Category: Holiday

Let me start by saying that Bush is a damn idiot. How the hell do you go off planning to spend all these millions of dollars on illegal immigrants’ hospital bills when you don’t even HELP THE PEOPLE WHO ARE ACTUAL CITIZENS OF THIS COUNTRY!! This country is going to shit. And fast.

I also can’t believe the little girls that were murdered in Illinois, may have been murdered by one of the little girls’ own father. How could someone do that to their own flesh and blood, their baby? It’s just so horrible. They were only 8 & 9 years old . Hence the reason I won’t let Eenan go on playdates yet–he’s already begged and begged. You just never know these days and that saddens me.

*composes self* Anyway, hope all the Moms out there had a wonderful Mother’s Day. I didn’t get a chance to finish visiting all my mom friends on the ‘net and personally wishing them a Happy Mother’s Day, and I feel very guilty for it, but I do hope their day was grand .

We started the day by all getting together at Mary’s and exchanging presents and having breakfast. Mario made me some eggs and bacon and handed me my plate and gave me a kiss. Everyone “Awww’d”. Later he tells me he was making himself breakfast, but after Annie said to Cata, “Aww, see Babe, [Mario’s nickname here]’s making Yajaira breakfast!”, so he gave me the plate. I said, “You know, I could have gone the day without knowing that,” and glared at him. Then he said he was kidding. I’m still trying to figure out if he WAS kidding or not .

This year, I got beautiful hand/homemade gifts (the best kind!). Mary and Noelia printed pictures of the boys and put them in the center of a plate. They helped the boys paint little hearts and stars around the plate with gold paint–they turned out so nice! Mary gave me a little angel salt-shaker, which she made herself, that had cherries on it to match my kitchen theme. She gave Annie one with sunflowers and Yadira one with cows . She also gave me a frame with a picture of the boys and a poem called, “Walk With Us Mommy”. I couldn’t even finish reading it that day because I was still PMS’ing and immediately began to get teary eyed LOL.

The boys gave Mary her gift, which was a jewelry box with a picture of them in the frame on the lid. I’d painted it white and the boys painted little stars and hearts and then we glued them on the box. She loved it. They made one for Mom, too. Mario and I gave her her gift, which was some DVD’s that she’d picked out herself LOL.

After breakfast, we drove over to the cemetary to visit and leave flowers for Mario’s Grandma, Great-Grandma and visited with Mario’s sister for a little bit, too. I’m not sure if I’ve ever mentioned it in the years I’ve been blogging, but Mario had an older sister (about 3 years older than Noelia) who passed away when she was only 3 days old due to being born with only 2 heart chambers .

We came back and chilled out for a while and then left to the movies. Mario’d been trying to convince me to watch that dreaded Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy. I’d watch it on DVD, but I wouldn’t spend almost $8 to suffer watch it at the movies. We compromised and watched Kingdom of Heaven instead. I can’t say I was thrilled about it .

We went to eat at the House of China on North 10th in McAllen. I so love the one on South 10th…this one didn’t have the crab thingys covered in the fried…thing? I forget what they’re called at the moment, heh.

It was nice though. The boys behaved for the most part and Yadira and I shared our labor stories with everyone LOL. We ended up helping Mary pay for the bill and now we are b-r-o-k-e. Thank goodness Mario gets paid this weekend!

After lunch, we went to visit Gramma at the nursing home and took her our gift. We stayed and talked for a while and then we left to visit Mom. I gave her and Aunt Nora their gifts, which they loved . I talked with Mom for a while and talked to John who’d been laying in bed practically the whole day. I told him to come with us, so he could drive a bit and of course he refused. I don’t know how he can complain about not having a license when he won’t even make the effort to learn or take the car out for a spin on his own. Hell, that’s the only way I started driving. I got a few lessons here and there from Mary and Mario and then I was on my own. Had I not started driving Eenan around on my own and taking the initiative to get over my fear, I still wouldn’t be driving.

We came home and Mario was tired so he was going to take a nap. I laid down with him to cuddle for a little bit and ended up falling asleep for about 45 minutes . I really need to start going to sleep earlier. I went to Mary’s and joined everyone after I woke up and started on a scrapbook embellishment: popcorn! I had little carnival theme embellishments (Sandylion brand) and it was missing a box of popcorn so I thought I’d make one. It turned out really cute. I want to make some candy apple ones but I’m not sure how to go about it. I have these clear sheets of plastic–the ones the stickers come on–and I’m thinking of putting those on some red apple-shaped cardstock to make it look “glazed” and adding a little stick. Hmm…

I scared Mario last night. I wish I had the camera with me to capture his expression–it was priceless! I was washing dishes in the kitchen and he comes up behind me, playfully smacks me on the butt and then gives me a kiss. I step away from him while holding his hands and tell him, very seriously, “I need to tell you something.”

He gets this OMG look on his face, kind of smiling, kind of freaked out, kind of about to PASS OUT and he says, “WHAT?”

“You know how your mom accidentally got me the wrong pack of birth control pills?”

At that point I didn’t know if he was going to cry or scream…or both. I start laughing uncontrollably and say, “No, you weirdo, I’m not pregnant! I’m just saying, she got me the wrong ones. I can’t take these because I’m supposed to take them the first day I “start” and well, I’m about to finish so I can’t take them. I’m afraid I’ll become incredibly naseous or that they’ll ruin my cycle. I’m telling you this because I “want some” after I’m done with this thing so you need to buy condoms.”

He look so relieved and then whined, “Condoms, hell no.”

I rolled my eyes. Though it would be weird going back to condoms after all these years, I don’t think he wants me to utter the words, “I need to tell you something” for at least 3 more years LOL.

Which brings me to the talk we had Saturday night. We decided we’d live here for at least 2 more years. We’re in no hurry to buy a house, though it would be nice–really nice. This lil’ apartment was built just for us, so we decided not to take it for granted, save, I’m going to go to school and then hopefully get a job after Jaylen starts school next year, and then we can buy a house. We could go and apply for a loan right now, but we could only get a small house. Once I start working (hopefully) we can get a bigger loan which means bigger house, which is what we both want. 4 bedrooms–no less, two living rooms, big kitchen, etc. We’ll have either red brick with white trim or cream colored brick. Yup, I’ve got it all planned out LOL.

I forgot to mention. A few days ago I uploaded my Lil’ Mama Clique index to this site. What a mess that was. If it weren’t for Jessica I never would have noticed! Well, not until I updated LOL. Thanks, Jessica :).

Well, I guess this’ll be all. I should get all this laundry hung up and folded. Then I have to clean the bathroom. Fun, fun . THEN, I’ll hopefully get a chance to upload my simple little scrapbooking pages to show y’all.

(more…)

I’m watching American Idol right now…everyone was sucking until Bo Bice started belting out “Stand By Me”. Not only do I love this song because it reminds me of when I was little and would listen to oldies with my Mom, but he’s got such a nice voice *swoon*. (OOoh he also sang “How Far Is Heaven”…loved it!) I still can’t believe Constantine got voted off before Anthony Federov and Scott Savol (but I like how he sings, sometimes). I can’t believe Paula CRIED! Oooh now Carrie’s on…she’s my favorite.

Eenan’s graduation was today . He looked so handsome in his shirt, tie and slacks.

Mary went with me to drop him off and we spoke to Ms. O., who looked so cute in her maternity clothes . She took all their gowns to iron them at home, herself. I stopped by the classroom before Eenan got out of school yesterday so that I could pick up the gown to iron but she said she’d do it. I kept asking her, “Are you sure??”, but she insisted.

When we got back from dropping him off I frantically ironed all our clothes, and flat-ironed my hair, got all the cameras together and whatever else that needed to be done. I would have done everything last night except Mary and I went to Wal-Mart to get “surprises” for Eenan to give him after his graduation. After 30 minutes of rummaging through the piles of stuffed animals stuffed in the shelves she found a graduation bear and I got him a Glow in the Dark Do-Your-Best Bear from Mario and I. Needless to say, I was dead tired when we got home.

We got to the Performing Arts Center at the high school at around 8:35-8:40 and didn’t get seated till at least 9:15! The graduation was set to start at 9am and they didn’t start till 10 something. It was all made up for when they showed a video Mr. Z., the music teacher, had put together. It was mostly pictures of the kids all doing their work in their classes. When I see them flash a picture of Eenan up there I started bawling. They were also playing Leann Womack’s “I Hope You Dance” in the background, so that hit me and I couldn’t get the tears to stop LOL. I love that song!

He looked so cute going up there and getting his “diploma” (which was a fake rolled up piece of paper they took away LOL). He looked over to us when he went up the steps, kind of posing for us to take a picture. When all the kids got their “diplomas” we all walked out and met the kids in the main lobby(?) and took pictures of them, etc. I took a picture of Eenan, the pimp, with his arms around two of his (girl) friends. Too cute! We met the kids back at school and checked Eenan out for the rest of the day. He took a few pictures with friends, Ms. O., us and a group picture. He had so much fun and was beaming with pride since he’s going to 1st grade next year, “like Angela”.

Since the graduation took so long, and Mario had to leave to work by 12:20 and Mary had to go to work too, we just stopped by McDonald’s (since it’s the closest, fastest thing). We’ve been chilling out at home since. He’s so happy he’s “un-grounded” now LOL. He was grounded most of the weekend because he got a referral for sticking gum in a little boy’s hair during graduation practice last Wednesday .

As for the weekend, it was spent in town buying Mother’s Day gifts, getting John’s graduation stuff, and buying last minute stuff for Eenan’s graduation. We got:

1. Mary – 2 DVDs
2. Mom – shoes she wanted and gold/cubic zirconia earrings
3. Gramma – a nightgown and some chocolates
4. Aunt Nora – cubic zirconia earrings

We went to the circus Saturday night (Mary, Sonia, Yadira, the girls, Andy, Noelia, and the boys and I). It was nice…I was STILL expecting elephants and tigers and they didn’t have them, but it was still cool. The kids loved it. Jaylen was going psycho clapping because he was that excited.

The next day we dropped John off at home and Mom gave me my super wonderful Mom’s Day gift…the It Signature collection Bucket Bag. The first Dooney I laid eyes on back in the day and wanted:

It’s so awesome. It’s smaller than my Raspberry barrel, but still oh-so-cute .

I’m also getting back into scrapbooking. I’m slowly buying supplies, and cute embellishments and papers. I made my first page in years yesterday and it came out really nice, if I do say so myself . Noey went through a bunch of papers and cut-outs and she gave me some really cute ones (Halloween, Road Trip, Birthday themes) I want to use ASAP. She wants me to help her with hers when she’s done with her class. It shall be fun!

Okay, I should really get to vacuumming and making Mario’s lunch for tomorrow. I don’t know what to make for this man anymore!

(more…)

Hope everyone (who celebrates) had a Happy Easter :).

As for our weekend (man I really need to update more frequently!)…on Friday, while getting ready for when everyone got here (Jose, Elda and the kids were arriving that day), the mail got here and Sonia presented me with a package from Vic! I was so excited…my initial thought was, “I thought she was sending a thank-you card?” LOL. I frantically opened it and was so surprised to see 2 10″ Care Bears and 3 10″ Care Bear Cousins, Hello Kitty stickers, a cute bag that says ‘Visit España’ on it, a Rainbow Brite ‘Star Sprinkles DVD, cute pencils, some little parachute guys and little goodies for the kids, some Strawberry Gum Tape, a teeny Hello Kitty Plush, Rose Petal Palace rings, and finally, a letter . All that for helping her with Greymatter. She’s so sweet. I feel guilty for not sending anything to her when she hosted me, or helped me get my domain and all the other awesome stuff she’s done for me. Gotta send her a *cough* thank-you card, too .

I finished getting ready and a few seconds later, everyone got here. We went in and said hello and gathered around and talked. Noelia had come home the day before and had a bad, bad virus, probably the flu. Poor Angela caught it that Friday, so she was miserable all day. Then Saturday, poor Sammy ended up catching it. I’ve been Lysoling everything like crazy–I’m so scared the kids will get it. The fever accompanied by that flu, or whatever it is, gets really high and they can’t keep anything down, not even medicine.

All the kids naturally gravitate towards our bedroom since there’s a plethora of toys…so you can imagine the condition of the room. I left for about 20 minutes, and when I came back, the room was turned completely upside down. Natalie ended up getting stuck in the rungs of the bunk beds–which have no mattresses on them because we’re going to disassemble it and put/give it away. Jaylen’s little tool shed thing was completely taken apart…and I have no idea how they did that since you need to UNSCREW everything. Mary got them all to clean since I was about to lose it (I’d just cleaned earlier that day LOL). As for outside…the canopy of the swing is torn in half and the slide was separated from the rest of the swing set. 9 kids=madness!

We went to Yadira’s that night and just talked and laughed. Noelia invited Andy over so he could meet everyone and everybody liked him. I’m so happy for her . He treats her so well and she’s just really happy. It’s about time she found someone who suits her.

Mario got there from work that night and while everyone was in the breakfast nook I helped Yadira wash dishes and then I made some break-apart Easter cookies. It was a nice night. Oh yeah, and Eenan punched Jaylen in the face…but other than that, it was a nice night…

At the moment, I can’t remember much from Saturday but I doubt we (the kids and I) went anywhere. Oh yeah, no we didn’t go anywhere. Yazmin spent the night with us so we were here all day…she on the computer and I was cleaning and then making two pans of flan the rest of the day. We had a birthday party for Albert to go to and I was taking flan. The one I made for the party ended up breaking apart completely when I flipped it because I didn’t have my flan-pan (it’s at Maggie’s). I didn’t even bother flipping the one for “here” for Easter because I was afraid it would break too. I got ready and felt uncomfortable and “rolly” in everything I had so I just wore a Strawberry Shortcake t-shirt and jeans. I knew everyone would be all “fancy” but I was frustrated and couldn’t have cared less. On the way to the place we took a sharp turn and the cajeta split all over my leg. Niiiice! I was so embarrassed, but when we got there Mario said we took a sharp turn and it spilt on me, and not only that but he blamed the broken flan on the turn. I looked at him with an extremely thankful look on my face and he stayed outside with some of the guys and their wives and I stayed inside with Albert’s sister and wife. I drank a yummy wine cooler and then we went outside and joined the husbands. We all got our plates when the food was done and as soon as we sat back down, it started pouring. We ran inside and ate there. It turned out to be a nice night aside from the rain.

We got home at around 12-1am that night, so we were super tired Easter morning. We had our 6th Anniversary cuddle time and then I took a shower while he went out to get the fire ready for the bar-be-cue. We had a whole bunch of dyed eggs that needed stuffing and covering, so after I got out of the shower I took everything to Mary’s and got started. I only got to finish about 1 1/2 dozens, and the rest stayed without stuffing since we ran out of confetti. Sonia, Jaylen and I went to the Dollar General and Family Dollar stores and they were closed. H-E-B was closed for sure and so was Wal-Mart, so we didn’t even bother going. Andy’d come over to spend Easter with Noey and said that on his way over he saw people coming out of the other Family Dollar store, so Elda, Yazmin, Sonia and I went. Either they’d been open and we’d gotten there too late, or people were just stopping by and checking if it was open. We went to Joy Dollar, which was the only place open and found a whole bunch of cute, cheap stuff Elda needed for baskets and prizes for the egg hunt. I found confetti and some jumbo crayons and a coloring book since Jaylen’s basket didn’t have one and we came home.

When the food was finally done, we all ate then went outside to do the egg hunt and crack the eggs. Eenan started crying because he didn’t find an egg with a number on it (which means you get a prize) and Brandon gave him one since he found two…awww . There were prizes left, so even Jaylen got one. They had so much fun with the egg hunt and even more fun cracking the eggs on everyone. After that, we got all the kids in line to hit the egg-shaped pinata Annie brought. I quickly ran in to empty my other memory card and the darn thing wouldn’t erase the pictures because it was supposedly write-protected. Took forever, but I got it to work and I hear Mario yell, “Kids…get in line from smallest to tallest…Yajaira, you first.” The short jokes will never get old…

The kids opened their Easter baskets and were in love with everything in them. The main gift in Eenan’s basket was a Bionicle DVD and Jaylen got the Spongebob Squarepants movie. The boys got a basket from each of their Ninos (Godparents) and one from us. Since Jaylen has two sets of Ninos he got three baskets in total…so he had fun LOL. It was a really nice day. I loved that we all got to be together. I didn’t get to see Mom, John and Gramma though, so that was really depressing for me, but I got to talk to Mom and we’ll hopefully see Gramma on Thursday. Poor Mom had to work from 3-9 that day . Mario watched the Bionicle movie with the kids while I helped clean the mess outside. When I came in, he took a nap and the kids happily played with their toys. I don’t remember much from that night. I know we got together to have dinner, but I don’t remember what we ate, or who was here or what we did .

The next day the kids and I just spent the day here and I tried cleaning as much as I could. I tried spending as much time with everyone as I could, but since Eenan had school the next day I had to get him ready and I also had to make Mario’s lunch for work. The hectic-ness starts again!

Jaylen woke me up Monday night (early Tuesday morning) at around 2am asking for some milk. So I gave him a cup and straw and he finished it, then started rolling around in his bed groaning that his tummy hurt. I was so scared he caught the virus I couldn’t sleep because I was afraid he’d throw up. Then MY stomach started hurting. Needless to say, I didn’t fall asleep till almost 4am. After dropping Eenan off at school and making Mario breakfast and seeing him off to work, I took a nice, long nap with Jaylen. Then I cleaned. Mary called and said she was going grocery shopping and asked if I’d like to go along and I needed to so I said yes. Noelia would pick Eenan up. We came home and I helped Eenan with his homework, then everyone got together and we ate dinner. Andy came over and brought his little red-eared turtles with him (I think that’s what they’re called?). So now we have two little turtles named Jackie and Daniel…aww . Mario said he was going to kick my ass for taking more animals in but I told him he doesn’t take care of the other animals anyway (I DO) so I’d take care of them and he didn’t have to worry about it. The kids are excited…maybe it’ll heal the pain of losing their dear Goldie. Yes, I forgot to mention it above, but Goldie died on Friday, I think. I was going to change out his (her?) water and when Eenan passed by the tank, he yelled “Oh NO! Goldie’s DEAD!!” I ran over, and sure enough, he was floating sideways in the tank . He had been totally fine in the morning when Eenan fed him. His water wasn’t even cloudy. I think it’s because he needed a filter and stuff…and the man at Wal-Mart said all he needed was purified water. Grr. So anyway, I grabbed a little cardboard box and stuck him in it so we could bury him next to Hamtaro’s grave and Jaylen went crazy. After I taped up the box, he grabbed it away from me and just wailed that he wanted me to open the box and put Fishy back in his tank. He kept screaming, “Open it, Mama, open it!” I felt so bad and swallowed the lump creeping up my throat and told him we’d bury him and then he could visit him whenever he wants and take him flowers like they do to Hamtaro. That made him feel a little better so we went out there, buried him and they brought him little weeds and flowers LOL.

When I dropped Eenan off at school today he remembered it was Pet Day so I had to come back and get the turtles and gerbil and take them to his class. Jaylen woke up to help me LOL. Hopefully the animals are okay and not poked and prodded too much. I don’t think Ms. O. would let them mess with them too much anyway.

There were two other pets there: a teeny goldfish (with very cloudy water ) and an adorable Siberian hammy like Pecan. I would have taken Pecan but man, he’s a meanie! He’ll bite the kids for sure if they stick their fingers into the cage. I can barely feed the lil’ fucker without him trying to attack my hand .

Welp, gonna hang/fold clothes and then change out the animals’ sheddings. Then I’m going to watch Medium .

(more…)