Category: Gardening

So that interview I wrote about yesterday? I survived it once again.

But not before flipping my shit because I was half-abandoned and expected to do the thing myself when I didn’t even want to do it in the first place. I mean, I felt like flipping my desk over (if it didn’t weigh a literal ton). But I got over it, and wonderful Alexis (I’m so sad she’s not my neighbor anymore, waah!) practiced the Spanish part with me and Mrs. Thelma helped me through it, as did the two ladies interviewing us. They really are great at what they do and totally put us at ease and made us laugh.

I wasn’t too thrilled when Carolina, the lady who did the Spanish interview, offered to get in touch with her contacts at the other Spanish stations to interview us and promote the program there, too. I just smiled and gave a thumbs up. She’s just being helpful, of course, but I did stumble all over my words during the Spanish part. You’d think that after 4 years of Spanish being a part of my job that it would sort of just FLOW, but it doesn’t.

I’ve got lots to catch up on tomorrow since I took half the day today to comply with my appointments.

I met my love (and Marco, and then ran into Michelle, EZ and Anabel) at Palenque Chicken. I love meeting him for lunch .

Emily had a follow up at her dentist’s office. Well, not really a follow-up; more like a second opinion. I couldn’t believe it when they told me she had 2 cavities her last visit (after 6 months). During that same visit, when it was time to schedule an appointment for her fillings they tell me they would schedule her fillings for her 6 cavities. I tell them they made a mistake; check the chart. Nope, it was hers.

I felt weird and frankly, I didn’t believe it. So I scheduled an appointment with the pediatric dental specialist for today. He checks her and says he sees 4 cavities. Still not the original 2, but OK. And then he says he recommends she gets caps instead of fillings. I’m squinting at the X-ray; the cavity is miniscule!! I don’t understand how something that small needs CAPS!!!

Emily and Alaethia leave with Mary to have lunch, while I go to my dentist appointment. I text Jorge and tell him about my concerns, then I text Mario and tell him the same. They both agree they need to see a different dentist altogether. I get to my dentist’s and tell Jennifer and Elda about it. Jennifer says she used to work for them and they were kind of shady. I freaking new it. I’m moving the girls to my dentist ASAP.

I get my check up done and for the first time in a long time, everything is A-OK!! Woo!

I came home to change really quickly, then went to the girls school to meet Mario and the girls for Meet the Teacher night. I updated Mario; the girls weren’t going to be in the same class as their BFF’s, Audrey and Maddie (both sisters, both the same exact age as my girls). It kind of worked out when Audrey and Alaethia saw each other from across the hall and ran and embraced. As did Emily and Maddie. It was the sweetest thing :). Jenny and I found the opportunity to tell them that Audrey’s class was at the end of the hall and that Alaethia’s was a few doors down. They got it right away, but they didn’t get upset. We did promise weekend play-dates at Ben & Jerry’s though, heh. You gotta bribe them SOMETIMES!!

Jenny complimented me and said that I’m “looking good”. I joked that I jog once a week to keep my figure LOL. I told her we should go together and she replied, “I run, to the fridge!” Buaha. I love her, she’s hilarious. And the compliment was much appreciated as I’m feeling quite gelatinous lately since I’m not working out OR running. Waah.

I took the girls to Ben & Jerry’s for a treat after Meet the Teacher:

We got home and I sent them to the bathroom to brush their teeth!

Mary picked the girls. She’d taken the boys to get haircuts. I think it’s amazing how they both tower over me (it was bound to happen, heh). I love those lil’ guys. I need to mention just how wonderful they are. They’re so loving and great. Eenan sent me this last night when I whined about how much I hate being in front of the screen:

Such a great boy :*)! I just wish he’d see what a handsome boy he is!! I’m afraid I passed on my low self-esteem to my eldest child. How do I fix that :(?

Lots of hugs and kisses were passed around and then my kiddos left :(. It sucks that this is the last week of summer.

Jorge got home as the kids were leaving and before I started making dinner, I checked on my succulents. They’re doing pretty good since I separated them all on Saturday evening with the girls’ help ^_^.

The succulents in the large pot were having trouble, as is the Haworthia Zebra in the smaller “garden” so I had gone with Emily to Home Depot to purchase some small terra cotta pots. (Then we had gone to Kohl’s to finish their school shopping :).)

(I’m not too fond of that photo; it was dark and the flash made the succulents turn weird colors >_<.) Unfortunately, I lost my large hen & chicks and my Echeveria "Lola". They were never the same after we got back from vacation. I'll never understand if it was underwatering, overwatering, sunburn or WHAT that did them in =\. It's frustrating. [caption id="attachment_2344" align="aligncenter" width="300"] Leaflets, propagating.[/caption]

I put all the leaflets I was propagating in this pot. Well, the ones that made it, anyway. The wonderfully budding Jellybean leaves all shriveled up, except one. And even that one doesn’t look like it’s doing too good =\. I just hope the rest make it!

[edited on Friday, August 22, 2014]

I just realized the photo above is from August 15th!! The tiny, new buds have grown significantly in a week!

I threw in the other 3 that I’d been propagating separately, as you can see. Sadly, I’ve forgotten which they are! The little “beads” are Sting of Pearl leaflets and I know there’s a Donkey Tail Burrito. I thought there was a Golden Sedum, but I’m not entirely sure now, since it looks different O_o. Anywho, I can’t wait till they grow more!! The waiting game drives me crazy!!

And here is my windowsill at present:

*swoon* I could stare at them alllll dayyyyy!!

So, even if today started out pretty darn crappy, I have to say my family, friends and hobbies turned it around completely <3!

So it’s the end of August mid-September January and I’m finally sitting down to write about our little vacation in July. The delay is mostly due to wanting to add photos, of course, but it’s so time-consuming having to go back through the 500+ (or possibly more) photos I took during that week and even more of a pain to upload. But here goes. Oh yeah, and don’t forget the lack of time. Maybe I’ll even upload this entry before August is over! Ahaha. No.

We got all the kids ready to go on July 14th. Gave them breakfast, stuffed the bags in the back of the truck and got all 7 kids in the truck. We made at least 3 trips back into the house because we forgot this or that, Jorge stopped by Taco Palenque for tacos for us and then we took off for Austin!

That was the best photo I could get, believe it or not, hehe.

It was a quiet ride for the most part, as the kids slowly nodded off one by one. Jorge and I took turns picking songs to listen and sing to and then we get to the Falfurrias, TX check point. We wake all the kids up and like always, make jokes about them not being smart asses and saying something that’ll ’cause them to think we’re smuggling children ’cause there’s so many (what with all the smuggling going on these days).

We pass, “US citizens?” “Yes, sir,” and they wave us through.

Jorge jokes, “Alright, we made it!”
Jorgie: “Arriba!!”
Jorge: *breaks into Mexican anthem* “Mexicanos, al grito de Guerra…”

Always a laugh-fest with him and the kids ^_^.

We stopped to eat at McDonald’s in San Marcos at noon. People are usually pretty impressed with how efficient our orders are and how well-behaved our kids are ^_^. We let them have some time in the play area (well, the little ones, anyway) and then we were back on the road.

We made a few stops along the way, checked in at the hotel and finally made it to Dina’s around 5pm. Everyone passed around hugs and welcomes and we settled in. The first place we would be visiting would be the Micki Krebsbach Pool, so we got all the kiddos ready in their swim suits, packed coolers, and we were off.

Eenan is going to kill me if he ever sees this photo on the interwebs, heh. All 4 of the big boys are in this photo ^_^.

The kids had so much fun and reluctantly changed into their dry clothes asking when we’d be back.

We got back to Dina’s and ordered Domino’s. The kids were getting tired so we went back to the hotel. It was a tight squeeze with all our kiddos, since the room was lacking the sofabed it was supposed to have, but we made it work :). After showers were had and everyone put to bed, I pretty much crashed out.

I was the first to wake up the next morning and took Emily with me to get some breakfast. Nobody else was awake, or wanted to go. So I had my coffee and oatmeal and she happily ate her cereal.

Jorge eventually woke up, as did the boys and Alaethia and they all kind of lazied around playing on electronics. That’s what I love about our vacations: we’re not really in a hurry and everything’s calm :).

Jorge took some of the boys to get breakfast. I’d brought some pastries and yogurt and Alaethia, Eenan and Justin were ok with that. We got ready and started our day by getting a few groceries and things we’d need for our second pool day. We get back to Dina’s and start getting the kids ready. We couldn’t find Julien’s trunks anywhere, so we put him in some shorts that LOOKED like trunks and hoped for the best. We packed the bags and coolers once again and took off.

We get to Micki Krebsbach Pool…and it’s closed!! Jorge makes an audible growl and is kind of quiet on the way to the next place Briana knows about in Round Rock called Rock-n-River Family Aquatic Center. We arrive, we pay and
settle into the nearest, empty picnic area. But not before they stop us…because Julien’s trunks aren’t trunks. Ugh. Jorge’s patience was sliced very thin by now, but he kept his patience. And I’m glad, too, because the manager lent us trunks. Briana said they’ll usually kick people out!

The kids have barely stepped into the water when they blow the whistle.

Darn thunder and lightning are threatening to make their way over and everyone’s told to get out of the water. We have to wait 15 minutes before getting back in. If they blow the whistle again, it’s another 15, and so on.

So, we took photos to pass the time :).

The kids were becoming antsy so we gave them snacks. We waited a pretty long time, maybe an hour, and they continued to blow the whistle. They finally tell us they’re closing for the day and there’s an uproar from all the families that had arrived around the time we had and didn’t even get to get into the water. They gave us vouchers, but it was pretty crappy because we wouldn’t be around to use them because they’d be closed Wednesday and we were leaving Thursday. Ugh. So we gave them to Briana to use with the kids.

We get to Dina’s and she had just arrived from work. A drama show starts after a phone call from Jorge’s boys’ mother, who riled up Julien and he was inconsolable afterwards. Kept saying his mom had left him and he missed her. Heartbreaking. The boys confirmed that she’d not been home most of the week so he hadn’t seen her. It was sad, and Jorge was annoyed, so we gathered all the kids and went to the hotel.

We scanned the entire local phone book looking for take-out and couldn’t agree on anything with the kids so we just ordered pizza, from Pizza Hut this time. The kids were all thrilled, so that was great :). Can’t go wrong with pizza. Well, maybe for Eenan, but he was okay with it :).

We ate and joked around. Justin’s a clown!

(Hope he doesn’t flip because I posted that, haha!)

We got everyone showered and I was the last one. By the time I got out of the shower all the boys were fired up and hyper…and I find out Jorge let them have Capri Suns at almost midnight *sigh*. They were laughing their butts off, including Jorge! I finally had to switch to Strict Mom Mode and shush them all up!

The next morning only Jorgie and I were awake, so we sneaked off to get coffee for ourselves and Jorge. We watched TV while slowly each little head popped out of the covers. Some of the kids wanted breakfast from the diner, the rest wanted cereal in the room. So everyone ate, got ready and then we headed over to Dina’s, where we took an opportunity to get a group photo 🙂

Briana does a great job looking for stuff for us to do! This day, we’d visit Zilker Botanical Gardens. We usually take a hike with the kids at Walnut Creek, but this was different and AWESOME!

Throughout our hike, Julien would ask, “We see the dinosaur now?” and we’d say, “No, Pa, I don’t think we’ll find any…” and then we see this:

Jorge, Julien, Emily and I got separated from the group because the little ones needed to pee. We met up later at the butterfly area/children’s area. It was beautiful there!!

It was hot and the little ones were becoming antsy, but it was on to the next part of the trip: the Elizabet Ney Museum.

The kids thought they were visiting a castle, but they got a bit of a history lesson, heh. I was proud of how well-behaved they were :).

We went back to Dina’s apartment and ate, then packed our bags to go to the Micki Krebsbach Pool. Besides Jorgie dropping his phone in the pool and an initial stall because his in-grown toenails had become INCREDIBLY infected (and he never told us!), it was a great, great time. All us adults even went down the slide. Briana and I had to encourage each other, ’cause we’re both terrified of deep pools, but we eventually got on, TWICE!

Jorge and Javi went, too. Jorge was a bit terrified, only because he was afraid he and Javi would clear the turn and fly off due to their weight, haha, but they were fine!

I had a photo of Jorge doing the obstacle course (he kept “pish-poshing” when the kids would fall and said he could totally do it, but couldn’t LOL), but he’d kill me if I posted it :D. He did admit that it was harder than it looks, hah.

We finished the day at the pool and headed back to Dina’s. Everyone was exhausted after our long day. We gathered all our things after dinner (details are hazy now, but I think we ordered Chinese) and Jorgie spent the night there so we’d return to say our goodbyes in the morning.

We woke up, had breakfast, then checked out of the hotel. We picked up Jorgie and said our see-you-laters.

I wanted to visit East Austin Succulents so we Wazed the directions and after a slight wrong turn we found it. But only after passing by this bridge:

All the guys stayed in the car while Alethia, Emily and I browsed through the nursery.

I was in heaven :). The girls each picked a succulent and I picked two:

I drove around with them everywhere we went and prayed they’d make it home. They did. (But now that it’s been 6 months since I bought them, the one on the top right has since died, waaah! No wonder they sold it to me for $1 =\.)

We were going to drive home, spend the night and then leave to South Padre Island in the morning. But instead, we decided to drive to North Padre Island straightaway. We got a great rate on the hotel and were relieved to rest. Jorge went to Walmart to get sand toys (since we’d left all of the beach stuff at home), towels and I stayed with the kids and did some laundry. Jorge got back and since the kids wanted to walk over to the beach, we did.

We got back and washed everyone down and I finished laundry while Jorge ordered in Domino’s. And then, sleep!

Woke up the next day and we fed everyone. We made sure to gather all our things, pack our coolers and checked out and headed to the beach. It was a really nice day :).

And of course, he remembered:

A storm was rolling in and we left right on time. We got everyone washed and changed in the bathrooms nearby and then we tried finding a park on Waze. No luck, after circling the island forever. The kids snacked on stuff and then passed out:

And that was the end of our vacation. And it only took me 6 months to write about it, heh!

I spend most of my work days daydreaming about being at home. Most of the time, the daydream’s setting is the porch.

Or in the kitchen cooking with the girls while I swoon over my succulents ^_^.

This has been my “thing” lately; well, the weeks I’m kid-less. Free time is spent reading succulent care blogs or Pinning Succulents I eventually want to possess. Or visiting nurseries (like during lunch on Tuesday and after work today) or Home Depot, like on Wednesday night with John (and then he and Jorge ruined my workout by convincing me to eat Wing Stop!!). Gardening just…soothes me.

I never thought I’d get into gardening and then I did when we moved to this house and I planted flower beds everywhere. Then the Great Hail Storm of 2012 hit and ruined it all and then I stuck to my little succulents I’d planted in 2011 when I had the kiddos paint terra cotta pots for them. Just recently I got back into them (succulents are okay with being neglected, but I kind of overdid it, heh) and wanting to grow them myself, from cuttings.

So I searched for succulent propagation blogs and found these two to be really helpful: Life With SarahB and Succulents & Sunshine

So far, I think I’ve been doing pretty well!

This batch were the first little guys to undergo my latest project. I left them in the egg carton so the little cut end would dry up. Not all of them made it =|.

I laid some dirt in the carton, laid them out and began giving them a spritz of water once a day, every day for about 2 weeks.

That little cactus actually hitched a ride from Home Depot to our house when I bought a few other small pots. I hope he’ll grow!

Here are the leaves with their roots and buds almost a month later (I took these photos today):

These are a few little buds that completely propagated on their own. I actually found this Ghost Plant bud propagating on the windowsill!

I put it in a small pot, along with 2 other buds that began to propagate on their own in my large succulent pot:

This little guy overgrew the little pot Emily had painted. I picked up this blue-green-yellow pot at that nursery I stopped at today and transferred him over as soon as I got home.

I added the teeny Ghost Plant that had propagated itself so it can hopefully, eventually fill in that side of the pot. I was happy to see the Ghost Plant had a new sprout on one of the stems, too.

So now I have my first succulent garden that I wrote about 3 entries ago:

I’ve since removed the Baby Toes, which I named Roger, from the pot. It seemed unhealthy when I bought it, but it just never got better and eventually it started shriveling up. I took such good care of my first Baby Toes and now I can’t seem to keep them alive :(.

My Donkey Tail Burrito is also having a bit of trouble. At first I thought it was too hot outside, so I moved the pot to the windowsill and it’s still dropping a lot of “beads”. My String of Pearls was unhealthy when I bought it as well, and doesn’t seem to be getting any better. I’m keeping my fingers crossed though. Maybe neglecting it a bit will help.

I had bought a few succulents here and there for the past couple of weeks. A pink/green Echeveria and a Gollum at H-E-B, a severely over-watered Zebra Haworthia from Valley Garden Center, and then the other few that I bought when John and I went to Home Depot this Wednesday. So I made Succulent Garden #2:

I’m so happy with them. I hope I can keep them all alive. I’m so impatient. I want the sprouts to grow and I want to know the big ones will be ok!

So there you go: a bit of my madness and my current hobby. I’d been in a funk the last weeks of May and early June (no idea why, either, it was just weird), but I’ve been taking this literally lately:

It seems to be working pretty well!