Thanksgiving Feast

Less than 1 week until Thanksgiving and the official holiday season! But who’s counting right? I can’t believe how fast this year is going. Yesterday, I went over to join Matthew for his class Thanksgiving Feast. There is no greater joy than seeing his face light up when he saw me there. I’ve decided that I will do everything I can to be at events where parents are invited. The whole class dressed up as Indians and they were all sitting together for a feast. They were just so adorable in their Indian costumes! The table was decorated with the plump turkeys that the class made earlier. It was fun to see all the turkeys made up of so many different materials and in so many different ways. Not one was alike.

We don’t have any plans for this weekend really. M’s dad and his wife are officially here. They will be moving into their new house this Saturday so I’m sure M will be there to help them. The boys and I will try to stay out of the way, of course. The weather is suppose to be very nice this weekend, so maybe I’ll take them to visit the Botanical Gardens and snap a few pictures. I’ve been so bad with taking pictures. I was looking for photos for our holiday cards and realize that we don’t have many that I can use. Speaking of which, I’m proud to say that I’ve ordered the cards, so I can check that off my “to-do” list.

Yes, A Christmas Post

I’m sitting here listening to Christmas music at work and it’s not even the week of Thanksgiving yet. I loathe it and love it at the same time. I love the spirit of Christmas and the Holiday season. I love the sights and sounds of Christmas! Decking the halls? Love it! Stockings hung up with care? Love IT! I love it all and I hate myself for loving it all. For goodness sakes, we haven’t even celebrated Thanksgiving yet.

It’s like crack. I can’t but be pulled into it. I told M that we probably won’t be putting up a Christmas tree this year because we will be in CA celebrating Christmas with my parents, but I’m probably lying. OK, I am lying. We’ll go out right after Thanksgiving to pick out a tree.

I was walking around the neighborhood with the boys on Sunday and saw some of our neighbors already putting up Christmas lights. I felt like I needed to get right home and start decking my halls and hanging my stockings. Then I remembered that there’s a turkey waiting to participate in our annual Thanksgiving dinner.

But, I CAN start working on our Holiday cards. Last week, I finally got our family picture from the studio (after 8 weeks). I didn’t get digital images with my Groupon package, but I’m hoping that I can scan a 5x7 and have it be good enough for our Holiday cards. I’m pretty happy with the picture. Usually, I just pick the one that I look good in, but everybody looks good this one.

Finally, A Gap!

Happy, Happy Friday! This is a big weekend for my little Matthew. He is so very excited about Halloween. The first words out of his mouth this morning was, “Two more days until Halloween!” When he’s that excited, it’s hard not be look forward to Halloween myself. They both will be dressing up as knights this year. Michael is a little more subdued about Halloween. He hasn’t really said much about it, but I think he’ll change his tune when the candy starts rolling in.


The boys have a “Book Parade” today instead of a Halloween parade. They get to dress up as a character from a book and parade around the school. Drama, drama! Mostly on my part. No one else seemed to care. First, Michael was OK with being a knight (I had planned on getting a book with knights in it). So I thought I had it all planned out. Yesterday, little man decided that he wanted to be a Chinese boy from the book “Seven Chinese Brothers.” I had to come up with the Chinese costume in 2 hours? No chance. To make a long story short, I ended up going to the bookstore and finding a “Flat Stanley” book. The costume for Flat Stanley? Jeans and a green long sleeve shirt. Perfect! Easy, and Michael agreed to it! Matthew was drama free, which is unusual for him (i.e. this morning, he did not want to wear his jeans because it was touching the ground when he walked). He was a knight from the Narnia book.

In other news, Michael got 2 teeth pulled on Tuesday. One of his bottom tooth was lose and before it can fall out, his new tooth popped up behind the lose tooth. I’m hoping that it will move into position without the need for braces. Michael is so proud of the big gap in his mouth now. I think he has been waiting a couple of years now to get that gap. He loves to show it off!

Completely off on a tangent, last night, while M was giving them a shower, this was the exchange he heard between Matthew and Michael.

Michael: Matthew you are a tattle-tale

Matthew: At least I’m not a liar!

These boys crack me up everyday and I love it!

Luck

I found out that the Giants CAN play the Rangers for the World Series. It looks like that scenario could very well happen. Giants are up 2-1 and Rangers are up 2-1. Who will I cheer for if this happens? Oh, this will not be an easy decision…

M’s dad visited us last week and bought a house not 2 minutes away. Not sure when they will close, but it looks like they will be around for the Christmas Holidays so we may go over to CA to spend Thanksgiving with me family. Of course, we already told my parents we may send the kids to them over the Christmas break so M and I can go on a nice trip. But if we do that, we will be leaving M’s dad by himself for his first Christmas in TX. Dilemmas, dilemmas. I guess if this is my biggest family issue, that’s not such a bad thing.

I was talking to some of the parents at Michael’s soccer practice yesterday. One of the moms was talking about her upcoming trip to Disneyland so we all pipe in about the rides and the time wasted waiting in lines. She said something that struck me and I can’t stop thinking about it. She said they were lucky because her younger son has autism and because of that, they don’t have to wait in line and that they get special treatment from the rest of the staff. I know that the point of that comment was to give the Disneyland people a compliment more than anything else, but when I heard that, I thought to myself, “I don’t think I want that kind of luck.” I will gladly wait in line for hours and have staff people treat me poorly anytime as long as my children are healthy. I am LUCKY and BLESSED to have such wonderfully healthy and strong-willed boys. I must never forget that. Even when I feel like they are trying to drive me to the loony bin.

It's Time!

I’m a sucker when it comes to rooting for the underdogs. I’ve never been a big baseball fan, or any sort of fan for that matter, but it was fun watching the Rangers make history last night. So the Rangers have my heart for now for these reasons in no particular order.

1. No one picked them to have a winning season much less going to and winning a play-off series
2. I liked that they celebrated with Ginger Ale.
3. I now know at least three of the player’s names now. Wait, make that 4. How can you forget a Dominican named Vladimir?
4. They play the Yankees, and I don’t care much for the Yankees. OK, I hate the Yankees…
5. I would love to see a Rangers vs. Giants World Series. Can they play against each other in the World Series?
6. They are our home team!

Go Rangers!

 

Weekend Ramblings

We had a great weekend as always. The weather was again AWESOME, and Michael played great at his soccer game. Not too much going on at the Fisher household. I just love this time of the year because the weather is so great. We could've spent all day outside if we wanted to and Michael pretty much did. I bet he was inside for maybe 3 hours each day. He loves to be outside. Of course, it helps that there’s a TV out on our patio to keep him company.


Matty, on the other hand, prefers to be inside. He spent a lot of time on the Wii this weekend. He’s not really an outside person so I force him to go outside as much as possible. We had a nice bike ride around the lake yesterday. Well, nice until they decided that it was a good idea to run through some sprinklers. Always into to something…

Matty said one of the sweetest things about his brother last night. I think it’s one of those moments that doesn’t or wouldn’t mean much to anybody except for me as their mother. They were in bed and I went to check on them like I always do when I think they are asleep. Matthew, for one reason or another, was still awake (but barely) at 10:30pm. Michael was sound asleep. I went over and whispered to Matthew not to wake his bother up. He looked over a sleeping Michael, smiled, and said, “He’s so cute.” This really warmed my heart and shows me how much they love each other. I know that they love each other, but just to see the different ways they express that love is nothing short of amazing. That was one of the best birthday gift ever.

We also interviewed a couple of girls to be the boys’ part-time nanny this weekend. I was really torn on whether to leave them in their current afterschool program or take them out and hire an afterschool nanny. There were pros and cons to both, but in the end, I think it would be easier on us (and our wallet) to hire a nanny. The kids are excited to be coming home afterschool instead of going to a daycare center. I’m not completely comfortable with the idea yet, but I think it it’s better than the daycare alternative.

Weekend Wrap-Up

We were all soccered out this weekend. Both the boys had two games each in 3 days and I’m all tuckered out. Although, I must admit, I did enjoy watching them play. Plus, the weather was AWESOME! After almost a month-long bout of 100+degree weather, this was a change for the better.

In other news, big congrats to my bro for getting hitched last weekend. I’m sure it was beautiful and everyone had a great time. I’m sorry I missed it.

Because I knew I wouldn’t die of heat stroke, I took the opportunity to do some outside planting. Well, container gardening because we are not sure what to do about the landscaping yet. I think it turned out pretty nice. I planted a gardenia shrubs in each container and used petunias to give it a little color. Then, I found some old terra cotta pots and put in some begonias. I also bought some mums just to hedge my bet. One of these will certainly stay alive for, right? I haven’t really had too much luck with container plants, but I have a good feeling about this.