Abu Dhabi

This was Silas' new word yesterday. He said it over and over. I'm not sure if it had something to do with remembering what we lost this time 5 years ago or needing a vacation, or having developing a heart for those hurting in the UAE. Whatever the cause, I said a prayer for the families still grieving their loss of their loved ones in New York, a prayer for Joel and myself already in need of a vacation, and a prayer for the people of UAE.



We started the Great Celebration of September 15 on Saturday at the grown-up Fanks' house. Silas' attempt #1 at a birthday cupcake ended up with gagging but thought sticking his fingers in the icing and smearing it on the highchair tray was pretty serious fun.



Finally, to which of the following do you think this pair of glasses orginally belonged?

We know the truth...

But you'll have to call to find out the gender of our unborn child.

Fall Reviews

The following are ranked on a scale of 1-10 with 10 being that I highly reccomend this experience and 1 meaning I think you should avoid it at all costs.



PLACES TO VISIT
North Park Mall, Dallas TX: 8 points
Now that the new wing is finished, the mall goes in a full circle. The new wing features a food court for the common people, like Chic-fil-A and a more expensive version of Sbarro. Why do I like this mall so much? I can't think of any GOOD reason. Maybe because the majority of the stores are so full of silly fashion and coordinating silly fashion prices, it doesn't feel like reality.

Maumelle Park, Maumelle AR: 6 points normal, 2 points during Labor weekend
Joel and I agree this would be nice place to have a family reunion if you have an RV. Labor day weekend was too crowded and too noisy to be relaxing. Silas liked playing with the pebbles in the park though, and Lewis liked barking at the other dogs who had come to camp. It has a nice view of the river, but no good walking or hiking trails that we could find.

MOVIES
"Princess Mononoke" 10 points if you like Japanese animae, 1 point if you don't.
I can't say that I like Japanese animae. I tried though. I gave it an honest to goodness try. I just don't understand how getting stabbed enough times makes you turn into a demon-worm animal, nor can I follow along with the introduction and disappearance of characters (such as the Ape Tribe). It's rated PG-13 for violence and some language though I imagine if someone tried to make this into a real-people movie, it might have been rated R for all the arms that got cut off.

"Merlin's Apprentice" 1 point
This came on the Hallmark channel Saturday night. Tooooooo boring. Tooooooooo cheesy. Why did we suffer through it? We had no-bake cookies.

NON-CATEGORIZED ITEMS for the Fall Review
the No-Bake Cookies I made on Saturday: 10 points
The receipe called for brown sugar instead of white sugar. Joel and I ate the entire batch (minus a few we shared with the neighbors for letting us use their saw) within 24 hours. But with all the oatmeal we were getting, they couldn't have been THAT bad for us, right?



Silas: 10 points
Despite teething, he's really a sweet kid. Polite too. He says, "thank you" to everything, "good dog" to Lewis, and sings "dooby dooby dooby" to me while I'm doing the laundry.

Home from the Big D

Silas and I got back from Dallas last night. It was our most exteneded trip without Joel and we really missed him! We had a great time with friends and did a lot of things that we did while we lived in Dallas such as:

sit in traffic
eat tomato-basil soup at leMadeleine
browse Williams-Sonoma and window shop at North Park Mall
buy Tums at Super Walmart
enjoy God-given friendships at a mini-playgroup

The pictures are taken at Andrea's on our way back. We had a great time playing in the playroom with Abbie, Anabelle and Ava. Anabelle is very generous in making coffee and strawberry drinks. Stay tuned for a picture of Silas and friends at an icecream shop in Dallas...
We'll add a few more details about the trip then.

More First Foods

This is Silas' first (and hopefully last) meal at the Gurdon Truck and Auto Plaza, where we waited for the tire shop crew to finish eating their lunch. We had a flat tire on the highway so to commemorate it (and because it was lunchtime) we ate green beans, chicken fried chicken, mashed potatoes, and cottage cheese. The waitress even threw in a piece of cake and a roll.


On Joel's day off, we invited Silas to be a third wheel on our date. We ate at Leo's Greek Castle. Silas' first greek food included hummus, little bites of a pita and some meat from a gyro. He was thrilled with all of it, but not thrilled about the man who kept talking to him at the table across from us.


This is a picture of a post-call day sno cone party. Joel and I got my favorite flavor: sour cherry and coconut. Silas' first flavor of sno cone (pictured here) was snow flavored.

Diversions

We've had a lot going on here this week so buckle those seatbelts and get ready for all the news!

Since Joel posted about the national rock paper scissors tournament, the Bradleys (bring Sara with them) came through for a night on their way to visit Heath's family. Highlights: Ava was the happiest I've ever seen her, except for when Silas followed her on the stairs, touched her booster seat at dinner, or when Silas was being held by Andrea. It was exceptionally amusing. We all drank coffee, watched "King of Queens" and ate Nana's sticky buns. I was sad when they had to leave but comforted by the pajamas, dress and booster seat they left behind.

Then Mom Poteet came. We walked around the mall, went to Kohl's and then met Joel at the Dixie Cafe for dinner.

That night we watched what is, in my opinion, the best movie of the summer. "Everything is Illuminated" gets a 9.5 on my 10 point scale for movie ratings. Since I'm no good at writing movie reviews, I'll wait for you to watch it and then we'll discuss it in person.

So mom and Sara left yesterday. Silas and I took a good long afternoon nap. Joel came home and tried to make a bottle with coffee instead of formula (and it wasn't even decaf). And we watched "So you think you can Dance". Go Travis! Go Donyelle!

Finally, thank goodness for people like Mel Gibson who give us something to talk about other than firestrikes, gas prices, and all the murders in Little Rock.

rock, babies, scissors

In honor of the inaugural USA Rock, Papers, Scissors championship which ESPN felt the need to cover online 3 months after the event, i offer a picture of my baby being cute. and going with the "aggressive" rock...

Cheers and Jeers

Miracles happen every day. For example: the microwave oven is a miracle. It cooks things many times faster than the regular oven, or even toaster oven. And speaking of "faster", I would like to put in a bad word for Comcast Cable Internet services.

Much like our previous insurance companies (and maybe even out current insurance company) we were paying top dollar for a service we weren't receiving. We called to find out why two times. TWO times, I tell you. When I told comcast we were switching to DSL because we thought we would get a faster speed the lady assured me that there was something wrong with our service. That was what WE told the previous two customer service reps, one of which told us there was nothing wrong, and the other of which was just plain rude.

The rates of speed between our new DSL and the old cable internet isn't as dramatic as the cooking time difference in the conventional oven and our new microwave, but it really is remarkable. Shame on you, Comcast, for waiting until we cancel our "high speed" internet to offer professional customer service.

Here's a picture for you to ponder. It's my youngest sister, Rock Star Barbie Sara and my son, the Alien.

Because Benji Asked For It

update #1: the plumbing and electricity are fixed. with help from my good friend, jesse.

update #2: i've decided i'm not going to be a gastroenterologist, although hepatology is fun. organ donors are better livers, as they say... boo, boo for the horrible puns.

update #3: you became a cafe for lunch? well, that's convenient. i was just sharing with my fellow intern that i was the one who actually invented sliced bread. he didn't believe me. and i don't believe you.

update #4: silas cannot, to the best of our knowledge, regenerate foreheads.

update #5: at 14 weeks, we have our first photos of little fank #2. he/she is cute/translucent/grainy.

and update #6: i can't think of anything funny or important to say. (but you probably already figured that out, didn't you?)

It all broke

The light in the bathroom, the pipe behind the kitchen sink and wall, the telephone, a pie crust I made for dinner with Nana and Silas' forehead. We are learning so much about owning a house. And about having a crawler. Silas has the first of many marks of pulling up on the wrong thing. He has the smallest puncture wound from hitting his head dead on the corner of an entertainment center.

The flies left and have returned. I think they like the smell coming from the hole under the cabinet where the dishwasher should be. We found the picture dealio for the computer so I've attached a picture eating a biter biscuit. Mmmmm!

A word on church visiting: we are really appreciating things about Northwest Bible Church in Dallas that we didn't before. Like greeters at the door who don't assume you know where you're going, not be discouraged from taking our child into the worship service and singing songs that make sense. One really great thing happened on Sunday that hadn't happened at NBC though in a while: Silas was happy in the nursery (at the church where we were discouraged from taking him into the service)! He ate cheerios the whole time indicating that the nursery workers took care to follow my instructions for keeping a happy Silas.

A final word of happy things: it's been really nice to reaquaint with a few old friends who call LR home. I still enjoy the company of friends who go back as far as 4th grade. And Joel gets tomorrow off! HAPPY 4th OF JULY!!!

Bad news for the Roly Pollies

I can't find our camera charger/downloader. If you've seen it since the move, please leave a comment.
In other bad news:
There are little flies here. Like the plague. They get in our water and cereal bowls.
Morningsickness is not wearing off.
All the shows on the Food Network today were reruns.
I started consolidating unpacked boxes today in the extra room. It's nearly full and I'm not done yet. I thought when we packed we didn't have that much stuff. Do boxes have babies?

And some coffee from Peet's

Here's a few things that might be worth blogging:

Silas started crawling 3 days ago. He's the cutest crawler ever. It's slow and seems like he's carefully calculating exactly where and how he should place his hands and knees.

Sabrina has been going outside to play.

Joel started orientation and we had what I thought was the best pulled pork bbq I've ever had at one of his "meet your interns" dinners.

We've been tearing down all the useless fences in the backyard. If any of you would like some free chain link fencing, come and get it.

I found that we have 5 jars of peanut butter. I knew it was an excessive amount, but I didn't realize how excessive.

We went to the great dance recital of 2006 and then Emily and I threw a cast party to remember with such games as "build something cool with dominoes" (congatuations to our first prize winner, Mom!) and Mafia and with such great hors d'ouvres as Thai chicken lettuce wraps, spinach and artichoke dip with baguette crutons, fresh shrimp cocktail, lemonade cakes and mocha puddings. The drinks were virgin stawberry daquiris and pina coladas. Maybe after the baby is born, we'll kick this party up a notch!

Finally, I'd like to promote Heath and Andrea's blog this week. They have posted several things that I enjoyed reading.

http://thebradleys.blogplot.com/

Back Online

The move is nearly complete. Internet is back. Here are the pictures long-awaited.
Presenting: Dr. Joel.
And finally, go Mavs!

Graduation

Today Joel becomes a doctor.
CONGRATULATIONS!!!!
Look for photos soon...

Mocking Birds

This bird sat on the porch with Lewis and me while I packed up the closet. He didn't look very healthy. Also a group of mockingbirds have labeled Lewis an enemy of some sort. To the best of my knowledge he hasn't done anything to threaten them, nonetheless, they swoop down and peck at him.

Free Money

If all goes well at Walton's Market today, I will save $11.65 in coupons for things I would be buying even without a coupon.

URGENT!!!

Opinion Survey:

Can refried beans with lard be frozen?

A picture for pictures sake

This is at playgroup. The other 2 boys are Silas' best friends, JG (dark hair) and Quade (no hair). They're showing him how to stand up at the table. Not pictured is Silas' role model Andrew. He's 15 months and likes to throw things, just like the other 3 boys hope to do someday.

In other news, this apartment is a huge mess. 25000 points to whoever can guess what's happening over here. But it may not be what you think...

Happy Mothers' Day

Domino Effect

Silas learned to feed himself Cheerios! Here's more on this week:



Joel finished his last rotation yesterday. He now has 1 day of ACLS classes and 1 day of ACLS testing, and exit interview, graduation and our time at UTSouthwestern if finished.

I successfully organized one baby shower that I didn't get to attend and hosted another where I made prosciutto roasted figs stuffed with gorgonzola cheese.

Silas and I went to work, mailed some letters, cleaned the heck out of the kitchen, dining room, and living room, arranged flowers, picked up toys, rented a movie, wrote a get well note, had coffee with a friend, took everything out of the outside storage room, put everything back in the most organized fashion possible and scheduled a massage for next Tuesday.

I think I deserve it.