I'm drinking the Kool-Aid

I'm sold! Originally I thought that my suspicions that John McCain was in the throws of dementia had been confirmed. I couldn't grasp why he chose a virtually unknown candidate, from Alaska. (Alaska? really??) But after her speech, and a lot of the credit does go to her speechwriter, I am now a fan of McCain/Palin 2008. I'm not sure if her pageant experience gave her the poise and taught her to be articulate or if she was born with a natural talent, but she won me over! Her family was adorable too, especially the youngest little girl. She was a cherub!!! Did you see her holding the baby? She licked her hand and then tried to fix his hair, soo cute--

Why are the pictures so tiny?

I was watching it on PBS and one of the "commentators" said all the Bloggers will be behind her now. He said Bloggers like we are some kind of curse and byword. Of course I doubt he considers sweetmamak to be a force behind political machines, he's probably referring to those who actually get paid to Blog.

So Sarah is why an official Independent who not only voted for but campaigned for a real maverick in Kinky Friedman is getting behind a very conservative ticket of McCain and Palin. Good choice McCain, you've got another white suburban mother voting for you.

I just have to remember, she's not actually running for president, she's running for the office that John Nance Garner described as "spitting into a bucket."

But maybe in 4 or 8 years we'll be wondering who she's picking for her VP

Meteorologists=Fearmongers- a rant of biblical proportions

Even if you don't live on the Gulf Coast you probably have heard of the storm of the century that was SUPPOSED to utterly destroy New Orleans. I'm sure you heard the Ray Nagin soundbite "to get your butts out of nawlins." By now you realize it was a lot of hype. Gustav touched down at a category 2, despite all the dire predictions of our "board certified meteorologists." I can't help but wonder what the 2 million people who left Louisianna are thinking right now. And what about the tens of thousands who took public transportaion out? When a real storm hits, who is going to really leave? Who is going to believe that something bad is going to happen. I was real angry this morning while watching the weather channel and seeing that instead of reporting on the relative calm of the area they were showing file footage, of what happened during Katrina. FEARMONGERS!!!!!
Also and what's the deal with the army corp of engineers who still havn't finished the Harvey Street Canal and Levee? It's been three years THREE YEARS!!! All the time that went into memorial services could have been used to complete the jobs that started three years ago.
I went ahead and bought plywood for our windows, I doubt we'll ever need to use it, but its a relief to know we have it if it comes to it. I also have enough water for my family for a week, regardless of any future storm predictions, I'm pretty sure our family will not evacuate.

And this is MY CROSBY

Look Close in this sea of red..

You'll see a little non-conformist in pink- that would be Alice

In Texas, Football rules!!!

In the interest of full disclosure I want to preface this by saying, although we've lived in two small towns in texas, I've only been to two football games, one last year and one while pregnant with Joely. Before Robert (I like to refer to that time as BR) I went to a high school football game to watch my friend Darrah (who got married yesterday and I had to miss the reception in Dallas due to Joely bear having strep-) do her dance at a homecoming game. Her parents were in Europe and so I sat in as a youthful aunt. But I digress.

Last year we went to a game in Crosby, it was awesome, it was surreal, it was a flash forward into a world that I'm sure to join in a few years when the boys bulk up enough to be deemed worthy to wear the Cougar Helmet. A world where mom's wear their boys jersey to games, or bejewel "Cheerleader Mom" on their fancy shirts. The town is very into the sport. The team did real well, they went took district and headed to state playoffs. I may be wrong, and I'm sure it's on the website, but I think they lost in playoffs to Dayton High School, our neighbor to the north. That's the other football game we went to , Before Joely--We went to watch Little Kacie Petty and her flag team. Kacie is Robert's cousin and she's adorable. That game we sat on the Dayton side and cheered against Crosby, well not so much against Crosby as we cheered for Kacie, because the next weekend their band would be performing at the Macy's thanksgiving day parade.

So back to this week-

This year to kick off the season the Crosby High School hosted a community wide pep rally. All of the schools performed, there were free luke-warm hotdogs, cold water and plenty of Cheer. I went because Alice's school was performing the "cougar shuffle." The boys school also had something there, but they chose to stay home and relax. You are going to be hard pressed to find a pep rally of this magnitude outside of the deep south. It was fun and I'm pumped up, I mean I know this is their year to take state!

HERE COME THE KINDERGARTENERS!!!!

At this point Alice spotted the Camera and began her

cheese and ham fest!

We Say Totally, You say Awesome!

Totally Awesome!

Totally Awesome!And this one time, at Band Camp

The Drum Line!
Your Cougar Drill Team--In Casual Gear, not their

usual Cowboy hat and boots, like the Kilgore Rangerettes

The varsity Cheerleaders

The best t-shirt I've seen (and don't I wish I had a camera phone) said

"Athletes lift Weights

Cheerleaders Lift Athletes"

Oh and thanks to title nine, they did also cheer for the Volleyball team-- but by then I was so full from my hot dogs that we were headed home- thus there are no pictures from my camera, but here is one I snagged of their website.... hmm no pictures of the volleyball team, maybe someone should check on their title nine status!

Why I like the blogging world!

How my mess helps to create the genius that is my children!

So I found this cartoon on an old friend's blog. When I say old, I mean I knew her about 20 years- not that she's old. And this is why I love the blogging world. Thanks to it, I've coneccted (what is the spelling of that word, in the time it has taken me to write this I could have looked it up) with some old friends. It's neat to take a peek into their lives and see what they've been up to for the last twenty years or so. This week in particular I heard from Aryn Fitzwater, who was a friend of mine in Colorado Springs, her and her posse were/are 4 years younger than me, but I was their "leader" at girls camp and I adored them and named them my "precious little cherubs." Thanks to hearing from Aryn, I peeked in on blogs of her sisters, her dad- who I loved- another cherub Renee and Jan Mason (the person from whom I stole this cartoon)-- Jan was one of my young women leaders- and she was awesome and I'm sure she still is.

Another reason I love the blogging world is because I like to write down my thoughts. Now especially with only Joely at home, who is here to listen to me. Sure Joely is a great listener and she's smart too, but she doesn't exactly validate me! This way I can write down what I'm thinking and then look back later and see who validates me, my goal is to be cool like Brianne and have like 16 replies. I know it's kind of superficial, but that's me.

Before closing I'd like to end with a lovely mental image. Sadly the only person with me was Joely and she's not good with the camera, yet. I was out this morning putting up "Join Cub Scouts Now" signs all over Crosby. At several points as I'm bent over with my largesse butt in the air, someone would honk. I told my friends Alex and Robert Pena (husband and wife, alex is a shortened version of alejandra) about it, they said, "YOu still got it!" hee hee-

I used to make fun of the adult scout leader in the uniform with the patches, and now that's me and my life, so much so I'm actually RECRUITING people to join our Pack.

Enjoy the laugh on my behalf, beleive me I find myself laughing too!

Update on the Bus driver situation---

Hey, Alice did in fact get a lunch, they must have let her "charge" it- she didn't know what it was (something with holes) but she did like the banana-- "it was cut in half"-- Anyhoo I called my friend Mrs. Connie (the former busdriver) and she said she would have made sure the lunch kit got to Kindergarten, but sadly they don't pay people to care, so it's basically a crapshoot if you get a decent driver or not- -she said she'd find out who the bus driver is ---

The rule of the day, don't mess with the Cub Scout mothers Mafia!!!

Thanks for the concerned e-mails! I should have put in that tidbit about Alice getting to eat!

A rant about lame bus drivers--

So yesterday Alice got off the bus and she didn't look real happy, Quentin was quick to report that she was crying when he got on the bus. So I asked her what happened and she said, "I didn't get to eat my lunch!" This left me horrified, I had made her pasta salad, hard boiled egg, carrots (with ranch)-- well I didn't so much make the carrots as put them in a baggie, and for a snack her favorite, Grapes. Don't forget the Princess drink cup!!!!
So what happened was in the morning, she left her lunch kit on the bus. So instead of being a human being and realizing it was the little girls (clearly a girl it's pink) day would be bad if she dind't have her lunch, the bus driver just left it on the bus. Now I anticipated, somthing might happen, so I put her name, her school (for those interested, our school district has Kindergarten at their own campus, first and second at their own campus and so on) her teachers name and MY PHONE NUMBER -- in a sharpie on the OUTSIDE of the lunch kit. I wouldn't expect them to do this all the time, but come on the first day of a KINDERGARTENER.

When the (I'll call her evil) Evil busdriver dropped off the kids at Kindergarten (her last stop) do you think she could have done a quick sweep of the bus then and then handed any CLEARLY MARKED lunch kits to the people at the school???? Seriously they are just standing there.
Ok so that might have been too hard, I'm sure at the "bus barn" they have to walk through their bus, all she would have had to have done at that point is call the number on the lunch kit, I would have come down and got it from the bus barn. BUT NO, she hands it back to the precious little angel at the end of the day- and then yells at her when she goes to eat it. Of course it was all icky by then and she shouldn't be eating anything in the bus, let alone ranch that's gone bad.

And to add insult to injury, she was a full 20 minutes late getting home. Quentin was super mad because he thought he should be able to sit with his sister and the bus driver won't let the 3rd and 4th graders sit with Kindergartners, which I understand, but when there is a FULL-BLOODED relationship, why can't the big older brothers protect their cute adorable sister????

A pox on the bus driver.

I know two bus drivers, One Mrs. Walsh, a wonderful lady, I'm certain that on the first day of school she would have made sure the "baby" had her lunch, the other is Mrs. Connie, who is a former driver, but I'm POSITIVE, in her heyday, she would have made sure Alice had her lunch.

I'm done with the rant.



Other than that, Alice reported her first day to be totally awesome. Her teacher doesn't use a "color"system, where you stay on green, go to yellow all the way down to red for your behavior- she uses "Super" then "oops" then "time to think" then "bad bad bad" so Alice declared that she was "super" and would always be "super"-

David liked having his buddy JT in his class and enjoyed lunch, he hated everything else. Quentin said the same thing but complained that I didn't put a sandwich in his lunch. I said, "Q-bone you are nuts, I made you a sandwich" we were in the kitchen and he looks at the toaster, "did you toast my bread?" I said yes, " the toast is still in their mom"--- so he did not have a sandwich -OOPS!!! My bad- but he did have plenty of other treats and a granola bar for good measure- a chocolate chip granola bar, but a granola bar none the less.

OH an this morning I wake up Alice at about6:15, which would give her plenty of time to take a bath and eat her breakfast before primping her hair and clothing. The boys get up at about 6:30 and 6:40--- they are much quicker--- Anyhow, she began ranting on (I don't know where she gets that--definatly a Mullens trait) about how I never let her sleep, blah blah blah-- Well here's the deal. I want to make sure they have time to be clean and well dressed before school and eat a decent breakfast. I also want to make sure we have time to pray together and IDEALLY read the scriptures together. Inevitably (last year) it was rush rush rush at the last five minuts, the prayer was no longer an oral beckoning to the heavens for my child's welfare, but mostly a silent prayer that the bus would be late. And the "reading of the scriptures" was usually me quoting Saint John, "and jesus wept"- all the while pushing the kids out the door. I vow that this year will be better- so far - so mediocre. The prayer time is more meaningful, the scripture has changed to "love one another" but still no 15 minutes of devotion along with a hymn, beautifully plinked out on my piano...... One day my fantasy world and my real world will meet, of course by then, I'll either be on the other side, or in a padded room.

Below are some adorable pictures- enjoy!

Little Joely eating at Cafe Express, without Big Sister!

(not pictured Mrs. Arcalee and Mrs. Holli)

You can't hear her, but she's YELLING "DAVID"

RObert trying to kill two birds with one stone while trying not to kill "the precious"

Alice hates to "sleep alone" so Robert was reading the paper in there, hoping she'd fall asleep- note the beautiful, fairy realm netting, it's supposed to protect her--- needless to say, but I'll say it anyway she slept with Robert and I.

Good times, good Times

It wasn't too bad...

PEACE
So thankfully the bus was a full fifteen minutes late, so by the time it got there I forgot I was supposed to be emotional, I was dripping in sweat and couldn't wait to get back home, plus it was on the other side of the street, so I had to use my old 4th grade crossing guard skills to get them across-- and David and Quentin left their lunch kits on the other side of the road-- so I had to go back and get the lunch kits, run them to the bus all the while about 20 cars were waiting- LOVELY!!!!! Alice is so excited, I can't even cry about it! Here are a few pictures of them waiting! I forgot to take the picture of Bus 10 driving away with her, I'll have to take it after school

When will the bus arrive???? Alice's hair is going flat! HORROR

And so it begins.....

Kindergarten starts today!!!!

Third and Fourth grade start today too, and the boys are not very excited. Apparently they are aware of what happens next. They LONG for the days of Kindergarten with snacks, dancing and coloring.... David begged me for five more minutes, so he's still asleep while Quentin takes his shower.

They will all get on Bus 10 in about an hour.

I will be in the fetal position-

Thankfully Joely and I will be eating lunch with Arcalee and Holli today to brighten the day!

T

Do you remember what you did August 16th????

You, like most of the world, and myself probably watched Michael Phelps make history with his 8th gold medal. It was fun to watch, I mean what's not to love about him? He's adorable and he loves his mama!

Well I'll always remember August 16th for another reason.... It was milestone day for David. We had participated in a LOOPAPALOOZA, sponsored by pack 901. It was an all day event where the scouts could earn six belt loops. The Last event for David's group was bike riding. He had been practicing all summer to ride his bike and it's not gone well. For a funny mental note, picture me running behind him.. Anyhoo, Mr. John Lasseigne was there and within 20 minutes he had David riding a bike.

I can't even describe how happy David was/is. His new passion is bike riding. So in my little fantasy world I began my little interview with Bob Costas that will play in 8 years when David brings home the gold for long distance biking. When Bob asks me, "Mom when did you know David would be an olympian?" I'll say, "Well Bob, you may remember August 16th, 2008 as the day that Michael Phelps won 8 gold medals (flash in a picture of his winning relay and him mouthing the words "THAT'S GOLD!!!") well that was the day David learned to ride a bike. His Passion grew from that day. We'll always be greatful To a True American Hero, John Lasseigne of the National Guard, for taking the time to teach us his now patented method of bike riding"

Some people think I'm delusional, The voices in my head say I'm just creative and that most people are out to get me.

Anyway this wasn't about me, was it???- YEAH David!

The next Night Quentin was determined and he is now an official bike rider too. Of course miss ME TOO ME TOO Alice wanted to learn, but we didn't have a bike small enough for her, I told her for her birthday we'll get her a pink bike with streamers.

My camera died before I could get evidence of Quentin riding, this is evidence of him falling. The whole parking lot is clear and yet he manages to hit the Van. He's all bruised and scraped but he's happy. I'll end with the immortal words of Keanu Reeves from the Classic movie, The Replacements,

"Pain heals, chicks dig scars. Glory .....lasts forever"

Congratulations David and Quentin!

Love Languages revisited

Now that's LOVE!!!

You'll remember that Robert said that all his love language needed was clean socks everyday... Well His drawer runneth over with love. No more searching through the clean laundry basket looking for a match. He's had over a week of the kind of love that only comes from a full sock drawer!

I never want to have strep again!

I have had sore throats before, but never strep!!! Strep was horrible and put me out of commision for about 5 days. When I went to the doctor, I thought for sure it was tonsilitis and they'd schedule an emergency surgery to remove them, instead they just gave me pennicilin, it was kind of anticlimatic. I'm fine now, but now the kids are complaining of sore throats, so I'm hoping the doctor will just call in the penicilin so they won't have to miss the first day of school and I won't have to schlep all of them to the Humble Kelsey-Seybold Clinic. Something funny, the pencilin only cost me sixy cents! How funny is that?

But I digress...

Some Birthday Love from Gala Bohanon- YUMMO Cinnamon Rolls-

Since my last entry, I turned 38, like the faux tonsilitus, it was anticlimatic. I did get some fun gifts, I wanted the Mormon Doctrine Book of my parents, but they were not willing to part with their copy, so they got me my own, I've already dog eared some parts. David and Quentin were at mom and dad's and the girls were here with me and Robert. We went out to eat at on the Border and afterwards, being the scout geek that I am, I attended "roundtable" and learned how to be a first class scout leader.. We watched a really good old movie earlier in the week, (again it was nice to just have 1/2 of the kids around, and part of the time Alice was with Rob's parents) it was edited on cable (thank heavens) but it is called "Suicide kings" it was a good suspense whodunnit type thing with one of the scariest actors of all time,

Christopher Walken--

Then On Saturday Adrienne Yancey and her kids came to visit and well we let the good times roll (until on Monday when I came down with the vile and horrible strep- you may have already heard) Saturday night we went to the Movie Tavern (if you havn't been there go to one, you order food during your show, IT'S AWESOME) and saw Mama Mia.
It was such a fun movie, in fact I beleive that if everyone in the world went to see it, then there would be peace on earth. You need to look past the underlying theme of the movie and just let the Love of Abba infuse your soul! Meryl Streep has some serious pipes. Pierce Brosnan (bless his heart) sounded kind of bad, and then when he ripped of his shirt and showcased his hairy stomach and flab, I nearly vomited, but other than that moment, it was awesome. Quentin wants to see it as does Alice, but It's innappropriate, however Adrienne and My mother-in-law both said, "it's like Grease" -- which I watched about 100 times before I was 15 and Realized most of the songs were WILDLY INAPPROPRIATE-- Anyhoo, I totally want to see Mama Mia again and can't wait to have my own DVD of it and play it over and over and over and over again. That will make Robert happy, doncha think?

ABBA

It was such fun to see Adrienne and her kids. Adrienne and I met YEARS ago when Robert and I lived in Spring Branch. We were in the same ward at church. Initially Adrienne was irritated by me because Quentin and her son Colby were born a few days apart, and Colby was a big baby, but Quentin was bigger,(ten pound 14 ounces and 22 inches long- thank you very much- all pushed our naturally with the help of pharmacueticals) so when they announced it at church, Quentin got top billing and Adrienne didn't get the props she deserved. I'm so glad she got over it!!! She now lives Black Foot, Idaho -- The potato capitol of the world-- And although having more potatoes per capita than anyplace on earth is a big deal, it's hardly worthy of someone like Adrienne who cut her teeth on the Mean Streets of Salt Lake City, UT and then Denver Colorado before coming to the Real Promised Land of Houston, TX. So since I already mentioned that I had strep, I won't mention it again-- but Adrienne and her kids had fun galavanting around the Metro Area without the help of the Mullens, we were able to provide suitable lodging though and a place to park the rental. Adrienne is a good sport so I knew she was having fun. Colby had fun too, but I suspect he would have rather just continued playing Halo 3 or Super Mario Smash brawl (or whatever it was called)

I only got one picture of them, and it's not really them, but just the baby Jolie and our oldest, Sammi. You'll have to take my word for it that Adrienne (1/2 marathon runner) looks fabulous, and that Colby is handsome as ever. As you can see Jolie is a cutie patootie, plus she has an adorbale name, even if her mom spelled it wrong.

Jolie Yancey Making Nice with Sammi Jo

Jolie was kind and shared her cookies and any food with Sammi, Sammi tolerates all babies after about six months, when they become a movable feast. We were sad when the Yancey's bade us farewell, but we know they'll be back. Thank heavens for unlimited long distance minutes, it feels like Adrienne never moved away. Does anyone out there remember when you had to pay for every long distance minute??? Crazy times, Crazy times..

The Five LOVE Languages

I'm in a new book club with my compadres here in Crosby. My friend Megan chose this book for us to read. To simplify it, this author beleives there are 5 ways to show love for your spouse and so he has a test you take to determine which way you need love shown to you. It was funny to do the test with each other. The book club starts late (about nine) and Robert was already hiding in the bedroom to miss the "hen party." I had to go in and make a copy of the test and when I told him what I was doing he said, "Oh what grade are you in?" Sadly one of the 5 love languages is not SARCASM, because if it were, we'd both be on the same page.

Ok so after we take the test I was flipping through the book to see what the suggestions were for the different "love" languages. Here is one, and after reading it, I thought and then said outloud, "There is a good chance this author is full of crap"

So here is a suggestion for quality time love language

"Call your spouse on the phone and invite your spouse to lunch. Pack a picnic and go to a cemetary, spread out your tablecloth and eat your sandwiches and talk about how great it is to be alive"

I mean really!!!! So this morning at 5 am when robert was dressing for work I suggested that we do this to show our "Love Language" and he said, "How about you just have clean socks in my drawer and call it good!"

I don't think I'll be eating over any dead people anytime soon!

Adios Eduardo!

Tropical Storm Eduardo hit with little luster this morning at about six am. Fortunatly we just got some rain and a few gusts of wind, but nothing scary or dangerous. The good news is that Robert's plant closed today so we had a fun day with him and I was able to finish reading Breaking Dawn. I watched two movies last night, the Bratz cartoon movie with Alice, it was cute and Beowulf with Robert. Beowulf was wildly inappropriate and well just plain lame. It's been awhile since I read the classic tale but I don't remember all the bad language and "intimate" scenes.

I had a hard time sleeping because I was all keyed up with the storm. Ever since Katrina hit and I was worried about my friend Danielle and her parents, I've been a nervous nelly during the storms. Before Katrina touched down, I was able to talk to Danielle for a couple of minutes and they were finishing up boarding their houses and were going to Atlanta, but her parents had refused to leave. So until I was able to get in contact with her by phone a few days later I was glued to the tv, looking to see if some of the rescued people were her parents. Happily all was well and they survived with little damage. It's been what three years almost since then, and I'm still keyed up.

I was happy though to have Sudoku to play last night and Breaking Dawn so I wasn't as nervous as usual. Apparently the storm hit our area around six am, but I fell asleep around five.
I'm happy to report that I cleaned out, well clean is a loose interpretation of the word-- the garage so we had both cars inside during the storm. It's not real functional because in order to get into the Saturn you can only go in like Bo and Luke Duke---ya know, "general lee" style. So I don't anticipate both cars staying inside because Robert "BO" Mullens won't be going in through the window before his mornign commute, and to be honest, it's been a long time since anyone confused me with Daisy Duke!

Buenas Dias Eduardo

Crisis Mode at the Crosby Wal-mart

The only water left is Perrier. Did you all hear there is a Hurricane/Tropical Storm in the Gulf? Robert saw something last night when we were checking the Live Doppler Radar and it's supposed to hit land at about one am tomorrow. So we headed to Wal-mart for some supplies. The D batteries for two were marked 9.72, but before I could scream "price gouging" I checked one of those scanners and they were only 3.00 each. I bought 4 packages and then went to get the water. I really didn't hold out any hope that there would be water since Wal-mart in Crosby runs out of food every week, hurricane or not. So we went to Krogers and bought a couple of cases. We also have some coolers we'll fill with water and ice and fill up the bathtubs so we can still flush the toilets (a trick I learned in the Amazon rain forest) Hopefully it won't come to that. LAter this evening, I"m going to clear out the garage to make room for the cars, I don't want to lose our cars to flying debris! When we lived in Laredo a passing tornado blew out our car windows and it took about 8 weeks to get it fixed, of course that was on Laredo time and it was a different country!

Full Disclosure-I do realize it's lame to take a picture in Wal-mart-

My Predictions-It won't be that bad, we will have power the whole time and Robert will go to work.

If it is bad, Robert will STILL go to work.

Satiisfying My bloodlust



You may or may not know that I've been irrationally "ascared" of vampires since the Lost Boys came out (was that like 20 years ago????) I have a hard time inviting people into my home, because, ya never know, they MAY be vampires, and vampires HAVE to be invited in order to come into your home. Kind of a neat metaphor-- Evil has to be invited in- but my deep thoughts must wait, because I will be busy for the next couple of days reading the final installment in the Twilight Vampire Series. I promise Robert, not to begin reading the Jacob part until AFTER my house is clean! (now to find a cleaning service to come in today , this morning actually.....) I've read the Nora Roberts Vampire trilogy (Morrigan's cross is the first book) and I know a little bit better how to battle them, but I prefer to stay inside during the evenings now and have garlic strategically placed, I don't beleive in the Holy Water though... I digress

Anyhoo- to sum up my last week, we went to the zoo (pictures to follow) and then took Allie and Austin to the airport before heading off to Austin, Texas to spend some time with Mom and Dad. The boys are still there until this weekend when Adrienne Yancey and her son Colby and their little baby Jolie come to visit. When they leave we'll just have one week before school starts. Oh and Alice "faced her fears" and can now swim under water and jump in. She has been very brave in mom and dad's pool all summer, but not so much anywhere else, and she's never been able to put her face in the water "MOM I DON"T HAVE GILLS" but this last visit she just jumped in and figured out she can use her "blowhole" to blow water out, but like any dolphin she has to resurface to breathe. She took Robert to the community pool on Saturday to show him she could do it and then last night she went to another pool for the annual cub scout pool party and was able to jump off a diving board and go down the slide- Again pictures to follow and also I know this isn't real interesting to anyone that's not related to us, but it is (to quote my friend Hiedie)- a "bloggable activity"

Fun Day at Baybrook Mall

The new look of Her Royal Highness, Alice Anne Mullens

Today we had lunch at Chuy's- for all of you Texas Ex-Pats, I know you are jealous- it was awesome- Thanks to Allie for the delicious idea and for treating us!

Then after lunch it was time to hit the Lego store at Baybrook Mall. I figured in order to keep the boring cries to a minimum, I'd take Alice to get her hair done while the boys perused. They had fun and were able to find some lego sets, without breaking the budget and Alice got the new Reverse bob, with a stack. She wants to look like her pal Sister Zambrano- and now she does- It's an adorable cut and she had a blast getting her hair done. When Allie asked her what her dad would say, she said, "Oh he'll love it because it's beautiful"

We need not worry about her self confidence when she starts Kindergarten next month- (WAH WAH WAH)

Visions from surfside

Quentin and Austin McCoy

We spent five magical days and 4 night in Surfside Texas with our friends from St. George Utah, Allison and Austin Mcoy- It was great we rented a beach house, ate cereal and sandwiches and were beach bums. Hurricane Dolly touched ground and caused some havoc in South Texas, but here in the northern part of the Texas Gulf Coast, we only received some rain, so Wednesday we didn't swim, but the rest of the time was fun in the sun.

I love Surfside, it's a quiet lazy town free of the high rises and tourist traps of Galveston, it's located near Lake Jackson and Freeport off of Highway 288 south from Houston. Allison and Austin are here until Wednesday, in addition to Surfside they've enjoyed a pioneer day celebration on Saturday and they came to church with us on Sunday. Allison was prepared to substitute in Primary, but all of the teachers were there, so she held cute baby Delyla while my friend Gala did music time. We plan on doing some more swimming and to visit the Lego Store at Baybrook Mall. Good times, Good Times-

Getting in the last word

This is Alice, she was supposed to be IN her room

(she's only NEAR her room)

Last Sunday (july 20)was a bad day for Alice. For some reason Her and David stayed up until at least two am the night before, when I went to bed I told them to go to bed, but apparently I spoke portuguese to them and they misunderstood me. So when at 7:30 I had to wake them up for church, none were happy to get up. (side note- Quentin had stayed with Grandma Mullens) During the Sacrament Meeting portion of church both Alice and David slept and this seemed to rally David into being in a good mood, not for Alice. She threw some tantrums during Primary Singing time, (jr. sunday school) and so I took her out. When she starts to get mad, she gets louder and louder, frankly I've learned to appreciate the QUIET pouting of David and Quentin. She was so out of control, I took her to the car where Robert was waiting. She was acting out the parts in the bible that mention, "wheeping, wailing and a gnasing of teeth"

Church finally ended and we were on our way to Grandma Dorothy's birthday party. It should have been a magical event- Briscuit all the sides and desserts- all the aunts and uncles were there, even Ronny's family from S.C.- he had come in town to show off his new son-in-law and adorable grandbaby. Well something happened that set Alice off and she was in the throes of a meltdown. Robert had to forcible remove her and we made a mad dash out of the house. It was a bad scene, but at least we left the family with something to talk about!

So when we get home, about two o'clock, Robert declared Alice would be confined to her room. She was furious, but we thought she would fall asleep and all would be well---- Well she did not fall asleep. We heard cries of torture and abandonemnt. When it was dinner time and I brought her dinner in her room (she has a table for tea parties) she lost it- "This is worse than a zoo, I'm in a cage with no family" Finally around nine o'clock, the cried ended and I found her in the hallway asleep, with no part of her body in her room. It's comical, she did end up getting her own way after 7 hours of fighting.

My mom has a similiar story of me and some tinkertoys, I'm sure she'll tell you, if you just ask!

Off on a mini vacation

I never finished talking about The birthday party, I will though. I'm leaving with the kids to Surfside. My friends Allison Mc Coy and her son Austin are flying here to spend a week at the beach- So pray Hurricane Dolly stay south of here, say south padre corpus area, or we willbe evacuating- at least we'll have plenty of food. Robert's advice, keep the gas tank full- so we will-

I"ll post when we get back!

Alice the Cat

This is Alice with her friend Leilani, it was Leilani's 5th birthday and the theme was carnival fun- More info and pix to come, I've got an "appointment"