WOW!!!

Do any of you watch DIY Network? If so, you know that they were airing a show called "Burt Builds a Bandit". On the show, Burt Reynolds rebuilds the car from "Smokey and the Bandit" with a little help from his friends. After the "Bandit" was finished, one lucky person won the car and $20,000. Well, my first cousin Spencer won the car and the cash!!!! Needless to say I was just about speechless! We are so happy for him. Maybe the next time he's making a bootlegging run to Texarkana he'll drop by for a visit! Congratulations Spence! Here's a link to his winning entry! http://www.heavy.com/video/31907

Where did November go?

I've been a terrible blogger. November just flew by without a word from me. Here are a few of the highlights.

Mary Kay came to visit! Mary Kay was our next door neighbor in Arizona. This is the second time she has come to visit since we have moved here. She is such a treat and we love to have her come and see us. She spoils us rotten. But then, hey, I wish everyone had someone like her in their lives. We are truly blessed.

Eric did the final mowing of the lawn for Winter. 33. Yes, you read correctly, 33 yard bags later he was finished. Way to go Eric!

Noah's socks are finished and he has enjoyed wearing them. Now it's time to dye some more yarn and get started on some more socks! I LOVE knitting socks. The reason for this I think is socks are easy to knit once you know the basics, but varied enough with the cuff, heel, and toes to keep things interesting. Not only that, they are VERY portable. You can ask me at any given time if I have a sock project with me and I will say yes. Grocery store? Yes. Restaurant? Yes. Traveling? Of course! Parent Night at school? Yes. Church? Well, no. Too tempting. A girl has to have some limits. I think a pair for Eric is in the works. Something more subdued though. It has been said that making socks for someone is a true sign of love because one spends hours and hours of their time lovingly knitting socks for someone only to have them trampled underfoot until they are no longer usable and replaced by another handmade pair. Wear them in good health boys! I love you!

Happy Halloween!

This year things were a little different at the Ciminski house. Noah decided to stay home from Trick-or-Treating and be the one to give out the candy. He has been Harry Potter for years and this year he passed his costume on to Heber who wore it proudly. I stayed home with Noah and Heber went out with Eric. Noah and I sat out in the front and visited and gave out candy. It was such a pleasant night, and when Eric and Heber got home they joined us.

This is Neda. She lives next door and is such a cutie!

As you can tell, she gets along great with our boys. We love it when she drops by with her parents. We have such great neighbors!

Happy Brithday!

October is full of birthdays in my family. Eric, my Dad, and my sister Paisley all have birthdays during the month of October. During the weekend of the 19th, Eric, the boys, and I made a suicide trip to Arizona for my Dad's 60th birthday. No one knew that we were coming. We just showed up! Needless to say that we suprised everyone! The trip lasted 72 hours. 36 of those 72 hours were spent in the Mini between here and there. The boys were GREAT! I couldn't have asked for better travelers.

From the left: Paisley, Me, Arabeth, Dad, Fletcher, Taz, Mom. The only one missing from the picture is my youngest brother Jorisen. We missed you Jorisen!

5th Grade Musical

On the 16th, Noah participated in the 5th grade musicial. The program had a 50's theme and the kids really did a bang up job with their costumes. The girls wore poodle skirts and the boys wore jeans and white t-shirts. It was a nice program. Noah had a lot of fun singing and dancing.

Here's Noah with his best friend Hunter.

New Bike!

It's been a while since I've posted. Where did October go? Let me fill you in!

At the beginning of the month, Noah got a new bike! This brings our bike count up to 8. Two for every member of our family. We won't even talk about the bikes that Eric would LIKE to purchase. Anyway, this means that each of us has a road bike now and can go out together on rides. Eric has dreamt of this moment for some time. If you ask him about the greatest times he has ever had in his life, most of them include a bike.

This picture doesn't do justice to the paint job.

Knitting note: Finished Noah's first spirit sock and started the second!

OUCH!

Within the past 6 months Eric, Noah, and Heber have been in bike crashes. None of them have been pretty. While Eric's crash absolutely takes the cake, I have had more than my fair share of doctoring to do and the bandage companies have personally thanked us for our business. : ) The thing to do when someone in our family crashes is to take pictures immediately. At first, I was put off by this thinking that it was an awful thing to do. Then Eric explained to me that it was sort of a badge of honor as well as a guy thing and I softened a little and went along with it. Well, as of Monday October 1st I am officially one of the guys. I had a bike crash myself and what was the first thing I did? TAKE PICTURES!

This is what happens when a skateboard flies out from under a kid and sails out into the street and I hit it going about 15 mph. When a wheel bends like this it's called a "taco". Thank goodness I wasn't going faster!

This is just a few of my bumps and bruises on my right shoulder, elbow, and arm. I have bruises all over the place including on the insides of my thighs where my drops (bottom part of the handlebars on a road bike) hit with force as I was flying over the handlebars. Eric called me a "brave girl" because I was strong and never did cry and didn't even let on to what had happened when I called him to pick me up since I couldn't ride my bike home. He thought I had either bonked (completely ran out of energy) and vomited or had a flat tire.

I must admit I was more worried about my bike than anything else. Eric fixed my bike himself the very next day. (Thanks, Eric!) Amazingly, my tube, tire, and fork were just fine so he used the old tube and tire on the new wheel he bought to replace the "tacoed" one. I must admit that I want a new back wheel now that I have such a nice front one. I'm going out on a ride tomorrow. Hey! Where's that kid with the skateboard? ; )

Finished!

Heber's Sem Spirit Socks are all finished! I had a lot of fun knitting them up. I worked on them whenever I could and I took them with me almost everywhere I went. So as I waited for kids at practice, waited to be seated at restaurants, and waited for Noah at Scouts, I knit away. But I think the most interesting place I worked on these socks was as I sat on the Preston overpass waiting to turn on to I-635 aka LBJ Freeway waiting for the light to turn green. I'm sure the person in the car next to me thought I was nuts, but why not? You'd be suprised how many rounds you can get done while sitting at red lights!

Fun with Grandma and Grandpa

Grandma and Grandpa Ciminski stopped over for a visit on their way back to Arizona. The boys were glad they could spend some time with them. Wednesday they came for track practice, and Friday they watched the boys race. Saturday we spent the day showing them Dealy Plaza and taking them to Chuy's Mexican Restaurant with an arm wrestling match thrown in for fun. Sunday was church and a checker competition with an arm wrestling rematch! Monday night Grandma and Grandpa cooked us dinner. The boys were sad to see them go and can't wait until they come visit again.

Here's Grandpa between pictures. He is always taking pictures and is rarely in them! Just behind him on the road is the X marking the spot where Kennedy was shot.

The boys found a shady spot at Dealy.

Grandpa and Heber arm wrestling at Chuy's after eating.

Games with Grandma.

Even more arm wrestling! The boys demanded a rematch more than once!

We're back!

As many of you know, Eric and the boys enjoy racing their bikes at the Superdrome. However, with Eric's crazy work schedule this Summer and Heber being banned from racing due to his age we decided to take a 2 month break while things worked themselves out. Well, things always work out in the end and Eric will be returning to Lexis so he can spend more time at home and Heber has been cleared to race! (Incidentally, Heber is the youngest track racer in the history of the Frisco Superdrome!) Last Friday was the last race of the season and the boys had a great time seeing their friends again. Erin Popovich is the sweet girl in the picture who is a favorite with our boys. They're already talking about next season which starts March 1st!

Kapow Kings

Last year Heber went the whole school year without any receiving any Kapow Tickets. What are Kapow Tickets you ask? Well, at Sem Elementary, when a student gets caught doing something good they get a Kapow Ticket. This earns them some recognition and a couple of extra privileges. Somehow through the oversight of the teachers, he didn't get ANY last year. He is a good kid and towards the end of the year no matter how hard he tried, he just couldn't pull it off. This brought him to tears on more than one occasion. Noah was awarded several during the school year which only made Heber feel worse. Well, the Kapow fairies were watching out for Heber and sprinkled some of their Kapow Fairy Dust all over him since school has begun. He has received 6 Kapow tickets in the first 3 weeks of school! Noah also received one himself. Making the grand total of 7 Kapow tickets for the Ciminski family in a very short time. Way to go kids!

Happiness is...

There are a lot of things that make me happy. Creating is one of them. I love creating new things. Making something out of nothing. To me, there is nothing like it. Sadly, this part of my life has had to take a backseat to other things this past year. For me, being creative takes time and extra time I don't have a whole lot of. BUT! I decided to take a "vacation day" on Wednesday and do something I have been meaning to do for the past 6 months. I've never hand-painted sock yarn before. Honestly, I have been sort of intimidated by it. As I have said before I have been itching to start a new knitting project. Socks, to be exact. I decided that the boys would really love some "Sem Spirit" socks and dove in. I dyed the yarn their school colors and came up with this result. Generally, I'm pleased.

Last night, I started Heber's socks.

For those of you out there who don't knit, those knitting needles you see in the picture are quite small. They are roughly the same circumference as bamboo skewers used for kabobs. Am I crazy? Probably. But one thing is for sure. I went to bed last night blissfully happy because once again I have started the creation process. There's nothing like it!

Ahh...the smell of new crayons...

Even though I don't teach anymore, I get excited when the first day of school rolls around. Noah and Heber feel the same. They could hardly sleep the night before school started! This is their second year at Sem Elementary and they were so excited to get the school year underway. They both have very nice teachers. Noah has Mrs. Richards and Heber has Mrs. Parkey. In preparation for Middle School next year, Noah has three different teachers for various subjects. Mrs. Richards is his "Homeroom" teacher. He starts and ends his day with her. Noah says he is a little nervous about changing teachers and classrooms throughout the day. "I only have 4 minutes between classes!" he says. Here they are, at school, ready to start the new year! On a knitting note: Knitting with wire is not as fun as I thought it would be!

WHEW!

This last week of Summer has been chock full!

First of all, Heber lost his front tooth and the Tooth Fairy came to visit. Noah was convinced that Heber made out better than he did for the same tooth. That darned Tooth Fairy!

Secondly, Noah celebrated his 10th birthday! Happy Birthday Noah! I can't believe that I'm old enough to have a double-digit child! Where does the time go?

Meet Tanner! For his birthday, Noah got a Webkinz. Have you heard of those? Webkinz are stuffed animals that come with a secret code. You go online and enter the code and the stuffed animal you have becomes a virtual pet online. You have to make sure they eat, exercise, and all that jazz. It was VERY difficult to pry Noah away from the computer! You can check them out at http://www.webkinz.com/

His birthday was a simple one. All he wanted was to have a small family party at his favorite restaurant. What restaurant you ask? Red Lobster of course! It was one of Noah's nicest birthdays I can remember.

Lastly on a knitting note: I have been trying yo use up some yarn in my stash. 6 potholders later I am SO glad to be done with that pound of cotton I've had for years. I'm getting ready to hand-paint some sock yarn and start a pair of socks. I have been itching to do it, but I haven't had the time. Maybe once the kids are back in school........

I wasn't born in Texas BUT.....

I got here as fast as I could!

That was on one of the first bumper stickers we saw last year when we moved to the Dallas area. It was our family's sentiments exactly! We have loved living here and feel we are official Texans now that we have visited the Alamo and our beautiful State Capitol last week. So for my first ever post I thought I would share some of our trip with you.

First of all.....Can you believe that the four of us and all our stuff fit into Eric's Mini? Nope, me either, but we did!

The boys at the Alamo. This was late Wednesday afternoon the 15th. BEFORE tropical storm Erin hit. We managed to get in the Riverwalk too.

We thought all the water we would see would be at Sea World and at the hotel pool. BUT I digress.....maybe next time Shamu.....sorry.

Saturday. On the way home from San Antonio we stopped for a tour of the Capitol Building in Austin. Neato! What a beautiful building! It's even a little taller that the National Capital. You know Texas.....everything is bigger here.

It was a good trip. Even with all of the rain we are glad we went. Fun was had by all. We ate A LOT of good food even though this picture of Noah depicts otherwise!