At Gramma's House

As I mentioned, we took a little road trip.  Wednesday afternoon, we headed toward my mom's house.  We made a stop along the way to get haircuts.

Yeah..I know sounds crazy, but I have been going to the same hairdresser for 20 years.  I love that I can go in and she knows exactly what I need.  Bette is amazing as she changes up my style just enough to keep it fresh and stylish without making me work too hard to keep it that way.  It is also nice to have someone who knows your history so they can talk to you with ease.  She was so excited to meet Zaira.  I am sure she will one day be trimming up her hair just like she did for Amanda.

It is so hard to believe that this how we first met so many years ago.  Actually, Bette had been cutting my hair for about two years and then we had a problem!  Amanda (young pre-schooler) decided to cut her own hair and Bette had to fix her trim job.  It was quite an ordeal and Amanda ended up with a bob-cut!  Bette managed to make her look adorable.  We have never left Bette for more than a hair cut or two in all of the years since then.

Since I was getting a haircut, the boys decided to follow suit and found a local barber shop to get their own hair trimmed.  No bonding story for these guys, except the fact that the barbers have been cutting Aggie Corps of Cadets for many years.  It took them a while to make the rounds with only tow barbers on duty to cut five heads!

We also made a side trip to see introduce Zaira to some long time friends of ours.  It turned out our impromptu stop was not possible because they were all sick.  Only Kimberly was able to step out of the house to cooing over her from the side of the car!  She is such a good friend that we were still able to spend an hour talking to her.  She also promised to gather up all her girly clothes and have them for us the next time we were in town!  It is nice to have such a good friend!

We finally made it to Mom's around 10pm and we all went right to sleep...EXCEPT Brendan who had slept in the car most of the evening!  He decided to stay up playing beside my bed with Army guys!  Around 2am I finally told him the soldiers had to go back in the toybox.  He told me no every time he put a toy in the box and managed to fall asleep beside Michael!

We enjoyed Thursday with my Mom.  Michael had to do some military training and took the car.  I think Zaira was glad that we did not have an excuse to go some where.  We just had the time to relax and talk.  My Mom also introduced Zaira to her new 'doll friend.'  This doll is a 3 foot tall cloth coll with yarn hair.  She wears a purple dress with butterflies and Zaira will have a matching dress when she is a little older!  Mom made the doll because I mentioned it would be nice to have a stuffed animal to take Zaira's picture throughout the years.  Mom decided that a doll was a better choice.  I think we will name the doll Rose.  Amanda and I both have similar dolls that we cherish. Maybe we can all take pictures with our dolls when she comes for a visit!

Today is an even slower day.  Michael left for his second day of training and Mom had to go to work.  It is also raining here...flash floods throughout the area!  We are enjoying being lazy with old TV shows and computer games.

We did have a visitor for lunch.  My brother Adrian stopped by and ate with us.  It was nice for him to get to meet Zaira.  It was a good visit where we were able to catch on the last few months.  Zaira decided that she would sleep through the visit!  I still managed to get a picture of Adrian with Zaira.  One day (all too soon) she will remember him for his nickname...Uncle Rootbeer.

When Michael came home we loaded all the children in the car and took them to the park.  It was in between rain storms so the boys were able to play and get rid of some of their excess energy.  We stayed until it began to rain again.  Zaira slept through this event as well.  She woke up as we got her back in the car...I am sure she thought we were crazy as we tried to make it back in the car without getting wet!

The day ended with a leisure dinner and watching another round of old TV shows.

I cannot end without sending a birthday message out to my brother, Christopher.  He probably will not read this blog but just in case...I wanted him to know he was not forgotten.  The children call him Uncle Bubbles and sang a greeting to him on his answering machine...maybe we will still talk to him later in the night.