Birthdays, con't...

We had a very busy weekend and I honestly could have used an extra day somewhere between Friday and Monday!
Where do I start?!  I found out on Thursday that my huge research paper and powerpoint was due first thing Monday morning rather than next Wednesday like my syllabus said.....so of course this had a major domino effect on absolutely E-V-E-R-Y-T-H-I-N-G else in my life.  Tita had a birthday to go to on Saturday afternoon, so I dropped her off and headed over to the library to work on my paper until it was time to pick her up.  I lug my 50 lb. backpack into the library to find out it was closing in 25 minutes, so I lug it back to my car and head home.  I needed to get ready to go to Denver for my cousin Andrea's birthday party so I didn't have time to work on my research paper at all.  I pick Tita up and we all head to Denver.  We had
an awesome time, ate some great food and headed home very late.  I planned on getting up early on Sunday to head on over to the library to get some work done before we went to Julian's birthday party...that didn't happen.  Since we got to bed so late, nobody woke up early.  So we got up, got ready and went to the party.  We had a real good time, ate some more great food and watched Julian open his gifts.  He really made off like a bandit!  We left about 4:15 to get to the library before they closed at 5.  I ended up emailing all the information I needed to myself so I could do the work at home.  We got home and I finally sat down to do the dreaded research paper about 7 pm...I now know more about  the Rabies virus than I EVER wanted to know about it.  I ended up finishing my report and the powerpoint at almost 1 am.  I headed off to bed after that, but my brain was so wired up that I couldn't fall asleep...I probably ended up getting only about 3 hours of sleep last night!
Anyway, here are pictures I took this weekend:

This is my cousin Andrea and me.  This was taken in Denver Saturday night.

And this is Sunday at Julian's 2nd birthday party!!

Laura and Julian...He's not too happy about being called inside to take pics!

Julian and his cake

Laura's sister-in-law made Julian's cake...she did an awesome job!

Julian and his mom

Julian and his mama opening presents..

We had an awesome weekend

 :)

Happy Birthday JuJu!

Dear Julian,

Today is a wonderful day...it's your 2nd birthday!  You have been a blessing for this family from day 1.  It amazes me how quickly you have grown from such a tiny newborn to the smart, handsome, mischevious little boy you are now.  I love you very much and wish you happiness always.

I just had to include this picture because it is my absolute, all-time FAVORITE picture of you.  To me, it perfectly captures your innocence, wonder and charm.

Couldn't you just eat him up with a spoon??!!

Hope you have a wonderful visit with your daddy today, and I can't wait to see you tomorrow at your party!

Happy Birthday Sweetie!

Hugs & Kisses,

Honey :)

God is always with me..

So this is how my day has gone so far:

My alarm probably went off at the time I set it last night (6:00 am)...I wouldn't know for sure because the first time I heard it was at 7:08!  Ok, first of all, I know that I slept through it for a little over an hour, but my whole family too??!! GA!
So I'm racing around like a chicken with it's head cut off trying to get ready for school.  My kids are on Spring break this week  plus-it's Armando's day off today...so they had no reason to get up early.  And they didn't. So I'm racing around the house at about 7:25 and wondering how on earth am I going to be ready on time??!!
I only had time to put some eyeliner on and was almost finished straightening my unruly, crazy-mind-of-its-own, wavy mop of hair when my wonderful husband calls me downstairs to eat breakfast!  He so thoughtfully made me eggs, bacon and refried beans with tortillas!    It was delicious!  This was such a nice gesture because when we went to church on Ash Wednesday, he decided to give up breakfast for lent.  He absolutely does not eat anything until after 12 noon.  So he made my breakfast and went back to bed!  I so appreciated it...thank you Babe!  I ate my breakfast and raced out the door.  I had planned on getting to school early today, like at 8:00 to do some last minute studying for my midterm, and that obviously wasn't going to happen because even if all 50 stop lights I got to were green, the earliest I would get to school would be at 8:30.
I left my house at 7:55, prayed my normal prayers like I do every day, and was making good time, until I get about 3 miles from the interstate.  It's about 8:10 by now and traffic comes to a complete STOP!  So I wait....... And wait....... And wait some more.  I couldn't see what the hold up was, but I knew it was something BIG because we were at a stop for  f-i-f-t-e-e-n  minutes!  And to top it off, I was literally in a dead zone because I couldn't get a signal on my cell phone to call my instructor to let her know I would be late!  Traffic starts at a slow crawl at 8:25 and I finally realized that we were stopped because there had been a 6-car pile up just up ahead!  That's right! 6 cars crashing into each other!  I said a little prayer for all the people involved in that and also thanking God that I wasn't one of the cars involved.
I finally got onto the interstate and sure enough, I now had cell phone service.  I called my school to let them know why I would be late.  When I finally got to school, the class had just finished up an extra credit quiz and were getting ready for the midterm.  I was bummed that I missed that quiz, but, as my friend Taya told me recently: I'm a "glass half-full" kind of person and so my thinking was this:
If the worst thing that happens today is I don't do too well on my midterm, I'm doing well.  Honestly, if that is my worst problem today, that's ok.  I was so fortunate to not have been involved in that terrible car accident this morning and I pray that no one was injured.  God is so good to me and never leaves my side.

You know, yesterday, my classmate Angelica gave me this:

It's a Dove Almond Dark Chocolate candy.  Except that when she gave it to me the candy was nicely wrapped inside :)  It was soo good by the way!

Well, as she handed it to me she said to read the message inside because they come true.  This is what my message inside said:

It's not the best picture, but it says this:

"You are exactly where you are supposed to be.    Love, Dove"

Now I know why I didn't hear the alarm!  I was supposed to sleep in so that when I did leave late for school, I wouldn't be in harm's way.  I was supposed to be about 35 cars behind the cars that crashed.

Now do you believe?

Have a beautiful and safe day.  God bless!

Me + Honey Bee = :)

Anyone that knows me can tell you that I listen to music that is totally on opposite sides of the spectrum.  I'm not kidding!  I listen to a lot of Spanish music,, anything 80's, anything country and I can even sing along to Eminem!  Anyway, as you probably know by now (from an earlier post,) my favorite music in the whole world would be my beloved 80's songs.  To me, there's just simply nothing that compares to that magical music.
Well, coming in at a very close 2nd would be country music.  I loove Brad Paisley, Thompson Square, Miranda Lambert, Carrie Underwood, Sugarland, Taylor Swift, Tim McGraw, Lady Antebellum, Zac Brown Band and Alan Jackson.  Country music has always had a very special place in my heart.  :)   I have very clear memories of being 9 years old and singing my heart out to Patsy Cline and Loretta Lynn with Conway Twitty.  I knew the lyrics to every single song they ever sang.  I think I can actually admit that I was giddy when I bought my VHS copy of this:

I loove this movie.. and Sissy Spacek and Tommy Lee Jones were excellent in their parts of Loretta and Doolittle.  I think I have watched that movie at least 40 times since it first came out on video.  Since VCRs have phased out, I now own a copy on DVD!  That's right..I admit it!  I looved country music when it really wasn't cool! I used to get teased by my friends that wouldn't dream of being caught listening to, much less knowing the words and heaven forbid..... singing along to country!  So yes, believe it or not, country music was not "cool" like it is now. :)

Anyway... Sunday night we watched the Academy of Country Music Awards.  It was a huge event in the Silva household...well, for everyone except for Marko.  He wanted nothing to do with the awards show.  So he kept busy drawing in the other room.  Armando, Tita and myself were cheering on for our favorite artists and high-fiving when they would win.  We were all so excited when Miranda won "Top Female Vocalist,"  along with "Single of the Year" AND "Video of the Year" awards for her song "The House That Built Me."  I wrote this this post about that song and how special it was to me.
Tita was over-the-moon happy when Taylor won the coveted "Entertainer of the Year" award.  Taylor Swift is, without a doubt, her F-A-V-O-R-I-T-E singer EVER!!!!!  Tita has even asked us to MOVE to Nashville, because maybe....just maybe, she'll run into Taylor Swift at Target!  I was happy for Taylor too because she totally deserved that award!  Tita, Lynette and I went to her Fearless show a couple years ago and it was AMAZING!  That girl is so incredibly talented!
Anyway...I totally fell in love with Blake Shelton's new single called Honey Bee.   I am definately going to buy this CD.  Here is the song, enjoy!

Hair today..Gone tomorrow....

So Tita has been bugging me mercilessly for a few months now to let her cut her hair.  I always told her no and it usually resulted in her sulking for the whole day.  I dreaded mentioning anything about anyone's hair because it would magically "remind" her that she just HAD to have a haircut.  I know that it kind of makes me sound a little hipocritical that I always told her no when she'd ask for a haircut since my hair is short...But my hair was very long growing up.   I didn't cut it until after Marko was born.  Yes...I had a baby and suddenly had a "mom" haircut... I know that's a lame excuse, but it's the only one I have...  I just love her long hair and she kept it long because I'm her mom and I said so! :)

Well a couple days ago, I'm driving, Marko is in the front passenger seat and Tita is in the back seat with Peditos.  The radio was on and I asked Marko to lean closer to me so I could talk to him.   I quietly mentioned to Marko that I would be taking him to get his hair cut this week.  Well, Tita's radar picked up the "H" word..She sits straight up and asked me to turn the radio down.

Yes, she pleaded...........


and I gave in.

This is the before picture..

This is the AFTER picture of the mat on the floor..

Ta Da!!  This is my beautiful girl with all of her hair cut off!!

I have to admit that while I LOVED her long hair, it's just hair and it'll grow back.

BTW... I LOVE her short hair too.  My favorite thing about her new haircut?  The fact that with summer right around the corner, she can STILL put it up in a ponytail!  We got the best of both worlds...  <3

Bologna & swimsuits (:

Yesterday I went into Tita's bedroom to close her blinds before I went to pick up the kids from school.  I didn't realize peditos was in the room until I heard a noise under the bed.  This is what I found:

He was down there with a few things he got from the trash can he knocked over in the kitchen! 

Notice the bologna AND the cooked ham package??!!

This is the bologna packaging!  Armando HATES bologna, but this goes back to me growing up eating bologna all the time because it is and was so very inexpensive, and now my kids have grown up eating it too :)

Now I know why I always rinse out EVERYTHING before I put it in the trashcan!

Can you imagine the M-E-S-S I would have had on the carpet had I NOT rinsed??!!

Then last night was Tita's school's yearly swimming party.  It was a looong party (6:30-9 pm)  It was held at the local indoor pool and Tita could NOT WAIT for last night to get here.  She met up with some of her friends and had a W-O-N-D-E-R-F-U-L time!   I also had a good time hanging out with a few of the moms.  I took a ton of pictures...here's just a few of them:

This is Ashley, Tita and Kaiya.

Kaiya & Tita with the basketball

They had a REALLY fun time!

Kaiya, Ashley, Tita and Baily

Tita giving Ashley a piggy-back ride

It was a very fun night for the girls and I was really glad my baby was able to go.  Since this is her last year at her elementary school (she's in 5th grade), she just HAD to go because she had never been able to attend this yearly tradition!  All the previous years she either had strep throat, an ear infection or the flu during the swimming party.  I thanked God that she was happy and HEALTHY for this year's party.  She would have been absolutely heartbroken had she not been able to attend.

Hope you have a happy and safe weekend!

 

Rest in Peace Hopie!

As most of us know, life is so unfair sometimes.  Today is April 1st--the one day of the year that most everyone joins in on pulling pranks on their friends and family, and just having fun.  Some of these pranks are clean and innocent, while others are just plain mean.  I remember the first April 1st Armando and I spent together.  He had never really experienced the pranks people do to one another.  When I pulled a few pranks on him and yelled April Fools!!, he must have misunderstood me, because after that, he would try to pull a fast one on me and then he would yell April FIRST!! We made fun of him so much!  Those are good memories for not only me, but for the kids as well.

Anyway, while most of the people are so incredibly happy, still, others are suffering.
One family I know of that is suffering so much right now is the Monroe/Baker family from Alliance.  They have suffered an incredible loss because they lost a beautiful, loving and giving person last night.  Her name was Hope Monroe Baker.  Hope has been suffering from the debilatating disease of Diabetes, among other ailments.  I last spoke to Hope about a month ago while she was hospitalized.  That time, she was hospitalized for about 6 weeks because she had to have her foot amputated due to the horrible disease of Diabetes.  Her hospital stay was long and tiring because after the amputation had been done, infection set in.  We chatted on the phone for almost 2 hours, just catching up and laughing. A lot!  She excitedly told me of how quickly she was learning to move herself from the bed to the wheelchair and back, and how she was such a good student that the nurses were very happy with her progress.  I clearly remember how amazed I was at her attitude.  I even told her how much I admired her because in light of all she was going through, she was so upbeat and happy!  She was so optimistic for the future and her recovery.  She spoke of her husband lovingly building her a ramp to their front door and she went on and on about her sons and granddaughter.  They were, without a doubt, her greatest pride and joy.  I mentioned to Hope that day that my kids' Spring Break was coming up in April, and we excitedly made plans for me to go to Alliance and have lunch during that time.  Unfortunately, that never happened because Spring Break here isn't until next week, and it just breaks my heart that I never had that opportunity to have spent the day with her.    Hope spent a lot of time on Facebook playing various games and  ALWAYS asking for help on different levels she was trying to reach on these games.  I always smiled when I saw that on my wall, and I will certainly miss seeing that from now on.  Hope's husband posted a message on her Facebook wall this morning about her passing and mentioned that he was going to be leaving her profile up for a couple days for her friends to be able to post their last messages to her, but that he would be deleting her profile in a few days...

I got this quote from my cousin Diana:

Yesterday, God saw how much misery our dear friend Hope was in and how tired she was, and He extended His arms to her and said "My child, take my hand and I will end your pain."  She is with Him now.   Gone, but never forgotten...

(This is the way she was back in school.  I copied this pic from her husband's facebook.)

August 4, 1965-March 31, 2011

Rest in Peace sweet Hope.