Project 365 Week 4

19/365

A much anticipated order from Barnes and Noble arrived today courtesy of gift cards recieved for Christmas. Can you guess which books belong to which kid? Today was Martin Luther King day and no school. We went bowling with some friends...Kellers and Harpers. A fun day but looking forward to school tomorrow!

20/365

Inauguration day. Wow. Only time will tell how he will be as president, but I'm happy that I witnessed this day. From TV Guide to the Wall Street Journal, we've got the story covered!

21/365

One sick kid, one kid trying hard to be sick so he can miss school (doesn't he look pathetic?), and one kid whose birthday is this week so there's no way she's getting sick!

22/365

The pinewood derby weigh-in is tonight. It looks pretty sleek and fast doesn't it??

23/365

Pinewood Derby night and the third time's the charm! Jackson's car made it to the finals. Out of about 50 cars racing, 16 made it to the finals. It must have been all that skin super glued to the car that made the difference. :-)

24/365

Happy 6th Birthday, Jensen! Today was her actual birthday and her party as well. 20+ kids at a pottery painting party at the Mudpie. Too much fun!

25/365

Jensen is starting to read to us at bedtime now. It's so great to see her reading skills growing by leaps and bounds.

Project 365 Week 3

My goal is to get these posted every Monday. I even put it on my calendar! Didn't quite happen this week but I blame that on MLK. Hopefully next week will be on time. In the meantime, enjoy the little snippets of our life last week.

12/365

Taking a look at the full moon through the cool new telescope the kids got for Christmas from Uncle Tom and Aunt Cindi.

13/365

This pile represents 3 years of change collecting (by Jim), one industrial strength digital coin sorter received as a Christmas present from the kids so they wouldn't have to roll the change, two hours of actual change sorting, and, voila! $600 dollars in the bank!

14/365

Almost done.

15/365

A bathtime photo and the countdown begins...

16/365

Jackson has decided to give lacrosse a try.
$275 for the registration fee.
$170 for the equiptment...so far.
3 hours of practice every Saturday.
I hope he likes it.

17/365

Coach Drew giving the boys a piece of his mind. They suffered their first defeat. It came on the last play of the game. Definitely a bummer.

18/365

It might not look like much now, but come Friday it'll be a lean, mean Pinewood Derby running machine.

Project 365 - Week 2

5/365

Monday was the day we left Michigan to return to Houston. We always get a final picture of Jean with the kids right before we leave.

6/365

It was back to school today after two weeks off. Everyone was tired since our flight didn't get in until about 9:00 the night before. Jordan brought home a boat load of homework.

7/365

Practicing the violin should be a daily occurrence. She tries, but doesn't get to it every day.

8/365

Finally getting around to taking down all the Christmas stuff!

9/365

Friday, Jim and Jensen left for her first Adventure Princesses campout at Camp Cullen. Jordan and I had a get-together to go to at Kim Harper's. Barb and Ellie Hyler were visiting from Chicago so Kim got all the moms and daughters together at her house. Jordan has known these girls since she was three! They are now 11 and looking so grown up. In the picture are Jordan, Sydney, Ellie, Haley and Sophie. Jackson got to spend the night at Matthew Wemyss' with Ethan Harper so he was happy.

10/365

Saturday night all the moms and daughters came to our house for make-your-own pizzas. I had meant to get a photo of all 5 moms to go with the photo of the girls, but totally forgot. I had taken a picture of the full moon earlier in the evening so I guess that will have to be my photo for this day.

11/365

Since Jim and Jensen were still on their campout, Jordan and Jackson both wanted to sleep in the bed with me. We were all so tired after two nights being up late with friends. It was great to sleep in and not have to go anywere!

Project 365

Starting with January 1st, I embarked on a year-long scrapbook project where I plan to take a photo a day, write a little bit about it, and stick it in a photo sleeve in an album. The goal is at the end of the year, I'll have a pretty good representation of our day-to-day lives around here.

Once per week I'm going to aim to post the photos and notes for the week. I'm sure I'll get behind, skip weeks altogther, etc. but hopefully it'll all add up to something pretty cool in the end.

Here's week 1

1/365

On January 1st we were in Michigan having just arrived 2 days before. It snowed the night before and Jim was out early clearing off the driveway. This is his once yearly ritual. He puts on his dad's old hunting jacket, his mom's gloves, and his not-made-for-snow boots and gets to work.

2/365

January 2nd was the Fuja family holiday gathering. There 20 of us for dinner! My sister was also in town from North Carolina and came to the Fuja's as well. It was great to spend a couple of days with her.

3/365

On January 3rd, Jordan and I met my sister and some extended family (Loralee Johnson, her daughters Christa and Michelle and grand-daughter, Hunter) for lunch at Somerset Collection mall. I was bummed that I had not brought my camera. It was great to see all of them for the first time in several years. On the way out, Jordan and I bought a couple of these yummy gourmet carmel apples. I took a picture of them once we got back to Jean's.

4/365

The snow softened up enough to make snowmen! This one looks much better than the puny, little one we were able to make in Kingwood.

Since this was just a partial week, that's it for this post. Here's to a great 365!

December '08 part 2

December 18

Jensen and I were invited to a Mother/Daughter cookie exchange. I was struck by how lady-like she looked sitting there eating her snack. It didn't last long before she was up and running wild with the other girls.

December 19


This was the last day of school before winter break and it was class party day. Jordan had a half day at Riverwood so she came up to Shadow Forest with me. She spent a little time at Jensen's party then roamed the school with other Shadow Forest alums...saying hi to former teachers and generally basking in the glory of being middle schoolers.

December 21



The treat for today in the kids' advent calendar was to go ice skating in The Woodlands. They all did awesome! Jensen looks like she's about to fall in the photo but she really did an amazing job! I was impressed with how gung ho and fearless she was although I shouldn't have been. She approached ice skating just like she does roller skating in the drive way...all caution to the wind!

December 22


The kids and I were invited to another cookie exchange at Heather's. It was a blast as usual. I brought those peppermint cookies. Very cute, but very labor intensive. Probably won't make those again. Came home with enough cookies to give to several neighbors plus mail carrier.

December 24

Not sure why I took this picture. Jordan got these converse tennis shoes as an early Christmas present. They arrived a day or so before and she couldn't wait to wear them!

We had a nice, quiet Christmas eve. We had make-your-own pizzas for dinner for the second year in a row and tried to get everyone to bed early. Jim and I made it to bed around midnight only to be woken up at 5:45 a.m. ...

December 25






Merry Christmas!

December 26

Date Night # ? I'm not sure of the number but it's close to 25. We went to Vic & Anthony's steak house downtown. Also celebrated anniversary #18. Delicious meal and a fun night! A great end to a memorable Year of 25 Dates.

December 28

Scrapbook room nearing completion.

December 29

Getting packed up for our trip to Michigan tomorrow.

December 30


Jackson and I enjoying our seats in first class.

December 31
No pictures today but we had a nice new year's eve in Durand with Jean and the kids. Jackson and Jordan made it up 'til past midnight. Jensen tried but fell asleep around 11:00. Shhh...don't tell her. Happy New Year!

December '08

Last year (and by "last year" I mean '07) I gave myself a challenge to post every day during the month of December. I didn't post quite every day, but close, and I really enjoyed looking back over the month.

This year, I didn't do quite as good a job. I did manage to take pictures quite a few of the days but I didn't post even one entry during the month of December '08. I thought I'd get caught up now, on January 4th, with a review of December. As I looked back over my posts from last December, it's pretty funny, how many things happened exactly the same this December. That's both comforting, and a little disturbing.

December 1

I took this photo to illustrate that I still had my fall decorations up on December 1st. Thanksgiving was late this year, November 27th. December 1st was just the Monday after Thanksgiving...and I'm not ready to put up Christmas decorations until after Thanksgiving.

December 3

Wednesday I made a trip out to Ikea for the last of the things needed to finish up the cabinets in my scrapbook room. I can't wait to start out '09 in a newly organized scrapbook studio!

December 4

I had to take Jackson to Kingwood Medical Center for an x-ray on his foot. He had hurt it the week before and it was still bothering him. We thought we should have it looked at to rule out a fracture. It turned out not to be broken.

While we were at the hospital, we happened upon this display of Christmas trees in the lobby. I think they were going to be auctioned off to raise money. They were decorated in all different themes and there were some really cool ones.

December 6

Jordan had a community orchestra concert at a local church to play a few Christmas songs during an exhibit of nativity scenes the church has and opens to the public. They had over 400 different nativities from around the world. Certainly not something I had ever seen before.

December 7

This Sunday was our neighborhood "Santa Stroll." Santa arrived in Riverchase on a fire engine and drove around the neighborhood before heading to our pool house to receive visitors. We took Jackson and Jensen but Jordan opted to stay home. She had been at a sleepover the night before and had just gotten home and was a little tired, to say the least. Jackson asked for a cell phone (!) and Jensen asked for "American Girl doll stuff."

December 8

Finally got the tree up and started decorating.

December 10

Jordan's second orchestra concert of the year. In addition to the 6th grade beginner orchestra, we also got to see the intermediate and advanced orchestras. Gave us a little hope for the future. :-) Although, I have to say, the beginners have improved a ton just in the month or so since their first concert.

December 11



Snow! In Houston! And not just flurries...actual accumulation. What a fun night!

December 14

Another season of flag football has started.

December 15



An outing on the Polar Express! This was an Adventure Princess outing but the whole family went along. It was great, and would have been really great if we had lived about two hours closer to the place. It took us 3 solid hours to get to Rusk, TX to board the train. The ride was just over an hour and we drove 3 solid hours home. Even though it was short, they did an awesome job. The train steamed into the station just like it does in the movie in front of the boy's house. There were waiters on board that served hot chocolate and danced in the aisles. We rode to the "north pole" where Santa boarded the train and handed out bells to each child that still believed. A conductor crazily punched our tickets for the return journey. And we sang Christmas songs on the way back. It was fun and memorable but a very long drive...




Two weeks down and two more to go. But the rest will have to wait until I can get the remaining photos downloaded from my camera.