October 2016 Art a la Carte

I'm finally blogging again! It seems fitting that today I'm blogging about Eric's first Art a la Carte class of this school year. Actually, he had an art class last month, but his art teacher said that was more of a housekeeping class, preparing them for the school year and talking about stuff from last year. She was trying to make me feel better because I had planned on volunteering on the day they originally scheduled the class, which was Friday, September 30th. Eric came home on Monday, September 26, and said that he had art class that day. They changed the schedule and I was SO disappointed! I really enjoy his art classes and I make every effort to volunteer for each one. Luckily, when I found out about the art class schedule, I was already off today, albeit post-call.

This is Eric with his finished product from today, using chalk pastels. I think he should have blended the colors a bit better to cover up the black background and the white sketch lines better, but I love that this piece of art is all his. He made all the decisions about what to draw, what colors to use and where, and when he is done. Even if I wanted to, I would not be able to convince him to do it like I would like to see him do it. He knows what he wants to do and he does it. I'm good with that.

In case you can't tell what the art represents, it's a landscape with rolling green hills with a blue river running through the scenery, which is lit by a beautiful sunset. He even had enough time to put in a couple of trees. Most of the kids in his class took so much time choosing colors, coloring, and blending, that they didn't have any time to add any of those little details, like trees.

I also asked him to add the date. I recently cleaned up a bunch of his old art work (from previous years) and I was disappointed in myself for not adding a date so I knew when he made the art. It just means more to me when I know how old he was when he drew it. Nowadays I usually ask him to either add the date (so I also have an example of his writing), or I will take a picture right away so I have the date I took the photo.

Eric's decisiveness during art class was made more obvious (to me) because one of the kids at his table was as indecisive as he was decisive. She constantly sought approval of what she was doing after every single step and asked a lot of questions that were about to be answered the teacher during her explanation. I was a little tired from being post-call, so I was probably more irritable than usual.

I always like to add a photo of what the teacher posted on the bulletin board complete with art that she made herself to show as an example. She also puts up a little blurb on the artist. This time it was just a picture of David Hockney and an example of his artwork. I love how she also posts the main themes that they are learning about during class, in this case, "landscape", "pattern", and "rhythm". It's like a free art class for me, too.

They moved this art class from the scheduled 8:45-9:45 to 10:15-11:15 because of the special activities for Red Ribbon Week this week. Luckily, one of the other moms sent us a message about this change yesterday. Because of the later time, I didn't have time to go get Eric his usual requested lunch from Wendy's since his lunch was directly after this art class. I told him I would bring him lunch on Wednesday, my next day off, instead.

I'm so glad that Eric still wants to eat lunch at school with me. I love that he still enjoys having me volunteer for his art class. I love volunteering for his art class. I feel like I take a free art class each time. The biggest bonus, of course, is being able to spend time with my youngest because he is growing up so fast!

Makeover

This is my thirteen year old baby girl. As she likes to put it, she is my favorite daughter! She has been asking for a lesson on how to put on makeup. She doesn't plan on using makeup all the time, but I noticed that she has been playing around with it--a little foundation to even out her skin tones, a little blush, and some lip gloss. I wanted her to learn how to do it right, and she had heard about such lessons at Sephora. We have a little more freedom with scheduling in the summer, so we made her an appointment for today.

The lady that helped us (Nicole) was very helpful, showing her what types of products to use and why, and showed her simple things to do for every day, and what to do to if she wanted to get more elaborate. Nicole also started with showing Natalie with how to clean her face every day, and how important that is, which is something I've tried to get her to do, but she has been spotty about that--after all, I am only her mother.

The makeover is free with $50 purchase, but of course we spent "a little more" than that, almost $500 actually. I told Natalie that this was her birthday present, very generous but I have no regrets.

This is the "before" picture for reference. I'm a little biased, but I think she is beautiful with or without makeup. I am also constantly impressed that she basically rolls out of bed looking like this. Her hair, despite her complaints about how frizzy it can get, is gorgeous even when she doesn't do anything to it. She has gotten lucky so far in the acne department, but good skin care will go a long way to keeping it that way.

Now, if she would only believe it when I say that she is gorgeous instead of telling me I'm biased just because I'm her mother...

Happy 17th Birthday, Alex!

My number two son is 17 today! This is a picture of our present to him, custom Adidas shoes. Note the "Ali G. Baba" name on them--that's the nickname he has chosen for himself, an now he has it on his shoes. The shoes are a light gray and lavender color. As you can see from the background, he has on a purple shirt, purple being one of his favorite colors.

He and Natalie have been going to the gym in the mornings, including today. They went early this morning (around 8am) so they could finish and be back in time to watch Eric at his Jiu-Jitsu Tournament. They got there before Eric and I did, because the swim meet was going so slowly and Eric didn't finish his freestyle race until around 9:45am. He had to miss his backstroke race.

Alex spent the rest of the day mostly playing on the Playstation. I cooked yesterday for him, since I was out and about all morning and would not have had time to make him anything today. I made sausage-stuffed jalapeños and Banana Cream Cheese Bread. He was happy and very appreciative.

For dinner, he chose to eat at Canyon Cafe at the Quarry Market. He also willingly agreed to let me take this picture of him with his siblings. After dinner, he "allowed" Natalie to go to the Lululemon store for a bit. She has been obsessed with buying "pretty" exercise bras lately, so I bought her one at the Lululemon store. We then went to Paciugo's for gelato. Alex had the coconut and banana gelato while Natalie and I both had cappuccino and Bailey's gelato. Eric had the Wild Berries and Strawberry sorbets.

After we got home, Patrick and Alex watched the end of the Venezuela vs. Argentina soccer game in the Copa America, had some more Banana Cream Cheese Bread, and played some more video games. I think (I hope) Alex had the birthday he wanted to have. I did my best to make sure. Happy Birthday, Alex!

Father and Son Jiu-Jitsu Tournament

Lots of events going on today! Our morning started out with a swim meet at our home pool. I'll have to do a separate blog post about that later when we get the meet results. As soon as Eric got out of the pool from his 25 meter Freestyle race, we rushed off to my car so I could take him to the Jiu-Jitsu Tournament at his school. Patrick was left behind as a stroke judge for the swim meet. He came later, after Eric had already finished.

This first picture is of Eric receiving his gold medal from his Jiu-Jitsu instructor, and the owner of the Jiu-Jitsu school Eric and Patrick go to. The kids are lined up in the order that they placed, with Eric getting a gold medal/first place. He went up against the boy to his left, who got the silver medal, and the small boy on the far right. Every kid had at least two matches.

Notice how small the boy on the far right is? Natalie thought he was adorable. Eric got a submission within a minute of grappling with that adorable boy. He went the whole four minutes with the boy who got the silver medal.

Eric was very proud of himself, and I posted a photo like this one on Facebook. Natalie and Alex got up early so they could go to the gym and be done in time to watch Eric. They actually got there before Eric and I did, since we were running so late coming from the swim meet. They left shortly before Patrick arrived.

Fun fact--Eric got his Jiu-Jitsu uniform in order before the swim meet this morning, but he forgot to bring underwear. He had the option to wear his wet swimsuit under his gi, but opted against it. Patrick brought some things like water for Eric, but by the time he arrived, Eric's matches were over. He was at least able to see Eric get his gold medal.

I had to take this picture because Patrick and Eric were concentrating on the matches in front of them, with both of them in their uniforms. It's a nice Father-Son moment.

Patrick only had one match, which was fine with him. He went against the guy on the far left, and he was exhausted after the one match. He still enjoyed the experience of competing, but man I was sweating it out watching him struggling during the match. Eric watched for a bit then started playing with the owner's 11-month-old son.

This is my favorite picture from the whole tournament, my boys with their medals. I love these two!!

Cousin Visit

My cousin Rachael recently moved to Austin. We went to visit them there when they first moved there in April, but today was the first time they came to visit us here in San Antonio. My sister Cynthia and her daughter Aly also came for a brief visit so they could see Rachael and her family.

Natalie got rid of her princess toys, dolls, and other young girly things a year or more ago, but she still looked around the house and our game room for things that Rachael's daughters would enjoy playing with. They found this pink foam sword that we got at Disney last month. Eric wanted to get a foam sword and ended up getting a blue one, and picked out a pink one for Natalie. Charlotte is four years old, and even though she is girly, she didn't have any qualms about playing with that sword or any of our other swords. Natalie also found some stuffed animal pandas and a unicorn that the girls enjoyed.

In the first picture, Charlotte is playing with Natalie. In this second picture, Eric takes a turn, but this time, both of them have two swords apiece. Harper, who is almost one, mostly observed.

Harper was clingy in this new place, and rarely left her mother's side. Here she is clearly tired after crawling back and forth the long hallway to our game room. Eric crawled after her for part of the time, "chasing" her down the hallway. She found a box with different sets of cards (playing cards, educational cards, etc.) and finally started "playing" with them (or trying to eat them). Before that, she was busy trying to grab her big sister's tiny Shopkins toys (in other words, Charlotte's "choke-able objects").

Charlotte had no dolls to play with, but she seemed perfectly happy playing with Eric's Star Wars figurines. She happens to be holding Kanan from Star Wars Rebels in this picture, but she also played with Eric's Darth Vader and stormtrooper figurines. I love her playful face in this photo.

Cynthia and I tried several times to get pictures of Harper, but it was too dark in there and her smiles were fleeting, and so ended up blurry in the photos. I finally caught her smiling in this picture!

You can see Eric in one of our play tents in the background. He set up our tents and tunnels in the game room for the girls to play in, then put them all away by himself when they left for home. What a big helper!

Jason spent the time downstairs watching Alex play FIFA on the PS4 and then watching the Copa Americana soccer game. Patrick grilled steaks for lunch and it was delicious as usual.

It was so nice to visit with Rachael today. We hope to have many more visits with her and her beautiful family in the future.

New Driver

Alex got his driver's license today! Anthony was already seventeen years old and in his senior year in high school when he got his license. Alex wanted to get his license "before" Anthony got his, so with his birthday a little over a week away it was time to take his driving test. The Texas Department of Public Safety (DPS) website was confusing so he and Patrick spent some time filling out paperwork that they didn't need in the end.

Alex took his test at one of the relatively new super centers but the phone system designed to reduce wait times failed them. Instead of 40 minutes from the time they registered to be "in line," it ended up being an hour and 20 minutes and ran into the appointment time for his driving test. In the end, this didn't matter. It was just a long visit to the DPS office.

Patrick watched Alex do his parallel parking during the first part of the test. It was good, but not as nice as several nights ago when they went to the testing center after hours to practice parallel parking. After the test, the person giving the test said Alex lost some points for not watching for traffic on side streets closely enough but that Alex was doing a good job driving. Alex is happy he has his license, and he doesn't really realize it yet, but we are thrilled that we have another driver that can help cart people to various events.

I took the picture shown above after we celebrated with dinner at Grimaldi's, Alex's choice. The 2004 Lexus RX330 in the background is my old car that the boys have learned to drive on and that Alex now has the use of. As soon as Patrick added him to our car insurance policy ($3400 more per year--ouch!!), he took off for his friend Jeremy's house. Jeremy has been driving Alex around for a couple of years now, and he told Alex that when he got his driver's license, he needed to drive Jeremy around in return. Watch out, San Antonio! There's a new driver on the loose!

Shorter Hair

Natalie wanted to get a significant amount of hair cut off, and today was the appointment. I posted a photo on FB showing the initial 4-5 inches cut off and in a pile on the floor and joked about how it looked like a small animal. She got another inch or so cut off and this is what she looks like!

Of course, I told her she was beautiful, but she never believes me because I'm her mama and she says I'm biased. One of the ladies that was at the hair salon getting her hair cut even commented on how beautiful Natalie's hair was.

After the hair cut, Natalie commented, "My head feels so much lighter!"

First Swim Meet 2016

We had our first swim meet of the summer swim season today, and it was an away meet vs. Canyon Springs. For the first time in over 10 years, Natalie is not on the swim team. :( We didn't even sign her up this year. It's just not the same. Our team is much smaller than it has been in recent years, too, and Canyon Springs won the meet pretty handily with 662.50 points vs. our team's 442.50 points.

For a kid who didn't love being on the swim team initially, Eric looks forward to swim practices and did not complain at all about this swim meet. Of course it probably helped that he got to play on the iPad. I volunteered for "Ready Bench" for the first half of the meet, so I took this picture after my volunteering was done and it was Patrick's turn to volunteer as a stroke and turn judge.

We lucked out with the weather. The forecast was for rain, but it turned out to be "only" dark and cloudy for most of the swim meet. The sun came out in the last hour or so, but it didn't get too bad until the swim meet was over.

This is Eric's medley relay team. Eric swam the backstroke (first leg), the boy to his left swam the breaststroke (and got them way ahead of the other team), the next boy to his left swam the freestyle (anchor leg), and his friend and classmate Cameron on the far right swam the butterfly. The other team actually DQ'd, but they were so happy that I'm glad I got to take this picture!

It wasn't all good, though. The reason why Patrick hates being the stroke judge for the second half of swim meets is that they swim the breaststroke and butterfly in the second half, so that's when most of the disqualifications occur. Patrick ended up DQ'ing Eric on his breaststroke because, amongst other problems, he swam most of the stroke underwater. Eric didn't seem upset at all though, and Natalie did give him a few pointers later in the afternoon when Eric went with her and with Alex to the neighborhood pool to swim for fun.

I'm going to detail Eric's race times at this swim meet below, for my own record, with his placement in parentheses:

Event 16--Boys 9-10 25m Freestyle--27.19 sec (11th out of 11)

Event 28--Boys 9-10 25m Backstroke--29.34 sec (8th out of 11 and the three boys from our swim team that placed higher than he did were the three boys that were in the medley relay with him)

Event 46--Boys 9-10 25m Breaststroke--DQ'd along with one other boy with six boys total in the race

Event 66--Boys 9-10 100m Medley Relay--1:45.47

We'll be missing the next meet next Saturday because we will be in Houston celebrating my Dad's 85th birthday.

County Fair

Eric was studying about economics in his third grade class. The school holds a "County Fair" every year where the third graders can provide a product or a service that other students can purchase. Eric decided to make lightsaber bookmarks. Patrick cut some construction paper strips with my paper cutter. Eric glued the pieces together and did some additional freehand trimming. Patrick then used my old laminator to laminate the bookmarks. I usually have to handle these sorts of craft projects, but Patrick took care of it this time, and the two of them did a fantastic job.

Eric sold the bookmarks for fifteen cents apiece. He was supposed to make at least 30 of them. One of our good friends saw them and wanted to buy three this morning, but Eric only had the 30 and had to bring them all to school. He ended up selling all but seven of them. Of those, he gave three of them away to friends. What a little entrepreneur!

J Awards

Natalie's eighth grade awards ceremony for her school was tonight. We had gotten a call from her principal a couple of weeks ago to tell us that she was going to get the award for getting straight A's for all three years of middle school. We weren't supposed to tell her she was getting this award, but it's not like she didn't know that she has gotten straight A's every year.

What was a surprise was that there were only three of them that had straight A's for the three years of middle school. This is a picture of the three of them on stage holding their plaques for this award. The girl on the far left is Natalie's friend Abby. They have been friends since elementary school, and Abby lives in our subdivision. We were sitting in front of her family. It was cool to see the both of them on stage together.

This second picture is of Natalie with two of her good friends. Directly to her left is her friend Arela, who will be joining color guard with her this upcoming year. She got a few awards too. To Natalie's far left is her friend Claudia, who got the big art award for excelling in art. Natalie has said that Claudia is really awesome at drawing, which is why she will be going the NESA next year (North East School of the Arts).

Each student walked across the stage when their name was called. They shook their principal's hand as a list of their awards were read out loud. The principal then handed them their certificate--or stack of certificates in Natalie's case. Natalie got the following awards:

President's Education Award
Honor Roll All A's
Outstanding Student in GT English
UIL 2nd Place in Math
UIL 4th Place in Number Sense
UIL 5th Place in Calculator Applications

She said that she was the most proud of the UIL awards because she "worked hard" for those to win them in the competition. We think she works pretty hard in school in general. She was a little sad that she did not receive or even get nominated for the Principal's Award. Her friend Abby got that award tonight. Natalie is so hard on herself, but we are so very proud of what she has accomplished so far. Now on to high school! Eek!

Sickie Update

Some time after I came home from work yesterday (Saturday) morning, I was trying to take Eric's temperature with our home digital thermometer, and I did something to it to change it from measuring in Celsius units to measuring in Fahrenheit units. Still, when the number said 39.9 degrees Celsius, I knew it was very high. I confirmed that with googling a conversion table--103.8 degrees Fahrenheit. All weekend, though, Eric really hasn't looked or acted sick, except that he complained about a bad sore throat, and as a result, barely ate anything. This morning his fever was down and he was fever free this evening.

In contrast, Natalie has looked and sounded terrible. She has been coughing with a constant runny nose and intermittent fever. Tonight she said that she couldn't imagine how she could get better enough to be able to go to school tomorrow. She looked a lot better on Friday morning than she has looked all weekend. At least she has been trying to drink plenty of water to stay hydrated and she has been doing a lot of napping.

Both kids have been cooped up at home since Friday. Today I decided that they had to go out, even if they never left the car, although maybe that was because I wanted to go out somewhere too. For lunch, Natalie wanted some chicken noodle soup from Panera Bread, so she went with me to pick it up. She stayed in the car while I went in, ordered, then brought out the bag of food. We got something for Alex too. This afternoon, I took Eric to Bahama Bucks for a shaved ice treat. We went through the drive-thru, so he didn't get out of the car at all. When he saw me pull out my phone for a picture, he immediately posed and smiled. He really hasn't been doing too badly, so he might go to school tomorrow, but you can see in this picture that he has dark circles under his eyes. The shaved ice really made his throat feel better. In fact, when he tasted his mango/grape-flavored shaved ice, he said, "This is awesome!" Notice the napkins all over his lap. I told him NOT to spill any of it in my car!

This is a Tres Leches cake from Palenque Grill and it was awesome too. Patrick and I decided to leave the sick children at home to have leftover tortilla soup and to rest while we went out to dinner tonight. They even gave us another piece for free to take home--I'm not really sure why except that they were promoting their restaurant. Their "PR guy" sat down to chat with us to tell us about the restaurant's history. Interestingly, the owner is the same guy who started El Pollo Loco, and apparently when he was first starting out, he hired Brad Pitt (before he became famous, of course) to hand out flyers for his new restaurant while dressed as a chicken. That was definitely a fun fact.

Patrick plans on taking Natalie to the doctor tomorrow, and hopefully Eric will be well enough to go to school. If he isn't, he will go to the doctor too. I hope my babies feel better soon and that Alex doesn't get sick too. I want them to enjoy their last few days of school hanging out with their friends.

Sick Children

My children are getting "sick" right at the end of the school year. Natalie missed school on Wednesday because she had a fever or 101.9 degrees Fahrenheit, a sore throat and headache. I was off on Thursday, and although Natalie did not have a fever or headache, she stayed home because her throat was really sore. She didn't look that sick to me, but we let her stay home and told her to get ready to go to school today (Friday). She had an all day field trip to The Main Event, a big "entertainment" place where they can play different types of games including bowling and laser tag, so we figured if she didn't play too hard, it would be an easy day for her anyway. Well, she texted us after lunch to ask us to pick her up. Her teacher even said that she looked good this morning, but then started to look pale. She came home and went to bed but I can hear her coughing from time to time.

Meanwhile, Eric was doing fine, but he has been super busy. On Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, he has Jiu-Jitsu from 5-6pm, and on Tuesdays he has piano lessons along with his sister from 5-6pm. On those days, he has to get home and quickly change so he can go to the neighborhood swim team practices which are 6:30-7:30pm Monday-Friday. He doesn't get to bed until around 8:30pm every night because of that, and we have always gotten him in bed by 8pm on school nights. I also usually bring him lunch to his school once a month when he has Art Class, but they didn't have an art class this month, so I offered to bring him lunch today. Everything looked normal until I got there. He was "really cold" and had his arms inside his T-shirt because he was so cold. I'm usually cold but I was okay, so I let him use my sweater. I bring a sweater everywhere in the summer when I know I will be indoors because of all the over-airconditioning around here). He was eating his lunch as per his routine when suddenly he started complaining about his feet hurting. I thought that it was just his feet falling asleep, but after quite a while, he was crying and inconsolable and the "soreness" didn't go away. What could I do but bring him home? He doesn't have a fever or other symptoms, but he fell asleep very quickly after we got home and I put him in bed (now complaining that his legs were sore now also). Hopefully he will be better after a good nap because he is signed up for a Jiu-Jitsu tournament tomorrow (that he has been looking forward to).

Alex has been mostly well, but he has had a cough, likely due to allergies. He was asked by his magnet school principal to read out the names of awards recipients at their awards ceremony last night. Alex turned him down because he thought all of that talking would make him cough more.

I am on call tonight, my third call in two weeks. I'm still tired from the calls last Tuesday and last Saturday. That's two 16-hour calls and one 24-hour call and about 100 total hours in two weeks. I need to make it through tonight and I will only have one 16-hour call in all of June. The kids have less than two weeks of school left. I think we're all tired, but we all have to hang in there just a little while longer.

Disney 2016 Day Five

Today we visited Animal Kingdom. It was already packed when we got there at 9am, so upon arriving at the park, we proceeded to the Kilimanjaro Safaris, which was near the back of the park. One of the Photopass photographers took this photo of us later in the day of the big tree that to me is symbolic of Animal Kingdom. On the way in, we didn't want to stop to wait in line for one of the photographers to take our picture.

The Kilimanjaro Safari ride is also a ride that to me is just part of being at Animal Kingdom. The rides takes you through the different habitat areas in Africa and you can see lots of real animals in their native setting. I knew that even Natalie and Eric would enjoy this one. It's also a popular ride, and we weren't able to get Fast Passes, plus many of the animals were usually sleeping by around lunch time, so that's why we headed there first.

The posted wait time for the ride was only 10 minutes when we got there, and really, we probably didn't have to wait that long. They had lots of vehicles that held lots of people, so the line went fast. We were lucky to not only get to see some animals in action, but also to see them fairly close up.

These were apparently "baby" elephants playing. We thought it was kind of cool not only to see them, but to see them interact this way.

I still had to crop both of these photos, but the fact that I still got decent pictures (that weren't blurry) meant that they were close enough for my camera to get them in good focus. This lion was perched perfectly on top of a rock, easily seen by us and by my camera. In the past when we've gone on this ride, the lions were usually hiding or sleeping, so it was cool to see one just showing off on top of a rock.

After the safari ride, we went on the Pangani Forest Exploration Trail. There were more animals to see, and I was eager to do some walking after all the standing still in lines we did yesterday. At one point, Eric noticed a guide talking to some other kids about one of the animals, and it peaked his interest. They have something called a Wildlife Explorer program now. Kids (and some adults that we saw along the way) go to different stations throughout the park, learning little facts and getting "badges" (which were actually stickers) in these little books that they were given. We started visiting some of those stations.

We interrupted our Wildlife Exploration to go on the Dinosaur ride, because we had Fast Passes for 11:05am. It's a very mild rollercoaster/simulator type ride, and Eric enjoyed it a lot. The premise for the ride is that the vehicle you are in supposedly travels back in time to when dinosaurs roamed the earth, but you encounter some unexpected dangers along the way. I took this picture before we got on the ride because Eric wanted me to take a picture. He made that face all on his own. There was another statue of a dinosaur later, an iguanodon from the movie Dinosaur, and I took a picture of him in front of that one too.

Eric actually complained of being hungry even before we went on the Dinosaur ride, which is unusual for him. I held him off until after the ride, and we had some barbecue--Natalie and I shared some ribs, and Eric had a chicken drumstick. Eric also had some apple juice and that was it. He said he was too full to eat the grapes included in the meal, so I told him I wasn't going to get him any dessert until he ate his grapes. I felt funny saying that because it's not like grapes aren't already dessert-like with all the sugar they have in them.

Natalie took this to heart and when she wanted a Mickey-shaped ice cream bar a short time later, she barely let him have any. I had a chocolate covered frozen banana, which unfortunately also had nuts on it. I say unfortunately because I was willing to share, but both Natalie and Eric refuse to eat nuts. I still figure that we're on vacation, so I was letting Eric have some dessert even without eating a large lunch. He ended up eating some of my frozen banana, eating around some of the nuts.

One of the badges for Eric's Wildlife Explorer book was a "music badge". We searched for a while until we found it. It involved this man on stilts playing a "balafon", which is one of the activities in the book, to write down what instrument that is. He also had the kids at his station play some of the musical instruments. As you can see from the first photo, Eric was really enjoying himself!

This station and another station involving info about the Hindi alphabet and Indian culture were the most interesting ones, even Natalie agreed. The guide at that station wrote our names using the Hindi alphabet, and we learned a little about the Taj Mahal, which Eric had not heard of until today. She was very nice and we actually saw her at a different station an hour or so later.

It's been like pulling teeth to get the kids to do a lot of rides and other attractions this week. I wanted to stop at Disney Springs (formerly Downtown Disney) to look around. Today, Natalie finally allowed it, but she wanted to leave early from Animal Kingdom to get to Disney Springs so she could get back and pack. I'm not sure why she thought she needed so much time to pack since she didn't need that long to pack to come here. Whatever her reason, at least we got to go somewhere else and not just stay in our room.

We mostly walked around Disney Springs. We had to stop at the Lego store, of course. I took a couple of photos--this one of the two of them with Woody and Buzz, and another one of Eric outside with a display where Buzz is strapped on a rocket with Woody down below. Natalie ended up buying some Lego Mixels because she loves those and because they were on sale. We thought about eating there, but it was only 4pm, and we weren't hungry yet, so we went back to the hotel.

After a very long bus ride (I love the monorail so much and really hate the buses), we got back to the hotel. After trying to figure out what the kids want to eat for three meals a day, I was tired of doing it. I am ready to eat at home! I knew Natalie would want to just stay at the hotel, which made me a little angry, but luckily, Eric was up for going to the Magic Kingdom one last time to have dinner and dessert. We really didn't spend much time at the Magic Kingdom at all during this trip, not even a handful of hours on the day we arrived, Tuesday. The lines for rides were all really long anyway, but I still wish Eric had some interest in some of the rides. At least he let me take this picture.

We shared a "Pot Roast Mac and Cheese" which is basically pot roast with mac and cheese. I ate the pot roast and Eric ate the mac and cheese. Sharing entrees has saved me during this trip. Usually, entree portions are so huge, and it would have killed me to throw food away because I didn't have a way to heat it up again later.

For dessert, he only wanted one of those Frozen Strawberry Lemonade cups. We also bought some foam swords. Eric and Natalie have been playing with foam swords this week whenever they see them in the gift shops, and this was our last chance to buy them. Eric chose a blue one for himself, and he chose a pink one to give to Natalie. I'm not sure if he was doing this so he would have someone to fight with, or because he was trying to be sweet to his sister. He said to a family we met on the elevator that he was trying to be nice to his sister. What a sweetie.

I didn't want to leave Disney without having one of the Mickey Ears Kids' Ice Cream Cones, so we got in this long line and I purchased one last item before heading home tomorrow. I had to take a picture of it because I didn't get a picture of it when Eric had one earlier this week. I put him behind the ice cream in this picture just for fun.

What did Natalie eat for dinner while we were gone--mini-muffins. Sigh. I was so mad at her, but I was too busy packing everything tonight. We're out of here early tomorrow, and we'll hopefully be back in San Antonio by 9:30am.

Disney 2016 Day Four

Today was Star Wars day. Most of our activities revolved around attractions with a Star Wars theme. We had to take the bus to Hollywood Studios this morning, in contrast to the monorail we've been taking to Magic Kingdom and Epcot. Now I remember why I paid extra to stay at a hotel located on the Monorail line. The monorails run fairly regularly and there are several cars and lots of seating. The bus ran late this morning, and it took extra time for people on wheelchairs to get on and off. We wanted to get to Hollywood Studios by 9am (or earlier if possible) so we could sign Eric up for the Jedi Training Academy.

We did get there a few minutes after 9am, but there were enough people in front of us that it took us about an hour and 15 minutes to get to the front of the line. By that time, eight of the twenty shows had been filled, and the first available show (and the one we signed up for) was at 2:10pm. That meant that we had to be there by 1:40pm so that they could make sure the kids were all there and ready for the 2:10pm show. We already had a Fast Pass for 1:10pm at Toy Story Mania, one of our most favorite attractions/rides, so that was going to be tight.

While waiting in line, I took pictures to post on Facebook, of course. There wasn't anything else to do. I even called Patrick at home, since we didn't really have a chance to talk yesterday. When he could, Eric started climbing some of the rock walls that surrounded the line--I took a picture of that. Natalie also made a comment that if she were a Sith, she would be a "fashionable Sith". "There's no reason to just wear all black when you can look good with your pink outfit and your color-coordinated lightsaber." That girl cracks me up! Of course, I had to take a picture of her fashionable color-coordinated pink outfit.

After we signed Eric up, we headed to Star Tours, because it was a simulation-based ride that takes you through the Star Wars Universe, and he didn't remember taking it before. He loved it, of course, because he loves all things Star Wars. After that ride, Natalie took off running for the Twilight Zone Tower of Terror roller coaster ride. Eric wasn't interested, but we had already reserved a Fast Pass for 11:20 and it was already around 11:30. Eric and I headed to Star Wars Launch Bay, where they had character meet and greets with Chewbacca and Kylo Ren.

Eric chose Kylo Ren, and interestingly, the posted wait time to "encounter Kylo Ren" was only 10 minutes (which ended up closer to 20 minutes) whereas the posted wait time for Chewbacca was 40 minutes. While waiting, Eric entertained himself with trying to answer Star Wars trivia questions that were posted on TV screens there. There was a girl that came out after meeting Kylo Ren and saying, "He was so rude." Eric just laughed when he heard that, and okay, now we knew what to expect.

I took a video of Eric during the "encounter", which was fairly short. Kylo Ren paced around grandiosely and told the Photopass photographer exactly when it was okay to take pictures, and at the end, he told Eric, "Out of my way." Eric was smiling the whole time, trying not to laugh. Eric kept looking at him even when the photographer was taking pictures. I had to prompt him to look towards the camera. When Kylo Ren told him to get out of his way, Eric turned and headed out the door with a smile but without a word.

Natalie met us while Eric was exploring some of the Star Wars themed video games, and we went to have lunch. After lunch we only had a little time before our Toy Story Mania Fast Pass at 1:10pm, so we had some ice cream. The Toy Story Mania ride line went a little slower than we had hoped. Eric and I didn't have a great time either, because we weren't able to aim our "guns". Mine only shot directly in the middle of the screen and his only shot up almost out of the screen area, even if we tried pointing them in different directions. Eric was getting very frustrated, and we complained when we got off. They gave us free passes to use at another time because we were already late to the 1:40pm check in time for the Jedi Training Academy.

When we got to the Jedi Training Academy check-in, Eric got lined up with the other kids (only kids 4-12 are able to participate), and then they got robes to wear. We waited around quite a bit, actually, probably built in extra time so they could call kids on standby when the designated kids didn't check in and so they would have everyone ready for show time. We then had a little procession to the "Jedi Temple". They got lightsabers right after the show started. One of the kids asked earlier why they didn't get lightsabers when they got their robes. I couldn't hear exactly what the cast member told him, but I'm sure it had something to do with little kids waving giant pointy sticks around while in close proximity to each other.

It was tough to get good pictures of Eric during the show because I'm so short and there were a lot of people there also trying to see and take pictures. They had two Photopass photographers there, but I did try to take some video and some photos. Eric got to duel Darth Vader (or as Eric put it, "someone dressed in a Darth Vader costume") as did the kids in his line or group. The kids in the other line/group dueled against one of the Inquisitors from the Star Wars Rebels show. I can't seem to post those Photopass photos on this blog right now, so I'll have to settle for one of my own photos. Doesn't Eric look intense?

After the show, we were able to see some of the Star Wars: A Galaxy Far, Far Away show, which involved live actors dressed in costumes that included Kylo Ren, Darth Vader, Captain Phasma, and Chewbacca as well as some stormtroopers. After that, we saw the Indiana Jones Epic Stunt Spectacular that we've seen pretty much every time we go to Hollywood Studios. It's still a great show, even if they really haven't changed anything in it.

Our last activity was going back to Toy Story Mania for Eric to get a chance to do better on the shooting game. I let Natalie take my ticket while I went to get some Starbucks and get the Photopass pictures from the Jedi Training Academy placed in my account. We went back to the hotel and mostly stayed in our room. The kids were once again not interested in doing anything else at the parks or even watching fireworks downstairs from the window in one of the public areas.

My last photo for this post is a photo from one of the Photopass photographers. Natalie actually liked this picture, which is unusual. I love it because it's of me with my "favorite daughter". We had dinner together in the Contempt Cafe at the Contemporary Resort where we're staying. We had the same grilled salmon entree that we had on Tuesday, but we both still enjoyed sharing it. Eric wasn't interested in coming downstairs to eat, so we got him a kids' pepperoni flatbread to go. Natalie and I got to spend some mother-daughter time and it was a good time. Later, she watched Eric in our room and I got to go to the gym again.

Tomorrow, we're going to the last theme park, Animal Kingdom. Hopefully we'll get to go back to Magic Kingdom also.

Disney 2016 Day Three

Today was a bit of an adventure for me, because I had to arrange for transportation to Universal Orlando from our hotel. A cab would have cost more than $40 one way, but a shuttle cost $21 per person, which worked out to $63 dollars round trip for us. Add the tickets to Universal Orlando for $300 plus total, and it was an expensive day. It was well worth it, however, when I saw both Natalie's and Eric's face light up when we got to the reason why we went there--The Wizarding World of Harry Potter, Diagon Alley.

The shuttle turned out to be a Lincoln Town Car, so we ended up with our own private transportation to the park. We didn't have to make any additional stops or pickup other people, so that was really cool. there was a crowd of people heading towards the parks when we got there, but our first couple of hours were actually almost crowd-free. The weather was beautiful today--70s with a breeze, and sunny.

I haven't read the Harry Potter books in a very long time, and both Natalie and Eric have read all of the books since I last read them. The first photo opportunity was 12 Grimmauld Place, the ancestral home of the Black family. There were hardly any people there yet, so got a photo right away. The same thing happened for the Knight Bus, Natalie and Eric walked right up and took a photo with the "conductor" of the three-story bus. That bus was so big that I couldn't fit the whole thing in the frame when I tried to take this picture.

We then went into the Diagon Alley area, and Natalie made a beeline for one of the gift shops. Although I love shopping, I had to put my foot down and told her that we needed to do something else that was going to be crowded later, so we proceeded to Ollivander's Wand Shop. Interestingly, Eric went to all the sample wands and picked one out that he thought looked cool. It happened to be the Sirius Black's wand. Natalie chose a wand also, but I can't remember whose right now and she's asleep.

I had to tear them from their wand shopping so we could watch the show with Mr. Ollivander where the wand picks the person. There wasn't a line for the show, and later on in the day, there was a line out the door. Natalie grumbled, but we didn't have to wait in line to see the show, and she enjoyed it, as did Eric.

After the wand show, I bought them their wands, then I made them go outside to do something that didn't involve shopping. We went to Gringotts Bank where they have a ride. I had to no idea how the ride was, but as a rule, if there was a possibility of it being roller coaster-like at all, Eric refused to go. I stayed with him, of course, while Natalie went into the single rider line. They allowed us to go on a "bank tour" instead, which was awesome, because we still saw some of the bank scenes like the riders did, but we left just before we would be getting on the ride AND we didn't have to wait in as long a line. Eric was good about posing in front of some of the scenes from the books.

We had lunch at the Leaky Cauldron which included Eric's first taste of frozen Butterbeer. He seemed skeptical at first, but after he had some, he enjoyed it so much that we had to get some more in the afternoon before we left the park. We even had some Butterbeer ice cream, although that wasn't as special, It was like vanilla soft serve with some flavoring. Natalie and I shared the Beef and Lamb stew while Eric had the Kids' Mac and cheese. We've been able to save a little money (and not wasted extra food) with sharing entrees. Neither of us like sharing with Eric because of his very plain choices.

This is a picture of Eric dancing with a Minion. This was the last place we went to before heading out of Universal to the City Walk area. Even though I was sure that the Minion Mayhem ride would be tame (since very small children were allowed on it), he didn't want to ride it, and since Natalie and I had not been on the ride before, we couldn't vouch that he would be okay with it. The wait was 55 minutes anyway, and by this time, that would have made us potentially late for our shuttle bus pickup, so we didn't try to convince Eric to go on the ride.

We did end up in the gift shop that is at the end of the ride, however, and there was a short line to get photos with this Minion, so Eric of course wanted to do that. I was a little embarrassed that he started sticking out his butt like this, but as you can see from his smile, he was having a blast! Besides, that is the way the minions dance in the movie.

I saw this sign also on the way out, and I had to take a picture of Eric in front of it, especially since he was wearing one of his many minion T-shirts today. He hammed it up and made this silly face and held up his thumb. What a goof!

The rest of the time there we enjoyed some street shows. The Blues Brothers sang at one, and I got Natalie to pose in front of their iconic vehicle so I could send it to Patrick. He loves the Blues Brothers music. There was another show featuring the "Beat Builders" which consisted of four guys dressed up as construction workers who played percussion on construction equipment. The beat was catchy and they were entertaining. The show that Eric enjoyed was some guys pretending to sell fish and they did a combo of acrobatics and juggling (using fake fish and knives) to a catchy soundtrack. Eric was impressed, but his favorite part was at the end when they said, "#ourfishfly". He kept repeating that phrase for the rest of the day. Eric and I watched a show featuring rap music while Natalie was on The Mummy ride, and all of us watched one more show featuring two female singers that were supposedly competing. Both of them sang really well, but one sang 80s-era music while the other sang more contemporary tunes. Natalie enjoyed a lot of the songs, so she enjoyed the show.

Natalie rode on The Mummy ride by herself because, again, Eric wasn't interested. That one was probably one he would not have enjoyed anyway, according to Natalie when she came out. Eric and I noticed that the warning sign at the entrance to the ride warned people with prosthetic limbs to secure them or they might be jarred loose by the forces of the ride. That told me that the ride was most likely rougher than what Eric (or I) would be interested in. She would also have ridden the Men In Black ride (which Eric and I might have been interested in), as well as the Transformers 3D ride, but they were both closed when we were there.

We left the park at about 2pm, and ventured out to the City Walk area for a bit until it was time to go to the shuttle stop. We've taken pictures at this one spot before where there is a surfboard and it makes it look like you are surfing on the surfboard. Eric hammed it up when he was on it, but when Natalie got on it, she pretended to only be interested in texting on her phone. She can be a ham too, but in her own way.

Our shuttle bus back to the hotel was not so private, so it took us twice as long to make the trip as it did in the morning because of the extra pickups and drop-offs. We finally made it back to our hotel, we rested for a short period, then headed back out to Epcot to the countries we missed yesterday. We were hungry and ended up eating in the Mexico area. Natalie and I shared some beef tacos, and Eric had some chicken tenders. It was so packed at that restaurant that we had exit the restaurant to find seating on the ground a few feet away.

We then proceeded to Norway. I think we have taken a picture with this giant troll in the Norway gift shop every time we have gone to Disney. I should do a scrapbook page or album using all of those photos to show how the kids have grown.

Those were the two countries we missed, but we went ahead and walked in the opposite direction as we did yesterday, to go back through the other countries again, searching for something to eat for dessert. I was disappointed at the gelato choices when we got to Italy, so we didn't end up getting dessert in the Epcot World Showcase at all.

We stopped off at a playground that Eric could climb around in. There were two xylophone-like instruments and three different-sized drums in one area that Natalie played with. Eric did a lot of climbing, so much so that one of the mom's exclaimed, "Look, is that a monkey? That's a monkey!" to her small son. One of the other small children told him, as he hung upside down from one of the bars, "That isn't very safe." Although that is probably true, Eric really knows his way around a playscape.

Our last stop was the Test Track ride. Finally a ride that we thought Eric would enjoy. We originally had Fast Passes for the ride yesterday, but they closed the ride due to the inclement weather, so they said they would honor the Fast Pass today. I would have gone with them on the ride, but we didn't feel like finding a locker for our stuff, so I waited for Natalie and Eric outside. I got some Starbucks while I waited, and I ended up buying a Starbucks Epcot mug also. Natalie and Eric requested some favorite pastries for breakfast tomorrow, so I got those too.

When they came out of the ride, Natalie did not want me to get the ride photo because she thought she made a funny face when they took the picture. I saw it and she was actually smiling, although she complained that her hair was in her face. That girl! I added it to my Photopass, so now I can at least show it to the family when we get home. Eric looked excited when he came out, and he said he loved it. I'm glad he can still enjoy some rides.

We didn't get back to our room until after 8pm. It was a very long and exhausting day, but the weather was beautiful and we had fun. Tomorrow, we are going to Hollywood Studios.

Disney 2016 Day Two

Today was Day Two of our Disney Trip, but we could probably nickname it--Our Rain Day. The day started out very rainy. There were thunderstorms when we awakened this morning. The rain let up a little to barely a drizzle when we first got to Epcot, but it was fairly constant all day, often getting harder, and occasionally lightening up. We decided to visit Epcot today, because it was close to our hotel (so we could go home to change wet clothes or to rest if needed) and because a lot of activities were inside.

I didn't bring my big camera because of the rain. I was hoping to get a bunch of photos taken by the Photopass photographers, since I bought the Memory Maker package ahead of time so I can just download those photos, but because of the sometimes heavy rain, even those photographers weren't out there taking pictures. We did manage to get a few taken, like this one with the Epcot "golf ball", and I was happy to be in some photos.

We started out in the Innoventions exhibit, because there were a bunch of indoor hands-on activities for the kids to do. There weren't that many people at the park yet, which was great because the kids could take their time and not have to wait for anything. We started with some hands-on science activities, and then proceeded to the new "Colortopia" exhibit sponsored by Gladden paint (at least new since we last visited five years ago), where the kids played games with colors. The next stop was an area where the kids designed their own ride, then got to experience the twists and turns that they planned out on a simulator type of machine. It's hard to describe, but I'm sure my big boys would have thoroughly enjoyed it. Eric was within the 48 to 54 inch height window where he wasn't allowed to go upside down, but I'm sure the big boys would have included some of that in their ride. I didn't participate, obviously, because rides just aren't my thing.

I did go on two "rides with the kids. We went on a ride of sorts that included a presentation on energy by Ellen Degeneres and Bill Nye the Science Guy. It was a low "thrill" ride that was mostly the presentation. Eric enjoyed the info and the part that included animatronic dinosaurs.

The other ride was Mission:Space. We chose the "mild" Green Team that didn't involve any spinning. As it was, I got a little light-headed in the simulator that enacted a space rocket takeoff and rough landing on Mars. This is a picture before the "ride" part began. With every ride, Eric was hesitant until we told him that it wasn't like a roller coaster. He has recently decided that he doesn't like roller coasters. He loved the Mission: Space ride. After that, we participated in a simulation involving two teams fixing their space ship, and our team, team Orion won!

We had lunch at the Electric Umbrella, a fitting name for the day. We all ordered the kids' cheeseburger meals, and lunch was only about $20 today. We decided to head back to our hotel room after lunch because we were so cold. The rain wasn't bothering us, but it was windy, and we couldn't take being cold any longer.

When we got back to Epcot, we proceeded to the World Showcase. I tried to get a picture at each country. I took this one in Canada. Natalie actually saw this photo opportunity first and asked me if I wanted to take a picture of them in it. She knows how important pictures are to me, and I love that she is being so helpful.

Next up was United Kingdom, and we ended up getting Patrick a little present there. We went into a lot of gift shops today, because they were interesting with the country-themed goods they had, but also because it kept us out of the rain. The rain actually let up for an hour or two, and we actually thought it would stay that way--of course not!

We were purposely heading toward France, because I decided that I wanted a crepe for dessert and I remembered that they make those in France. I had a chocolate crepe and Eric had the vanilla soft-serve ice cream. Natalie had a Starbucks Java Chip Frappucino earlier, so she declined. Eric's cone was big enough that it started really melting halfway through his eating it, and I got to eat some of that too. The next country was Morocco, then Japan.

I wanted to share two of the photos we took in Japan. This first one was taken by someone who I took a group photo for and who wanted to return the favor. I was going to get Natalie to take the picture of Eric and me, since there were no Photopass photographers around, and she was all set to do it, but then she didn't have to. Eric had been posing for the previous photos as if he had a lightsaber or gun in his hands, but I made him stand up straight since someone else was taking the photo for us.

I took this photo in front of the gift shop in Japan. Eric cracks me up with his posing, and Natalie was doing it too. I let him pose how he wants because these photos will tell me what stage in life he is in plus he still lets me take photos of him. All I have to do is ask.

The next country was America then Italy. In the gift shop in Italy, Natalie fell in love with some expensive perfume by Valentino called "Valentina". She seemed to want me to buy it for her, but that is not something I want to get on our vacation. She did say, "Maybe for my birthday?" I told her no promises, but my baby girl is getting more expensive taste.

Next was Germany, then "Outpost" which seemed to be the same as "Africa". In this picture, we're in the China section, and this was our last stop before trekking back to Japan to eat dinner. We were trying to make it all the way around, but it was already around 5:30pm, the rain was really starting to come down hard, and we had dinner reservations back in Japan at 6:10pm. We made the reservation yesterday when Natalie and I felt like Asian food and every restaurant in Disney that we looked at had only "American". We plan on going back to finish Norway and Mexico tomorrow evening.

As you can see from Eric wearing his hood on his head, the rain was starting to get heavier at this point, so much so that we decided not to wait before heading back to Japan, and it was a good thing, because the rain started pouring down by the time we got to the Tokyo Dining Restaurant--more on this later. Eric didn't bother posing with a lightsaber because we were trying to get under cover. We spent quite a bit of time in the gift shop trying to wait out the rain, but finally we had to go.

Again, the rain didn't really bother us, but it was raining hard enough that some of it was getting in my eyes and causing my eyes to burn. By the time we got to the restaurant, my hair was dripping wet. Our jackets were damp, but at least they were still keeping us warm.

Natalie actually felt like having sushi, so we both ordered some. I was not even going to ask Eric if he was going to have sushi, but they had a chicken tempura on the kids' menu, and I told him that was like chicken nuggets or tenders. They also brought him Miso soup and he just looked at that bowl like he was saying, "No way." He did try to use chopsticks because Natalie and I were using chopsticks. He had a hard time using them the way they are supposed to be used, so he started doing what he's doing in this picture. I even offered him a fork but he said he was doing "okay". Natalie thought I needed to take a picture of this! :)

The rain let up a little so we could get back to the monorail and back to our hotel without getting too much wetter. The kids were ready to take their showers and cuddle up under warm blankets. I was good and went to the gym at the hotel. I was all by myself in there, which was fine by me after fighting the wet crowds today.

Tomorrow we are headed to Universal Orlando to see the new Diagon Alley area. Eric started watching the second Harry Potter movie tonight, so he is primed and excited for tomorrow. The forecast says sunny all day. We're looking forward to staying dry.