My Favorite Thing . . . Right Now

Of course my children are my all-time favorite things, but at this time of year, my favorite thing happens to be the oranges in their mouths. Not just any oranges, navel oranges from Mesa, Arizona. For my Christmas gift I ordered an entire box of them, and when they arrived late in the evening on Christmas Eve I literally whooped for joy and threw myself into my husband's arms.

When I am "home" in Mesa for Christmas, these oranges are synonymous with family, peace and security. Who knew you could feel so much by eating citrus? My other favorite thing is sleeping with the windows open in the early spring and smelling the orange blossoms!! That is my heaven!

Unfortunately, they also turn me into a bad mother. I wait until the kids go to bed and then eat myself silly, just so I don't have to share. Jacob goes ga-ga over them--he has found their magic already!

Snow!?!

I may be changing my mind about snow! For the last several years I have hated it--and I mean HATED it! I don't ski, or sled, or anything requiring snow. Every morning from November to March (or April) I would look outside my window with my heart pounding--would there be snow, how deep would it be, how are the roads?? Every morning I felt like I was taking my life in my hands as I drove across the valley to teach. Never was school delayed or canceled--NEVER. Nothing ever slowed down, it was business as usual regardless of how much it snowed. The snow may have been a contributing factor as to why we moved here--maybe, O.K, perhaps it was a BIG reason I was willing to move somewhere warmer.

There is no snow in Texas, everyone knows that! And then on Christmas Eve it began to snow and actually stick--the kids thought it was a Christmas miracle, but I was just glad I didn't have to drive anywhere. The snow only stayed on the ground 12 hours and then disappeared--which I liked. The news talked about people staying home from work, appointments, etc.--which I also liked. I realized that I liked the way Texans dealt with snow--with a healthy fear and knowing that most things aren't worth driving through the snow for.

If this keeps up, I may just learn to like snow again!

Happy New Years!!

Is it breakfast? Is it dessert? We aren't quite sure, but after seeing a T.V. show with their own version of chocolate chip pancake sundaes we knew we had to try them for our first meal of 2010. Josh's eyes glazed over as he saw chocolate chips added to pancakes, vanilla ice cream scooped on top and covered with whipped cream, drizzled with chocolate sauce and sprinkled with strawberries and bananas (it was breakfast after all). I guess we'll have to wait to start our New Year's Resolutions tomorrow . . .

We Are Texans Now--I Think!

We are starting to feel settled now, and I will try to post more pictures and comments than I have been doing over the last two months. This shows our family entering Texas, Jacob was asleep in the car, Elle had just slipped in mud and was covered (thus the embarrassed pose) and Josh just along for the ride. We started this new adventure with a lot of laughter as we crossed state lines!

We're Moving . . .finally

After months of waiting, sometimes patiently, we are moving to Texas! This has been the driving force behind finally starting a blog. I've been intimidated and nervous and I have major writer's block--but now that I have made the first step, I hope it will get easier. I've started just in time to stop, at least until we make the move and unpack and then I'll start again--hopefully it won't take me as long as it did to begin in the first place.