We had such a nice few days this past weekend.
Friday night was our Cotton Bowl party, and we had a fantastic crowd. Our new TV performed beautifully to show every detail of the Tigers’ win over the farmers–err–Aggies. I have to confess that I actually watched very little of the game. I spent most of the time happily socializing and hostessing in the kitchen or the playroom. I was a little worried at first when some of our Aggie friends started showing up in their painted game overalls, but I am happy to report that there were no major altercations.
On Saturday, Michael and I both had full, great days, but spent little of the day actually in the same place. Sometimes that happens I guess. 🙂
Michael went to his monthly men’s prayer group around 8a.m., and I headed off with El Bebe on a long walk with some friends in a nearby neighborhood. It just so happens that my humble neighborhood is right across the street from one of the most beautiful neighborhoods in Houston. I had never really been in the neighborhood before. It’s not a gated community(which is a little surprising to me), so we just parked in their country club lot and headed off to explore.
The houses are all so gorgeous! They are all custom, and most of them are very Southern, with lots of shady streets with oak trees and landscaping and white columns and wrought iron and tall windows…these homes remind me so much of all my favorite houses in Baton Rouge and New Orleans. I can’t wait to take my mom for a walk through this neighborhood next time she comes to visit! She’d love it.
After Michael and I both returned home from our morning activities, we scrambled to get ready for our midday activity, a first birthday party for Audrey Therese, the daughter of some good friends of ours, the Fontanas. Unfortunately, I could only stay a few minutes because of a Life Teen meeting commitment at 12:30, so I had to leave early.
Little did I know I was going to really miss all the fun!
Peter Fontana came up and told Michael and I when we arrived that his family had a special tradition that on each child’s first birthday: the birthday boy or girl was put into a box filled with whipped cream and strawberries with whatever friends of theirs were a year old as well. That meant that Gabriel and the child of some other friends of ours, Blaise, got to strip down to their diapers and eat as much whipped cream and strawberries as they wanted! On camera, of course! See below 🙂
My Life Teen meeting did go extremely well, however, and I was pleased with all of the much-needed planning that we got accomplished.
I was also pleased that our team leader, Fiona, planned the meeting to end right as Saturday confessions were beginning, so I got to attend a much-needed confession as well. Michael and I decided recently to start attending confession once a month, but both of us have let the holidays and general forgetfulness to defeat our best intentions. It felt absolutely wonderful to feel the spiritual strength and graces this sacrament always gives me so much of.
When I got home from my meeting and confession, Michael was just about finished up with an impromptu game of football he was out playing with a few guys we know. I got to spend a few minutes visiting with some sweet friends of mine (the wives of the aformentioned “few guys”) who volunteered to stay at the house and babysit Gabriel as he took his afternoon nap.
That evening, I curled up in bed early with a few chapters of a wonderful book I’m reading, Graced and Gifted, by Kimberly Hahn, and fell asleep nice and early. Yes…9:00p.m. would be a lovely regular bedtime I think!
It was very fortuitous that I got some good sleep on Saturday night, because Gabriel decided to arise surprisingly nice and early on Sunday morning to the tune of 6:21a.m. He normally sleeps until 7 or 7:15a.m. on the weekends, so this was something of an unwelcome “nice and early” surprise if you catch my drift, but I won’t complain further because lots of my friends get much, much, much less sleep than I do.
The good news is that I had enough reserves to be generally cheerful about the early wakeup call. I found myself surprisingly cheerful even when Michael, still in a NyQuil-induced stupor (he’d gone to bed late and hadn’t felt well the night before), attempted valiantly to get up with Gabriel and I, but just collapsed in a big, warm, sleepy, non-responsive ball on the living room couch. The bigger they are, the harder they sleep I guess!
The rest of Sunday was spent doing house chores, preparing for the Life Night, cleaning our two cars, and dealing with an uncharacteristically cranky 13 month old. Overall, it was a good day. The only rough part of the day was my 9:30-11:15p.m. cooking spree after I got back from Life Teen. I suddenly got a burst of energy to cook when I realized that I was starting the week with no prepared food for either of my boys to eat the next day. I HATE not having enough food for my boys! So, to keep with my plan to make big batches of food, my crazy self made a triple recipe of homemade meatballs, spaghetti sauce, pasta, and (count it) two batches of steamed sweet potatoes. And I did ALL the dishes before I got in bed.
What was I thinking?
I don’t know, really.
I can tell you what I’m thinking now though…9:00p.m. would be a lovely bedtime tonight. 🙂
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