Worthington Family Photoblog

Ok. Funny Story. I bought that shirt for Burgundy, but Korben comandeered it because it was a cool "Star Wars Shirt" - hahaha!





Oh no! it's the mama monster!




























Apparently they needed to document the mess they made.

















Me and my bitches, sleeping.

I have been working on getting some house stuff done during my break from Kindermusik. I've been trying to stretch our dollar further by shopping even more at resales than I did before, and I think it has helped a lot. I took the kids this morning to get their hair cut. Korben was getting Really Shaggy, and even though I know that's totally hip right now, it was a bit much for me. So I had them clean it up to a more "Zac Efron/ 17 again" look, and Sophie just got a trim. Then we hit Walmart early in the day to get backpacks and the last few school clothes we needed. I wanted them each to have a new warm-weather outfit to wear to school on the first day, since a lot of the school clothes I bought are for winter. Sophie also got a new lunch box and some juice bottles. I haven't bought Korben's school supply list, because I think we paid the PTA to do it, but I can't remember for sure. Our Back-To-School night is on Thursday, so we'll find out then, if not before. School starts on TUESDAY! I need to take him up there to find out who his teacher is and what classroom he'll be in. Sophie has a whole week at home with me all day. Scary! ;) He also has a new bus stop this year.

After we went to walmart, we stopped for lunch and then went to the ICM thrift store down the street from us. We had gone to a bouncy-castle place in Pearland with friends on Thursday, and I didn't want to blow a huge chunk of change going somewhere I knew was going to be crazy crowded on the last friday before school starts, so we cleaned out the board games section of the resale store. I spent about $10 on games and got a brand new Upwords, along with Mouse Trap, Hungry Hungry Hippos, Where in the World Is Carmen Sandiego Jr. Detective Edition, and a battleship-like hangman game. Most were missing something - usually just the little avatars, which are easily replaced. Mousetrap was missing the mice, the diver, and the pool. We tried to make do but couldn't find a toy the right size and weight to replace the diver, and it also had NO CHEESE cards! We made some out of cardstock paper, though. Hangman had enough letters to play on both sides, and we had a good time with that one. Carmen Sandiego was missing Kazakhstan and most of the little 4-piece "wanted" posters that you hid under the country pieces, so I printed out a picture of her I found online on colored cardstock and cut them into the 4 squares. We had a set of hungry hippos that was missing parts, so for a buck, we now have a complete set. :) Korben did really well with a lot of these games that were very hard - most were rated age 8 and up and he did just fine. He was neck and neck with me all through upwords, and caught on super quick. That was always one of my favorite games.

We played games for several hours throughout the afternoon, and Ryan came home just in time to join us for the Carmen Sandiego game, which even Sophie could play, as it required no reading, just matching map pictures, and it really felt good to be spending time together doing something like that that cost so little. I want to make a collection of leftover game bits to keep on hand for this kind of thing, too. It was also an opportunity to show the kids how to "make do" by creating our own pieces to replace the ones that were missing. I even made some paper-doll people to use as game pieces. Those are the kinds of life lessons that I think people sometimes forget to show their kids, you know? Anyway, it was a great day.

Because I have awesome friends, we got to go to the ceremony for the returning crew of the Space Shuttle today, and Korben got to meet the astronauts!


Here's Korben with Dr. Dave Wolf. The Doctor spoke with Korben for quite a few minutes and it was photo op time, so he may have his picture published somewhere.

Here's a writeup of the landing: http://www.nasa.gov/home/hqnews/2009/jul/HQ_09_179_Shuttle_landing_success.html

I'm laughing at the name of the new treadmill. Stephen Colbert knows no shame.



He kept asking Korben questions, and I was shocked - Korben was so overwhelmed by meeting the austronaut that he was speechless!



Sophie still looks like a mini-Burgundy most of the time, though her eyes are more green than burg's now...

OK, the technology in the house is cooperating now. I hope it stays that way.

I have not had a computer for almost a week, and we had no TV or internet for a big chunk of the week, too.

I had one of those days where nothing worked the way it was supposed to, and it carried over into the rest of the week.

And now I have PMS. So I will just give you pictures and videos.

Apparently it's been forever since I unloaded my big camera. This is from Korben's Kindergarten graduation:

From july 2009

A boy and his dog taking a nap.

From july 2009

Korben and his teacher.

From july 2009

Korben and Sophie at his graduation.

From july 2009

From july 2009

Paper Quilt seen in the hallway at Korben's elementary school. *spock eyebrow*

From july 2009

At the beach yesterday...

From july 2009

From july 2009

From july 2009

From july 2009

"Waaaaah! I got water in my MOUTH!"

From july 2009

Ahoy, there, Mate!

From july 2009

Korben made a friend. Haha, actually, this was PERFECT timing, because not even a half second after I snapped this, Korben noticed he was moving and screamed like a girl and dropped it. He wanted to bring it home, but I explained that it was an ocean hermit crab, not a land crab, and we don't have a salt water tank here.

From july 2009

I've never seen the trawlers working so close to shore before. I took this driving down the seawall. We left the beach when I started hearing thunder. It had briefly sprinkled while we were there, but I made a good call getting out when we did. Not 10 minutes after we got in the car, the heavens opened up and poured down for a good 35 minutes. It was heavy enough rain that the kids thought it was another hurricane, and the traffic on the freeway was going 35-40 instead of the normal 70-80. But we had a great time.

From july 2009

LOL. Sophie napped most of the way home.

From july 2009

We went to a classmate's birthday at McDonald's this weekend, too.

From july 2009

Sophie's best friend in the whole world, Frankie, and Frankie's sister. I wish I could get them together for playdates, but without cooperation from Frankie's mom, there's not much I can do except hope that Frankie and Sophie will be in separate classes next year so she can make a new best friend who's more available.





Here's the other video from Korben's graduation. Enjoy!

Last night we went to dinner with Ryan's Dad, Linda (SMIL), and his step sister and her fiancee. We almost always eat at this little greek place down by their house called Skippers, and have for years. Friday nights, they have a belly dancer! Sophie was enthralled.



Sophie and Grandpa


I had been trying to figure out where this goofy grin Sophie's been making comes from, since it doesn't look like anyone in my family, and not that I'd noticed in Ryan's family either... well, now I know after last night: It's grandpa's grin! LOL


Korben and his cousin, Alec, who he just idolizes.

*Huge thanks to my In-Laws, who made this bathroom fix-up possible!*

We finally got the floor done and replaced the toilet, which handily fixed all the leak issues we had in there. It was a complete mess - a previous owner of the house had assed it up so badly when he'd done whatever it was - there was no wax ring under the toilet, he'd filled in the concrete around the sewer hole with road-grade concrete, and hadn't leveled it off... there were two layers of linoleum. It's no wonder the damn toilet leaked from the day we bought the house. The commode was glued to the floor with caulk. Literally.

Anyway, here's the before and after:



Please note that I finally got to install my fish toilet seat that I bought 5 years ago when we bought the house.

I enrolled the kids in swimming lessons at the YMCA. They are really enjoying the lessons.



Korben's doing great with the swimming, but has gotten in trouble several times for not listening to the lifeguards (i.e. getting in the pool when he's not supposed to) and Sophie is struggling with getting her head wet. She apparently is just like I was and doesn't want to get her face or ears wet. We're working on it.