Cool!!!

Dallas Zoo trip!

After 8am mass, we headed down to the Dallas Zoo where we enjoyed the place to ourselves. One of the koalas was awake, the kids fed the lorikeets, we saw a baby flamingo, met the cheetah cub, Kamal, and our traditional rides on the carousel and monorail.

RIP Snowglobe

This dear snow globe was given to Claire as a gift from Tia 6 years go. Loved by all, we even kept it out in the non Xmas season. Eventually the snow stopped flying. The snowman became dislodged. The plastic broke. But each child (4 clumsy and rough hands) loved and adored it. 

Twas the night before Christmas...

We're not in Florida anymore, Toto...

Cheese!

Off they go!

To dinner and the symphony!

More Holiday Pics

 Saturday we took the kiddos to see Santa's Village here in Richardson. The big kids went into a couple of the themed houses and completed the activities. Of course their favorite was Santa's Pet Shop. Tonight was the holiday party for the twins club. Santa made an appearance and the club photographer took much better photos than the one you see here. (Our new camera is currently in the repair shop, a fix covered by warranty, but still, I am without the camera!)

Here are some more shots of the Fab 4 this holiday season.

Twin time!

One more set...

Time passes but some things just don't change...

It must be genetic...

Kate, 1979

Jude, 2013

Ice Storm! Days 2 & 3

Day 2 brought more indoor activity, but we did venture out for walks around the neighborhood. All of our trees seem to have withstood the ice and we even had a little melt today (Day 3). Unfortunately, school was cancelled again for tomorrow.

Oh the weather outside if frightful...

But the kids still wanted to go out and play! Well, maybe not Jude so much, but Asher and Claire were gung-ho! The ice is a little intense-- I'm worried about some of our big trees losing limbs, esp over the twins' bedroom. Slumber party in the living room!

Let's play! ❄️

Carly says, "What weather?"

Funny boys

Asher calls Jude a "dead baby" when he lies on the floors and plays with his cars. I hink likes to be down low so he can see he wheels turning and everything moving. Ironically Asher did the same thing when he was young... But anyway, Jude looks like a dead baby to him. And yes Jude is squishing his nose. 

Ho ho ho!

Well, the holiday season is here! To kick it off, we had a wonderful visit from Santa. Most of the kids did anyway... Let's see.  Avery asked for a Spider-Man lunchbox. So did Asher. Claire asked for 2 glass bunnies, a stuffed lion, and Friends Lego. And Jude... He wasn't exactly thrilled with the experience...

Another colds day!

Headed down to the Perot museum downtown and enjoyed a nice fuddruckers lunch after. The kidlets had fun racing dinosaurs and looking at all the animals. 

Aunt Katie enjoyed a lunch with ALL her nephews and niece. 👍

Dallas arboretum in the cold!

Im way behind on posts so here are come collages in which succession. 

Everyone arrived on Saturday, so after mass, we beat the winter storm and headed to the arboretum Sunday morning. It was empty--imagine! We enjoyed the children's discovery garden with the fam. 

Let's play a game

It's called, "What did Carly eat today?" 

The choices are:

A. 94 nilla wafers

B. 1 entire brand new loaf of bread

C. 2 bowls of dog food

D. All of the above in a 12 hr period

Don't look at the calendar!!!

Just enjoy the fact all four are facing the same way!

Children's Discovery Garden at the Arboretum!

Finally! Some new arboretum pictures-- no more pumpkins, pansies, or parsnip pictures-- yay, you must be thinking. Finally convinced the kid-lets to venture in there this afternoon, and it was well worth the convincing. Every thing was cool, top of the edge technology and fun.

The only downside were 2 individuals who felt the need to point of any potential parenting inadequacies that they witnessed. I love the picture Scott snapped of the Dallas police officer, telling me I "better watch my children because one of them just wandered off." I replied, "Just one? I used to have 4 of them." I saw where he was pointing, and *gasp*, Avery had wandered off to a very tall, handsome, and capable man-- his father. Then this other man was freaking out because "Where's this boy's parents? Who's with this child?" as Jude and I circled a tree, playing a relatively safe game of hide and seek.

If I had a dollar...

A picture is worth...