1 Year, 44 Weeks.
Another long week. Man, how quickly it flew, and yet, each day seemed to drag on and on and on. Tangie was in Atlanta this past Monday and Tuesday for what I'm hoping was the last trip out of town this busy season, or at least, for a while.
I'm hoping AND praying! It hasn't been
that bad ~ I can remember when she was just starting out her career and working longer, crazier hours that the peons were expected to do. But moving up the ranks allowed her a little more leeway with her work schedule and demands, and it helps when she knows she has a family to come home to. And what a happier home it is when she does!
Let's see, so Friday we had planned to have dinner at the Food Truck Pod again at Bill Breeze Park in Ocoee. They do this once a month, but I think it's been like every 3 weeks or so. I'm going to have to check the archives to make sure. Anyway, the afternoon and evening weather seemed threatening, with a few light spotty showers here and there, so I wasn't totally convinced we and the rest of the food truck group were going to make it. Turned out, the Bergherm's were out of town for a funeral and the Clarke's had opted to go to a Thai restaurant, so we were left on our own. After Tangie arrived from her flight back from Atlanta, Braelyn and I headed out to pick up some food. There was still a pretty good turnout of trucks; The regular ones like Cuban and Brazilian always have interesting menu items. We loaded up on some Kobe Beef sliders, fish tacos, a Cuban chicken sandwich, and some grilled chicken hearts on skewers, which tasted just as delicious as it sounds. They were so good and...hearty! Braelyn loved them and ate them like meatballs, so much so that I myself only had one skewer to her two. Tangie respectfully declined, as I expected!
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| Maddy wanted a turn to pull the wagon. |
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| She fell on her way to pick big sis up from school and refused to get up until I helped her. Such a diva! |
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| Brae with her stash of good eats from the Food Trucks. |
Sabbath brought us to church, as I was on my 3rd week of 4 commitments to help out with Sabbath school. I wish more parents would help out and lead. I mean, I get it if you're afraid to get up front, but these are 1 and 2 year olds that couldn't care less about the performance, much less the content. As long as there are snacks during story time, right? Anyway, Corey and I did our thing, which, I'm proud to say, I think we're getting the hang of. She even did a little ad libbing with the Noah theme and props and I was like, "You go with your bad self!" After this week I'm going to take a break ~ doing ribbon gymnastics each weekend is starting to take its toll! Thanks Duncan, for taking the video:
After naps we had the Inner Circle (minus the Johnson's due to an illness) over for a French themed dinner. We had been trying to get the group together the past month but every weekend was booked with activities and other plans so we finally were able to settle on this past Saturday night. I had decided to be a little adventurous with the menu (big surprise, right?) and decided to make roast lamb and baked quail as the main entrées. The store was out of snails for escargot and I opted out of doing the rabbit because then I would have had to skin it, and braise it, and that takes time...just kidding! The Z's brought a cheese quiche appetizer, Deininger's were in charge of making a veggie pasta dish for the children, Cochran's made a vibrantly green and delicious vegetable dish, and the Johnson's in absentia delivered chocolate croissants and gelato, which, though Italian, made for a nice touch. We all had a great time preparing and eating the food; I'm giving props to William as I just love to watch him work in the kitchen. I mean, the man brought dough to prepare and make some baked Brie! And in addition to the Brie we also had a nice selection of different French artisan cheeses to indulge in. Gotta love French food!
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| Rob takes a photo of the spread before we annihilate it. |
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| Just your typical 7 course French meal! |
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| You can tell no one was talking and just focused on the food! |
Sunday morning was a treat. Tangie had to work, so she left around 9 until 3 that afternoon. I had been invited to join some dads in what would be my first official paintball experience. During busy season, Tangie's company has this benefit of free childcare. The lady that came was Sonia, who had taken care of the twins over a year ago when they were just around 9 months old, when they were sick and we both couldn't take off work. Anyway, it was great to have her back and she said she had so much fun with all 3 children, she even offered to watch them if we ever wanted to have a date night! Anyway, our neighbors Richard Ottati, along with brothers Cy and Nick Mahavir and 10 other people, converged on a wooded lot in Apopka that was owned by an SDA member from Richard's father's congregation. Speaking of which, Pastor Ottati joined us and played amazingly ~ I had never seen a 66 year old man run, dive, dodge, and shoot paintballs the way he did! It was so cool to watch and participate, until I got hit by some paintballs. PAINFUL!!! But what a rush of adrenaline, running through the woods, ducking behind trees, sneaking up on unsuspecting opponents, making your first "kill". I thought a lot about when soldiers would go into a skirmish, and how if you got shot it was literally Game Over. Puts a lot of what they do for our freedom into perspective. Much respect for our troops for sure.
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| Our group of paintballers ready to go head to head! |
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| With good friends and neighbors Cy and Nick Mahavir. |
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| They told me to stay low and shoot! |
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| The paintball that got me actually burst INSIDE the mask! |
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| As you can see from the welt growing above my eyebrow. What fun! |
As I said, Tangie flew out early Monday morning so I was flying solo with the children for 2 days. Again, not a big deal, especially knowing that Duncan was out of town as well leaving Corey with her 3 for 4 days, it wasn't so bad! The hardest part was getting Brae out of bed and ready for school; On Monday she did not want to wake up! After loading her and her gear/breakfast in the van I would get the twins up, one by one, change their very full diapers and load them in to the van, pajamas and all. A rush into downtown through 408/I-4 traffic, we drop her off by 7:50 and then we go back home to start our day. I guess the good in getting the twins up that early is that they are ready to go down for their naps by 12:30, as I get them up at 2:10 to go pick Braelyn up. Trip to the park, a walk in the neighborhood, feeding the ducks are just some of the afternoon activities, before supper, baths, and then bedtime.
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| Maddy decided her baby doll wanted to swing as well, |
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| Feeding the ducks! |
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| And feeding himself! |
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| Maddy being a goofball. |
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| I think she thought half of the bread was for her! |
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| I love it when all three get silly together. |
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| Apparently she was really enjoying her wagon ride! |
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| A visit to the park with Jared and Isabella on Tuesday. |
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| Baby doll wanted to slide too. Maddy's really started to play with the dolls, unlike her big sister at that age. |
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| Swinging in pairs. |
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| Braelyn works on the kitchen honor at Adventurer's and ended up making and eating a pbj sandwich! |
The twins are really engaging with us, big sister, and each other. They are starting to put words together and really trying to communicate what they want, especially Madelyn. She has started to string 3 and 4 word sentences together: "Kohlden, no singing!" "That funny!" "I don want it." Kohl isn't too far behind, although he still is the whiny one, especially when one of his sisters takes something that he either had or was going to go get. He still hasn't got the art of "trading" yet, which leads to a lot of frustration and tears. Seriously, I've almost had it up to here with all the bickering and fighting over the same toy. Sometimes I just want to take a sword and cut the thing in two and give each one a half, but that's just the Solomon in me.
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| Weekly giggle at Costco. |
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Like father, like son: accident prone.
"Gravel sidewalk, meet face. Face, gravel sidewalk. Oh, I see you've already met..." |
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| "Daddy, why do Doritos turn my fingers orange?" |
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| She wanted to carry big sister's backpack. |
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| That thing was almost as big as she! |
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| Trying to pick up her spilt peas. |
Food:
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| Rosemary garlic roasted lamb on white beans |
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| Honey balsamic quail on couscous with quail eggs |
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| Mac 'n Cheese |
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Prime Sirloin on lentils with minted pea purée
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Randoms:
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| Multi-denominational? |
Quotes:
- As Braelyn is talking to Mommy in Atlanta over the phone to say goodnight, finishing up their conversation:
Brae: “Ok, goodnight Mommy. How do I turn the phone off?”
Tangie: “Can you hit the button with the E.N.D. on it?”
Brae: “I see a P.”
Tangie: “It's a button at the bottom. I'm not sure what Daddy's phone looks like.”
Brae: “It's black.”
Tangie: [With a chuckle] “How about I just hit End on mine and it will hang up
both of us.”
Brae: "Ok."
That was easy enough!
Have a great weekend!
