Day trippin'

WARNING: extremely long post! This goes to show why I named my blog "Each Day is a Little Life!" Our days and our lives are busy and full. We are blessed to be able to spend whole days in this way.

We left home in the morning and had our pictures taken at Portrait Innovations. I had been wanting to have family portraits made since March, when Paloma's adorable seafoam green shoes still fit, but there was always someone who needed a haircut or had a cut or bruise or we were just too busy. Just doing our passport photos was a pain. So I spent some time on Friday getting clothes, shoes & bows ready and getting Gabe's hair trimmed for the Saturday appointment. I also prepared and wrapped gifts for the three birthday parties of the weekend as well as a baby gift for my cousin Chrys, who has been restricted to bedrest in the last few weeks of pregnancy.

I actually MADE three bows. Nesha loaned me the instructions she bought on eBay; she's been making beautiful bows for months now. I'd say to see the ones my girls wore on the 4th, but I haven't got around to an Independence Day post yet. Crazy! Anyway this was my first attempt at bow-making ever. What's silly about this is that we probably have 50 bows upstairs. But here is why I don't make bows:


It takes a lot of materials, time & makes a big mess! (Well, I do, anyway.)

Anyway considering all of the preparations I had made, Saturday morning was more rushed than I wanted it to be. I fell asleep Friday night without ironing anything, and on Saturday morning, David went to get his hair cut.

The kids spent most of the morning vegetating in front of the t.v. (This is pretty rare, thankfully) while I ironed and finished getting things together. I didn't want to do Paloma's hair until the last minute, because it doesn't stay long and/ or she messes with it.

We arrived at Portrait Innovations just in time, which felt like a miracle, but we had not really given the kids much of a snack and Paloma seemed to be getting sleepy already (even though it was only 11:15, the earliest appointment I could get that day).

So here are a few of the pictures. Tell us if you want one. We have a few extras after I made a stack for each of our families.

This was the best group shot, though Paloma's not really smiling, David's feet are cut off, and if you look closely, you can see Paloma's sippy cup in his hand.

This was the best of the three of them, I thought.
I liked this one because we could see their heights.
I didn't buy a print of this one, but I love how Paloma was playing with Carmen & Gabriel's hands.


This is one I didn't order prints of. It wasn't quite as good as the red one, I thought. On second thought, maybe it was. I don't know. Too late now, though!

There were several good individual ones of Carmen, though she is struggling with what is a "real" smile, especially since her front teeth are missing. I was actually hoping for a shot that showed that better!





Gabriel had several good ones to choose from, too:





Overall, it's nice to have it out of the way, but I'm not as happy with the end result as I was last year. First of all, there's not a matching (good) one of Paloma in the pink & green combo

(this was the best one, but I didn't like it nearly as much as those of the other two)
and the photographer didn't take individual pics of Carmen & Gabriel in the red. So now I have my 3-frame photo sitting empty, for now.

Second, there are really no good smiles on Paloma (in any that were viable otherwise). Here are the best ones of her, though:

I liked this family one (and several others like it) except for the shadow on Gabriel's face.
Overall, we still like Portrait Innovations far better than the other portrait places we've used. But now I still feel like I need to go back to match things up. . . who knows when that will happen again!

We ate lunch at Market Street (but my review of that experience will have to wait for another time!), picked up our pictures, then headed to Dallas for Sofia's princess birthday party (where princess attire was requested--but only Carmen wanted to change). We were the first guests to arrive.

Lety greeted us wearing a gorgeous velvet ball gown,
and almost immediately we asked her to explain how she constructed the castle cake!

We polished fingernails and made necklaces & bracelets,


then we made crowns,



and Sofia was already worn out!

Next, Lety held a dubbing ceremony to name the royal princesses & princes


then a "princess" came to visit and read the Princess and the Pea to the kids.


Adults congregated in the kitchen

and took pictures and video.

I don't know if they ever played "Pin the Kiss on the Frog" or not, because if they did, I missed it, but it was cute, anyway!


The royal party ended (for us, at least) with an impromptu concert by Benjamin and Carmen.



After the party, we went downtown to get our circus tickets, then to Luna's Tortilla Factory.

David wanted the kids to go inside and told them how he had come there since he was a kid.






I decided to take a few pictures. While I was shooting, the owner asked if I was taking pictures because I'd heard the news.

No, what news? That they were closing that historic location and moving in August!

We talked to the owner for a bit and left with our tamales, tortillas, chips & salsa.

Next, we went to a Fiesta grocery store to shop for Carmen's party. One of the first things we noticed were the gorgeous, huge piñatas hanging above the whole produce section.




Next, we found cactus, peppers, tomatillos before we ventured into an area with Mexican toys and games (Loteria and mini-tortilla makers) and candy for the piñata. (We wanted to get Mexican candy for the novelty.) I also found Fiesta-brand soda pop, so we're all set now. (David wondered whether we could find Joya sodas, but those came in glass bottles, so they're not allowed.)

We fit everything into the van only because we'd left the stroller at home (so we could take our tent & sleeping bags to Lety & Tom for their vacation). The car was PACKED and we wondered how well the piñata's streamers would survive next to Paloma.

When we left, it was dinner time, so we went down the street to one of my favorite restaurants in the world, Ali Baba, for some Shish Tawook, the yummiest rice in the world, pita and Greek salad (and David had gyros this time, but normally he gets Mashwi Shish).

Next, we tried to go to La Mariposa (again for Carmen's party), but it had closed at 5:30.



So before heading home, we made one more stop: the Apple store. The kids had the kids' section all to themselves, so all three of them enjoyed playing with Dr. Seuss, Dora & Cars software while I played around with an iPhone (at David's suggestion, though as I already told him, he doesn't have to sell me--I want one! My phone is so old, I can't get a decent ring tone or text message. I can receive messages, but not reply to them or even tell who or what number the messages come from... but still, it is also a palm pilot, my calendar and my phone book. We are waiting for our Sprint contracts to run out to change phones, though.)


Watching the kids on the Macs made me a little more willing to consider what David keeps bringing up: getting a Mac mini. But I always wanted to limit or avoid the kids playing video games. I've seen some kids become completely anti-social because of them (at least it seemed that way. My students and I have healthy arguments on this sometimes). I've had to take them up from students at school (in the middle of teaching!) before.

We finally headed home. David & I had to get ready to teach Sunday school the next morning (and we had a big day in the afternoon, too).