Let's go swim!

My great aunt and uncle were nice enough to buy Bryce a pool. He loves it! Those of you that have seen him "swim" on the land know that he was born to be in water. He even likes putting his face in. Yes, I am watching him to make sure he doesn't drown.

Papa just gave him this great bucket and shovel set. It's perfect for the pool.

I think he's trying to crawl out...don't tell him he doesn't know how to do that yet.

Memorial Day

We took our annual trip to my aunt and uncle's beach house to celebrate Memorial Day with the family. We had lots of kids this year to keep everyone busy.

So many fun toys, why does everyone want the wooden spoon?

Group card game, Dede makes up new rules everytime she teaches someone how to play :)

Bryce shows Gabby how much fun it is to play on the floor.

Russell and Bryce are discussing fishing tips and tricks before Russell heads out for the day on the boat.

Goodbye Austin, Hello Canyon Lake

My parents came in on Saturday and helped us move out to the lake house. I think 99% of what we took is Bryce's stuff. That kid doesn't travel light. We're all settled in for the time being. Sunday we went to my parents' house. Bryce, Mother and I grocery shopped while the men played golf. Russ is back in Austin now and I'm out here until the end of June. I know these pictures don't go with what I wrote but moving pictures aren't very exciting so this is what you get!

Happy Mother's Day!

We celebrated by going to the Round Express game. Anything to get out of our house! Lara was in town and came with us. We're getting smarter and found a shady spot to sit in.

Making Progress

We went out to the house today...and we have walls! The exterior is about done (the stucco was painted the wrong color in back and needs to be re-done). Sheetrocking inside is almost complete so we should see paint on the walls soon. Very exciting!

This is the view into our kitchen.

Back of the house

Bryce and I had a big discussion about the progress of the house.

Backyard

Moving Out

We sold our house recently and have begun the move out process. Since the new house isn't ready yet, my grandparents were nice enough to let Bryce, Josie and me live at their lake house. Russell will stay in Austin with a friend. I'll be out of the house on May 19 and Russell will leave on May 30.

My grandparents came out this weekend to go over a few things about the house and we started taking stuff out there. How did we end up with so much stuff?

Take Me Out To The Ballgame

We took Bryce to see the Round Rock Express, Austin's minor league baseball team. We got berm tickets so that Bryce would have plenty of room to wriggle around. He had a great time!

They were giving out bats today to all kids under 12...is that a good idea?

Do you think Mom knows I'm drinking beer?

French fries at the ballpark are the best!

I'm getting tired. Maybe I'll just close my eyes for a minute behind my cool sunglasses.

Progress...finally

Well...after a few weeks of "inspections" (read: not doing anything), the crew was back to work on our house this week. They've started on the stone and stucco on the outside. Not much progress on the inside as we still have to our pre-drywall walk through (where I get to tell them what's wrong before the walls go up). So...hopefully that'll be soon b/c as of 5/30 we'll be homeless and the sooner they finish, the sooner we'll be able to move in. Here are some pictures...

First set is of the left side and the garage


They finsihed this whole side this week. This is also the left side just behind the garages. That section that isn't finished is called a gable...it gets done last. It's stucco, so they do the stone first.



This is the other side of the house (right side). The picture on the bottomyou can see the dining room windows on the far left.


Back of the house is getting stucco. Apparantly they have to do 3 coats before they can paint it. I think this is still the first coat.



Some random pictures of the backyard take from the right side of the house.



I tried to do a pano from the back patio so you can get a feel for how the yard lays out. It's got a long way to go before anyone is rolling in the grass.

Musical Prodigy

Bryce taught Russell a few things on the guitar recently. Obviously got his musical ability from Russell. Russell is actually worried that my singing nursery rhymes to Bryce may damage his hearing :)

Since we haven't done anything exciting lately, here's a picture from today playing outside. He's still not crawling. If he runs out of toys within his reach, he usually finds dirt or a leaf to occupy him.

Passover...a little late

We typically have seder on the closest Saturday to the beginning of Passover so by our family calendar, it was time for seder this weekend. We went to the Barbans to celebrate.

Here is a typical scene. Everyone is wandering around doing their own thing.

While we were thrilled to have "Rabbi" Arnold pose in this picture, it's really highlighting the new bib that Mimi just bought for Bryce.

While we still love the bib, this picture was better posed to show off the people in it.

Capitol 10K

[Russell Posting] Today was Bryce's first race...the Statesman's Capitol 10k. This year happened to be the 30th annual one...so it was particularly crazy. About 18K people lined the streets of downtown to suffer through 6.2 miles of heat and humdity. The rain threatened, but managed to hold off. Normally that would be a good thing, but the weather was so gross the rain would probably have felt good. I pushed Bryce in the jogger and Paige ran with our friend Michelle (the blond below who isn't Paige). Other than the pictures to commemorate the event, the race itself was forgettable. Bryce was obviously unimpressed with my efforts to zip through traffic so he decided to take a nap. I wished he would have chatted or cried or something b/c when he was talking...it sort of acted like a horn and people got out of our way. Once he snoozed...it was back to bobbing and weaving. Paige and Michelle did great! They were both a little zapped at the end, but hung in there. Everyone was rewarded with sandwiches from Schlotzky's for lunch. Here are a few before shots...perhaps if the official race photos turn out, we'll get some action shots.

Happy Birthday Papa!

Papa was 81 today and we went to my parent's house to celebrate.

Holy Crap! It's a house!!!

[Russell Posting] Well...things move fast when the weather is good. Paige, Bryce, and I took a drive down to the new digs to see how things were progressing. Well, when they say the early parts go up fast...they weren't kidding. Geez...the whole frame is up, some of the roof is done, and well...it looks like a real life house. We were really happy to see how big the backyard will be. It's funny how the shape of the lot is different w/ a house on it. The rear elevation shows how high the foundation is...much higher off the ground than we though. So...the new idea is to try and add a deck or something off the covered patio. This way we get some more entertaining space...and more importantly, I don't have to trim any more hedges. Not sure if the descriptions will come through, but I wrote some descritpions if you go to the actual picture trail site, perhaps you can read them there. So...we're off and running. Since we had some rain early on, looks like we'll probably list our house the end of this month. Luckily, Paige has already started packing...and I've only had to take Bryce out of 2 boxes ;-)

http://www.picturetrail.com/gallery.fcgi?p=12&gid=15595892

Cool Slideshows