Category: Memories

It has truly been a great week :).

Sunday, July 29th

Eenan would be turning 13–YES, THIRTEEN!!–on Monday, the 30th. Since Mario was picking all the kids up on Monday night to celebrate Eenan’s birthday, we decided to celebrate on Sunday instead.

We slept-in somewhat, gave the kids a light breakfast, showered, got the kiddos ready and gave Eenan his gifts:

He was happy with his stuff and immediately opened up his sketch book and pencils and got to drawing <3. He's still into drawing, still loveable, still my sensitive boy (but don't tell anyone I told you so, heh). I knew he had to become a teenager eventually, but I feel like it just crept up on me. One day I'm lugging around this chunky, adorable baby and now he's 13 and at eye level with me?? (Ok, we all knew that would happen sooner than later, considering I'm 4'11"!)

Where did the time go!? The past year and a half or so were a blur, considering he’s in his dad’s custody most of the time, so it feels like I’ve missed things; like time’s passed so quickly even moreso :(. It still kills me, but I’m glad most of that whole drama is over for their sake.

ANYWAY.

We braved Golden Corral on a Sunday, because that’s where Eenan wanted to celebrate. During our drive there, several chaotic scenarios played in my head: the long line we were going to have to wait in, losing a kid in the crowd, the insane bill we were going to have with 3 adults and 6 kids, the girls (probably Emily) having a fit in public, one of the kids eating so much they barf. BUT, I was pleasantly surprised when we arrived and went straight to the cash register, our bill was half of what I’d budgeted, all the kids were calm and went in 2’s as they picked their food, the girls were very well behaved and ate their food before asking for orange sherbet ice cream cones with gummi bears and chocolate-covered marshmallows, and only Jaylen had a slight stomach ache when we left, heh. Jorge and I even behaved ourselves better than I thought we would :P. Everyone had a great time :).

I’m sad I didn’t get a pic of the kids at the restaurant, but everyone was up and down and just concentrating on eating :P. We got home and we chilled out the rest of the day. I made dinner, we watched movies. It was a great Sunday :).

While we watched a movie, Jorge downloaded a program on his phone and surprised me with this:

It still takes me by surprise how sweet he is !

Monday, July 30th

Eenan’s actual birthday! My big boy chilled out with me while I got ready for work and we had cereal together :).

Most of my work week involved planning for a video we’re working on to promote one of our upcoming events. Other than that, I spent the week covering the front desk during Rosie’s breaks.

I wanted to start taking lunch all week, 1, because if I ever go through with trying to eat healthy, it isn’t going to happen in restaurants. And 2, we spent a SHIT TON of money the week before eating out, going out. We’re blessed and lucky to have these extra funds, but we need to stop spending so much on unhealthy food . I’d like to put that extra cash towards paying off some of our bills!

The only bad part about eating at work is that my day goes by much slower when I don’t leave work for lunch. The crappiest part is not seeing Jorge :(. But we both wanted to start eating better, so we were going to try.

I got out of work an hour early, got some things at H-E-B and then got home to make sure my babies were ready. Mario picked them up and as soon as they left I started making dinner for Jorge, Mom, Jorge’s boys and myself. Then I started on a cake for Eenan. It was going to be a regular round cake, but then I thought I’d try making a Minecraft Creeper cake for him. I risked it being an epic fail since I didn’t have fondant to make it nice, or a square pan to make a cube, but I ended up cutting up a rectangular sheet cake into 4 and dying the batter green :). End result:

The kids got home as I was decorating it. It’s messy and I thought it was pretty crappy, but the boys were actually impressed, heh. They each started making requests for their next birthdays. They always know how to make me feel good .

Jorge got home and we sang Happy Birthday to Eenan :).

My darn flash kept taking too long, so poor Alaethia was struggling to keep her eyes open, can you tell? LOL

He WANTED us to push his face in the cake. Then his face had a black hue the rest of the night LOL.

We told the boys to shut off the video games and watched “Wrath of the Titans”. Of course the girls and I passed out, but the boys enjoyed it :). I love my family ♥!

Tuesday, July 31st

More video planning at work. More covering reception. I believe this was the day I received yet another copy of the final decree of divorce (yep, STILL haven’t signed the Final, despite having our “final hearing” since April 18th!) and I sent back some corrections.

I ate lunch at work and started feeling REALLY ill. Same thing had happened the day before, but this time my eye was twitching, I was nauseous and I had heart palpitations every few minutes. I had been getting a feeling like my heart was skipping a beat for the past few nights, but this time they wouldn’t stop. Michelle said I probably had anxiety. I looked up my symptoms and 80% of what I read said I had anxiety. I didn’t know what I’d have anxiety about. I mean, I worry about bills and stretching our paychecks much more than any normal person should, but it’s the norm for me. Other than that, the only thing I felt might be stressing me out was the fact that we were going to need to get another vehicle soon, since Javi was picking up the F-150 after it being in our possession for a year and a half. Jorge had already had several appointments that his boss had set up with different dealerships, but he wasn’t happy with any of them.

I made it till 4:40pm; almost till 5. I got home, greeted all the kiddos, changed and made fideo with chicken and squash for dinner. During prepping ingredients for dinner Alaethia asked for a piece of watermelon, 2 jumbo marshmallows and a small glass of milk. When the food was almost done, she came up to me and told me, with a squeaky, small voice, that she’d thrown up. I cleaned her up and put her in the bath, all the while lecturing about how I told you, one of these days you were going to eat so much you’d barf!

Still, it didn’t stop her from sitting at the table with all the other kids and eating her entire bowl of fideo, heh. I’m glad she was ok :).

Jorge got home and we ate, and then we sat to watch Gymnastics on the Olympics. He went outside to start skimming the pool and I helped. As we cleaned we talked about the car dealerships and what our options were. We discussed current finances and what was going to be necessary to make a new car possible. And then my eye started twitching and I started getting heart palpitations! I told Jorge, “You see! It’s the car thing stressing me out!” LOL

We swam around with the kids for about an hour. I got the girls inside for a bath in the tub, read them a story and tucked them into bed. Alaethia’s doing great and falling asleep in her room and staying put till the morning. Emily: not so much, heh. She still sneaks off to Mom’s room every-so-often. We’ll get there one of these days :).

Wednesday, August 1st

I managed to eat lunch at work for 2 days in a row…and then Michelle said she felt like having Olive Garden’s soup and salad lunch. That might be healthy…if I could refrain from eating 5 of the delicious bread sticks .

On the way there, Jorge calls and lets me know he’s been having a meeting via cell phone with a guy from a dealership. I talked to him and gave him some info, too, and Michelle and I enjoyed our lunch. I managed to only have 1 1/2 bread sticks *beams*.

My love texted me and let me know we were approved for the car. Now we just needed to get them to give us the monthly payment we wanted. Which we got :). We’d be going in the next morning!

I got out of work and hurried home to make sure my kiddos were ready. I smooched them and helped them get their stuff together and Mario got here for them. I changed and went to Jessica’s to pick up a kitten. Little did I know he was a very tiny kitten and wouldn’t stop meowing and refused to drink from a bowl :(.

I made us some seafood soup when I got back home. Jorge loved it. I have to admit, I wasn’t too crazy about the octopus LOL.

We sat on the sofa and watched the newest Kevin Hart comedy. It was funny, but I enjoyed the one that came before this one a lot more.

Thursday, August 2nd

I had no idea how busy my day would be. As soon as I got to work I started typing out the scripts for the video interviews we’d be shooting that afternoon. Jorge calls me at almost 10am to drive over to the dealership. Jorge’s boss and the guys there really outdid themselves; they helped us out a lot :). The man who helped us last, Augie, was such a sweet man. He kept talking about his wife and was giving us marriage advice, aww. We were done in under 2 hours and got to drive our new BMW to lunch, heh :).

I know. A BMW. I never in a million years thought I’d OWN one of those, ever!

The afternoon went by fast after we shot our videos at work. I went to Old Navy after work to get Alaethia some jeans since they were on sale. I found myself a cute red top for the pie party at the boss’ house that night. And then I waited in line for close to eternity.

I waited for Jorge to get out of work, and then for my black cardigan to dry in the dryer. We finally made it to the boss’ house at 9pm (in our new car, woo!), had a slice of blueberry cheesecake and a slice peanut butter pie. I’m proud of myself for only having 2 slices; I’m pretty sure I had about 5 last year, heh.

We were polite and sat for a while but left since we didn’t know any of the guests. All my co-workers had already gone home. I found out some of them were talking about me earlier that day, so I can’t say I was sad that some of them weren’t there, grr.

Jorge and I got in the car and decided to go to Cigar Bar for a few drinks since it was early. We laughed and watched Olympics and took pics. We even ran into Karina at Delorean’s next door :).

It was a great night :).

Friday, August 3rd

Friday felt like such a long day for me, probably because I stayed in for lunch. One of the highlights of my day was when Nancy, my first boss at my current workplace, told me she knew it was me in the bathroom stall next to her when she looked down and saw turquoise toe nails and tall fushia wedges, heh. As we walked down the hallway she says, “You are JUST DARLING. Hey…do you have a boyfriend?” When I blushed and answered yes she said, “Shoot. Of course you do!” And began to tell me how she met this rich, handsome young man and wanted to find him a girlfriend and I was the first girl to pop in her mind. I guess that’s a pretty nice compliment, heh!

I’d bought one of those Deal of the Day coupons so Jorge and I had a dinner date at La Jaiba and I couldn’t wait :). I love our dates :).

I tried calming the tiny kitty down when I got home. He’s so screamy and loud :(. And he scratches and has razor sharp teeth. I can tell I’m getting old, because when I was younger I had no qualms about staying up all night with kittens and puppies and keeping them quiet and entertained. Now, I have no patience!!

*sigh*

My love got home and we got fancy for our date :). There was an insane amount of food, and it was all so good :).

We joked and laughed and he reached across and rubbed my hand and said, “We need to continue to do this. Spend time with the kids, have friends over, but once every week or two we should have a date where it’s just US.” I agreed :).

We wanted to watch a movie, so we stopped by a Red Box. We decided, after flipping through selections, that we’d just rent “American Reunion” from DirecTV. I’m so glad we did; it was hilarious :).

I was going to finish writing about Saturday, but I’ll finish with that later. I’m sleepy. I’m going to go and enjoy a full night’s sleep without heart palpitations :).

I went to bed early the night of the 3rd. Jorge and his buddy chilled out on the porch. We were texting back and forth and he kept trying to convince me to go outside, but I was so tired I crashed out on the round sofa with Ruffles, heh. The girls had already gone to bed, but he had the boys get ready for bed. He’s the best !

I woke up completely refreshed, whipped up some banana pancakes (and hazelnut coffee for myself), and fed the kiddos. I paid bills online and then we got ready to go to the Red Mango grand-opening.

We found a parking spot right in front, which was awesome since the place was beyond packed. They gave the kids balloons, we all got free small yogurts of our choice with 2 toppings (was NOT expecting that!), free tiny cupcakes from CC’s Sweets & Tweets next door and I got a t-shirt :D.

We headed back home and the boys stayed with Mom while the girls and I went to the library for a bit. They found a few books at the book sale and we came home. I made lunch for us (deviled eggs and macaroni, their choice, heh) and we ate on the porch and then Jaylen, Aly and I played hotscotch :).

Jorge got home and we ordered Domino’s. We started noticing that it felt really hot in the house. The thermostat said it was 85 degrees . I’d noticed since much earlier, but I figured it was on account of me running around sweeping and doing laundry. We called the landlord and she said she’d try to get ahold of the air-condition guy but we never got a call back. Jorge said, “Screw it! Let’s get a hotel!” So we searched around. We wanted to stay at the beach with all the kiddos, but the Comfort Inn–where we’d stayed the week before–was sold out. Actually, every hotel we tried on South Padre Island was sold out. Stupid Spring Break!

We had planned a trip to the zoo with the kids for the next day, so we figured we’d just stay in Brownsville. We were lucky to get a hotel there; we got the last 2 rooms!

We packed quickly (yet efficiently; of course I made a list and checked it twice) and we left on our little road trip. The kids were amazingly well behaved. I think Mom was the one complaining the most, heh. Jorge and I shared MixOreds and chatted all the way. I love our little trips .

We got to the hotel and the kids all settled in and before long we were all in bed and ready to sleep.

We got up and had breakfast at McDonald’s. Not our first choice, but we’d passed all the restaurants and were almost to the zoo LOL. The kids had fun anyway. They had their breakfasts and then played in the park thing for a bit.

And then we got to the zoo. I was a little sad that the zoo looked less than…appealing. A lot of the animals were gone and it just looked messy and unkempt :(. I didn’t visit it at all last year and it looked worse than in 2010.

But the kids had fun :). Here’s a few pics:

My babe took this one :)!

The kids were tired by the end and so were we LOL. We had a long drive, but we stopped for snacks and listened to music on the way. We had dinner at Denny’s and then we came home and relaxed :). It was a great weekend!

I’ll start this post by saying that Friday night, the 4th, I renewed my domain for another 2 years :)! I usually only renew for a year at a time, but…I had a coupon, heh. 2 years for $16? Can’t beat that.

Pixydust.net will officially be 10 years old on November 16th. I can’t believe it! Even though I slowed down a bit in recent years with blogging I’m really glad I never let the domain go ♥.

I left off on October 29th. Mom and I packed snacks for the kiddos (grapes, Doritos, pretzels, pears, waters) and we got in the car to find a park to go to. I figured the one on Daffodil would be packed, I forgot about the one on Daffodil that’s closer to the house, so we went to the one on Nolana since we were going to Walmart afterwards. It’s a small park, but it was empty except for a dad and his little boy and toddler girl. Mom took a walk and I took turns with the girls, “catching them” at the end of the slides. Jaylen hung out mostly with Emily and Eenan did his teenage thing and watched videos on his phone and listened to music. It’s so…gosh, I can’t even explain it. Weird, shocking nervewracking? Heh, I can’t explain it. It’s just amazing that I have a 12-year-old boy and he’s becoming this little teenager. He has his moments, but he really has matured in the past year ♥.

Emily made friends with the little blonde-curled toddler girl :). She loves “babies”. She wants to befriend all the little kids she sees :).

The kids had their snacks and then we packed up and went to Walmart. Eenan and I got down to pick the pumpkins. Of course we wouldn’t find very attractive ones as it was 2 days before Halloween, heh. We finally found two big ones that weren’t too wilty. They didn’t have the medium sized ones in stock at all, but we found the only bag of tiny ones they had. The girls and Eenan wanted to paint those, and Jaylen wanted to carve one. We took an extra big one in case Jorgie, Justin or Nick wanted to carve another. They’d just carved some earlier that day. We got a carving kit and the few groceries we’d need for dinner and went home since we were expecting Jorge’s family :). We’d planned a movie night outside on the porch on the projector. A cheesy movie that wouldn’t really scare the kids. “Killer Clowns from Outer Space” was the movie of choice, heh.

I got home and made some chili. Everyone got here and I served everyone dinner while my babe and Javi got the movie on the screen. Briana and the boys brought with them the pumpkins they’d carved and displayed them on the porch ledge and lit a pumpkin spice scented candle in each. It smelled like Autumn ♥. When everyone finished eating, the adults grabbed lawn chairs and the kids got a spot on the exercise mats Jorge put on the floor for them. We got each kid a blanket, Jorge brought out several bowls of popcorn and Briana brought cookies. The kids were surprisingly into the movie!

Alaethia politely reminded me every-so-often that I had promised they’d paint their pumpkins. I waited till the movie was about half way and then I got the box of paints out.

The movie finished shortly after and then the boys started getting everything ready to carve their pumpkins.

Jorge’s family left a little while after and we sat outside with the kiddos while they degutted the pumpkins. The girls went inside with Mom since it started to get chillier. The boys each slowly went back inside until only Justin was left carving a pumpkin, but he didn’t mind. I told my love it was a great night for Abuelita chocolate…and he made some for us !

It was great :). I got sleepy right after that and went inside to watch TV and crashed out. I woke up a while later, I can’t remember why now, but I went outside and saw my babe had strung the lights up with all the kids’ pumpkins. It looked so nice!

We sat outside recounting moments of that great day. I felt so blessed . It truly felt like Halloween and fall and family :).

I can’t remember much from the next morning (Jorge and I are trying to remember right now, heh). We remember our traditional Sunday omelet. Eenan wanted one too, so I made him one even though all the kids had eaten :). And here’s where we’re drawing a blank, up until I texted Briana so everyone could come over for lunch and cupcakes. I’d promised Javi strawberry cheesecake cookies, so I was making those, too. Briana texts back that they’re in Mission and on their way. Oops! I was just starting with the Mummy Dogs, but I figured I’d have enough time to do everything.

Everyone got here and the kids played and everyone lounged around. The first batch of Mummies came out and they were a hit, even with the adults, heh.

I started on the strawberry cheesecake cookies and realized I didn’t have white chocolate chips. I let everyone know I’d be right back, took Emily with me because she wanted to tag a long and headed to Family Dollar. Emily had fallen asleep, so I lugged her inside and lo and behold: no white chocolate chips. Grr.

I go to Target next since it’s nearby and go straight to the baking section. That was the fastest trip to Target of my life. I didn’t allow myself to get distracted :P.

I start baking the cookies and the first dozen comes out. There were none left by the time I finished putting the next batch in. Javi really liked them, hehe.

We only got to have cookies since the family needed to go. It was so fun though, that whole weekend. I took my kiddos to La Joya later that evening and on the way back I saw a shooting star! Hadn’t seen one of those in a while!

When I got back Jorge asked, “Do you want to pick something up for dinner, Babe? You’ve been in the kitchen all day.” I thought it was a great idea. We got Church’s :). We all ate and then I did stuff around the site, like adding a “Like” button. I’d really like to get a new layout up by my 10th anniversary, but you know how that goes!

It was Halloween the next day. I had agreed to let Emily spend Halloween over there since I had them last year. I was trying my hardest to be fair and civil, but it really bothered me that my kiddos weren’t going to be here with me this year .

That morning at work went by quickly. We’re having to wrap things up for this next event. I was going to munch on stuff at work for lunch since my stomach felt weird but Michelle told me to accompany her and we’d share a Palenque Bowl from Palenque Chicken. OMG. It was so good, heh.

I got a call from the kids’ school that afternoon around 3:45 that poor Alaethia was still in the front office. She missed the bus. Jaylen was on it, and she wasn’t. Of course, nobody wanted to take blame for it but I had nice “I told you so’s” to share with Mario and his mother. THAT’S why I wasn’t ok with my poor baby taking the bus, as much as they say SHE wants to go. I’m just happy they didn’t put her on a different bus :(. Sonia went for her eventually (again, if she could go, I don’t know why she can’t do it all the time!)

I went to HEB to pick up sushi stuff. My babe was kinda down about not spending Halloween with the kiddos, too, so we figured we’d have a movie and sushi night ♥.

As I was rolling the sushi, Mario shows up with the kiddos. I was so happy :*).

That was nice of him. I was surprised, really, and I appreciated it :D. Almost made up for my baby girl being left at school for 30 minutes. Almost. Not quite.

We ate dinner and then Jorge and I got comfy on the sofa to watch TV…and crashed out immediately!! That’s how we spent our Halloween, buaha!

The Annual Banquet was the next day. I got all my stuff ready and took it with me so I could change at work. Darryl “the Moose” Johnston, former player for the Dallas Cowboys, was the speaker so we were dressing in Cowboys jerseys and t-shirts and jeans. I don’t really go for anyone in football and wasn’t about to spend $60 on a jersey, but I got a cute t-shirt and I was thrilled about wearing jeans :).

I met my love at Old Navy for work since he was going to go with me and he needed jeans. We found them really quickly (30% off, too!) and then I took him to lunch at Palenque Chicken, heh. It was so good and inexpensive, $12 for both of us! It’s so nice to just unwind with him during lunch :).

I stayed till 5 that day and covered the front desk since Rosie and everyone needed to go home to change. I got to change and be in jeans at work, heh. I had a few things to lug with me and went to the Convention Center to meet everyone. I got sent back a while later since they forgot a bottle of wine, and since we’d be selling roses for a fundraiser and had them in this awful 5-gallon bucket, I found a nice black satin tablecloth to cover it with.

My babe was running late, and when he finally got there they were going to separate us. Neither of us was too happy with that idea, so he went to chill out with his work buddies. I’m glad he did. I would have felt even more guilty that he got dressed up and everything =\.

We sold roses later on. I was kinda annoyed thinking I had to do it on my own, but another co-worker and the boss’ daughter did it, too. I actually sold most of my roses until they called me to do something else. We got to eat (wasn’t too happy about it, hotdogs and burgers, blah) and I didn’t see the nachos or pretzels so I didn’t get any LOL. I woulda been much happier with the latter!

I ended up being moved to the silent auction and once that was done we cleaned up, went back to work and unloaded and THEN I could come home. My babe was still a little upset about the whole thing, and I started getting upset and quickly went into panic mode because it was exactly a year to the hour since The Big Drama happened last year. I was actually a lot…calmer than I thought I would be on that night, but I owe it to keeping busy all day. I didn’t have time to “think” too much. But we were okay and we were together and in our soft bed and comfy sheets ♥. All was wonderful again by the next morning :).

I was so stressed out at work. One sponsor dropped because they’re closing their business. Another changed marketing directors and the new one didn’t include our event on their calendar. OMG I was so mad. And THEN, another company wanted to drop out too because my contact is just…awful. I knew she was going to be trouble as soon as I started dealing with her. I was about to lose my shit and texted Jorge to tell him how stressed I was. He asked when I was going to lunch and told me he’d meet me. He surprised me by showing up at my work ! We drove to Espi’s together and I just spewed everything out, everything that happened. He listened, offered advice and listened some more. And then he told me to forget everything and just enjoy lunch, so I did :). I was so grateful that he went out of his way to make me feel better.

I reluctantly went back to work. I wished Jorge could stay with me, or I could go with him, heh. But the day got better; my boss dealt with the sponsor and I got about 3 new exhibitors.

My Emily was brought to me 😀 and I made us dinner. We all got in our PJ’s and went to Walmart to get goodies and catfood, heh. We browsed around and then went home and watched XFactor. Emily fell asleep on my lap and Jorge took her to her bedroom where she stayed all night ♥. We finished watching the show and sat together enjoying each other’s company. We both expressed how we’d like every day to be like that :).

I couldn’t help but think to myself how much better this November 2nd was compared to last year. And we both agreed: it’s only going to get better :).