Tummy Tingles and Police Chases

So here we are at Surfside for our annual Labor Day Weekend at the Beach. We look forward to this every year and somehow, every year, it sneaks up on us.

The good news is that we've been doing this so long that we have it down to a science. We keep the menu pretty much the same each year. We have our packing list in a spreadsheet that gets updated with what we learn each year. The same spreadsheet keeps an outline of the menu and the grocery list. So, a few days before it's time to go, we pull up the spreadsheet, make a few more tweaks and, voila, we're ready to start getting ready. And this year, we did make more than the usual tweaks to the menu, but we left the important parts alone.

First, what's different about this year is that there is no hurricane or tropical storm in the Gulf that we need to worry about. Of course, the forecast for the weekend did call for isolated thunderstorms. So far, we have made it through two days without rain.

Oh, and that's a second thing that is different...we shifted our weekend to start on Thursday evening instead of coming down on Friday. Last year, we stayed over until Tuesday but found that Monday was a very crowded day at the beach. So we decided to try and let Friday be our extra day. And it has turned out well. We practically had the entire beach to ourselves. The only downside was that the ice cream truck didn't come by.

The first tweak to the menu occurred for our very first meal. Since Leslie was recently given a fritata pan as a gift, she decided to actually make a fritata with it. It was received with a chorus of yums and there were no leftovers. It was made with ham, mozzarella and cilantro.


Afterwards, we headed down to the beach and hung out all day. As I mentioned, there were few people there. The weather was perfect...not too hot and not too cool. The water was calm, clear and warm. We enjoyed swimming, playing in the sand and playing ladder ball. Aunt Nada thought she might even dip her toe in the water (but she never did).

For dinner, we had one of our beach staples...one that probably will never change. It was Nada's night to cook and we had the yummy chicken pockets, macaroni and cheese, and salad. Every bite was more delicious than the one before.

After dinner, we wrapped up the evening with a good game of Jokers and Pegs. We played teams of Henry and Mama, and Nada and Leslie. Whooo Hooo, Henry and Mama won!

We woke this morning and Nada was up again with cooking duties. She made crepes that we smeared with nutella and stuffed fresh strawberries. Yum Yum!

From that point, our day at the beach was pretty much a repeat of yesterday...fun in the sun and sand. The only difference was that the ice cream truck was running today. Yippee.

Tonight was my turn to cook. Again, it was one of our standard meals that was born on our first weekend at Surfside many years ago: bratwurst, corn on the cob, and baked potatoes. Nada says I need to mention here that my meal was delicious. (I thought that went without saying!)

Tonight, we are planning on playing a round of farkle. I wonder who will win. Probably Henry.

And, I almost posted this without explaining the title. When Henry and I go out deep in the water and ride the waves, he tells me that it makes his tummy tingle...like roller coasters. I thought that was so cute.

And we witnessed a police chase as we sat at the beach. It was an unlikely suspect, though. Someone's donut floatie had gotten away from them and was rolling down the beach. It rolled past the patrolling police car. We laughed as we watched the police man maneuver his patrol car to cut off the runaway floatie. He missed the first time and took another stab at it and was able to head it off at the pass. We were waiting for the helicopters to show up for live coverage.

Wordless Wednesday

Beach pictures

Things have been a bit hectic, so I haven't had a chance to blog for the last few days. But I did get our beach pictures put together into a scrapblog. Enjoy....

I sneaked on you

We are home from the beach. Arriving home is always bittersweet. We LOVE our time at the beach, and we LOVE coming home. So we're sad that our fun is over, but glad to get back to our lives.

Last night was capped off by four rounds of Uno. I seem to be the only "loser" of the weekend. Leslie won three rounds, Nada won one. Add Henry's Sorry win and Nada's Sorry win, and I got nothin'. But great sportsmanship abounded, so Henry went to bed watching Nick at Nite or Noggin or some kid's programming channel. We finished watching Emma, that we had started two nights earlier and called it a night, ourselves.

When I woke this morning, Henry proudly announced to me that he had a loose tooth. Now, this has been his heart's desire for quite some time...ever since watching the episode of Arthur where Arthur has a loose tooth. He asked me when he would get a loose tooth and I told him after he was five. Well, the day he turned five, he started looking for his loose tooth. And today, he found it. It is one in the center bottom, on the left (looking at him). He had to talk to both Nana and Papa tonight to share the news with them. Papa's hoping it holds out until he arrives next week.

This morning, as anticipated, we enjoyed crepes with nutella and fresh strawberries. They were tasty. Even Henry ate one for the first time, although he insisted on "no chocolate".

Then we started on the hustle and bustle of cleaning and packing. Between loads of linen laundry, we headed down to the beach for a photo shoot. Henry was most cooperative even in the face of biting flies that we were all swatting at.

Back at the house, we finished up the laundry, lugged everything down to the car and headed for home. It was a quiet trip home and Henry occupied his time playing his new "first day of school" gift of the Wall-e game for his Leapster. There were parts of it where he just giggled and giggled, so now I want to play it to see what's so funny.

After unloading the car, Henry and I headed up to the carwash to de-sand the car. He was a great little helper guy, pretty much vacuuming the back of the van all on his own.

We decided to cap off our holiday weekend by having dinner at our favorite Mexican restaurant, Gringo's. On the way there, Henry requested sitting next to Aunt Leslie. As dinner was being served, he kept kissing her cheek. He was trying to surprise her with his kisses and kept telling her "I sneaked on you". Neither of them was too happy when I told Henry he would need to stop kissing Aunt Leslie so everyone could eat their dinner. So he used our temporary distraction to pluck the cilantro off of Aunt Leslie's enchiladas and stuff it into his mouth. He then demanded that I give him mine, which I thought was only fair.

We ended our evening watching a few minutes of the Astros/Cubs game. Henry was rooting for his cubbies, but during the inning that we watched, the Astros tied the game at 3. I had to promise the boy that we could check the score in the morning in order to get him off to bed.

A different kind of beach day

So, we weathered the storm of Gustav...which was non-existent for us. Our thoughts are with those that did take a hit from Gustav, but we are so grateful that it didn't interrupt our weekend.

Wrapping up yesterday, we were going to eat at a place called Hammerheads. It "looked" like a cool place...high up with glass all around, and near the beach. However, after parking and walking in, it was really a bar and was quite smoky. So we headed off to find something different. We drove past another place, but it also called itself a bar and grille, so we passed. We ended up at the Red Snapper Inn.

Oh my, dinner was yummy. Henry insisted I order a fish and shrimp combo to share with him. So I tweaked one of the combos on the menu to get what he wanted but to get what I wanted, too. I ordered a side of "la grecque" sauce. True to form, Henry ate his portion willingly, even asking me to put lemon on his fish.

We returned home and Henry decided that we should play another round of Sorry. Well, he was not able to repeat his win from the evening before. Nada won while Henry had his last man in the safety zone. Due to unsportsmanlike behavior, Henry lost his TV privileges for that evening and soon headed off to bed. When I came back after getting Henry to bed, Nada and Leslie were engrossed in a 2006 rendition of "The Ten Commandments" starring Naveen Andrews and Dougray Scott, and other people that they made me keep looking up on imdb.

We turned it off at 10 to watch the evening news. Assured again that we would be okay for the night, I headed off to bed.

Today was not our typical day at the beach. Maybe because of Gustav, the tide was as high as we've ever seen it. Where we normally set up our "camp", there was three feet of water. We had to set up on the far side of the beach...across from where the traffic goes by.

Henry did get to visit the ice cream truck once today. He spent a great deal of time digging and playing in the sand. The surf was so funny that I wasn't really comfortable letting him play in the water on his own...compounded by how far away we were from the water. We went out for a while, but the undertow was so strong that I had these horrible visions of him being dragged out and not being able to do anything about it.

He went for a long walk with Aunt Leslie, and when they returned, we took our beach chairs out to the surf and sat where the waves crashed around our feet. At one point, I was eating a snickers and a wave caught me off guard and splashed my candy bar. Henry did get down on the ground and roll around in the surf at this time. We all got sandy and yucky and decided to call it a day (as far as the beach was concerned). We packed up and headed back to our yellow house for a late lunch.

After lunch, Henry had an upset tummy (after eating blue ice cream, red tomatoes and orange cheetos) and tossed his cookies. He laid down afterwards and fell instantly asleep, and slept for 3 hours. He felt better when he awoke and was claiming he was starving before dinner was served.

I was on dinner duty tonight. I made the same meal that I always make, just had to shift from cooking outside on the grill to cooking inside due to the mass amounts of mosquitoes. On the menu tonight: bratwurst with carmelized onions, corn on the cob, and sweet potatoes. I won the "messy kitchen" award, but thankfully, since I cooked, I didn't have to clean up. :-)

Tonight, we are playing Uno. Henry promises to work on his sportsmanship, and even his dinner prayer included a special request to "help Henry have good sportsmanship'.

Tomorrow, we'll enjoy a leisurely morning complemented by Leslie's strawberry and nutella crepes. Then we'll start the cleanup efforts of our favorite, yellow beach house. Then its home again, home again to unload all of this sandy stuff and get ourselves ready for work on Wednesday.

Day Two - Labor Day Beach Trip 2008

Before I start in with the recap of today, I must mention something that was overlooked in yesterday's recap. Breakfast. I gave props to Nada's dinner, and it was very yummy indeed. And the best part is that there were leftovers. But breakfast was worth mentioning, as well. Leslie prepared her mexican egg casserole. I'm sure it has a fancy name, but I simply call it yummy. And again, the best part is that there is leftovers. History has shown that this yummy, mexican egg casserole is even better the second time around. So it will serve as breakfast again tomorrow.

After we finished dinner yesterday, we set up for a game of Sorry. Henry won, of course. And I don't say "of course" because we let him win. We all learned early on, you don't need to give the boy any leeway. He has a knack at games. And he roundly beat us all without any of us helping him along.

We wrapped up the night with Henry falling asleep to "The Sound of Music" and the ladies watching "Emma" until it was time to watch the latest Gustav update. We went to bed feeling pretty confident that we were not making the stupidist decision of our lives.

This morning, I was on kitchen duty. I decided to try and repeat the yummy breakfast we had when we visit San Antonio a few weeks ago. I had copied the recipe and everyone was game to try something new with me. Well, it turned out great if I do say so myself. It is a sort of french toast. You dip cinnamon raisin bread in pancake batter and pan fry it. Then is is served with toasted pecans, banana slices, and syrup. (I know that I mentioned yesterday that we use the same menu on every trip, but since we added one more day, we had to add this one additional meal. Lunch is always sandwiches and leftovers, so it can easily be extended a day. And we decided to actually venture out for dinner one evening to make up the extra dinner meal.)

Another great day was spent at the beach. We had just the tiniest bit of overcast-ness in the late afternoon. It helped cool things off. Several visits were made to the ice cream truck as it went by.

Henry spent a good amount of time on his boogie board. He has a little one and a bigger one. The little one, he has totally mastered on his own and will spend long stretches of time on his own surfing in the waves close to shore. The bigger one must still be used in the company of an adult and he and Leslie spent time playing with it this morning. Leslie also ventured off on her own with the bigger boogie board and seemed to enjoy surfing the waves with it.

After lunch, Henry decided to spend his 30-minute quiet time in the hammock. Yesterday, he did his time in his little pop tent. After swaying for about 20 minutes, he actually fell asleep. I let him sleep for about and hour. During this time, the tide came in and we actually had to push our "camp" back about 10 feet. We left Henry where he was, so he woke up on his own little "island".

Recapping our favorite things for today:

• Nada: Sitting, relaxing and reading. Also, she enjoyed a dreamcicle...something she said she hasn't done since high school (although she won't admit how many years ago that was)
• Paula: Reading and listening to my iPod, while Leslie and Henry surfed; and watching Henry surf with his little surf board on his own
• Leslie: Building a sand castle estate, complete with two towers and a tunnel, and hearing what Henry's favorite thing was
  
• Henry: Relaxing in Leslie's arms when they swam in the morning; eating his snowcone, and eating the bubble gum that was hidden at the bottom of his snowcone.

Tonight, we are actually going out to eat. For some reason, we've never done that on our beach weekends. It's nice to think that no one needs to cook tonight and no one needs to do dishes. After we get home, Henry will probably whoop us at Uno.

Well, that's it for now. Stay tuned for the next update.

But that's not even an adventure

Well, we just enjoyed our first day on our beach weekend. Nada is busy in the kitchen making her most yummiest chicken pockets. It will be accompanied by her famous salad with goat cheese and candied pecans, and macaroni and cheese.

We have our beach weekend down to such a science. We have an excel spreadsheet that contains a tab that has our menu, a tab that has our packing list, and a tab that has our shopping list. We use the same one every year. We have the same menu, the same rituals. It is 'comfort' to us.

We rent a house that is on the beach (second row, actually, but still walking distance). We can drive the car on the beach. We have the whole setup: canopy, chairs, tables, sand toys. So all the beach stuff stays in the car...we unload and setup at the beginning of the day, and the we tear down and throw it in the van at the end of the day. And do it all again the next day.

This year, we took the plunge and extended our holiday weekend by an extra day. Of course, that may all change based on what Gustav decides to do.

We had perfect weather today. Not a cloud in the sky. There was very little seaweed. The water was a clear as it could be for this part of the gulf coast. And the water was as warm as bath water.

Towards the end of our day, I posed the question: "What was your favorite thing today?" And here is everyone's answer:

• Henry: The ice cream (because indeed, the ice cream truck drives by about every 45 minutes)
• Mama: The walk Henry and I took looking for shells for our art project
• Leslie: Playing with Henry on his new boogie board
• Nada: Sitting and reading her book (to which Henry responded: "What? But that's not even an adventure!")

And while dinner is being prepared, Henry is laying in bed watching pre-season football. In deciding who to root for, Henry has no problem. He simply chooses the team that is already winning. In this case, it was the New York Giants...or according to Henry, the You Nork Giants.

Tomorrow is another day, stay tuned...

Oh, and I can't add pictures from the beach. So look for a post next week with a recap of our photos. Oooh, another opportunity to scrapblog!

Lunch with my boy...Gustav threatens our beach weekend

Earlier in the week, I asked Henry if I could join him for lunch one day this week. His response? "Hmmm, well, it's my school, so it's my decision. Let me think about it Mommy". Alrighty, then.

So on Friday, I asked him again if I could meet him for lunch. He thought for a few seconds, and replied "I guess that would be okay."

When I arrived at the school, he was at his little table. He'd already set a place for me, complete with a placemat and napkin. He'd already gotten all of his lunch items out of his lunch bag and placed them on his own placemat. He's also already put his lunch bag under his seat. He was seated nicely while the rest of the kids to finish their lunch preparations.

Soon, it was time to start. Everyone had to show their "ready fingers". This means that one finger goes in front of their mouth (like saying sh) and the first finger on the other hand goes in the air (pointing up). So we both showed our ready fingers and the kids sang their little pre-lunchtime song. And then we could start eating.

I had stopped and picked up Burger King. I was so proud of Henry as he picked up his sandwich and ate all of it, before moving to his cucumbers and apple. I wouldn't believe that a room full of 3-6 year olds could sit so calmly and eat the lunch that their parents has so lovingly made for them. I know that I make that lunch for his lunchbox every day and then always wonder what actually happens to it at lunch time. How much gets eaten, how much gets thrown away? Now I have a better sense.

All in all, lunch was wonderful and Henry was quite snuggly with me before I had to leave. He wasn't upset that I had to leave and he had to stay...so different than my attempts to have lunch with him even last year. My baby is growing up and becoming independent.

Now, on to Gustav. We are enjoying our favorite beach weekend in Surfside. Gustav is in the gulf. I hate how much time we have to spend watching and monitoring the projected path of this hurricane. But so far, it looks like it won't impact our plans.

I have not checked in for a while so let me just catch you up real quick. Ashley had her baby in February – little David Leigh. You really love him– it is cute and you are so sweet with him. We just went out to eat with them and David Leigh was smiling at you and you were saying he likes me. So sweet. Also, Lucy died in February. You weren’t as sad about it as we thought you might be. Your Mom and I are both very sad – she might have been a grumpy dog but we loved her and she was so protective of you. You still mention her in your prayers. We took her to be cremated and you stayed at the house with Nana and Papa – when we came home we all sat down and told you what had happened not knowing what kind of response we would get. You laid your head down on your Mom’s shoulder for just a bit and then you raised your head up and said “so are we getting another dog”…guess you were over it.
I had to have surgery in April and we told you that I had a boo-boo in my tummy so to be careful. You asked me for a long time if my boo-boo was better. It worked out just perfect that you were in Chicago during my surgery and hospital stay – so it was all over by the time you came home. But since I was scared, it was really hard talking to you on the Sunday before the surgery but you did talk to me. Thanks.
Also, I got laid off in February and for a while it was a sore subject – bad thing was you had just learned the Legend Logo – so every time we drove past a sign or a billboard you would say “you don’t work at Legend Homes anymore…do you?” yeah, thanks there Henry.
You have had a nice summer – you were such a good boy at the District Convention and have really gotten into helping with the volunteer work. We were assisting with cleaning one of the restrooms and you were such a big help and really tried to do what you could. Then for the whole month of July, you and your Mom were in Chicago. Mom said you did great on your road trip. When you came home, I asked you how your trip was and you told me “I drank root beer floats and watched too much TV”…well, sounds like vacation to me. I think you went fishing, swimming, you played basketball a lot. You also started watching a lot of Cubs games with Papa.
Over Memorial Day, we went to the Yellow beach house and this time Jack came and stayed. You guys had a lot of fun playing in the water. You also played lots with your boogie board and would try to body surf. I had brought a game called the “ladder game” kind of a version of horse shoes but different – well, you loved it and wanted to play whenever we were playing. We will be going to the Yellow house again at the end of this month with Aunt Nada over Labor Day.
We are going to San Antonio this weekend and you are going to see a play I saw about 20 years ago – “Alice, A rock Opera” I am so excited about you seeing it. We will be with my friend Katrina and maybe Brent, Hannah, John and Skylar were supposed to come but John is very sick and they can’t make it. If the weather is nice, we are taking you to Schlitterbaun on Sunday – but we haven’t told you yet. You have been asking to go so hopefully it will work out.
You are now 5 and really have a little boy look about you – not looking like a toddler at all. You can almost read. Also, Mom is going to be redoing your room and she is probably going to let me arrange everything. So we have been looking at furniture. I am going to give you 5 choices for your theme and see what you pick. You have an interest in just so many things I think you will have a hard time.
The Olympics are on right now and you are “strung out”. You don’t care what is on – you want to watch it and ask which color we want to win. Last night you and Papa went swimming and you pretended to have an Olympic swimming match.
OK, back to work – will write more later.

Green Bay Packers

September 4, 2007
We just got back from our Surfside weekend and you love it as much as we do. You just play and run and dig. We can tell a big difference since you have grown from last year to this year. You call it our yellow house. Jack, Courtney and John came out for the day and you guys had so much fun. When Jack got to the beach, you and I were in the water and you started yelling “Jack, I am so glad you are here”. One of the cute things you say right now is – cut short. You say that for a short cut and we don’t correct you. Then on Sunday we were watching a football game and decided we would cheer for the Green Bay Packers. We turned the TV off and didn’t see the last of the game so when you woke up that next morning, you said I wonder how my Green Bay Packers did. Just funny stuff.

I want to Hold You

August 8, 2007
A couple of really cute things that you say right now are: If you want to be picked up or carried – you say “I want to hold you” It is really precious and of course who could resist that. Also, you love delivery trucks, UPS, FedEx, and the mailman. You call UPS “P-U-S” and right now you tell us when you grow up you are going to be a pilot for a FedEx airplane.

Back to your adoption: Finally, everything is finalized in Russia and you get to come home. You fly from Vlad to Seoul, Korea then to Los Angeles, CA (Nana flies to Chicago from there ) and you fly to Houston. During the flight you get sick and throw up on everything and on Mom. (you always talk about throwing up – it is funny or you will say “I didn’t throw up” you are kind of fascinated by vomiting) They said you were such a good boy on the flight. I pick you up at the airport and this is the first time I meet you. You have been traveling for more than 24 hours and you are still so precious and excited about everything. You want to show me the baggage claim carousel right away. We bring you home and you do fine with you first time in a car seat. The first week you have jet lag but every night gets easier and easier and within 1 week you are adjusted to our Texas time. You come home on November 21st a Saturday. The very next day everyone comes over to meet you and we have your first party. The Suttons, The Noltys, The Winslows, The Legas, The Saouds, and the Dancers all come over – you got presents and everyone thought you were adorable – YOU WERE! You start settling in to your life here much easier than your Mom thought you were. For about a month or so you are afraid to take a bath but we work with you and get you toys and now you love it completely and we can’t get you out. In December, Mom takes you to Chicago so you can meet all your relatives. You have a party while you are up there also however, you got RSV while you were there and you were in the hospital for about 7 days. You went by ambulance – you were a sick little baby and we were all worried. I hated that I couldn’t be there but you were in good hands and your mom never left the hospital the whole time.
In Jan, you, your mom, your Nana and Papa and I go on a Carnival cruise. You loved it. We had a good time. In Cozumel, we went to a beach called Natchi Co Com and it was just a spectacular day – we have some really cute pictures of you there.
You went to your first meeting at the Kingdom Hall, your first Memorial, your first District and Circuit assemblies. You immediately were a good boy and got the routine. Everyone at the hall loves you. You are the “Kingdom Hall Baby” right away. Right now Elton Brown always gives you a piece of candy so he is your favorite and you share a birthday – Elton and his boys love you.
Every September, Nada, your Mom and I rent a beach house at Surfside. You absolutely love it and you settle in to this routine with us also. We are so glad you love the things we love so much. You love to find the moon at night and during the day. You always tell us how good food smells and how pretty things are. You are very dramatic – I think I have rubbed off on you.