Before and After

We have lived in our house for 2 years already. So far I have painted the kitchen, dining room, office, master bathroom and the half bath. We have really needed to paint the living room and going up the stairs, because having two boys is not the best for light colored walls. The walls are so tall we didn't think we could do it ourselves and do a nice job.

Brad and I decided we wanted to get the living room and entryway painted. We also have a deal with replacing the floors. We needed some money, so we had a Craigslist garage sale. We spent an afternoon going through our things and deciding what we really needed and what we could get rid off. I should say going through Brad's things. He is a pack rack. Kind of a white Sanford and Son. We ended up selling everything we posted and made about $1400. The first thing we did was get the painting done. I love how it looks, see the before and after pictures.. In a couple of weeks we will get the floors done. I can't wait.

Happy Birthday Tan Man!!

My sweet baby is 9 today. That is really hard to believe. He is really growing up. I am very proud of his accomplishments this year. He has become a great student. He loves to read, which makes me really happy. He is becoming more confident in himself. He has such a sweet heart. I love that about him. Today we went to pick up his cookie cake from the mall. Mason disappeared, which really aggravated me. We looked around and called his name, but he didn't come. I told Tanner let's go to the car and we will drive up to the entrance and I bet Mason will be there looking for us by the time we get there. I really was trying to teach Mason a lesson. He likes to think he is big enough to wonder off and not let me know where he is going. I was hoping to scare him. Tanner wouldn't leave with out finding him. Mason was right where I thought he was, at the music store around the corner from the cookie shop. Mason is lucky he has a brother that cares about him so much. He is still pretty shy. When someone says hello, you can barely hear him say hi, and he won't look at them. Today he surprised me. The lady running the party asked him what he wanted to do and gave him a list of activities and the order she was planning on doing them. Tanner looked right at her and said, "I would like to play kickball, dodgeball, and then basketball." I was very proud of him. He still cries when he gets disappointed, but it doesn't last long. I am hoping by the time he is 19 he will stop this. I guess it is just part of his sensitivity, which is a good thing. I wanted to scan a baby picture of him in, but Brad unhooked our scanner and I don't know how to fix it. I look forward to spending another year watching my little boy grow up. I am so glad I am his mom.

Idiots

I know it sounds crazy, but I really look forward to a weekend of baseball. I love watching my boys play. They make me so proud. I really like socializing with the other families. Overall it is a good experience. Today was a crazy day. First Mason's team played a team called the Astros. The parents on that team were talking smack the whole game. Of course it didn't help that our kids didn't play very well. I ended up leaving that game and walked over to watch Tanner's game. I was thinking it would be better and I could relax a little more. The minute I got there one of the parents said we were playing a real ghetto team. I don't mean color, I mean attitude. The boys had their hat brims flat like a rapper. Their coaches were complaining about everything. We ended up losing by 1 point. When the game was over the coaches from the other team began yelling and pointing at our team in a real disrespectful way. One of the coaches even flipped us off. I was so mad! I began yelling, along with the rest of our parents, to the umpires. I got into an argument with some of their parents and I told them that was a trashy thing to do. Some people take things way to serious. We are talking about 8 year old baseball. We have a million more games to play. They other team kept saying we were just upset because we lost. I can't say I like to lose, but I would never be so disrespectful to another team. I hate people like that, they take the fun out of it. On a brighter note, after the games we went to Lupe Tortilla's for a margarita and it was just what I needed to relax.

Rain, rain go away

The rain has just kept on coming since Friday night. Both boys had a baseball tournament this past weekend at Baseball USA. We were very excited about it. I was happy because Tanner's two pool games were Friday night and Mason's two pool games were Saturday afternoon. This would work out great because I could see both boys games. Sunday might have been tricky, but at least the games were in the same park.

I got home from school on Friday, loaded Tanner up in the car and we went to the ball park. It looked a little cloudy, but the weatherman said only a 20% chance of rain all weekend. During the game it started lightening. The moms in the stands were all getting a little nervous sending our babies into a big field with a metal bat. We wanted the lightening to go away because our boys were playing great. I don't think they could do anything wrong and were winning 7-0 in the top of the fourth. The umpire finally cleared the field and we waited around for the rain to stop. They finally had to call the games for the evening and told us to check the website to see when our games would be rescheduled. Lucky us, they scheduled us for our make up game at 8:30 in the morning. So much for sleeping in on Saturday. Tanner and I got up and got there at 7:30 to find out they had cancelled all the games for the day. Bummer!!

The changed the tournament to single elimination games played on Sunday. Mason's game was at 9:00. Mason was the first batter and hit the ball just inches from going over for a homerun. After that he got thrown out stealing from 2nd to third. They were playing on a softball field and running was like running in quicksand. The rest of the game was not pretty. The boys just looked flat. We ended up losing 13-4. The umpires were a little different. They called in field fly, which hasn't been called in a tournament we have played in yet. The pitcher hit one of our boys with a pitch and he didn't let him take his base because he said he didn't try to move out of the way. I hadn't heard that rule either. We probably still would have lost, but it is discouraging.

Tanner's game was at 10:50 and they ended up losing by 1. The boys did not play terrible, but did not look like they had on Friday night. Tanner did make a great catch at home and tagged the runner out.

It rained again on Sunday night. Then yesterday it started raining in the afternoon and I don't think it stopped until this morning. School was cancelled due to the flooding. It had to be bad for the schools to cancel, because today was one fo the big state TAKS test. The picture is the bayou behind our house. It usually just has a little stream of water in it. It was full this morning. I hope this rain stops soon.

Snakes

Tonight Mason was walking into the house from the front door he yelled, "Oh my God, a snake skin is in the house." Brad ran over there and looked and confirmed what Mason saw. They kept asking me to come and see, but I was too scared to get off the couch. Brad kept saying how big it was and asking where the snake that shed it was. He kept saying it must be in the house. I kept telling them I didn't believe them, but Mason really looked freaked out. I slowly made my way to the entry way and sure enough it was a snake skin about 2 feet long. I was thinking we were going to have to move, because I can not be in the same house as a huge snake. To be honest I can't be in a house with a baby snake either. I hate snakes!! Finally, Brad started laughing and said he found it by the bayou on his bike ride and brought it home to scare us. He is so nice. Then because we are so nice too, we decided to play a joke on Tanner. We put it by the front door and waited for him to see it. He didn't freak out like we did.

Determination

There are times when you can see the wheels turning in your children's brains when they are learning new things. Last weekend after Tanner had played his two baseball games we went to watch Mason's two games. One of the kids at the park had brought a rip stick. Tanner decided he wanted to learn how to ride it. He spent most of the first game trying over and over to ride it. He kept falling off. I kept seeing broken bones, but luckily he wasn't hurt. He spent the second game riding that thing like a pro. He kept asking and asking for his own rip stick. I decided to get him one for Easter. We got it yesterday while we were in San Antonio.

Mason decided he wanted to learn how to ride it. We went to our hotel and Mason spent about an hour trying to learn to ride. He got very frustrated and even started crying, because he couldn't do it. Today at Nana's house he kept trying and could finally stay for a few seconds at a time. When we got home tonight he spent about three hours riding it around the block. He has mastered the rip stick. I hope they put that much effort and determination into everything they want to learn to do.

Baseball, baseball, and more baseball......

We had a total of 9 baseball games this weekend. Tanner played in LaPorte both Saturday and Sunday. Tanner's team played really well. We got 6th out of 15 in the tournament. The most amazing play happened. The 6th inning came around. We were down 5 runs. We ended up tied. The other team was home, so they got to bat last. We had 2 outs and they had runners on 1st and 2nd. The batter hit the ball into the outfield. The runner was rounding third towards home and the ball was thrown to Tanner, who was playing catcher. He caught the ball right when the kid was at home. Tanner blocked the plate and tagged the guy. Tanner was bent down and the kid flipped over Tanner's back. They both fell down in a jumbled up mess of legs and arms. When the dust settled, Tanner still had the ball in his glove. He got the last out to keep them from winning the game. This made us go into extra innings. We ended up losing in the end, but Tanner got the game ball, for being so tough.





Mason played in Katy all weekend. Tanner played at 9:30 and 12:30 on Saturday. Mason played at 4 and 6. Mason's team killed the two teams they played. Winning by 10 or more points. Sunday I had to miss the first two games, because I was in LaPorte with Tanner. I heard they didn't play really well. But they ended up winning. This put them in the championship game. We were winning the majority of the game. In the end we lost by one. The kid made some really stupid mistakes in the last inning. I think they thought they had already won. We still came in 2nd place. We get a little break for the next two weeks. And then it begins again.