Dr Seus

Dr Seuss was a genius. If you don't agree, check out the juvenile portion of your local library. Pull out any random book and see if you recognize the name as quickly as you do Seuss. Then pull out a Seuss book with its lack luster art and crazy semantics and realize this man figured out a fantastic way to market his books. As further proof, type Seuss on your computer. Spell check even recognizes it.

Some of his books really do nothing for me and the pictures don't help. Then there are such charmers like "If I Ran the Circus", "Fox in Sox", "I Can Read With My Eyes Shut Tight", and "The Sneetches" (to name a few) that I read over and over again. We even own the Boris Karloff version of "The Grinch Who Stole Christmas" as well as the book. My dad introduce the movie and my mom would randomly quote it while we were driving to the various errands in the car. Speaking of cars and Seuss, we happened to check out a audio cd of "The Cat in the Hat and other Dr Seuss Favorites" and listened to it over and over and over again as per the children's request as we drove from MD to TX. And, I would have to confess, I actually liked hearing it over and over again myself.

Many of his books hold profound lessons and moral applications. I often think about Green Eggs and Ham as a metaphor on temptation. In other words, stick with your gut feeling about avoiding the temptation, because it's a lot easier to avoid it without the desirous taste in your mouth.

Now, you might ask, "If you love Seuss so much, how come you spelled his name wrong in the title of this Post?" Well let me explain. This past week was Dr. Seuss worship week at school. His birthday is March 2 and makes for a fun week at school. I thought that it would be fun to spell out his name in Mia's hair throughout the week. I found that fitting since he was notorious for crazy do's. Monday-Thursday sported these looks, but by Friday, she wasn't interested. Part of the disinterest had to do with my over promising of spelling the whole name in her hair. Way too ambitious for my abilities, but I thought I would try. No go with my abilities and her hair texture. Do you blame her for not wanting to downsize? (Sorry if you can't determine the letters. . .I did warn you that I lacked the skill and Mia's hair texture didn't help)




Aside from the hair, Mia sported Seussical outfits such as this polka dot top with striped pants and mismatched socks all week.


Mia's words about Dr Seuss week:

Well, um, Dr Seuss day I ate Green Eggs and Ham and it was so so so so so so good. My friend, Sarah, and Jordan did not like the green eggs and ham. They did not like them like the Sam I am book. But, I liked my fun day of the last Dr Seuss day.

Calming and shrinking effect

Feeling empowered with my spasmodically colored yellow room, I felt the urge to paint my bathroom. I imagined this tranquil beach inspired room that featured a cute print of my kids in paradise aka Destin, Florida. As seen in the undoctored colored version:
Once again, I think that my expectations of the paint were a little over speculated. I wanted a deep color that set off the drabness of bathrooms, but I never wanted it to visually appear significantly smaller then it did with blah beige walls. Oh, well. I think I just frame the mirror with white trim and do the same with the window. Tiago was a big help and even painted a whole wall part by himself. I think my next project is waiting for me to begin.

Happy Birth Day

Congrats to our California family (sorry, they have opted for privacy in blog world)! I hear through the grapevine that you have my newest niece outside the womb and healthy as can be. My kids will have one more cousin they can talk about wanting to visit. Luckily in June, that wish will come true. I can't wait to hear all the details.

Yes we Can!

With Obama fever filling the nation, I had high hopes for the HOA meeting I attended this last week. I sat through the meeting listening to various expensive ideas the community members had to make our streets more safe. The fact is that our community is really safe, but people were shooting out ideas for speed bumps (which cost quite the pretty penny), and even making our community a gated community. I threw out some suggestions and even signed up to be on some safety committee. Then when the meeting was offically ended, I raised my hand to add a food for thought.

When we were house hunting a year ago, this property had a lot of appeal but lacked a critical component: a swimming pool. As you can imagine from my posts previous to this one, this is kind of essential. In the end, the fact that Sea World is 5 minutes from our house convinced us that we could buy a home without a pool in the community. Since then, we have heard of a few people who wanted to move into this community but opted for the neighboring community that came with a pool.

With that said, My motivation for building a pool in our community has increased drastically. I want people to love our home and community so when i go to sell in a few years, we will have some serious buyers. Unfortunately, the rest of the HOA people and community members were not so thrilled. They didn't even want to discuss the possibilities. They said it was too expensive and would increase our HOA fees. Sadly enough the people failed to realize that our HOA fees are comparable to our neighboring pool owning community, but all we see of those fees are notes for home improvement and some catered party. With the number of homes and the amount of dues and the trimming of unnecessary monetary waste from our HOA, we can have a pool.

Westover Place HOA, you haven't heard the last from me. Grass movements obviously work in this nation and it's in my families blood to campaign.

Let's hear Foux Da fa fa

One of our friends had these videos on their blog awhile ago and they made me giggle. Ok, I actually snort laughed which happens when the explosive giggle comes so unexpectedly that I can't get my mouth to open fast enough. My kids heard me and came running to see the cause of such an outburst. They will now start singing parts at the strangest times. We often hear "brown paper, white paper sticky ba da with the tape" repeated. I sometimes wish (usually on the 18th time that line is repeated) that I watched it alone, but you should enjoy these too. They are strangely catchy and clever. Warning. . .most of their other movies are less then clean.

Bust out the swim trunks

San Antonio has the most unique and vacillating weather patterns of any state I have visited. Winter months consist of a cluster of warm days (70+) and then a sudden stint of cold weather (50 or so degrees). It makes life interesting and difficult in so many ways. For example, when Mia gets ready for school, we never know what to send her with. The morning could feel freezing and by the end of school she is roasting. It also throws our systems for a loop since we can't ever really adjust. I always felt like the blood had a chance to thicken during the winter months then as the temperatures warmed up to the 50's, the body would feel the need to dawn spring clothes. For us, 50 feels freezing and then when it jumps to 80 the next day, we are searching for the pool.





This past week was such the case. We invited some friends and tried the sprinkler ball. A few days later we tried our newest water toy, the Crocodile Chomp. I should have tried the set up before I had hot kids waiting for fun. I tried to be quick, but I totally set it up wrong and no one cared.

We had a few readers in the group who happen to glance at the Warning label and instruction manual. Due to their literacy, I wasn't able to try out our new slide and yet they didn't seem to observe the slide with hand out in front and no running on the slide rule. Poor Talia had to wait and watch while everyone else had all the fun.




You know you want to come out and show me how to set it up correctly. Just remember to bring plenty of sunscreen, swimsuits, and clothes to layer with.

The Healthy Way to Eat Donuts

After Jumping (and technically dancing) for life, Mia knew just what the focus of our last FHE should be. I was her co-partner responsible for acquiring the much needed viewing material. Even as amazing as I can be sometimes, I couldn't produce the jump rope champion or his video as he stated was for sale at the assembly. I tried to throw in the idea of talking about Daniel and his word of wisdom experience, but I guess that isn't as fun as the other famous Daniel and the lion's den story. In the end, we went to the store to buy stuff for the treats and ended up with donuts. Tiago even warned us that "Donuts are not good for our bodies, but they're a fun treat." On the drive back, we re-emphasized the points made at the jumping assembly and figured out the most healthy way to eat a donut.