Say my name, say my name

Blurg. I actually like that song, but I'm stuck on it because Claudia and I were watching Top Songs of the '90's on VH1 yesterday and that, getting stuck on songs, I mean,I hate.

I got home at almost ten tonight because I had a board meeting at church. Jamie greeted me at the door, literally, with dinner--a steak, rice and broccoli. Isn't he lovely? You are lovely, Jamie!!

Here are the interesting things I found around the house this evening when I got home.

Up until like a week ago Claudia said she hated to paint and refused to do it at all. Then all of a sudden, she's painting!

This is Sasquatch. The square in the upper corner is labeled "foot print". The square at the bottom is labeled "hair" and it's an actual clump of suspiciously-Bobo-looking brown hair.


Here's another she did of a dinosaur.


Drawing of a Unicorn by Claudia.


This is a throw pillow Jordan's painting. She's making it out of recycled jeans.

Tuesday

Well we've been back in dull, dull Indiana for a week now and Jamie and I are finally feeling rested and caught up. The house is almost back in order thanks to Jamie, volunteer work is humming along, I'm searching high and low for good deals on school supplies. It's kind of stunning how much we have to buy for school supplies this year. I've been looking online, too, for interesting stuff (which we may or may not actually purchase).

Pencils made with recycled jeans:


Messenger bags that Jordan's looking at:


Lunchbox that Jordan likes:


Lunchbox that Sammy likes:


The kids are going to bed at their regular school bedtimes starting this week and getting up at 6 each morning to get used to it before the first day of school (of course, then they grump back to bed a short while later, but that's ok). I bought Sam and Jordan combination locks so they can practice them before they have to try to open their lockers. Oh, and Claudia's being forced to practice her trumpet every day to get her lip back before school and also, learn the bass guitar really quickly in case she wants to try out for pep band.

In other news, the awesome Leah defends this week (Wooooo, Aunt Doctor Leah!!!!) and we'll be seeing the Riegers this week (yay!).

Travelogue by Claudia

6:19 p.m.: Alabama. Adventure!
6:20 p.m.: Little girls fly paper airplanes into my back with messages on them. I don't appreciate it.
6:24 p.m.: Jordan wants to touch a mimosa leaf "SO BAD!" I wonder if this is code for something?
6:30 p.m.: Right now I'd be watching Brian Williams. That reminds me of what mom said about him this moring. She called him a "doll baby". I don't know what that means.
6:31 p.m.: Smith Farms has "over 60 varieties of cheese" and "Amish candy".
6:32 p.m.: 44 mi. from Birmingham. Adventure!
6:44 p.m.: mom is playing a cd with Disney crap on every other track. It makes me wanna bang my head on the window. ADVENTURE!
6:51 p.m. Mom cranks up the Hannah Montana. I cover my ears but the banshee's screeches still make it into my ears.
6:53 p.m.: Now that 9 minute long Don McClean song is on.
6:54 p.m.: a house is on fire in the woods. Also, mom wants some pork barbeque "Reeeeeel Bad!"
7:33 p.m.: just got done eating BBQ. As Rachel Ray would say: "yummo!"
7:36 p.m.: Mom proposed that James get her name tatooed on him somewhere.
7:40 p.m.: We're in Birmingham.
7:41: Hooter's Billboard Counter: 3
8:07 p.m.: We just pased a large cloud of mist. It was kinda creepy.
8:50 p.m.: I just saw a billboard for Outback Steakhouse. I didn't know Alabama had bloomin' onion technology.
8:53 p.m.: the lightening is scaring me. I'm scared, I'm scared, I'm scared.
10:24 p.m. We got to Mississippi a while ago. Stopped for gas. Lots of rednecky people. Mom calls them "interesting clientel."
11:02 p.m. Me and James are keepin' an eye out for the mothman and the sasquatch. Mom just informed us that we're heading toward where Jamie Lynn Spears lives. I'll keep an eye out for babies in the road.
11:53 p.m. We stopped at at gas station. James and I went in to get mom twinkies. They don't have real twinkies, they had Mrs. Freshley's twinkies. mom refuses to eat off-brand twinkies. The town's newspaper calls the mentally challenged "retarded people". James and I still aren't sure what a doll baby is.
12:07 a.m. Adventure.
12:11 a.m. I want to go to Waffle House.
12:14 a.m. Mississippi has an O'Charley's. How bland.
12:54 a.m. Mom proposes that I get prescription sunglasses. I think they might make me look like Richard Belzer.
12:56 a.m. Me and James are still on mothman patrol.

Day 2: Lousiana

12:17 p.m.: We're going to Galveston.
12:21 p.m.: Adventure!
12:30 p.m.: Mom said, "ascared of."
12:38 p.m.: crossing the Mississippi River. Mom says, "it's VERY important that you look at it, children".
12:40 p.m.: I'm eating a cookie. Adventure!
3:43 p.m.: We are back on the road afer eating cajun food. Or, as I like to call it, James Carville food.
4:02 p.m.: Fierce! Traffic.
4:07 p.m.: I wish I had a small pet dinosaur.
4:56 p.m.: Out of traffic. It was a hot tranny mess.

My Magical Sister

Look at this photo in my sister's flickr account. OMG! You should dash over and tell her how incredible it is!

We're Home!

Huge Congratulations to the awesome Jamie! He checked exam results when we were in Austin and found out he passed! Woooo!!!!

The children were completely awesome travelers! On the way back the children tried Memphis barbeque for the first time and Sammy tried cole slaw and peach kolaches and sausage kolaches for the first time that we got from a Czech community in Texas (Jordan wants you to know it's no longer Czechoslovakia. It's now the Czech Republic and Slovakia).

I burst into tears on Friday when Jamie, my mother and I were in the grocery store shopping for the trip home. Then again later in the day because I was leaving my family and my friends. I hate that my kids don't get to see their friends and family there often enough and I don't get to see my parents often enough and it feels a little tragic that I hardly ever get to see my southern friends. Jana, Ginny and Christine are such fabulous friends and it's super hard to see them so infrequently and sad that our children won't know each other well. So we have to figure out a way to see everyone more often. I'm thinking group beach weekend this time next year!

While we were in Texas I found out why I'm the only one in our family that doesn't really get bitten by mosquitos so much. I was chatting with Ginny's Grant, who is entering Kindergarten next month, and he very earnestly told me, "Oh, it's because you're not sweet." I had to agree! Isn't he adorable?!? I'm still laughing about that.

Heading back to Indiana at 6-ish a.m.


More Krause Springs photos.

Jamie and Sammy swinging from the rope into the water.






All the kids in the tree house at Ginny's house.


On the swingset.


Racing around the house on the golf cart.


And on foot.

Friday

Sammy got up and went walking with Grandpa, sans the very tired Jamie this morning. I thought they had walked three miles each of the other days, but they walked *almost* three miles on those days and actually hit it today. When I got up this morning I found my parents reading the paper at the dinner table and Sammy on the laptop on the internet and eating breakfast.


This afternoon we drove out to MF to drop Claudia and Jordan off at their dad's house so they could hang out and do some shopping. Jamie, Sammy and I went to a mexican restaurant so Sammy could try some different things. She's tried a lot of new foods this trip--barbeque in Alabama, turkey sausage and brisket in Texas, cajun food, Bluebell ice cream, Big Red soda, moon pies, fajitas and lime and strawberry slushes from Sonic so today we bought a few ala carte items so she could try a tamale, a cheese enchilada and carne guisada. She decided Tex-Mex really isn't her thing, but it's good to experiment and she's a trooper!



After that we went souvenier shopping.

I ran into someone I haven't seen in 20-something years and it was like I had seen her last week. She was the first person I met in first grade and we went through twelve years of school together.

And then we went to Aunt Ginny's house and Sammy and Bailey drove the golf cart around the cow pasture. Grant was very adorable and showed us the tricks he can do on his power wheels and he has a really cool little trailer that he attaches to it. I want that!



After our stop at Ginny's we dashed over to pick up Claudia and Jordan, we ran by a mexican restaurant for tamales to take home and then we drove to Austin to meet our fabulous friends Christine, Ray and their four kids at a restaurant so Claudia could spend the night with them tonight and go to the Schlitterbahn with their son who is her best friend, Cutter, and some of his friends tomorrow. It was so great to see them and we got to meet their *adorable* "new" 10-month-old baby! Jamie and I both got to hold him and he liked us--I could tell he thought we were both mildly amusing. Jamie told me I was doing Pee-Pie incorrectly, that it's supposed to be Peek-a-Boo, but he's wrong about that, of course.

On the drive home we cut across town via Sixth Street which was getting into swing for the weekend. And then when we got home my lovely and fabulous parents had dinner waiting on us.

It's true--we are slap wore out. OMG! But, of course, all worth it!

Thursday

Yesterday morning Sammy was knocking on our door at 5:45 to see if Jamie wanted to do the 6:00 a.m. three-mile walk with my dad. She seems to really like doing that so Jamie went with her. She gets to see lots of outside cats, dogs, bunnies and my dad teaches her about the plants and trees.

Claudia and Jordan are back from their overnights at their dad's house and they had a very fun time. They went shopping and to a movie (hell boy for Claudia and that center of the earth movie for Jordan) and out for chinese.

We met them and their dad at Krause Springs yesterday where we all swam, everyone but me and Claudia did the swinging from the rope and dropping into the water thing and it was just a great time. I am seriously disappointed in the photos I got, though. This was a *beautiful* spot with waterfalls and moss and ferns and my photos just sucked. :(

Their dad brought a bunch of his arrow heads to show Sammy, several of us got fire ant bites, we saw a *huge* spider on the side of huge cypress tree. Oh, and we saw a white tail doe and her fawn--so sweet!

After that, the five of us drove into Austin, eating sandwiches in the car, and stood on the Congress Avenue bridge and watched millions of bats swarm out from under the bridge. It was so cool and the noise was indescribable.

Wednesday

Wednesday morning Jamie took Sammy swimming then for lunch my parents took her to a hamburger joint to get takeout burgers and she got a watermellon snowcone, too. Then that afternoon Ginny and Bailey drove in to see us and we had a great time catching up. Sammy and Bailey hit it off really well and they had a blast playing outside and on the computer and eating ice cream together. Sammy's such a cool kid and she's just a friend to everyone. We could hear them singing Hannah Montana songs in the office together and it was very sweet. We're going to go out to their house sometime this week and Bailey's going to teach Sammy how to drive the golf cart.


Then before bed Sammy watched Daddy Day Camp with my parents and Jamie and I went out for coffee.


We spent some time playing around with the camera. I had the better subject but Jamie was the better photographer.

Tuesday

This morning Sammy and Jamie got up and left the house at 6:00 a.m. to go with my dad on his daily three-mile walk. Sammy was very much wanting to do this and I think she enjoyed it up until the very end, when she was getting pretty tired.

After they got back Jamie, Claudia and I ran over to Round Rock to buy the best donuts on the planet from a bakery over there. Jamie said he likes to polish off his work-out regimen with pastries.

After breakfast, we hung out, got Claudia and Jordan packed so they could spend tonight and tomorrow night at their dad's house and my dad measured all three girls. It's a tradition my parents have kept up since I was around 6 and Amy was around 2, that every year all the children are measured and it's marked on the door jam. When my parent's moved, the marks were recreated on another door jam and installed in the new house.




While we were in MF, my parents took Sammy to see Wall-E. They all said they liked it and Sammy brought home a huge box of sour gummy worms that she managed to polish almost completely off!

On the way back to Austin Jamie and I stopped and got carne guisada and potato tacos (sooo good!!)for lunch and then we went to Oak Hill to *try* to get some tamales from Rosie's Tamale House to take home for dinner but they were closed. I was *so* annoyed. So we went and got stuff for taco salad and some Blue Bell chocolate chip ice cream, which we can only get here. I love it so much with its dark chocolate flakes instead of chips.

This evening Sammy did a Which Way USA with my parents and after that she, Jamie and I made taco salad for dinner (Sammy asked for a cheeseburger instead and did a very nice job of cooking it!).

After dinner we watched part of a project my parents are working on. They're working with my mom's brothers and sister to create a film about all the houses they lived in while they were growing up in Memphis, Tennessee. They've counted 47 houses that their parents lived in during their marriage so far. It's neat to listen to the stories and the kids think some of the stories are very funny.

And after that there was a screening of the Bee Movie.

Monday

Monday the thermometer at my parents' house read 105 degrees!

In the morning after breakfast, Sammy and Jordan took turns making phone calls on the "old timey" telephone.




After that, Sammy went out to the backyard and caught a toad!

Then my parents took Sammy and Jordan swimming while Jamie and I took Claudia to the LBJ Library/Museum.

After lunch we went to a very cool little toy store called Atomic City down near the UT campus.

It's described on the internet as:

"You’ll find hundreds of Tin Toys… Robots and Spacemen… Spaceships and oddities… Betty Boop beaded curtains, inflatable pink flamingos, clocks with scary cat eyes and tails that swing, not just the typical ones either… but Otto Mesmer designed ones… There are shoes, shoes imported from special insane shoe makers from far off distant lands… T-shirts with the coolest of cult film creations upon them… Hawaiian shirts made seemingly for this store alone… where else can you get Sid Vicious Hawaiian shirts… Button up shirts with Sailor Jerry Tattoos with Zoot Suit Suspenders… all lit by Pulp Art Adorned Lanterns, which also happen to be for sale!
There are wallets and purses made from Japan, created of lenticular material that create cross dressing images of HAMMER HORROR monsters, watches with Roy Rogers and King Kong and G.I. Joe upon them… Universal monsters cufflinks and bracelets and button covers…
Petty and Vargas girl ties, science fiction jeweled Christmas ornaments… Oversized bugs and frogs and lizards and Platypus puppets… Posters from Japan of Kurosawa flicks and Barbarella…
This is a shop that Tim Burton would love, that Tarantino does love and where John Waters would feel strangely at ease."

Claudia bought a Gama-Go tshirt, which is a brand Amy and Marinda introduced her to. Sammy got a tiger bobble head and a unicorn.

Then we went for water and ice cream and headed to MF to go to the Slab with Claudia and Jordan's dad and cousin. The slab is a section of the Llano River that is usually shallow enough that you can walk across it. The water runs over sand and granite outcropings so there are rapids and varying depts to swim in.

After that it was home for pizza and sleep!