Grandparent Visit

Back in July Nana and PawPaw came to town and visited. Granny came also but she stayed in Houston with some family. Saturday night the boys went to the Astros game and the girls went to the movies. We saw the new Ice Age movie, it was like all the other Ice Age movies but Tess enjoyed it.

After the Movie we stopped for a quick Ice Cream Treat. Our Family loves Ice Cream, we usually have some sort of ice cream in the freezer but it’s a special treat to go to an ice cream shop. Tess always picks out Chocolate Ice Cream and some sort of Chocolate mix in, this child loves her chocolate.

On Sunday we ventured out to the Children’s Museum. The outside of the museum hasn’t changed much since I have been but the inside has completely changed. We got there when the museum opened so we missed most of the crowds. Tess has a ton of fun running around looking at everything and trying everything out.

There was this one section where you could build things and knock them down, I think her daddy, PawPaw and Tess enjoyed this room the most.

Overall the museum was a nice outing for the family and we had a fun weekend with family. 

Built-in Shelving

Clayton and I realized after Tess’s birthday that we needed a lot more storage upstairs for all her toys and nick knacks. We looked around and I could not decide on anything that I really wanted and one night he looked at me and said well I could build you something, I think he regretted saying it right after it came out of his mouth. My simple shelving unit morphed into a built-in that took up most of one wall in our upstairs play room.

I took a week off from work and Clayton and I started the process of building our built-in shelving unit. The whole process took about 3 days and it was nice because we had the Olympics on the whole time. We also painted the playroom and decided to rearrange things while we were up there.

I still have some knick-knacks to buy for the top shelves but I am pretty pleased with how the unit turned out. Tess loved it, she kept wanting to go upstairs and play in her pretty room. She thanked Clayton and I so many times for making her play room so pretty for her. 

A goalkeeper cannot win a game, he can only save it.

For the second year in a row the Texas Fire Fighter Games was in Conroe. Tess hung out with my parents while I hung out with Clayton. 

It was a hot couple of days. There were 3 Houston teams again this year and they had to combine the Division 1 and Division 2 because they made an over 35 Division. This caused some confusion for day 2 when games were changed and led to Houston playing Houston for 3rd place in Division 1 even though there was only 1 Houston Division 1 Team.

The last game was not a good game for Houston but the two days overall were fun. Clayton and I had fun on our mini vaca in Conroe. 

Summer...

We have had a pretty busy summer, it seemed to pass us by and in no time it was time for school to start again. Tess had to go to the Doctor for her 4 year old check-up. We really like her Doctor and the nursing staff. She had a lot of energy that day and was bouncing off the walls and the nurse didn’t miss a beat. I am pretty sure everyone could hear her outside our room and the doctor walked in and got her to calm down a little bit but not much. We had to get shots this year and she was not happy, we got ice cream after and everything was fine. These shots must have hurt because she walked a little funny for a couple of days after but she never complained.

One of the things that filled our time was field trips at school, in Tess’s new class they take trips outside of the school. She went on her first field trip this summer, it was to CiCi’s Pizza but she thought it was the coolest thing ever.

We have played Dress-up, she randomly comes downstairs in different outfits and wants me to either take pictures of her or to help her complete her outfit. She loves her dress up clothes and we sometimes add different items like wands and tiaras to the pile.

We also have spent time playing around the house dancing and singing. I try to be sneaky and record Tess without her knowledge but she always catches me. She doesn't shy away from the camera when she catches me, she always performs more and asks me to either record her and then show her or take a picture and then show her. I don't think we will have to worry about her being shy. 

One evening our little girl had some extra energy and we were looking for something to do so we and some friends took our little girls to visit Chuck e Cheese for the first time. When they walked in and realized they could play all the games it was like Christmas morning. Ivonne and I also had some fun playing some of the adult games. We will definitely have to go back and let the kids and adults play more games.

Clayton and I went to a concert one night and Tess spent the night at her Oma and PawPaw’s house. She was ready to go and took her back and started walking to the car. She now constantly asks when she will be able to spend the night at her grandparent’s house. This is something that I really never did so I am glad that Tess has the opportunity to do often with both sets.

We also did some fishing with Tess’s new fishing pole. We did more avoiding turtles than catching fish but Tess enjoyed the time spent with her Daddy and eventually she will catch a fish on her pole.

We have also rode our bikes, Clayton and I gave Tess a new bike for her birthday. We have spent some time teaching Tess how to ride the new bike. We did not have the best luck the first couple of times but we realized she liked riding her bike more if we were riding ours so we made it a family event.

And last but not least we of course of gone to some Astros games. Tess has started to learn the game of baseball, and she can instantly recognize the Astros logo. She likes to walk around the stadium and play in the kid area. We will have to wait another season to root on our boys.

This summer was fun and exhausting at the same time.  

Turning 4 Round Two…

 Round Two was another party using the blow up water slide but at our house with mostly friends and my side of the family. We had a lot of people in and out of the house and a chaotic week leading up to the party. We decided to put in a back porch which was wonderful for the party but stressful leading up to the party.

Tess went to school on her actual birthday and wore a special birthday girl shirt. We ate donut holes that morning and brought cupcakes for her class to eat for snack.

Her class sang Happy Birthday to her, she loves the birthday song especially when they are singing to her.

We had a ton of people over for her party, and we made it pretty easy on us this year. Food to snack on, tray from Chick-fil-a, veggies, and fruit. It worked pretty well and was really easy which was needed since we had two parties this year.

We had another cookie cake and Tess loved that this one just had pink and purple on it, her favorite colors. We got the biggest cake because we weren’t sure how much we were going to need. We ended up sending some cake to the fire station.

Tess got a lot of presents and she was so excited when she saw them. My sister got the whole opening presents experience on video and everyone at the party thought it was hilarious how excited she was for every single present. They call it the Tess Experience. She is so innocent and I love that even when she received the same toy twice she was just as excited the second time as the first time and exclaimed she could share it with her best friend Kayla and Anthony.

She had a good time celebrating her birthday (twice), this year we started to a process that she needs to clean out old toys before she can put open up and put away her new toys. We then donate her old toys. This helps us keep her playroom clean but it also helps us teach her that its always good to help those that may need it more than we do. 

Turning 4 Round One…

We celebrated 4 twice this year, once in Bedford and once in Cypress. Granny wasn’t able to travel so we brought the party to her. The party was mostly family and Tess had a lot of fun. We came in Thursday night and celebrated Mona’s birthday on Friday. Tess and I took her to a ceramic painting place where you can also mosaic. I didn’t get a picture of her masterpiece but fun was had by all.

From the moment we arrived Tess started getting birthday presents, to say this child might be a little spoiled by her grandparents is an understatement. She loved that her presents were spread out and she had time to play with each one before opening the next one. This year she really got into the presents, making a list of her own and she lit up when she saw something that she had put on her list. It was really neat.

Aunt Alicia and Cody fishing pole, which she had been wanting for a long time. We met them at a stocked lake that night to test it out. We had been out to this lake with them before but Tess now had her own pole to test out and she was super excited. Tess didn’t realize the patience required for fishing. She also didn’t realize how slimy fish were. 

Alicia caught a fish on her pole and let Tess reel it in, once she got the fish in she dropped the pole and ran. We have used the pole at home but she has informed me that if she catches a fish daddy will have to take it off the hook.

Saturday was party day, we brought our blow up water slide with us and as usual it was a big hit with the kids. The kids played, and ate and played some more. I think they were all pretty tuckered out by the end of the party. 

Its nice that even though Tess doesn't see her distant cousins all that much she still gets along with them really well when they are all together. 

We decided to go with a cookie cake this year, Tess loves cookies and it worked out pretty well. We ate cookie cake and ice cream, opened presents and then said our good byes. We cleaned up the house and everyone had rest time.

We of course had to get our dog picture before we left. We had a good first party, round two was the following weekend. 

Summer is here

Summer started with a roar. Tess’s daycare send pictures when they are doing fun activities and they were dressing up like the circus one Friday. She decided to be a Tiger and they painted her face. She usually doesn’t like anything on her face so I was surprised to still see the paint on when I picked her up. When we got home she immediately said get this paint off my face. It was cute while it lasted.

The annual Guns & Hoses game this year was a bust. The game was on Saturday night and the game got cancelled and rescheduled for Sunday. Not a lot of people showed up for the rescheduled game on Sunday. The rain held out for the Dynamo game but it started raining as Clayton starts playing. Several lightning strikes ended the game and they have yet to reschedule it. Clayton did an interview at the beginning of the game which he was not really prepared for. We had celebrated Mother’s Day before the game so my parents brought Tess to the game right as the Dynamo game was ending and she was excited to see Bubba. She misses him since he has moved. He carried her on his shoulders to our new location for the Guns & Hoses games. And we were prepared for a good game. The weather had other plans.

Matt and Tess had fun dancing to our new location. Tess likes music and likes to dance but she doesn’t like loud music. She put her hands over ears because the drums were too loud for her.

Our normal summer time activity is the Astros Games. We have enjoyed quite a few Astros games and Tess is starting to learn the positions and the rules. My mom has started teaching her the game. She has the brand recognition down, anytime she sees the Astros logo she instantly says it’s the Astros, I go see them.

We have also tried to spend some time outside while the weather was still nice, it didn’t get too out till later in the year this summer. One of our neighbors has this toy motor bike thing and Tess enjoyed riding it. She was a little apprehensive at first but when she got the hang of it she took off. She was not so good at turning though.

Clayton and I knew that we wanted to get Tess a Bike for her birthday but we didn’t know what size helmet she needed. One day while we were out shopping we decided to try on some helmets. They have some interesting helmets for kids these days. We decided on a Minnie and Daisy helmet for Tess.

Lexi has spent her summer in the cone of shame, she scratched her eye again. We later found out that there were some little hairs inside her eyelid that were wreaking havoc. She spent a good amount of time in the cone until we went to a specialist and she had surgery.