Joe for Judge!

This past Tuesday was the primary election in Texas and as most of you know my big brother, Joe, is running for Judge here in San Antonio. Many of the other judges did not have opponents in the primary, but my brother did have one. We anxiously awaited the results at a poll watching party Tuesday evening and I am happy to announce that my brother won the primary election by a large margin! Now it's on to the general election in which he is up against the incumbent judge. Fingers crossed he can win the election in November!

My brother and his wife, Melissa (sorry it's blurry)

The family



He whooped Cameron Cooke's butt! (62% over is measly 37%)

Teacher gifts

So I was trying to think if something cute to do for James' teachers as a Thank you for a wonderful year. Once again, it's Pinterest to the rescue. We painted some small terracotta pots with blackboard paint and then used yellow on the rim to mimic a ruler. James picked out the plants he wanted to use, I made cute little "Thank You" signs, and voila we had some really cute teacher gifts. I think they turned out great!

Using chalk I wrote, "Thank you for helping me grow!" on the pots

He was so proud :-)

Memorial Day 2012

This past Memorial Day was very relaxing. We started the day by working on Maddie's nursery, which is coming along nicely. I promise to post pictures as soon as it's finished. Then we headed over to my parents for swimming and hot dogs. As always we had a great time and James loved swimming around on his own. He still needs the noodle to swim, but we are starting swim lessons next week so hopefully that will be a thing of the past soon.

James having fun with his "squirter" as he calls it

happily swimming along

Mmmmm, watermelon!

James and Margaret enjoying their drumsticks

he loves his ice cream :-)

Madeline's Nursery

So we have finally started the process of putting together Madeline's nursery. I started by picking the bedding I liked the most. I decided that I didn't want something that was too overwhelmingly pink, so I settled on this adorable Aqua Pixie set.

We are planning on putting up a chair rail and painting the top the aqua color and the bottom the pink color. My handy husband will also be putting up crown-molding to top it off. We are currently torn between two cribs. We have decided to get a convertible crib again so that it can transition into a full size bed. The one I really want is almost double the cost of the other one, so we'll have to figure out if we want to spend that much money...

My favorite...it comes in white as well, so I'm not sure if I would do the dark wood or white

This one is a close second and the matching furniture has adorable crystal knobs

I also am determined to have a crystal chandelier in the room even though I still want to have the ceiling fan. I was thinking of swagging it over her crib in the corner so that I could keep the fan, but I'm not sure if it will be too much. We'll have to see...I just love the look of a chandelier in a little girls room. Here are some options:

So that's the nursery so far...we are going to start the hard work this weekend...painting, chair rail, crown-molding, etc. Wish us luck!

Mother's Day 2012

We had a very nice and relaxing Mother's Day yesterday. After sleeping in a bit, I was awakened with a cup of coffee and my first gift of the day (that's right, I got two :-)), a nice new Nikon camera. Hopefully this one will take faster pictures than Mike's 10 year old Fuji. My second gift was a new toaster oven...I know, I know it's not all that glamorous, but it was something we needed since ours recently broke. After a relaxing morning we headed to church with the family. We had planned on doing a Mother's Day dinner in the evening, so after church we headed home to relax some more. Mike took James to run some errands so that I could have some quiet time to myself, which was so nice. Then we headed to dinner at my parents where James tried escargot for the first time and he actually loved it! Overall it was a very pleasant and relaxing Mother's Day.

James posing with one of my presents :-)

Mommy & James

James and Daddy

James about to try escargot for the first time (he's super excited)

James enjoying his escargot (he ate 4 of them!)

San Antonio Mission's Game

James attended his first baseball game this past weekend. Our friends the Hutchisons received 6 free tickets to the Mission's baseball game so we thought it would be fun to take the two boys. We stopped off at Buffalo Wild Wings for a pregame dinner and then headed on to the game. Not surprisingly James had a great time. In the beginning he was thoroughly engulfed in learning about the game from Daddy, which was super cute. As the game went on though I think both boys were getting a little bit rambunctious. All in all however, it was a great time and I think we will definitely be taking James back for more games.

James and Logan @ Buffalo Wild Wings
(wish it wasn't blurry, but you can't always get the best quality with a camera phone)

Daddy teaching James about the game

James & Daddy enjoying the game

James fully engulfed in the game

watching the fireworks at the end of the night

Mother's Day crafts

Every parent and grandparent loves getting something homemade by their child or grandchild, so James and I decided to make hand print flowers for his two grandmothers for Mother's Day. It was super easy and they turned out great. We first just made his hand prints onto card stock using different colored paints. Once they dried, I cut them out and added personal touches with pictures and sentiments (see below). Then I put them between two pieces of contact paper to protect them (I'd love to have a laminator at home, but contact paper works too). Hope everyone had a wonderful Mother's Day!

Little man making his colorful hand prints

my goofy boy

We made homemade cards for both grandmothers as well and here is James decorating the inside

Magnetic hand print flower and our homemade card

We made these to put into Gigi's bouquet of flowers, but of course I forgot to get a picture of them in the bouquet

Baw Paw's Birthday

This past Sunday we celebrated my dad's birthday with a nice birthday dinner for the family. While I busily prepared dinner James and Mike took advantage of the nice weather and went for a swim.

playing with Daddy in the pool

James hamming it up

trying to splash Daddy

James and his baby cousin Louisa

Mel and Louisa

my adorable niece

James and Louisa enjoying their lemon slices (or are they?)

James ate a whole artichoke by himself...might be his new favorite food (I'm sure the lemon-butter wasn't a factor ;-))

James with his Baw Paw (the birthday boy)

about to help Baw Paw blow out the candles

Miscellaneous moments in April 2012

I have started to print out my blogs into a book so that I can have the memories and photos for years to come. There are so many moments that I catch on camera, but don't have the time to write a blog about. I figured in order to incorporate them into my books, I will do monthly blog entries that include some of those moments. Here are some of those moments from April...

James playing in the grocery store at the San Antonio Children's Museum

James and Logan playing at the Children's Museum

Naked baby running through the backyard :-)

Naked driving :-)

Making a birthday cake for Daddy

blowing out the candles with Daddy

James and Logan climbing a rock wall at McAllister park

@ the playground at Beto's Restaurant

my sweet boys taking a nap

Dinner on the patio

my goofy boy

@ the King Williams Parade

Wrestling with Will (their favorite past time) @ the King Williams Fair

The kiddos enjoying their cookies @ the King Williams Fair