Howdy, Partner

We have nearly officially moved to North Texas.  At the end of February, Mike had had enough of the traveling cross country on a weekly basis, so he packed up the Rav 4 and headed to Plano, Texas, home of Learfield Sports and his new office (when he isn't traveling to the West Coast).  The boys and I stayed and weathered March.  At the end of the month, I packed each of us a suitcase and the boys and I flew to Dallas.  We've be enjoying life in a furnished apartment there for the last seven weeks.  Thomas has really come into his element.  He loves meeting new kids.  Every day, we traipse to the courtyard area to see who is out.  In an incredibly diverse area, Thomas is one of the few kids whose parents are from the US.  He loves hanging out by the pool with his buddy Arif and playing ball.

Hanging at the community pool

Playing in the driveway

Thomas and his buddies at the square.

 Thomas has found friends everywhere we go including the National Scooter Championship qualifiers that were in our area.  All four of us loved watching the teenagers scoot.

Playmates at the World Scooter Competition

 Maybe all this diversity is opening a door for Thomas' taste buds! 

Flat Chinese noodles?

We didn't meet any friends at the bowling alley because, as Thomas would say, we were busy doing a pattern: bowl, eat, bowl, eat, bowl, eat.

Ryan nearly beat me and he actually beat Thomas!

 We have hit up local libraries during story time.  It's a great chance to get out and see other kids and do something academic, especially since Thomas hasn't been to preschool since March.  The boys love to hit up the computer section.  Every time we go, Ryan calls Aunt Erica on a computer mouse.  I wonder why she never answers?

Curious George came to Frisco's library!

We had the special treat of attending a Frisco Rough Rider baseball game.  They are the AA affiliate of the Texas Rangers.  It was superior family fun.  The boys got to throw balls in the outfield before the game, we had free food, saw some baseball, and even went to a playground within the park!

 Mama's favorite spot is an indoor trampoline park.  We went once with Nana Honey and Papa Bear when they were visiting.  I love it because it's cheap, Ryan loves it, Thomas loves is, and I get to jump around on trampolines too!

 We have finally found a house.  In the second hottest real estate market in the country, it's not easy to find a house that isn't gobbled up within a day of hitting the market.  On June 1st, we will land at our new house in Frisco, which is about 20 minutes north of Dallas.  It's home to about 140,000 people and growing like crazy.  Many corporations are headquartered in that area and the schools are rated among the top in the state.  We think our neighborhood is going to be fabulous.  We grabbed sno cones with some soon to be neighbors and thought that we'd made a pretty solid choice.

Until we are able to move into our home, we are always looking for things to do outside of the apartment.  One Saturday, we visited the Perot Science Museum in Dallas.  Very cool hands-on things for us to play with and figure out.

How waterways work

Little Drummer Boy

Putting an organ system back in may be a few years beyond Thomas' reach

Even though we moved a thousand miles away, we are still up to the same shenanigans.  Thomas still works hard, Ryan still does whatever Thomas does, 

 And well, I may have turned over a new leaf...

Eating a chip and guac out of his hat

Blessings and Burdens

One Sunday morning, I flipped on the tv in the basement so that we could try to watch basketball while we played tennis down there.  I found no basketball at 8:30am, just Joel Osteen.  He intrigues me, him and his gigantic church, his flashy, sly smile.  I've caught Pastor Joel before.  He's got some messages I can relate to without being to preachy.  His sermon that Sunday was about blessings and burdens.  He argued that we pray for things, like a bigger house, and along with those bigger things, come burdens, like cleaning all those rooms.  Or with a raise comes higher taxes or more travel time away from family.  He caught me.  This is exactly where I am right now in my life with Mike's promotion and trying to find a new house in TX.  Tennis would have to wait a minute; I was hooked.

I thought about the things he said in his sermon.  The most glaring example of blessings and burdens come from my kids.

Ryan is so independent already.  This is a blessing because he plays by himself and brushes his own teeth, but  the flip side is that he climbs chairs and jumps off of them unannounced and that he wanders out into the road after a ball instead of being cautious.

Got himself into and out of this garbage can

Mosied on up to this random kid curbside at the airport minutes after we arrived at DFW

Thomas is in a state of independence.  Right before Mike left to drive to Texas with his belongings, we caught Thomas trying to microwave pizza in an aluminum foil wrapper.  Overall, Thomas' independence is a little less dangerous than Ryan's though.  He is adamant about doing things his way (wonder where he got that?).

Scooting is a favorite past time

Styled his hair to match cousin Elizabeth

We are all very excited about the adventures that Texas has for us.   In our less than a week here, we've enjoyed the warmer (hot) weather, the scooter-friendly apartment complex we're staying in, some delivered to your door pizza and frequenting a nice little park just down the block.

Playing outside of our temporary digs at the apartment

Dad's new office

Note the TX flag in the background

Monday Pizza at the Gate

Getting pizza with Nana Honey

 The burden, however, it means leaving good friends like our neighbor Bob.

An outstanding neighbor and his buddies

We are blessed in many ways, so it's only natural that there will be many burdens along the way.  May our burdens always be as minor as they are now....and let us be blessed on my househunting trip today!

Vacation

February was vacation month for 3/4 of our family.  Mike's new job kept him traveling quite a lot, so the boys and I packed up and headed to his parents' house in Florida.  Here's what we left:

View out the front window

So we got our man Ryan a haircut, took Thomas out of preschool for three weeks and by no small miracle, made it to our plane despite what felt like the longest car ride to the airport ever, arriving 20 minutes prior to our scheduled departure.  We gratefully headed south to Nana Honey and Papa Bear's house. 

Before

After

Thank God for Pop Chips and good snacks

Sleeping handsome buy on my right

Wakeful handsome boy on my left!

Our cool little dudes were pretty amped up to get the party started.

Thomas couldn't wait to get in the pool and hone his swimming skills.  His preschool teacher was kind enough to let us bring a "backpack" (floatie) that they use in his swim lessons with us.  We are so proud to announce that two weeks into the trip and sore from the strap rash that tons of swimming had given him, he swam and jumped with NO FLOATATION DEVICE!!!

Swimming one day with Nana Wuff

Thomas was also pretty excited at the constant distraction that multiple adults provided.  Family friend Lisa from Sweden, who once took care of Mike when he was a boy, was also visiting and she was such a fun, yet calming influence on our boys, especially Thomas.  She took the boys to a couple of playgrounds, spearheaded ordinary and extraordinary adventures, went swimming, spun tales, provided horseback rides on her back, dug holes and planted landscapes, danced, subsidized the Mardi Gras beads collection and let Thomas help with the cooking.

Dancing to some music at the Mardi Gras festival at The Villages

A little lemon in the coconut is a surprisingly good treat!

Cheers!

Our man Ryan loved getting out and about and playing almost as many sports as Thomas did.  We already knew he has great hand-eye coordination and enjoys tennis and golf, but we learned that he was strangely adept at shuffleboard considering how long the pole is given his respective height.

Truth be told, he was probably most excited to not have to transport Thomas to and from preschool and accompany me on endless errands!  Instead, he could eat, sleep and play (mostly) on his own schedule.

Feeding the Bear

All of  this fun, required lots of eating and drinking.  So we made sure to replenish all of the time!

Trying gator bites at lunchtime

Sharing a drink at tennis

Thomas' new favorite glass

Thanks to all the helpers, everyone got to experience a wonderful vacation.  Nana Honey got to spoil two of her favorite people, who kept her in stitches most of the time with their antics; Mama got to head off to play pickleball or walk or go to the store alone; Papa Bear got lots of chances to take pictures and videos; Thomas could usually find at least one of us to play with him or go along with what he wanted to do; Ryan had a lot of people to take him out in the golf cart for rides.  And I hear that Lisa is actually going back to the McCollums' house in a few weeks, likely to have her much earned vacation after watching after our kids for two whole weeks!