It’s Whatever: July 2009

Saturday, July 11, 2009

I am so grateful

I'm leaving for a camping trip in Leakey, Texas with my family tomorrow. I am so exited as this will be the first time in 5 years my brother and sister and I will all be together with our children. I was searching for an FHE (family home evening) lesson for Monday night that could be shared with nonmembers, I came across one that the topic was pretty general for one of any faith, "Gratitude" ! I was looking for a talk that would go with it and loved this one, O remember O remember, a talk given by President Henry B. Eyring. It brought me to tears as all of them do, but I'm grateful for my family and my brother and sister and parents and nephews and nieces and the time and opportunity that Heavenly Father has orchestrated for us to be together. This is a perfect talk to share.

Friday, July 10, 2009

Gone but not forgotten...

On July 1st we learned that a very dear and long-time friend of the family had given up his decade long battle with cancer. These pictures were taken just over a month ago, we had to privilege of running into him by chance. Of coarse we see him at a Mexican restaurant with Mariachis playing, that was so Hector! I'm so glad we took these photos for as it turns out would be the last time I was able to see him alive. He fell in love with Mia and Sebastian and I'm so glad he got to hug them both. Hector Flores influenced my life in many ways. He taught me a love and profound respect for my Mexican culture. His love for Mariachi music led him to his successful and talented position as singer and violinist for some of the most well-known and followed Mariachi groups in South Texas. Mariachi Del Cielo is one that I remember best. After many years of listening to this music and understanding its meaning, he encouraged me to start Florkloriko dancing, and so I did. I will never forget that time in my life, I was doing something that truly made me happy and proud of myself. I will always think of Hector whenever I see a Florklorico performance, or hear a beautiful Mariachi song. He was a devoted father and a man of many talents. Hector,you will truly be missed !

Wednesday, July 8, 2009

Camera Happy

So there's this abandoned house that is just gorgeous, well, I took the kids to take some pics and we had a blast. It was super hot, but kind of adventurous cause the owners live like 50 yards away, yes we were trespassing, but my dad said they were hinting that they wanted to sell it to him, so hopefully they will. They have a ton of antique furniture like the teal desk Mia is sitting on and beautiful doors with glass and metal door knobs, just too chic.

Bash

Thomas

In case your wondering why there are only 2 pics of Bash, MOM !, he HATES taking pictures, I'm lucky I even got the 3 that I did.

Mia

Mi Guajira y su hermano Chicano, que llevan sus guayaberas

Could my kids be any more HOT Blooded? These are the long awaited for pics of the kids in their guayaberas, happy Mom? Their Abuela brought them back from Miami and we are so glad cause well, see for yourselves.

Caught you Mia !

A Happy Independence Weekend !

So we got off to a FIERY start. Yep, John lost his front right tire, yes the one on my side (as if I needed any more reason to lose weight), and when I say lost, I mean the whole thing flew off, lugs and all. We're going about 70 mph when all of a sudden we hear this super loud bang and as were skidding on the rotor down Hwy 77 4 miles north of Refugio, we notice sparks and smoke. John begins to pull into the grassy median, thankfully the next median after the blow out because the one before caught fire from the tire and spread so quick in this heat. If it had been our median we'da been in some serious trouble. Well, it didn't take long for the old fire brigade to get there and a tow truck, then a good samaritan volunteer fire fighter came to help us tow our trailer. Thankfully, we said our prayers before we left so no one was hurt. Despite the heat and the backyard mechanic all was fixed in under an hour and we continued out trip to Corpus. There were a million other ways it could have turned out, but Heavenly Father was lookin out for us as always.

At last we arrived at a beautiful suite that my parents got John as one of his graduation presents. We cooled off in the pool after a hot & sweaty fiasco with the truck. We went to dinner at one our favorite Mexican restaurants, Acapulco, that we use to love to eat at when we lived there. The ladies were serenated by a trio. They sang "La Princesa" to Mia and she just hammed it up. My stepdad and John kept that trio busy requesting song after song, but we enjoyed every minute of it.