June

6.2.14
Dylan received several awards from school, I guess down here they do award ceremonies instead of fifth grade graduation. He received an honor for participation in choir and having high grades in math, science, and reading.

6.4-6.14
Our kids got to spend some time with their second cousin (I think that's what he is) Cameron. He spent a couple of nights at our home while his mom made a trip to Arkansas.

6.6.14
Summer officially began for the Giovannoni's.

6.7.14
The Mr. and Dylan flew out to spend 10 days in Utah.

6.8.14
A first since living in Texas...We made it to church on time. It's amazing how much quicker things went with 2 less people.  We even had time for a picture!

6.11.14
Aunt Cozette gave Dylan a haircut at her school. I thought growing his hair out might help give me the ability to actually style it, but I was wrong it just got bushier and bushier.  Thanks Cozette for making him look like a handsome young man again.

 6.14.14
Derik ran the Utah Valley Marathon.  It was the first marathon he's attempted since hurting and then having surgery on his ankle.   He messaged me early the morning of the marathon and told me he wasn't running it, BUT I KNEW BETTER....  Several hours later I received an email showing me his race medal and race time.  Mr Giovannoni I'm so proud and happy for you!  You are an example to me of always pushing through difficult things.

6.15.14
I got out of doing anything for Fathers Day this year (since the only father I'm near enough to do anything for happened to be far far away), but the kids missed having a dad to shower their Sunday School treats on. 

6.17.14
The Mr and Dylan came back home.  Have I ever mentioned that driving in Houston traffic at 6:00 pm gives me unbearable anxiety.  I made Derik drive us all home from the airport because I couldn't stop shaking from having to drive there. 

6.22.14
Alivia and I made a large batch of cinnamon rolls. We experimented around and made them with Coconut Oil and Coconut Sugar and they turned out heavenly...So good that we wanted to share them with every neighbor we had.  I was even brave enough to run some over to the new couple who moved in two doors down.
 
The rest of the month was pretty quiet.  Having all four kids home all day everyday is a challenge for me.
With few friends, no family, hot SWEATY weather, no place to go, and limited electronic time, we all get crazy and grouchy and irritated with each other.

I found this little gem on the floor of our car after church one Sunday.
I laughed so hard when I read Isaac's answer to the question at the bottom that my neighbor came out of her garage and said, "I don't think I've ever heard you laugh, that must be really funny"!
First off I was amazed that Isaac's Sunbeam teachers understood him, and secondly it was an answer right from his heart, and just one of the many reasons I love having Isaac around.

He likes to eat dinner...Yes that is totally my Isaac! 

May

Dylan celebrated his Eleventh birthday.
He chose to have Ribs and Homemade Pizza for his birthday dinner.
His dear friend Matthew and his dad took him to a movie.
He got the Harry Potter book series and a brand new bike.

 

He also earned his Arrow of Light in Scouts.

He graduated Cub Scouts and is now a Boy Scout

In just three days he will graduate from Elementary.  He was awarded and recognized for his academic and choral preformances.

The Mr. helped me out the other day so I could surprise Alivia at her end of school party.  

 She has loved the first grade and most especially her teacher this year Mrs. T.

Isaac gave his first talk in primary!
Nobody understood a single word, but he did great!
Other that that he's managed to frustrate his mother and annoy the neighbors with his stealth ability to sneak out of the house.

Abrielle finds great joy in teasing and tickling, saying hello and waving to anyone and every one.  She's definitely shaping up to be another tried and true Giovannoni  and her big personality shines through more and more each day.  She's discovered that she loves to climb, so all of my kitchen chairs now reside on top of the table, because she refuses to stay off them.  I thought she was getting so tall until she had her Dr's appointment and I learned she's only in the 44th percentile for her height. 

Mothers Day and my birthday brought a flood of lovely cards and a lot of laughs from my children.  There's a lot of them.

 One of my favorites "V" if for don't know, "U" is for unmean".

And it's nice that she reminded me that God loves me :)

 Alivia:  My mom makes the best play dough...Couldn't stop laughing!

Derik bought me a beautiful new garden swing for my birthday since my last one was way past gone. Abrielle thinks the swing is for her she loves it.

The garden is doing well.  My tomato plants are so big and heavy they have all ripped or tipped over their cages.  Isaac loves raiding the cherry tomato plant every day.  My squash plants suddenly up and died yesterday but other than that, everything is still thriving.

I have done a little building here and there.
I made these matching nightstands.

I painted our front living room a gray green color called Cliveden Gray Morning .

Just today I finished these crown moulding shelves for a friend.  I made her two so they are stacked on top of each other so they stay safe until she can come get them. 

Catch-Up

Dylan
His fifth grade Science Fair Project kept us busy for a while....Not this mothers favorite homework assignment.  I really wanted this to be an experiment he could do by himself and enjoy and learn from, so we researched topics he likes, i.e. Bridges, Earthquakes, Tsunamis, and Tornado's.  He liked a  project that involved learning which bridge structure stood up best against earthquakes.  We ordered a recommended bridge kit (for this particular experiment) and I put off making him do it until the very end, BAD idea..  We soon learned that even though people had reported success with this idea we just couldn't get it to work.  The bridge kit was just to sturdy and even after throwing the bridges into the floor repeatedly we couldn't get the structures to break (which was sort of the point).   He then tried tooth picks and marshmallows, but those bridges proved to be to flimsy to accurately gauge anything.  So I was in a total panic as to what he was going to do last minute.  Thankfully his teacher okayed him changing up his original idea a little and things went rather smoothly after that.
Here's what the end results looked like.

So glad that it's over with, I was so stressed out about the whole thing.  Just three years til I have to go through that again.  

Dylan also did his last Derby Car Race in Scouts.  His car managed to be the slowest one again!  Dylan was an emotional wreck about it just like the last three years.  Abrielle had a coughing fit right before the race began and she vomited half digested pineapple all over me and herself, so gross. I sat in the hall, puke covered while trying to console Dylan while Derik wrangled the rest of the kids and tried to help with the race, therefore I didn't get any pictures this year.  Yep I'm glad that event is over with too!

Alivia

Remember how I promised a picture of her with her "new" birthday bike?  Well here it is six months later.

It always makes me laugh when I pop the SD card into the computer and see all the selfies my kids take   

 Alivia got another beautiful and fantastic letter sent home from her teacher.  It so nice to have that positivity in my life. I'm so glad she works so hard and is so eager to be everyone's friend.  

Isaac

He finally had his fourth birthday.  He asked months in advance if we could go to the beach for his birthday so that's what we did.  It was a beautiful day and I think the kids had a real good time.  We got home in time to open presents and have cake before crashing in bed.  

He finally got his own remote control helicopter, since he refused to leave his dads alone.  

 

 He also got himself a shiny new bike as well.

Abrielle

My snugly love-bug is so full of "personality" these days. 

When we went to Galveston for Isaac's birthday the first thing she did was stick her head in the sand and rubbed her head back and forth, I thought she had fallen the first time so I brushed her off and then she turned around and did it again on purpose.   Every time I would clean her off she'd do it again. So we just went with the sand mohawk look.

I've been keeping myself excessively busy.  

I spent a good chunk of the last month out in the yard.  I ripped up my garden boxes and did something a little different.  I planted trees and flowers.  Other than having to re-sod some patches in the back yard that I tore up the yard looks gloriously beautiful.  

I finished my shoe dresser too.  One of  my favorite builds.  I ran out of paint and so the paint job is pretty horrible, I distressed it hoping that would distract from the bad paint job, but I loved the stained flourish so much that I didn't want to try and mess with the paint job.   It is a shoe holder after all so I'm not stressing to much about it.  It fits perfectly in my tiny front entry way with out being in the way because it's only six inches wide.  I love how the doors tilt out so I can get quite a few pairs of shoes in it.

I also painted up the shelf I had made before and hung it across the way from the shoe dresser so the kids had a place for their backpacks.  

 My latest build is the whole reason I really wanted a wood router.  I made this Faux window frame and it turned out almost perfectly.  I know it's stupid and silly but I could stare at it all day.   I just can't believe I actually made it.  I eventually plan on putting a picture behind it but for now it just adorns my wall in it's barest beauty.

The Mr.

Derik has been crazy busy at work.  Like I never see him busy.

He gets to move from his corporate office to the facility that is super close to our home this month.  It will be nice having him work so close to home. 

He's back to training for a marathon.  He's hoping to run one in June.

Frr Frr Frozen

Looks like Alivia's Hero Elsa came for a visit.

Dear Elsa you should let it go...I can't hold it back anymore...I'm ready for Spring!

(Alivia actually stood by the window posing this morning,

 she was like "I love Frozen, it's frozen outside mom, take my picture"!)

I fought a huge crowd of over zealous gardeners at this years county extensions vegetable sale on Saturday.  Boy I'm glad I didn't plant my stuff yet!  On average the last freeze/frost date here is Feb 18.  

My poor trees and bushes were just starting to recover and get new leaves and buds from the first hard freeze.   Let's hope they'll recover twice. 

Sunday Snippets

February 3 - 15, 2014

The Mr. and I went out to a Chinese buffet for lunch to celebrate our Wedding anniversary.  We went on a Monday so we only had two kids with us instead of all four. I really didn't like the Chinese they had to offer, but the salad and wedge fries I had were pretty good.  Even if the food was sub-par the kids were pretty good and it was nice to get out. 

 These pictures was taken on the morning of February the 5th.  I just had to document the first snow I've experienced here in Houston.   Funny thing is the day it actually snowed the kids had to go to school and didn't have a "snow day", oh the irony...

See it on the tramp and roof tops?

My neighbors whom I really really like (but have just recently gotten to know) whom have three (great) kids the same age as mine had my three oldest children over for a movie and pizza night.  I think it was the first time since the Mr. and I moved here that we could sit down in silence and watch a movie of our own.  It was extra nice cause we weren't paying out the nose for a babysitter either.  Usually we are hosting the neighborhood kids or watching someone elses children, so they can go on a date night.  It was exceptionally nice to be on the other end of the deal this time.  It makes me want to cry thinking these wonderful neighbors are moving this month.  I am going to miss them! 

I'm not much for partying or holidays or birthdays, I'm like the scrooge of everything, but I decided that maybe my attitude and choices about those things were rubbing off on my kids.  So I've been trying to exert a little effort into doing something special for my kids when holidays or important events roll around this year.

For Valentines (my least favorite holiday) I gave each person in our family a cheesy valentines that involved something they enjoyed.   

I made our dinner Italian themed.  It included Two-Timing Pasta (a blend of Marinara and Alfredo sauce) Salad, Garlic Bread, a Cherry topped Black Forest Cake from scratch, and homemade Italian Sodas.    

We waited and waited for the Mr. to come home from work, but when it became apparent he was coming home anytime soon, the kids and I lit-up some candles turned off the lights and had a wonderful date night.  

We took turns telling each other why we loved each other.  It actually was a fun night.  The kids ask to do candle lit dinners all the time now.  

Isaac was upset about something and threw a shoe at me from the top of our stairs.  I was busy undressing the baby and didn't see it coming.  The corner of the the sole of his Sunday shoe stuck right in the side of my eye.  I thought I had been shot.  All l know is my world went black and I started screaming and bawling and flailing all over the floor.  Darn that kids aim!  Oh how it hurt, I remember first thinking I was blind, and then when I stopped panicking and started being rational I realized I could still see, but everything was fuzzy and my eye burned with each blink.  Eventually my vision cleared and I just had a blood shot eye.  Thank goodness there was no permanent damage.  

Miss Abrielle is a walking machine, and she won't be contained.  She refuses to let anyone hold her during church.  She wants to be all over discovering everything.  She is covered in bruises though.  She tripped walking around with her daddies cup in her mouth and has a giant ring bruise that goes around her whole face.  My mom sent her these really adorable dresses  for her first birthday.  I tried to grab a picture of her cuteness, but like I said she wanted nothing to do with being still.  

She totally let out a very loud fart during the closing prayer in Sunday School.  The youth in our class appreciate the laughs she brings.  She just stood there grinning at them as they giggled at her.

Both Alivia and Dylan are working hard on memorizing the Articles of Faith, they each have the first three memorized.  It's my hope, we'll have them all memorized before Alivia's baptism.

She's ONE

I've heard it a million times before, you know that saying that goes, "time flies when you're having fun" and while I'm not sure I'd call the last year fun (stressful and chaotic are coming to mind) time has flown!
I'm having a hard time coming to terms with my baby being one.  She is so sweet and snugly and innocent and content, that it makes my heart hurt a little to see her grown up.  It's selfish of me, because she's quite happy to grow up and learn and explore life, It just happened so fast for me that I feel like I didn't get to enjoy her as much as I wanted to.
Abrielle Elizabeth Giovannoni,
I thank God for your precious spirit every single day! I desperately wanted you!  And I love, love, love you!
You are everything sweet.   Your greatest pleasure in life is being snuggled, from day one you weren't happy or content unless someone was holding you close.  I find myself a little put out every now and then when you're whining for me to hold you, but the minute I pick you up, I remember and thank you for demanding the love you so earnestly deserve.  You have a magical ability to calm me.  It's hypnotic to listen to you breath next to me, you just have a way of stilling me from the inside out.
You love to eat, anything and everything.  You make noises while you eat, just like Isaac.  It's quite comical to listen to the two of you moan your way through a meal.
You inherited the Giovannoni - Ward stubborn disposition.  I've decided there is no escaping this genetic mash up.  You will do what ever your heart pleases no matter the consequences.
Thankfully you really only desire to eat and be held so you haven't gotten yourself in to to much trouble yet.
You have two brothers and a sister wrapped around your little finger.  They tease and torment you to no end, but you also have your happiest moments with them.  They make you laugh and they take care of you when I'm not available to.
You are definitely daddy's "baby".
You are the worlds lightest sleeper.  Everything wakes you up. I have never been able to successfully transfer you when you are sleeping. 
You have my eyes.  You look so very much like me, sometimes it cracks me up to see my face and facial expressions staring back up at me.
You have a bunch of teeth.  I should probably count them and put an actual number down but you are asleep on my lap as I write this and I don't want to wake you up.
You love being outside.
You still don't have much hair on the top of your head and a bunch on the back, it's sort of like a mullet I guess.  I am however loving the little wispy curls your back hair has. You REFUSE to wear any sort of headband or bow so everyone thinks you're a handsome little fella! 
I am so happy that you are mine, that you are happy and healthy, that our family was blessed with your presence.  Thanks girl for making me love that much deeper!