Plate for Carmen

Carmen always makes special gifts for all of us, so we decided to make something special for her this year. I took the boys to "Color Me Mine", a ceramic store in Frisco, where they painted a platter for her. They came up with the design idea and did all the work themselves. They even painted her cats under the tree. We took this to Carmen on Christmas Day and she loved it!

Griffin Basketball vs. Fowler 12/17/09

Alex's team won by 1 point in a nail-biter and Joey's team lost by 1 point in another nail-biter. Why do I always miss the great games??:-) Charlie went to both basketball games while I went to Tennis with Ben (he is soooo good at tennis). Games resume in January.

Christmas 2009

Hard to believe Christmas has come & gone so quickly! The gifts were plenty, but smaller in size and larger in price! The boys pretended to "believe", but we know they don't. They still get so excited and look under the tree every day for new presents and keep count as to how many each one has. Christmas Eve was got a couple of inches of snow. We still went to Macaroni Grill for our traditional Christmas Eve dinner and then ventured out again for the 10 p.m. candlelight service. The roads were very icy going to church. Charlie ushered and Alex was acolyte. There were about 100 people there--we were surprised so many got out. The boys woke us up at 4:15 a.m. to do their gifts, but we said "go back to bed". That was a little too early, but we finally got up around 5:30. Oklahoma had about 14" of snow, so we couldn't go to Chandler under the following day. We spent Christmas day in our pj's enjoying each other and playing with our new goodies. Alex got a new bike, custom designed nike shox, impression phone, madden 10, cologne, clothes, itunes. Joey got an Acer, impression phone, cologne, clothes, UA shoes, movie, tony hawk ps3 game. Ben got a Flip, DSi, phone, games, shoes, pjs. Charlie got riding boots, movies, gift card for new clothes, coin counter, clothes. Lisa got Williams-Sonoma cheese grater, measuring cups & spoons that the boys picked out for her :-), clothes, jewelry, new electric skillet (luv it!).

Ben is a ROCK Star ARTIST!!

Christmas Card Pictures....why????

Why do I put myself through this every year???? After many takes and re-takes and yelling, we finally got one. The kids just cannot sit still long enough to get a good picture.

Basketball--Griffin vs Pioneer 12/10/09

Griffin lost all 3 games to Pioneer last night. Joey (#00) & Alex (#22) played well. Sure wish the lousy coaches would get off their butts and actually COACH the kids! UGHHH!!! Very frustrating.

Griffin vs. Scoggins Bball 12/3/09

C team won 31-5--Alex played great!! Hustled, got rebounds, steals, took several shots, but no go tonight. He played much improved from YMCA basketball.

B team won 37-18--Joey played awesome! Several steals and scored 2 points. Missed 4 free throws though, so he will need to practice those this week :-)

I love basketball, so I hope they enjoy playing too. I played on my first team at Chandler Jr. High in 8th grade. 3 on 3--no crossing the half court line--defense on one side and offense on the other. Oklahoma stopped playing that way after I graduated.

Upstairs bathroom leaking....

It's been one thing after another for the last few weeks....hot water heater went out, garage door needed a new spring, couldn't find the Christmas tree because we donated it last year and completely forgot, upstairs bathroom leaking into ceiling of downstairs bath! UGHHHH!! Charlie found a loose, cracked tile by the bath tub and says this is the reason. Now he has a repair job to do on the celing. Good thing he's a great handy-man!

Joey 12/3/09

Joey has his first 7th grade Griffin basketball game tonight! He was dressed in his game-day shirt and tie this morning and looked so cute! Go Joey!!! Can't wait to watch he and Alex play tonight. Go Gators!!!

It Snowed Today!! December 2, 2009

Rained overnight and then turned to snow about 7:30 a.m. Joey & Alex went to basketball practice at 6:30 a.m., so they missed it! I hope they got to see the snow at school. I don't think we've had snow before Christmas before??? It was gone by 10 a.m. Possibly more snow on Friday.

Thanksgiving November 26, 2009

Happy Thanksgiving! We fried a turkey for the first time and it was yummo! Charlie was pretty nervous about the hot oil, but it was fine and the turkey tasted great! Carmen came over and brought pecan pie, pumpkin pie, carrot souffle, and green beans. Her pies were delicious, especially the pecan pie! Alex loved both of them and ate a lot of both pies. I made cornbread dressing, mashed potatoes, spinach-artichoke dip and a salad. We kept it simple, but very yummy! The weather was perfect. We watched the Cowboy game after dinner and then more football.