larger view

Tuesday is my birthday as well as April Fool’s Day. This should be great fun for everyone as usual, except me. All my life on this day I get more then my fare share of April Fool’s jokes, but luckily I have a good sense of humor so it isn’t so bad. My oldest son will be the leader of the jokes for this week, constantly saying the words "April Fool’s". He is 13 and has Down’s Syndrome which means once he gets stuck on a topic it is hard to get him to move on. This is one of his favorite parts of the year and since he also loves when it is anyone’s birthday, it is even better. It should take about 3-4 weeks for his April Fool’s jokes to fade away so I have been trying to get myself it the right frame of mind to keep that smile on my face all month.

Those of you who have read my blogs know that I I also have 2 other boys and a 17 month old baby girl that will be enjoying the April Fool’s fun. I am sure that by the end of the week, my daughter will be saying yet another series of words, this time joining in with her bothers in with her own “April Fool’s daddy.” I think this year might prove to be the cutest April Fool’s yet because of her.  

Loading...

Larger Map

larger view

Sorry for missing a week, but since everyone was on spring break, I took the week off from doing any school work.

This last weekend was Easter, and so we did our yearly ritual of driving out to the country near Yoakum, Shiner and Moulton to spend the weekend with the in-laws and extended family. My extended family grew when I got married from about 10 people to well over 250. This was quite a shock at first to me but over the years I have grown to enjoy having a large family to visit with several times a year.

This year, we went to visit my mother-in-law’s family and spent the day out on the farm. We did the traditional flower picking in the country, followed by nest making for the Easter bunny. This involved 5-6 pickup trucks full of kids and adults riding along dirt roads looking for wild flowers to pick and carry back to the farm to build nests in the driveway. The kids would then all run of and the Easter bunny would come and leave candy in the nests. It is a very cute custom and everyone has a blast. This was the first year for my little girl to participate and she loved playing in the flowers. She actually didn’t eat any of them, which was a relief.

One final note this week.

I discovered that many of my in-laws who live in that part of Texas, have been reading my blog regularly and had many nice things to say about it. I guess this means I will have to keep it going long after my class ends since, I have a growing fan base that I hadn’t even thought about. Thanks for reading!

larger view

Well it’s spring break around here, at least for my kids and my class at Austin Community College. UHV gets spring break next week, but since I take all online classes and work full time I don’t get a spring break this year and it kind of sucks to not get the week off anymore. My kids are off at their grandparents having fun and I get to drag my butt into work on less crowded freeways. That is the one thing I miss about being a full time student with no job. The spring, winter and summer breaks were great.  All that build up and then sheer bliss of no responsibility.

I will get my break in May, when my classes are done for a few weeks. The wife and I will be going to Alaska by boat from Seattle for a week. The kids will still be in school so they get to see it from the other side.

larger view

If you read last week’s blog, you know that I have a shiny, mostly new Mazda RX-8 that I am enjoying. Friday, I came home from work and pulled into the garage and shut of the car. I left the driver door open and when my wife and 16 month old daughter came into the garage to say hi, my daughter ran past me and climbed into the floorboard of the car. She then proceeded to pull herself up onto the driver’s seat and grab the wheel with both hands and make vroom vroom noises. She even puts one hand on the gear shift and pretends to shift.

It is the cutest thing I have seen in a long time. I guess she is going to be a car girl.