Early Spring

I decided to post come pictures of earlier this Spring when it was relatively sunny outside. The pool wasn't open yet, so the kids went into the backyard and played in the sandbox. They filled the lid with water and the sand was already wet and muddy from earlier rains. It was gross, but they had a blast! Tommy stripped down to his diaper and got so yucky that he had some trouble walking, as you can see below. When he finally got into the shower, it looked like he had taken half the sandbox with him in his diaper!

Anna got all ready to go to the pool one day, and we went, only to discover that they had chained it shut! She was really disappointed, but the kids went into the Master bath and "swam" in my big bathtub. They had a lot of fun, but unfortunately, I don't have pictures of that.

$10 Crib

I've been looking for a new crib for a while, but didn't really want to pay $100 or more for a new one, so I turned to Craig's List. I found this one Monday morning, and picked it up Monday afternoon. The woman selling it lived only about 2 miles away. It didn't have any hardware, but I was able to find some that worked just fine in my garage. The crib was REALLY dirty when I got it, but Tommy helped me clean it up and put it together, and I think it looks pretty good.

True Confessions

I am a good mom, at least I try my very best to be, but sometimes I make mistakes. Today, after I was done with all my chores, and Tommy was happy watching Thomas and Friends, I decided to lay down and rest. It was 3pm and I have to leave the house at 3:30 to pick Anna up from school. Well, I fell asleep and didn't wake up until 3:45! I got a call from the school on my cell phone, on my way to pick her up, asking where I was! Yikes! Anna was one of only 3 kids left waiting in the office. She was fine, no tears or anything, but I felt REALLY guilty, so we went to the snow cone stand and got snow cones. I think she wants me to be late tomorrow so we can go get snow cones again!

New Look

Missy suggested that my blog needed to be updated with a new look, so here's one I'm considering. What do you think so far?

Maybe a little help...

Danny and I are having a lot of trouble coming up with names for this baby! I only have 3 months to go, and we would like to have some help with a name. The middle name is set in stone, so feel free to fill in the blank! _______ Manuel Najera. Any and all ideas are welcome!

Our Roof is Fixed!

After the first wind storm in Feb, we discovered that some of our shingles had blown loose. We took a look at our warranty and discovered that getting it fixed for free was going to be a huge hassel, and there was a possibility of it not being covered. So, we waited, and during the last big storm, our roof started leaking into our bedroom! We checked the next day, and all the loose shingles were gone. We found them all up and down our alley and in our neighbor's yard! It wasn't good. To get the warranty to cover repairs would take more than 3 weeks, just to get the claim processed, and more storms were coming, so we called a regular roofer. They came out and did an estimate and discovered that the shingles were installed incorrectly and thus voided the warranty. The repair was going to cost around $300, and they couldn't get to us right away. Well, on Monday, I got a letter from our home builder and they had negotiated repairs with the shingle company, and said that the shingle company would cover all repair costs. I called the number that Lennar gave me, and I was told that they would send a local company out as soon as they could, to make repairs. I expected it to take them a long time to get to me, but when I came home from teaching on Tues, the roof was already fixed! For free!

Let's save some energy!

Did you know, that by simply replacing a couple of light bulbs in your house, you could save more than $100 in energy costs a year? Lighting accounts for about 20% of a home's electric bill. By switching to a CFL bulb, you could reduce greenhouse gases and save energy and money! Mom is a great example. She has already replaced most of her light bulbs with compact flourescent bulbs. Danny and I are doing the same. I know, I sound like an advertisement, or a PSA announcement, but I feel that it's important. At Wal-Mart, you can buy a 6-pack of bulbs for only about $10. Those six bulbs could end up saving you around $200 in energy savings a year. I think that's a pretty good investment. With a baby on the way, Danny and I have been trying to find ways to save money, and this is one way that we're doing it. I challenge everyone in the family to replace AT LEAST one light bulb in your home. If you've already done it, good for you!

Confessions of an Accidental Killer

Mandie may have killed her camera, but I, Melinda Najera killed a squirrel. Yes, that mangled little body on Cross Bend Drive in Plano was indeed a squirrel. The street was wet and I just couldn't brake fast enough for the little booger. The sickening thump-thump under my tires will haunt me forever, well at least for a couple of days. So I admit it, it was me that killed that squirrel, and I hope to never hit one again!

Way To Go, Anna!

Anna got 50 out of 54 questions correct on her end-of-year math test!

Take Anna to Work Day?

Tuesday morning Anna told me that her throat was hurting, and she was pretty sure that it was Strep. I looked at it, and it didn't look too bad, so I sent her to school. I had to work that day, so I told her that we would go to the doctor as soon as I was done teaching. We went that afternoon, in between thunderstorms, and sure enough it was Strep! The doctor was clearly in her 70's and didn't want to believe that it was Strep, but Anna's had it enough now that she knows when she has it. Because she had Strep and was contagious for 24 hours, she couldn't go to school on Wednesday. Well, I work on Wednesdays as well, and I couldn't take off because it's the end of the school year, or change teaching days because I was busy the rest of the week. What was I going to do? Well, the only thing I could do! I took Anna to work with me! She packed a large purse full of fun stuff to do, and off we went to teach tuba lessons! I only had 7 students that day, and 6 of them were at Danny's school, so Danny was able to entertain Anna during 3 of those students. She got bored by the last 2, but she held in there and made it to the end without any major tantrums or problems! Even when she felt really yucky and just wanted to take a nap, she didn't really complain! Ahh...if only she were like that all the time!

My New Toy!

Danny sold mom's car on Easter and she gave him a nice commission for his work. There are a ton of things that we could have done with the money, but I saw this cute, little steamer at Wal-Mart, and looked it up online. It got great reviews, so Danny and I decided to splurge and buy it. It was only $70 and it's the best $70 we have spent! I love it! My carpet gets really dirty, and this gets it really clean! It's a little disturbing to see the dark brown water that I dump out of it, but that tells me that it's working! It doesn't clean large areas at a time, but that's perfect for us, because with 2 kids running around, we can't have large areas of damp carpets! It also fits nicely in our vacuum closet, and it's not super heavy. I am no longer ashamed to let people see my living room floor!

It's a boy!

For those of you who don't know, I am pregnant, and expecting the first week of September. I had a sonogram and all looks good with the baby, and it is indeed a healthy boy! Danny and I are super excited, and Anna is quite relieved that she doesn't have to share her room with a baby! We don't have any solid names, yet, but we'll keep you updated!

Take My Test!

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My first nasal obstruction extraction

Today, after Anna got home from school, I turned on cartoons, and gave the kids their snack of Yo-Gos. For those of you who don't know what Yo-Gos are they are small, round fruit snacks covered in a yogurt shell that my kids LOVE. I have never had any problems with my kids eating them until today. Tommy started crying and was pointing at his nose, so I assumed he needed it wiped. I got closer and saw that the nose was REALLY red and said jokingly to Tommy, "you didn't stick a Yo-Go in your nose, did you?" He looked at me and whimpered, "uh-huh." So, I proceeded to try to extract that yucky thing out of his nose. I am SO glad that it was food that comes apart easily, and not something like a rock or penny that he stuck up in there. He was not happy with the whole process, and hopefully we will never go through this again! Or, this could be a glimpse into the future, sigh....boys!

I am grateful for Warranties and HOAs!

As you know, we had some roof damage from the wind storm a while back. Noel gave us a number of a trusted roofer, but for some reason, we never got around to calling him! Noel even called us twice to see if we had followed through, but it just never happened. Well, one day, I was bored and got online and went to our HOA website. I rarely ever visit it, but I was glad I did! On the home page there was an announcement about the wind storm and the damage caused to our roofs, with a link to the warranty division of Lennar (our homebuilder) to get our roof fixed. Apparently, our roof has a 10-year Warranty and will be fixed for free! Danny and I had no clue. We thought that there were no more warranties on the house when we moved in. I am SO GLAD that we won't have to pay to fix our roof, and that we were lazy and never called Noel's roofing guy! I'm also glad that my HOA is good for something! The roofers were supposed to come this weekend, but that didn't happen, so we're just playing the waiting game. I'm not going to complain because it's free!

Not Again!!!

Last night, after her bath, Anna was complaining that she was cold, so she put on her footie pajamas. I thought she was crazy because it was quite comfortable, and almost too warm, but I made sure that I took off her blankets before I went to bed. Well, when I went to wake her up this morning, she had 2 blankets on top of her, and she was burning up! She took the blankets off, and went straight to the bathroom (nothing unusual). But, she didn't come out for about 5 minutes, and then I heard her calling. She was on the bathroom floor, clutching her stomach and saying that she had to throw up. I moved her to the toilet, and she did, indeed, throw up. She got all cleaned up, and went straight to the living room to lay down, with a thick blanket. I called my baby-sitter and Danny and told them that I would not be teaching today, and as soon as the Dr.'s office opened, I called them, too. Red flags were going up everywhere when Anna said her throat hurt, as well as her stomach. I wasn't going to miss another possible Strep episode this time, and the vomiting made sure of that! Well, the doctor confirmed that Anna has Strep, AGAIN. It's the second time this year! The doctor said that if she has it 1-2 more times this season, we will be referred to an ENT to take a look at her tonsils, and possibly have them removed. Yuck, but at this point, I'm tired to having to disinfect the house each time she has Strep, and deal with the 10 days of antibiotics. So, this is not the day I had planned, but at least Anna will be on the road to recovery quickly, and possibly go to school tomorrow.

Our Trip to the zoo

Today Tommy, Anna, and I went to the zoo with Grandma, Missy & Ben, Randi & Mary, Suzy, and Damaris. It was VERY busy today with Spring Break, but despite the crowds, we had a pretty good time. Suzy, mom, me, Damaris, and I think Missy all brought cameras so there should be tons of pictures. Here are a couple of cute ones of mine. Anna was the navigator today, so her and Suzy took the lead and lead us through the zoo. I don't know what I would have done if Suzy and Damaris weren't there to help me with my kids! Thanks! In the last picture (but actually the first animal we visited), the ape actually charged the window scaring everyone except Tommy. You should have seen Anna and grandma running for their lives! It was kind of funny, but Anna didn't think so. She didn't want to see any more primates and was ready for something a little more low key, like flamingos.

March Madness

Here's a picture of Tommy helping Danny remove the old baseboards and quarter rounds from our kitchen. As you can see, that linoleum isn't super ugly, but it's still not something I was willing to look at any longer! It was just too dirty, and very hard to keep clean, especially with Tommy around. If he would splatter any tomato-based sauce on the floor, it would stain it pink! Yuck. So, we decided to put in some laminate flooring. This week is Danny's Spring Break, so we thought it was the perfect time to get a big job like this done!



What do you think? We're still not completely finished with it, though. We lack some baseboards in the pantry, and a couple of quarter rounds, oh, and the final moulding piece that connects the laminate with the carpet. It has taken us 3 long days to do less than 150 square feet of floor, but just looking at it now, I think it was totally worth it! Danny and I are both super tired, and I know those Home Depot people are really enjoying our 1-2 trips out there a day!

Technically, the wind storm happened at the end of February, but it's close enough. This is some of the damage to our roof from that storm. We still haven't been able to get it fixed, though. All it requires is some tar to hold down those shingles, but we're not sure if anything else was damaged, so we're waiting for a pro to come out and take a look at it!

Lighting Deals

I went shopping today and found this super-cute Hello Kitty rice lamp for only $3.49 at Target! It's normally $12.99! Anna was telling me just the other day that she wished that she could everything that is Hello Kitty. Well, now she's one lamp closer!
This is our new entry way light. I got this at Ikea for only $17.50! It was half price because the box was dented! I think it's WAY better than our old light, and the price was just a fraction of what we would have paid at any other store!
Yes, this is our old light. Danny and I didn't like it at all, but Anna just LOVED it! She tried her hardest to keep us from taking it down, but of course, we prevailed. If anyone wants it, it's yours!

Movie Reviews (I'm copying Missy)

So, Danny and I decided to subscribe to Blockbuster Total Access. It's so great! We don't go to the movies very often, so there are always A LOT of movies that we have to catch up on! Also, Anna loves Hello Kitty, and she can rent all the Hello Kitty movies out there, which is somewhere around 30! Well, we've rented a lot of movies recently, and we would like to recommend a few.

RV: This movie is hilarious! If you love slapstick comedy and Kristen Chenowith (sp?) then you'll love this movie!

Cinderella 3: A Twist in Time: Anna and Tommy give this one 2 thumbs up! Tommy learned to say "rewwa" (short for Cinderella) from watching this one. The plot is pretty thin, but if you love true love prevailing in the end, then this one is for you!

Shaolin Soccer: Kenny recommended this one to us a long time ago, and we just got around to watching it. It's so funny! It's action-packed with soccer and martial arts, and plenty of Chinese wit.

Others worth seeing are: Invincible, Goal!, Nacho Libre, Click, Curious George, and Open Season.

Those NOT worth seeing are: Mission Impossible 3, and Beauty and the Beast: Belle's Magical World (so boring that even Anna didn't sit through this one!).

Anna Knows Best

Yesterday, Anna came into my room and announced that she couldn't go to school because she had Strep Throat. I looked at her like she was crazy, and then checked her temperature. It was normal, and she had no symptoms other than a sore throat. I sent her to school, but when she came home, she said her throat hurt worse and her eyes were all itchy. I thought that it must be allergies, and gave her some allergy medicine and sent her to dance class. At around 10pm we heard Anna crying in her room, so we went and checked on her. She said her throat was hurting so bad that she couldn't sleep. That sent up some major red flags, so we grabbed the thermometer to check her temp, but the darn thing decided that after almost 6 years of service that it was time to quit! I told Anna that we would go to the doctor first thing this morning, and she agreed quickly (which is quite unusual because she HATES going to the doctor!). Well, lo and behold, we went to the doctor this morning and Anna has a bad case of Strep as well as Pink Eye! I should have listened to her on Thursday morning when she told me that she had Strep. Goodness knows she's had it enough to know what it feels like!

Remarkable Flowers

Missy asked me how my plants were doing, and I thought

I would show you. I can't believe this bulb actually bloomed! I thought for sure it would die, but apparently, it's quite resilient! So far, none of my flowers have died. My big bush bounced back into shape after all the ice melted, but a smaller bush that was planted in front of it was flattened, and I'm hoping it will begin to grow back in the Spring. Hopefully, my plants will not suffer any lasting damage from all this ice and snow, and I'll have beautiful Spring pictures to share with you!

Once There Was A Snowman...

I can't remember the last time I built a snowman, so I decided to go outside today and give it a try. It ended up only being about a foot tall, but don't you think it's cute?
Tommy had never seen a snowman, or in this case, a snowgirl, so he was quite intrigued by it.
As you can see Tommy is wearing only a fleece shirt and pants, sandals, and my gloves! Believe me, it was a struggle to get that much clothing on him! Right now, he's asleep on the couch in only a diaper! Needless to say, he didn't last long outside today!

Oh, What a Beautiful Morning!

Ahh...the beauties of snow! It started snowing yesterday a little before 3pm, and didn't stop until 7pm. We didn't expect much more snow, but when Tommy woke up at 3am, I looked outside to see thick, falling snow! The picture above is a picture I took before I took Anna to school this morning. I was glad I did, because as soon as I stepped on the street, I discovered that it was not snow, like it looked, but ice! So, I prepared myself for a slippery drive to Anna's school! To begin with, our alley was an icy mess, so just getting to the street was trecherous! We got to the street and inched our way along. Our 3 minute drive turned into an almost 10 minute drive! We saw lots of interesting things along the way, such as a Hummer, who thought he was above it all and could drive quickly, slipping to a stop at a stop sign. Serves him right. And 3 kids, who were walking to school, fall on their little behinds as they tried to walk on the icy side walks! Poor kids. What an interesting morning! The picture above is one I took this morning, and the picture below is one I took yesterday at 5pm.
And last, but certainly not least, Anna and Tommy outside this morning. They wanted to be outside and LOOK at the snow, but they refused to touch it, and certainly didn't want to play in it! Two minutes outside for a picture was enough for them!

Pictures from Wednesday

Anna spent most of the day playing her Hello Kitty video game. Tommy erased all of her game data, so she had to start all over from the beginning! She wasn't too happy about that, but at least she didn't have to go to school! She also spent the entire day in her Dora nightgown!
















Tommy spent the day being VERY silly and getting in loads of trouble. But, that's just like every day!












My crazy bulbs started coming up shortly after Christmas, and now I'm sure they regret it! They are already turing brown and wilting!

More Ice!?!

After a long night of kids waking up for various reasons, and Tommy climbing into bed with us at 6am, Danny got up to get ready for school. We were both very tired, and quite suprised when the phone rang a little before 7am. It was an automated phone call from McKinney ISD telling us that school had been cancelled! We had missed the weather report the night before, and during the night we thought we heard rain, but we were suprised when we looked outside and saw a solid layer of sleet! Danny and I are both a little upset about the school closings, even though we're tired. Today is one of my teaching days, and Danny has a concert next week that his students aren't quite prepared for, and they desperately needed today's rehearsal! The only one happy about today is Anna, of course. So, we'll sit out this icey day, and hope for better weather tomorrow!

ICE!

This morning, we woke up to a land of ice. Everything in sight was covered in about an inch of it!

Everything looked very pretty until I saw our nearly 12 foot shrub reduced to a bent-over mass of branches only 4 feet high, as you can see below!
You can see our formerly tall bush at the very edge of our house. I hope it bounces back when the ice melts!

December

Now that we have a much faster internet connection, I can post more pictures! It used to take me, I kid you not, almost 3 minutes to post ONE picture! Now I can do three in less than a minute! Here are some pictures from this past December.

Here's Anna at her very first dance recital on December 9. She danced to the Chinese dance from "The Nutcracker." We have about a minute of the dance on video, and I'll try to post that soon.
Anna and Tommy on Christmas Eve.

Anna's fabulous gingerbread house she made at school. Didn't she do a great job?

More pictures of Tommy's room

Bittersweet Sunday

Well, it has happened. I am officially released from Nursery. This was a difficult calling for me, and I'm glad it's over, but I'm also a little sad. Another worker and I worked out a great new schedule for Nursery and it worked really well on Sunday! We actually had fun! I don't think I had fun in Nursery at all since I was called. We didn't really have structure to the Nursery until now and it made a huge difference for the workers as well as the kids! We used to have 1 and 1/2 hours of toy time, which was SO boring, but now we have reading time, and singing time, and actual structured play time! It's great! Time goes by so much more quickly! I'm glad that the changes were made, but a little sad that it took 10 months to make changes! I just sat back and let the Nursery Leader do all the work, and I didn't really voice my opinion until I had another worker back me up and give me support. I have learned so much in this calling in just the last couple of weeks! I'm grateful for this experience, but now I can have a much more relaxing Sunday!

Tommy's new bed!

It's taking us a while to finish up Tommy's room, but I finally bought his comforter today, so I decided to take pictures. Of course, no room is ever "finished" so this is a picture of Tommy's bed.

Well, I thought I had the cutest kids....

So, when I looked at everyone's blogs, I kept thinking that "man, my kids are cuter than yours!" But, as I scanned through baby pictures of Tommy, I realized that even the cutest of kids can take some REALLY bad photos!

Sad News

On Sunday, we learned that Ella Mae and Manuel won't be joining us for Christmas. Manuel is in the hospital with some sleep-related issues and won't be strong enough to make the trip up here. We love them very much, and we will miss them this Christmas!

Our SUPER busy Saturday!

Danny and I decided that Tommy needed a room makeover because he wasn't sleeping in his room! We chose a new color and decided to take down his toddler bed and buy him a big boy bed. We bought the bed at Ikea on Friday night, and prepped the room so I could paint Saturday morning. I started painting Saturday and discovered that the blue that was already on his walls bled through the light brown that I was painting! We also had to paint over the inside walls around the window. Who paints that? Apparently the previous owner did, so we had to take down the blinds and paint all of that section too, unless we wanted a brown room with a blue window area! So, already the job was getting harder. Danny was so wonderful and decided to clean up the kitchen while I painted. After he did the dishes, he went to run the disposal but the disposal just hummed and didn't run! After a couple of seconds the humming stopped and we started smelling a faint burning smell. Danny opened up the cabinet under the sink and the disposal was smoking a little! Danny took Anna to Home Depot and they bought a new disposal ($80! Yikes!) and Danny spent the next hour installing it. After that was all said and done, it was around 4:30. I had finished Tommy's room, which was a complete miracle, and it was time to go to the Ward Christmas Party. We would have skipped it, except we were playing in the "Nauvoo Band" and Danny was directing it! The party was really good, except I didn't get to play much because I was chasing Tommy all over the building! Poor Anna didn't get to do much either because I was busy chasing Tommy and Danny was leading the band. We were so exhausted when we got home, but the house was a disaster! We spent about an hour cleaning the house, and another hour moving Tommy's furniture into his room and setting up his new bed. It was a long, and fruitful day, but hopefully we don't have another one like this for a long time!

Snow!

So, my kids officially do not like snow! Tommy didn't go outside today until I went to pick up Anna and he cried the entire time! Anna couldn't wait to get into the snow when she got home from school, but she was outside for a total of 3 minutes until she came in and professed, "I don't want it to ever snow again! It's too cold!"

Let it Snow! Let it Snow! Let it Snow!

Wow! Snow in November! I LOVE days like this because they don't happen very often! We had a ton of rain last night and were disapointed to wake up to a wet day, instead of a winter wonderland of ice and snow like they promised last night on the news! But, the snow finally came around 11am, and hopefully we'll get more! This picture was taken at noon, and I'll post more when we get more accumulation.

Some Pictures From the Parade

Anna's class sitting in the median watching the parade and chanting, "USA! USA! USA!"
The front of the parade with the first graders leading it off.

The cool biker guys.

Anna posing for me, with her friend Jose Antonio in the background.

Patriotic Parade

On Friday, November 10, Anna's school had a Patriotic Parade, and it was really fun! They had all the parents, grandparents or any relative who are firemen, policemen, paramedics, or armed forces come march in the parade in full uniform. It was neat to see the pride in the kids' faces as they marched with them! They had a motorcycle brigade, 3 police cars, a firetruck, a float with war vets, several cars with various school officials, 3 motorcycle cops, and all the children in the school marched in between. All the kids wore red, white, and blue and had made flags or banners to wave. The Kindergardeners got to watch all of the parade from the street, and joined in at the end. Papaw's name was also put on the Wall of Rememberance with other members of the armed forces that have passed. We had a lot of fun and we look forward to the parade next year!

Tommy the chef

Here's Tommy's Halloween costume. I decided to make him a chef, or a little baker as Anna calls him, so I could incorporate his beloved spoon into his costume. This is about the best picture I could get of him that night! He was a little hyped up on candy, as you can see in his hand, and the excitement of Halloween in general made it almost impossible for him to stand still. This was taken on our front porch where he was entranced with our super-cool, fiberoptic cat that would light up and move (thanks mom!).

Anna's Halloween Costume

This year I decided to buy Anna's costume instead of make it. So, we talked about what she wanted to be for Halloween, and she said she wanted to be Cinderella, then changed her mind, and wanted to be Aurora, and changed her mind AGAIN, and ended up wanting to be every Disney princess or Fairytopia, or anything that was pink or sparkly! I ended up taking her to Toys R Us and it took her only about 5 minutes to decide on this Fairytopia outfit. Gosh, I wonder why?