This past Saturday Mike had a little run in with a strong man.    No, really...he was strong.   His name is Dennis Rogers.   Never heard of him?   Here's an excerpt about him from his website:

"Today Dennis is a Grandmaster Strongman, and travels the world performing incredible feats of strength. Named Pound-for-Pound the World’s Strongest Man for the feats he performs (A.O.B.S.), he is the most seen strength athlete in history- witnessed by over 300 million people in 156 countries, through either his live or televised performances. Even Oprah jumped on his bandwagon, as she selected him as the "World’s Most" Performing Strongman.

All are amazed as he twists steel bars and horseshoes, rolls frying pans up with his fingers, tears thick phonebooks and decks of cards like they are tissue paper, and drives nails through construction lumber with a mere blow of his fist. Just a handful of the many feats he performs through his inspirational and motivational performances."

For real, yo. He did this to a frying pan and gave it to Abby:


So it was an innocent Saturday eve at church (yes, we go to church Saturday night...it rocks). Pastor is wrapping up the big fall sermon series, "Unwavering".  They usually pull out all the stops for the fall & new year sermon series...this was no exception.   To illustrate the point of Pastors sermon, they started off the service with a little demonstration by Dennis Rogers.....and..........since WE sit in the front row (yes, we sit in the front row...it rocks), well.....I'll just give you a visual:


Yes, that is my husband.   Yes, that is a 6 inch nail in the strong mans hand.   Yes, that is a board on his lap.  Yes that is a balloon between his legs.  Yes, he is wearing blindfold-glasses lest he should flinch and the strong man renders him...ahem...um, you know.

Pretty good action shot, eh?   Thanks to having the old point-n-shoot in the purse (thanks, Mom!!).

Dennis went on to rip a deck of cards in half, bend a steel rod, make a heart out of a horse shoe, bend a hammer and wrench  in half.   And oh yeah, drive a nail through a piece of wood with his bare hand.

All this strength makes me think of my man............today is his birthday!!!   So I shant let this post end without sending props out to my personal strong man.   Later after church during supper, he bent a straw with his bare hands!!   What a feat....I love you, Mike!!  Happy birthday, you will always be pound-for-pound, Club Amaro's strongest man...

peace out...

Warning. Scary toe alert. Don't say that you weren't warned.



Last week my mom was here visiting and us girls got our toes done. All the same color. Such an event called for a photo shoot. I think it's a framer, don't you? What? You don't agree?

Hey, it could have been worse - at least I didn't title it, "3 generations of toe jam".

I hesitated to even put this picture up. My toes look way swoll. (I know that's not appropriate usage of swoll, but I've recently discovered this word and can't stop using it...thanks, Jen O.)

A big shout out to Mom for treating my toes right.

Hey y'all...Hope you're all recovering from your wild and crazy July fourths - or would that be July 1/4's? Hey, I never promised you grammatical correctness here...you get my point, let's move on.

We are bringing down the house here in Tejas - trying to keep cool in the midst of 100+ degree weather. We've managed to do a pretty good job - after all, it's a "dry" heat, right? We actually had a little cooling trend here today - got down to about 93 degrees - Grandpapa kept saying if it gets any cooler we'd have to break out the coats.

Thought you'd all be on the edge of your seats waiting to hear what we've been up to, so I'll do a little recap. I gave you the Reader's Digest version in the post title...but I'll follow up with a few pictures and a little commentary.

The Dremel...one of mankind's most useful tools. Do you not know about the dremel? If not, immediately go down to the Home Depots and find out all you can about it. When Abby was a baby, she would get the crusty nose. Those of you with kids know what I'm talking about. Even if you don't have kids - you've had a case of the crusty nose. Don't pretend like you've never had one. Anyway - when Abby had the crusty nose, Grandpapa always said he was going to go get the q-tip attachment for the dremel and take care of biz. Now see...if you don't know what a dremel is, that won't make alot of sense. So - all that to say, Abby & Grandpapa had a little time with the dremel today. NO, there were no q-tips involved thank goodness! They were working on a little project together.



As you can see, Abby's has her safety goggles on...Grandpapa's motto is: SAFETY FIRST.

Of course, you have to balance out your workshop projects with a little domestic activity. That would be Grandmama's area...here, you can see Abby in the kitchen assisting GMM with the lemonade pie we had with our 4th of July meal.



Abby did most of the work on the pie herself, down to the licking of the spoons, beaters & bowl. I think all the licking took place prior to the mixing of the pie filling, but I'm not sure...let's hope.

Once again, it's all about balance. Workshop project and domestic activity must be balanced with the right amount of blowing stuff up. Yeah...huh, huh...blowing stuff up is cool.

Just let me have my pyromaniac moment, please, ok?

In honor of our country's 233rd birthday, GPP purchased the Costco package of fireworks, complete with Eyeballs, Happy Penguins, Poppers, Bumble Bees, Snakes, Sparklers and those little things that look like booger papers that you throw on the ground to make popping noises.



One thing about GPP...he's all about safety. His motto is: SAFETY FIRST (my motto is, REPETITION AGAIN). I took one look at that box of firecrackers and my finger turned into a bic lighter...I was ready to tear into them and light stuff. But GPP had to have a staging area AND, the lighting area had to prepped. That included soaking of the wood and grass in surrounding areas as well as proper safety gear for those under 7 years of age.



Abby is not afraid to watch fireworks (we have 5 years of Titoland to thank for that!). However, the thought of lighting one up or holding onto a sparkler put her in a tail spin. Mike and I trust GPP (20+ years in the military and some of those as fire marshall) and had no problem with him teaching her respect for fire and proper techniques for dealing with it. She was apprehensive at first. She could barely light the wick without GPP there holding the punk (fyi - that's a big long incense looking thing they use to light the fireworks...don't know if that's official, but hey, GPP said). After she lit it, she would run for the hills like a little school girl. Of course, she is a little school girl, but that's beside the point. It took a little gentle - and I do mean gentle - coercing, but by the end of the night, Abby was running the fireworks show! She knew the names of all the fireworks and was instructing the onlookers about what was going down - all this with her hand on her hip. Those of you who know Abby personally can visualize just what I'm talking about.

During all this display of fire power, I had a chance to play with The Reb and see what kind of fun images I could get. Here's one of my favorites - this one is called the Eyeball.


One thing that I didn't squeeze into the post title is our trip to Rangers Stadium on Friday night. A great game (Rangers won 3-1) that included a home run and a post-game fireworks show. We were WAY up high, but they were still great seats (and thank goodness, in the shade!).

Be sure to visit the DropShots account for all the pics...you know, I don't post them all here. These are the teasers, people. Go there, make comments on them...let me know that you're out there.

So there you have it...another update from the Club. You will probably hear from us again before we leave at the end of the week. So keep your bookmark handy.

Keepin' it real in Tejas,

k

We had the privilege of watching "the boys" tonight while their mom, dad and 2 sisters had an evening out.


Boys. I didn't get the handbook on those. Come to think of it, I didn't get the handbook for the girl either. My Mom, on the other hand always referred to the 'Mother's Handbook' - she even referenced pages ("Well it says on page 732 of the Mother's Handbook..."). I guess I missed that day at the hospital when they handed them out.

As a Mom to one girl, I always feel inadequate to handle more than one child...or...boys. But, I'm easy going and flexible. How hard could it be? I'll pull out the box of Lincoln Logs and they'll play that for 4 hours, then clean it up and go to bed, right? Yeah, right.

Your honor, I submit Exhibits A - H for the jury.










It started off innocently enough with the Lincoln Logs...but once I pulled The Reb out, it was all over. It must have been some boy switch that I didn't know about - whatever it was, it got flipped AND it was contagious. The 3 of them started running and screaming all over the house, trying to get away from the camera. This went on for a very...long...time.

By the way...if you're wondering why Beth Moore is hanging on a shelf next to Rotel and Progresso soup it's because....well, it's a really long story. Maybe for next time.

Regardless of the running and the screaming, I'm a fan of these 2 boys...they are precious in all their boy-ness. I can't help but pondering the future...10, 15 years down the road. What young men they will be. Will they be trying to win the affections of a girl we know? Time will tell, but for now...we enjoy.



Boys - you gotta love 'em...even with a trail of boogies under their nose.

Snips and snails,
Puppy dog tails...

k

WARNING!
The following content contains DISTURBING IMAGES, GRAPHIC CREVICES and UNIDENTIFIED SUBSTANCES and should be viewed with extreme caution. It is advised that small children and the elderly be kept far, far away from this post. Do not view on an empty stomach, or while eating a greasy polish sausage sandwich. If at all possible, please close your eyes while reading.

Consider yourself warned...



I told you...what are you doing with your eyes open anyway?

I want you to know I am putting these pictures of my feet on this blog against my better judgment. The Reb, in all it's glory could not make my feet look good...and, I refuse to photoshop my feet. Partly because that means I would have to look at them for an extended period of time. Partly because I just have to draw the line somewhere.

I'm now suddenly feeling very vulnerable. Can somebody please have pity and kidnap me away to Bella where I can get a glass of wine and some foot attention? Also, I think my toes need liposuction...is that on the menu?

Ok, enough of that...I promised Abby that I would blog about this, so here goes.

Abby thought it would be a fabulous idea if she treated me to some nail polish. Those of you that know me know that this sort of thing is lost on me. But, I don't dare want to disappoint the youth. So I agree.

First, you must pick your color. Lucky me - thanks to my CVS Coupon Commando excursions, we've got gross green and bluer than blue (hey, when it's free, who cares what color you get)

Hey, I've already gone this far exposing my little sausages to the open air...may as well go for broke and do one of each. "Great!" exclaims Abby. Let's start with blue...gotta give it a good shake, now.









Warning...another foot picture coming up. Just treat it like the sun...a quick glance and then look away.



Now, moving onto the left foot...green is up. Another good shake.



This is actually how Abby was painting my toenails...with her eyes closed:



She was also holding her breath...poor child turned as blue as my right toenails at one point.

Now, take a look...




Don't try to sue me for retinal damage...the well is dry, friends.

Abby had a great time doing my toes...she went on to do my fingers as well...but, I went with the sparkle clear for those. Once my sausages dried, I put my shoes and socks back on. Ahhh..my comfort zone.

Well, this was good for me (I don't know how good it was for you)...sometimes we have to bring our problems into the light (without photoshopping even) so that others can share in our pain. That's really when true healing can take place.

Ohh...my toes are starting to tingle just thinking about it.

Of course it could be that my toe jam is reacting to the paint.

love you guys.

k

Today was a beautiful spring day...I would call it 68 degrees and blue skies. This afternoon I took it upon myself to start tackling the front flower bed clean up. Ok, well technically it's not a flower bed yet....but it's gonna be. Right now, it's over run with monkey grass and very lame shrubs. I hate shrubs. But I sure like playing in the dirt.


Exhibit A: This is a picture of me with my great grandpa in his garden, circa 1975, Monroe, Louisiana. Nice pants, huh? Stop laughing...you know you had pants like that.

In addition to a great veggie garden, great grandpa had a worm farm. When we would visit, I would spend time there helping him harvest the little wormies. Fun, fun, fun. What kid doesn't like playing in the dirt, digging up worms?

Fast forward 34 years (save your brain cells - I'm 37). My 6 year old is digging for worms in our patch of dirt. Another "coming full circle" for me...



It seems as though the dirt in our patch is full of wormies...and every one of Abby's worm discoveries was followed by a gasp and a "Coooooooooool". I explained to her that the worms prefer to stay IN the dirt, but she insisted on building a "worm jungle". On the concrete stair.

In case you're wondering about the elbow/knee pads - she dug these up in the garage and decided to put them on. When digging, one must be well-protected.



I guess it's better than being on the end of the hook, eh?

Yo.

The Reb has been workin' overtime...capturing all the haps here at Club Amaro. First of all, I'm handing out kudos to Canon for making the absolute best camera battery on the face of the earth. I have not had to charge the battery yet and I'm running this thing like Walter Payton just broke through a tackle and has 90 clear yards ahead. It's amazing. Now since I said that it's going to run out on my next shot, watch.

Anyway - got a few things to bring you up to speed on...so gather 'round.

BIRTHDAY.

First of all, we had a very special occasion here last night - the celebration of GPP's birthday. His real bday is on St. Patricks, so he always has green cupcakes. We certainly did not want to be accused of breaking tradition, so Abby and I got the Yellow & Blue food coloring out and had a little meeting with Betty Crocker.

We wanted to make them extra-special so I decided to try putting a little globule of marshmallows in the center (you know, hoping to create some kind of twinkie filling action). Well, it didn't really work but we did have a fun surprise instead.
The mallows kind of crept back up to the top during cooking and created a crispy little topping that was fabulouso (so I was told - I did not partake!). Most important, Grandpapa enjoyed his cupcake...and birthday gifts which included a homemade treasure box that Abby made.


After the festivities, it was time for a favorite pastime...coloring.



BIRDWATCHIN'

Abby is a fan of birds. She even has her own Bird book, which Aunt Jan gave to her way back when (Aunt Jan is a bird fan herself...). She also has a set of binoculars. This morning while GMama was in the beauty chamber getting ready, Abby was reading to her about the types of birds from her book. Later on, Abby took the binoculars outside to do some watching. We spotted a Robin's nest on the Oak tree in our front yard...YAY! It's a hefty nest too. We are hoping that Mike & GPapa will be able to put our bluebird house up in the next few days...that will give us even more birds to watch.





I thought the picture above would have been much cooler had there not been a big ol honken motor home in the background...maybe I'll have to do a little Photoshoppin' on it.

Oakie Riggin
The man-zone (aka the garage, aka the shop, aka "out there") has been seeing serious action since Gpapa arrived. Because we have a good bit of leftover debris in our backyard from the marathon pruning event that happened last time he was here, Gpapa decided to fashion something for Mike's truck that would allow him to transport more than the standard truck bed. I'm sorry that was such a long sentence...I'll give you a minute to catch your breath. Ok. So Gpapa went to work on what is now affectionately being referred to as the Oakie Camper.



This thing is a work of art...and I'm normally not the carpentry-appreciating type.



It comes apart in pieces - easy to put up, easy to take down.



Impressive...and, it can double as an Oakie tent, too.

Well...this is just too much information. I hope you've been able to take it all in. I'm going to go take a nap in the Oakie tent.

Oakie love,
k

Settle down Billy Joel fans...

Just wanted to give you a quick update on recent Club haps. Last night we had a bon fire in B & M's back yard. It was killing three birds with one stone, really. For one, you have a nice way to burn the branches and leaves from recent pruning events (and your Christmas tree, if you still had it...which we did) While you watch all that burn, you gotcherself a nice toasty fire, perfect for keeping warm AND toasting marshmallows. One word people: S'MORES. It's all about marshin' the mallow. The kids love it. I know Abby does for sure - it's a chance for her to walk around with food all over her face and me not chase her around with a wet wipe.







After the kids went to bed, the adults stayed by the fire and started throwing some really COOL stuff on the fire. Like our 4 month old Christmas tree. OH YEAH. The burn factor was off the hook. I came home with a sunburn on my chest - I'm not kidding you.

On a cooler note...Club Amaro is joining forces with the B & M household to start a HUGE garden. This year, we are doing it in their backyard since none of us know what we're doing - it's better to just screw up one large plot, right? Actually, it should just be more fun all working together. Did I say it's going to be big? Yeah...big. Today, Mike picked up a pile of horse poop in his truck and him & M tilled it into the ground. I've worn out the "crap" jokes 10 times over. We're excited to get going - and I'm sure The Reb will be snapping as we go. Stay tuned...

WELCOME GMM & GPP...as I write this, Grandpapa & Grandmama are on approach in the Sweet Rig. They'll be rolling in any time. They are here for a 10 or so day visit. No telling what kind of shenanigans will turn up... Again, stay tuned.

Hope you're enjoying your weekend...stay out of trouble!

k

I have added something new to my job description. Tooth-puller.
I submit to you, Exhibit A.



After quite a number of weeks being loose, Mr. Tooth decided he'd had enough. He could no longer stand the incessant wiggling and touching by Mr. Pointer Finger. So this morning, when Mr. Tooth was almost perpindicular to the gum line, I just stuck my pinchers in and took care of biz. Abby didn't even know what hit her. She was suspended in this confused state...not sure whether to be mad at me for pulling her tooth without asking, or excited at the fact that she's just crossed over into a new season of dental glory. As she stood there with blood trickling out of the newly created hole in her gum line, I yelled at her, "GO LOOK IN THE MIRROR". She snapped out of it and giggled all the way down the hall.



I'm having flashbacks of my orthodontist yelling at me for not wearing my retainer.

Whad up, peeps...

I got a sweet love note today...actually, I get sweet love notes everyday. Lots of them. Trees have sacrificed their life for the sake of the notes I get. But this one ranked extra high in sweetness.



I love that she loves me to the moon & bake. How cute is that.

One last thing:

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO GRANDPAPA!! See you in a few days, we'll have the green cupcakes waitin for ya...

k

This picture was taken on Sunday - the day after the big "spring forward" event that Mike is always so excited about. I on the other hand lament each year about my loss of sleep. Why is it that I was awake taking this picture of two sleeping people? Hmmmm...I was so disgusted by their inability to stay awake that I left the house and went walking around the neighborhood.

Speaking of walking - lately during my walks in the hood I've been noticing certain things happening. Maybe I've been watching too much Plant Earth for my own good. But the birds are active... I think if there were no trees on the earth to get crazy over, I would definitely be putting birds as my number one thing to observe. I am especially loving the Robins. There were not too many Robin's out in California where we lived. Neither were there Cardinals. We get a pretty good dose of both of them here. Anyway - the birds are frolicking, the time is changing, we have had 2 straight days of 80 degree weather. I would say that spring is in the air. Although I wouldn't mind another good snow, the warmer weather is like an old welcome friend. Walking in 10 degree weather has not exactly been fabulous, I must say.

Speaking of birds...for those of you on Rebel watch ("Rebel" is my new big girl camera, by Canon, the best company ever...love the Canon) he'll be arriving on Thursday. Actually, that has nothing to do with birds. But I will probably be taking pictures of birds...so that's good. Yeah, just think of all the pictures I'll be boring you with from now on!

Speaking of pictures (I'm trying to be better with my segues...how am I doing?)...I thought you'd like to see a picture of my daughter NOT being cute. The utter silliness that happens here can only really be experienced in person, but this picture can at least give you a little glimpse into life at Club Amaro.



Just a side note to this picture: I thank God that the growing out of the bangs phase lasted two days. We went back to her Dora the Explorer look when we got haircuts this past weekend. HA-LAY-LU-YA!!!

I hope that you are enjoying the change of seasons and noticing the little things that are happening in the environment around you - even if it's just bird flirting.

love you all!
k