A Day In the Life {4.16. 25}

This quote just spoke to me. I want to love my life and if the answer is this simple then it's worth a shot. 

On this day, I set my alarm for 6am, but was an awaken at 5:15 by Kitty so I decided just to get up. 

I spent my quiet time reading through my favorite blogs, researching cruises and made a list go things to do today while listening to music. I was inspired to listen to French music by my favorite blogger Mix & Match Mamma so I asked Alexa to play "French music" and discovered a delightful mix!

At about 6:30, I went back to my room, made my bed and got dressed in my workout clothes. My favorite tank and leggings are from Beyond Yoga. Super soft!

And made the bed. Making the bed is one of the things I try to do everyday. 

Then it was back downstairs to get Marky's breakfast ready. His favorite thing to eat right now is chocolate croissant. I get these from Trader Joe's. so easy and yet so fancy. I take it out of the freezer, leave it out overnight and pop to in the oven and bake for 12 minutes. He literally eats 2 of these almost every morning. 

 

I went and took short 30-minute walk around our new neighborhood and enjoyed the beautiful weather that we are having. I'm a big believer in taking advantage of the good weather while we have it. I've been told that Georgia weather is similar to Texas so I'm dreading the summer heat that is coming. I just LOVE how pretty our neighborhood is.

After school drop off, I went to Pure Barre for my barre workout. I don't love it as much as Bar Method, but I'm going to give it a little more time. Today was my 10th class so I got a new pair of socks! Excited to wear to my next class tomorrow!

We are going to re-do some front yard landscaping so I made a stop at the Home Depot and Lowe's to see what bushes and flowers I want to add to our flower beds. I found a few and I like, but I think I'm going to wait until next Spring to replace anything. I was also very tempted to start planting some tomatoes and a few herbs but I needed to wait and find a good spot for them first. We don't have much outdoor space at all which makes me a little sad.

The rest of the day was moving around the house doing little chores and making appointments until it was carline time. Mark does not get out of school until 4:15, but I head out at about 3:40 and sit in carline. With how nice it has been, I sit in my car with a cup of tea or a can of mineral water and listen to my audio book or read while I wait to pick him up.

He is starving when he gets home so we try to eat an early dinner or he has a pretty heavy snack if I can't get dinner quickly enough. But today, we went and got him Chick-fil-a because I forgot to defrost the ground beef and I had paella from Trader Joe's. 

After dinner, I finishes up a load of laundry, talked to my parents on the phone, and had some chill time before getting ready for bed. Lights out at 10 for me!

Something Different

This past weekend, we had Mark try something different - he tried go-kart race driving. We thought it might be fun for him to try it and if he liked it, we would be on board with him racing go-karts.

He liked it OK but not enough to commit to it because it would be a huge commitment with the start-up cost as well as the time commitment from the parents. It would have been a really cool thing for him to do but he would have to be passionate about it and that level of passion was not there.

We did get some cute pictures out of it though.

Getting instructions from the "coach."

Hitting the course hard going 5mph. Ha! They actually go a little faster in an actual race.

It was a beautiful day to be outside. Bonus - we had Steak and Shake for lunch afterwards.

Georgia On My Mind

We have been in The Peach State for almost 3 months and it has flown by. We are settling in and Mark is doing well at his new school. We are in the midst of bathroom remodels and our house is in chaos. I am doing my best to look past all this. I can't say that I feel like I'm at home yet but I've been trying to get some normalcy back. 

It's been exciting exploring my new surrounding and discovering new places but I won't lie - it has been lonely and hard at times. Thankfully, Michael has been home and not traveling as much so that helps. I am trying to find ways to fill my days. I have started going to Pure Bar. Jury is still out on whether I will stick to this. I much prefer Bar Method but I will give it a little more time.

On a  more serious note, My mom has been diagnosed with lymphoma so I will be flying back to CA to see her when she starts radiation this Friday. It will be good to be home. I am dreading the flight. The worst part about living in Georgia is how far it is from California. I pray that she makes a full recovery after her radiation therapy. 

It's been a busy couple of months but I will try to check in more often. I am committing to making this blog more of a priority. 

Trying to stay upbeat an positive over here. Wish me luck!

Back At It

It's been almost 4 years since I've logged onto my little corner of the Internet. A lot of life has happened. Some really great, some good, some bad, and some  - well just awful. But there is no joy in looking back on the awful and I'm not sure if the awful will ever truly go away, but time will dull the ache and I can move forward because it's the only choice I have. 

So here is where we are at. We are in the process of selling our house and moving to Atlanta. I am excited for this new chapter but will definitely miss this life that I have built is Dallas. It is bittersweet and there will be many people I will miss but after much thought and discussion, this decision is the best for our family's future. 

I have never been afraid to live in new places and this is no exception. However, there are so many moving parts now that it's been a bit stressful to say the least, and I've been told that journaling is a way to deal with it. I have found that writing has been a great deal of help to me when there is a lot going on. I am not gonna lie - I am utterly overwhelmed with ALL the things (emotionally, mentally and physically). I have to remember to focus on our family goals and take things one bite at a time.

Goals:

1. Sell  house

2. Buy house

3. Move

4. Remember to be grateful for what I have - and I have so much.

Sports!

Well, here we go again! Our weekend got busy pretty quickly. Mark had his very first soccer tournament this weekend. Although the games did go their way, I think he played really well for his first couple of games on his first select team. I'm very proud of him.  

He was so excited to finally be able to play on a more competitive league and he seems to be getting along with his new teammates. He had two soccer games - one on Friday and another one on Saturday. His game that was scheduled for Sunday was cancelled due to rain, which was a relief because he had a basketball game as well.

After his game on Friday night, we went dinner. He deserved a big dessert which he had no problems finishing with Daddy.

His basketball team played against a team that had a lot of his friends on it on Sunday. It was so fun to watch especially since the Dragon Ballers won 21-8! I don't know what it is but victory is always sweeter when you play against your friends. Haha!

This was the only picture I got for this game..

But here's a few from their first game. They won that game 10-8.

Michael's school soccer season has started and they are looking good! He had a couple of scrimmages this weekend and won both. He has a preseason game this Tuesday and another on on Friday so we are going to be busier than we've been in a long time, but I welcome this! I just hope that it continues and he gets to finish the season his senior year. Of course, I didn't get any pictures. 

I entertained the idea of getting all three boys to take pictures with Santa this year since I don't have a picture of all 3 of them together with Ole' Saint Nick. I didn't really think it would happen, but I threw it out there. The older boys were not into it, but I persisted and this happened! I am so proud of myself for using the right combination of threats and bribery to get it done. Ha!

We went to breakfast after this the Santa session and everyone was happy, including this mama.

Birthday

Last month, Mark turned 9. I think there is a big leap from 8 to 9. Not just physically but also emotionally and mentally. I'm no expert, but he's much more mature this year than same time last year. He has his emotional meltdowns, but that's a another whole post.

But, yes, he turned 9 last month and I am just writing about it now. We celebrated with ice cream cake with family. We did celebrate a day early because M had to leave for a work trip on his actual birthday.

Mindcraft lego set from grandma and grandpa was a huge hit.

He was THRILLED about this gift from Poh-Poh and Gong-Gong. He couldn't wait to start building in. It took him a week.

He requested homemade Belgian waffles for his birthday breakfast. It's his favorite!

Then he had a great time celebrating with his friends at his birthday party at Stampede Arena. We had a little issue with Stampede (they were renovating and didn't open in time for our scheduled party) and had to delay the party a week, but they were great and had the room all decorated for us! This was a nice surprise. It was one of the easiest parties I've thrown.

We had to cut the cake and then do candles because, you know, COVID...

Love these two guys so much!

I can't believe this little baby is almost double digits. Happy birthday to my sweet baby boy! I love you more than anything in the whole wide world.

Still Here

So it's been a long hot minute since my last post. I don't know why but I just have not been really into writing lately. Blame it on COVID. I just felt overwhelmed every time I sat down to write. I've missed a lot and I may go back and do some highlight posts but for now, here's the low-down of what we've been up to lately.

We hosted Thanksgiving at our house again this year. That's alway a fun event. We had the traditional Thanksgiving food, but the boys requested Peking duck again this year so we added that to our menu. It was a pretty laid back day. Of course, I didn't take any pictures except for this one before everyone came over.

Mark did an amazing job in helping to set the table. He LOVES this part of hosting Thanksgiving. We did a semi-formal setting this year so there were more plates and glasses to set out. He has great eyes for the small details.

Snowflake made his appearance and brought the boys some hot chocolate bombs which is all the rage right now. I am thrilled that Mark is still into this tradition.

What do you do when you have hot chocolate bombs are waiting for you? You make hot chocolate and decorate the tree! I have to say, I'm quite happy on how the ribbon on the trees turned out this year. It's so much easier and looks much better when you cut the ribbons before you work it into the tree. Don't let this picture fool you. This was the only ornament he hung. Haha! 

This boy was the most excited to decorate for Christmas. He actually did most of the decorating around the house. 

Matthew hung the most ornaments out of the the three boys. and the only one wearing a shirt. Haha!

Mark picked out another ornament for Michael and Matthew this year. Last year, he picked out different birds for each of them. This year, he picked our different owls. 

I love that this is turning into a family tradition. He already has picked out a theme for next year - snow globes. Can't wait to see what he will chose for them.

The boys are back "in" school today. I was certain that school was going online after Thanksgiving break because the COVID numbers have been exploding, but am thankful that the district is still giving us parents a choice as to either go virtual or in-person. Mark and Michael are in-person and Matthew is going to school virtually.

I've been substitute teaching for the district and I have to say that I am really liking it. I've discovered hat teaching the high schoolers is much easier than the elementary school kiddos, which is the opposite of what I thought it would be. I'm sure it's completely different from a regular school year, but it's really neat to see what different classes are doing.

The best room I've been in is this one. I would have loved to have a classroom like this when I was in school.

This is my little set-up in the back of the room. I had time to work on some of my own things while the students were working with their teacher during their online instruction time.