Family Invasion - Round One - Preparation

Mom and John are coming for their annual December visit tomorrow. This will be the 8th year in a row that we've been able to celebrate Sheela's birthday with them. They take us downtown for the night. We all go to dinner, then they take the kids back to the hotel while Sid and I go out. The next morning we get up early and grab breakfast in the Hotel and then walk down the street to watch the Neiman-Marcus/Adolphus Children's Parade. After the parade we will come back to the hotel for lunch and then head home after the crowds are gone. And this is just the beginning of a wonderful week of visiting.

Before this however comes the making of the house presentable routine. We were actually in pretty good shape this year as we'd just completed a rather thorough cleaning. However the family room was still torn up from the baseboard work, the stairs were covered in two weeks worth of things waiting to go upstairs, the game room was buried in clean, folded laundry that was never put away, the paperwork pile is out of control and the computers are only half reassembled. The majority of these chores were to have been completed last weekend at our leisure but I had a cold and slept through the weekend. Monday night Sid watched football and I finished another book (Bone Finder by Sarah Andrews). Last night we finally dove in. We accomplished a bunch but there is even more left to do and only one night to do it. Oh, and I started another book (Earth Colors also by Sarah Andrews). No pressure.

Half birthdays

Happy Half-birthday to Sunil! He is 4.5 today. The only celebration that really comes along with this is the marking of his height for posterity. He's grown roughly an inch since May.

Precious Elf Child

Sunil's school will be having their annual Holiday program on Dec 15th. I can't wait! This is Sunil's first time to do a performance of this kind. He gets to dress up in the "precious elf child" costume and sing a few songs with his classmates. Unfortunately the date that they've chosen is half way between Mom's visit and Dad's visit so both will miss out. I'm sure that there will be video later.

UIL - University Interscholastic League

Last month Sheela tried out for the UIL creative writing competition. She was not selected to represent her school but she did have a great time working on it. My favorite part was reading the stories she worked onat home for practice. I would draw four simple, unrelated pictures, then she would choose one of them to incorporate into her story. I think she was allowed 15 minutes to write the actual story.

Last night she brought home a permission slip to try out for another UIL competition. She didn't even know what the competition would be but it said UIL and she wanted in. It will be story telling this time. At this age they read each child a book and then they go in and retell the story to the judges one at a time. Sounds like fun to me. I can't wait for the practice sessions.

The darkside

I've pulled Sheela over to the darkside. She now spends most of her free time curled up in the glider in my room reading. I've moved from reading in the glider to reading on my bed to make room for her. We tried it the other way but then she fall would fall asleep in my bed and I would have to haul her out. I enjoy having someone to read with, it makes me feel less antisocial. At the same time though I know that reading gets in the way of almost every normal activity. There are mornings were I have to fight the impulse to call in sick so I can stay home and finish a book... or get a head start on the next one. There have been many nights where I left a mess in the kitchen while I run upstairs to change. Instead I pick up a book and never come back down. Bills don't get paid, children don't get feed, laundry doesn't get put away, phone calls don't get made. This isn't really the life I want for her, but I want to enjoy it for just a little while.

Playground

Here are some pictures of the cousins at the playground in Longview. I think I like this playground even better than the one up at Celebration Park by us. Maybe its the wood, maybe its the castles. By the way, that is Seema posing on the swing and Nita climbing the stairs.

Oh No! It's a Chevy.

Sid bought a car this weekend. It was time. The Explorer racked up nearly a 150,000 miles and was close to becoming a liability. The Trailblazer is a 2005 and has only 16,000 miles on it.

Hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving

We've had a busy few days. Tuesday night Jasmine spent the night and Globix Trading through together an impromptu Holiday Party (we all went out for Greek food). Wednesday I took a day off from work and took the kids ice skating. It was Sunil's first time on the ice. He is such a good sport. He did great. He never quite got the hang of skating alone but he did well with the wall or holding my hand.

Wednesday night we went up to visit Cindy and Mack. We haven't seen much of them lately. It was good to catch up. We also watched War of the Worlds, which was a massive waste of time.

Thursday morning we drove over to Longview, TX to visit Sid's sister, Sushama, and her family. They've been in the new house for six months and this is the first time we've been here. We need to do better about coming to visit. They are only two hours away and we have great time. We are still in Longview today (Friday) but we will drive home this evening. I have some pictures of the kids that I'll post when we get back home.

Right now we are off to a car dealership, Sid has his eye on a car there that he is trying to talk me into... It would work better if he was talking me in to a new car for me, but he really does need a new car more than I do.

The Five Whys

First we had All I Ever Needed to Know I Learned in Kindergarten which helped explain how to get along with others. Now we have the principle of the Five Whys which explains how to find out what really went wrong on the production floor. You don't ask why the error happened, accept the answer, fix the problem and move on. You ask why, then you ask why again, and again, and again and again. The problem needs to be addressed at least five layers deep. Kids have know how to employ this technique since the beginning of the spoken word.

"Why can't I have candy for dinner?"
"It's not healthy"
"Why isn't it healthy today, I had some last night?"
"Last night you had a small piece after dinner."
"Why does it matter if I have it first or last?"
"It lacks the nutritional content of meat and vegetables. You need to eat those first so that you aren't too full to eat them later."
"Why do I need nutritional content?"
"You need the vitamins and minerals to grow strong and healthy"
"Why can't I have a vitamin pill with my chocolate?"
"You are right, eat the chocolate, take the vitamin and bring some for me too." okay, this isn't quite the same thing as getting to the root of the problem but it does illustrate the benefits of a persistent nature.

By the way if you haven't read Robert Fulghum's books you should.

And even more team pictures

More team pictures

Can you tell that these were taken 10 minutes after sunrise? The Panthers ended their season 9-2-1.

End of season party - Hot Wheels

The boys had their party last night (even though we still have one game left to play). We celebrated with all-you-can-eat pizza at a place called Double Dave's. We followed that up with a brief award ceremony. Each boy earned a trophy, we gave "coach" caps and whistles to the coaches, and I was given a beautiful picture frame and bath oils. Then we had cake and let the boys run amuck. It was quick, it was easy and the boys were proud.

Bye-bye Bello

It's been a fun couple of months and I'm going to miss Bello more than I will the kittens but I'm pleased to say that Bello has found a new home. She went to live with my friend Patti. I hope that this will work out well for both of them.

Power tools

Sid and the kids spent some time this past weekend trimming out the family room (old garage). We still don't have it entirely done but now that the weather is cold we are getting there.

Working with clay

I have a friend who is an artist that works with clay. On a whim she gave Sheela a pack (well two packs now) of clay that can be set by baking to make all sorts of neat stuff. Sheela finally got to work with it last night. She covered a basic ball point pen in yellow decorated with red, blue and purple dots.

Unguarded fruit

While I was out having a nice lunch today, my cube neighbor Leo defaced (or faced) my unguarded clementine.

Surgery today

Bello was packed off to the vet this morning. She received a full round of shots, as I type she is being spayed, she also has an ear infection. She will come home tonight and spend a few days recovering. Hopefully during those few days the weather will warm up a little bit and she wont mind going back out. I forced her to go out for a few minutes this morning and she wasn't too happy about it. The wind chill was in the upper 20s.

A Gala Affair - 2005

Aren't we cute?

Music Award

Sheela received the second grade girl's music award for the grading period. She isn't sure what the overall criteria is for winning the award but she is pleased and proud just the same. So are we.

Bye-bye Adventure

The last of the kittens went to her permanent home last night. A guy from work and his family stopped over last night and took Adventure home with them. Which leads us to the big questions.... why is bello still locked in the bedroom? It was a nice comfy 70+ degrees this morning. The temperature now is 50-ish. We have a freeze warning for tonight. When Texas weather changes it does it all at once. I couldn't convince the kids that she needed to go back out yet.

Holiday Party Success...

I'm pretty pleased with the way the Holiday party turned out. The food was every bit as good as I'd hoped, the band was great (if a little bit too loud during dinner), the magician was a big hit and everybody that knew it was Sid's wine was impressed. There were 250 people there which was just what we planned onWe made it almost all the way through the evening before anyone displayed their undergarments, but I turned my back on my friend for one second and when I looked back she was taking off her blouse (the women were all on stage dancing at this point). At least she was in the back row. I made her pull it back on before she got her arms all the way out. I don't know how many people noticed.

We across the street to another bar after the party to play tabletop shuffle board with a couple of the other die hard party goers. All of whom I'm glad to say had rooms for the night.

Second Grading Period Ends

Sheela brought home another straight A report card. She is pretty proud of herself...we are pretty proud of her too!! The thing that I am like best about her school work is that we've been shown how to not make it OUR problem to see that she gets it done and gets it done right. We check it after she goes to bed just to see what she is doing, but we don't offer advice or corrections unless she asks, and we try not to ask her if its finished. She taeks care of it all herself. She almost always does it at her afterschool club but sometimes she brings it home. She controls her time and her schedule. She takes care of asking the teacher if she doesn't understand one of the problems.

Earlier this year one of our friends was explaining that she (the mother) and the daughter spend time every night doing the homework together and it took two hours on the last night before its due. This year, at Sheela's school, all homework is due on Friday. Phyllis was spending 3-4 hours a week helping her daughter with her homeowrk. Her function was to sit at the table and constantly remind her daughter to focus. That would make me nuts.... and it meeans that her daughter doesn't have to focus because Mom is handling that.

A night out... or two

Farhana has taken the kids for the whole weekend so Sid took me out for dinner last night. We went to Kobe Steaks, which is a Benihana type place. The food was excellent, the drinks were tasty and we made a few new friends (a middle school teacher and two school councillors). After dinner we walked over to Pete's Deuling Piano Bar. We stayed there a couple of hours. It reminded me alot of the piano bar at Pat O'Brien's. A good time was had by all. We didn't get to be until 2Am and I woke up at 7AM. A few more hours of sleep would do me good, but it is not to be.

We are trying to get some work done on the house this morning, then catch Sunil's soccer game. From there we are driving over to Los Collinas to check in to the Omni Mandalay. We are staying the night over there for my company Holiday party. I'm on the planning committee for the party so it's wont be all fun and games for me but we should have a pretty good time.

Tomorrow when we pick up the kids we are going to do some work on Farhana's house in exchange for burgers and margaritas. It's a win-win deal.

Bye-bye Zachary

Another kitten has moved out. Zachary, the little blonde boy, has gone to live with my friend Eileen. The remaining crew is getting smaller and smaller. We have only Bello and Adventure left. Adventure is a smaller version of herblonde brother (and Sheela's favorite). There are still four people that tell me that they want her but I wont belive them until they actually show up and take her home.

Party Plans

Sheela has choosen to have a birthday party at one of the local ice rinks. Since I'm paying for it I got to choose which one. The cost isn't too bad and the rink is beautiful (its inside of one of the REALLY swanky shopping malls) and it will be decorated for Christmas. As it is older it is not really designed for parties so it will be pretty low key. I'm okay with that and Sheela will be too. The big draw back is that we will actually have to go to a shopping mall during the month of December.

The good old days are back

Trevor Stokol's blog of his travels has been offline for a few weeks. I don't know how long its been back, I was checking it one more time before casting it off from my list of favorite places. I'd followed him through Hong kong, India, Pakistan, South Africa, The United Arab Emirates, Malaysia, Thailand, Vietnam and on in to Laos when the site went down. I read an entry or two (or three) a day and I still had four months of his life left to follow. I'm glad it's back.

Bye-bye Barbie...........

No we did not name a defenseless kitten Barbie. Our previous computer (purchased custom built off the internet from a quasi-reputable dealer) came with a silver Barbie keyboard. The Barbie name had been scratched off but the big green daisy was still there. The dealer swore it was a mix up in the "stock room". It was actually a pretty good keyboard but our sleek, new HP keyboard is much less embarrassing.

Parent Teacher Conference

We met with Sunil's teacher this morning. Her name is Ms. Tehmina. He is doing really well in everything except penmanship. We need to have him practice his writing a lot more (or let him use his scissors more often). He can read all of his simple short vowel words and most of his simple long vowel words but she wont start him on books until after the holidays. It is a waste of time to start and stop repeatedly.

He has spent a lot of time working on geography and can name all of the continents, most of the oceans and quite a few countries. States are giving him some difficulty, but like most people born in Texas he tends to think that it is larger and more important than it really is.

He also knows the days of the week and the months of the year.

Bye-bye Belle....

One more kitten left for its new home. We are down to one cat and two kittens -- plus of course, the cat that is staying. I'm hoping that Bello goes next. She is so sweet but she's in heat again and none of us are enjoying her confinement. I'd let her out but if she shows up pregnant at her next home I know they will give her back.

Melt that plastic....

A rather large chunk of our day was spent buying things. We managed the quarter round to finish out the edging in the family room (though we will need to special order the t-molding in order to get it dark enough), three new sink faucets (one for the downstairs bathroom and two for the masterbath -- they were all on sale), new tennis shoes and new hiking boots for Sid (today is his birthday so we passed them off as gifts), a pair of dancing shoes for me (our corporate holiday party is Saturday -- I'm wearing and old dress but I needed shoes) finally we moved on to the biggie, a new computer (the power supply on our former computer has finally given out). I'm about ready to commit to a new comforter for our bed too. The old one we've had longer than we've had Sheela. As soon as I get the new comforter I'm going to need to paint the bedroom (its the beginning of an ugly cycle).

Bye-bye Monster

The first of the kittens has moved to his new home. Monster (the solid black kitty) went to live with my friend Nancy and her other cat, Sabrina. We wish them all the best.

A new process book

The Quality director bought me a new book: Process Mapping, Process Improvement and Process Management: A Practical Guide to Enhancing Work and Information Flow by Dan Madison. Now I have an excuse to actually read at work. I haven't done that in awhile. It's not quite as engrossing as reading fiction and not quite as much fun as attending a class where I get to interact with other people and discuss new ideas, but it's better than requesting yet another document change that will only get repealed in a few days, because someone wasn't diligent in checking their facts. It's been a big week for undoing the work I did last week.

On a work related note, we were audited by the FDA this week and it went very well. No observed deficiencies (it's very rare that they don't document anything.) I didn't have anything to do with this audit but I'm proud of the team that did (and they did feed me breakfast every morning).

First Aid and CPR Training

Sid and I rounded out our annual training requirement with CPR/First Aid/SIDS/Shaken Baby syndrome. The group that performs these training classes focuses on the Daycare market (daycare employees are required to have bi-annual certifications that are kept current). So we went to a local school and joined their session. It was quick, convenient and affordable.

I'm trying to arrange a similar training session at work but I need CPR/First Aid/AED (defirillator) and Bloodbourne Pathogens. The price according to the American Red Cross (for 14 employees) is $1400, the price from LifeQuest is $330. The American red Cross class also takes 10.5 hours as opposed to 3.5 hours for LifeQuest. The difference in lost time to the company for the additional seven hours of training is another $4900. Now I have to decide if it's worth it to the company to pay the extra $5970 to not have it say anything about serving the daycare industry on the cover of the handouts.

Halloween has come and gone

The kids had a great time and collected an obscene amount of candy.

Our traditional work celebration was toned down considerably. This was a good thing. It was to the point that the larger departments (40+ people) would put on skits lasting up to an hour. They also spent three days decorating and two days cleaning up. Its hard to remain productive in that kind of chaos. This year there were no departmental skits, no group costume awards, no required costumes at all. My department traditionally has not dressed up in costumes at all (and this year was no exception) we do however spend more time on the potluck lunch than the norm. Once again we put together a wonderful spread and ate until we were sick (that's what we were going for...)