Afterwords: A Special Parent/Daughter Outing on the Riverwalk

When I was a little girl, our family had a tradition with baptisms of going to dinner with our parents without our siblings. It was a big deal! We decided to keep the tradition alive even though Mia's baptism date fell on the Saturday before Easter. (our family's other tradition is to do all the bunny side of Easter on Saturday and spend Sunday focusing on the real Easter stuff) Mia originally chose a restaurant that Fernando and I abhor. Not wanting to overrun her special day, but attempting to avoid heartburn (to say the least), I reminded her of Rainforest Cafe on the Riverwalk! Genius! She gladly accepted the switch much to our hidden delight.






Fernando and I were full before we even finished the appetizer that we ordered. It was called the "Awesome Appetizer Adventure ideal for two or more (warning: its huge) featuring our Chimi-Cha-Chas (yummy), with Spinach Artichoke Dip, Cheese Sticks, and Chicken Tenders Served with coconut curry sauce (double yum). If we could have, we would have cancelled our main course, but our food was already plugged into the system. Unable to avoid the advertised dessert called a Volcano, we gorged ourselves past the point of sanity. I must confess that brownies and ice cream with chocolate sauce engineered in a fancy way has always been my weakness.

For the birthday special song that this restaurant did, Mia had to wear two water cups (as shown below) to look like a bird and wave her hands up and down while they sang! Good times!

Special Day

Every birthday is special, but as a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, eighth birthdays have special significance. Mia was now old enough to get baptized.

In college, my major in Human Development was fascinating (though kind of unmarketable by itself). I remember learning various theories to explain the similar human experience we all have growing up. Over and over again, the age of eight was a time when children view the world in terms of black and white, right and wrong, and have the desire to make choices that coincide with their understanding of the world. What a perfect age to make such a decision.

In preparation for the big day, we went shopping to find a perfect dress. In my mind, that meant a white dress which we found many. Unfortunately, the majority of those dresses were sleeveless and San Antonio weather doesn't really allow for a shrug to solve that problem. Just about the time we were going to give up (translation: my shopping time had expired before we went into the store, but it wasn't about me), Mia spotted her dress. I really couldn't have imagined a more "Mia" dress: feminine, delicate details, and just enough blue to make her eyes pop! After calling my sister to help me get over some strange protocol in my head that the dress had to be white (thanks Ang), we had one more important check on our list of to dos.

She also got to decide who was going to participate in her special day. Both her grandparents made sacrifices to come out which made it even more magical. Mia asked her Mama Clara to say the opening prayer, Grandma Cromar to lead the music, and I would give the talk about receiving the gift of the Holy Ghost. I am grateful that Fernando was able to baptize her and confirm her.

Then, after years of preparing and teaching about the importance of baptism, she was baptized. I can't explain the feelings of happiness I felt. It was overwhelming. I can't think of anything more joyous than watching someone you love make correct choices on their own. She is an amazing girl, an example to our family. We love her so much.


Several friends came to support Mia including her Vice Principal who was also her 1st grade teacher. I wished we could have taken a group shot, but we got the most important people.

It's a New Generation

Yesterday, my kids rushed downstairs too excited to tell me about the miracle they just witnessed. I will quote directly so as not to miss out on any goodness.

Tiago "Mom, you know that thing that we take to music class that plays the songs?"

Me "The CD player?"

Tiago "yeah, that! Well, Talia turned it on and music started playing with out even a cd in it!"

Me "That's called the Radio."

Tiago (still a bit confused why I haven't joined the enthusiasm to his level yet) "Mom! After a song was done, it kept playing and the people were talking so fast and funny!"

Me "Yeah, that's Spanish Radio!" (trying hard to be really excited and cover up my amusement and huge desire to just hug him for his cuteness.)

Who knew how magical a Radio could be. They listened and danced for over an hour. Then they took it outside to play and dance some more. I was pretty ok with the spanish stations since most play Cumbia, but had to find a new station once we found the classic rock. Well, that is until they started dancing to this "Cowboy" Song:



Every time the radio announcers would come on, they would burst into laughter. I love my kids!

Viva Fiesta

During the week of the birthday fun, San Antonio decided to celebrate Fiesta. It is kind of its own little party celebrating our Alamo heritage from both the angle of the defenders and the Mexicans. They even have a mock battle with Flowers instead of ammunition. We have yet to participate in any of the city activities since we all are in bed before most of the celebrations start, but thankfully the schools do their part in celebrating. They have cascarones, parties with nachos and otter pops (yeah, otter pops have nothing to do with anything) and piñatas*.
Mia's piñata was adorable and loaded with delicious treats to "share" whether she wanted to or not.

*Incidentally, the day I helped out at Tiago's class fiesta party was the last day he went to school. I was so enraged at what happened or I should say what wasn't happening in regards to education that I could no longer be ok with sending him there even if it was for only 2 1/2 hours. I think that if I hadn't just been dressed in a pink sequined number for Talia's birthday party and feeling a little hot from standing in the Texas sun, it might have been a little less dramatic. In any case, I wish I would have come to this conclusion clear back in September.

Safari Birthday Fun!

Miss Mia has been an animal fanatic for as long as I remember. So, for her birthday party I had a genius idea to take a few of her friends to the zoo. The night before the party, I switched game plans for fear that the zoo would be crazy on a no school Friday. Since the party at the zoo was just going to be an exploration with a breakfast break, I had to come up with some games and a out door venue. The venue was easy and next to the zoo...Japanese Gardens that I love. Games--well they got creative. We started out with a tour of the gardens so I could set up the clues for the scavenger hunt. We happened to find a cute little turtle trying to find its way to the water
After we eat some deluxe waffles for breakfast. Too bad I didn't take into account that the wind would blow up dirt and get in the whipped cream. Most girls found away around the dirt nonsense.




When everyone was "full" or at least incapable of swallowing any more dirt, we started the scavenger hunt. As a funny side note, some kid was doing a photo shoot for his senior pictures. One of the camera helpers had brought his kids who were bored and found some of our clues around the garden. They took the clues down, but had the decency to confess and return the clues. I made up the rhymes for the clues quite late at night and had to remember various spots of note in the garden to hide the clues. I also felt driven to tie in the animal theme since it was supposed to be a safari b-day party. The goal--find a lion that escaped from the zoo. To give you an idea, one clue for the bridge with vines had references to camels and water divine (so we could rhyme with vine). They eventually found the lost lion under the waterfall.

The next game was a creature drawing game. The idea was to take a tri-folded paper and draw one part of an animal. Everyone had to draw one head, one torso, and one feet area. The girls switched papers after they drew each portion. So in the end, the creature would have been created by 3 people. Confused, well, the girls were too which made it even funnier.


I had two more games, but we had run out of time. I asked the girls in the car if they had fun. Resounding YES! I should have left it there. I then made the mistake of asking if they were sad that we didn't end up going to the zoo. Again, Resounding YES! Oh well. . .Mia loved it and said it was her "best birthday ever"!

Birthdays!!!

This week of April is always a marathon week for me. Fernando and our two girls share this week in birthdays. Fernando starts it out on the 14th and then we hit the next two on the 16th and 17th. It is always a trick figuring out how to make each day special and avoid eating way too much cake and ice cream (yes. . .it is possible. . .at least for little kids and my backside). It turned out that school was not scheduled for Friday and so it made for an easier arrangement of friend parties and family parties. Talia who is in love with Princesses especially Rapunzel from Tangled (aka the only Princess movie she has seen) kicked things off with a Princess Party:

After everyone was gathered and finished dressing their paper doll knight or princess
, we ate a royal feast of "gold and jewels". I just had my daughters favorite foods like macaroni and cheese to look like gold, green and purple grapes for jewels, and royal carrot scepters. While the kids ate, I read to them the book Falling for Rapunzel by Leah Wilcox. In the book, a prince tries to get Rapunzel to throw down her hair so he can rescue her, but she mishears him and throws down random objects from her room instead including silky dresses , dirty socks, cantaloupe and a swine (instead of silky tresses, curly locks, rope, and twine).

I told the kids that we needed to help out Rapunzel. We sat in a near by room to go on a "Rapunzel Hunt" which was simply an adaptation of going on a "Bear Hunt".



I tried to help them imagine jumping over gorges, walking over bridges, cutting through tall grass, and snorkeling under a wide stream.

I luckily had my mom here and she hid upstairs ready to throw down some of the things from the book like socks and dresses. I told all the kids that the Queen had special treasures for each of them but that they were hidden in the mess that Rapunzel threw down to the prince.



After the kids found all their treasures, we went to decorate sugar scepters that they could use magically to change the color of their frosting. I wanted to read another favorite book of Talia's called Alice the Fairy. She uses her magic wand to do all sorts of things. Unfortunately, I couldn't find it. So I just had the kids use their scepters and funny magic words to repeat as they stirred in the food coloring.


Next came tower building for Rapunzel. Good thing they didn't connect the fact that the tower was actually a bad thing. I needed something to fill the time with that would work well with 3-4 year olds.
Accepting one little girl who wandered most of the party, the kids were really cute and seemed to really get into each random activity. They would listen to the books and even enjoyed putting together puzzles that one friend gave as a present.

Thank heavens for my mom's help with all the prep work including cleaning the house. Let's be honest, she was rockin' that orange rhinestone wonder! Also, great thanks to a wonderful mom that stayed so we could have all the really cute pictures. Happy Friend Birthday Talia!!

St Patrick's Day

Years ago, when we lived in MD amidst all the amazing community events, we attended several St Patrick's Day thrills. Except for dyeing the San Antonio River on the Riverwalk green, there isn't much to do here. So I decided to make our own little fun event. Because of the dynamics of our ward (ie 120+ primary kids), we had to find some line of demarcation on invitees. I opted to limit the invitation to our neighborhood boundaries. We still had a good 20+ kids in attendance.

I originally wanted to split the families into 4 groups to rotate among the activities. Then I remembered that I am not really a true proponent of agency. I am the dictator in my family and when we do parties, I love to extend that dictatorship to those around me. With all the moms looking on, I spent the next hour making a slight fool of myself and loved every minute of it.

The stations were more glorious in my head than in actuality. We started off in a group explaining the stations and that after we became St Patrick Day experts, a leprechaun might lead us to the rainbow's end. The first station was Leprechaun training. Training meant picking pretend clovers (although my grass has plenty to pick, it was on the wrong side of the yard), whistling, dancing a jig, ducking into small hiding places, and clicking your heals into the air. I wish I could have taken a video.
They were adorable. Some kids were really concerned about their abilities which made me giggle. Then we went to get face painted and color St Patty coloring pages. After they finished, they dug for gold coins (which are surprisingly hard to find in stores the day before St Patricks Day). I buried them in our rock pile. Each time they found a coin they had to tip toe up the stairs to the slide. They would have to slide down and drop it into the Leprechaun's bucket. Finally they got to design a Leprechaun's home via chalk drawing.

While the children drew their pictures, I pulled on of the older girls aside to dress up like a Leprechaun and lead the kids around the block back to my house to get some otter pops (thanks wendy for the supply). The older girls only had whistles to communicate and the kids were strictly warned not to touch the leprechauns. Too bad the follow the leader bit lasted for only a few moments. When I came outside, I found a crew of moms walking back the way they went hoping to meet the kids at my home as they ran full speed around the block! Talia came in very last, but was still really proud of herself. I can't wait to try again next year.