For My Girls...

A cute and fuzzy bunny.

木こり

I've written a haiku, inspired by my lumberjack post:



私はガレージでから見ている私の妻の驚きに傷を得なかった





Kidding! I didn't write it in Japanese. Here it is:


I didn't get hurt,
to the surprise of my wife
watching from in the garage.

Gabi's Birthday 2007

Our Kitchen

Sonya did some cool paint work in the kitchen. Our theme is 'French Country'.

I'm running out of witty titles...

The girls groom a goat at the zoo.



Uri or Gabi took this of Gabi's stuffed dog 'Smelly'.
Uri took a shot of Sonya enjoying a tasty homemade popsicle

These Go Way Back

These shots were taken by Uri on one of our first visits to the San Antonio Zoo. These are from before we bought our house, probably around Christmas time, 2006.

Gabi and I are caterpillars.

7th Anniversary

Sonya & I celebrated our 7th anniversary yesterday. I gave her a ton of flowers and she made me this really cool card. It rocks. She also had the mariachis play 'El Rey' for me when we went out to eat. At our engagement party, my future uncle had the mariachis play "El Rey"; he told me it would be my theme song. Its basically about a guy who's been kicked out of the house, but still claims to be the king. Pretty funny.

I am amazed that its been 7 years. Sometimes it seems like it was just last year. I pray for many happy years with her.

I'm a Lumberjack, and I'm okay...

The girls took these photos of our efforts at cutting down a tree. If you look back at the photos I posted of our new house, you can see a tree growing right on the edge of the drive. I was getting tired of driving around it, when it became infested with aphids that dropped (pooped) sticky goo all over my truck. Said goo turning black with mold rather quickly, and difficult to clean off.

Out came the axe!

Chainsaw, really, but the tree is gone. And, I didn't get hurt, much to the surprise of my wife and children watching from the garage.

Parking Bliss!

Easter 2007

The girls are posing here with the lamb cake Sonya made for Easter last year. It was kind of rainy, so the cascarones (bottom picture) weren't the huge event they've been in the past. The girls had fun, tho'.

Fiesta San Antonio

Working our way forward in time (it won't last - I've got a really old roll of film somewhere) to April '07 and the Battle of Flowers Parade. With us is Sonya's aunt & uncle, her cousin (orange shirt) and his daughter.

New Post, Old Photos

St. Patrick's Day is coming up, and I thought that would be a good time to post photos that I've finally developed...from last St. Patty's Day!!! I wish I could say that's the oldest roll of film I had, but I'd be lying. :)

Sonya had the camera on this outing, so no shots of her, although you can see her shoe here...
These are Sonya's parents...

Ninjas are everywhere.

Happy New Year! We entered the new year peacefully, and relatively quietly. I say relatively, because people here in Texas like to shoot fireworks off on New Year's Eve, so it can get pretty loud. I could probably sleep through it, but for the crazy dog that lives in our house. He can't stand loud noises. Makes him vibrate and pant. Tries to climb in bed with you. That kind of thing. Sonya and I took turns keeping him quiet and off the girls beds. That lasted about 2 hours. That and watching a DVD was the extent of our celebrations.

Sonya and I started training again. We have our little family dojo now, and are teaching the girls taijutsu. The saw a karate demonstration at school and got excited about it. Sonya said, 'Heck, we can train them ourselves.' And so we are. Its all starting to come back to me. It feels good to train again. Sonya and I hadn't trained for about 5 years.

In other martial (sort of) news - I went deer hunting last weekend with an acquaintance from church. We saw a young buck, but decided not to shoot him. If he makes it another couple of years, he'll be really nice. We were hunting on a private ranch, and they try to actively manage the deer, so it could be that he'll make it.

A friend sent us this a while back, and I just found it. It makes me smile. (The picture is of Ogata Shuma Hiroyuki later known as Jiraiya, a ninja in a Japanese folk tale, with a heavy gun, overcoming a huge Snake which has preyed on his friends the Toads):

Ninjas are everywhere. Ninjas are in movies, ninjas are on TV, there is probably a ninja clinging to the bottom of your desk right now. With their roots in the battlefields of 14th century Japan, ninjas were assassins who practiced the are of ... oh, who cares? It doesn't matter where ninjas came from. All you need to know is that ninjas can totally kill you without even thinking about it. In fact, ninjas are so lethal that it takes an enormous effort of will for them not to kill you. YOU are only alive because a ninja is trying very hard not to shoot a blow dart through your neck right this minute. Ninjas are being kind to us and yet we haven't returned the favor. Even so, ninjas have stealthily taken over the planet in the last few years and no one over 30 saw it coming.

Las Posadas

Christmas is looming!

Soon, we will 'light' the third candle on our Advent wreath. We all had a lot of fun making it out of construction paper on the morning of the first Sunday of Advent.

Wednesday we went to buy our Christmas tree. We were going to wait until Christmas Eve, but thought we might not find one then. The girls enjoyed decorating it - we went with an antique theme, using ribbon as garland, and old-fashioned toys and bells for ornaments.

Next week we will be hosting Las Posadas, a traditional Mexican Christmas novena that reminds us of Joseph and Mary’s desperate search for lodging in Bethlehem. I will post some pictures of that afterward. We got our neighbors in on the act - the houses on either side of us will be the first two 'inns' that Joseph and Mary are turned away from. Then the procession comes to our house, where we have a big party. It should be great fun.

Las Posadas: In 1578, an Augustinian friar introduced this novena in Mexico to combat the pagan customs of the Aztecs. They honored their warrior god, Huitzilopochtli, during the time that corresponds to Christmas - the friar’s intent was to begin a Christian devotion that would lessen the attention that the Indians gave to pagan rituals.

Tiny Toons do TMBG

I fondly remembered these Tiny Toon's videos for 'Istanbul (Not Constantinople)' and 'Particle Man'. It occurred to me today to Google for them. You can find just about anything now.

Istanbul (Not Constantinople) - Tiny Toons

Particle Man by Tiny Toons

Big Ol' Texas Halloween!

We celebrated our first Halloween in Texas, and Nana's Birthday! It was a fun evening. Sonya and the girls made a gluten-free birthday cake, which Uri and Gabi iced. Sonya worked very hard to make all the food and decorate. In the process, she managed to rearrange the living room and play room. Now we have a much nicer layout.
That wasn't all - Sonya made the Underdog costumes the girls wore. They were very excited about those costumes.


The girls had more fun handing out treats than they did Trick-or-Treating. We don't give out candy, instead we distribute little toys. This year we had small plastic ninjas and rubber bracelets. I must say, there were a few ungrateful kids out there. Most of those had about 3 pounds of candy in their sacks. Most kids said thank you, and a few got pretty excited about the ninjas.


Sonya's brother, Steve, and his wife, Amanda, celebrated their daughter Laiah's first Halloween with us. Laiah is dressed as a chicken in this photo. Gabi and I went with them around the neighborhood to trick-or-treat. Laiah's only about a year old, so she didn't do much, but she had a good time. The girls think my fat witch costume is hilarious. This is like the 3rd year I've worn it.

Now that Halloween is behind us, we're getting geared up for a visit from Grandpa Carl & Grandma Mary Jo, and Thanksgiving!

Pax et bonum



(Photos by Amanda)

Simpsonized Redux

4th of July

We had a little shindig on Independence Day (hence the red clothes and beads). Sonya is holding our neice, Laiah, in these pictures. You can visit Laiah's blog here. Uri calls her tie-died shirt her 'fireworks shirt'.