Playing dress up

With the promise that we would picked them up early Sunday morning, both girls went home with their father. Arriving at their home around ten AM Sunday to pick them up, they came out of their house with their mom. Even their dog was excited to see us. She wasn't allowed to get in the car with the girls and was handed back to Amy. The girls competed for attention, talking at the same time and asking questions. At the restaurant they ate their breakfast carrying a lively conversation about their parents and about what they were going to do at our house. We got home at about noon. As we worked on our bedroom, Isabelle and Lily played. Lily alternating between their room and ours. She had found a feather to write and to dust with. Isabelle sat in the stairwell landing by the picture window. She decorated the glass with sticky notes.
I went out to work on a project and came back in to find both girls in the living room. Isabelle made a quick dash to hid behind the sofa. Embarrassed that I had seen her playing dress up. I thought it was a great moment needing to be preserved in a photograph. She was a reluctant model.
Grandma helped her pose for the photograph but she was not happy. Elfida made the suggestion of cutting the dress so it would fit better.

Isabelle's embarrassment turned to joy now that grandma was helping with her gown. The footstool served as a pedestal to stand on. Now the center of attention of both grand parents, she smiled.

With long gloves and green eye shadow, she is ready for that imaginary ball. The one where fairies, princes, kings and queens attend and dance all night.

The smile grows to loud laughter when little sister announces that she is going to shave all the hair off Fifi, grandma's chihuahua! Lily not into long gowns, gloves, and dance shoes, is content to pretend her battery powered fan is a set of hair clippers. She exits the room in pursuit of Fifi and her hair cut.

Now a willing model, she spins and smiles. She is a princess. The scraped knees and bruised legs from roller skating accidents have gone away. What wonderful world the imagination of a little girl can be.

The gown almost compete. Grandma leaves the back a little longer than the front so it can trail as the princess walks into the ballroom.

It is a perfect fit. And it will be a perfect evening with laughter and lots of dancing and grandma will be there too. Like a fairy godmother, always ready to help, always there to make thing right. There is no place like grandma's house for a little girl's imagination to come alive. Where else will plants bloom and flower on a fireplace mantle? Yes, they are real plants.

Different talents of our sons

We always knew that our two kids had very different personalities, tastes, and talents. They look totally different. One thing they have in common is their ability to resort to acting like little kids as soon as they walk into our house. It becomes more apparent when they are together and if I close my eyes and listen only to the sounds I can go back 20 years. It's still, "Maiko leave your brother alone!", "Quit wrestling on the sofa!", "Carlos, Maiko, where did you leave the remote!", and the popular "Car-maiko, or Mai-carlos behave!"



Anyways, Carlos was suppose to come by this weekend but didn't make it until Monday. He had a camera in Iraq and broke the screen while over there. The last time he was here he had ordered a new screen for it. It had come in and had been sitting on the table for about three weeks. Monday he sat down at the kitchen table and took the camera apart, put the screen on and put it all back together. He handed Elfida a working camera. Carlos got online and googled how to replace the screen, read the instructions and fixed it. He always had a talent for understanding electronics and computers.




He gave the camera to Elfida, who really liked the camera, but what she really loved were all the pictures of Carlos while he was in Iraq that were still in the camera. The first picture on this post was one of those pictures. I downloaded the pictures to my computer and then it was like going through the boxes of stuff we have in the garage or going through the boxes in the attic and finding all those little treasures we have kept and forgotten. We were able to recapture an era in Carlos' life that we had missed out on.

Maiko's talent? Well, his is in the kitchen or on the grill. He can watch the cooking shows and understand all they say. He can then go to the kitchen and make whatever he saw on TV and he can read a receipt book and make what is in the book. He is a great cook.

This was the 3rd weekend of eating seafood. Oh, It was good. I couldn't stop eating the breaded calamari. I finally quit eating so that I would leave some for the others. Later I found out he had left some uncooked so he could use it as fish bait! That was some expensive fishing bait.

We love having our kids at home. They are welcome anytime. But... we also enjoy our time. Time spent with just the two of us. On Valentine's day we got up and went to McGregor to eat breakfast just the two of us and in the evening we got dressed and headed out to dinner with some friends and then to the Sweet and Sweetheart event. I took this picture right before we left. Sunday Morning we got up early again and went out to have breakfast again, just us.

Another home project

This was the start of putting planters around the trees in the front yard. I thought we were going to finish Elfida's raised gardens in the backyard, but she said she needed the front yard done first so she could start planting flowers for the spring. Saturday we got up late and ate breakfast at home. Big breakfast. We made it to Home Depot about noon, then went to Lowe's, then to The Restore Store. Finally we went back to Home Depot and bought the landscaping timber. I started with the little chainsaw but it was taking too long. I brought out the big one and things went quicker. We stopped at about 05:00 pm when Maiko and family came over for the big dinner preparations. Maiko was going to make Chapino! He did and it was so good.

On Saturday I used the truck as a tripod to take a couple of pictures of us working. Notice the gloves, safety glasses and belt. After lots and lots of minor injuries, I finally figure out why people wear safety gear.

Sunday morning we were outside by 10:00 am, after eating a big breakfast. This time we had a photographer. Isabelle had spent the night with us and I gave her my Canon camera to take pictures. For an eight year old she takes very good pictures. Well, she took more pictures of the dogs than she did of us, but the ones she took of us came out very good.

We would build the planter off to one side to make sure we were setting the timbers right. Then I marked the area where they were going and then leveled the ground. I was going to drill holes on the timbers and use rib bar to hold them in place, well drilling through all the timbers with a 1/2 inch bit was too much for my little cordless drill. Elfida went to Wally World and bought an electric drill form me.

The planters look good. They are sturdy and should last unit we decide to tear them down. We still need to fill them up with dirt. We bought the material to put in them so weeds don't grow in them.

By three o'clock we had finish building them it was getting cool already. This is another Isabelle picture.

She went to sit with grandma so I could take a picture of the two of them. Now all we need is the rain to keep coming so our grass will grow again.

They do make the yard look a lot better. It will also make it easier on me when mowing the grass, once its starts growing again. While we were out there taking pictures Carlos called. He was out shopping for some shoes. It always makes Elfida's day when he calls.

Isabelle had been waiting for us to finish so Elfida could help her decorate a shoe box for Valentine's day. I went up to shower and Elfida and Isabelle started on the shoe box. By the time I got back down, Elfida was working on the shoe box and Isabelle was playing in the movie room. I gave her permission to get on the computer and she spent the about an hour on the Hannah Montana website. I gave her a bag of balloons I had in the garage and she spent the next hour getting me to blow them up and trying to make balloon animals with them. Amy picked her up at about six 0'clock and we settled down to watch a movie. I put on "The Frighteners" and old Michael J. Fox movie. It was a good weekend.

My wife's home town and others

Years ago we were passing through my wife's home town in west Texas. We stopped at the house she had grown up in. It was a cool sunny day in March. Winter was over but spring weather hadn't arrived yet. Walking around the house, my wife found an old rusted metal wheel. It had been her favorite toy. She wasn't sure what it had originally been used for, but for her and her brothers and sisters, it had been an ideal toy. You could push it, roll it, and ride in it. How simple the times had been during that era in her life. Happiness was spinning around in a metal wheel.

Bargaining for some New Mexico Chile. Going down the main drag in the big city of Pecos, Texas, she spotted this sales person. This was a great bargain, but what to do with a sack full of red chile's. My wife remembers looking forward to the big city of Pecos as a child. It was always a treat, a very special occasion when going to town. As a teenager, Pecos was where the big dances were held, it was the place to go cruising, where the theater and drive-in were at and there was also a city park to go and hang out at.

While still in West Texas, we came upon one of the many ghost towns in the area. Towns that at some point had been booming because of oil or agriculture. Schools, churches and post offices had been built. The towns now almost abandoned except for some die hard residents set on living their last days in the same town they were been born in. Playground long void of children remained well preserved in the dry climate. They slowly spin in the strong west Texas wind. The winds carry the mornful squeaky voice out into the dry dusty plains.

Isabelle in a field of blue bonnets. Okay, this isn't near Pecos. I just found the photo while going over some of my old files. One of my first great pictures taken with a digital camera.

Back in west Texas, a few miles north of Pecos, one deep man made hole. Elfida's brother-in-law kept telling me that there was a big canyon north of Pecos. We drove there one day. Sure enough there was a huge hole in the ground. It was a place to go with someone who knew the area. The hole was invisible until you were within a few yards of it. It wouldn't be to difficult to fall into it while driving in the area. It must have been a gravel pit for many years. The roads leading into it are still visible even though they haven't been used in years. My wife said she never knew that it existed.

What a strange creature. I saw many of these in the area, but got near only this one. Elfida's brother went to supervise the workers on this project.

The Dairy Mart. We have to stop by this place every time we go to Pecos. My wife has to order a Milk Shake and Burger. This was the main burger joint in town when she was growing up. I learned that I had to buy my diet soda at the store before going to eat here. They don't believe in diet anything here, so don't ask for a diet drink. They don't sell any here.

Rocket Park in Pecos. The zoo is across the road. It doesn't have many animals but it is still a zoo.

A restored theater. She remembers it opening only once in a while. Now it is open on special occasion only. There aren't enough people in town to open on a weekly basis.

These little towns far from the large cities fight a losing battle every years. The young people leave in search of better jobs, more excitement, greater opportunities and different experience. My wife was one of the many young people to leave the very small town of Barstow, Texas. She wasn't the first and wasn't the last. Her family Web Page still gets posting from ex-Barstow residents that have moved away but still retain the fond memories of the simple days growing up in a small town.