Category: Birthdays

Been trying to update all day and of course, never got a chance. Oh, what I’d give for wireless internet and a damn laptop. I’m gonna start saving for one, dammit (a laptop).

Anyway, my birthday was lovely . Thank you all who wished me a Happy Birthday…I’ll get back to you all individually soon!

My birthday was so totally not what I expected for some reason…and that’s good. I didn’t think we’d do anything to begin with, but we did, and on my actual birthday, not on the weekend like I initially thought.

I woke up and got Eenan ready for school then dropped him off. The first thing he said when he woke up was “Happy Birthday, Mama!!” Then, when I left him at his class his teacher wished me a happy birthday too. I thanked her and asked how she knew and she said, “He’s been talking about it non-stop since Monday”. My baby! *tear* When I got back I just sat on the couch and idly watched TV. Mario woke up, wished me a happy birthday and then asked me what I wanted for breakfast. I was craving an omelette and so he made me one. It was the cheesiest, tastiest omelette with ham, jalapenos, and cilantro I’ve ever eaten and although I may have gained 5 lbs. that morning, OMG it was SO worth it!

We plopped ourselves on the couch after our gluttonous breakfast and after flipping through channels, Mario decided to cancel the Starz package and got Showtime. After a few seconds of flipping again, I found one of my favorite 80’s movies, For Keeps?. Mario, being the wonderful husband that he is, sat through it and toughed it out to make me happy .

We picked Eenan up from school and I see him bringing a cupcake with him. Ms. O. told Mario (since he’s the one who got off the car to get him) that a little boy had a birthday party and Eenan refused to eat the cupcake…he said he was keeping it for me since it was my birthday . How freaking sweet is THAT? He even brought me a party hat…aww!

I took my time getting ready when we got home. We’d be meeting at Yadira’s for my birthday. We had lasagna, spaghetti and salad and everything was delicious. Bless Mary’s heart for cooking everything . They also surprised me with an ice cream cake from Dairy Queen! I’d told Mario I’d love to have one and they got me one! It was delicious. Mario ended up having two slices LOL.

After cake, I opened my gifts. Mary and Big Mario got me a gorgeous heart-shaped ruby necklace (that I’m dying to wear somewhere!) and Cata, Annie and the kids got me two cute T’s–one with Tinkerbell and one with the Pink Panther. Yazmin wrote me a letter on a Hello Kitty card and gave me two Hello Kitty Uno cards with a 2 and a 3 on them…too sweet . I was a happy, happy girl.

My nose was red-raw because I was constantly blowing it. Egh! I’m just glad I wasn’t as sick as I thought I was going to be. I think *knocks on wood* that I may have actually skipped the cough part of this thing!

The next day was the usual. Jaylen and I just chilled out here. I had cleaning to do, so I was kind of relieved that Sonia would be picking Eenan up for me. John came over since he’d be spending the weekend here for Jaylen’s party. Mario got out of work a little early and took me out to a movie for my birthday. We watched Beauty Shop. Mario was cringing at the thought of watching a “girlie movie” but he actually enjoyed it. My favorite line in that movie’s got to be “It’s hotter than a jalapeno’s coochie out there.” That’s how I’d describe a south Texas afternoon . The only thing I didn’t like was that we once again sat in front of a bunch of annoying little kids who were constantly kicking our seats. I refrained from smacking the little girl behind Mario and instead yelled at her to quit her shit. What is it with these morons? I don’t pay almost $8 to have my damn seat kicked .

After the movie, we went next door to Wal-Mart and Mario bought me two DVD’s I wanted, 50 First Dates and 13 Going on 30–both make me cry like a baby at the end . We tried looking for Independence Day for him, but had no luck.

The next day after we ate breakfast and Mario left to work I got ready and went to town with Mary to run errands. Eenan stayed with John. First thing we did was pay bills. I paid all of them and it felt so nice getting everything out of the way. Then we went to Target where I bought a cute brown shirt with embroidered flowers on it and my favorite bras which were on sale. We went to Pet Smart for rat food and I saw some red eared sliders–they were HUGE. My babies are going to (hopefully) get that big one day .

We went to the new Wal-Mart, which was extremely crowded, to get a few things we needed for the goodie bags for Jaylen’s party. I also found Pocky sticks! I’ve never seen them at the other Wal-Mart, or anywhere else for that matter.

When we were on our way home there was this green truck in front of us. It suddenly stopped in front of the drive thru shaped like a 6 pack of Cokes so we stopped too, naturally. Then we felt this huge smack that jerked us foward. Someone hit us. Since Jaylen had been moody, I’d reluctantly sat him on my lap and he fell asleep. I’m so, so grateful that nothing worse happened. I couldn’t sleep that night thinking, “What if he’d taken his seat belt off if he was in his seat?”, “What if it would have been much worse and he was on my lap? What if he flew out the windshield?!” “We were in the van, what if we were in one of the smaller cars?” I’m extremely anal about them being in their seat belts and I couldn’t believe we get hit when he’s not in it. Instinctively I wrapped myself around him when I felt the van jerk foward and immediately afterwards I felt my back start throbbing. When we were getting off to check the van, I hear Mary say, “Oh my God, he’s leaving!” Asshole . I asked the men that were standing nearby if they saw where he went. He’d reversed and then made a U-turn and sped off and according to the men, his whole bumper was hanging off. There was glass everywhere and it wasn’t from the van. All that happened to the van was a piece of plastic fell off of something, the bumper got scratched and the license plate fell off. May karma strike that man and his car .

After calming down and shaking it off, we came home. Mary made broccoli rice for Mario’s Grandpa Leo’s birthday party and I cleaned up and then bathed the kids. I took an Advil after bending over the tub to wash them because my back was killing me. We left to pick Mom up from work–she’d be spending the night also for Jaylen’s party. We went to the other Wal-Mart afterwards to pick up a few more things they didn’t have at the other Wal-Mart and to exchange a gift Mom bought Jaylen since Andy bought him the same one. THEN we went to Grandpa Leonel’s party. The food was awesome and they even sang Happy Birthday to me LOL. The kids had fun running around with the puppies and all their cousins. On the way home, Mom gave me my birthday present from her–a beautiful silver heart-shaped necklace with lots of little pink and white stones on it .

When we got home I fed everyone and then we worked on the rest of the Ninja Turtle centerpieces–just touch ups here and there. I got everything ready for the next day and finally finished around 12am.

The next day we all got ready, had breakfast and then got ready to leave to town since we had lots of stuff to do before the party. Mom and Eenan would go with Mary and John and Jaylen would go with us. We went to JCPenny to leave a payment and get Jaylen some new shoes and a shirt for Mario. Then to Payless to exchange some shoes Mom had given me…I got some cute, brown Airwalk flip flops to match my blouse. Then we went to Pet Smart to get the filter for the turtles’ tank, some crickets for them, water conditioner and some new, bigger pebbles for their tank since we removed the gravel ones (they might think they’re food and eat them). I still want to get them a background for their tank and a cute ceramic/resin? palm tree they had there .

We went to Wal-Mart again to get Jaylen a new gift from Mom and John needed some stuff so he got them. Then we went to Best Buy to get Independence Day for Mario and then to Home Depot for heaven-knows-what that he needed and then to Dairy Queen, which was right across from the party, to get Mario some food since he was “starving” and said the pizza wouldn’t fill him up. I got a yummy caramel Moolate *swoon*.

When we got to the place, Eenan was already playing and Jaylen quickly joined him. John watched them for us while we got stuff ready at the tables.

Aunt Nora and Tio Arturo were some of the first to get there. We mingled while we were waiting for them to bring out the pizzas. Albert’s wife, Jannette, got there with her two nieces and her baby, Alan. I sat with her for a good while and we ate and talked. She’s nice . Jaylen had a blast. We brought everyone together to sing to him while he and Eenan poked at the cake as usual LOL.

After we ate cake, it was time for him to open his gifts. I think he needed a nap by then because he was quickly becoming irritated. He was grunting when I’d ask him to take pictures with his gifts.

He opened a few presents and then got to Andy’s, which was the Rafael (or Rafayeld, as Jaylen calls him) set with the bandana, sai (?), belt, and elbow/knee pads. He didn’t want to open anything else after that. Then Eenan wanted to play with it so all hell broke loose LOL.

They played a little more and then the party was over. We thanked everyone for coming and then dun*dun*dun…it was time to pay. We were SO surprised to find out it was only $281 this time. We’d given $100, and Mom had given $100 for the deposit, and Mary put in the $81. I’m so glad they help us out each year and I’m so glad it wasn’t so pricey this time (there’s usually a whole lot more people). One year it came out to $725…yeah, heart attack .

We dropped Mom off at home and she noticed she didn’t have her shoes–she’d left them at our house so I said I’d go drop them off. I cleaned up while Mario set up the new stuff in the tank for the turtles. Then John, Jaylen and I left to Mom’s. I wasn’t too nervous driving all the way over there, which surprised me since it was my first time driving all the way over there without Mario instructing what to do and where to go. The off-ramp made me nervous, but I did okay, and when we passed by the big Coke drive-thru I got nervous too, because I remembered when that idiot hit us. Other than that I did good. I sat and had a chat with Mom and Aunt Nora for a good hour and then we left.

John stayed over again that night since he didn’t have to go into school till noon on Monday. I cut his hair that morning after dropping Eenan off and then helped Jaylen open the rest of his presents, when he finally remembered there were some (he was still clutching on to his sai sword thingy Andy got him though!). I cleaned the house most of Monday…it was chaotic. Sonia picked Eenan up again for me that day since I wasn’t going to use Noelia’s car. I went to the Dollar General with Mary for a few odds and ends and got some scrapbooking stuff. I want to start scrapbooking so badly, but need more supplies first. I’ve got so many ideas! When we got home, I started on Jaylen’s cake. Since the 18th was his actual birthday, I was baking him a cake to celebrate. He wanted green frosting, so I used up 1/4 of a bottle of green food coloring to do it. Then I drew Rafael on it LOL. He liked it. He blew out his candles, then we ate cake and he opened his presents. Later Yadira stopped by with the girls and they had some cake too. Yadira said she didn’t like yellow cake (all we had) but she tried it and ate it all. She said, “And I really don’t like this. Dammit, Yajaira!” I guess it was good cake !

We talked about the kids’ first days of school and then she mentioned maybe putting him in Head Start next year, since he’s already 3 and is potty trained. I’m not sure if we’ll qualify, or if I even want him to go there (she took Angela out since the teachers or whatever they are were being sort of negligent). But then I really want to start school and get a job and all that jazz…so ugh, we’ll see.

After everyone left, we came back here and Mario got home. He ordered Flight of the Phoenix…very good movie.

As for today, it was spent cleaning once again. After picking Eenan up from school we went to the Family Dollar where I bought 3 stacking shelf things for them to put their toys in. Jaylen’s Ninja Turtle box became too small after all the Ninja Turtle gifts he got this weekend and their Dinosaur boxes are overflowing. I got them to help me clean the room because it was a disaster and I painstakingly scrubbed crayon off the floor since Jaylen decided to scribble all over . I got all my chores done early and still got to enjoy American Idol and I Want a Famous Face, or whatever it’s called. It’s already 12:23 though, which sucks because I actually thought I was going to get to sleep early. I forgot to wash Mario’s work clothes during the day and had to stay up for that . I’m ready to crash right now.

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Thursday was spent in town all day. Ate at Burger King for breakfast (healthy! *sarcasm*), went to JCPenny for Eenan’s shoes, Target to return/exchange some things (exchanged a shirt for the Cheer Bear Cub I wanted–only to have it go on sale again this Sunday!), a shoe store who’s name I can’t remember for Mario’s shoes, Wal-Mart for house stuff, Star’s for lunch, back home so the boys (including Mario) could all take naps, spent some time outside talking to Big Mario and ooohing over the truck he bought (very cute 70’s stripes along the side!), went to RGVmag to get our “prize” since Mario answered the mystery thing correctly (and I’ll be coming out in the magazine in a few months–I looked like total crap!), stopped at Mario’s work, took Eenan for a haircut (only $3.75!), visited Mom & John for a while, went to H-E-B for groceries, picked up a pizza from Pizza Hut (our prize!), and then I got home and made mole/rice for Mario’s lunch the next day, tried watching a movie with Mario on the futon but kept dozing off, and then I went to bed. *whew* Yeah, it was as hectic as I just described .

Friday the boys and I just chilled out here and when Mario got home from work we went to Jorge’s (with only Jaylen, Eenan of course was sleeping over with his Nana). Don’t really remember much from that day…it’s a bit of a blur.

The next morning I made breakfast and saw Mario off to work then got the boys ready since we’d be going with Mary and Yazmin to watch Robots. It was too cute and funny. The boys actually sat through the whole thing and didn’t ask to go home once. When 4pm rolled around I took the meat, sausage, and fish down so it would thaw and made a chocolate cake and flan. I got myself ready and called Mary since she’d be watching the boys for us while we went to Hiram’s get-together. Mario got there and we got all the stuff we needed for the bar-be-cue together. On the way over I had this nagging feeling we forgot something. I think I told Mario twice, “I hope we didn’t forget anything”. We get there, say hi to everyone and take all the food to the kitchen. We were already late and we had the majority of the food. When taking all the ingredients out of the bag for the guacamole dip I was going to make, we realize we forgot the darn meat! He took off in a huff and came all the way back home to pick it up. I met Naomi and Eric, then later on Albert, Jannett and their baby, Alan; Frankie, and the Cat (as they call him) arrived. Joe and Hiram were already there with Jorge and Maggie. All in all it was a great night. Lots of laughs and Alan fell in love with me. I don’t think a baby I don’t know’s ever just jumped on my lap like that. He was the cutest thing with the BIGGEST eyes I’ve ever seen! Hiram got a little wasted and was being hilarious. He ended up with cake all over the place and was even spanked with a huge plank by Eric LOL. He complimented my cake and said he was impressed…that only his mom made cake that moist..aww! Maggie liked the flan…she ate half the pan by herself, no joke!

Everyone was really nice. I was a bit leery about going since there were going to be all these people I’ve never met there, because everyone (mostly the guys Mario works with) like to talk shit about the wives and how ugly/fat they are. Mario told me not to worry because I wasn’t fat/ugly and because everyone thought I was cool and not bitchy LOL. That made me feel a little bit better .

Sunday Mario was off work and we just stayed home all day long. It was so boring LOL. He made dinner that night which was Penne Pasta with spaghetti sauce, ground beef, and mushrooms mixed in. He topped it off with parmesean cheese and some spices and some garlic/parmesean bread…it was SO good.

Today was the first day back at school for Eenan. Back to the same ol’ routine…egh. He did good though…didn’t give me a hard time when he woke up or anything. ‘Open House’ was tonight and it was the first day of their book fair. Mary, Noelia, Jaylen, Eenan and I all went walking to the school. Ms. O. had nothing but nice things to say about him. He’s such a good student, I’m so proud . He went around the class showing us everything they do, where he sits, and was even showing Jaylen stuff like puzzles and their games. We went to the book fair and they got Unlovable, How Do Dinosaurs Get Well Soon? and Little Quack’s Hide and Seek. They’re all too cute, but I especially loved Unlovable. Now I want a pug .

Tomorrow they’re having “Muffins for Mom’s Day” for Public School Week at 10am. Since I won’t have a car (Mario will be at work by then) I’m taking Jaylen in his stroller and we’re going for a walk. Hopefully it’s nice out, like it was today. It’ll be good exercise.

For dinner tonight I made Chicken with a Twist, without the ‘twist’ since I used elbow macaroni (I had nothing else!). It came out pretty good–the boys even ate it. Let’s see if my toughest critic, Mario, likes it. He’s finally home from Jorge’s .

Hah, he liked it, who’da thought? I really need to go see Gramma this weekend. Mom called and told me she was very depressed and was complaining about a pain in her chest. I hope they get her checked out and that nothing’s wrong with her. I kept thinking about her and was praying she was okay. I wish I could see her more often . Okay, Jaylen’s heavy and is on my lap trying to go back to sleep so that’s my cue. Goodnight.

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Hadn’t blogged in a few days due to a horrible cold I got. I’m finally almost completely over it, thank God.

So Pixiehost finally received a payment from me. I had to manually send it, which is what I think I’m going to do from now on since their billing system is not working. I had some downtime that same day I made the payment, which kind of pissed me off, naturally, but it wasn’t for long. Or, so I hope it wasn’t.

Saturday, I dragged my sickly ass to two parties with the mom-in-law and the boys. I felt really bad–my whole body was weak, my head was killing me, I was coughing up a storm and my nose was dripping like a water faucet–but I’d promised her earlier in the week that I’d accompany her, so I obliged. We went to visit Gramma first for a little while. She’s doing so, so well . Jaylen and I had some sugar free candies with her and chit-chatted and then we left.

The first party was a pizza party at Peter Piper. I thought I was going to die. The kids didn’t make it any easier on me. Sure, most of the time they give me a little trouble in public, but it was a thousand times worse considering that I felt like crap. Melissa had a Shark Tale theme for Jaimito and had gotten two tables. On the center of each table, she had a little goldfish bowl with a Beta fish and pastel rocks in it. Needless to say, the boys fell in love, would not leave the table, and I practically had to drag Eenan out when we were leaving. She was raffling them and a few plush fish she also had on the tables and we didn’t win anything, which made Eenan feel worse.

We left to the other party, which was a surprise party for one of Mary’s co-worker’s sons. Jaylen had crayons and a little activity book that was in their goodie bags from the previous party, so he was cool. Eenan took his Gameboy SP down with him, and his game was pissing him off so he was quickly developing an attitude. After threatening to take it away, he finally started calming down. The birthday boy got home, and everyone yelled out ‘Surprise!’. He wasn’t surprised…someone had left an invitation lying around and he found out about it. Bummer.

Since I’d already eaten two slices of pizza, some strawberry soda (very little…it was yucky) and a buffalo wing at the pizza party, I only had a cup of beans to eat and a Coke to drink. Broke my no-caffine streak. And it totally fucked up my stomach too, let me tell you. I had the most increcible gas EVER and I got constipated. TMI, I know, but that just goes to show how bad that crap can be (even though it tastes really good sometimes *sigh*.) The boys and Mary ate and I spoke with Yvonne, another of Mary’s co-workers about potty training. Her Goddaughter has been potty trained since she turned 2. I told her about how I’ve tried potty training Jaylen since he was 1 1/2, then I give him a break because he gets annoyed and doesn’t want to cooperate. She said her Goddaughter’s mom would encourage her to pee in the potty chair as soon as she got her out of the tub and then one day, just stuck her in panties and never put her back into diapers. She would also give her little treats or prizes when she’d successfully make it to the restroom. I didn’t ask about accidents and she didn’t mention them so I don’t know about that. She did tell me what I knew all along: boys are a bit harder to potty train. You’re telling me. Eenan didn’t get potty trained till he turned 3. He just wouldn’t do it. Couldn’t stand the sight of underwear and he could have cared less about prizes. All he wanted was his diaper. Then one day, while watching Blues Clues, he asked if I could bring his potty in front of the TV, so I quickly did so, and lo-and-behold, he POOPED! I was thrilled. I left the potty chair in the living room, in front of the TV till he got a bit more used to it and would only put him in diapers at night, for about 3 nights. Then I just left him in underwear after that. He had a few accidents during the night for two weeks after that, but I got him potty trained. And now, I’m trying with Jaylen. Have been since Monday. I thought I was going to go bonkers…he kept peeing on himself and everything around him. But, if I want him potty trained, then I’ve gotta put up with it. I kept having to tell myself this, after counting to 10 . I almost busted out the diaper last night after he peed on my lap, and my Hello Kitty blanket that I wrapped him in. He was SO moody since he caught my cold and I was a bit annoyed that he’d peed once again and almost threw in the towel. But I can’t. When I finally put him to bed, I spread a towel on the bed and then layed him on it, just in case. Didn’t even switch him to diaper during the night and guess what? He actually didn’t pee ALL NIGHT! And that’s because he woke up at around 6:30, coughing and drank a lot of water. I’m so proud of him ! So far today, he hasn’t had an accident. He hasn’t pooped since yesterday, and that kind of worries me. I already had to wash poop out of his undies the last time I tried the potty-training-thing. Not fun!

Sunday was Angela’s birthday and she wanted to celebrate it at the zoo, so we did. It was SO COLD! It was in the 40’s. The poor animals were all huddled up together–they looked so cute! I’d never been to the zoo when it was cold. It was kind of uncomfortable when we first got there, but once you got used to it, it was cool (no pun intended, heh). Sure beats walking around in 90-100° weather though! I still felt like crap that day, worse even. But I put on a happy face and trudged along. Jaylen kept getting out of his stroller to look at animals and was well-behaved for the most part. Eenan on the other hand was always at least 7 feet ahead of us and was being very impatient. Noelia ended up taking him with her, which I wasn’t too happy about because that meant as long as someone else would listen to him, he didn’t have to listen to me . We ended up meeting around the petting zoo and the kids had a blast there of course. I loved seeing the sugar gliders and these tiny pygmy monkies. And the squirrels, meerkats, lemurs, spider monkeys and so on. If I could, I would have smuggled them to the van in my pocket .

When we were visiting the gorillas, one of them was in the background happily eating his own poo. Yadira saw him first, and alerted us and then she started gagging like crazy. I gagged too and controlled myself, and when I turned, Yadira was in the corner…puking. I almost puked just knowing she’d puked LOL. We looked at the last few things and then went to the (dreaded, horribly expensive) gift shop. Big Mario had given the boys $25…and they used it LOL. They each got two huge, curling rubber snakes (as luck would have it, they didn’t charge us for Jaylen’s! Yay!), Eenan got a dinosaur pen and Jaylen got 4 huge lizards. They had a blast.

We went to a pretty park nearby and ate sandwiches and chips. Angela and the rest of the kids wanted to play, so we walked over there. I think the adults had more fun than the kids LOL. There was a huge pirate ship play area and a whole bunch of swings and monkey bars. I wish we had a park like that around here…ours is really small, but at least there’s one. Maybe Friday, if I have Noelia’s car and she doesn’t have anywhere to be, I’ll take them to the park after picking Eenan up .

Later that night, Angela and Yazmin came over and just chilled out. I fed all the kids spaghetti and then we all left with Mary to Yadira’s for Angela’s cake and presents. She was so happy. The kids gave her a Playful Heart Monkey and she just hugged him while she opened the rest of her gifts. Mario surprised us by getting to Yadira’s after work before we did. He’d told me he was going to be doing something (forget what) and then he was coming straight home to work on the headliner for the car. We chilled out, then came home earlier than everyone else since we were going to get to work on the car (and still had to bathe the kids and put them to bed). The headliner was a pain to install, but we did a pretty damn good job *beams*. It almost looks factory, except for one little pucker behind the rearview mirror.

I haven’t updated my “weight loss journal” since I got sick. I probably won’t anymore, since I got kind of tired of it (hence the reason I didn’t make an extra site for it alone even though I really wanted to). I have been watching what I eat (except for today, had some sour patch kids, cheetos, and 2 lolly pops–I’m a cow!). I hadn’t exercised either since I hurt my left wrist somehow. I don’t know if I slept wrong, or if I hurt myself when doing bench presses…or what. It was hurting so bad I had to wear a little Ace bandage thing. Didn’t help that I’m a clutz and kept banging it into every single thing I passed by. I will keep it up though–eating well, exercising–because I really want to lose a few pounds. I’m determined to do it.

Going to go finish fixing up my collections. I was dusting the poor things today and organizing my Popples (finally got a hold of a ladder!). I’ll hopefully get some updated pics posted in my collection page tonight.

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