Back to school shopping

Two weekends ago we headed to St. George to do some back to school shopping. As it turns out 5 and 7 year old boys care as much about school clothes as they do the price of beans in Timbuktu. NOT AT ALL. So we split up with Dew taking the boys to Target to pick out backpacks and me going next door to Ross. A short time later we met back at the car, them with their shiny new back packs me with 8 pairs of size 6 Levi's. (the cashier asked if I had taken all the size 6's they had........I did and informed her my two boys that were going to wear them would likely need more in a few months so they best get some more :)

After a quick stop at the mall to get the "all important" first day outfits. (All important to pretty much just me) Dew was in the dressing room helping the boys while I grabbed sizes. I heard one of the boys ask "dad why do we have try all these on?" to which Dew replied "cus mom wants us to". Ha its good to be queen :) We (me) decided on two outfits, the boys official opinion was "yea great can we go now".

We stopped at one of our favorite restaurants, "Mongolian BBQ" for lunch. By "our" I mean me and the boys, its not Dews favorite but because he loves us we can usually talk him into going. Its a family run restaurant so its always the same people every time we go. They are so nice and give extra special attention to the boys and remember them every time. Kolby and I fill our mostly veggie bowls (he tried a little chicken this time) on one side. Luke and Dew go down the other getting their mostly meat bowls. Literally Luke gets just meat with a few noodles. Which makes this place perfect we all get what we want.

We topped off the day with a stop at the city's water park.

It should go without saying this was by far the boys favorite part of the day.

It was almost as fun for me taking pictures

All natural no posed smiles

A big part of the fun was playing "lets try to get dad wet"

I just LOVE our boys smiles

Seeing their pure joy made sitting in 105 degrees worth every minute.......every sweaty minute :)

Irony.....

I know everyone knows the definition of Irony but in case your ever asked and need to whip out the perfect example of the word I'm here to help.

You might recall that last year our garden was a lush jungle providing us with tons-o-yummy veggies. All winter my mind was in a fevered pitch as to how I could make it bigger better. I would have a whole salsa section and can dozens of jars of homemade salsa. I would have a herb section and learn to do all the things you do with herbs. Not to mention trying new veggies like soybeans and artichokes. (please picture my hands rubbing together with a glint in my eye for the above section)

In spring several weekends were spent enlarging the garden to fit all my new plans. We bought new fencing to cover the big new wonderful expansion. When you have chickens you need to fence your garden. Chickens are great to prepare the soil before and after the garden (a free little garden fact for you) but they like squash almost as much as I do so once all the good stuff starts growing they treat it like their personal salad bar. So Chickens = fenced garden.

I planted at least 100 seeds in the house weeks before they were ready to go in the ground. I lovingly placed them in front of our sliding glass door. I turned them everyday so each one got all the sunshine it needed. They grew fat and happy and I was giddy with anticipation to plant. However I heeded the "old timers" of the area. After Memorial weekend, check. No snow on the second peak on the mountains to the east, check. (these are real people) Dewey rototilled and added the mulch, the garden was as ready as can be for my little plants. One full day was spent planting, we ended up running out of room even with the expansion. But everything was in the ground just waiting to grow. Its at this point if we had set up a camera to go off a 5 minute intervals you could have watched every plant wither and die. It might have been the drought we are in causing the ground to be bone dry. It might have been the TWO freezes we had or the constant wind, its hard to say but every single stinkin one of the plants we planted died. Ever the optimistic I replanted seeds and plants Neighbor Don gave us.....didn't come up and or died. My last ditch effort was planting Winnie's extra plants from her greenhouse. So we do have a few squash plants and a cucumber plant that survived and have veggies on them.

Are you still with me?

We have had chickens for years which I really enjoy. They lay yummy eggs that I will eat (unlike those gag white ones at the store) and they play in the yard. Well not play but definitely do chicken stuff in the yard. We needed a new rooster and somewhere in the planning stage for a new rooster it was decided we would get all new chickens. So Dew and neighbor Don special ordered a BUNCH from a catalog. (don't you love that you can order anything through the mail) Don kept the chicks at his house getting up in the middle of the night (every night)  to check one them (I swear). Here's the thing with chickens you can't put new ones with old ones. We tried a few years ago and it didn't end well. Its easiest to think of the old chickens as a hardcore gang and a rival gang enters their territory...not good. So it was decided to give away all of our old chickens in preparation of the new little ones arrival. Off they went to what I am told is a happy green farm where they play all day. (Dew might sugarcoat things a bit for me) And the new chicks all 14 of them were ready to come to their new home. Things went swimmingly (don't you think that word should be used more) for all of one day. Normally Dew goes out to feed in the morning and I do afternoons but he had an early appointment so it was me that went out to find..... a chicken slaughter. Every single one of the chickens had been killed. It could have been a fox, coyote, skunk, badger,we live in the country with all manner of animals about so no way to know really.

So to recap...... enlarged garden that now holds a few skinny little plants, new fencing to keep out chickens that we gave away and or lost to a mass killing.

People if there is a better definition of Irony I dare you to find it.

Feel free to use above definition if ever needed. It might be a little long for say Jeopardy but maybe some trivia board game :)

P.S no photos for this post as dead gardens and chickens don't make for good pics.

Texas ya'll

Who visits South East Texas right smack dab in the middle of summer????

WE DO!

Well three of us do, Dewey stayed home to work and take care of the farm all things animal and green.

The boys and I drove to Las Vegas, hopped on a plane, stopped in Dallas and landed in Houston last Tues, July 3rd. And if I can just brag for a minute, the boys were both so good on the planes. I'm sure everyone has an "annoying kid while flying" stories. I'm proud to say my kids did not provide any stories for strangers. Luke seriously acts like an old pro while flying. On one of the planes we hit turbulence and the plane started bouncing. Kolby and I held hands with our eyes wide open. (there may have been a slight look of panic in them) Luke was chatting away about something totally unconcerned with whatever the plane was doing.

We made it safe and sound only to be slapped in the face as soon as we stepped outside by the heat and humidity :)

My brother Steve flew down on the same day to meet us there. We packed in loads of fun stuff the whole time.

Including stopping at the lovely little town of Columbus to see the birth place of the Texas Rangers.

My little brother Jordan is starting at TLU in the fall. (so proud of him, he got a full academic scholarship plus playing on the football team) We stopped by the campus so we could look around. Its a beautiful campus. Luke is holding a Bucky beaver. We also stopped at Buc-ee's which is holy cow the biggest and nicest truck stop I have ever seen. Of course the boys had to have their very own Buc-ee beaver. You will also notice everyone in the photo wearing Nike's I didn't get the memo and wore gasp sandals so they wouldn't let me be in the picture. Ok so really I was taking the picture but that would have been funny, and almost true.

I just love this picture of my brother Steve and Luke, holding hands in their little almost matching shoes and shorts walking the streets of San Antonio.

I burst out laughing when I saw this picture. Luke is doing his classic eyes closed looking into the sun forced smile. Kolbys is pure hot and tired forced smile. For some reason I remembered the Alamo being a lot bigger the last time I was here. Of course it was 102 years ago and I was not much bigger then the boys but still.

We made our way to the San Antonio river walk which I loved! Lush and green with lots of yummo restaurants. We ate at a British Pub for lunch, they even had a gasp vegetarian section to the menu. I had a delicious veggie BLT. (you would be surprised how easy it is to make me happy)

We took a river boat tour, mostly because I'm a nerd and love all the fun facts you can only learn from a tour guide. Luke made it all of two minutes before he was out, fast asleep on Uncle Jordans shoulder.

Back in Katy there was park time with a roller slide a hit with the boys.

In case you didn't know it was hot, this is a picture of how Kolby looked most of the time..... wet and drippy. (he bit a hole in the bottom of the water bottle....don't ask hes a 5 year old boy)

The last day before we left we went to the Houston zoo. This is the first zoo for Luke (we took Kolby to the Guatemala city zoo when he was one, he slept through the whole thing so really this could be considered his first time too) Needless to say they LOVED every minute. I have asked them several times since we have been home what their favorite part was and they each say something different each time. But if I had to guess Luke's favorite would be the dinosaurs.

I mean look at this pure happy smile on his face. Kolby was a little sure that the dino robots were going to eat him up. Luke wanted a picture taken with each and every one.

I think Kolby's favorite were the monkeys.

We had a wonderful vacation. The boys simply adore their uncles, all three of them. Adore to the point of the uncles being near super hero's in their eyes. They could not have been happier hanging out with them. I'm so thankful that we were able to make the trip and spend time with everyone. Huge thanks to our Katy family for everything you did for us we really appreciate it!!!

Adventure on our way back when one of our flights got canceled as we stood at the check-in counter. They got us on a different airline different layover city with us getting to Las Vegas two hours earlier. Great except there was not an extra two hours in our timeframe. The boys and I literally ran to make both flights. (kolby holding onto the strap on the carry on and me yelling "knees up, run run" We got to each as they were boarding. For those of you that know me know that this is something that would make me CRAZY. Luckily I have the very best hubby who took a shuttle to Las Vegas to meet us at the airport and drive us home.

Summer Solstice

To the north of us is a place called Parowan Gap. It is much as the name implies a V shaped rock gap opening from a canyon into a valley. Only it is much much more, you knew it would be right :) Ancient petroglyphs abound and it is considered sacred ground by the Native Americans. Once a year on summer soltice the sun sets exactly right down the middle of the gap. To mark this occasion on Saturday evening there was a gathering with experts to explain what was happening. Fasinating stuff!! As it turns out these petroglyphs date back to 3000BC. They were used as a calendar and map, the gap was the super highway of its day. Who knew, well the experts did but I did'nt.

See the V with the ball at the end thats the gap with the valley. There are 180 small marks you can't see in the picture that represent days.

This one is the lunar calendar with days and weeks marked off.

After a very interesting lecture we walked about a half mile to have the best view of the sun setting.

Look shadow family.

I know you are not supposed to take pictures into the sun. And when you do this is what happens, but I still like them.

This is my face when I am trying to process the words coming out of an Astrophysicist's (you better believe I had to look up the spelling on that word) mouth. Can't you just picture those little squirrels working up a sweat on a treadmill trying to get my brain to keep up :)

Random cute pic of Kolby. He was hopping around when I was taking pictures trying to get in the shot, he cracks me up.

Beautiful right?

So happy we did not miss this opportunity to learn and experince the wonder of nature.

Fathers Day.. a little late

Happy Fathers Day to all you wonderful fathers out there.

We spent the afternoon at Dad & Winnies having a very nice BBQ. I made sure they even had steaks. The real kind not the veggie meat I'm always trying to pass off to them as real. I did have to ask a fellow shopper which ones to buy, I picked someone wearing wranglers. I figure a cowboy knows a little something about beef. Nothing but the best for my two favorite dads.

I know I don't say or write enough about what an amazing father Dewey is. I have known Dewey for 26 years and he has always had a way with kids, they simply love being around him. With Luke and Kolby he is the super fun roll around on the floor wrestling kind of dad. The soccar, chess, battleship, starwars playing kind of dad. Almost every night after I have tucked the boys in bed they ask Dewey to stay and talk to them. The three of them have boy talk from 3 minutes to a half hour. Dewey stays and talks and listens until they are done saying whatever is on their minds.

Something happened this week that only added to the million things I adore about this man. Dewey has an incredably stressful and demanding job. From the moment he wakes up there are phone calls and emails waiting. This past week we noticed that Lukes Guine pig seemed to be breathing wierd. Dewey called me at work to say he was going to be late they were taking Tennison in to the vet. He had two upset and worried boys on his hands. They headed into town, got to the vets office and were waiting for the doctor to come in when Tennison took his last little breath. Now he had to explain to two upset boys that Tennison didnt make it and went to heaven. He then drove the half hour back home so the boys could bury him. That morning Dewey took the few hours that it took to make sure Luke and Kolby knew that their feelings were important. And believe me when I say Dewey does not have any spare time, he had a stack of calls waiting for him. Even when things are stressful and seem overwhelming Dewey puts the boys needs first.

Happy fathers day Dewey, we love you.

Cowboy swimming pool

So lets just say you live in the country where tumbleweeds abound and the wind always blows. You can imagine how a cute little blow up pool would not last long in such conditions. So what happens when its a very hot day and two little boys are jumping up and down to get out their swimming pool to play with. Do you explain that their pool is residing in the local dump since last fall? Leading to a surefire meltdown of epic proportions. Here's another option... If you have a very clever hubby like mine you get a "Cowboy" Swimming pool.

When you have horses you always have water troughs hanging around just waiting to be used.

I have to hand it to Dewey he played it up like this was by far the coolest and best swimming pool available. And not everybody was lucky enough to have their very own "Cowboy" swimming pool.

As you can see the boys had a blast, jumping, splishing and splashing. I have heard them telling people about their "Cowboy" swimming pool and then wathcing peoples faces go blank, makes me smile every time :)

In contrast to my sad flowerless yard is my baby sisters PERFECTLY landscaped yard. I'm not kidding not one weed in her whole stinkin yard. (you can't go more then a few feet in mine without spotting 1 or 500) I tell her the weeds are scared of her and wouldn't dare grow in her yard. (its probably true)

She has a beautiful pond that her and her husband made their very own selves.

They have all kinds of exotic fish that proved to be simply irresistible to the boys.

Since none of the fish let my little darlings pet them (weird I know) Auntie Liz showed how she hand feeds them treats. Both Luke and Kolby were suitably impressed with this.

Pretty sure that unless we win the lottery and I can pay someone to landscape and then maintain our yard it will never look as good as Liz's. But I do have standards, I occasionally ride around looking at our little neighborhood which is made up of 5-6 acre lots to check out the other yards. As long as ours is not the worst I'm happy. There is only so much time in the day, Pick your battles people :)

Lifes little adventures

Two weeks ago as I was leaving work I noticed a strange smell in the air.... Hum that smells like smoke. I turned around to see smoke billowing over our building. This picture was after, once the fire was under control but it looks much the same. That would have been cool if I was level headed enough to whip out my camera before hand.

I ran back in, grabbed Dewey and said I was pretty sure something was on fire possibly our building. He ran out and sure enough to the West side of our building there was a fire coming up the hill......fast. There happened to be a hose attached to a faucet so Dewey grabbed it and started spraying down our building. Apparently the fire department were aware that the fire was moving up hill towards business and homes, they were there within minutes. This was when my camera came out.

They had the fire under control and then out in no time at all. Which was a good thing since when the other business's in the building were running out with their servers and important equipment. I ran back in totally not prepared as to what I should grab. I mean I heard everyone talking about servers and thought yea that sounds important, huh I wonder where ours is. (ok and I really don't even know what one looks like shush don't tell)

I took these the next day, the fire was literally feet from our building.

The boys thought it was super cool their dad was a firefighter for a day, spraying the building down.

And the smoke....gag... my car stunk inside and out. Our office is just now losing the campfire smell. The other day I was standing in line at the bank and thought "gross whats that smell" Didn't take long to figure out is was me, well actually my purse. Even my cell phone smelled like smoke. 

Just another adventure.......