Port A here we come!!!

So I'm sure most moms go through the same dilemma on their birthdays like I did.....that question 'What do you want for your birthday?' I don't get one single moment to think about myself...ever! So this year instead of trying to do last minute research on the purse I want or the jewelry that I wish I had, I opted for a short vacation. And to leave some element of surprise to the present, I told Justin he could choose between Port A (our favorite local beach hang out) or the Hill Country. Of course he chose Port A (so I guess there was really no element of surprise when leaving that decision up to my beach loving, fish-in-the-surf, sun soaking up husband).

So we are off to Port A as soon as Justin gets home from work. We come home Sunday. Everyone have a great weekend!

Bring on the sun.......

What is the old saying...'if you can't beat 'em, join 'em'

Well after weeks and weeks of my sweet Kate praying to Jesus for rain, we have had none. Zip zilch nada. It is so dry and hot here that our land has cracks in the ground 2 inches wide and they are never ending (I expect for a little kangaroo to hop of one one day!). We are getting all kinds of insects and small animals coming nearer and nearer to civilization b/c they are looking for water and food. Just the other day a 60 lb bobcat was hit right in the middle of a Victoria residential area. They presume it was looking for water.

I had really been trying to shelter the kids from the heat by keeping them indoors as much as possible but at this point its just not working. They get stir crazy. So for the past week we've had fun in the sun starting about 5:30 and going as long as we can handle it...normally our session ends when Wesley ingests too much water or the fire ants starts moving to the pool in hopes of getting some water (I said everything was thirsty!!).

Here are some pics of the kids enjoying the cute pool Trey got Wesley for his birthday. Thanks, Trey!

If it isn't going to rain we'll make our own!!

My munchkins! They are so tan right now!

Wesley Chillin in the pool!

Pop a top!

No..this post isn't about Justin =)

My granny (probably about once a week) sends the kids a package. Kate has been fascinated with mail and packages since she was Wesley's age and my granny works at this little restaurant/country store in Schulenburg. The store gets the coolest toys and my grandma (not always knowing what young kids will like since she's been so far removed from little ones for a while) waits to see what is popular with the customers....then before they all sell out, she races to by stuff for Kate and Wesley.

So earlier this week she sent a package that had the coolest old school metal top for Wesley. When you get it going really fast it sounds like a choo choo train. Pretty cool.

He has spent hours carrying it around asking me to help him sound like a choo choo train. Pretty fun stuff!

And the puppy saga continues.....

It's been a super busy week and I have neglected to post anything new (bad mom) but last night as we got ready for the weekend (thank God!) my 'puppies number 3 & 4' came out in full force.

As I do on most Fridays, I had washed clothes, so on Friday night our dirty clothes bins were both empty. Puppy #3 took the liberty of snatching an empty clothes hamper for herself and Puppy #4 to 'sleep in'. So at bedtime she configured a nice little set up for her and her little brother (who so graciously played along). I thought for a split second they may actually fall asleep in their 'puppy beds' but no such luck. They had to 'transform' into humans for their 'real bedtime'.

I was in The Woodlands on Thursday to enjoy a team celebration with one of my clients. It was really nice to see everyone. David even convinced his lovely family to come up at lunch and I got to see the new baby - Jansen. He is super precious with TONS of black hair. Jake and Julia were super social and sweet (gave me hugs and waved goodbye a lot!). Kelly looked great for just having baby #3. Very sweet family!

We really have '4' puppies in our house....

I bet you all didn't know that we went from 2 dogs to 4 overnight (well not overnight since this has been an ongoing obsession of my sweet Kate).

We now officially have:

1. a super high strung, very demanding of attention Poodle--Jake

2. a super mellow, sweet, but losing his hair and teeth Maltese--Rex

3. a very bouncy mixed breed that wants mom to pour water in a bowl so she can drink from it like a real puppy, and has started asking to take baths out in the pool instead of outside--Kate

4. and finally our super smiley little boy puppy that basically just copies everything his older, mixed breed sister does!

So I thought I'd share some of the pics I snapped the other night of Kate playing puppy and Wesley try to hang on for the ride..and just in case you were wondering where Kate's clothes are...well since she's a puppy, she gets 'hot' in her fur.....go figure? who would have known?!?! got to love them!

This land is our land.....

This land is your land.....ok..so I'm not feeling patriotic but I am feeling some excitement.

We officially closed on our land this afternoon. And with that, we have accomplished goal #1 - Find a Lot to Build on by September.

We have 2.5 acres in Post Oak Estates. We are going to be on the North East side of Victoria near Inez like if we were heading towards Houston. The subdivision is right off of 59 but its a country subdivision so its very serene and peacefully. This lot meets all of our prerequisites.

1. Jessica did NOT want more than 5 acres (I have two active kids, a full time job, and commitments other than mowing the grass, bailing hay, and feeding livestock)

2. Justin wanted to be secluded and have some separation from our neighbors but still close to the city. In Conroe we bought an acre and thought we'd have some 'space' but unfortunately they built two homes on each side of us that ended up right on top of ours (literally one was built on our property!). So this lot is perfect. We will only have 1 neighboring lot where someone can build and that lot is 3 acres in size. So hopefully much out of distance for my socially refrained husband.

3. Kate wanted a big tree where she can have a tree house and a tree swing (Pine trees haven't really served much of a purpose the past 6 years so we promised her we find her some oaks!)

4. Wesley really didn't have any prerequisites, but we know that he wants the space and maybe a little 4 wheeler some day! And he does love the deer that are plentiful out there.

5. And finally, I really wanted some place that would hold value. We aren't necessarily concerned about resale value b/c we plan on being here forever, but we do care about the stability of the neighborhood. Victoria doesn't have a lot of really nice subdivisions. This is one of the few and we snatched it up.

The clearing will be our future home site.

Remember we haven't had rain in like 3 months so what would normally be nice green foliage is a little dry right now.

Thank You Kimberly....

My sweet Kate doesn't really miss Conroe much..I've learned that at this age as long as they are with mommy and daddy they really don't care about much else (or maybe I just have really mellow kids). She does ask for Kyle, Avery, Nadia and Ryan though and if they are going to come play in her tree house when we build our house. But outside of her friends, the one thing that she has mentioned is her Cane's chicken strips. She LOVED that chicken and unfortunately there is nothing even remotely close to Cane's chicken here in Victoria. I am making a trip to the Woodlands on July 23rd and I promised her I'd bring her back some Cane's chicken strips and bread but in the meantime I needed to make her happy (b/c my sole purpose in life is making the cuties happy!).
So I was reading Kimberly's http://www.bledsoefamily.typepad.com/ blog the other day and came across the Pioneer Woman's blog (very good suggestion Kimberly) . I stayed up way too late that night reading her Love Story but came across this Easy Chicken Strip recipe http://thepioneerwoman.com/cooking/2009/05/quickie-homemade-chicken-strips/
I soaked mine in buttermilk overnight and fried them tonight (we aren't big on frying foods in our house so the idea of having an inch of oil kind of freaked me out) but geesh oh mighty! Kate ate like 4 chicken strips, I had more than my share and Justin gave me a cooking compliment (he does NOT give out compliments very often!).
I am going to try the apple tart http://thepioneerwoman.com/cooking/2009/05/quick-easy-and-yummy-apple-tart/
Kate will enjoy helping me cook and it looks delicious.

Thanks Kimberly for sharing your discovery. That's what blogging is all about!

Our feet.....

Tonight was the first night that Dad wasn't at home. Victoria got slammed with some wicked Thunderstorms this evening. Our subdivision went without power for several hours and Justin got called out shortly thereafter and has been working ever since. People need their TV, phone and Internet!!

So as I sat in between the kiddos tonight trying to get their mind off of the endless 'where is daddy' question, I decided to snap a few pictures of our feet. The cute story behind the 'feet'. Well, this past Friday I was painting my own toenails (because the days of pedicures went out the door with my lovely baby #2) and Kate wanted hers painted just like mine (very odd occurrence b/c normally she purposely wants the opposite color that I have on...like green or red or purple while I dote pinks, maroons and french tip).

So I did her toenails and she sat very patiently and they turned out so cute....

Then Wesley came into the bathroom as we were finishing our toes and he wanted his painted as well.....so I found the palest pink I could find and painted his toes...he sat really still and thought the polish was 'cold'.....see the results

And just for giggles.....my lovely Rex is having 'feet' issues too. He (just like Justin and Wesley) has horrible allergies. Except with Rex he doesn't get congested and have asthma flare ups. Rex gets itchy and licks his feet...all of the time..he licks and licks and licks his feet.

So while we are on the 'feet' subject here are Rex's beautiful 'feet'.

Happy Birthday Little Man!

Wesley had a bug themed party so (for the first time in my motherhood) I made his birthday cake. It was the cutest caterpillar ever! Kate and I also made dirt cake which was a huge success....can you say calories, please?!?!
It is 9:01 pm and Wesley is FINALLY asleep. Must be a mixture of all the sugar from the brownies and cookies he had at school to celebrate his birthday with his friends AND the adrenaline high from he and Kate singing Happy Birthday To You a million bazillion times.

And I have to note that Wesley can completely sing the entire song by himself. He is super sharp. He can count to 20, sing the ABC song by himself, sings twinkle twinkle little star and can completely carry a conversation with me. He speaks so clearly and says the cutest things. He has the best manners..says Please, Thank You, Excuse me (when he burps) and Sorry (when he does something he knows he shouldn't). Today when I asked him how old he was he said with the utmost confidence - TWO and held up two fingers! He has an amazing spirit about him and he and Kate compliment each other so well. She is Miss Mellow, never in a hurry, goes at her own pace, and Wesley is Mr. Into Everything, Going a Million miles an hour. And tonight they were laying on the couch and Wesley grabbed Kate's foot and said 'Tickle Tickle' she bust into laughter. Then he busted into laughter and it was just infectious how beautiful he has become.

He had an amazing party on Saturday (we had 33 people in our house and my granny fixed so much good food!). It was the first real reason for Justin and I to throw a shin dig to get all the family together since we moved and it was so much fun. All of Justin's aunts and uncles came along with a few of his cousins and their kids. A few of my cousins (and there kids) who live in Victoria came as well. The kids had fun in the water in the back yard and finally (when it got a little cooler outside) the kids hit the pinata that my granny insisted on getting b/c what's a party without a pinata?!!?! Much thanks to my granny who went way overboard making this special day for her special little boy!

Wesley laughing with grandma and MiMi (Justin's mom)

Wesley and Aunt Margaret after he munched a cupcake!

Wesley getting Aunt Margaret to feed him a LaffyTaffy from the pinata.. Wesley with is icing face Wesley opening up his gifts Wesley blowing out his candles..with some help from dad and Kate

The family
Vanessa making more water balloons..I think she made like 100....

More family....the boys LOVED the train table

Aunt Joyce with our newest family member Francis Ann (April 5 - see my blog back in April about our April birthday month!!)

Water fun with Miss Kate

Wesley in his refurbished Barbie 4 wheeler (yes..this used to be pink and purple and Kate and I painted it red and black to make it suitable for Wesley...

Wesley and Cade on the slip and slide

It's July! Another Birthday month!

My favorite month of the year has come! I absolutely LOVE July! Could I be biased b/c my own birthday lands in July - quite definitely. But, for me, July resonates such fond memories. As a child, who didn't love the months of June through August (remember the days when school ended in May and started in September!). I loved the summer b/c it meant no school, sun, and relaxed rules around bedtimes, spontaneous sleep overs and tons of family visits!
And everyone wanted me in July. Because it was my birthday month, Grandma Irene wanted me in San Antonio with her so we could visit Sea World and do some back to school shopping. Grandpa Sam wanted me with him at the farm for no good reason at all other than the fact that he adored the time he got to spend with me and he loved making (from scratch) my very own birthday cake. My cousins in Mount Pleasant wanted to come spend time with me in July b/c we probably hadn't seen each other since the previous November or December. They loved coming to Hallettsville in the summer and spending time in my small town.

Fast forward 10 years...I meet and marry Justin. And July became even more special. Justin's Godmother (and Aunt) Joyce, Grandma Peters, his Mother all have birthdays in July. Not to mention his cousin Shelley and I share the exact same birthday!

So when it became obvious after we had Kate that we could pretty much 'pick' the month in which we wanted our 2nd child born - we did! And hence, we have Wesley's birthday on July 6! And we pretty much 'picked' the day as well since he was a scheduled csection. And in selecting his birthday as Friday, July 6, 2007, that meant that all 4 of us (Justin, myself, Kate and Wesley) were ALL born on Friday. Pretty cool! Maybe that's the reason Friday is my favorite day of the week as well (or it could be that Friday meant going out to Grandpa Sam's place, high school football games, pep rallies and Fridays were always PIZZA DAY AT SCHOOL!!)

And as we dive into the month of July I'll be posting some pictures of Wesley's 2nd birthday party soon!

Kate's 4th of July program at Summer Camp....

The 4 preK summer camp classes had a 4th of July program at school. Song selections were your typical - Yankee Doodle, Star Spangled Banner, etc. Of course, Kate's class sang a song we weren't so familiar with 'Grand Ole Flag' so it made it a 'tad' more difficult to rehearse with Kate at night but with some help from Mrs. Suzie, Kate's teacher, we learned the song and practiced.

Kate sang her heart out (as you can see in the first picture). Then we had the choice of eating lunch provided by the school or we could bring lunch in...to treat Kate, we brought in Chick Fil A.

And since Wesley is battling through a respiratory flare up right now, he was at home with Mom today so he got to enjoy watching his big sister and eat Chic Fil A during (what is normally) his nap time!

And please do take notice (if you haven't already) that our child is JUST LIKE HER MOTHER....the shortest in her class ALREADY! But she's so cute.....