Disney on Ice and Kerrville

OK - I have to finish my Spring break posts because now I have bluebonnet pictures and egg hunt pics! =) So here are the last two big events we had for spring break wrapped into one post!

Thursday we hurried back from Austin to drop Eden off at home with Grandpa (thanks dad for the last minute babysitting!) Claire was so excited for her special date with mom and dad by herself but couldn't stop talking about Eden on the way. She thought Eden was going to be sad she missed the show and that she was going to tell her all about it. What a sweet big sister!

We met our friends down there to enjoy the show. Here is Philip and Doris with Iliana. Congrats on their new baby boy Philip IV who was born less than a week later!

What a good looking family =)
Thought the princess section would've been Claire's favorite but nope! She LOVED Mickey as the Sorcerer's Apprentice when the brooms come to life. It was a really cool part of the show and my favorite when I was a kid too. Guess that's why they call it classic!
Priceless face... even if we had bought the tickets this face would've been worth it all!
Ili LOVED Claire and kept touching on her face. Claire was pretty smitten with her too!
Here is Jenny, Danny and Lily. Danny's brother in law works for a radio station and is the one who gave everyone extra tickets. Thanks Danny for asking us to go!
So we thought we'd splurge on a souvenir - a snow cone in a Mickey cup!
The finale!! So cool! The best part was when the Toy Story characters came out and they had a troll that danced - it was HILARIOUS!
Walking back to the car on daddy's shoulders. One of Claire's favorite spots =) You can see the Tower of America's in the background. Love this picture!
Claire didn't get to bed till 11 p.m. that night but again, worth it. Of course, we have a child who wakes up early even when she goes to bed super late so she was up by 6:30 a.m. YUCK!!

Then is was ready to get things together to drive to Kerrville to visit Neil's grandma. We took her out to lunch for her birthday and then we spent some time down by the river. Beautiful but windy day! Too bad the ducks were hiding from us!
Windy Claire
Oh - that's a joy face! She was so happy to be able to get out and about after two days of road trips and sitting in her high chair and car seat. She LOVED pointing to the flowers and chasing the birds.

Went back to Maw Maw's for yummy chocolate cake and some more time out back. She has such a green thumb and I had a great time talking to her about everything she had getting ready to bloom. Claire and Eden enjoyed an egg hunt that Maw Maw put together for them. So sweet of her! Claire kept hiding the eggs over and over so she could hunt as long as she could =) Funny.... even when she hid them she would have a hard time finding at least one. She must be a good egg hider =)
Love all the pics of Maw Maw with Eden showing her the flowers. Eden loves flowers and hopefully will be better at keeping things alive than her mama!

Whew! That was a crazy but fun week! The weekend was full of more time outside, a birthday party, raking leaves, painting sand box covers and other little projects.

16 months

I wasn't planning on doing a month update up Eden has changed SO much this month and there is so much I want to remember! I also wanted to scatter this post with some great pics of my baby from this past week.

Now that the weather is getting to be beautiful, Eden LOVES nothing more than being outside. I know I've mentioned it before but it's that big of a deal and that important!! Tuesday we took pics in the bluebonnets with my amazing photographer friend Jenny at Synergy Photography (check her out! Can't wait to share those!). Below are two Neil captured on our camera!

Her love for music and dancing grows everyday! She can't get enough and it's the cutest thing you ever heard and saw. She's a pretty good singer! Makes a mommy proud =)

Eden now has 5 teeth as you can plainly see in this cheesy grin! Daddy was tickling and rocking her back and forth. She's working on two more on top.

The past two weeks Eden has gotten really good with a spoon and will actually fuss until I give it to her. She's so independent (and stubborn!).

She has really become such a goof! She is now intentionally doing things to see our reaction and make us laugh. She'll do something like hold her spoon or cup in her mouth without her hands and look at us and giggle just a little to get us going! She will also try to tickle us and play chase to get us to laugh. Class clown? Maybe she'll get Aunt Linda and Uncle Mike's witt?!

She's doing new things everyday and trying to be a big girl with older kids around (especially her sister!) She wasn't too sure about the ball pit at open gym today but she loved the trampoline!

A few more things to remember:

• Eden can't wait to be around Claire and she wants to mimic everything she is doing! So cute but not always a safe idea =) The cutest one to note is learning how to blow bubbles in the bath tub.
• She's talking a little more but still not much we can understand. Her latest word is "no" - not the one I'd choose before mama and dada. She's shaking her head no too which is so cute. She's kind of saying nose with her new "no" word. I thought I might have heard "hi" today on our walk but we'll see if she says it again.
• She LOVES touching and labeling people's faces when you ask her: eyes, nose, ears, mouth and hair. She's actually pretty good at it but gets stuck on eyes because she thinks eyelashes are so cool. When she reaches for our glasses or isn't gentle with eyes, we say "no" which then made her say "no" for them. We're re-teaching those. She also knows tummy.
• She understands most everything we say to her which AMAZES us!
• One of her favorite things to do is clean up. She puts her toys where they should go when I sing the "clean up"song. This includes throwing away her wet diapers after I change her (she does that without the song). She gets SO excited and so proud!
• On the diaper note, yesterday she started patting her diaper when it is dirty. Too cute!

Ok - I think that's it! Love keeping up with her like this so I can look back at all the details. My girl is growing up!

Taste of Ethiopia in Austin

Tuesday and Wed. of Spring break included swim lessons (Neil got to see her for the first time!), errands, play time outside and some much needed organizing in the kid's closets and kitchen cupboards.

We traveled to Austin on Thursday to visit Billy and took him to try a highly recommended Ethiopian restaurant, Aster's. It was super good! A little tiny building but super clean and everyone was so friendly.

You could tell that a lot of the people were regulars. Most everyone ate with the forks but I noticed that there was a couple to the right of us who were only using the injera bread. Couldn't tell if they were only using their right hands or not (didn't want to stare!) My first taste of Ethiopian cuisine was split yellow peas with injera bread in my right hand. Very tasty... the injera bread has a very unique texture and taste. Kind of sour and spongy. I loved it as it kind of neutralized some of the spice. Billy and Neil were not fans. Claire wasn't either but I'm glad she at least tried it! She did enjoy her dance with Uncle Billy after we were wrapping up our meal.

We all (except Claire) loved it and would definitely go back for their buffet or even just a meal now that we know what we liked. My favorite was the Atakelt Wott (stewed carrots, cabbage, green beans, onion, garlic, ginger and turmeric sauce) and the Alicha Siga (stewed tidbits of beef with onion, garlic, ginger and turmeric). They used a lot of onion, garlic and even cinnamon. Berbere is a spice that is unique to Ethiopian food and makes things spicy!

Eden attracted a lot of people and I'm so glad because we met an interesting man who happened to be from San Antonio. He asked if we'd been there and he hadn't either but loved Ethiopian food! He had a young man from Ethiopia live with them for seven years while he was going to St. Mary's. So they have a lot of experience with the food eating it all over country including Paris where this young man's family now has a restaurant. Cool! He said to me, "Oh! And you're eating it just like they do! But your left hand would be in your lap." SO cool that he noticed and gave me the tip =) Of course I was holing Eden's food with my left hand so I had a good excuse. (I did break out the fork because I was going through the bread like crazy). I should've asked him after they ate how it compared... darn! We even parked next to them. They had ACCD faculty sticker so maybe we'll run into them again someday.

We would recommend Aster's to anyone and will be going back. Wish they had a restaurant here in San Antonio so we could try it more often.

After lunch we went to see my older brother, Mike, and got a tour of the fence and garden project. A short but sweet visit with much needed hugs.

Our trip was cut short so that we could get back for Disney on Ice that evening. We got called on the way up there with an offer for free tickets! Yes please and thank you! Stay tuned =)

Spring Break - Japanese Tea Gardens and the Train

Spring Break was so wonderful this year!! I love it when Neil has the week off to be home, play and get some projects done around here. Mostly, I love our outings around town to see new things and our day trips. This year was a busy one - there will be a lot of posts so we can remember all we did!

Monday, after I got home from my lovely annual appointment, we ate lunch and spontaneously packed up to head to the park down by the zoo. Eden had taken a really late and long morning nap so we wanted to take advantage of our time and the beautiful day! Little did we know, the rest of SA was too - the zoo, Brackenridge area was packed but we were blessed with a great spot right in front of our first destination, the Japanese Tea Gardens. We love it here! It's beautiful and so unique. It's a little bare still but Spring is showing her face more and more. This was Claire's first visit and she loved it! Especially all the fish and turtles that were sunning themselves =) Eden liked it too (she went as a 6 month old!)


Can't resist the daddy daughter pics - they are my favs!
Too sweet!
Me and my girlie's
Love this one on the steps of the bridge. Not sure what Eden just saw but she liked it!

Wow - a family photo!

So then it was off to the park across the street to ride the kiddie train. I have lived in SA since I was 10 and this was my first time! I think I was just as excited or even more excited than Claire! We had a great time riding and it was a long ride around to show us some fun sights. Hoping to do this when my aunt and grandma come down in April.

Then it was treat time and what did she pick? Blue cotton candy!! She was in heaven eating this pure sugar and I enjoyed it too =) I love cotton candy!

We'll need some extra teeth brushing tonight!

And Eden enjoying her dehydrated apples... no cotton candy for her yet but her time will be coming soon!

It was such the perfect day which ended with a yummy fish dinner and sweet potato fries... these days are what memories are made of!

Thank you Lord for such a wonderful family!

Prayer Request

Just a quick prayer request. Today I call to find out how many (if any) spots are open for the MDO/school program over at Northwest Hills. I REALLY want the girls to go there next year so I'm praying that there is a spot or a short wait list. I will be standing in line Saturday morning (probably SUPER early) to register them. This is really the best situation for us so I'm praying it works out! Please pray for us!

***Update: Called and the four year old class is completely full =( So Neil or I will be standing in line on Saturday at a ridiculously early hour to make sure she is the first one on the waiting list. Eden's class has three spots so we will register her and pay the registration fee in hopes that Claire will get in off the list. I will be looking at some other programs too before we'd decide to keep her at the school she is going to now. If you could now pray that Claire is the first one on the wait list and will get in =) Thanks for your prayers!

Trip to Austin

Last week while my mom had a few days off (YIPEE!!), we took the girls to Austin to visit Mike and Heather (couldn't get in touch with Billy). We had a great time eating fish tacos outside, loving on Maggie, hearing about the garden, getting nails done by Heather (Claire) and just spending some much needed time together. Mike's been working weekends now so its been forever since I've seen him! Thanks for a yummy lunch and a great time Mike and Heather!
It's been beautiful outside lately even with the 10 minute shower we just escaped after lunch!

Checking out the rosemary - my girls just have a thing for it!
Jicama - Claire LOVED it and it was a great addition to the tacos =)

Learning about thermometers from Uncle Mike - checking out the temp on the rain water

Sisters

Can you get much cuter than that?

Or this?

Yup - you can! This is TOO CUTE =)

Claire loves her time with M&H

Thanks for Claire's manicure Heather!

So after lunch, mom and I headed to the outlet mall for some quick shopping, yummy dinner at Cracker Barrel and then back home. A full, fun day together!