Category: Jorge

We had a great week with the kids. It started on Sunday evening when we picked them up from the other parents’ homes and took them to the drive-in to watch Maleficent and Transformers: Age of Extinction. We bought tons of snacks and got the cooler, blankets and lawn chairs ready, went on the drive and found a pretty good spot.

They were into the movies, thank goodness, and although the girls and I spent a lot of time in line at the bathrooms (OMG, the lines!!), we had a pretty good time :).

We got out super late, though, and Jorge and I worked the next morning so we got them home and put them all into bed.

This was the 1st year that we’ve gotten to have all 7 kids together for 4th of July, so we were excited :).

Our boss let us out early on Thursday, by noon, so I went straight to HEB to buy all the stuff for the BBQ and s’mores during the fireworks. I wasn’t sure about what type of patties to buy for the burgers, so I called Jorge and asked, even sending him a photo of the beef patties I figured we should take (and that weren’t part of a recent recall). He approved, and I took them.

Got home, made dinner for the kids, Mom, John and Jorge. I got ready and met Alexis at the gym. We didn’t want to miss it since we knew we’d be “bad” the next day. I had all intentions of eating many s’mores hehe.

She didn’t have plans since her hubby would be working, so I invited her and her nephew over for the festivities :).

Jorge and I started the next morning off on the wrong foot; we just argued about who knows what (the sky being blue? Something ridiculous like that, heh). So I was huffing and puffing by the time the kids and I got in the car with Mom to go to Walmart and to visit Gramma. 4th of July is her birthday. Mom wanted to stop by Walmart since she wanted to do some last-minute shopping for her and so I waited in the car with the kids while she and Jaylen got down. Emily wanted to get down too, but I could already imagine the trouble she’d give Mom, so I told her to stay with me. Thus began the Meltdown of the Century. The other 2 kids and I had to endure the wails; she needed a nap BIGTIME. It seemed like Mom and Jaylen were never getting back! When they did, we took off to Gramma’s.

The smart thing would have been to take her home and go back later, but I had a long list of things to get done so I figured she’d calm down. WRONG.

She wailed while we visited with Gramma, until a nurse came in to tell us to keep it down. She said the “family” of a dying patient a few rooms down wanted us to be quiet. I’ve already gotten into it with her before; she was the nurse who so kindly quit sitting Gramma up in her wheelchair because Gramma “didn’t want to”. Grrr. Gramma NEEDS to sit every day or else her pneumonia will relapse. Just seeing her pissed me off, so I gave Gramma a kiss on the head, and grabbed Emmo’s hand and we stomped off. I turned back to the nurse and told her I wanted to make a complaint. There’s been plenty of times that I’ve had to visit Gramma with people howling for water, for their relatives, food, going to the bathroom and they’ve scared my kids but I’ve been understanding. I got that Emily was loud and perhaps there really was a family who asked (I didn’t believe her, though), but the way she told me was rude and condescending. Of course, the one person I had to make the complaint with never became unoccupied (figures) so Emily and I just left. We sat in the car and I was so frustrated I just bawled with her :(.

Low and behold, we get home and Emily falls asleep. Poor thing. I couldn’t even be upset with her, it wasn’t her fault. But I tried making the best of the day and I cleaned, and then we picked up fireworks with all the kids and got back home to start the fire. Alexis got here with her nephew and we prepped the corn on the cobs, chopped veggies and got everything ready. I realized, in horror, that I hadn’t defrosted the darn hamburger patties!! So I start thawing them in water. Jorge walks in and says, “Nooo! Use the microwave!” But it’s too late. They’re all mushy and weird. He stands over my shoulder as I’m pulling them apart (’cause the centers are still super frozen) and patting them back together once they do fall apart. He says, “Are you trying to feed me turkey burgers? ‘Cause they look like turkey burgers. The hot dogs are turkey. (insert suspicious scowl here, heh)” I tell him, “No! They’re beef, hello, I sent you the pic yesterday, remember?” I even walk to the trash to find the packaging, ’cause now I’m wondering if they’re beef, but the package is under way too much junk.

I finally get the patties to look decent and take them out to Jorge. Jorgie walks in and says, “I think those patties are turkey…they keep falling apart. Dad says regular patties don’t do that.”

I go outside and sure enough, they’re falling apart. There were some casualties, but the ones that do make it looked pretty good, and tasted great!

We got all the kiddos lined up and fed and Alexis and I were pretty proud of the “healthy” burger version we made. It was amazing!

We got all the kiddos in the car and Alexis followed us to the same parking lot we went to last year to watch the fireworks. All the kids were well-behaved and patient. It was a nice show :).

We had a pretty “easy” time getting out of the parking lot, considering how crowded it was. It took us about an hour to get home last year!

We got home and we all helped getting the table and chairs out for the fireworks and s’mores. It was such an awesome time with all the kids and family and Alexis :). And nobody caught fire or anything so that’s a plus!

A few days later I’m cleaning up the counter and find an HEB receipt. I crumple it up to throw it, but something tells me I should read it so I do. The first thing on it: “soy patties”!!!

I couldn’t stop laughing. It wasn’t EVEN turkey, it was SOY!! I texted the photo to Jorge and he posted it on Facebook for all to see, buahaha. I guess we ate pretty healthy after all!

A little over a month ago I started jogging with Jorge and eating better to hopefully keep from having to continue taking high cholesterol medication like I’d mentioned at the end of my post 2 posts ago. I’d been taking Lipitor since February 7th after my yearly checkup discovered that I had insanely high cholesterol. I hadn’t been taking the medication since the beginning of May and I wanted to give myself a month to “fix” myself. Of course, we would do excellently at the beginning of each week, but once the weekend came and we had work events and Pizza Friday, our progress was interrupted. We did manage to take the boys on several runs with us, but when we took all 4 to McAuliffe park and Jorge took the fast little ones (Jaylen and Justin) and I stayed behind with the older ones, Jorgie, Eenan and I realized we’d be the first to go during the zombie apocalypse lol.

Jorge and I continued our runs/walks while the kids were gone the beginning of summer (mine with Mario at Disney World and Jorge’s with his mom in Austin) but I just felt like I wasn’t doing enough. And then I started to get lazy again and stuffing my face after dinner while we watched TV.

When Emily had gotten sick 2 weeks ago and I’d taken her to the doctor, I went ahead and got my 3-month checkup. I called Laura for the results and she said I brought my cholesterol down significantly (which was better than I thought since the meals at my events at work weren’t exactly cholesterol-free). BUT, because it still wasn’t as low as they wanted, I still had to be on the pill. Boo.

I picked up my prescription, but I haven’t taken it. Yes, I know I should, but I really want to bring it down on my own!

The girls at work told me Tuesday 2 weeks ago that they started going to a new gym miss Alma told them about. I jumped in and said I’d join them, before I could psyche myself out and change my mind. So I went home and changed, made the family dinner and was on my way.  It was hard, but I was already feeling better just knowing I was doing something.

I’ve kept at it since and my Love even got me a Polar FT4 watch, which I’ve wanted FOREVER.

I’ve managed to lose 4 lbs in 2 weeks, so that’s pretty good. I switched classes and now go right after work with Alexis since going to class at 6:30 felt like I was wasting too much time. Now I can get home and make dinner and shower and be lazy with the kids :). I just hope we can keep it up. Our instructor is planning on switching locations and I think the new one may be too far :(.

I made breakfast for my love and I on Saturday and then Michelle and I got ready to attend the 11am class, but we arrived to find the gym closed =/. So we went to the park and worked out there instead. Did our own little circuit. Never did I think I’d be one of *those* people, but we were in our own little world and everyone else was in theirs :). And we burned a pretty good amount of calories for it just being us two doing our own thing!

I actually look forward to going to work now. I’d gotten to the point where I guess everyone gets to; when you just feel “blah” getting up every day, doing the same routine. And well, even though I’ve developed a new routine at least I know it’s a good one. Even Jorge said, “You’re in a much better mood all the time now!” He doesn’t like when I’m mopey and I’d been doing that a lot lately, probably because of the way I was eating and feeling. I guess they’re right about those endorphins and exercising!

So I’ve been waking up, getting ready for work, working, eating at work most of the week (while I track my calories on Myfitnesspal again. It’s a huge help!), get ready for the gym as soon as I’m out of work, go to the gym, head home, shower and make dinner while tending to the kids (or vice-versa; my Emmos is still very attached and wants attention as soon as I’m home). Then we relax and watch a show if possible and I usually crash out on the sofa right after I get the girls into the bath and put them to bed. Oh yes, and I get my stuff together for my morning smoothie, my lunch and my gym clothes (or else I’m scrambling around the next morning. I usually end up doing that one -_-). I’m hoping I can develop a bit more energy, as I was hoping I’d be able to stay up a little later hehe.

I hope we can keep it up. The girls and I encourage each other at work and even from home, on Facebook, hehe. Our gym is moving a little farther away, but I’m hoping to make it there till at least the 23rd, when my paid month is up. Gotta take advantage! We’ll see what happens after the month is up. I hope we can continue with something though!

It had been a hectic month and a half, what with 3 important, somewhat unexpected events at work. To think they weren’t even large expos or festivals. One was a dinner, the second one was a breakfast and those two were pretty easy. They flowed well. The last–and largest–was the most stressful. It was a 2 1/2 day event and it was my department’s duty to take care of all details (and by my department, I mean my boss and myself LOL). I asked myself daily if I’d actually be able to pull it off. We got tons of help from EZ, Bob, Michelle and Gerry–tons. I was eternally grateful. And in the end, everything worked out, THANK GOD.

The press conference at the airport started late, but it went well. Lunch at House.Wine was perfect; they do such a great job with our groups!

I’m pending a photo from the first evening’s dinner at the museum. Alexis, Michelle and Anabel took over for me and helped me so much that night. I made sure to have everything ready since they’d be taking over for me. Jorge and I had already made plans way before we learned about this event to attend the George Strait “Cowboy Rides Away” Tour. Of course I was on my phone the entire time, making sure the violinists arrived, that the crew ate, that the food was ok, that there was enough seating, etc. I really didn’t relax until George’s encore!

I was a little nervous about the concert, as we got to attend last year in San Antonio and it really wasn’t all it was cracked up to be. He didn’t sing an encore, didn’t sing very long, sang a few covers instead of his own songs and at the end, didn’t even sing “The Cowboy Rides Away! BUT. He completely redeemed himself with this one!! He did a great rendition of “Folsom Prison” with a huge gunshot blast and all, had an encore, sang “The Cowboy Rides Away” at the end and sand for almost 3 hours!! It was fantastic :).

Anyway, the most important part of the visit, the ceremony, was the next morning. After that, I headed to the office to double and triple check my RSVP list. I KNEW I was going to get some last-minute attendees, but so far, everything was okay.

After many, MANY visits to shops downtown and HEB, Gerry helped us get the gifts ready and then Michelle, Bob, EZ and I headed to Quinta to set up. After a misunderstanding (isn’t there always one??), we were ready to go.

Everything went without a hitch, thank goodness. Even after 13 extra people showed up O_O.

Since our crew didn’t get to eat, our boss took us to House.Wine for dinner. We chit-chatted, ate and had dessert. He even gave me a high five. All the weight floated off my shoulders. The last part of the event was the next morning and then, THEN I could relax.

The Cowboy Breakfast the next morning was a hit and everything went smoothly. I was so glad!! After picking up some vases we forgot at Quinta, I was FREEEE!!! I joked with Jorge that I needed to get a T-Shirt that says, “I Survived SLP Delegation Visit 2014” LOL.

I made sure to ENJOY and relax the rest of the weekend. Well, as much as I could following a 3-yr-old around and vice versa LOL.

I was awarded a gift certificate to Tony Roma’s so Jorge and I planned a date night for Wednesday. It was so odd to have a non-stressful week! But you can bet I appreciated the crap out of it!

My babies were picked up the Thursday afternoon (day of the first event/concert) by their dad and his family. They were taking them to Disney World. I tried my hardest not to text every 5 minutes to ask Mario to please take care of my children. And when I felt that I was missing them to the point that I was going to become depressed, I’d keep myself busy. Mario was nice enough to send me photos of their activities throughout the trip, and I spoke to them every single day, so that was nice and comforting.

I’d been running and eating well for 2 weeks straight (running for almost a month in total, with breaks in between)…until the Wednesday before the event, and after that my diet and exercise went down-hill :(. I keep saying I’m going to start again but Jorge and I started watching Orange is the New Black while our kids were gone so…yeah. You can say it took precedence =\.

Jorge and I finally had a date night on Wednesday. I can’t really remember the last time we had a date night. We eat lunch together often, but we’re usually accompanied, so it doesn’t really count, heh. It was nice to spend time alone together and reflect on our day and talk about ourselves and just everything. The food was pretty darn good, too.

We didn’t have dessert there. Instead we went to House.Wine just to have the Banoffee ^_^. It was a pretty great night :).

Thursday was a pretty easy day at work and I got to take Friday off. I made the most of it, cleaning a little, making myself breakfast and lunch and I finally decided I was going to plant a succulent garden! So I went to Home Depot and picked up these babies:

It was a lot of work to find the perfect pot and to get them just right in the pot, and even then I left a few spaces in the pot bald =\. But it was so satisfying to see it come together and it brought such a huge change to my patio table!

I hope they thrive! I check on them all the time and I even added new cactus soil to my old ones on my windowsill ^_^.

I’m reading up about propagating them and have a few started up already, most of which happened on their own.

Sally and I finally got a chance to meet up on Saturday :). We tried having brunch at Birdie’s but that didn’t work out very well so we ended up at Los Cazadores. We had a nice long catch-up chat; it was therapeutic!

We went to Marshall’s next and browsed and then I dropped her off and came home to be picked up by Jorge, Jr. and their cousin Joey and his wife, who are in town for a while. We went to Cheddar’s for afternoon drinks and this was the continuation of my bad eating (had scrambled yellow eggs, bacon and a pancake at Los Cazadores, then spinach artichoke dip and chips and a Maui Margarita at Cheddar’s). We shared some stories and shared some laughs, it was nice. We headed to a Vape Shop for Jorge and then we tidied up at home since everyone was coming over to watch the UFC fight. I managed to stay awake most of the time, until we ordered pizza and I crashed out on the patio sofa LOL. Poor Jr. wasn’t far away, lounging as well since he was in pain from being diagnosed with gout =\.

Father’s Day was the next day and my babies came home early that morning. They brought me some gifts <3. [caption id="attachment_2247" align="aligncenter" width="253"] Cheshire cat cup and Ariel blouse![/caption]

We all settled inside and I started making breakfast. Took Jorge some breakfast in bed and asked what he wanted to do. He said: nothing. Just stay home and relax and do nothing. We obliged :). Well, until we had to go get a few groceries LOL.

We had the traditional botana from Espi’s and watched movies with the kids. It was a really low-key day, just like he wanted :).

We had a lunch date yesterday at Kumori. We hadn’t been there in a LONG time!! I missed the miso soup and the jalapeño firecracker. MMMmmm.

We took my truck in to the shop since the air conditioning in the back of the truck stopped working so I picked my love up after work. We did some MORE grocery shopping and we got home to find out poor Emmos didn’t feel well. Needless to say, she had a terrible fever around midnight and I had her sleep with us since fevers at night terrify me. That’s always when they get so much worse. So I held her and gave her medicine and water and took her to pee and refreshed the washcloth on her forehead. We woke up, took Jorge to work and I took her to the doctor. She had a throat infection and the ear infection started as soon as we got home. Since I was already in the office, I got another cholesterol lab done. I was hoping I’d be eating well and exercising–the way I had originally planned so I could get off the pill completely, but I ate like crap all weekend =\. I wouldn’t doubt I still have to be on the darn thing :*(.

My Emmos had fever on and off all day, but she was in good spirits and I’m hoping the fever finally subsided. The only bad thing is, now she’s really feeling the sore throat. I cleaned up since I was home and the boys helped me with the lawn. Made dinner and now I’m beat and ready for bed. Hoping for a much better day all around tomorrow :).