This is classic. I went to my dad’s work yesterday for a few medical appointments. He manages the building and works in the parking booth out front, so he knows everyone very well. And he is hard to miss. Everywhere I went, I was met with the “Gary’s son” tag. Cool. Whatever.

I meet this one guy, though, and he calls me Logan.

“No, that’s my brother. I’m Brandon,” I say.

“Oh, I have your shirts!”

No, I haven’t been holding out on you about a secret designing gig. The guy was referring to my Bar Mitzvah shirts. Something about a show…I don’t remember. It was Oscar-themed. All I know is that my dad wears those damn shirts around all the time and I hate it. And now, apparently, strange ponytail man he knows wears them too. Great.

Anyway, I just got back from a movie – Invictus. It was great and it didn’t even seem like a sports movie due to all of the political references. However, my friend farted the entire movie through. I’ve been stinking up my house (it’s the soy milk my dad bought me!), but I did not fart in that theatre. “B”, on the other hand, stunk the house up. It was vile. I should have known she was gassy since she farted all over my bed before we left. My bad.

Also, the rugby players made me very horny. I am now obsessed with rugby. They are so beefy and solid. I love it. Hi, Matt Damon. Really, all I could think about the entire movie – besides sports, race relations, politics, Africa – was ripping the clothes off of 95% of the team. Even the older, fatter ones. I love big butts and, no, I cannot lie. Well, I can. But I don’t. I probably should.

This was a far better movie than the other one i saw this week, Did You Hear About the Morgans? Yes, I heard about the Morgans and I’d rather hear about Jersey Shore for the millionth time than see that movie again.

Besides all of the movies (I also watched two I got for Hannukah) and my writing work that I have been doing, home has been blissfully low-key. My nieces have been over a few times and they are as adorable as ever, singing Paparazzi and doing the Single Ladies dance.

I’ll check in soon, kiddos.

BM

After spending a weekend entertaining my little brother in College Station, I packed up two weeks worth of clothes (NOTE: My Italy packing is going to be laughable.  I brought five bags for two weeks this time.  How on earth am I going to get that down to two 70 lb bags with 3 months worth of clothes in the fall?) and headed back home to Angleton.

As always, my two beautiful nieces are a couple of the best parts of coming home.  The “babies” are getting big on me!  Nina is so smart (and I’m not just saying that!).  She just turned 3, and she already has a huge vocabulary, a bunch of little-kid songs completely memorized, and she can recognize written numbers.  Leah is just beginning to talk (she can say “uh-oh” and “ball”), and is a complete mama’s girl.  She loves to eat!

Just a few minutes after I got home on Sunday, I was off to search for the House of the Century with William.  I’ll do a separate post for those adventures, but it definitely made my Christmas break.  I’m not really into adventures… but I guess when architecture is involved, I buck up and deal with the mud/bugs/barbed wire.

I have a few projects for over the break.  #1 is a haircut!  Ever since that terribly short haircut about a year and a half ago, I’ve been on a little bit of a haircut strike.  #2 is applying for summer camps!  I’m heart-set on working for a camp this summer.  I hate the idea of inundating my references with requests for information, so I’ve only applied to three or four camps right now.  I’m considering applying to a few more soon.  I also decided to feel out the possiblity of an architecture internship, so I’ve sent a couple of firms an exploratory email, just to see if they’d even consider an intern.

#3 is starting half-marathon training.  Today’s the day!  It’s a little too early/cold right now, plus the girls are celebrating Christmas a few days early this morning, so I’ll wait until it warms up.  But, I’m doing it!  Really.

#4 is scrapbooking.  I have a year and a half of pictures to catch up, so my goal over the break is to make a little bit of a dent in that.  It’ll be fun.

During all of this, it’s my intention to straighten out my sleep schedule.  For example, I got tired around 10 last night, so I went to bed.  Now it’s 5:30 am, and I’m awake.  No good.  I’d like to aim for a 9 am-midnight day, maybe even 8 am-11 pm, if I start feeling ambitious.

Merry Christmas for now, just in case I don’t blog before then!  What a beautiful God, who sent us a savior in the form of tiny, fragile, human baby.  Let’s go tell it on the mountain!

I am the worst.  The worst best friend, the worst sister-in-law, the worst everything.  There’s no one out there and there’s nothing left.  I’m pretty sure I have a nephew, but I can’t be sure about that because our cells are shut off and we can’t receive any pictures.  We can get messages, but they are blank.

We have the two girls, one of whom is very anxious to hear about the arrival of her baby brother, but forget that because NOTHING is working.  Nothing here is working anymore.  I am so frustrated, so infuriated, and mostly, deep down, just sad.

My sister-in-law possibly had a c-section, because last I heard she was going into surgery, and they can’t send me anything.  I am so mad…frustrated…sad.  Just, sad.  I want to hold him in my arms and I want to go there and see her but I am just so upset I can’t even…anything.  I didn’t go to her shower and I am totally 100% unreachable now.  I am the worst, the most unreliable.  I want to crawl in bed and make the world disappear.

This is so not how I wanted this day to go.  I wanted to be able to go see him when he was born.  I wanted to be there for her, I wanted to be one of the first to see his picture and tell her how beautiful he was.  I wanted to be pregnant when it happened.

So is it guilt?  Or jealousy?  Or selfishness?

Whatever it is, I don’t like it…and I’m done.

I realized today that Christmas is next week. Next week!! It doesn’t even feel like Christmas. I’m feeling blue. Sleepy, and just blue. There is still shopping to be done, presents to be wrapped, gifts that I know will make people happy, and I just don’t care.

I want to care. I really do. But I don’t feel anything.

On the up side of things, I talked with my sister-in-law, and we will be welcoming my nephew to the world in just two days. My beautiful, wonderful nieces will be here tomorrow evening to spend several days, and I am finding it in me to at least be a little bit excited about that. I probably love those two girls more than any other children on the planet.

I love my husband, I love our dogs, and I love my job. I can’t wait to hold my nephew in my arms, and I can’t wait to hug my sister-in-law and congratulate her.

But I am still feeling down.

I don’t like feeling down at this time of year. I have so much to be thankful for…but somehow, I can’t even care. It is what it is.

Brother rings every afternoon now that it’s Hanukkah, which is sort of funny. We’re totally non-practicing but there’s that thing where you have to at least recognize it!

On the second night, received a photo of the girls with Santa Claus.They’re practically grown. Next year, #1niece may be too good to sit with her little sisters!

You know what I say to my ignorant niece. Good bye and good rittens . Ya’all don’t come back now ya hear! Hope you grow up real soon before your daddy has a heart attack from saving your ass all the time and you screw up your son’s life who you claim to care about so much but are too worried about your own needs before his basic needs.

That is probably what I will tell her on the way to the airport.  Along with a few other things.

I have this niece. She use to be a cute little princess type of kid who was daddy’s girl.  Obviously that didn’t turn out so well for my Brother or his wife. She did at least finish high school and then… started going gangbanging with her boy friend, got arrested for being in a drive by. She was never convicted but I am sure she was involved. I just have a feeling she was thats all. Anyway she found out she was pregnant while she was locked up for the whole 2 weeks she was because she got bailed out by her loving Daddy. I told him not to get her out, I told him to leave her ass in there because I knew she wouldnt learn a damn thing if he did get her out. Lucky for her the witnesses claimed that it wasnt her at the “drive by”  because I am sure they wanted to take thier own revenge later.  I know how things work , I grew up in the same area. I am not stupid as I have told her a million times since she was 12.

So she has the baby and stays with “baby daddy” as she calls him. Whatever…   They get an apartment that lasted for a couple of months. She moves back in to dear old Dad’s house after leaving the baby daddy in the apartment.  Soon baby daddy follows her to my brother’s house and they proceed to live there rent free and jobless with thier food stamps. No one in my family approves of this behavior , you know getting food stamps if you “really” dont need them and I dont mean people who have a job and do need them , I mean people who don’t bother to get a job and sell their food stamps to other people for 75 cents on the dollar because they dont intend to actually feed people with the free government money they got for doing absolutely nothing. or living rent free off your relatives when you are capable of getting a JOB. So baby daddy and her get into lots of fights. She kicks him out she takes him back blah blah blah . The last draw for my Brother was when he strted tearing up the house. He said baby daddy wasn’t welcome there any more.

She is finally (or so we are told) done with baby daddy and wants to try and forget him and do something with her life. She asks Gramma, my Mom, if she can come here and stay in our state instead of staying in her state.  Of course Gramma says yes and since me and my family live next door we are subject to this as well.  Don’t get me wrong,  I am all about helping my family, I was really hoping she would straighten out her life. My niece gets here and decides she wants to go to school. Since I am mainly a stay at home mom I offered to babysit for her while she attends classes.  Classes were starting the next day when we found the one she wanted so she had to wait till the next session. She bubble fucks around and we start thinking she realy isnt doing anything to get to school. We find out that the next session has been canceled and she has to wait till the next one. Mean while she is doing NOTHING to be helpful around either house except take my daughter over to play with her son because that basically keeps him out of her hair and busy so she can sit on her ass and text with the phone her dad pays for and use the internet my mom pays for. . She is a lazy ass Mother who doesnt change her kid regularly and he is always getting a fricking diaper rash. He was eating crap for food , chips , cookies , candy  Basically anything that is easy to shut him up or a bottle of milk . He is 14 months old he needs more then a bottle of milk now doesn’t he.  She can not keep a schedule for him because if it interfears with her time it isnt good for her so he will be dragged around cranky if she can’t find one of uus to sucker into babysitting. So in short she has food stamps , doesnt work , doesnt go to school and doesnt help my Mother keep her house clean. Here is what she does do. Go out every single night with the people she met in the short time she has been here,  steal thier pot ( or so i was told)  and resell them and then mooch off a neighbor for his pot when she has none. She did get caught by my Mom driving her car while smoking pot (not cool) and now that we dont all bow down to her princess ways she wants to go home back to daddy cause it is just a little to hard for her here and she is tired of us being all in her bitness! Sorry hunny you made us be in your bitness.    UGH!!! All this and she claims on her myspace page  to be an independent woman doin it all on her own UGH!!! PULEEZE!!!

15 days before christmas… and I’m almost finished with my christmas shopping! I usually start buying gifts in September, because with a lot of cousins and nephews and nieces and friends, I really need an early start in buying gifts, because if I rush it I tend to just buy whatever I see and that is usually a mistake!

The christmas tree is gorgeous! So is the Belen (nativity figurines)… although I think I kind of went over-budget with the decorations. But darn it! Our christmas tree is 12 ft. high! It’s so hard to fill it up with decorations without it not looking too bare. And we can’t exchange it for something smaller because our living room is so big, a smaller tree would look out of place.

Anyway, I’m also having fun thinking about what to prepare for christmas dinner. Although we’re cooking some old favorites, I’m also thinking of some new dish I could introduce to the family. Any ideas? Well, I’ll try food network later, and see if there’s anything not too complicated for me!

I’m also thinking of making gingerbread cookies. It will be fun to see the expressions on my nephews’ faces when they see the designs of the cookies I’ll bake!

Then, I still have to bake some cupcakes for my cousins’ christmas parties at school. Yep, I got roped in to do all the dirty work. In exchange I told them I’m expecting some nice surprise under the christmas tree! Yup, christmas is truly the season for giving and receiving!

I saw this pic on the internet and now I’m using it as my desktop wallpaper…

Blue Christmas

So in 30 minutes, I’ll be entering the lion’s den (aka sleepover with the nieces) and I’m looking for ways to entertain them, when we’ve tired of coloring, wrestling, “pretend” and TV. And by “we” I do mean myself, not the girlies. I’m great and car games and heavily rely on my mobile phone as a backup, below are a few favorites and would love to hear more suggestions.

Games on the fly…

“How much does x animal weigh?” Ask the little ones to guess how much an elephant, zebra, whale, python, giraffe weighs…let your imagination go, trust me it takes days before you run out of suspects in the animal kingdom. If we’re in the car I pull up Wikipedia on my phone and away we go. Plus, you never know, next time the small talk at happy hour gets dull bust out your plethora of animal weights…see who’s silent then.

The Guessing Game – Disney style. “I’m thinking of a character.” This game we can play for hours, it’s amazing how many characters, princesses, and villains Disney has created. Although playing with a 3-year old we get a lot of Princess Aurora and Snow White. And the five-year old is convinced iCarly should be in that category, although as a kid I would have argued the same for Punky Brewster or Rainbow Brite. I mean come on? Fabulous outfit – check! Great hair – check! Own tv show – check! Doll – check! Hard to argue otherwise.

And last but not least – Bubble Breaker on my phone. It’s even more cool now that I have the HTC Imagio with a Touch Screen. I’ve seriously moved up on the cool auntie scale after that plane ride. She was even telling the Gram, how cool my new phone is now.

Have other suggestions? Trust me I’ll need them, post away.

I think that anyone in my position would have baby fever.  I am surrounded by pregnant people and people with infants.  Over Thanksgiving I found out that both of my step-sisters are pregnant.  Add those babies to Jacob, and Jess and I will be aunts 3 times in 2010.  Also, my cousin John and his wife Kathryn had their baby boy yesterday.  They named him Corbin.  I’ve seen a few pictures, and he’s such a cutie!  I can’t wait to see him at Christmas!

Just in case you’re starting to wonder, I assure you Jess and I don’t have anything up our sleeves.  We know that we cannot afford a baby and we are in no rush to have them.  However, we do know that we want to have them and that we want our children to have relationships with cousins, aunts, uncles, grandparents, etc.

I almost wish we were ready so our kids would be able to have the same kinds of relationships that I had with my cousins when I was growing up.  I had 4 first cousins on my mom’s side and 10 on my dad’s side.  Needless to say, I’ve never had a dull holiday!  It was awesome to have so many cousins, especially the ones who were close to me in age.  I never realized how lucky I was until talking to Jess about it.  Most of her cousins lived in New York or Ohio, not to mention she was the youngest, so no one really wanted to hang out with her.  I have some really amazing childhood memories, and I hope that one day we will get to provide some wonderful memories for our children.

In the meantime I’ll have to settle for being the best aunt ever!  It’s not so much a consolation prize as it is an incredible opportunity.  I feel so lucky to already have 5 nieces and nephews in my life, and I’m really looking forward to that number increasing to 8.  I guess I’ll end up with a big family after all.  : )

Indeedy!

Yesterday was the best Thanksgiving in decades. The Bigots -Dutch’s side of the family did not come. We were only eight, rather than twenty-eight, and we got to sit at a table.

I set up the video recorder at the beginning of the meal and it’s funny to hear how much I tell the kids, “I like to take a bite of __  with a bite of __.”

There’s a reason for this beyond the fact that I plain old like food! They don’t encourage the children to try things, even crazy shite like DRESSING at Thanksgiving. -that’s a staple; we’re talking TRY, not eat the whole thing–not liking something is fine but if you’ve never tried? I’m always talking “up” foods. So far? It has not worked at all but I live in hope.

Before they came out, I sat down with a drinky-poo and my uke. Had just started playing when a car horn started blaring. Now, I know from my behavior -at least I’m not sharing Thanksgiving Dinner you’ll think I’m on drink number five but in reality? I was just in a good mood and I’m always crazy! That was my first drink and I’ve had one sip. Heh.

Another video -not to worry, it’s not posted where Brother comes in and we have a typical sibling exchange. -for us, anyway He takes my drink and slugs most of it, which is fine. After dinner, I had two to make up for him drinking 2/3 of mine.

Brother wanted to lie down after eating. I opted for a walk and the girls wanted to come. -of course! Oddly, their mother tagged along, which is extremely odd.

Anyway, we’ll leave that but we hiked through the woods and crossed a fence. The kids, being from the city, aren’t exactly skilled at fence-crossing. -particularly with 2 rows of barbed wire on top of a 5 footer Their mother started freaking, as per usual. The kids are pretty much used to their mother freaking, so they proceeded. Their mother stayed on our property but the baby wanted to come with, so we handed her over.

We used the back pasture to go a lot faster than through the woods and ended up at the back corner of our property where it intersects with two others. The back creek gets even better the farther you go -off our property but since their mother was already freaking out…::rolls eyes::

So, we just played in the cold, clear water -wearing Wellies, dur for awhile. I admonished the Childrens that they Must Be Very Careful as they were going to their other grandmother’s house that evening for Another Thanksgiving Dinner That Couldn’t Be Beat.-you get that reference, right?

Naturally, #2niece fell in the water. We were above freezing but barely.

Her mother started to freak but I busied her with handing the baby over to her and yanking #2niece up and out. Meantime, #1niece did an EXCELLENT job of re-crossing the fence! Practice makes perfect!

I double-marched #2niece to the house; mostly, this was to get herself and me away from her not-so-happy mother and also, it did her no harm to generate some body heat.

She took it like a trouper: never cried, never complained, just thought it good fun to be completely submerged in cold water in the woods!

Got her to the house and stripped her, wrapped her up in a huge fuzzy towel and chucked all of her clothing into the dryer. All was well.

They’ll remember that, won’t they?

Oops

#2niece carrying on the Tradition of falling into cold creeks.

I am so thankful for my nieces.   This is a picture of a horse back ride through the mountains.  It was a great time!  My oldest niece loves horses and when she came out to visit we planned this trip.  It was a great trail ride through the desert!  Very fun.  I am also thankful for my baby niece!  Someday she will be old enough to take a horse back ride with!  I am thankful for trips like these that bind our family closer together!   My Dad funded this trip….I am thankful for that too….with 4 girls these kind of trips are really pricey!  Thanks Dad!:)  I really appreciate these trips you provide for us!

What are you thankful for today?

Please visit Karla:

Mr. Darcy’s Dream
by Elizabeth Aston

This was a lovely book. Louisa and Phoebe are of marrying age and spending the summer at Pemberley. These are the nieces of Lizzy and Mr. Darcy. They are lovely girls and it was fun to join them in their quest for love and happiness. There is, of course, an elaborate, beautiful ball and many intriguing characters. This is a light read and a wonderful journey into the world of Austen. Ms. Aston did a great job of recreating Jane Austen’s world. I recommend this for anyone whether you enjoy Austen or not.

Day two in New Zealand and there are more bonuses being here than just missing the bad weather in the UK, two very very good reasons.

My two little nieces, Princess Genesis who is nearly 4 and beautiful bug-eyed Asha who is 4 and a half months old.

Today, Gen and I played Princess and Evil Stepmothers and lil Asha played with her bug.

I had a lot of fun today, a lot of fun with my two little friends.

I’ve mentioned before that every eight years, I get engaged. It’s just something that seems to happen, like those bugs that hatch every few years and cause a plague upon the earth. At first, it seems exciting, but then it turns out to be a horrible idea. That’s the bad news here.

The good news is, every same eight years, I am also blessed with a new niece born of my sister, Christa.

So welcome, dear tiny Cora. In the words of my friend Sonia, you’re gonna like it here.

possibly the cutest halloweeners EVER:

we present two of our six nieces, clad in pink, sparkles, and plenty of superwoman-ness head to toe:

what was your best halloween costume?

i remember wanting to be cinderella when i was in 1st grade. grandma made the perfect cinderella ball gown (you know, the white and blue one where she dances with prince charming before midnight) and i was adament about having “glass slippers.” so mom bought some white slip-on shoes (from hills, i think – remember hills????) and we poured elmer’s glue on them, and sprinkled silver glitter all over to make them sparkly and glass-like. i kept them in my closet for the longest time. if only i could have put my hair up into a lovely bun; but wait, i had mushroom head at age 6. and 5. and 7. yikes.

So I finally got a photo of my new niece.  Her name is Sparrow Cortez Arntzen Wagner.  It’s a mouthful but I like it!  She is so cute.  I hope I get to see her sometime soon.