Another vacation day...

I'm sure that I should have spent the day getting ready for the next round of family but I'd have enough of being trapped here all day with the kids. So I packed them up early and went to the zoo. It was a beautiful day and the bickering was minimized by outdoor activity. I love the zoo for many reasons.

I finally got to see the new Asian Small Clawed Otter exhibit. It's been open since September. I just haven't been in a few months. It actually took us three passes past the exhibit before I saw otters frolicking, but it was worth the effort.

Its hard for the Dallas Zoo to compete with the Fort Worth Zoo (one of the top five in the Nation). The Dallas Zoo has changed its focus from trying to raise money to build huge exhibits like the Chimpanzee Forest, the tiger exhibit and the Gorrilla exhibit to opening a bunch of little exhibits that are very affordable like tamarinds, otters, saddlebilled storks and Bug University. They are hoping that the variety will be a big enough draw to keep people coming back.

Sunil and I... On our own

Sheela spent the night with Ronnie Sue. Sunil and I slept late, painted a shirt, went to the grocery store and ate frosted sugar cookies for a snack. It's not even 10:00 AM yet. Now we are off to make musical instruments at the Allen Public Library.

A Breath of Snow and Ashes

Santa Claus brought me Diane Gabaldon's new book, A Breath of Snow and Ashes. She is one of the three authors that I actually care enough about to anticipate their new book releases. I've been waiting for this book for about a year. The book actually came out back in October but as it's still in hardback and essentially a 1000 pages long I couldn't justify it as an impulse buy at the grocery store. I'm only a third of the way through it but I'm off from work for the next seven days. It shouldn't be a problem to finish this one. The problem comes in when I feel compelled to reread the previous five-1000 page novels.... I may be late getting back to work. Oh well, it will be a New Year with a new crop of vacation days, I'll work it out. I also get like this when Tom Clancy comes out with a new book and everytime J.K. Rowlings releases another of the Harry Potter books.

LimeWire

Dad showed me a program for downloading mp3s that I'm really enjoying. It's called LimeWire. So far I'm still using the free version but the Pro version is less than $20. I may choose to upgrade. I've downloaded roughly 25 songs since yesterday morning. I have pretty well exhausted my repertoire of song titles. I've never paid much attention to who sings what. I either like it when I hear it or I don't but I've never been one for buying and playing albums, tapes or CDs. I guess I'll have to start paying attention.

Merry Christmas everyone!

I hope that your holiday was as relaxing and enjoyable as ours. The kids slept agreeably late. The gift giving, receiving and opening was enough to feel blessed but not so much as to be overwhelming.

Dad finished protecting and leveling the mantle. It was reattached above the fireplace in time for me to hang the stockings (again). This time not a single item slid off and the color is perfect with the wood floor.

We spent the better part of the day preparing, cooking and eating a three course fondue feast. We started with a Swiss/mozzarella cheese fondue with French bread, apples and bagel bites for dipping. Then we took a little break. We moved on to both beef broth and hot oil fondues with beef, pork, broccoli, mushrooms, tomatoes and potatoes. Then we took another longer break before moving in to a very basic chocolate fondue with pears, apples, marshmallows and pound cake. We skipped dinner (but I did have a piece of pumpkin pie much later in the evening).

Christmas Eve

Eileen, Sheela and Ronnie are baking pumpkin pies. Sunil and Sid have been getting groceries to support our fondue feast. Dad and I have been taking it easy watching Speed TV and doing Suduko.

Pre-holiday work

Due to illnesses and co-workers vacation schedules I had to come in to work today. My vacation doesn't really start until Tuesday night. But so far I'm the only one in my department here today. There is a chance that one or two people might show but I don't expect them. Manufacturing is already gone for the week (they get Fridays off) and our documentation center is closed for a few days. There isn't much that I can really accomplish here today. So it's all about staying awake until lunch, eating with friends and then leaving early. Only three more hours until lunch.....

Sunil and Opa

Sunil got to spend time with Oma on Monday night while Opa and I took Sheela to Soccer. Sunil got to spend time last night with Opa while I relaxed in the other room and Oma cooked a delicious dinner. We left Sheela at Kids Club extra long so that she could finish watching the movie "The Polar Express". She actually got to see it twice yesterday once with her class and once at Kids Club. Sheela does get Oma and Opa all to herself today. She is off of school already but we sent Sunil to school again today. He will start his Winter Break tomorrow.

Micky-D's goes upscale

Believe it or not this is one of our local area McDonalds. Sunil and I stopped in for a bite on Sunday after Sheela's soccer game. The entire restaurant is decorated in hunter green (marble, paisley and plaid) and cherry wood. The lights are wall sconces and chandeliers. It was very elegant and more than a little bit strange.

The 'rents have arrived

I managed to get the house mostly spiffed up yesterday morning (well at least the first floor). Sid had already cleaned the game room and the bedrooms were looking relatively orderly, but I abandoned a bunch of junk in the upstairs hall in my hurry to clear the stairs.

Sunil received a clean bill of health from the doctor. He asked us to keep the nebulizer for another few days just in case but we aren't planning on any more treatments.

I arrived at the airport in plenty of time to pick up Dad and Eileen. I didn't have the actual flight number and it was a little bit tricky to find the right baggage claim. It all worked out in the end and we settled back in for a an afternoon of easy chatting. Then Dad and I took Sheela (and Claire) down to soccer practice. It was about 35 degrees and they practiced for nearly two hours. Dad and I went back home for homemade beef stew while they practiced. Coach Tim brought Sheela and Claire back.

Home Invasion - Round Two - Preparation?

OOOppppsss! We never actually cleaned up for Dad and Eileen's visit today. Their plane arrives in six hours and I still have to go to the grocery store, take Sunil to the doctor, take the computer in to get it fixed (more later on that), clean up some cat puke, sweep, mop, vacuum and dust. At least the bathrooms are already clean. Oh, and I stained the mantle last night in the entry way. Of course the stain leaked through the newspapers and there are red oak stains on the white tile. The mantle looks great, but we can't put it up until we add a few layers of protective coating.

Three-in-one tree

Our new tree is a beautiful three-in-one prelit tree. The three-in-one gets its name from it's ability to have either all white lights, all colored lights, or of course both white and colored lights. It's a great concept (not as great as having the lights permanently on the tree). Luckily for me I like ALL the lights to be on. The reason that I'm lucky is that the remote control included with the tree that controls the light settings was not correct. We had to send it back and have it replaced. The replacement just arrived and it is the same one that we were sending back. So our tree is really more of a one-in-one. She may get it right this next time or we may just always have to leave on all the lights.

A Christmas Carl.......

That was the name of Sunil's Holiday Play. It was very cute. The two-year olds sang a song (all wearing cute little red winter jammies). Then the three-year olds came up and sang four songs. The boys were dressed as Santa and the girls wore red velvet dresses with white fur trim and fur trimmed red boots. Next the four and five-year olds came up and sang as the chorus (all dressed as elves) during the play. The afterschoolers played the parts of Christmas Carl (the grumpiest elf ever), the ghost of Christmas Past, the ghost of Christmas Present, the ghost of Christmas Future and a host of other elves. It was much more elaborate than I had expected. The chorus sang at least six songs.

Here is a picture of a small portion of the elves. Sunil is in the middle of the bottom row.

Super Blue (98)

We were intending to watch Sheela's team play today but as it happens Sheela's name was added to the team's winter roster a few weeks back even before we'd started to attend the practices. At the last minute she found out that she could play. I didn't manage to get a picture of her in her new uniform yet (but there are three more games this session and she'll keep the same uniform for the Spring.) Her new number is 30, her old number was 3(so is Sunil's).

As an unrelated side note, all of the 5, 6, and 7 year-old girls' teams seem to have pink as their dominate color. We've crossed a line somewhere now they all seem to have royal blue. This was third game where Blue played Blue.

Churrascaria

Today my boss has arranged to take the department out for lunch. Instead of staying local we will venture outside of McKinney in search of a more elegant locale. Actually there are tons of really good restaurants here in McKinney now, probably 5x as many as there were five years ago when the office moved up here. But today we are heading back down toward Dallas to the dining mecca that is Addison, Texas. We are going to a churrascaria (Brazilian steakhouse) called Texas de Brazil. The servers dress in traditional gaucho (Brazilian cowboys) garb and bring the grilled meats around on skewers that resemble swords. The menu has only one real option, meat with salad bar. There are however dozens of different meats, each brought around continuously by the servers (rather like going for dim sum) and the salad bar is huge. This could take us a few hours.... I love my job.

Norbert is alive and well.

He lives with my friend Nancy and her other cat Sabrina. Sabrina and Norbert almost even like each other now.

Nebulizer

Here is a not-so-flattering picture of Sunil taking his breathing treatment. He was still pretty miserable last night, and even part of this morning. After his four hour nap however he perked right up and has been raring to go since 2:00PM. He will be back at school on Wednesday.

Strep Throat

Sunil has strep throat. He didn't start to complain about his throat hurting until this morning... though he did complain of pain in his back, his sides and his hips at varoius times. At least his fever seems to have broken. He has been given a prescription for antibiotics for the strep and a nebulizer to improve his breathing. He needs to check back in with the doctor in a week.

Ice Skating Party and More

Sheela's official birthday party was yesterday afternoon. Here is a picture of here skating with Tannah. We ended up with nine kids and nearly that many adults (most of whom were too chicken to skate - or who knew how badly cheap skates hurt). After ice skating we went to Sbarro for pizza and cake.

She received a lot of very nice gifts (including CDs and books -- yay!) but the biggest hit of all was seamonkeys. They have evolved beyond the little throw away brine shrimp of my childhood. Evolved is not really the word.... they have been genetically improved to be larger stronger and more exciting. But even better is the extra time and attention put in to their marketing campaign. Now available is a stunning array of seamonkey accessories including the aqualeash, a race track and a portable playpen for taking them for walks.

Sunil was unable to attend as he is still feeling puny. He is off to the doctor this morning. More on that later.

We managed to get the Christmas Tree set up and decorated. We bought a new tree this year, the lights are permanently attached to the tree. At first we gave Mom a hard time for not setting the tree up correctly. The remote control is supposed to turn off and on the white and colored lights independently -- instead it turns the lights on the bottom half of the tree off and does nothing to the top half. In the end we apologized, the remote control included in the package is the wrong one. We expect the replacement today.

Two years ago Mom made us a beautiful tree skirt. It has two cute little kids building a snowman, a bakery, a church, etc and a million pine trees each capped with sparkling snow. I don't have a picture of it at hand (but there will be one on her blog soon). The school house in the village scene was named DeGroot. That was the name of the school where Sheela, Sunil and Blake all went. This year Sheela asked Grammylyn to add another school to represent Anderson Elementary. So last night Mom added a whole extra building. I am pretty impressed!

Fever

Sunil is home for his third day in a row today. Wednesday he had a low grade fever which left him tired and cuddly. We spent a very enjoyable day reading, snuggling and napping. Thursday his fever was close to 104 until the Tylenol kicked in. When the fever drops he forgets he is sick and wants to run and play. This was made even more noticable as Sheela was home too. She wasn't sick but the schools were closed due to ice storms late Wednesday. The day was just not as relaxing with both of them bouncing off the walls and bouncing off of each other. Here is a picture of the kids showing off the artwork that they left outside a few days ago. It is covered with a solid sheet of ice.
Iwas supposed to have today (Friday) off from work but I escaped the house and went to back to work. Sunil I left at home with Mom and John. Luckily he seems to be back in the low grade fever mode and Sheela went back to school.

Happy Birthday Sheela!!!

My little girl is eight years old today! I can hardly believe it. We woke her up early with breakfast in bed today (a family tradition). She isn't home from school yet, but we have a small cake (and a dozen cupcakes) plus a big pile of gifts. The pile is big.... the gifts aren't really all that large or all that numerous. I just packed 'em in big gift bags.

In contrast to what I hope has been a really great day for her, Sunil woke up with a fever this morning and he and I spent the day laying around attempting to sleep. He was mellow enough for long enough to listen to me read a whole Junie B. Jones book to him. That's the first time he's been able to sit through a whole one at one sitting. I also managed to finish Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (again).

Let December Begin

December and May are always the two busiest months of the year. We've kicked off this December with a visit from the folks. Mom and John arrived on Thursday. We started off their visit with Sheela's Soccer team's end-of-season party at Double Dave's. This kept the kids out late, but was fun. The girls got trophies and large, pink, plastic fish (made out of an old 2-liter drink bottle). The fish were a gift from the coach to the girls.

Friday I took the day off to play with Mom and John. We actually changed out sink faucets and did some minor home repairs. The new faucets are really pretty. The old, yucky ones were originally gold but the gold had worn away. The new ones are chrome with gold accents.

We picked the kids up early and took the train downtown. Sid met us after work and we walked to a local Italian restaurant for dinner. For entertainment, the building next door had a minor fire in the elevator shaft scare. Five or six firetrucks and rescue vehicles responded to the scene. We were surrounded by flashing lights and sirens, but as the fire was already out, the response crew was very relaxed and friendly. Mom took some pictures of the kids and the crews.

Sid and I went out to a movie (Aeon Flux - skip it if you have the chance to see it) while Mom and John took the kids all over downtown to see the lights and decorations.

Saturday morning Jazmine and Farhana joined us at the hotel for breakfast and then we walked down for the parade. Here is Garfield dressed up as Santa Claus.

The weather was beautiful this year! It was nearly 80 degrees by the time the parade was over. We celebrated with a walk to the Farmer's Market for lunch and fresh produce. We couldn't get much as we had to cart it back on the train but we bought: Fuji apples, a pineapple and asparagus.

We took naps in the afternoon and then did some more home repairs. Sid and Sheela went out on a double date with Rick and Ericka. This year they weren't able to get tickets to the Daddy-Daughter Dance so they went to dinner and a movie instead.

Sunday morning Sheela, Sunil and I drove to The Colony (that's a town) to watch her new academy soccer team play a game. The girls lost but it was a good game and the indoor field was very nice. Sheela went home with her friend Analeise. The rest of us napped. Sheela came home and took a six hour nap. Normally we spend the Sunday after the parade decorating the house for Christmas. This year we've ordered a new tree which hasn't come yet. We delayed all of the decorating until it arrives.

Monday I packed the kids off to school and vegged at home. I finished doing some laundry and read another book. The kids came home early to bake a chocolate pie with Grammylyn. The crust was made from scratch and was delicious. The filling was made from instant Jello Pudding and would have been great except I added peppermint extract. Apparently the dregs of the extract bottle are quite concentrated. The whole pie tasted like chocolate toothpaste. Then Sheela and I went to soccer practice. The practices are outdoor even though the current season is indoor. It was about 30 degrees and miserable for those of us watching. I managed to get two of the Moms to at least walk with me to keep warm.

I'm back at work today trying to catch up. Mom and John are off to visit other friends for a few days. We have two nights with no commitments before we start it all again.

Sometimes I just need a little perspective.....

Last night while attempting to drift gently off to asleep I was beset by a coughing fit. I coughed long enough and hard enough to make myself throw up...repeatedly. Not my best night. I finally settled back down and tried to sleep... of course by then I was no longer in a gentle drifting off mode. So I went back to reading for awhile. I settled in again and just when I could feel myself sliding under Sunil started to cough. By this time, I fell like the whole world is set against me. I'm sick. I'm exhausted. All I want is a little bit of sleep. Is that so much to ask? Sunil coughs harder.... and harder..... and crying..... and coughing... and crying some more. This is ridiculous.

I get out of bed to go give him some cough medicine. I don't want him throwing up, that would really ruin MY night. He takes the medicine but is coughing too hard to tell me what is wrong. I go get him some more water to see if that will help settle him down. When I come back up he is completely hysterical.

A little bit of background here, Sunil sucks his thumbs at night while he is sleeping. Normally this is okay but weith the cooler weather comes drier air and the thumb sucking leads to painfully chapped thumbs and open wounds. Earlier we noticed that his thumbs were looking bad and needed a night to heal. We covered his hands with socks (held on with tape) to keep them out of his mouth. We've done this maybe five times over the last year, it doesn't seem to interfer with his ability to sleep and it makes a big difference in how his thumbs look the next day.

Back to my hystericaly crying/coughing boy. With his hands wrapped up he couldn't get his covers unwrapped from around himself and he didn't feel like could climb out of his loft and all he really wanted was to go to the bathroom. The poor kid coughed himself in to wetting the bed years after he doesn't do that anymore. Suddenly, a little bit of throwing up in the bathroom didn't seem so bad.