I’m so bad at updating everything. Well, except of course Twitter/Tweetdeck, which automatically sends everything to Myspace and Facebook. I’d started the whole 365 thing on Flickr–not joining the groups or anything, just for myself really–and I think I got to day 7 or 8 and that was it! I was hoping at least keeping up with that since I do a crappy job of keeping up with this blog. Oh well!

Mario and I were supposed to be working on the plans for our hopeful, future kitchen/dining room remodel, but he says he was waiting for me all day to talk about it and I was busy. Of course I was busy! I was getting the rest of the stuff I needed for Alaethia’s birthday this weekend (and I still forgot the helium tank, 2 bags of tortilla chips and mayo) and then I got home and cleaned and then I took the boys to Taekwondo. Luis, the instructor, gave them kind of like a pop quiz. The boys almost ended up having to go back to the white belt class for extra practice! They’ve gotta perfect their form by Thursday or else!

Anyway, so yeah. After I made dinner and fed all the kids (Rolando included; he came to visit after TKD) I came over to the living room where Mario was on his laptop so we could start jotting down plans for the remodel. We’ve been sitting here for at least 2 hours on our respective laptops and I keep bringing it up but he says now he’s not in the mood. Makes me so mad!

Well, since he won’t hear me out, I’ll jot down my ideas here. We’re both thinking of completely flipping the dining room and kitchen, kind of like what Sally and Pete did at their house. So when you’re walking in the from the living room, it would be living room, dining room and then kitchen. The only problem is the darn bathroom! It’s right next to the dining room right now, which I HATE! We’re thinking of completely flipping the bathroom around making a tiny hallway for it. I was thinking of making a partition wall next to the hallway, so that it’s not RIGHT THERE next to the kitchen when we remodel. But I don’t know. Mario doesn’t like the idea because he says it’ll take away from the cabinet space. We’re going to have so much more room anyway if we do flip it!

And in the dining room, I want to make that awkward angled wall a mostly chalkboard wall with a cork board on one side, with a nice moulding around them/separating them. I also want a credenza or hutch or something with shelves and doors to hide the kids’ game boards, crayons, notebooks and anything else they usually leave lying around in the dining room. BUT, Mario doesn’t like the idea of cabinets in there. Poo.

(…1 1/2 hrs. later…) Well we finally went in there, measured and taped things off. We’re going to have to do some major changes in there to get the counter space we want. Like moving the hallway entrance (to the bedrooms) from the dining room to the kitchen (were the awkward wall is) and then the rest of the space on that wall will be chalkboard for the kids! The bathroom doorway will be moved completely to the opposite side with a partition wall so the door way’s not THAT close to the kitchen. We’ll have a top-to-bottom pantry where the bathroom door used to be and we’re going to hopefully have enough space for an island with cabinets for the bigger appliances and pots/pans and a space for my cookbooks. I’m so excited, you have no idea. Unfortunately, though, we’re going to have to do it all little by little since we’re on a tight budget. But we can do it. Just gotta have a little patience with our situation…and each other LOL.

01/01/10 – New Years – I stayed up a little late but woke up early (and woke the girls up early) to go over to Mary’s to help embarar (spread) tamales. She was shredding the pork off the bone with her fingers for the pork ones and she’d already seasoned the deer & beans for the other two batches.

Sonia, Mom, Elda and myself helped Mary spread the masa on the tamales. I suck at that LOL. Not to mention what a perfectionist I am; the whole thing had to be even and perfect! I didn’t even get a picture of the mountain of tamales. We were too busy eating them. But I only had 4 (I can usually eat up to 6 or 7!).

Mario was still in a mood from the night before. He stayed holed up in our bedroom pretty much all day. I chilled at Mary’s with Mom, the kids, Andy, Noelia, Sonia and Elda for a good while.

When Mario finally got out of bed we had the moms watch the kiddos and we went to Walmart for a few things. I wanted some cheapy boots, because I have nothing nice or warm to wear for winter (I’ve only got flats and sneakers) but of course, they didn’t have my size.

We get home and I decided to make Velveeta cheese dip (with Rotel & ground beef) for dinner. Hey! It’s got all the food groups (chips made the grains one LOL!).

Aide and I sat in the dining room and chit-chatted about everything and looked through a little Izone album I had since Eenan was a tiny baby. Emily looks exactly like he did back then, aww :).

When Adan, Aide and their kiddos left we got all comfy on the sofa and watched “The Half-Blood Prince” on Blu-ray (one of my gifts from Mary :D). Mario hadn’t seen it and he actually enjoyed it.

I started my 365 that night. I highly doubt I’ll keep up with it, but we’ll see LOL.

Mario and I stayed up till 4am that night, even later than New Years the night before! We’re such an old married couple. We were sitting in the living room, across from each other on the sofas looking for pictures of kitchens we liked on Flickr and Ikea.com LOL.

01/02/10 – Girl’s Night Out – I spent most of that day cleaning. John had come over and kept bugging me to make banana muffins, so I made some. We had Sebastian, one of our neighbors here most of the day; he’s Eenan’s age. He’s always here, poor kid. I don’t mind, though.

We went to pick up Subway for lunch, ate really quick and then Aaron came over to play video games with Jaylen for a bit. I continued with cleaning but oh my gosh. I have so much to go. The living room & kitchen were clean, but a corner of the dining room’s a storage unit for now. I still need to go through all those boxes of Alaethia’s old clothes and hang up what I’m going to use for Emily.

I texted Mario and asked if he wanted to go out. He said he’d already made plans with Jorge so to make plans of my own. I called Sally up and she invited me to a bar-b-q at her friend Monica’s house. I got ready in record time (heh) and drove over to her house. We switched to her vehicle and made it over to Monica’s. It was a CRAZY night. We played Flip Cup, which I’d never played before and we played with this really crappy champagne so I got tipsy really fast LOL, but it was fun!

We ate, had some laughs and talked about high school and old crushes and by the end of the night polished off almost a whole block of Philadelphia cheese and salsa with tiny wheat crackers.

We wanted to get some drinks somewhere so we went to Woodreaux’s. Neither of us had ever been there, so we figured we’d try it out. As soon as we walk in, a surly short dude with a black cowboy had and a huge mustache pulls my sweater from my shoulder. I scowl at him and shake my head when he waved us over to his table.

Sally and I sit at the bar and browse through the menu and talk about how weird that guy was. She says, “I thought you knew him. Thought he was one of Mario’s friends.” I tell her, “I have no idea who he is,” and we just laughed about it.

10 minutes later the dude comes back. Tries to literally pull us off the bar stools asking if we want to dance. We both say no and he insists. We again, politely decline and he leaves. Sally and I can’t help but laugh. We decide that if any other creepy guy approaches us again we’d pretend we were lesbian Life Partners LOL.

Well, that completely goes out the window as we’re finishing our drinks and the same dude comes up to us and begs us to dance with him again. We couldn’t stop laughing from how uncomfortable we were! He told us just about every lie and line in the book. Couldn’t stop talking about how beautiful we were. Even mentioned how he was a widower. Uh huh, sure. I started getting really mad once he kept insisting we see his truck. He kept raving how we’d love it. Um, no. I kept staring at the bartender, asking for help with my eyes LOL. He finally got the hint and directed the crazy dude to a couple who was already getting up to leave. Bartender tells Crazy Dude, “Look, this girl in the purple? She LOVES to dance!” So Crazy Dude goes over there and embraces both the guy and girl as they’re getting up. We took the opportunity to run out of there like bats out of hell LOL.

We got to Sally’s and retold the story to Pete, Alyssa and her boyfriend. Buahaha. It was insane but truly a night to remember!

Happy New Year, everyone!

Starting this up at 12:11, so I’m not to late, heh. Had to stop our celebration half an hour early and bring the kids inside because idiots in our neighborhood started shooting their guns. They do this crap every year!

John chilled out with me most of the day. We watched some marathon on VH1 about the new millennium and I got a quick work out in before I showered and went to McAllen to cash Mario’s pay check. I wanted to have the entire house completely clean, but I only got to do a few dishes, 2 loads of laundry and toss out the trash before I had to leave. I always hear Mom in my head saying “if you don’t have the house clean on New Year’s Eve, you’re going to have a messy house the entire new year” and “if you don’t shower on New Year’s Eve, you’re going to be dirty the entire new year”. I at least got the shower part done LOL. And the messy house isn’t anything new, heh.

We had lunch and Mom got situated with all the kiddos before we left. We went all the way to McAllen and I stopped by Mario’s work to drop off the things he asked me to take with me. He said the checks still weren’t in, so to go ahead and waste time in town. I looked down at my legs, which haven’t been shaven in weeks because it’s been cold. I was in shorts since it was in the 70’s today and my favorite jeans were in the dryer back at home. I was NOT about to go into Barnes & Noble with legs like that LOL. So John and I just waited in the parking lot, listening to music and sharing the latest gossip. We waited about an hour and a half, just so that Mario could finally get his check and tell me he needs to get something for his Boost phone so he’d go ahead and go to the bank. So basically…I went to McAllen for NOTHING. I could have been cleaning the house! Or baking! Or starting on the dips for tonight!

So I get home and since John wasted all that time he asked me to give him a haircut. Fine. Then Mario gets home and wants one. Fine. Then my dad-in-law wanted one and a beard trim. Oh, alright.

So needless to say, I didn’t get the dips done :(. And we find out at the last minute that everyone’s going over to Grandpa Dario’s for a bar-b-q instead of getting together at our house. As crappy as it would be not hanging out with the entire family, it’s a tradition to pop fireworks with the kids, eat and have a few drinks here, at home.

Mario and Jaylen left to buy fireworks and Mary, Alaethia and I went to Walmart to get a few things. Mom stayed with Eenan & Emily. I got the s’more’s stuff, got some Moscato wine, beer, and pizzas since I wasn’t making the dips (can you tell I’m bummed about not having Spinach Artichoke and Velveeta/Rotel dip? LOL).

As soon as I got home I popped the pizzas in the oven. Rolando, Eenan’s friend, was already here. The boys were outside popping fireworks under Mario’s supervision.

Mario wasn’t in a good mood at all. He even snapped at me a few times, and I told him to stop ’cause he was being super rude. What a way to bring in the new year! I ignored it, though, and enjoyed spending time with the in-laws, Mom and my kiddos.

Eenan had a little moment of emo-ness, too. He was sad because Angela and the other kids weren’t here, but I told him it was fine, he was still spending time with his best friend and siblings. He threw a small fit outside and I just snapped. I sternly told him, “All the people that matter the most are HERE! You, and everyone else that’s complaining (*cough*Mario*cough*) need to realize that!”

I didn’t hear any more complaining after that.

I got everyone fed and the boys popped more fireworks. Emily was having a blast with her grandparents and Alaethia was coloring with her Crayola stuff. She’s still not too fond of fireworks.

The boys were getting a little overexcited with the fireworks, so we brought out the S’mores stuff. They were excited to melt their own marshmallows with the skewers.

They had about another hour to pop fireworks before Rolando was picked up. I brought out the bottle of wine and Mario opened it and poured my glass, as a nice peace offering that I gladly accepted.

The girls were becoming antsy, Jaylen was sleepy and quickly becoming moody and then the neighbors started shooting so we came inside. I texted and responded to a few New Years texts and then John came over around 12:40 to pick up some food he forgot here. He chilled for a bit, shared some disgusting stories (LOL, typcial John) and then left. The girls are now sleeping and Mario’s still outside, drinking alone, still in a not-so-good mood according to his Myspace status. *sigh*

I can’t believe a whole year’s passed. 2009 was a really good year. I became a stay-at-home mom again. Emily, my surprise baby, came into my life and made it even better than it was. My entire family’s healthy and well, even though Gramma did have her bouts of pneumonia, she prevailed and she’s healthy again. I hope God keeps her that way for many more years to come. We did lots of cool things during summer, like going to my very first concert every (George Strait & Sugarland in Houston!) and we visited Disney World again! The boys and I joined Taekwondo and I feel healthier than I have in a long time. I’m finally 120 pounds again (hope to get to 110–it’s not too little, I’m only 4’11”, remember!). And countless other blessings I can’t recall off the top of my head. I know 2010 will be even better!

Must work on a New Year’s Resolution list tomorrow!