache for the class picture. These pictures are only for us and friends and family to enjoy. So no yearbooks were maligned with a kid wearing a mustache in his picture. Although I think that would be kind of awesome too.)


Thanks for visiting me and I hope you have enjoyed my tale of the Hollywoodstache, Spring Picture Day and Connor. :) 

San Antonio Road Trip-Part Two-SeaWorld

I'm back with more pictures from our San Antonio road trip. On the last day of our little trip, we went to SeaWorld. We got there right at opening; actually a little before opening. Here are the boys at the front while we were waiting to get into the park. It was a little cloudy and cool in the morning. 

Since we were there a little early, Connor decided to check out what he could ride. When we were at Disney last time, he was just a little too short to ride any of the "cool" rides. He was determined this time to ride something big.

And this was it:

As soon as we got into the park, Chris and Connor went right to the Steel Eel to ride it. Spencer and me are not roller-coaster people, so we waited. And waited. The line took a lot longer than we thought it would. It gave me plenty of time to test out my little camera and make sure Chris called me when they were getting on the coaster. I staked out my spot and started taking pictures as soon as the coaster came over that first hill. I only had my little P&S camera, but I was surprised that I got a couple of good ones! 

You can barely see Connor's head sticking up in the last shot. He was so proud of himself! He also didn't  want to ride it again. lol! 

We also went to see a couple of shows. This is the Believe show that has Shamu in it. 

And again, I was very impressed with the pictures I got from the little P&S camera. 

The water park part of SeaWorld was open this week too since it was Spring Break. The boys wanted to go to this all day and finally in the afternoon the sun came out and it got a little warmer. So they changed into their suits and gave it a try. 

It was a little cold. 

Therefore the swimming part didn't last too long. Connor and Chris did go down a water slide. I'm not sure which one it was but I think Connor liked it, although he said he ended up going down backwards and it was a little scary. 

We went to the aquarium and saw pretty fish and cool sharks.

Now on to the power of the internet and smart phones! I had posted early in the morning a picture of the Steel Eel on Facebook stating that Connor was getting ready to ride it. A friend that I had met years ago on a scrapbook message board posted on that picture that she and her family were at SeaWorld too. I didn't think we would ever meet face-to-face because I lived in Missouri and she lives in Texas. I think we actually emailed back and forth more about the show Lost than scrapbooking! We were always discussing Lost theories the day after the show aired. 

So now I'm living in Texas and happened to be visiting SeaWorld the same day she is and I posted it on Facebook. She happened to check her phone and saw the picture I had posted. We texted back and forth a few times and finally caught up with each other! 

Me and Jenn

It really is a small world! It was great finally getting to meet her! 

So that is the end of our mini vacation to San Antonio. It was a great success and even ended with an unplanned meet-up! We will definitely be visiting again. 

Thanks again for visiting me! 

Spring Break Road Trip-Part One

Last week was Spring Break here and we decided to take a short road trip to San Antonio. Warning: Photo Heavy Post Below. 


We stayed right on the Riverwalk. The weather was just perfect! 

Here are the boys on the Riverwalk right after we arrived. It was so busy! I'm not used to everyone having Spring break at the same time. I think the whole state of Texas was off that week. 

This was the view from our hotel room. We actually had a little balcony. The boys loved the hotel because they offered free soda and popcorn every day from 3-10pm.  I think in the first picture Connor is carrying a bag of popcorn he got at the hotel when we checked in. 

The next day we went walking on the Riverwalk and went to the Alamo. Unfortunately the boys were not very thrilled with this historical tour. 

However, right across the street from the Alamo was a Guinness Book Of World Records Museum. And this was very exciting for the boys, especially Spencer. Spencer has been buying every edition of Guinness for the last 4 or 5 years. 

Right down the street from the Guinness museum is a Ripley's Believe It or Not museum. This is seriously the street for boys. All kinds of weird and kind of gross things to entertain them. :)

Here we are at the entrance to the Ripley museum. These animated figures were singing Top 40 tunes and Chris thought they were very funny. I have to admit that it is kind of funny to see the "bearded lady" singing Ke$ha. 

That guy isn't real, but doesn't it look like he is? Creepy! 

These test tube things were funny! The boys crawled underneath and then popped up inside of them. I have a ton of pictures of them making goofy faces in them. 

Since we were there the weekend before Saint Patrick's Day, we got to see the river dyed green. 

Hey look, there is actual photographic proof I was on this trip too. ;) I don't know why it looks like a major storm is brewing behind us. I think that is a building or something, because the weather was nice. Sometimes it got a little cloudy, but never looked like this. 

Those are just some of the pictures from our first two days. We went to Seaworld the next day and I will post pictures from there in a day or so. 

Thanks for visiting me! 

The Weather Outside: Not So Delightful

Wow, it has been a long time since I blogged. The last time I was so impressed with the fantastic weather we were having the week before Christmas. And for the most part, the weather here has been pretty good. Until this week. 


It all started about 4 am Tuesday morning and hasn't really stopped since. The first round was sleet that was so loud it woke me up at 4am. That lasted a few hours and then changed over to some snow for just a little while. The precipitation was all over at about 10-11am that morning. It really didn't look too bad out there; that was until we realized they don't really clear roads here. We have to wait until it warms up for this stuff to melt. And it still hasn't warmed up yet. 


Our neighborhood has just been covered in ice since then. These next two pics are from that first day. The neighborhood kids were going down their ice coated driveways in laundry baskets. So the boys got all bundled up (thankfully we saved our winter gear from St. Louis) and grabbed a laundry basket. 

Sledding: Texas style. 

So it was all fun and games that first day of the storm. Chris' work closed and everybody was home and happy for a day off. 


Then Wednesday was still so cold, so nothing melted and school was canceled. 


Then Thursday was still so cold, so nothing melted and school was canceled. 


Then Friday, it snowed some more! So nothing melted and school was canceled. Again. 


This was not what I was hoping a Texas winter would be like. This is seriously disappointing. 


Seriously. Disappointing. 


On a different subject, I have been redoing Spencer's bathroom and I am just about done with it. I should have pictures next week to share. I really like how it is turning out! 


Thanks again for visiting me!  

The Weather Has Been So Delightful!

Seriously Delightful! The last few days the temperature has been in the high 70's and low 80's. It is hard to believe that it is the week before Christmas and we are walking around in short sleeves and no coats. 

Unfortunately it came to an end today. We are gray and the temps have dropped back down. It is only suppose to be in the 50's for the next week. Bah Humbug! I want that 80 degrees back!

Yesterday we took advantage of this awesome weather and drove over to Dallas. Neiman Marcus has an awesome Christmas window and it has these tubes the kids could climb through. I have always wanted to go to NYC to see all the Christmas windows but I haven't made it there yet. I thought I could at least see one that is relatively close to us.

The theme of the window was outer space. It had rocket ships and monkeys in astronaut suits, aliens, and these monitors that we couldn't quite figure out what they did.  

 The best part was these tubes the boys could climb through. They went in and out of the windows. 

 Here is where the tubes came out over the sidewalk. It was really neat! The boys had a great time and went through it twice. 

The boys sitting in front of one of the decorated windows. I only took my small camera with me (didn't want to lug the big one around downtown) so my pictures didn't turn out great. I didn't realize I got so much reflection of other buildings in most of my pictures. 

 After we got done at Neimans, we had lunch and then headed back to the car. I couldn't find any parking garages and ended up parking at a meter on the street. And that only gave us two hours to play. There was a small park right by our car so the boys played there for just a bit. 

I do like this picture of the boys playing with all of the big buildings surrounding them. Dallas is such a pretty city. I can't wait to go back and explore it some more. It really was the perfect day to be walking around outside. 

And I thought I would leave you with this last picture.

This is what you get when your kids ask you if they can use your camera to take some pictures of the Christmas windows. 


Thanks for visiting me! 

Getting that Perfect Christmas Card Family Picture

Last weekend, we decided that we needed to get ourselves together to take the always pleasant Christmas Card Family Photo. 


You know that annual picture where you lovingly request your children to put something on that resembles the Holiday season, then pose for a few hundred pictures. And for goodness sake, please look happy while we are doing it! Yes! We are a Happy Family! 


We wanted to take our big picture outside by the pool this year; but of course it was way too windy to do that on the day we finally get ourselves in gear to take the picture.  


So we move indoors to the living room by the Christmas Tree. I really wanted to use the lighted Palm Tree in the picture. 


Which was suppose to be by the pool. 


But it was too windy. 


Once again, procrastination ruins a good plan.

So we move the Palm Tree to the living room. 

Yeah. I know. It doesn't work. Darn. 

So the Palm Tree gets axed. In come the kids and the dog. 

Okay now let's make sure the remote clicker is working. 

Looks good. 

Look, I joined the picture now! That is the beauty of the remote. Very handy little device. 

Now if we could just get Maggie to look at the camera. 

Maggie, please look at the camera. Please.

Well, you know that old saying they have in Hollywood. Never work with dogs or

Children!

I think my motivation was gone by that last shot.

Thanks for visiting me. 

I'M HERE! (In Texas!)

Wow, I haven't blogged in forever! To be honest, I almost thought about not starting it back up, but now that things have settled down here I feel like I will have more time to devote to it.  


Since it has been a few months, I will go back in time for the next few posts to share what we have been up to here in the Lone Star State. 

This is the sign welcoming us to Texas on our drive down. Spencer took that picture for me as we were entering our new state. It was a long drive, but not too bad. 

This is the boys at the new house right after we arrived. They wanted to see the pool right away.  We are having some work done on it right now and I will share more about that in a few days. 

Two weeks after we arrived in Texas, we got to fly to Ohio for a family wedding. Chris' brother Kevin got married to the lovely Megan. It was a gorgeous wedding and we had a great time seeing everyone. And Connor for some reason thinks that he is a hip hop dancer now and poses like this in most pictures if you don't catch him in time. He was very entertaining at the reception with his dance skills. :-0

After we got back from the wedding, the very next morning was the first day of school. School starts very early in the morning here! Even though the boys look like happy, smiley boys ready to start the new year, they actually felt more like this:

Spencer adjusted to his new school great. He goes to an intermediate school that is just 5th and 6th grade. Connor had a more difficult time getting used to everything. I think it was the combination of being the new kid and not having his brother in the same school with him. He is doing great now though! 

I had to get used to no bus service for Connor. I got spoiled back in Missouri where they picked the boys up in front of the house. Luckily, we have lots of kids in the neighborhood, so I now carpool. That means I only have to drive him (and two friends) to school a couple of days a week instead of every day. 

And we also got to celebrate a couple of birthdays since we have been here. 

First up was mine. When we first moved in, one of Chris' co-workers brought us a bundt cake from this company called Nothing Bundt Cakes. It was so good that I requested one for my birthday cake! Yummy, yummy, yummy!!!

And someone turned 7! 

Connor! 

He had a great birthday. His Grandma Linda was visiting us from Kansas City and got to go with me when I brought cupcakes to school for him to share with his class. He asked for a cookie cake for home and got to pick a restaurant for dinner. We need to work on his restaurant choices. I won't name any names, but let's just say it was not good. Blech! But Connor was happy! 

Now that things are settling down, I'm going to try and update this blog on a more regular basis. Next I will post about Halloween and then I think I will have hit the major points since we moved. 

Thanks again for visiting me!!!!