Windows On 40

We rounded out February with a small celebration (per request) for a big birthday! The previous weekend we celebrated with siblings and wives at St. Arnold's brewery on a cool and cloudy afternoon. The itinerary was simple: drinks on the patio and a brewery tour. (Thanks to Uncky Dan for many of these photos!)

Here's the birthday boy's portrait. Isn't he handsome? I think the glasses really help counter the necklace to create a nice balance.

It's nice to get baby-sitters during the day! We should do this more often!

The brewery tour was pretty standard stuff. No samples?! I guess this ain't Budweiser! Good times channeling our inner hipsters, nonetheless.

Nothing like a mid-week birthday to keep it small. We tried to go to Pappasito's on a Wednesday night at 6-ish, but the wait was crazy! So, we ended up next door at Pappadeaux's for our kids first seafood restaurant experience. Meh, they were not impressed since most of the food was spicy and kid's portions were too small for Owen. Anyway, back home we went for presents and cupcakes!

I should have presented these camouflaged cupcakes on a different surface. Oh well. Happy birthday, love! I won't tell anyone how old you are.

The kids' school had a silent auction, and we got a good deal on some symphony tickets. So we ventured downtown for a fancy Wild West matinee show. The conductor was dressed as a rodeo clown, and they had a couple of kids' performing groups to help with lyrics and story-telling, since it was a family show.

Their school also had a 'wear your college colors' day, so I had to document them in their burnt orange! Hook 'em!

February was also good for our windows. We got uniform, clean, new white blinds on all the windows in the house! No more cat-peeping windows with sun-faded, wood-colored middles, or mini venetian blinds upstairs, or 12-foot long tilt rods hanging precariously from the second-floor foyer window: before and after. Ahhhh.....

A few weeks later, we got new windows installed on the backside of the house, since the front ones have solar shades. The windows were probably original to the house: single-pane, drafty, and several could not stay open. Hopefully, these changes will help our house be a little more pleasant come summer. Before and after.

Here's a side by side (old on left). The new ones have a thick, sturdy frame that is supposed to be hurricane-rated and are double-paned for extra insulation. It was quite a process to watch them remove the old windows, involving large triangles of glass and blowtorches! We had to contend with rain stoppage, but they got 13 windows replaced in two days around the rain showers. Not too shabby!

We also added some picture windows, figuring them to be cheaper and more energy-efficient, and who opens windows that much in Houston anyway? It's hard to tell, but I had to do a few double takes once they were installed because it looked like there was no window! I like them and hope we can enjoy them (and keep them clean)!

Friendship Parties

February really cranked up the home improvement projects (more to come on that later), so we couldn't wander very far from home. As a result, the kids' imaginations have been coming alive, especially as unpacking in the game room revealed more and more forgotten toy treasures. For example, here is a blanket fort converted to a buggy to transport Queen Hadley with driver Owen, but the travel was so long that they needed some reading entertainment on the journey.

On another day, I happened upon a grand meeting of all of the stuffed animals in Owen's room. Roll was taken, and Owen presided over the meeting, but I'm not sure exactly what was discussed. You'll notice the highest esteemed, most senior loveys got prime, front row seating on the mermaid's tail.

We've also been enjoying monthly Kiwi Crates, which the kids got for Christmas. Each month a box arrives with a new STEM activity outlined in easy to follow instructions with all the needed supplies. So far we've learned about capillary action (through color absorption) and mechanical joints (through building an arcade claw game). Someone really looks forward to these boxes!

Remembering our success in Idaho, I have joined a few online "mom groups" in the area with hopes to socialize and meet people outside of our neighborhood. It's definitely harder to find fellow moms of older kids willing to make new friends, but one group had a meet up on the weekend at Little Land, which was an indoor playground nearly too small for my kids. O and H had a blast anyway, despite being among the oldest there, and I did meet a few nice ladies. The kids enjoyed the obstacle course, slides, and sack swings best.

We all know that February brings Valentines, and their new school encouraged parent volunteers and visitors to attend the class parties. I went back and forth between the two classes, and it was great to put faces to names, see the kids in their class environments, and participate in the fun! Hadley's class imitated cupid with Q-tip straw dart practice and candy heart towers.

Owen's class passed around a plastic wrapped candy ball that you had to unwrap with oven mitts and exercised their lung capacity by transferring candy hearts with straws.

The school called them "Friendship Parties", which I think is a smart move these days to foster a love for all of your classmates. The kids loved getting a card and item from everyone and passing them out, too. They didn't even seem to mind that we reused their box/bag from last year! ;)