Trick or Treat

The kids were so excited tonight for Halloween and Trick or Treating! This was Laurie's first year really going house to house with us and she LOVED IT! When she would get candy, she would tell us, "I Trick Treat" and when we would see a spooky house, she would say, "Daddy, that's not scary, Daddy." It was so sweet and special. And, she ran from house to house trying to keep up with the big kids.

We wore out a lot earlier this year, only staying out an hour. Don't worry, the kids got more than enough candy in that hour.

Laurie - our little Princess

Daniel - the Police

Ashley - A Queen

The whole Trick or Treating gang

Our Jack O Lantern

Laurie and her school Halloween Shirt

Halloween with Granny

For the last several years, the kids and I have attended a Halloween party at my grandmother's assisted living facility, Colonial Oaks. We have always had a blast as evidenced by my previous blog posts about it. http://the-5-jones.blogspot.com/2007/10/halloween-party.html and http://the-5-jones.blogspot.com/2006/10/halloween-partying.html

This year was a little different. By just some twist of fate, my mom, I and my kids were joined by my brother, Leah and kids, my dad and Brian. So instead of the small group she had to celebrate with, Granny had a whole table full of family there with her for the evening.

Granny was moved this year to "The Village", which is the name for the Dementia Care Unit at Colonial Oaks. She has made a marked decline these last few years, with it seeming to speed up over the last several months. It is not unusual to arrive for a visit and find her sitting on the couch waiting for her Daddy to take her home, or to find her without much emotion or things to talk about. While it is difficult to see her living in the past, I think the days where she is very quiet are more difficult to experience. It is almost like she is a shell of her former self. Granny always had such a zest for life, so happy, always singing or humming a song - well, when she wasn't talking about the Astros or some other sports team. It is still amazing to me how much she knew about sports - specific stats about so many players and teams. And not just the Astros. She loved the Oilers, the New Orleans Saints and of course my own Houston Cougars.

This blog post wasn't intended to reminisce about Granny or to be sad. My goal was to discuss what a great time we had last week at the party. The 12 of us sat at a huge table and laughed and talked. Granny was in such a great mood, very playful with us and the kids. She even sang to Megan, who was completely mesmerized by her Great-Granny. The best part was the DJ/Singer who kept serenading her, which caused Granny to giggle like a school girl and turn beet red.

It was so special for so many of us to be there and have her really with us for the evening. On one hand, I'm sad because it reminds me of what the kids and I are missing in our regular visits, but on the other hand, it helps me remember all the great things about my Granny.

It's Fall

It is officially Fall in Houston! Which actually just means that the temperature stayed below 80 degrees for the whole day! So, it must be Fall. Brian and I are getting ready to leave for our anniversary trip to Mexico in the morning, so I took a few pictures of the kids today while we were taking a break from packing.

End of a Long Weekend

Brian and I sent the kids out of the main rooms tonight so we could sit by ourselves and eat Brian's homemade sushi. When we peeked in at them on our bed, this is what we saw. Aren't they just so very cute. They were watching Tom & Jerry!

The Great Computer Crash of '08

Two Saturdays ago, we experienced the Great Computer Crash of '08. Or should I say, I experienced it. As I was leaving my bedroom for the kitchen that afternoon carrying my computer, the cord got snagged on the doornob and I dropped my laptop on the tile. I picked it up, checked to see that it was still on and took it back to the kitchen. It seemed to be alright and right when I was taking a big sigh of relief, it started making strange noises. Me, being me, I kept working to see if it would stop. Nope, it got worse. I went and got Brian, who said it was bad. While he was working to save a file off my computer, the hard drive completely stopped working. My life flashed before my eyes as we stood there looking at this blue screen. Then little tears sprang to my eyes as Brian told me my hard drive was fried. Everything is on my machine! All our addresses, financial data, files, and every digital picture I've ever taken are on that computer. HELP!

About the time I had stopped breathing and was in complete panic mode, Brian decided to put me out of my misery. He had backed up my laptop two days before Ike! And, he bought me a new 100 GB hard drive for my birthday a few days before! Yeah! All was not lost.

When everything was moved over to the new hard drive, I had lost a few emails dealing with Phi Mu business, updates on a few files and about 2 weeks worth of pictures. That means, all my pictures of Ike (pre and post storm), the pictures we took at the zoo after Ike, a family picture taken at church that previous week and a picture of Brian and I on our 10 year anniversary in September. (Luckily, my family has lots of Ike pics, Leah had some pictures also from the zoo, and I do have a copy of the anniversary picture on facebook though it is too small to print) That's not bad considering what we stood to lose without having backed up the computers for Ike.

So, I guess The Great Computer Crash of '08 should not go down as a "Great" crash. But, then again, maybe it should because it was I who dropped my own computer and caused the whole ordeal. The moral of this story is - back up your computers constantly, and carry your laptop and power cord seperately and carefully over hard floors. Uh oh, It's been two weeks since the Great Computer Crash of '08 and ask me if I've backed it up since. Oops. Gotta run and do that!

Update on Things

Alert the Press!!!! Ashley ate pizza again!!! At another birthday party. While she won't actually admit that she likes it, she does not seem as adverse to it as she did previously.

There is a new record in the daily counting of School Buses. Daniel and I amazingly counted 55 buses on the way to his school last week! Can you believe we pass that many in our 17 minute trek to preschool?

Birdie has picked up a new word ... AWESOME! Yes, she's 2 and says Awesome. And knows the words to half a dozen Hannah Montana/Miley Cyrus songs. When we walk through a parking lot she tells me, "watch for cars Mommy". She has also picked up the nasty habit of saying "Yeah" instead of "Yes".

Ike's Black Hole

Do you ever feel like part of your life got sucked into a black hole? That's exactly how I and many other Houstonians feel after Ike. We just lost a few weeks of our Fall. Everything has gotten pushed back a few weeks or just is gone! Poof!

While we didn't have any real damage from the storm and I'm not complaining about Ike when other people had a terrible time, but we had had a few "issues" since the storm. When we got back into our house with electricity, we noticed that our TV in the Family Room (which we had unplugged) wasn't working. The lamp had blown during the storm. Then I opened the dishwasher. Unfortunately, I had left dirty dishes in it during Ike and now we were housing ANTS! It has been a month since Ike, and I'm still fighting with these darn sugar ants. Third, our downstairs air conditioner stopped cooling (second time in a month). Luckily, it didn't take very long to get it fixed.

We started back to soccer last week, after missing two games. Dance class for Ashley & yoga for me will resume this next week after missing a month. The studio took major damage as the roof was breached early in the storm, and was flooded when it was all over. We will be meeting in a rental space until the studio can be fixed.

Laurie had a really difficult time getting back into the groove of school again. Lots of crying at drop off and pick up. Then, this week, it stopped. She actually wanted to go to school again. And then, she got another bad cold and had to stay home. ARRRGGG. Once again, all of us are fighting this head cold, with Brian & Birdie getting the brunt of it. Ashley is handling it the best.

One really good thing that came out of Ike - we missed the rest of the usual Hot Houston September. Ike cooled us off a little earlier than normal and we Love it!!!

Maybe I should stop waiting for Normal and just remember that this is actually what Normal looks like!

Addicted to Puzzles

Birdie Boo is totally addicted to puzzles. Loves them! She was doing the wood Melissa & Doug kind, but has now moved on to the 24 piece jigsaw puzzles. At first I was really hesistant at letting her play with them, thinking she would just lose the pieces, but she surprised us. After you do the puzzle with her a couple of times, she is able to do it completely on her own. I can't tell you how much she loves to do them. She just stands at the coffee table putting them together, taking them apart, then putting them together again. What a smart little Birdie Boo.

Pillowcases

This week, Leah and I attended our first Sewing Class. We had so much fun! And made these really cute pillowcases. Daniel is in love with his that I made, telling me it gives him good dreams.

I just can't wait to sign up for another class and make something else. So many ideas and fabrics, so little time.