manmaw, tase me!

I arrived in McKinney with belated Christmas presents from Uncle Jeremy and Aunt Jennifer. John loved his puzzle book, and we put all the puzzles together as soon as he opened it.
I has also brought my Cindy Lou doll to show to Taylor and John. Taylor graciously allowed Cindy to wear an outfit that Taylor had outgrown, so now Cindy has clothes on.

I went back to visit on Friday, and planned to babysit with the kids Friday night. When I got there, John was wearing his football helmet, pants and jersey that I had gotten him for Christmas. We went outside, great weather, and played football. That involves John throwing the football nowhere near me, and then we run to it and he falls on it like recovering a fumble. Then we played his favorite game so far, chase. John: "Manmaw, tase me". Then he runs around the backyard and I chase him, sort of. He puts in a LOT more steps than I do. He also likes to play "hide". Sometimes he wants to hide and I count to 10, and other times he wants to count: "one, two, three, six, eight, eleven, sixteen, eighteen, ten!" He is very good about not peeking, and runs around a lot checking all obvious hiding places. I have a GREAT time playing with John.

The evening babysitting included baths, playtime and stories. John climbed into the chair in Taylor's room and asked me to put the boppy pillow in his lap. Then he wanted me to put Taylor in his lap so he could read her a story. I ran to get my camera before I did that, and when I got back, she had climbed up there by herself.


I also had a report that she has been climbing into John's bed, and here is a picture Ashley sent showing where she found Taylor after leaving her for a few minutes to go into another room. She'll be climbing out of her crib before too long!
Taylor gets fussy when she is sleepy, you pick her up, she wants down, she wanders around, comes back and lays on the floor, you pick her up, she wants down, and so on. After about 10 minutes of this, I lay her in her crib, patted her on the back a few times and walked out. She wailed for about 90 seconds, then was silent and sound asleep. John and I watched TV and played with army men. Army men today are sure different than my old green plastic arm men. These have movable arms and hands and have cool looking uniforms. I played the way I used to, laying out a blanket on the floor and making hills and valleys. I set them up and John knocked them down.
The weather was great that Friday, blue skies, sunshine, and very comfortable outside. But the next day when we tried to make an outing to the Dallas Arboretum, it was chilly and windy. So after a quick romp through the Arboretum (Jason bought a family pass, so I can go back there again with John and Taylor and parents another time), we headed to the Dallas Aquarium.
The Arboretum has beautiful grounds, a restaurant or you can bring in a picnic. It is not very crowded, and they make seasonal play structures for kids. I saw a thatched roof house, like a Hansel and Gretel house, and a castle, all kid sized, but large enough for kids to go inside and play. With the family pass, this will be a great place for good weather outings, and it probably is never very crowded.
The Aquarium has a lot of animals besides fish, and has a rain forest environment, complete with water falls, pools and trees. There are monkeys and birds, including penguins (in a separate cold area), and exhibits of insects and reptiles. There is a walking path that winds around inside through several levels, so you get to see everything. Here John and Taylor watch the monkeys swinging in the trees.
We heard a loud horn blowing and then right behind us came the Mayan Indian dancers ready to perform. They were rather frightening up close, and John wanted his Daddy to hold him. But he was fine while we watched them dance.

The kids were alseep in the car before we got to the freeway, and went right into naps as soon as we got home. Great way to spend a Saturday morning. On Sunday, Bill and I stopped by on our way out of town, and enjoyed much warmer outside weather. We played in the backyard for a few minutes.


I got to see Taylor in pigtails.
I also got to hold Taylor, she likes me now! No more crying when I pick her up, and actually will hold her arms up to me to pick her up.

Just a few more pictures from this trip, Bill and I stopped to look at an airport community close to Jason's house. There were quite a few homes and airplanes around a small runway. Some were for sale. Here is a airporch complete with airplane tucked up under cover.

Free breakfast at the Marriott Residence Inn includes Texas waffles, I love them!
Next trip to McKinney may not be until John's birthday, and I look forward to seeing the kids again.

Cruise ship wedding and Travis' BDay party

Bill and I went to his nephew's wedding, which was held on a Carnival cruise ship in Galveston, after which we got off the boat and the newly wedded couple sailed away on a 5 day cruise for their honeymoon. Nice way to do it, all around, except for the part about having to drive to Galveston and back and having to board the boat at 10:00 a.m. before all the other passengers. The wedding wasn't til 1:00 and we had to get off the boat by 3:00, so a full day for wedding guests. The wedding was handled by a pair of ladies, one was the wedding coordinator and the other was the minister. It had all the typical stuff, mothers being seated, father walking bride down the aisle, lighting candles, and lots of pictures by 2 photographers. A reception followed with appetizer buffet, drinks including champagne for toasts, a cake and dancing, complete with announcement of couple, first dance, father-daughter dance, etc. Most importantly, Donny and Jodie were excited and happy and looked so committed to each other.

Bill had dinner at his house one night while Brent was in town after the wedding, and of course William was the star of the show. He sat at Grandpa's kitchen table for dinner, with an old-fashioned phone book booster seat.

Grandpa also has some neat toys to play with, including pvc pipe, pot lid and wooden spoon.



The next day I went to Wonderwild for Travis' (twins cousin) 3 year old birthday party. OK, just a word about Wonderwild, it is a place for kids to play inside on bounce house things and indoor slides, a toddler play area and a bubble machine. Think McDonald's play area only 1o times bigger and costs money to play. Actually, it is a great place for birthday parties (lots of jumping, running around, wears the kids out), the weather is no factor, and there is an indoor room with tables and chairs for sitting around and having food and cake, whatever parents want to provide. Plus the staff serves it and cleans up after! And the presents get piled into a cart and go home with the birthday kid to be opened later on, a great concept. And these kinds of places are open the rest of the time for drop-in play. There are lots of them, like Pump-It-Up and Bouncing Bears, along with Wonderwild. Obviously as you can see from the pictures below, the kids loved it. Jake loved chasing the bubbles, as did Claire and Travis, on the far right.
Video of the kids playing with the bubbles.




Video of Jake and Claire going down various slides.


Travis blowing out his candles, with a little help from his dad.

Superhero Travis wearing the cape and mask that JanMa got him for his birthday.

Here are a few pictures of dinner out with twins at Chick-Fila.
This weekend I'll be in Dallas for my monthly visit with John and Taylor. Taylor can wear pigtails now, and John has a 3 yr old birthday coming up for my next monthly visit. He is quite the young man, and I'll be taking the Wii to play Cars 2 race game with him.
John is an awesome big brother, he shares the "lick" spoon with Taylor, truly brotherly love.
See you kids soon, JanMa

Back into the routine...

With the holiday over, I'm getting my retirement routine back. Bill spent some time teaching me how to caulk, and it's actually much easier than I was making it. I have a new skill, and plan to use it next caulking my bathtub. Here is the powder room caulking job.
I also got back into the kitchen and tried out Ashley's cream cheese sausage balls recipe. Basically the same as my old recipe, except replace 1/2 of the cheddar cheese with cream cheese. Ashley used a dough hook attached to her KitchenAid, I have 2 dough hooks attached to my wrists. Whatever recipe I use, it's still a messy job for me. So I don't make sausage balls very often, which is a good thing!
The retirement routine also includes swimming, and I headed back to the rec center pool on a gorgeous January day. Water was great, went topless to blow dry my hair, and felt good.
Bill and I watched the Houston Texans game together (go Texans!), and ate sausage balls. I made a stop at the twins' house on my way to Bill's and spent some time playing outside with the kids. Claire got out the chalk bucket, but there were only a few chunks of pink chalk left. I have no idea how Jake got the chalk on the seat of his pants, I never saw him sit down in the driveway.... but he managed it somehow!
I ended up the week attending a bridal shower for Bill's nephew's fiance. They are getting married on a cruise boat and heading to a tropical cruise for their honeymoon, so a bridal lunch at Tommy Bahama's made a lot of sense. I kept the tropical theme going with my Hawaiian shirt. The temps were warmer and the sun was bright, adding to the tropical ambiance.
I've also been working for JanMa's Digital Memories, transferring several dozen dv tapes to DVD and this next week I'll be starting a wedding slide show project. Having my own business is really a lot of fun, as long as I don't have to make a real living at it!

Overnight with the twins

Last weekend I got to overnight with the twins. Mom and Dad had left the car with carseats and I got to take the kids out. Late in the afternoon we went to the playground with the scooter motorcycles. For some strange reason Claire will ride a bit, then get off and carry the Lil' Harley. Jake sees her do it, then he does it too. He can scoot faster on it than she can, maybe that's why she gets off, so she can move faster.

After dinner, Bill came over. The twins were all over him, Jake showing him his tractor and Claire telling him about the fireworks, which took a bit to understand, as you can see from the video.



After bath and some video watching, it was bedtime. Jake fell asleep fairly quickly, and Claire was not quite there so I held out my arms to hold her. She jumped on that opportunity, and then was up for another hour. I took her out of the nursery so she wouldn't wake Jake up, she chatted with me for awhile, then I took her back to the bedroom. I asked her if she was ready to get back into bed with teddy bear, and she climbed into bed and was asleep in a few minutes.

Jake woke up about 7:30 the next morning, and then we both got Claire up about 8:30. Then it was breakfast at McDonalds. I got the big breakfast with eggs, sausage, a biscuit and pancakes and split it for the kids. They ate quite a bit, and tried everythng. After some playtime in the McDonald's playroom, we headed home. There we found the housekeeper busy but short on some supplies, so we went Krogering! I got to use the grocery basket car thingie, my first time ever. No such things existed when my boys were toddlers. Claire tried to steer both steering wheels, Jake hollered, I told Claire to let Jake steer his on side, and she did. But that is the kind of thing she does, she likes to be in charge. Can't imagine where that comes from!


(I have perfected a technique for getting 2 kids in and out of carseats. One gets plopped in the front seat, door closed, while I put in the other one. Then the front seat kid gets put into the other carseat. Just reverse it, take one out and plop him/her in the front seat while getting the other one unstrapped. That way I'm not wrangling a loose twin in a parking lot while trying to get the other buckled or unbuckled from a carseat. On one of Jake's stints in the front seat, he grabbed an apple Jennifer had in the car and started eating it.)


Back at the house, we spent the rest of the morning outside in gorgeous weather and finished off the apple as a snack. I got out their water paints and play-doh, we kicked goals and hit T balls.

When they started to fall asleep in the swings, I brought out a lunch picnic of crackers with peanut butter, some cheese and yogurt. A few trips up and down the sidewalk on the motorcycles, and Mom and Dad arrived home.




They like playing together, Claire seems to look after Jake, taking him a cracker or sippy cup, or grabbing his hand to bring him to something. Jake is quiet and busy when Claire is not around, but as soon as he sees her he smiles and gets excited. Jake is starting to use understandable words for things, and I expect his vocabulary and speech will explode over the next month.

It was so much fun, they are at such a fun age. Claire had a few moments of temper, but I was firm and plus I'm bigger, so I win. I corrected Jake one time, and he dissolved into heaving sobs, and I caved quickly. They both bounced right back. They don't seem to mind that Mommy and Daddy are not there, but they are so excited when the parents return. They also no longer fuss when I leave, it's like bye-bye JanMa, and take off to do other things.