Confession

Hi internet,
I have a confession to make. I have a new addiction. It's called bento. It is a japanese art form for packing single portion meals usually with rice, fish or meat and vegetables. In Japan you can buy these meals ready made but homemakers spend extra time to make meals visually appealing and go to great lengths to make characters, shapes, etc... This is said to be as an expression of love for their family members as well. Google bento and you'll see what I mean.

Anyhow I feel like I have been in a rut with lunch ideas for hubby.... they aren't well balanced... alas a sandwich every day for 6 years gets old. He doesn't like to carry a bunch of stuff with him to work. So I found out about bento and now I am fixing efficient lunches and adding variety.

Hubby never complained about lunch before (what a great guy) and now says they are yummy and seems less hungry when he gets home. Now keep in mind I don't do exactly the japanese versions, this is just the idea adapted for what works for us. Also I have been coming up with exciting ways to present food to the kids that sometimes works, sometimes doesn't. So please indulge me when I present bento posts.

I love these containers they are called lock and lock. They are perfect for a sandwich and adding a few extra things to make your lunch a little more. I love that we reuse the containers and don't throw away foil or plastic wrap. I promised Hubby I wouldn't make anymore "turkey" character sandwiches. But hey it was just before Thanksgiving and somebody needed to see what cute things I could do! He commented that lunch was a little embarrassing and made him feel like a gradeschooler! I'll make it next year for the kids!

Santa pancakes

Our first married Christmas 2002, dear hubby searched high and low for perfect gifts. One of the neatest things he did was in desperation and has become our very own family tradition. Now evolved even more. He bought a pancake gift box mix. You know the kind with all the yummy smuckers jellies and flavored syrups? Yummmm. Anyhow pancakes on Christmas morning is a tradition, and now they are Santa pancakes! I am especially looking forward to the kids response this year. What is your favorite family holiday tradition or memory?

It's not done yet!

On the topic of veiwing old holiday movies with young master. If there is a song and opening credits he will adamently state "It's not done yet." And this will continue until his Father reassures him that the movie is not over.

He has been making us open pretend presents. "Mommy, I have a present to you. Open it. It's a banana book!" Then he will make us read our pretend books. Sometimes it is a strawberry book.

He has decided we are leaving Santa chocolate milk. We will be decorating sugar cookies. Wow, Santa has got it good this year!

Happy Holidays!

Hi there, tap tap anyone still checking in on my little old blog?

Life with 2 little ones makes it hard to keep this thing up to date.

We went to Austin and Dallas for 2 weeks at last week of Nov. first week of Dec.

We had a nice time & now we are back in 6 or so inches of snow.

Also our computer had to have a well visit for a noisy fan problem.

This is a picture from September...

yes I am still behind on posts about all our adventures

I still have from August on to update about.

Young Master has really gotten the concept of Christmas.

We are showing him all the old Burl Ives and puppet animated movies.

Every time he hears the drummer boys song on the radio

he recognizes it from the shows and says,

"It's a new drummer boy song!"

A Love Letter to my Children

To My Beautiful Precious Babies,

I just want you to know how very much

your Daddy and I Love You!

What a blessing you are in our Lives.

We are so lucky God entrusted us

with the privilege to be your parents.

I hope that you understand that I'm

still learning as a Mom and forgive

the mistakes I make along the way.

This is the hardest but BEST job

I've ever had in my whole life.

Daddy keeps taking all these pictures

and making videos cause he says

someday we're gonna miss all this

and I believe he's right.

I know that someday I'll have to

step back and let you make decisions

so that you can learn and grow.

But for now please understand

if I hold onto you just a little

tighter or a little longer.

It's because I love you and

don't ever want to let go.

But when that time comes

I will.

I also want you to know

of my strong Faith and

Sincere Love for Jesus Christ,

who died for us and took

all our sins away.

How I hope that I can

teach you about God

and his perfect Love.

To Love God and to Love others.

The most important

of all his commands.

We look forward to watching

you grow and develop

into the people whom God

intends you to be.

I pray that you know the

Bible and can share it's

message easily with others.

I pray for your purity and

the purity of your future spouses.

I pray for Blessings on all

of your relationships.

I commit to pray for your

protection in this world.

To be blessed physically,

emotionally and spiritually.

I pray that you know

Who You are,

In Christ.

We have a wonderful

Family and Friends.

I am Thankful for

the many Blessings

we have been given.

All too soon time will

quickly pass by.

I will look back and

wonder.....

Where did it go?

I hope you have fond and

Happy memories of

your childhood.

Know that I will

always Love you and

you can come to me

no matter what.

I end this letter with

our Family Blessing

that we pray over

you every evening

before we put you to bed.

Numbers 6:24-26

"The Lord bless you and

keep you; The Lord make

his face shine upon you

and be gracious to you;

The Lord turn his face

toward you and give you Peace.

All my Love,

Your Mom

Happy Belated Halloween

Trick or Treat smell my feet

give me something good to eat!

Stuntwoman was getting unruly

so I gave her a lolipop to keep her busy!

Master was totally posing for this picture

He realizes Sister has sweets and hollers for his share!

Excited to get his sugar rush on too!


After each house the Master would say
"Let's go to another house!"
One of our last houses on the way

back home he told the Lady

"You go back in your house now."
Translation : "Let's go to another house!"

Neighborhood Sign

Y'all have a neighborhood sign like this?

Late July, Chinatown

The last Saturday of the month was rainy

so we ended up staying home.

But on Sunday the 27th after church

we ventured downtown to check out Chinatown.

Football Man was hoping to try a place

where they had poultry hanging from the window.

I opted for a picture instead.

The Kids were really fascinated with the chopsticks!

More Ottowa Fun

The kids are starting to get

the hang of this traveling thing.

Here they are having fun eating out!

Have you ever had a BeaverTail?
It's fried dough, in this case with cinnamon and sugar.
Although you can get it with many different toppings.
Chocolate sauce, maple syrup, honey, whipped cream, powdered sugar......
Basically it's an artery clogger!



We saw this sign an Irish Pub

where we stopped for lunch and had to take a picture!

Ottowa

We visited the capital of Canada

over the weekend of July 18-20.

On our way driving there we stopped off

at the 1000 Island region for a boat tour.

This is an amphibian bus tour we took in Ottawa.
We are just entering the water.

Me trying not to panic.....

as I fear for my children's safety

..... wondering if the bus will float.

Canadian Tomb of the Unknown Soldier

located at the National War Memorial

in Confederation Square, Ottowa.

Isn't the Parliament a gorgeous buliding?

July 6th, Casa Loma

We had been looking forward to checking out Casa Loma a major Toronto tourist attraction. A castle that has also been used for filming for several movies. Do you recognize it? Well the inside is what I recall from X-men, but it has been used for many other movies. Anyhow we went on this particular weekend because they were having a Renaissance festival. They have super cool events here like sleeping beauty plays and elf workshops, and they even transformed it into Hogwart's in conjunction with the release of the 7th Harry Potter book. Look it up in Wikipedia and go to their own web site to see what a cool place it is. A word to the wise it is not stroller friendly so that is why I'm not smiling as I'm chasing Miss Stuntwoman all over tarnation. But we scored a lucky trip down the antique elevator because one of the staff was just stepping on. Young Master was really thrilled. I wish we had taken a picture of it as it was all wooden and really old!

Wasaga Beach

On July 5th we ventured to Wasaga Beach

known as one of the world's longest freshwater beaches.

Stuntwoman loved chasing the seagulls and running from Mommy!

Master had a blast because the water is very shallow

unless you wade further out. It was a nice outing!

What we did in July 2008

On the 1st we celebrated Canada Day!
We went to Barrie where we
happened upon a little street festival.
We found a great Mexican restaurant, very yummy!

We found a water park and
then hung out at the beach.

Traveling Longhorns

Get your own Family Sticker Maker & MySpace Layouts.

Secret Crush

Shhhh! Don't tell my Mom or anyone, but I have a secret crush. There is this tall dark handsome drop of water from Dallas! Boy they sure know how to grow em in Dallas.

Anyhow I think I drove by his house a couple times last night to see if he was home. I was hoping he would notice me. He's super cute and I like totally Love him! I think he really digs me too. The other day he said "Hey can you take these pants to the dry cleaner?" And I said "Yes!" It was a very special moment. I think he wants me to be his girlfriend! I would totally be his girlfriend for sure! Like totally! Ha ha. All kidding aside Happy 6 Year Anniversary to the man of my dreams. My sweet Prince Charming and the Daddy of our Sweet Babies.

I. LOVE. YOU! 11/09/02

Computer Tag

Hmmm, this has turned out to be like phone tag maybe. Sorry it has taken me this long to post. Dear Hubby was away on business and the house we are leasing here in Canada has a hot tub out side. Turns out the heater quit working and it snowed, twice before Halloween. Yikes! We also got to have Grandma VanO here and we had a wonderful visit. I'll update on that at some point too. Anyhow I really do apologize for not doing this quicker. By the way can anyone please watch my kiddos so I can blog and craft to my hearts content? Tap tap, this thing on? Anyone???

So Kathey From My Window has tagged me to post the fourth pic from my fourth folder. But I have a dilemma. We have labeled the folder and somehow the order got moved so do I post folder number 4 or the folder sitting in the fourth spot currently. Decisions, decisions....

So I'll post from both since it's both my sweet punks! Poor Daddy was wearing his old swim trunks in our Texas back yard. Young Master needs a hair cut.... and someone should tell his Momma to do something about that. Sweet Stuntwoman learning to pull up to stand. Is it illegal to want to just gobble your adorable baby up? Sigh, I was still nursing her then. Now she is turning into a red-faced defiant terrible two's kiddo. "I do it, I do it" she says when I put her in the car seat to do the strap. I have to be careful not to pinch her fingers, I finish securing her seatbelt "click" and she says "Yay, I did it". These kids are the best. But there is no better birth control than the terrible twos and threes! Hee hee.

Late June

At the end of June (28th) we went downtown to some conservation area. Wish I could recall the name. Anyhow we walked almost a mile but the kids were getting fussy and we were using the single stroller and carrying one kid back and forth. It was a flop and no picture for the effort. Guess it was more of a place to bike or run. We tried a mexican restaurant downtown and had a disappointing meal by our Tex-mex standards.

Here we are enjoying the water sprinkler in the back yard! Good times!!!

Happy Birthday

Happy Birthday Aunt Kathy for Oct. 8th!

We hope you have a fabulous open house.

Wish we could be there to celebrate with you.

We miss you and send our Love!

Please take a look at her gorgeous work here http://www.kathleenmariestudio.com/

African Lion Safari

On June 21, we went to the African Lion Safari.

Just as we got there the elephants were going for a swim.

We got to see them up close!

Young Master really liked the Lion mascot, he had a grin a mile wide!

It was fun to see all the animals up close.

This ostrich was looking for food!

We got alot of great videos too.

More Father's Day Weekend

Did I mention there was lots of kissing that weekend?

New Feature

Hooray for fun new blog gadgets! On the left you will notice some pictures and underneath it is powered by youtube. You can click on these to see our home slideshows created by the handsome and talented FootballMan! We have recently added a couple new ones from Ottowa and Quebec travels. While in Quebec we heard a singer duo called Dala and he used their music for the Quebec slideshow. He has always been very thoughtful with the music selections for the slideshows and does an amazing job making these. He says he wants to watch these when we grow old and miss our babies. Sniff, sniff, waaahhhh!

Father's Day Weekend

June 14 and 15 we had a nice weekend.

On Saturday we went to a park downtown by Lake Ontario.
We had a pretty day and enjoyed each other's company.

There was lots of kissing on this weekend!

On Sunday we made Daddy mango apricot bars.

The recipe was kinda a flop! But we had fun making it.

Did I mention there was lots of kissing ???