Fishing with Daddy

A few weekends ago there was a kid fishing day at the park across from our neighborhood. Thanks to Nana and Papa for watching Caleb. I'm sure he would have loved it too but he would have been swimming with the fish! I was sleeping after work so Ethan got to have some quality daddy time.

I think it was just a bit sunny!

He is a good little fisherman...very patient. Kudos to Daddy for remembering to bring his little chair.

Success! Well, sort of. Mondo said that there was a man fishing next to him with his daughters. He caught a fish and gave the pole to Ethan and let him reel it in. Ethan was so excited because he finally caught his very own fish! :-)

Swim Lessons!

After several years of me saying that Ethan doesn't need swimming lessons...we signed him up. I decided that he has too much fear of the water and is a little too comfortable swimming in a life jacket forever for a 5 year old. We chose Emler Swim School in Southlake. He has 12 lessons and goes once a week. Mondo took him to his first lesson because I thought it would be a complete disaster. I thought he'd cry the entire time and not want to do anything. Mondo is stronger than me. I would grab him out of the water and tell him he didn't have to do it. :-) I was suprised and happy to hear that he did great! The only time he cried was when he had to jump in from the side into the instructor's arms. He did it but it was against his will. We made it a family event on the second lesson. We found a little childcare place across the hall for Caleb. I totally thought he'd freak but he suprised us all and stayed the entire 30 minutes of swim lessons! It was great! Mondo and I were able to focus all of our attention on Ethan while Caleb got to play and have fun.

All dressed for swim class! When we first told him about it, his little voice quivered and he said he didn't want to go. But we talked a long time about how fun it would be and how they won't make him do anything scary. When it was time to leave he was excited! The bag of chips was a snack on the way there. :-)

They have all kinds of toys and gadgets for the kids to make it fun. Look how intently he is looking at the instructor.

Floating on his tummy...with his face in the water!! Mondo was so suprised when he saw Ethan doing everything the guy told him to. I guess it helps when it is a "teacher" and not Mommy or Daddy.

This is a little funny...and a little embarrassing. At the end of the lesson the kids get to go down the slide....that big yellow slide behind Ethan. There was NO WAY he was doing that! He chose (slightly against his will) to go down that tiny slide! He has a lot of trust issues when it comes to going under water.

And Mondo gets an A+ for taking great pictures for me since I was a chicken and didn't go to the first lesson! :-)

The Love Story

I'm a bit behind in my post about our anniversary. We celebrated 8 years of marital bliss on February 23rd. Get prepared for a super long post about how it all began....

15 years ago, I was 16 and Mondo was 15. We both went to the same high school and he visited my church frequently but I had never seen him...but he had seen me. He watched me dance in drill team without my knowledge. He had his friend at church tell me that he was interested in me. We started talking from there. We talked for several months but never actually dated. I was dying for him to ask me out so I wrote him a note (I know, how very high school of me!) and asked him if he was going to ask me out or not...this was on February 13th. He informed me that he was waiting until Valentine's Day. Whoops. So our dating anniversary is the day before Valentine's Day because I was too impatient to wait. :-)

We dated for 7 years with only one 12 hour break up. No, I'm serious. The night before I left for college we had a long tearful talk. I wanted to see other people since I was starting college and a new chapter in my life. I wanted to make sure he was the one. Poor guy still had one more year in high school and I ditched him. That was the worst night of my dating life. I didn't sleep at all. I cried all night. The next day I drove to Abilene, got settled in my dorm, then drove back to GP to go to a good friend's wedding. Mondo was there. It was way awkward. Do we sit next to each other? Do I even say hi? I desperately wanted to sit next to him and hold his hand and tell him I was an idiot. But I didn't. I said hi and then sat with some friends. By that night, back in Abilene, we were on the phone with each other talking about what a huge mistake we, I mean "I" made and we were inseparable after that.

He gave me the "7 year test" as he calls it. I didn't think he was EVER going to ask me to marry him. I was beginning to wonder if he ever wanted to get married at all. Poor Mondo. I gave him such grief and so did my family. Every anniversary or special occassion I watched for the little ring box but it never came. We went to lunch one day at our favorite chinese buffet place. After that we went to Lincoln Square and ate Marble Slab ice cream at the horse fountain. Typical simple date we frequently had. Until we got ready to go and Mondo dropped down on one knee and said he had something to ask me. All I remember saying is, "You better not be kidding!!" He wasn't. He gave a nice speech that neither one of us really remembers. I was so excited!!! We went straight to my parent's house to tell them. And you know what? My dad already knew! That little turkey had known for a while because Mondo actually went old school and asked him for permission to marry me. Awww! And Dad didn't tell Mom because he thought she might let it slip. She wasn't home so I called her. She was in the check out line at the grocery store. I think I had to tell her 3 times that I was engaged because she didn't believe me. She showed up with 5 or 6 wedding magazines. It was then that Mondo began to wonder what he got himself into!

We got married at our church and honeymooned in Maui for a week. It was amazing. I took some pictures of my wedding pictures so they're not the greatest but it's better than nothing!

It's so crazy to look back at how young the kids are! The little girls are my nieces: Morgan, Madilyn, and Destiny.

I LOVE this picture!! Hilarious!! Look at little Blaine under Mondo...he's 15 now!

Sorry Mondo, had to put this one in there. Look at the emotional little face watching me walk down the aisle. He loves me. ;-)

Here comes the bride.....

Loved that dress. Hmmm...looks like I'm missing a bridesmaid. Summer, where did you go? :-)

Whew, it's all over!

The whole wedding party...well, minus little Morgan. I don't know where she was.

Yummo! I would love some that cake again...so good!!

Groom's cake. See the chocolate covered golf balls on the top?

A little cheesy, I know.

This is another one of my favorites.

Yep, we left in a hummer limo. Mondo was in heaven! Because he was with me of course!

The inside of the limo.

Maui!

The luau. One of my best memories from our honeymoon.

And here we are today...still all kinds of in love. This picture was taken on our actual anniversary. We went to have steak at Chamberlains. Really good!

And what love story would be complete without the children?

My Strongman

A few weeks ago, the pre-k class at Ethan's school had a circus performance. There were lions, dogs, strongmen, elephants, clowns, and gymnists. It was SO CUTE! Ethan was a great strongman. Unfortunantly, I don't have any pictures of the actual performance, just a video...that won't upload! I've tried twice. Maybe I'll try again later. I think it might be too long. His performance was him picking up a barbell and holding it over his head while slowly spinning around in a circle then setting it down and flexing. It was so stinkin' cute!

The strongmen before the performance.

Caleb really enjoyed the show. I think this is when he was coming off of his cold and starting the ear infection. Poor guy.

The strongmen after the show.

You Know You Want to Book Us

Ok, so maybe I'm a dork for posting these pics but I was excited that they turned out pretty good. Mondo and I had our first photo shoot as professional photographers for his Dad's wedding. Ok, so we're not professionals, but we tried to make it look like it. These were taken between the wedding and the reception. At first I was having a hard time trying to find places to pose them because this place was pretty much just cactus and brick walls. Luckily Mondo sprang into action and started getting creative. It's a lot harder than it looks! Especially when the bride didn't speak English and I didn't speak Spanish! Here are a few that I played with.