Unfortunately this recording starts too late and they had lost some of the joy of saying "trick or treat" by having to say it over and over for the camera, but at least you can see them in the flesh here.
Saturday, October 31, 2009
Happy Halloween!
Josh wanted to wear his spiderman outfit from two years ago with his batman mask from last year. We decided, whatever makes him happy. He looked great though. Here he is with his ever-present thumbs-up pose.
Lucas would NOT wear the dinosaur costume I won on ebay for him, so he was little batman. Which is fitting, I guess. He wasn't too into that costume either, but we hustled him out the door quickly after getting it on, and then he basically forgot about it, because he was really into trick or treating!
Here we go!
Our scary door greeter:
Lucas and Daddy (and the moon, which looked a lot bigger in person):
Lucas would NOT wear the dinosaur costume I won on ebay for him, so he was little batman. Which is fitting, I guess. He wasn't too into that costume either, but we hustled him out the door quickly after getting it on, and then he basically forgot about it, because he was really into trick or treating!
Here we go!
Our scary door greeter:
Lucas and Daddy (and the moon, which looked a lot bigger in person):
Josh really wanted to carve his pumpkin to look like a spider, but we told him that was too advanced for this year. But one of our neighbors had done it, and well:
"Trick or treat!"
We tried to get a good posed photo:
Back at home, waiting for our own trick-or-treaters (and with Josh and Lucas' carved pumpkins on display):
"Trick or treat!"
We tried to get a good posed photo:
Back at home, waiting for our own trick-or-treaters (and with Josh and Lucas' carved pumpkins on display):
The dinosaur costume that wasn't
I thought it was cute, and I thought he'd really like it since he's into dinosaurs now, but he hated it. We had to wrestle him into it each time he tried it on, and each time he'd cry and try to get himself back out as quickly as possible. I think it was mainly the head/hood. Probably too heavy or bulky. Oh well. He made a cute mini-batman.
Sunday, October 18, 2009
Saturday, October 10, 2009
The new house
Our camera has been acting up so I wasn't able to get any pictures of the house when I tried. John got some interior shots, but we don't have an exterior photo. These will give you a mental picture though.
The house we are renting is way out from downtown Fort Worth, in fact I pass several horses, cows, and occasionally goats on my commute home. But the boys of course love that we see so much animal life. And it means the house is bigger and newer than the rentals available closer to downtown (which were pretty slim pickings anyway, at least based on the literally one day John had to look at houses and pick one). So we have a four bedroom house now, meaning the boys each have their own rooms now! They love it.
Here is our room, which is big enough to finally fit our bed, bench, armoire, and treadmill all in one room:
(We also have a master bathroom, with his and hers walk-in closets, which we are loving after the very small closets of our circa 1925 house in Portland.)
This is Josh's room (yes, there is nothing on the walls yet in any of our rooms; we will get to that eventually):
A second view of Josh's room:
Lucas' room:
The kitchen (with, again, much more cabinet space than we are used to):
The house we are renting is way out from downtown Fort Worth, in fact I pass several horses, cows, and occasionally goats on my commute home. But the boys of course love that we see so much animal life. And it means the house is bigger and newer than the rentals available closer to downtown (which were pretty slim pickings anyway, at least based on the literally one day John had to look at houses and pick one). So we have a four bedroom house now, meaning the boys each have their own rooms now! They love it.
Here is our room, which is big enough to finally fit our bed, bench, armoire, and treadmill all in one room:
(We also have a master bathroom, with his and hers walk-in closets, which we are loving after the very small closets of our circa 1925 house in Portland.)
This is Josh's room (yes, there is nothing on the walls yet in any of our rooms; we will get to that eventually):
A second view of Josh's room:
Lucas' room:
The kitchen (with, again, much more cabinet space than we are used to):
Our dining area:
Living area:
Fireplace:
View looking back to the back half of living area, aka the boys' play area:
The house is still cluttered with boxes and things as we continue to unpack, and there are no decorations yet, which makes these pictures look less than professional quality, but so far it seems to be a good house with good space, and we are enjoying it.
.
Living area:
Fireplace:
View looking back to the back half of living area, aka the boys' play area:
The house is still cluttered with boxes and things as we continue to unpack, and there are no decorations yet, which makes these pictures look less than professional quality, but so far it seems to be a good house with good space, and we are enjoying it.
.
Josh's (second) first day at school
Here is Josh getting ready for his second first day at school, this time at his new Texas school (Lake Pointe Elementary). He goes to a brand new elementary school here. It is going so much better. His Portland school (which he attended for 8 days) had 31 kids in his class, and 700 in the school, and the entire student body had to enter the building at first bell and be settled, seated, and ready to go 10 minutes later at second bell. It was chaotic, and much too much for him.
This school has 19 kids in his class, and they trickle in over a 30 minute period in the morning, and he is doing so much better. He loves going now. He even has his first field trip coming up, to the Fort Worth Zoo. Very exciting!
When we were getting his backpack ready for his new first day, we pulled out all the classwork they had stuffed in there in Portland on his last day. One paper was a worksheet where the kids had to draw a school-related picture (Josh drew a bus) and fill in this sentence: "At school I like to ________." Josh had written, "cry." And it was true, he cried every day. Now he doesn't. It's going great here and Josh is a champ.
.
Texas!
We arrived in Texas around 5 pm on Sunday, September 27. I had to start work on Sept. 28 as a condition of my employment, due to the end of the federal fiscal year that week. So we just squeaked in under the radar. It had turned out that one day to pack and load the truck in Portland (and go to my doctor, and later to Lucas' surgeon, one last time) wasn't enough (who woulda thunk?), so we had left Portland a day and half late, plus four days of driving, and we just arrived in Texas Sunday evening.
But that turned out to probably be a good thing, because when we arrived at our rental house, the key code given to us by the leasing agent was wrong, and we couldn't get in. We spent the first 10-15 minutes thinking we were doing something wrong. Then we thought I remembered the code wrong, and called around trying to find someone to check email and confirm the code. Turns out we remembered it correctly. We tried to reach the leasing agent, but of course couldn't. We tried and tried again, before becoming so frustrated and finally giving up. We then tried to find a hotel on the fly, but travelling with an 80 lb dog limits your options, and we also had two tired and increasingly cranky kids (and their very cranky parents) to feed and get to bed. The first two hotels turned us away over Sammy, but my sister looked online and finally found us a place that turned out to be midway between the house and my office, which was nice since I'd be heading straight to work in the morning.
So in the end, I worked a full day before I ever saw my new Texas home. The first week was exhausting, with learning my away around at work, unpacking and setting up the new house, getting Josh enrolled in school, and researching daycares for Lucas (not to mention learning roads and routes to and from work, etc). But now at two weeks in, things are settling and it is starting to feel like home.
Here we are arriving in Texas, just at the state line.
It was really hot. After this 15 minutes or so out in the sun (even at 5 pm) taking pictures, not in the car with the AC, Sammy was panting like crazy. He didn't stop until we reached the rental house (an hour later) and found the outdoor faucet for him.
It was also really bright. Lucas would NOT stand at this sign and look at the camera (facing the sun) until we thought of giving him my glasses.
But that turned out to probably be a good thing, because when we arrived at our rental house, the key code given to us by the leasing agent was wrong, and we couldn't get in. We spent the first 10-15 minutes thinking we were doing something wrong. Then we thought I remembered the code wrong, and called around trying to find someone to check email and confirm the code. Turns out we remembered it correctly. We tried to reach the leasing agent, but of course couldn't. We tried and tried again, before becoming so frustrated and finally giving up. We then tried to find a hotel on the fly, but travelling with an 80 lb dog limits your options, and we also had two tired and increasingly cranky kids (and their very cranky parents) to feed and get to bed. The first two hotels turned us away over Sammy, but my sister looked online and finally found us a place that turned out to be midway between the house and my office, which was nice since I'd be heading straight to work in the morning.
So in the end, I worked a full day before I ever saw my new Texas home. The first week was exhausting, with learning my away around at work, unpacking and setting up the new house, getting Josh enrolled in school, and researching daycares for Lucas (not to mention learning roads and routes to and from work, etc). But now at two weeks in, things are settling and it is starting to feel like home.
Here we are arriving in Texas, just at the state line.
It was really hot. After this 15 minutes or so out in the sun (even at 5 pm) taking pictures, not in the car with the AC, Sammy was panting like crazy. He didn't stop until we reached the rental house (an hour later) and found the outdoor faucet for him.
It was also really bright. Lucas would NOT stand at this sign and look at the camera (facing the sun) until we thought of giving him my glasses.
That's right, we're not from Texas, but Texas wants us anyway.
--Lyle Lovett (paraphrased)
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