Brazos Bend State Park - March 2013

At the beginning of March we had a Saturday with no soccer and no baseball (it was the weekend before Spring Break), and we were trying to think of something fun we could do with the kids.  We decided on Brazos Bend State Park, which is just outside of Houston (Houston is about a 2 1/2 hour drive from us).  We had heard it was a great place for seeing alligators, and if you know any of our kids (or Daniel), you know that means it was right up our alley.  We decided to make the trip a little more exciting and drive down on Friday evening and spend the night in a hotel (because hotels are right up there with alligators on the excitement scale in our family), and then wake up early to head on over to the Park.  Daniel’s brother Anthony lives in Houston, so he met us for dinner on Friday, and then joined us the next morning for our alligator adventure, too.

It’s silly that I have waited a month and a half to blog about this, but here is what happened – at the beginning of April I sat down to blog about the month of March (because that’s usually how I do it), and then I thought, “oh, wait – I can’t blog about March until I blog about Brazos Bend, and I took so many pictures it should probably be its own post.”  So I got all set to start a big Brazos Bend post, when I realized that all of the pictures I had taken there were dated wrong – somehow when I had uploaded my pictures from my camera I had switched the option to label each picture with the date it was uploaded instead of the date it was taken.  I started going through and manually changing the date on each picture (and regretting that I had taken so many) and when I was done I looked at a few more from March, and realized that all of those pictures were dated wrong, too! 

So instead of blogging, I spent all my energy and blogging time fixing all the dates.  And I guess after that I just ran out of steam and gave up on blogging altogether.  A couple times during April I would think, “hmm, have I done my March post yet?”, and then I would remember, “no, darn it – I still have to finish that Brazos Bend post!”  And then I forgot that the reason I had stopped doing it was because of the dates (which were now fixed), so I convinced myself there was some big overwhelming reason that I wasn’t doing it – like it was going to be a super complicated post. 

But today I realized how complicated can a post about my kids and alligators be?  So I decided it was about time to get it done with.

Here is Rachel playing at the playground near a parking lot at the Park. 


When we first got there, I didn’t realize there were going to be actual alligators all over the place starting immediately – I thought we’d have to go on big long hikes and search high and low for them. So I was pretty surprised when we walked down a path right by the playground and all of a sudden saw 3 alligators.  I thought the first one I saw was maybe an alligator statue because it was sitting so still.  I thought, “oh, maybe they put little alligator statues right by the path to show that this is a neat state park where you might find alligators.” 


Not statues:


Also, alligators are not the only fun animals in Brazos Bend.  Here is Daniel showing Cynthia two snakes that he spotted on the edge of the bridge.                      


Everyone was looking at the alligators, and being the expert wild-life spotter that he is, he recognized that it looked like a good area for snakes, so he started looking around.  These two were right below his feet:

And if alligators and snakes aren’t your thing, there were also lots of cute turtles:

And cool looking birds:

But mostly just lots and lots of alligators:

Rachel and Lizza up on a lookout platform:      


Looking down at all of the alligators below:                                                        


Our family:                                                       


The kids with Uncle Anthony:                              


Henry trying to pose in front of an alligator (you can see one out there in the water behind him), but right before I took this picture he fell and landed right on his face and got a bunch of dirt and sand in his eye.


Cynthia posing, with an alligator in the water behind her:                                                    


Creepy looking swamp.  The kids kept asking “would you rather” questions, like, “Mom, would you rather walk through that swamp (which was on the left of the path), or swim through that pond (pictured above)?”  I chose swimming through the pond, but they all said that was a bad choice. 


Big frog:


The kids with Uncle Anthony on a big log (poor Henry’s eye was still hurting):

Jumping off:


Daniel demonstrating the more awesome way to jump off a big log:

After seeing that, Tristan decided it was worth climbing back up for a re-do jump:

Anthony, Henry and Cindy examining a bug:

After we walked all around the pond in the first area, we drove to another little area and ate a picnic lunch.  Then we set off on another trail to find more alligators. 


Henry petting a little baby alligator:

Rachel picking flowers:                                                          


Looking for things:

Trying really hard to find a snake that Tristan had seen in the grass.  He startled it, and it went off into the water.  They searched and searched, but didn’t find it again.  I loved seeing Daniel and Anthony out in the wild looking for animals together – it was so easy to imagine what they were like when they were kids (basically just like Tristan and Oliver). 


I think these were the final two alligators we saw.  Daniel and the kids were keeping track, and we ended up seeing more than 50.  It was a perfect day full of alligators.  


Our cutest little alligator hunter, ready to head back home to Austin. 


The end.

February 2013

My mind doesn’t believe that it’s really April already, so it feels like February just barely happened.

Tristan and Oliver had a lot of basketball games in February.  They were on different teams, and played a lot of games at the same time in different locations, so there was some driving back and forth and juggling schedules to try to watch them play. 

Tristan’s below in white (#3), and Oliver’s in the gray (#4).  Wearing black church socks, I just noticed.  Not sure who let him out of the house like that:


The cheering section:

Rachel working on her backbend:                                               


Melted crayon Valentine hearts hanging on the windows:            


Rachel and Cynthia on Valentine’s Day:

Rachel sharing with Cynthia.  She is such a good big sister:                  

Rachel with big eyes because Cynthia has a death grip on the sucker and is stealing it right out of Rachel’s mouth:                                                


Lizza sorting through all her Valentines after school. 


Also in February, some bonding time with Lucy the snake.  And if you’re wondering if Cindy wears her Avengers shirt almost every day, the answer is yes.  Even if she’s already dressed in something else, she’ll still manage to find it, and then tell me she’ll just wear it “on top of.” 


The kids all had fun not going to school on President’s Day. 

Tristan and Oliver tried to teach Henry some football skills on the xbox:

Rachel and Lizza went outside to jump rope in the rain:


And Cindy celebrated by dressing up with a Darth Vader mask, her Captain America shield, and one cowboy boot.  She clearly knows what President’s Day is all about.


When she’s not dressing up, she still spends a lot of time on puzzles. 


She wanted to move up to some of the “big kid” puzzles, so Henry decided to be her puzzle tutor and teach her how.  He would get so excited whenever she found a piece – he was making the best faces, and acting all “older-brotherly” with his arm around her shoulders and everything.  I love watching my kids try to teach my other kids things.  They snap into “helpful mode”, and act all kind and gentle.  I wish they stayed in that mode always.  (they don't).     


These two are great at working/playing side by side:                                      


And when Henry is gone at playgroup, Captain America fills in as Cindy’s puzzle buddy.  She has such a crush on Captain America.  She has stolen Henry’s action figure for her own (even Henry accepts that it’s basically hers now), and she loves to take him everywhere.  The other day she was telling me that Captain America really likes her and he is her friend, and then she did a big sigh and said, “Captain America is just so awesome.”  Then she did an even bigger sigh and added, “And mom, he’s just so handsome!!” 


She also likes to sneak in some time with Henry’s legos whenever he’s gone.  She knew she was busted here. 


Once in a while they do take a break from puzzles and legos.  I’m not sure what they were doing here with Cindy’s old push cars, but it reminded me of how we used to always turn our big-wheels upside down when we were little and pretend they were ice-cream machines, and we made the ice-cream by turning the pedals with our hands. 


Also in February – Rachel and Lizza started soccer.  This is Lizza’s first year.  She loves it.

She has practice once a week, and the other kids (minus Tristan and Oliver, who are usually at baseball practice) love playing at the park nearby.                                                   


Then twice a week Rachel has her soccer practice at a different park, so Lizza gets a chance to play, too.  It’s actually been really nice, because I’m not great at taking my kids to the park very often, and this way they get to go three times a week.  And in between giving lots of underdogs, I even get in some reading time once in awhile, so it works out great for everyone.                      



Have you ever seen a cuter little tie-dyed belly? When her regular Avengers shirt is in the laundry, she loves wearing this one, because she says it makes her look like Captain America and Ironman, and what could be better than that?  I seriously can’t get over her cuteness sometimes.  I usually think that I’m ready for my family to start growing up, but then lots of times I wish I could just freeze her in this stage forever:


The first day of soccer season was also the first day of baseball season, so it was a pretty wild day.  Early in the morning Daniel took the older boys to their baseball opening ceremony, and then they met up with the rest of us  at the soccer fields for Lizza’s first game. 

This girl was born to be a soccer player.             


Everyone cheering her on. 


And also catching bugs:                                                                 


Lizza scoring her first goal.  Since it’s her first year and we didn’t know how well she would do, Daniel told her he would pay her $2 for any goals she makes this season (thinking maybe she would get one).  She’s already scored 10, and we’re not even halfway through the season.  She’s going to be an expensive little soccer player.

She was so funny to watch on the bench after she scored.  Before that point, she had been acting really intense and serious, and then here she is after – non-stop talking.  I’m sure she was replaying the whole thing to her friends:                                                           


After Lizza’s game we had time for a short lunch break, and then it was time for Rachel’s game.  This is her 3rd year playing, but the last two years neither of her coaches had ever coached before, and her teams never won a single game, so she still has no idea what she’s doing.  This year she’s with a much more experienced coach, so hopefully she’ll learn a little bit.  She’s just too nice and mellow to ever want to go kick the ball away from anyone.  We’ve tried telling her it’s okay to get a little aggressive out there, but it just doesn’t come naturally to her (which is just fine with me – it’s why she’s such an easy kid). 


After both soccer games were done, we all drove over to the baseball fields.  There was still an hour before the boys’ games started, so the little kids played at the playground while we waited:


Tristan and Oliver’s first games both started at the same time, on different fields.  Daniel is coaching Tristan’s team again this year, so he and Tristan headed over to their game, and the rest of us walked across the complex to watch Oliver play. 


Oliver’s game finished a lot earlier than Tristan’s, so we walked back over and were able to watch the end of Tristan’s game, too.                                                              


It was a long day, and everyone was pretty worn out by the time we finally got home that evening.  After I got all the kids fed and bathed and jammied, I found Henry and Cynthia reading together at the table.  Because there’s nothing like a good book (or Lego magazine, in Henry’s case) when you’ve been out all day watching soccer and baseball:

And speaking of reading, Henry has been having so much fun with his new skill.  He reads everything he can get his hands on:

Another night, some more readers, all cozy on the couch (with gloves on, even!  It must have been pretty chilly). 


At the end of February, Rachel and Lizza finished their latest gymnastics session at the rec center.  They’ve had a lot of fun doing it, and I love that it’s close, inexpensive, and they can be in the same class as each other.


But I’m pretty sure their favorite part is that they get a special medal after the last class. 


The end.