All in a day's work

Anyone who has spend any time around me at all knows that I have an amazing job that I really love!! It really is the best job in the district and I am very, very thankful for it!!

Along with getting to get to know some really neat kids and teaching them some really crazy stuff (Transformations of Square Root Functions is my current nemesis!!), I get to be out "in the real world" everyday and see some really interesting things. At the beginning of this school year, I started taking pictures of things that I found cool, weird, or downright head-scratchers!! Here's a small collection:

Let's start with the sweet and innocent ......

A mama and her babies!! Awwww!! Yes, I'm assuming she had twins ..... probably not reality, but let's just go with it!!

Beautiful horses ...... I get to drive past these beauties everyday.

There's a ton of road construction being done around the high schoool and it has cut into the land that these guys used to roam. One day, as I was pulling into the high school, I noticed this lone horse on top of a huge pile of dirt! It totally cracked me up!! I wish I'd witnessed the King of the Hill game he/she won to have that privilege!!! :)


This fella lives in a field close to my house so we get to see him almost every day as well! He's been around a while now, but when he first appeared in a field of horses, it was a bit of a shock!! The day that I took this picture, I slowed way down and he stopped eating and stared right at me. The second I took the picture, he immediately started screaming at me ......I saw his teeth and everything!! Totally cracked me up again!!!

Now for the weird ones ....

This car caught my eye a few months ago. First off, who puts magnetic flowers all over their car?? Second, as this car sped past me, I noticed that it was a Lexus!! A Lexus covered in brightly colored magnetic flowers ...... you don't see that everyday!!

This fun car was parked next to me one day ...... it had a nice zebra paint job but even better than that was this fun sign on the window! Well darn ...... I guess I'll have to find another car that DOES have some drugs!

This last one goes in the Serious Head-Scratcher category. This sign was one of two or three in a normal, suburban neighborhood!!

Ummmm ........ ok??!! I guess we all need to have something we can be proud of!!?? Thanks for feeding the birds?? I wish I knew the story behind this sign!!

So, not only do I have a great job, I get the added bonus of seeing fun stuff like this!! And if it weren't for some very strict privacy laws, I'd have lots of fun stories to tell too!!

Alex and Reagan

These 2 boys turned 15 last month and they've been friends almost since their days of birth!!

I thought it would be fun to look back at some happy times with these two .... especially since they rarely smile for the camera anymore!!

Here they are at Alex's annual Spring Creek Birthday Dinner ...... so happy to finally be 15!!


After their first official game as high school basketball players!!

This was at basketball camp last summer. Alex had already enforced his no-smile policy while Reagan had not yet decided to commit to that line of thinking.

At the 14th birthday dinner at Spring Creek ..... all smiles!!
Game faces .... 7th grade football ...... the only picture ever to have these two playing football together. Long live #88 and #89!!!

Teenagers!!! Yikes!!

Twelve year olds!!

Halloween 2004 ..... 7 years old!!

5 years old!! Nice smiles, guys!!!

Three year old Soccer players!! These guys were THE cutest ..... so funny to watch!!

In my scrapbook, I have all the pictures of them in their first attempt at team sports. I had written that Alex started off the season and was really excited about playing but as the season went on, he began to lose interest. By the end of the season, he only wanted to play when Reagan was playing so they could play together!!

Love the friendship these two have .....it's a great thing!!

Baby Luke

The big NINE year old was known as Baby Luke for a long time!!!

Here's the 2 year old version ....

The 3 year old baseball player .......

Graduating from The Grace Place at 5 ........

And just for fun, look at these little goofballs!! I'm thinking they were about 3 and 1 ..... and probably weighed about the same!!!

Sweet babies!!!

Luke is NINE!!

The sweetest, most huggy boy on the planet turned 9 last week. Coincidentally, his birthday fell on the same day as the first game of the Upward season. I'm honestly not sure which one he was more excited about!! Throughout the week leading up to the big day, I would hear he and Landry doing the countdown ....4 more days .....3 more days, etc. Invariably, they would follow that with ...until Upward starts, not "until my birthday!!"

Luke is such a great kid. He's very kind and sensitive. He works really hard to keep up with his 2 big brothers and also stays busy bossing his little brother around too!! He's thoughtful and considerate, always quick with hugs and "I love you's".

He had been wanting an ipod touch for forever and had waited patiently for it. This Summer, his good buddy, Kaleb, had his old ipod for sale and Luke really wanted to buy it. I was a little hesitant for him to buy it, as Kaleb had bought it in used condition, and I was worried that it might not last too long. Luke reeeealllly wanted it and could not WAIT to get his money and exchange it for the ipod.

Before the decision was made, I gave Luke a piece of paper with a line drawn down the middle. On one side, it had a + sign. On the other side, it had a - sign. I told Luke to sit down and list all the good reasons to buy Kaleb's ipod under the + and to write all the bad things about buying it under the -. After a few minutes, he had one thing in the + column and several things in the - column. I asked him what he wanted to do and he calmly said, I'll wait to get a new one. When I asked him if he was sure, he said ... Yes ... there are more bad reasons than good ones, so I'll just wait.

And that was it .... he waited patiently and finally got his ipod for his birthday!!

I thought at the time that it was so simple for him once he saw the pros and cons in black and white!! Wouldn't it be so nice if all decisions were that simple?!

Here he is with the beloved ipod touch!!

Mom and the birthday boy!!

Legos!!!

The cake that pretty much took care of my sprinkle collection!!

A few days before Luke's birthday, I was in Central Market and noticed these cinnamon rolls!! This is the same brand of bread that we really like so I was so excited!! We have not had cinnamon rolls since Luke was diagnosed with Celiac almost 4 years ago!! I made regular cinnamon rolls for the rest of us (from the can, of course, and ohmygosh .....they were sooooo good!!! It's been a long time!!!) and I made Luke one of these. He was kind of excited about it except he's always so nervous on the first day of Upward!! So, he might have eaten half of it before reminding me that he just can't eat much before the first game!! Silly me .... what was I thinking!!??

Happy Birthday Luke!! You totally rock!!!

Sharing the Christmas Love

Oops!!

These should have gone in the Christmas Day post ..... a little family love in Granbury!!






How can I fix those darn red eyes?? I even tried on Picnik and couldn't get it to work!!

The Merriest Christmas

This Christmas was a really great one!! Well, they all seem really great at the time, but then they just seem to get better and better!!

We did most of our celebrating on the 26th because that's when Ryan and the girls arrived. No one seemed to mind waiting an extra day ... it almost made it funner!!

Of course, Santa still made an appearance on Christmas Day. Here are the highlights ...

(Excuse the red eyes ... it seems to be a problem throughout the pics!)

The littles with the cookies and milk for Santa .... Santa loves Chocolate Milk!!!

Some of us had a slow start ....

#1 Baylor fan . . .


Awwww look .... the little ray of sunshine perked up when Santa brought him a phone!! No more flip phone for Alex = much happiness!!

And the Baylor boy got a new phone too!!

Legos and Hot Wheels ..... always good presents!!
Presents, Church, Family, and a trip to Granbury made for an awesome Christmas!!

Finally ......the Tooth Fairy!!

Landry is 6 years and 8 months old and finally, has lost his first tooth!! Most of his little friends have big giant teeth in their cute little mouths, but Landry's teeth have stubbornly held on tightly.

Until now .....

Happy times!!

Somebody's gonna have a Merry Christmas!!

Landry came home with this little activity last week and he happily sat down to complete it. When he was all done and brought it to me, I couldn't help but smile!!

(In case you don't read 1st grade writing often, this says Legos, M&M's, and Lollipop!)

This Christmas list is totally doable and I know one little boy who is going to be pleased on Christmas morning!! I have a feeling Santa is even gonna spring for the M&M's in the candy cane this year!!

If it would only stay this simple!!!

FIFTEEN????

How can it be that this little, tiny 9 pound baby . . . . .

1 month

3 months

6 months

1 year

3ish years

. . . . has grown into this FIFTEEN year old young man??? Happy Birthday Alex!! It's been 15 of the fastest and best years of my life!! I can't wait to see what the next 15 bring!! Love you!!

Run Parker, Run!!

Parker finished an awesome football season last night with another great game!! He returned a kick-off and had a great run! During the season, he had 2 touchdown catches and several other great catches and tackles! The best part? He had a great time doing it!!

Emily managed to get this video of his run last night. This is going to be so cool to have when he's playing in the NFL!! Ha!!!

Congrats on a great season, buddy!! You were awesome!!!

Pumpkin Fun

This year, the pumpkin carving was put off until almost the last minute!! Thankfully, we managed to get it in and enjoyed some beautiful weather while doing so.

The only before shot . . . Luke won the prize for the hardest pumpkin to get a knife through!! Look at the excitement on that face!!!


Here's the worst part . . . the guts!!!





Then the funner part . . . the carving . . .

Such concentration!!

Finally . . . the finished products . . .

The boys really look forward to doing this little Halloween treat. And as much as I enjoy it, I'm really glad it only comes around once a year!!