On top of spaghetti...

Outdoor sculpture at the Blanton museum... check it out! My kids could have played there for at least an hour, easy.

Fit for a king

My brother Cooper was in town and we just had to take him to some of the finest places in Austin...

Hot plate art

My mom taught me this lo those many years gone by. Put a piece of paper on one of those hot plates, draw on them wax crayons and the crayons glide all melty-like and the picture comes out all vivid and intense... kind of like painting with crayons... it's really fun.

Not photoshopped!

It's not a wig, either.

The fort

Matt just busted out this new fort and we are really psyched. This little movie doesn't really contribute that much to that information but I am also really psyched to discover that it's mad easy to upload video onto here... ok, Future, we have really arrived. Anyway, back to the fort:



It's not really for the faint of heart... or people who might be inclined to faint, either one. I don't know what kind of mother I am to not be fainting when I see them do this kind of thing... I've resigned myself to the fact that there'll probably be a few more ER visits and broken bones in our future either way... our friend and fellow climber Oliver fell off the couch recently and broke his arm... so my plan is to just embrace the fact I've got three thrill-seeking children and well, just keep my fingers crossed.

Dia de Los Muertos

I've always wanted to decorate sugar skulls for Day of the Dead and I finally got to do it. Martha made a huge batch of skulls for us... I wish I had a picture of them all lined up, bare and white... it really was kind of chilling. Soon enough we all had at them with the frosting tubes and they got all festive.

I think the dead were very pleased.


Some from the party scampered off to dance the Thriller dance (http://www.thrilltheworld.com/) in the awesome Day of the Dead parade they've been having over here on the East side for the last twenty years or so... a goodly mix of tradicionale and Keep Austin Wierd-ness... oh and a healthy shake of zombies, don't forget.

BIG FIVE, the way we like it

Jack's birthday... so simple yet so divine. If I dare to tell the real honest truth... and only three months on the late side! Not too shabby. (Hey we DID just have a baby, y'all...) (Oh yeah, what was that, a whole...almost five months ago now? Guess that excuse is about wrung dry by now...).

Decorated their own cupcakes, worked out quite well, especially for the child found off by himself chowing on the bag of red-hots.

Then on to the main attraction...


BOX SLEDDING! Sledding, Texas style... all you need is a broken down box or big piece of cardboard and a steep, grassy hill. Quite good for the boundless energy of these young folk... nothing like full on RUNNING back up a steep hill ten million times to put at least a tiny dent in that relentless vigor.

Happy 5, sweetie boy.