Don't Underestimate Alex

Alex has been joking about all of the reports on Hurricane Alex. He loves the lines on the TV screen that say "Don't Underestimate Alex" and jokes about how all of those reporters are trying to "track" him and talking about how "strong" he is. I couldn't resist taking a picture of him in front of our TV during the local newscast.

Patrick and Alex are always butting heads. They just don't see eye to eye on a lot of things. In many ways, they seem to be alike. Both are a bit stubborn and won't change their opinions so easily. Both love playing games, although obviously, Patrick's grown-up sense of responsibility usually takes over while Alex's immaturity is still apparent. They're very different in a lot of ways, of course. One of the ways was causing us some trouble this morning. Alex tends to ask for a lot of things, and we might agree to all of them, but when we finally say "no", it doesn't matter how many things we already said "yes" to, he automatically makes it seem like we never say "yes". Hopefully he'll outgrow this and realize how lucky he is as he matures.

Alex has been pretty obsessed with video and computer games this summer. Because of our discussion with him this morning (see above), we told him he couldn't play with any electronics today. He found other things to do. He actually played with Eric. He actually did his chores. He actually asked to go to the pool instead of complaining that the rest of us wanted to go to the pool and he didn't. We'll see if he still remembers our discussion later this week.

Home Improvements

After all of this time we've lived here, we finally put some new plants in the front and back yards. It's hard to imagine exactly what it will all look like once these little plants "grow up", but I'm hoping for the best. It's going to be better than what it used to look like.

This picture shows a view of the fountain area as well as the front of the house. I have some other closeups of some of the plants but I didn't post them here. We put a couple of magnolia trees in the front, just because Patrick and I both like the way they look. I'm hoping that it will all look better when the plants get bigger.

This is a view of our backyard from the street that runs on the side of the house. This is a larger area with more plants so I'm able to imagine the final result a little better than I can for the areas in the front. We figure that we can also always add and change plants later. We had some really heavy rains last night so the ground was nice and moist for removing the old plants and adding new ones today.

We're also trying to improve the inside as well as the outside. Our hall closet was getting out of control again. The kids seem to store shoes there and then forget to remove the ones they've outgrown. At least we finally found Eric's sandals that I bought him this spring. We'll see how long it stays neat in there.

Speaking of Eric, I couldn't resist taking a picture of this sleepyhead. He fell asleep while eating his Easy Mac dinner. He kept trying to stay sitting up but his little head kept bobbing forward and sideways and every which way. Every time his head would move, however, he would wake up a little. I thought he might want to go to bed so I kept asking him if he was finished with dinner. To that, he kept answering an emphatic "NO!" I had Alex video the incident and Anthony ended up posting the video to Facebook. It was hilarious! Despite Eric's protests, I finally just moved him upstairs so I could wash him up and change him into his nightclothes. Unfortunately, after a few minutes in bed, he woke up completely.

Championship Meet Results

I'm going to list out Natalie's Championship Meet results, not so I can brag (although I'm quite proud of her) but so I can record them for later:

Freestyle Relay (2:06.48) - Her team got fifth place. Interestingly, for her other three meets this summer, she swam with three different girls on a freestyle relay team. For some reason she was placed with the younger (and slower) team for this meet, but the other team got disqualified. Although I find that disqualification surprising, this is just affirmation of my belief that God has a reason for everything. If Natalie had been on the team that she had been on, she might have been disqualified. We were so proud of her because she gained pretty significant ground during her leg of the race (third leg).

Freestyle - Natalie got ninth place which I'm proud of for two reasons. She beat her "seed time" (23.33 sec vs. 24.47 sec) by over a second and all of the other swimmers who placed before her were eight-years-old except for one other seven-year-old.

Backstroke (28.14 sec) - Natalie tied for fifth place.

Breaststroke - This was the one she was most concerned about since it's her newest stroke. She got ninth place, which was last place. That's quite a bit slower than she swam last week (42.93 vs. 37.57 sec) but we're happy that she did the stroke correctly and didn't get disqualified.

We were at the natatorium from around noon to 4:30PM. There were four swim teams in our division and apparently ours "won" the meet. Even though there was a lot of waiting and her usual friends weren't there to play with in between races, Natalie loved it.

A Calm Saturday

For the first time in a number of weeks, we didn't have a swim meet or anything to get up early for on Saturday morning. Of course I was on call last night so I did get up early, but when I got home, everyone was still there either sleeping or playing quietly (Eric and Natalie). I decided to go ahead and make the traditional chocolate chip banana pancakes and turkey bacon. Here Eric is staring intently at the bag of chocolate chips on the counter. He looked so cute with his head on his folded arms that I had to take a picture.

He has been so attached to this stuffed dog lately. I posted another picture on this blog earlier in the week. He carries M the dog everywhere. Here, Anthony put the dog on the sofa so she could "watch" Eric eat some lunch. The dog totally looks like she's watching him, doesn't she?

Eric has also been doing more things "by myself", from picking out and putting on his clothes, to getting his own milk cup from the refrigerator. If we try to help he gets upset. Here he decided to get his own cheese stick while I was cutting up his hotdog. I took a picture as future proof of his climbing into the refrigerator. I really only mind when he gets into the freezer because he's not very fast and I'm worried that everything will defrost. We're encouraging the independence up to a point. I just wish he would be independent-minded enough to use the potty by himself!

Three of the four kids had friends over today. Here Natalie is reading with her friend from down the street. AR's mom and I joked about how we paid $100 (swim team fee) for our kids to meet each other, even though they just live around the corner. They have family in Mexico and they'll be leaving for a 3 or 4 week visit on Tuesday. Natalie has been trying to play with AR a lot before she leaves.

What else did we do today--watch the World Cup of course! We were disappointed that Ghana defeated the US today, but it was still fun to watch the game. Anthony's good friend AO spending the night. At the time I took this picture, Alex also had a friend AE who was sitting out of view of this photo.

Tonight Patrick and I went out to celebrate our anniversary. We went to the Lodge Restaurant that we've gone to for the past couple of anniversaries. Our actual anniversary was last Sunday but because of Father's Day/ Alex's birthday, we moved the celebration to tonight. I took pictures of all of the entrees this time (except for the one I forgot) and I'll try to post that in the next day or two. Tomorrow Natalie has her last swim meet of the summer.

Summer Kid Activities

I don't think I've talked about the various activities the kids have this summer, so I'm just going to summarize them here:

Anthony has soccer "strength and conditioning" from 7-8:30AM Monday to Thursday for this week and next week. He actually wanted to get up that early! He also wants to have a few private training sessions with his club soccer coach. Then, starting July 12 from 7:30-3PM for three weeks (M-Th) he'll be a "camp counselor" at his school. That's the freshman camp that he went to last year except that he will actually be helping out this time. He is required to volunteer for 30 hours per school year and he doesn't have any hours recorded yet, so this will allow him to catch up a bit.

Alex really doesn't have anything scheduled yet. He has a club soccer practice next Monday and a couple in July. Both older boys have club soccer practices starting in August.

Natalie has had swimming in May and June, as I've so frequently mentioned. She has also had group piano lessons in June. That means that her lessons are 1 1/2 hours long once a week and she has lessons at the same time as other kids. They play duets and do flash cards together and such. She doesn't have lessons in July and then she picks up again with her individual lessons in August. She has had Vacation Bible School this week from 9-12 every day with a neighborhood friend of hers. She's really been enjoying the crafts and games they play.

Eric was going to "school" (aka daycare) twice a week until school ended. Since the older kids were going to be home, we thought he would rather stay at home with them. He doesn't have any other activities scheduled as of yet.

Bug Bites!

I'm going to apologize for this gross picture, but Eric has had quite a large amount of bug bites on his legs in the last couple of days. They started out small although very plentiful, but yesterday we noticed these huge erythematous areas around each of them. He doesn't seem to be bothered by them so Patrick and I don't want to call attention to them (at least in front of him) and that's why I took this picture while he was sleeping, but he must be rubbing his legs on his sheets when he's sleeping or something to make them expand so much. Oh, and by the way, we put bug spray on him whenever he's outside for any length of time, but because this is so bad, we're wondering if we should put it on him in the morning and throughout the day even when he's going to be inside the house? My poor baby! :(

Little Obsessions

I've posted many things about Eric and Natalie. I don't often post about Alex. Ever since school ended, this boy has been almost obsessed with video games. He has been constantly on the PS3, the iPad, or the computer/Facebook. We've been pretty lenient with all of them but this afternoon, Patrick and I said, "That's enough", or at least for today. He was mopey after that, wondering what else he could do. He got this toy gun and started playing with it.

This little boy saw me taking a picture of his brother and asked me to take a picture of his stuffed dog. Natalie received this stuffed dog from her school bus driver as a birthday present (ahead of time). She gave it to Eric and he named it after her good friend M who Patrick and I are convinced he has a crush on. ;)

When Alex left his gun on the sofa so he could get a second dessert (we didn't allow it--he's been a little obsessed with dessert lately too), Eric of course decided to pick it up and play with it. What is it about boys that makes them gravitate towards playing with guns? Eric's favorites are Alex's gun that shoots foam discs and any kind of water gun.

Speaking of water, we went to the Six Flags waterpark this afternoon. Today was a day off for me, and it was nice to have some fun with the family. It's back to work again tomorrow.

My Little Fish

I've talked too much about Natalie's swimming already, but I didn't have anything else to take a picture of for my picture for today, so here's another photo of Natalie swimming. That yellow thing between her legs is a sponge that her coach used to train her to keep her legs together while swimming the breaststroke. He only worked with her and a boy about her age on the breaststroke, so she got lots of attention today.

I feel very proud whenever I see her on the starting block. She looks so good, like she really knows what she's doing--until she actually dives from the starting block and then I realize that she's only seven, because she sort of just falls in the water. Her start isn't as polished (yet) like those swimmers you see on the Olympics, not that I expect that at this point, of course. Even though it was unbearably hot and humid (I almost said "impossibly hot and humid"), I really enjoyed watching her swim. She just makes it looks so easy, and when she looks over at me to see if I'm watching, I get a warm feeling (in a good way this time) and I give her a big smile back. :)

Father's Day 2010

I already posted about our early morning activities. Well, around 10:30, I took all the kids with me to Target, their favorite store, so that Patrick could relax at home while watching one of the World Cup Soccer games (Italy vs. New Zealand 1-1). We came home and had lunch, then we went to the pool. After coming home to watch the DVR tape of the Brazil vs. Ivory Coast (3-1) game, we went to Patrick's favorite restaurant, El Mirasol. After dinner, we came home and watched the new Cartoon Network series, "Unnatural History" that the kids have taken a liking to. Patrick prefers low-key celebrations and I think he was pretty happy with how we celebrated today. :)

I ended up taking a few photos of the kids individually with their father, mostly because I couldn't get them to come together for another group photo, although I'm pretty pleased with the one above. This one is of Patrick with Anthony in the office. I made a comment to them about how I wanted to document the two of them sitting next to each other while playing games on Facebook.

This photo and the others below were taken at El Mirasol and at home. I think they show how happy Patrick is with each of his children. He told them how each of them is very different from the others and that he learned a lot from each of them. I know he thinks he's a pretty lucky father. :)

Buddy Bucks

This morning, Eric and Natalie went with me to the grocery store for the traditional Sunday morning doughnuts. Usually Patrick makes the run, but since it's Father's Day, I took my turn. Both kids were already up, of course. They helped me pick out the doughnuts, then when we checked out, Natalie asked for some HEB Buddy Bucks. Buddy Bucks are something our local grocery chain gives to kids. They can play on these machines for free. The machines give out stickers with a certain amount of points. When they collect enough points, they can trade them in for free stuff. After they got their stickers, we got a couple of free balloons that they always have near the checkout lines. Natalie picked a red one and Eric picked a blue one. There were suckers tied on the ends to weigh them down. I had to smile as we were leaving the store. I had two very happy kids and a pleasant trip to the store. :)

A Swimmer Just Like Her Papa

I've probably taken too many photos of Natalie with KD, but I like to show how much bigger some of the eight-year-olds are than my little Natalie. The eight-year-olds are of course, her competition in all of her races. She really held her own today, though.

Here she is swimming in the 25 meter Breaststroke. She placed fifth overall out of five swimmers. She came very close to getting fourth place and she is only one out of two breaststroke swimmers in our neighborhood. The other swimmer is KD in the above picture. Patrick and I think she is doing great for having only learned breaststroke a couple of weeks ago.

Some other boring facts (or at least boring to other people who are not her parents):

Girls 7-8 25 Freestyle-- She got 6th place. She was fourth out of the eight freestyle swimmers in our neighborhood. The three ahead of her are 8 years old.

Girls 7-8 25 Backstroke-- She got 5th place. She was second out of the seven backstroke swimmers from our neighborhood.

Girls 8 and under 100 Freestyle Relay-- Her relay team got 2nd place, but they only missed 1st by 0.05 seconds Natalie gained on the third leg.

She beat her previous race times by as much as five seconds (that was in the breaststroke).

When I told her about all of the above, Natalie looked so pleased with herself. She is really excited about swimming and we'll be checking into year-round swim teams soon. Next Sunday, she swims in the "Championship Meet", which is a swim meet with all of the other swim teams in our group. I really love that she loves swimming so much and Patrick, having coached and having been a competitive swimmer, loves that one of his children finally loves swimming too.

Alex's 11th Birthday

Today, Alex turned 11. Patrick got some muffins for breakfast and Alex got to play as many video games as he wanted. I even let him "control" who got to play with the iPad, although after his friends got here, he either played with the PS3 or he wasn't playing video games. He wanted to open presents this morning, so here he is with one of the World Cup Soccer jerseys that he got from his Aunt M. He wore it during the USA vs. Slovenia game, then he changed into the Spain jersey because he preferred its red color. He said he preferred Spain except for if they went head-to-head with the US.

I missed the USA game because I took Natalie to swim team practice. I took Eric with me to the playground, but after a few swings and slides, he wanted to go home. He loves to play at the playground, but Patrick reasoned that this little boy was plain tuckered out from his late bedtimes and early risings lately. Here he is at the pool (which was the start of Alex's party--more on that later). He wouldn't even look at me when I was trying to take a picture. I thought he looked cute in his goggles, especially since he was even wearing them while eating a snack.

With the goggles on, however, he let Patrick and me take him "swimming" across the pool. Basically, I wouldn't move forward unless he was kicking his legs so he could "swim" across the pool. Sometimes he would purposely stop kicking just so we would stop moving. At the steps he would pretend to "west" (rest) by putting his hands up to his face like he was sleeping. Totally off the subject of Alex's party but too cute!

After we spent a couple of hours at the pool, Alex wanted to go to his favorite ice cream shoppe (and ours), Brindles. Here he is just before he dripped quite a bit of his Dreamsicle ice cream all over his Spain jersey. He wasn't very cooperative with the photo, as usual. Patrick thought it was amusing that we brought 8 kids into the ice cream shoppe for ice cream. Besides Alex's three friends, he invited his friend's little sister, who is a good friend of Natalie's. He figured that Natalie wouldn't be bothering him if she had a playmate.

We let Alex be in charge of what he wanted to do at his party, so after ice cream, we came back home. We watched "Planet 51" then we had pizza for dinner. One of his friends (the one with the little sister) went home around 9PM. His friend doesn't like to sleep over at friend's houses because he doesn't get any sleep. Smart friend. :) Since the movie until now they've been playing on the PS3. It's seems like a perfect party for this 11-year-old!

Wisconsin Trip Photo Recap

I'm short on time and I have lots of pictures. Here are just a few of my favorites. I may try to post a few more if I have time in the coming week or so.

Alex went kayaking pretty much every day we were there. I found it interesting that he always wore his goggles. He wouldn't let me take many photos, but he didn't have much choice when he was on that kayak.

Anthony is trying on Grandpa's life preserver belt, or whatever it's called. The other lifejacket was wet and he wanted to use this, but obviously it's a little big. I don't see him without a shirt very much, but I'm still amazed at how skinny he is. It'll be interesting to see how and when he "fills out" in the coming years.

Anthony was just "innocently" texting on the sofa when Natalie and Eric decided to jump on top of him. Luckily, he's pretty tolerant of his younger siblings. Alex would have been yelling and trying to throw his sister off, especially since she was probably laughing very loudly in Anthony's ear. Eric was trying to balance without using his feet. He's going to grow up to be a daredevil, I know it!

When his siblings were playing with each other on the covered porch, Alex stayed inside to watch TV. Patrick surprised him by getting on top of him and trying to hold him so I could get a picture. I loved being able to get a photo of the two of them goofing off and smiling since these two probably butt heads more often than anyone else in the family.

Natalie fished for the first time on this trip and she loved it. Of course, she wasn't the one who put the worm on the hook or removed the fish from the hook (catch and release). Papa had to do that for her. She caught the biggest fish, probably almost a foot long. Both Alex and Natalie caught quite a few fish. Eric wanted to fish also, but he couldn't hold the pole by himself. I might try to post a picture of that another time.

I really love this picture of Eric in his goggles! He wore those goggles even when he was just standing next to the pier shoveling rocks. We're hoping that having these goggles will allow Patrick to teach him how to swim since he hasn't been willing to get his face or head wet yet this summer.

I went kayaking too, and Patrick got this picture of me going by the dock. It's proof that I actually went out on the lake.

Patrick's maternal aunt, who he calls "Tia" lives in an assisted living place and his mom brought her for a couple of hours yesterday so she could see the kids and they could see her. It was a short visit but we're glad we could see each other.

Eric really enjoyed this rocking horse. Natalie was too big to get on it this year. Eric even pretended that his friend "Jacob" was riding on the horse and he was helping him. We're not sure if there was a kid with that name in his daycare class or if this was a made-up friend. It's interesting that he likes to pretend now.

This was a picture we took this morning before leaving for the airport. I think it turned out great! Look--everyone is looking at the camera AND smiling! Thanks for having us this week, Mom and Dad!

Beautiful Final Day

Whereas yesterday was rainy and gloomy, today was bright and sunny. We spent most of today playing outside. We all took turns going kayaking, even Natalie went on a kayak all by herself. I can post a picture later when we get home, but for now this iPhone picture of Anthony will suffice. The paddle was way too long for her, and she seemed a little tentative, but she did a great job. Eric spent most of the time picking up rocks from the lake with his little plastic shovel, putting it in his little plastic pail, and then dumping it all on the dock when the pail was full. He also went out for a "boat" ride in Patrick's kayak. Alex and Anthony swam, went kayaking, and shot each other with water guns. The temps went up to the mid-80s but the breeze kept it cool. Patrick's mom even picked up here sister for a short visit with us.

Tonight, Mom and Dad are planning an early "birthday" dinner for Alex including grilled steaks. We'll be home by around this time tomorrow.

Starbucks

We paid a visit to Starbucks this morning so that Patrick could help his mom configure here laptop to get on the Wi-Fi there. Apparently the Wi-Fi is free but you need an AT&T account or a Starbucks gift card to access it. What a hassle! Well, I got Patrick to buy me a gift card out of the deal. *wink*

Natalie came with us, probably so she could get out of the house. She gets much more stir crazy inside the house than her brothers do. They are happy just playing video/computer games or watching TV. She got a glazed donut and chocolate milk out of the deal anyway. Notice how she is dressed. She first changed into that this morning so she could take a walk with her grandparents. I guess she's not such a "boy" after all if she sometimes prefers to dress in a skirt just to go for a walk.

The kids will get to see their second cousins this afternoon. Patrick's cousins and their families are really great people and we're all looking forward to their visit.

Back In A Lifevest

At first, Eric kept saying that he wanted to go out in the boat but he did not want to wear the lifevest. Of course we were adamant about not letting him out without one. He finally relented and here he is with Patrick in the "boat". It's pretty windy out today and even when Eric was standing by the dock playing with toys he found it difficult to steady himself with the strong waves pushing against him. Patrick and Alex both took the kayaks out for a short period of time, and all the kids swam for a bit. Now we're warming up inside while we watch Italy vs. Paraguay.

Lake Activities

We're planning a relaxing day today. Here Natalie and Eric are watching a streaming video of Madeline from Netflix. I love it when the kids get along. Of course, just before this, they were arguing because Eric wanted to watch a Thomas video and Natalie didn't. Just after this, Alex came in and wanted to use the iPad too.

We're currently watching the Japan vs. Cameroon World Cup game. We've been trying to catch as many games as possible-- the advantage of being on vacation. Patrick is planning on doing some fishing later with the kids. Yesterday, Grandpa took Patrick and Natalie out on a boat ride. Eric wasn't keen on going out again after the "incident".

All the kids had been out playing in the lake with their life jackets on. Anthony and Alex had gone out in the kayaks. Anthony had given Natalie a ride in his kayak and they both enjoyed it despite the kayak turning over when Anthony tried to make a turn and Natalie leaned the wrong way. Because the lake water was about 70 degrees, Natalie seemed to feel like she should scream every few seconds just because she was cold. Eric and Natalie then stood in the shallow part and played but Natalie went to go sit down and Eric was left by himself. I had been taking lots of pictures and I was trying to get a photo of Eric in his goggles and Thomas swimming trunks when suddenly I noticed that he was face down in the water. He looked like he was swimming with his arms moving at his sides. I realized, of course, that he can't swim and that he was crying when he was able to turn his face to the side. I ran out to the dock to get to him, because of course I was carrying my big camera and I didn't have a swimsuit on. I managed to grab his arm and lift him out just as Anthony had run through the water to get to him. Patrick had been out kayaking and he got back by this time. He had seen it from afar but of course he couldn't do anything about it. We took Eric inside and he forgot about the whole "incident" after we gave him a snack. One of the kids mentioned his lifejacket so Eric got it in his head that it was the lifejacket that tipped him over.

Hopefully this "incident" won't stop him from going out in the lake with his lifejacket for the rest of our vacation. Patrick's first cousins will be visiting tomorrow with their boys and they are all around our kids' ages. We always have a great time with them.

Milwaukee Visit

We had a pretty good trip here today. Our first flight left late and so we had a tight connection (30 minutes) in Memphis. Luckily the second flight boarded late. I was just happy that both flights were fairly smooth despite the pilot saying that he expected some turbulence. It was supposed to be in the mid-60s here, but it felt closer to the mid-70s and overcast. We're planning on relaxing this week and seeing some of Patrick's cousins.

Two summers ago, when we were last here, we thought that would be the last time that Natalie would be able to get on their old rocking horse. That didn't stop her from trying, but that horse was sinking a little too much. Eric, however, was easily able to ride and he enjoyed it a lot despite needing some help getting down. This photo was taken with my phone. I'm sure I'll have plenty of opportunities to get better photos this week.

Family Portraits 2010

We went to the Picture People at North Star Mall this morning. As you can see from this picture, they weren't completely open yet when we got there for our 10AM appointment. Eric found this harmonica in the van on the way there and he was continuously playing it as we walked through the mall towards the store. We had a family portrait taken this morning as well as individual photos of the kids. I'll try to scan some of them tonight or tomorrow morning so I can post them here, if I have time.

We'll be leaving tomorrow to visit Patrick's parents in Wisconsin and we'll be returning before Alex's birthday next week. Hopefully I'll be able to post on this blog even while we're gone, with pictures.

Play Park

Patrick and I have had the hardest time getting the boys out of the house since school ended. They want to stay at home and read or play video games. Today, we insisted that they go to our neighborhood park with us when Natalie went to swim team practice (at 10am). I thought I would first post thia picture of Eric playing on the playscape. Last week when we went to the playground, he tried climbing up without using those yellow "stairs". Needless to say, he found it very difficult to get up there. This is his favorite part of the playscape because there is a big slide at the top.

Patrick and the boys played around with the soccer ball. When they "play ball" it has pretty much been with a soccer ball. They didn't make it easy for me to get a good picture, but at least I've documented this shared activity. Alex started out with reading a book but was convinced to get a little exercise instead.

Eric has been a bit bossy lately. This morning he was in the gameroom when Alex came in. He told Alex to get out of "his gameroom". Here he is telling Alex not to sit next to him and trying to push him off the bench. We've been letting all the kids stay up pretty late just because we want them to be more relaxed this summer and also on the hopes that they start sleeping in. Eric has been taking three hour naps too. Do you think that he is a little tired?

I'm on call tonight, so I'll be home tomorrow. We're scheduled to have pictures taken at the Picture People so hopefully I'll have some good pictures to post tomorrow.