Riley's First Basketball Game

Riley had his first basketball game on Saturday.  He is playing basketball for the YMCA.  I have to admit that I don't know how much was Riley wanting to play basketball and how much was his mommy wanting him to play the sport that she & her daddy played in high school.  But I am also trying to remember that at age 5, I was pretty bad myself.

 The biggest struggle at this age is learning to dribble.  This was never my strong suit, though.

The other skill we definitely have to work on is learning that he can NOT do any good standing under the goal.  Maybe it was because we kept yelling, "Go to the Goal"  or maybe he knows that is where the action is, but Riley was under the goal on offense & defense.  Now we just have to teach him that you can not shoot under the goal, you can not stop a shot under the goal, and you cannot rebound anything, but a made shot from under the goal.

 But on a good note, he did hustle up and down the court and we only had to yell once or twice to pay attention and find the ball.  Plus we now know the skills we need to work on.  I also have to remember that he can not learn the whole game of basketball in one week. 

I will also say this, I have seen VAST improvements in his skills in the past 2 weeks.  It should be really impressive to see how far he comes by the end of the season.  His first season of soccer, he didn't score a single goal.  So I'm trying not to expect too much.  But with each game will come more confidence from Riley.  He is too much like his mommy and doesn't like to do things where he is not already good. But first we have to learn to survive the Thursday night practices from 7-8pm (8pm is his BED TIME!) and find someway to not be overly exhausted & wild on Fridays.  
  Oh and isn't it great, that his team color is finally maroon!  I can wear my Aggie stuff every Saturday in suppport of his team!  Go Thunder!

House Redo!

It all started with a gift.  We were going to get a new entertainment center.  Somehow it turned into a week long project.... The new entertainment center was given on Saturday.  Sunday we went shopping and found the perfect one.  Then the brainstorming started. The first decision made was if we were going to do all this, then ALL the Christmas decorations had to come down that night!!!  So at 4 pm the 4 of us started taking down the Christmas tree.  Everyone was lots of help until we finished the tree.  Then I was on my own.  By 11pm that night every Christmas decoration was down and in boxes!  Wow, was I tired!  I have never done that before, but it was kind of nice.

 Monday morning we purchased the entertainment center & scheduled delivery for Thursday morning.  Here are some before pictures of the house.  The rest of Monday was spent exchanging presents for the right size or returning that petite shirt that my husband thinks I should be able to wear.  He just doens't understand that 5'9" is NOT petite!  But at least he tried.  Then I started making phone calls to schedule a few other things while I was off work.  Carpet cleaning on Wednesday...Directv on Friday.

 Tuesday was furntiture moving day & painting day. First we moved every piece of furniture into the garage, except the beds,dressers, kitchen table, and other tv.  Mom & dad took the kids home with them and we got to work.  I taped while he painted.  The sad thing was I was only about one wall ahead of him the whole time.  I HATE TAPING!!!  Originally we were just going to paint one accent wall.  That turned into let's paint the whole living room, and then continue with the attached breakfast area & kitchen. 

Here is my garage with all toys & furniture!  But a perfect time to do some serious cleaning out.  In fact I still have not moved all the toys back into the house.  Mostly only NEW Christmas toys have made it into the house. We could seriously do just fine with not moving anything else inside! 

 Painting continued into most of Wednesday. Wednesday morning we had all our carpets cleaned, and Randy painted the kitchen.  I took a break to spend time with family, but Randy kept painting between lunch & dinner with family.  It is a good thing my parents live so close!  We thought we were done Wednesday night.  But as we studied closer, Randy realized that his second coat of paint in the kitchen, was actually flat instead of SATIN!  Grr!  Back to Home Depot....
    Thank goodness Randy was able to take most of the week off from work, or we never would have finished.  Thursday they delivered the Entertainment center.  Now it was time for to reset up the tv, stereo, and dvd player.  But that 29" picture tube tv just would not do!
    Friday morning Directv came out and installed a HD DVR for our soon to be new tv.  Randy had to get some work done, so he wasn't there.  The installer scratched our brand new, less than 24 hours old, entertainment center.  Good thing we bought the scratch protection plan!
    Saturday we thought about things and debated on how to decorate.  Then Sunday was time to shop for a new TV.

Sadie wasn't sure where to hide with no furniture, so she climbed in the empty doll case!

 Our NEW wall!

My pretty red pepper wall.  Now I just have to figure out how I want to decorate my baker's rack.  Alot of my old stuff had hints of maroon in it and look horrible against the red paint.

Then finally the same red as an accent wall in my kitchen.  At the end of our week long project, I have to say that I love all the work we did.  The funny thing is it didn't seem like a whole lot of work.  I think I just enjoyed spending so much time with Randy.  It is not often that we get to spend almost a whole week together working simultaneously on a project and agreeing on almost everything.  I definitely headed back to work with a clean house, and loving feeling in my heart. 

Wetz Family Christmas

The Wednesday after Christmas, we took a break from painting (I will go more into that on another post), to spend time with my mom's side of the family.  My cousin, Jamie, her husband Chad, son Caleb, and Aunt Jeanne all came in from Round Rock.  Then both sets of grandparents came over to my parent's house.  The kids had spent the night, since Randy & I were painting.  That meant they were there to play as soon as cousin Caleb got there.  Alex just follows Caleb around and tries to immitate everything he does.  Around 1:00 Randy and I joined the crowd.  We all enjoyed lunch and then hung out together all afternoon.  The kids played wii or just ran around.  Then eventually it was time to open the presents.  Seriously such deprived children! LOL!

Alex got a super cool PINK bike!  She was so excited.  Luckily Cousin Jamie assembled it for her.  Her mommy is not very good with assembling things! :(

Just a little too short to reach both pedals at the same time!  But don't I look cute with my new fairy wings and dress up skirt while riding it???

The boys I believe were playing "football!"  Except there wasn't actually any ball involved, but at least they were running off some energy.

My gift to everyone this year was a personalized calendar with every month having pictures of the kids.  I spent like 3 days straight while my student teacher was teaching completing these.  I'm still not quite sure why it took my so long, but I learned something very important in the process.  We did not have any pictures of the great grandparents with the kids from the whole year.  That included 3 birthday parties, last Christmas, and Easter.  I think we are always trying so hard to just get the 3 kids together, but it is equally important to get pictures of the great grandparents too.  We are so lucky to have such young and healthy great grandparents for the kids.

Here is Grandma Betty and Grandpa Bill with Riley, Alex, & Caleb.

Then lastly Nemo & Papaw with the kids. 

This will be a New Year's Resolution of mine, to get more pictures of the grandparents & great grandparents with the kids.  Maybe next time Caleb won't already be in his pajamas!

Christmas Day

Happy Halloween!  I mean Merry Christmas!  Santa Claus brought each of my kids a new costume for Christmas.  Riley had specifically asked for a Spider Man Suit and Alex just "needed" a Belle dress from Beauty and the Beast.  So immediately each child wanted to put on their new costumes and wear them while they continued to open presents.  That is why all these pictures on Christmas morning, you see costumes instead of the cute pajamas that I looked so hard for and tried to match, sigh....

This particular Christmas, Alex had a definite theme to her presents.  First of all she is so into the Disney princesses, right now.  Yes, her mommy has guided her a little, but she chose which princess she likes best all on her own.  Belle is her favorite. Maybe it is because she is the only princess with dark hair, or maybe it is because she was the only one she could say at first, but either way Beauty from Beauty and the Beast was the theme of most of her presents.  Alex got the dress, the magic wand, the tiara, the shoes, and of course the movie.  The funny thing is neither child has even seen the movie. That will be fixed soon and long before we make our big trip to Disney World for Spring Break.

This is what I call a Christmas explosion.  No one would believe this room was spotless at 7am that morning!

Daddy got a rubber football from Riley.  This year Riley bought presents for us at school.  He did a great job.  I gave him $20 and he actually came home with CHANGE!  He bought Daddy the football, Mommy earrings, and Alex a princess necklace.  I was so proud of him!

After all the new presents were opened, they went back to playing with the presents they got yesterday.  Each of them got a Zhu Zhu pet & a car for their new pets.  Poor Sadie, our cat went nuts.  Its bad enough they look like a mouse but then they move too! LOL!

Then Daddy hung Alex's new princess mirror that she got from Papaw & Grandma Karyn in her room.  It says things like, "You are as pretty as a princess."  She loves it!

Finally it was time to get everyone dressed & ready to celebrate with my mom & dad at their house.  This was the first year that we went somewhere else for Christmas day, but only because they live 10 minutes away and Mom could start the cooking before we got there.

Alex got a set of princess pajamas (The theme continues....)

 Riley got a desperately needed new backback.  Since he will be playing basketball this winter, it is appropriately a Dallas Mavericks backpack.

 Alex got another new baby, but this one is a Cinderella baby princess.  She is such a little mother.  Even my babysitter tells me all the time, how she loves to mother everyone,  especially "baby Lauren" as she calls her.

 Then we got my parents a bottle of wine with a personalized label of the kid's Christmas picture.  I did this when Alex was just a baby and decided they needed a new one.  Such a neat gift that Dvine Winery in Grapevine does. Plus it gives me an excuse to drive over there and pick up a bottle for ourselves!

This Christmas was just my parents, since my cousin & family were not coming in until later in the week, so the Farris family joined us.  It was so nice to have all of us together.  Grandma Karyn was having a tea party with Alex.  Soo cute!  Another Beauty & the Beast themed present!

After so much excitement, we headed home that afternoon to let the kids take a nap, while Mommy & Daddy rested & cheered on the pitiful Cowboys.  But it was nice to watch our Aggie quarterback come in and almost pull off a win!

Christmas Eve 2010

Christmas Eve the Farris side came over to celebrate and open presents.  They brought lunch of barbecue, so I didn't even have to cook.  Then we all started opening presents. Papaw Richard got to help Alex open most of her presents.

 Grandma Karyn showing off Riley's Christmas Eve pajamas that we bought him.

As Riley was opening his presents, we forgot that he was going to open a game for his new Nintendo DS system that he had not got yet.  So we quickly threw it in a bag to give it to him.  I think it really threw him off.  He hadn't asked for it, and wasn't too sure what it was.  But at least the game made more sense to him. 

Daddy started showing him how to use his new game.

 This was Alex's favorite gift.  She doesn't so much play the keyboard, but LOVES the microphone.  I think I have a little diva on my hands! Since Christmas, I have caught her several times "performing" for our carpet cleaner & furniture delivery people.  I think we will be in trouble when she actually learns some songs and start really singing.

 Just to prove she is a total diva, she loved to wear all of her new jewelry.  Of course, Aunt Kalee had to show her how! :)

The other favorite toy was the remote controlled helicopter.  We all laughed as Riley & Randy played with it about a solid hour while we opened the rest of the gifts.  It was a little hard to control and they both thought it was really funny to buzz each of us.  It felt like I had a bee buzzing around my head.  It was lots of fun until the helicopter hit the ceiling and broke one of its propellers.  Sadly that was the end of the helicopter.  We tried to glue it back together but it just couldn't keep balance and fly.

After the presents were all opened, Alex decided to return the love to Aunt Kalee.  Since Kalee made Alex pretty in all her jewelry, Alex made Kalee "pretty" with bows.  At first she just put one bow in Kalee's hair.  Then she started requesting more bows from me.  To make it worse she wouldn't take just any bow.  She was picky on which ones she took from me.

 Such a good sport! I'm sure her FSU sorority sisters would be so proud.

 Then Karyn remembered one more gift.  After her own personal experience/scare of skin cancer she is so worried about all 3 Farris men working out in the sun all the time.  So she bought them each these visors.  They were actually designed to go around the hard hats, but since they don't seem to "remember" to put them on either, maybe he will actually wear it at least when doing yard work at home.

 As the afternoon wore on, Alex started showing signs of getting sleepy, but Ryan was the one who actually decided to settle in and catch some shut eye.  It just so happened to be on Alex's pink pony.  So cute!!!

 Sadie even decided to sneak in a little "cat nap."  I'm just glad that this time it was under the tree and not in the tree which is where she went at least once a night.  Luckily no ornaments were broken in the process.

 After the Farris family left, we put the kids down for a "quick" nap before heading out to church.  Christmas Eve service is a very important tradition to me and my family.  As long as I can remember we have gone to the candlelight service at First Methodist Hurst, usually at 11pm.  One of the really special things about this service was leaving the church and knowing that it is Christmas.  But things change.  I now have little ones and we live 40 minutes from church.  These kids need to be in bed around 8pm, so we now attend the 6pm service.  Randy is not one to get overly involved in the church service.  He mostly tolerates me and knows I think it is very important in the upbringing of our children.  But this year was different.
     There was just something special about standing there and watching my five year wanting to follow along in the hymnal, all four of us going down to take communion together for the first time as a family, and then finally all four of us lighting our candles at the end of the service.  At the end of our service we all light our individual candles and sing Silent Night together.  It is truly one of the most beautiful sights, seeing our gorgeous sanctuary decorated for Christmas, with no other lights than 600 candles glowing softly.  Randy and I agreed to not let Alex light a candle yet.  But as she looked at us with pleading eyes to be a part of it all, Randy helped her light her candle.  So I held both our candles, while he held her and her candle.  I almost cried at how blessed my life is.  I have two wonderful children, a husband who loves me, and was standing  next to two of the best parents in the world, my own.  It just doesn't get any better than that.  All that and knowing it was the eve of the celebration of Christ's birth.
     After we sang, "Joy to the World", we exited the church and hurried home to tuck my babies into bed.  This year didn't involve any extra assemby, and most of the presents were already wrapped.  Amazingly Randy and I were actually crawling into bed by 10pm ready to be awaken at 7 for Santa!

Holiday in the Park 2010

On the Tuesday afternoon before Christmas, we went to Holiday in the Park at Six Flags.  My mom, dad, the kids and I were there as soon as it opened.  We headed to the first big ride, which I can't remember the new name for, it used to be the Avalanche Bob Sled.  Riley was excited, but a little nervous.  He ended up loving the ride, as I knew he would, and this year Nana got to ride with us.  Last year, my mom was set to have her triple bypass surgery within two weeks and was not able to ride any of the rides, so mom was excited to finally get to ride a rollar coaster.  Unfortunately the line was really long, so Gampa and Alex headed to the teacups (rode it twice) and then to the carousel.  Just as we finished up, the rest of the crew arrived. 

 Randy's mother, Sandy, his brother, Travis, and sister in law, Jamie, all met us at the gate.  Grandma Sandy had brought some glow in the dark necklaces for the kids, which was perfect for hanging out at Six Flags in the dark. 

 I wanted to make sure that we caught the show that my student teacher was performing in, so we headed that direction. We had a little extra time, so we all got on the "cave" ride.  Again I can't remember the new name, I can only think of the names from back when we had season passes back in high school. 
Unfortunately, the line was too long for the cave ride and I just barely made it into the show on time.  Randy, Alex, Sandy, Travis, and Jamie did not.  It was a good show, and really fun to see Cynthia in such a different light.  She was so bubbly during the show, quite different from the teacher voice that I heard.

 After the show, we met up with the group again, ate a really nasty hot dog dinner, and then headed to the next ride.  Riley really wanted to ride the snow hill.  Of course, this was another really long line.  But we were spending some quality time as a family. In fact this marked the first of several times over the Christmas break that we spent quality time as a family, even more than usual.  It was really nice!

 The line was long and Alex was being her ornery self, messing with Daddy's eyes, and Nana's mouth, but always having fun. 

 Finally it was time for each of us to sit our dry rear ends on wet cold sleds and take our turns down the snow hill.  Even though it was 50 degrees outside, we all loved it, although we spent the rest of the evening, with cold wet pants.

It was a great evening.  We didn't get to ride near enough rides, but we had fun on those we did ride.