Getting Ready for Soccer

Look who's getting ready for some spring soccer!  

Henry agreed to play on the condition that Daddy coach his team and that we try to get as many friends to play with him as possible.  

Daddy is all signed up to coach (and he's coaching Will's team too!).  

Check out Henry's new yellow cleats.

What a kick!

We are ready for a fun soccer season! 

Snapshots from the Week

We are back in the groove of the school year.  Christmas break was fun but routine is good too! Here's some of what's been going on at our house.

Will reads the comics daily, so our mornings look a little like this:

Henry adores his new shoes, so getting ready to go anywhere looks like this:

Will is so efficient with his homework these days, so afternoons look like this:

Some of us into yoga, so a Saturday morning might look like this:

Others of us are into bread-baking, so Saturday afternoon almost certainly looks like this:

I get lots and lots of love from my three guys, so nearly every day looks like this:

I love the special things we do as a family but I also love our predictable everyday routine.  It looks good to me!

A Sunday Adventure: San Felipe

We have been having so much fun lately exploring nearby state parks, so on Sunday, we packed up the car and headed west to San Felipe, the colonial capital of Texas and the home of Stephen F. Austin.  

At the San Felipe de Austin State Historic Site, we walked around the site of the original township and ventured into a replica of Austin's log cabin.

Will read the monument about the town hall. As a former teacher of Texas history, it is so much fun for me to visit these places with my little Texans!

Then we drove on to the Stephen F. Austin State Park for our hiking adventure.

We saw cardinals, vultures and hawks everywhere in the park.  

Our first short hike took us down to the Brazos River.  

Can you just imagine the Texans scrambling to cross the river during the Runaway Scrape?

We brought a picnic lunch. Yum!

Our second hike took us on the Cottonwood Trail, Raccoon Bend Trail, and the Opossum Loop.

We looked for wildlife at the Wildlife Viewing area but we didn't see anything (we are not exactly quiet!). Later, we found deer tracks, leafcutter ants, and many more cardinals.  

We all found lots of mud, Gene found a huge leaf,

and all three boys found walking sticks.  

The bigger the boy, the bigger the stick!

It was a beautiful day to be outside, and the four of us are already looking forward to our next hiking adventure.  

Christmas Break

Our Christmas break has been so much fun! The best part was having Daddy home for 12 whole days. What could be better?

We've kept busy the whole time, playing games like Chinese checkers,

Rat-a-Tat Cat, Candyland, and Solitaire Chess.

The boys went on several 3-mile bike rides (round trip) to the Fire Truck Park with Daddy. After one adventure, they celebrated with special lunch at Little Matt's on the way home. Daddy is so fun!

We've read lots of books (Captain Underpants is still a fave).

Will finished Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone before Christmas break and has been begging for the second book. We're holding off for now (he's reading The Chronicles of Narnia instead) but he still really wants Harry Potter!

We spent lots and lots of time with the cousins and ate a gingerbread igloo.

 The boys worked

very hard in the yard

and in the kitchen,

but we also let them stay up late, 

partying on New Year's Eve

with good friends, yummy food, and helium balloons.

Baster (Will's pronunciation and spelling) got a new sweater

that Aunt Jess made,

and Henry dressed up as a pirate superhero
with a big round belly.

 We visited the science museum,

 of course.

And lest you think it's always balloons and bunnies around here, we have our rough moments too. Henry was mad at Will and wrote him this note.

But mostly, our break has been good, 

with plenty of toothy grins and big belly laughs.  

Ducks and Trains

Last Sunday, we invited the cousins over to spend a whole day with us. Gene, Mike and Jess took the four kiddos to Hermann Park to ride the train and feed the ducks, while I stayed home nursing a bad cold. Little Michael is almost 2 and in the obsessed-with-trains-stage, so it was a fun outing for everyone.

Do you think the little boys were excited?  

It was a chilly morning so they were bundled up. 

I love it though. Houston is so hot most of the year that I always look forward to these cold winter days.

After riding the train, the kids fed the ducks.

We always have fun spending time with the cousins!