2011 in review

I rarely write based on prompts. Maybe I should do it more, maybe I should keep finding an excuse not to do them. However, I wanted to come up with a review of my year of sorts, maybe shed some light on a few posts that were ignored or maybe you missed just because you were busy like me.

Sooooooo, when I saw Mama Kat’s latest prompts I decided to dive in. In case you get bored between now and 2012 why not take a look at my favorite posts from the last year?

January I’m 30 today. It’s the first time I talk about Kona (and my 2nd trip there) and well before I meet all my fellow Austin bloggers.

February – It turns out that I absolutely can not pick one. We can’t forget my SITS day because it was when we announced we were having another sweet baby boy. Then there was also the post about my amazing husband; after reading about a women venting here and a woman venting there I decided that the internet need more posts about how we LOVE the man that provides for us and allows us to stay home and blog. (I mean stay home and take care of the kids)

There was also one about my sister, who I miss dearly.

March- I couldn’t decide what to share. There wasn’t much “good” stuff. Hmmm, I mean there was but not like February. I picked this one. It’s a cheap trick and I don’t care if you like it or not…. I’m just throwing it out there.

April - Oh, boy. April was another good month. I need to learn how to space my stuff out better. I had my feature with Scary Mommy. That was a tough post to write but I learned a lot about myself and the words just flowed. It’s a great post if I do say so myself.

As I go through April, I realize there is much I would like to share again, so I’ll just let you look at everything if you feel so inclined.

Yes, I know I promised a “how do you do it” series that I never even touched. It’ll come. I think.

 May –  Maybe this recap thing wasn’t a good idea, or maybe it was just what I needed. I’ve been thinking to myself that my traffic is fairly low, so I must not have that many “good” posts. However, I now realize I do. I have amazing posts. I love how I’m documenting MY FAMILY on my blog. It’s for me. It’s not for you. Sure, I share it with you, but I’m not changing to keep you or to bring more of you in. I’ll be grateful if I do, I’d be lying if I said having readers and comments wasn’t exciting. The bottom line is, it’s not why I do this. May was another good month. Check it out.

I do this because of my boys. This past May my baby turned 3.

June – This was an exciting month because that baby became a BIG BROTHER. It was a fun month because I was honored to be a maternity model at a photograhy workshop and a sad month because it marked 6 years since I lost my Daddy. I also talked about my husband, again. You can find those posts here.

July – I didn’t post much in July. I wanted to focus on my sweet new baby, but I did have guest posters help me out. I’d love it if you would check them out.

 

August – I had more guest posts, another photography session, my baby started first grade and I spoke of struggle and voiced my opnion. Loud and clear. Wanna see?

September – I thought September was a “Calm” month until I looked at the posts. It was another sad month, as it marked 2 years since Cancer stole my mother-in-law. It was a fun month because my biggest baby had his first spelling test (which he aced) and joined cub scouts (where I promptly became a den leader while my husband was away on his first business trip to NEW YORK) and he knocked out a tooth at his “girlfriend”‘s birthday party.

It was a history making month for Texas. My state burned. A lot.

It was also a month of reflection. My “anniversary” is in September and this year marked 12 years since my injury.

October – I had the chance to preview an Extreme Makeover episode before it aired, I posted the final maternity photo session, I had a slight panic attack after being up close and personal with a star flight helicopter and I reflected on my pregnancy with Nathan and how it almost wasn’t. I also gave a cool recipe storage tip. Wanna see all of them?

November – This month was a bit calm, but not entirely. I talked about meeting Brooke and Laurie. This is a must. If you don’t read any other post, read this one. I talked about my struggles with my oldest and Lucas having his first sleepover away. There were also a couple of old papers I wrote when I went to Coastal Bend College.

You can read everything if you want.

December – December came far too quickly. This was a fast year. I hate that. Every year gets faster. Bleh. My little baby ate his first solids, I was stranded in a bathroom, my biggest baby turned 7, I celebrated 9 years of marriage and had an amazing dinner out. I’ll make you work for the rest. :)  but if you have any guesses as to where I was when I had my bathroom mishap, feel free to shout it out.

So I guess I really didn’t follow the rules, but I loved writing this post. It cleared things up for me. I love blogging for me and my family and I love the friends I’ve made along the way. I’ll probably never make money doing this, but that’s ok. It’s not my goal. I enjoy the SWAG I get when I go somewhere like the Beef Council event and I love writing reviews that are unprompted by businesses and friends I love. I don’t see myself writing many (if any) sponsored posts unless it’s already a company I believe in and would have written for anyways (more coming on that next year). I WILL continue to make friends through social media and to spread my word. I’m paralyzed but I’m still a mom. I still do everything you do, I just do it sitting down. If I can do it, so can you.

Rule or no rules, you can play too. Mama Kat and I would love to see some of your posts from the last year.

sleepless nights and potty training

The last week my husband has been home. It’s been great. I’ve loved almost  every minute of it.

This week has also been quite exhausting. My sweet tiny boy isn’t really sleeping. I think he’s teething. Maybe he just has allergies.

Look at this sad little face. You can tell he doesn’t feel well.

sweet boy

I want to think it’s teeth. The orajel seems to make it better. We’ve been so fortunate to have little ones that usually sleep well and this is just dragging on a bit longer than I remember. I am sure it’s probably quite similar to how it was the other two times. Hopefully the new year brings new teeth.

Potty training. No, we are not potty training Nathan. Yet. We are still working on Lucas. He’s close. He’s doing great. He’s not there yet. He’s wearing underwear at home. NO PANTS. Pants seem to backfire and we have accidents. Pooping is totally hit or miss. He’s even run to get a pull up and pooped in it. He doesn’t want to ruin his underwear but he doesn’t want to poop in the potty either.

We even made this:

Poopy Treasure Box (ignore that it's a BAG instead)

 (made with long discontinued Laura Bansiak digital scrap goodies)

It’s starting to work. We just need to be consistent and loving. I am pretty sure Will was on of those rare overnight kids that trained instantly. Lucas is not. That’s ok. Lucas has more patience overall with life so I shouldn’t be complaining. I’ll keep you posted. I’m sure you are eager to know the continued success (and failures) of my son’s pooping matters.

Connect with me

Just a quick note!!

I’ve been informed that Google Friend Connect is going away. It appears that this is how several of you may follow me. If you do, would you please consider follow me via RSS instead? Or get my updates in your inbox, which you can do on the side ———> ?

 

 

vacations and breaks

Will is out of school until January 4th and Charlie is off from work until January 3rd. We will have a lot of time to “just be”. It should be nice. I hope. I hope we all still like each other by the end. We’ve never spent that much time, day in and day out together. Well, I have with the little boys but not with daddy, not even before we had kids.

I’m really looking forward to it.

We also took an official break from Tae Kwon Do. Will’s heart is just not in it right now. Charlie and Will are both only about a year away from being black belts so they are not quitting. Our Tae Kwon Do family has been instructed to pester us and annoy us and not let us forget that once school is out we should be BACK on the mat.

Will and Nathan had well checks. I can’t believe my biggest baby is 7 and that my littlest is 6 months. How is he 1/2 of a year? How?

Will is staying steady in the 75 percentile for height and weight. I’m assuming considering how thin he is the weight is directly related to the height …

Nathan has moved up a bit. He was hanging out in the 5th percentile and he jumped into the 25th.

I’ll be “around”, but my social media presence won’t be as strong. :)

Kona Grill amazes me

My kids love Scooby Doo. They are obsessed. Lucas more than Will, but that doesn’t matter. We have around 15 Scooby Doo movies on our Tivo.

One of the many is called Aloha, Scooby Doo. It’s about a little Hawaiian Island that they think is haunted and it, as expected, turns out to just be one of the natives.

Scooby Movie screen on my tivo. exciting stuff.

There is a little lady, I think she’s a witch doctor, or she thinks she is, I can’t remember, that makes a mean macadamia nut pie. Well, I assumed it was good. It made Shaggy’s mouth water and convinced Scooby to lure the bad guy, so it had to be good.

I like to bake. Really. I do. I had no desire to seek out the recipe for Macadamia Nut Pie. I just didn’t have it in me.

Well, because I’m an all time Konavore, I get Kona Grill emails. You should sign up. They will feed you on your birthday. Seriously.

No I do not get a kick back if you sign up. I just think you should. You get free food.

Anyways, back to the emails. A few weeks back I get an email that talks about a new temporary menu. They call it Bliss.

Seriously. They call it the The Bliss Menu.

Yes, I used the word Bliss in my 9 year anniversary instagram picture and I’m just now realizing how perfectly fitting this is.

Back the the pie.

Macadamia nut pie is on the BLISS MENU!!

I immediately tweet out that I would totally be willing to review the pie (which was aaaaaaaaahmazing) if I could try it for free.

A few emails and tweets here and there and I’m told to email Scott at my local restaurant and he’ll hook me up.

I email Scott, tell him I have reservations for 6 on my anniversary and we’d love to try the pie. Done.

I email him back and ask him if they have champagne, but he doesn’t see it before we arrive. No biggie. If they do, they do; if they don’t, they don’t.

Traffic and parking sucks so we end up running just a little late but as soon as I roll in I am greeted with the Kona smile and directed to a table.

I wish I had gotten a picture of the entire table. It was lovely.

There was already a chair removed just for me, they had a beautiful display of pink roses, 2 champagne glasses, and an awesome card signed by the staff.

While I didn’t capture the entire table, I do have this picture of the flowers.

Pink roses given to us by the staff at Kona Grill in Austin

Our server, Christie, approaches and our lovely evening begins. I won’t bore you with all the details but we are treated to champagne and Scott’s personal favorite sushi roll. It’s not on their menu, but I was instantly blown away. It was probably the 4th or 5th roll I tried and the only one I’ve loved. I can’t wait to have it again.

I was also shocked when Christie asked if I wanted one of my favorites. I usually order their sweet and spicy shrimp AND the tomato bisque soup. When I didn’t order the soup, Christie asked if I would be having that as well. She remembered!! Now that is service!

I know the beginning of this post was all about the pie, but as I continued to write and think I realized it was much more. It was about the power of social media. It was about the connections that can be made between managers and customers. It’s an amazing thing.

Anyways. Pie. We were almost to full to try the pie, but we were not disappointed. It was a very generous serving and we even had some leftover for the kids to try!

They loved it to.

I forgot to take a picture of the pie, but it was definitely deserving of being on the “bliss” menu.

 

This post was 100% my opinion. The only “compensation” I received was a lovely night out at Kona Grill. I did receive flowers, champagne and one sushi roll COMPLETELY free but it was nothing more than kindness of the manager. I wrote this post because I truly love good service and appreciated the effort to give us a lovely anniversary night and good service deserves to be talked about!

 

 

Roial bar austin

In 12 years, I’ve run into my share of accessibility issues. It’s usually because a where I was going was in a historical old house or hadn’t been remodeled in over 25 years. I get it, a ramp could destroy the beauty. If it’s somewhere we MUST be, we can work around it, no biggie. I married a strong, willing man, so he helps me out.

Last night I went to a fairly new bar on 5th street. It was beautiful. They consider theirselves “green”. They have an amazing rooftop deck where all the real action takes place. They have a live band and more than half the space is up there.

I didn’t get to see the rooftop deck. I just heard about it.

Why did I not see it? There was NO elevator.

Yes, my husband could have carried me up, but I was wearing a skirt. I didn’t want to be a Britney and flash all my husbands co-workers.

They forgot that teeny tiny detail when they designed this elaborate club.

I’m pretty sure that’s illegal.

I guess there is a chance it’s not illegal because the first floor was very accessible with a lovely ramp to the bathroom.

The reviews on this place were poor to begin with. It seems they pick and choose who can and can’t come in.

They could had a good thing going, but they failed in so many ways.

I think our local news station even covered how they were cheating their employees out of money.

I don’t see myself ever going back. I don’t see this club sticking around. I agree with other reviewers.

Roial bar is a major fail.

I rarely write accessibility reviews because it’s rarely an issue. The majority of bars and places don’t forget that detail.

Bathroom misadventures

So, for the last 12 years I have entered bathrooms with caution.

What if my brakes fail?

What if the toilet moves on me?

What if my chair slides while transferring?

What if?

What if?

Well, it’s always been a SILLY what if. It’s never happened. It was never GOING to happen.

Well.

It finally did.

We were at a very well known Austin original. I will not name names…THIS time, but if it happens again (I plan to go back JUST to test this)you can bet your bottom dollar I will tell you exactly where on Barton Springs Road they are.

This is a hint. If you live in Austin you may be able to guess where I was.

 

We finished our meal and I had a huge glass of water, so, well.. you know.

I had to pee.

I think.

I assume I did, so I went anyways.

I enter the bathroom and “what if” enters my head. I lock the deadbolt that is the only lock.

I almost leave my phone on the little ledge but WHAT IF WHAT IF WHAT IF keeps playing in my head.

I put my phone in my purse, instead. My purse is on the back of chair, so I should be able to get to it.

I transfer and my chair scoots. Just a little.

I finish up and get ready to scoot back into my chair and I can’t. It moves. I try it another way. It still moves.

Well, crap.

I try something else and NADA. I’m stuck.

I call my husband and he doesn’t answer.

I call him again and it goes to voicemail.

He beeps in. I answer.

I tell him I’m stuck and nothing I try works.

I even tried putting my wallet behind the wheels. It slid the other way.

I hear him outside the door. He told Will to stand there and keep Lucas out of the way (or something like that).

He says there is no way to unlock from the outside that he can see.

Well, at this point they are going to have to break down the door or call the fire department because I was either going to be stuck on the toilet or on the floor.

He realizes he can jimmy his key in the little hole and turn it. Sorta.

The little old lady waiting informs him that there is someone in there.

He knows. It’s his wife and she’s in trouble.

Jimmy a little more. Key breaks but he opens it.

He holds my chair and I get in in.

He realizes how slippery the floor is too. He doesn’t fall but he holds the sink and slides on purpose to test it. Its’ REALLY slippery.

Safe.

I come out.

Where’s the baby?

Oh, crap.

He left him at our table.

Our waitress was waiting.

At first she thought we forgot him but the hostess said he was helping me.

We talk to a manager and she says she’s so sorry and she will have someone clean it.

We tell her it’s actually VERY clean, just slippery.

She’ll have them clean it anyways.

She will have HER boss call me and she hopes we have a great day.

S/He hasn’t.

It’s been over a week.

He’s Seven

My first baby is 7 today!! How is that possible?

 

Here is his first picture, ever!

 

William in 2004

 

and here he is today.

William today - Heavenly Peach Photography

 

He’s come a LONG way from that day.

He’s now a very smart 1st grader and loves reading.

He wants every Titanic book he can get his hands one.

He loves legos and playing.

He adores his baby brother and tries to tolerate his other little brother.

He’s hard headed and far too stubborn for his own good, but he can be the sweetest, most sensitive little boy ever, all in the same day.

Here is a letter i wrote after he turned one but  regretfully didn’t finish:

 

February 21, 2006

 

Dear William

 

It’s February and you are just over one year old and such an amazing little boy! I read on a website that I should write you a letter every year on your birthday and I think that it is a fabulous idea. So here is letter one, just a couple of months late!

 

The last year of my life has been one of the best in my life. It’s had it’s sad moments, but what year doesn’t? No matter how much I miss your Big Grandpa I am eternally grateful he had the chance to meet you and give you lots of love.

 

You grew especially close you’re your girlfriend-sister-cousins (Brittany was your favorite, but she also took you from the other girls more).

9 years

It’s been NINE years since we said “I DO”. Have you ever read our “Wedding Story” ?  Well, why not? :)

It’s been a quick nine years.

It’s been an AMAZING nine years.

It’s been a fun nine years.

We’ve had 3 children in nine years.

We’ve lost 2 parents in nine years. (one each)

We’ve lived in 3 different places in nine years.

Between the 2 of us we have driven 6 different cars in nine years (Miata, Xterra, G20, Sentra, Quest, & M3).

Charlie has worked at 3 different places in nine years.

 

Here we were NINE years ago.

2002

and ….

Here we are today. (well a few weeks ago)

 

Necklace winner

 

That’s Amanda from Keep It Complicated!

 

 

Amanda, I know where to find you. ;)

I’m happy that so many of my friends helped me share this amazing story and are helping me ease Laurie into the blogging community so she can spread her mission to encourage parents to strap furniture.

Thank you!

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