All About Liza

The first picture of me being 1




A little light reading


All About Liza on her Birthday

Favorite Toy: mom's car keys

Fovorite Game: putting things in/taking things out

Favorite Food: pancakes or waffles

I could win a trophy for: Most Bald Baby

I am famous in my family for: pooping in the bathtub

Favorite Activity: eating

Favorite place to go: down the slide at the park

Cutest Feature: the gap between my two front teeth

Our latest Project

Ryan doesn't know what to do with himself between the end of football season and the start of pool season so he does home repairs. The 1st thing we said we would do when we 1st looked at this house was replace the flourescent light box in the kitchen. Well 4 years later it is finally done.

Isabel's observations on Ryan's project:

Isabel: Mom, dad got mad 'cuz he broke that thing. He said bad words. I'm glad its quiet now.

So am I so no more projects this year.

Here are some recent pictures so Grandma Bear can see how much the girls have grown. We have a meeting about kindergarten next week. It won't be long before Isabel starts big school. Liza is 1 next week. She is a very independent baby. She figured out how to open the door of her classroom at daycare so they had to put a new lock on. She would just go out cruising the halls.

Squirrel Emergency!!

So Killer, pictured above lounging on the decorative throw pillows, caught a mammal and was eating it in the back yard last night. Ryan wasn't sure if it was a baby mouse or what so he did some google research. Turns out we had a nest of baby squirrels fall out of one of the palm trees. Due to Hurricane Ike there are lots of displaced wildlife animals now and so we came across a wildlife rehab site that gave phone numbers. Ryan called and said we had a nest fall down and the lady actually said, "Oh this is an emergency!!" So we packed the squirrels in a box and rushed them to the lady's house. She has incubators in her laundry room and added our squirrels to the four she is already caring for. They will be released back into nature in about 8 weeks. Hopefully no one runs them over. Thanks to Ryan there are 2 more squirrels in Texas tonight. Who knew squirrel rehab even existed.

Bad Hair Day

Isabel has been asking to get her hair cut for a while now. So I take her to the shop for one of those cute short in the back, longer in the front cuts. The lady cut off quite a bit more than we expected and Isabel actually fell on the floor and insisted her hair be put back on. A trip to the toy store and the assurance that her hair is growing all the time restored her mood. We also pointed out that Liza is bald and happy. I didn't think her first traumatic hair cut would be at age 4.

Finally

The jolly green bathroom has been updated. We spent 2 weekends working on it. I did the painting and Ryan did the plumbing, lighting, and all the little touch-ups like adding a chair rail. I am no longer embarrassed to have guests use the bathroom. Maybe I'll even start offering them drinks now.

We are still in the process of re-modeling one of our other bathrooms so you know what we will be doing this weekend.

A Day Off

Liza had a fever yesterday so I took a much needed day off to stay home with her. She still wakes up happy as a clam. Today is her lucky day because she has free reign over Isabel's toys, at least until school is out.

Some funny stories from work:

My co-teacher was trying to explain the meaning of the word "literal" to her kids. Her kids hear us describe our students with autism as being very literal. So my co-worker is trying all kinds of ways to explain and finally says its when something is black and white. Her 1st grade daughter says, "oh I get it mom. Its like my friend Hannah. She's both black and white. She's brown so she's literal."

I have a student who is obseessed with fashion. He was sharing his observations on skinny jeans, mainly that more girls than boys wear them. His hypothesis: Boys don't wear them as much because they are tight and might hurt your cuticles.

Ha Ha

Love is....

Peek-a-boo on a Saturday morning.



looking out for each other.



spending time with old friends.



visiting family.



playing with my sister.

Merry Christmas

This post is just a little late. We had a wonderful Christmas. My parents came to visit and Almas was over for dinner. Its hard to believe its been a month since Christmas. We are busy remodeling two of our bathrooms. Hopefully I can post before and after shots soon. As for work.....I have entered the dreaded ARD season. Every special ed. teacher knows what that means. Lots and lots of paperwork and meetings.

Santa-tonio

Grandma and Grandpa came to visit so we took them to San Antonio and did all the touristy things: The Riverwalk, The Alamo, a horse carriage ride. Isabel was so excited and I finally figured out that she thought we were going to Santa's hometown of Santa-tonio. It was only in the 40's so it felt like the North Pole to us.

Only a matter of time...

I knew Eliza would find the tree. We didn't hide it very well.

'Tis the Season...

We've hung our stockings and done our shopping and Isabel wrote her 1st letter to Santa. She's expecting a dollhouse, a Barbie computer, and a pony, stuffed not real. Liza started crawling the day we brought out all the Christmas decorations. So far she leaves them alone though. She is content to follow after Isabel.

Giving Thanks

We had a nice relaxing Thanksgiving. Ryan always cooks the meal so that may be the best part for me. Sam (our cat) caught his own bird and was quite proud of himself.
Isabel told us she is thankful for "her" baby, her family, Santa, and her dolls. I was thankful not to be out shopping at some awful hour on Friday. We always spend the day after Thanksgiving at the zoo. It beats the mall...the animals at the zoo have better manners.

Some old favorites

Just a few pics