It’s Good Friday so the kids and I have today off. Emily and Alaethia left to their Dad’s yesterday. I picked Jorgie and Justin up from school and took them back to work with me, and then they suffered at Old Navy while I tried exchanging my Pixie Pants for the 3rd time. I was finally successful, but it only took us an entire hour. Half of that was spent in line, grr.

Anyway, the boys are grounded due to a bad progress report card, so we actually spent some time outside. Jorgie somewhat played football with Justin, until Jorgie threw 2 footballs into the tree and got them stuck there. So up he goes, which makes me nervous because you just never know with kids and trees. That, and I’m always illogically afraid he’s going to hurt the leg he broke. But he was fine and got the footballs down.

Jorge got home from work and he started playing football with Justin, then Jorgie joined in and I put on some shoes and joined them, too. I’m pretty sure the soreness is going to kick-in sometime today, when I least expect it. It was fun, though, and such a nice day.

We ate dinner (the boys scored an entire pizza at my work and I made Jorge and I salads) while I spoke to the kiddos about their day. Then we sat down to watch “The Labyrinth”. As it started, Justin commented, “It’s like watching High School Musical, isn’t it??” But they didn’t hate it and watched the entire thing. Us old farts ended up bidding them adieu and went to bed LOL.

I’m so darn used to waking up at 5-5:30am for work that sleeping past 7am this morning was useless. I woke up when Jorge’s alarm went off. He snuggled up to me, wrapped his arms around me and whispered, “I hate you,” ’cause I was still in bed and he had to go to work, heh.

I stayed awake a while, slept for about 30 solid minutes more and then woke up because Mary and Emily were picking up Alaethia’s iPad she forgot yesterday. We hugged and she picked a flower for me and they were off. (TMI, but I’m PMSing so the kids not being here is getting to me, and I’m tittering on the edge of becoming weepy, so I have to distract myself.) I came inside and made some cappuccino for Jorgie and me and then some French Toast. I’m trying to low-carb as much as possible, but I suck at it, heh. 

I have so much I need to do regarding housework. Dina, Briana and the kids arrive today and the house needs to be in tip-top shape.

Which reminds me: I need to change out Violet’s water (Alaethia’s beloved Beta).

I also want to do other things, like painting some Minecraft art for the boys’ bathroom so they’ll be more encouraged to use it. They still travel all the way across the house to use the hall one. 

I want to figure out if I should paint a chalkboard wall in the kitchen, or find where they sell the chalkboard contact paper locally (’cause I’m too impatient to order from Amazon).

I want to relaunch my online Thrift Shop but I want to get some of my 80’s duplicates together to sell/trade with Paul, too. And at the same time, my pack-rat tendencies want me to keep everything. Ugh.

And, I keep forgetting this weekend is Easter so I need to finish purchasing chips, candies, and other goodies for the kids’ baskets. I know the oldest boys are 14 and 15, and I’m not really sure when you stop giving baskets to kids, but it’s not like I’m putting stuffed animals in them or anything and I’m sure I’d hear it if they didn’t get one, heh.

So, this will serve as my to-do list. I guess I’ll start with the housework, as that’s probably the most important *sigh*.

It’s been well over a month since my last update. At this rate, it seems I’ll have 1 post a month this year (which is totally NOT what my goal was!). But oh well. I can’t complain. I guess lack of updates means life’s pretty busy and I’m just glad it’s the positive type of busy. I hope it stays that way!

This will be one of those backward-type posts.

The kids are all home on Spring Break, except for Jules who went back home Sunday night. We took the kids to the Discover the Dinosaurs exhibit at the Convention Center on Sunday, except for Eenan who didn’t want to go (teenagers!) and stayed with John. Poor Jorgie had to get an adult ticket and couldn’t get on the moonjumps and rides. And Justin and Jaylen didn’t have as much fun as the little ones lol. But it was fun to get out and do something different.

We went to Weinershnitzel afterwards. Hotdogs and ice cream cones galore!

Emily and Jaylen accompanied me to the mall on Saturday. They had a great sale on kids’ T-shirts so I got the boys a few each. And got myself some work pants, finally. Now all I need is heels because petite STILL fits so long on me :(!

Anyway, my boy is such a gentleman, carrying bags and all :). We ate at the food court and then joined the brood at home, where I made tacos for all :).

Other than that, poor things haven’t had much of a Spring Break since Jorge and I are working :(. They leave with their other parents on Wednesday, so that cuts our week short. We were going to go to the movies last night but it became late so we opted to rent a new movie on Directv…just to find out the ones the kids wanted to watch aren’t out for home rentals yet, grr. So we watched “Interstellar”, which depressed the crap out of everyone lol.

Poor Eenan got his wisdom teeth extracted on Friday: all 4, all at once.

As annoyed as I was by the crappy service at the oral surgeon’s office and even worse service at the pharmacy, I’m glad my Nano is recovering pretty well. Even though he’s my big boy I can tell he loved the undivided attention and getting to laugh at my pitiful attempt at playing Halo with him. He even said at the beginning of the week, “I can’t wait, Mama.”

Me: “For?”

Eenan: “To get all the attention like Jorgie did when he broke his leg and like Emily did when she had pneumonia.”

He’s still my baby :). I wish we could spend more time together :(.

My poor Emmos had pneumonia :(. She was sick with an annoying cough for about a month and a half and it only got worse. She finally recovered the 2nd week of March, thank goodness. I’m sure the doctors thought I was crazy taking her in every few days, but when I finally requested an xray and the pneumonia showed up they understood why I was so paranoid.

Last week was a flurry of Open Houses for the boys.

I got to catch up with my girls, too, when I was kidless this past weekend. Jessica M. and I had lunch at Casa del Taco on Friday and then I met up with Jessica R.P. in the evening at Hobby Lobby and Starbucks. Both girls treated me, I felt so important hehe. It was great catching up, love them!

I ran some errands with my love the next morning and then I met Jessica M. at IHOP for brunch. I get home later and find a beautiful Hen and Chicks succulent that Sally dropped off for me. I called her and picked her up to go look at plants and Home Depot hehe. I love my girl-dates!

The week before that was a flurry of clothes shopping for them and the girls’ picture day and their Open House.

Before that, we celebrated Emily and Jorgie’s birthdays at Xtreme Lazer Tag. Due to her pneumonia, Emily couldn’t even enjoy the party because she got tired after the first round of tag :(. I sat out with her while she played with her presents and she was content. The other kids did have fun though. Jorge did too! He said, “I think I kicked a kid and used Julien as a shield!” ^_^ It’s a pretty cool place.

Emily got to celebrate her birthday with her classmates, too, and Alaethia was invited so that was nice :).

My love and I celebrated Valentine’s Day on the 20th since the 14th is Julien’s birthday and we had a party for him and Alaethia that day :). We had an awesome dinner at Palenque Grill. Those people are amazing! Super efficient and courteous. We watched “50 Shades of Grey” at Cinemark. I can’t complain about the movie and Jorge was pretty ok with it too. Although we celebrated late, my love outdid himself this year with the Valentine’s gifts.

First, he got me a Nosy Bear I wanted:

Which I was ecstatic about. But then 36 roses arrived at work on the 13th:

And another 36 at home on the 14th:

Along with some goodies:

And then some Tulips on Monday:

So yes, he most definitely outdid himself!

We had forgotten how crazy it was to put on a kids’ party, and that’s because it wasn’t anything huge, just a few friends and family. Very few. Dina chipped in and the family visited and the kids had a blast, though. Alaethia was sad Audrey couldn’t come (they were out of town celebrating her birthday) but Delyssa was there. And Sally, George and the kids. The kids all played Glow Tag with glowstick bracelets and necklaces all throughout the house while Joyce and I stayed at the moonjump with the little ones.

And who doesn’t like having a moonjump for 2 whole days??

So that’s part of March and some of February :). So many great things happening I could explode sometimes :).

I have a more detailed post in the works, but since my laptop seems to be on it’s last breaths and keeps shutting down on me, I’ll have to leave it for some other time. Oh yeah, I have to get up early for work, too, heh.

Speaking of, my last 2 large events are over, Hallelujah! I’ll update on those, too.

I feel a weight off my shoulders and even though I’m pretty busy with other activities at work, it’s nice to go through the day not feeling rushed, or worried. I had a perpetual heaviness in my chest I attribute to stress, and it seems to be completely gone from one day to the next! Don’t get me wrong: I really, truly enjoy my job, but the urgency I feel 24/7 comes with the territory. It’s expected. But it’s nice when something you worked so hard to accomplish comes to a fruitful end :).

It was a cold, drizzly, gloomy day. I even packed a soup and sandwich for lunch at work because I refused to go out in the cold.

I researched what to make with what I already had at home and figured Hasselback zucchini and potatoes would hit the spot. So, as soon as the girls’ homework was done and they were off playing Minecraft, and after talking to the boys, I got to work. And the Hasselbacks were a hit! Even the girls liked them :).

I wouldn’t consider them “healthy” (the butter, oh Lord, the butter!), but it sure was comfort food at it’s best! You could make these all sorts of ways. I’d like to try a sweet potato recipe soon! And although the slicing and waiting and filling are tedious, it’s pretty simple. I followed the recipe from Cupcake Project for a guide on the potatoes, only I substituted her ingredients for onion, tomato, turkey and American cheese–all stuff I already had on-hand.

For the zucchini, I followed Yummily Yours’ recipe, only I set the oven to 400 degrees to bake both dishes together and I reduced the amount of thyme to 2 pinches instead of 2 tablespoons.

Ok. My laptop died again and won’t come back up, wahh. Finishing this up on my Note. I need to make sure I backup all my photos and just everything on it. Ugh. Why now, laptop???