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Coach got me.  Yep, Presidents Day sale plus Valentine’s Day. Ha!

I have been eyeballing this ‘cosmic’ zip card case since it came out. I just couldn’t justify paying $50 when I already have a card case like it that I got for much cheaper last summer (signature print with bananas).  But when the 15% off sale hit, I had to go for it!  I also ended up finding a cute pink thin card case and got another pair of ballet flats. My current outlet pair is worn, and these were $67!!

Anyway, I decide to check out but wanted to keep looking at the sale. In the trending now section, it was denim & cherries. I bought a denim Cassie 19 last year, and it is so cute!! I was not really into the signature denim even though I have seen it A LOT on YouTube. I have also seen the white bags with red cherries. It’s nice and fun, but not something I thought I needed. 

As I continued looking on the website, I saw what looked like a combo of both that was SO CUTE! It was the Rowan satchel with a dark blue signature canvas with cherry print. The cherries were dark red and pink, and they looked almost like hearts! I decided I needed this print in my life, but I didn’t know which bag I wanted to get. I was thinking a mini city tote would be perfect. It holds phones and glasses and a small wallet which is perfect for my needs, but it was not available. I also thought the Rowan was so pretty when I first saw the print in that style so I searched for that bag again. When I did, I realized the have a mini Rowan. I started trading between the two sizes because I was determined to get one. 

I watched YouTube videos comparing the two, and even got out my old style Rowan (it’s been updated since I bought mine). I realized that I don’t like my old style one anymore so now that’s on the chopping block. Anyway, I still could see pluses and minuses about both sizes. The large one obviously holds a lot more and could have more overall function. The small one is something I can take to meetings with my essentials when I don’t have pockets. I was going back and forth and finally decided I needed to go to the outlet mall and see both. 

I hauled myself to the coach outlet and looked at both bags. When I did, I knew the mini was the one for me. The sales associate also showed me this matching cute bag charm that could work as a card holder, but I decided that I could just use my new pink card holder that I ordered online when it arrives. 

Anyway, I love the bag. I am doing a 4-6 month detail at work so I had been wanting to get a bag to make it special and mark the occasion so the timing is also good for that. I have also been looking for good bags to hold two phones and the basics so this fits that need, too. I took the strap off, but I think I will try it with the strap today. I always take the straps off bags since I like the hand carry look, but it might be nice to see how this thing does hands free.  I am super excited to wear it today.

Yes, purses bring me joy. 🤩 

This weekend is my daughter’s first water polo tournament. We are pretty excited!  It will be interesting to see how that all goes, but I am super excited for her.  I really hope she has fun. She wants to quit swimming and just do water polo, but that’s not happening quite yet. I told her she needs to at least see how the tournaments are. Her brother likes to swim (and wants to quit water polo), but he is also doing both because if I am dragging one kid to practice and if another can practice at the same time, then both are going. They are in different swim and water polo groups, but the stars have aligned and both are in the same pool at the same time for both activities so they are both doing both. 

Originally the plan was for my husband and me to have a special weekend with our daughter because her first water polo tournament is in San Antonio. We got a room near the natatrouim for the first night and a room downtown for the second night. The room the second night is in an old hotel and has a view of the Alamo (the Emily Morgan hotel)!  

When my oldest heard about the trip, he asked if he could go. We told him he could. Both hotel rooms have two queens so we can make it work no problem.  My middle child was planning to stay home with his grandparents and take care of the dogs (he also has an orchestra movie night Friday and really wants to play video games with his friends and there is a meeting at church about his mission trip that he wants to attend). 

But of course life is crazy. My hubs has to work on Saturday now. Ugh. He wants me to take all three kids to San Antonio so the house is more peaceful (the job he’s working is in Texas City so he will be at home at night). 

I am debating if I want to do both nights in San Antonio if I am 3-on-1.  Do I want to spend the money for both hotels for a weekend getaway without the hubs? Clearly it’s the second night that’s more expensive in the Alamo view room downtown.  He has taken trips with two kids without me (I have only done that with my daughter unless it’s scouts).  There will also be more water polo tournaments in San Antonio, this is just her first. 

I think the biggest thing is that I don’t like driving so I am not excited about driving in San Antonio which is just silly. Seriously, I think that’s my biggest hesitation about two nights. I guess I was just looking forward to the hubs going and of course him driving. It seems like if I am on an adventure he’s usually there with me. 

I know I can make this a memorable trip for the kids. I probably just need to sit down and plan what all we will do. I am thinking Friday night is mostly travel and low key dinner (depending on timing). The hotel the first night has free breakfast so that first morning I will make sure the boys get their fill of yummy food (they eat a lot). I will plan to get lots of snacks for the kids since I don’t know how the tournament will go or what the food scene is. 

As far as I know, we do not have a schedule for the tournament yet. We have some friends talking about seeing the baby capybara at the San Antonio Zoo so that could be fun. My daughter is also excited about seeing the river walk. 

Ok, let’s do this. You know I like to think things through by writing about them. It will be an awesome weekend for the kids. I do like the idea of a great experience for our first tournament weekend. 

The Explorer hit a new milestone this week – it hit 80,000 miles!  After the booboo it had in November (see previous post), I was feeling kind of down about the Explorer after getting it back.  It needed some clean up, I lost a piece of my roof rack while driving back from the shop somehow, and my back up camera has a period of time when it stopped working. It needs to be detailed like no one’s business. 

Anyway, last Thursday the back up camera started working again, and I was VERY happy.  When they replaced my windshield they put the cord for the camera into the windshield seal which makes no sense (it’s an aftermarket back up camera that we had running between panels).  I was unhappy about it, but things are looking up again with it actually working so that’s good.  We talked about getting a new Explorer (which would be nice) or an Expedition (which would actually fit our family), but we don’t want to make any moves until our oldest starts driving.  I don’t think the Explorer is a good first car because the visibility is really low, but the hubs pointed out that we know all the history of this vehicle so it’s better than buying used from a stranger.

In a perfect world, we would keep this Explorer, the F250, and then get an Expedition. That would meet all of our family vehicle needs for a while. If it were me picking a new vehicle, I would want a Mustang Mach-E, but I don’t see that happening because I have large children and a larger vehicle also makes sense. We have time to figure it out. 

For now I just need to love on my Explorer. I told the hubs I found these little pockets you put into the door handles in the inside to make it a functional space. Yes, that’s the next improvement I need. 😜 I also might need to replace my Nebraska sticker. It’s starting to g to peel. 

This March will mark 12 years with the red Explorer. It’s been a great Mom vehicle for me. My starter (white) Explorer was a 2000 model I bought in 2009 (when I was pregnant with first kid), and I drove until I got this one in 2013. I really loved that Explorer. It had 100k miles on it when I got it and was a higher trim model. We spent some time cleaning it up, I got a new stereo with Bluetooth, and it was perfect!  We bought it for $4000 and got $1000 on the trade in. That was at a time when the hubs and I each had two cars. Oh yeah. We each had a beater and one we loved. I had an Escort that I used that crap out of until I sold it when I got the white Explorer and a corvette. He had my old Ranger and a 2010 F150. 

The longest running vehicle we had was the Ranger. I bought it in 1999 and we sold it in 2012 although it’s the one vehicle we really miss. Hopefully this one breaks that record for us. The Ranger had way more miles by this point!

Anyway, for the Explorer’s 12th birthday, I will get her the ridiculous door handle pocket things, get the toll tag going again (had to get a new one with the new windshield), and maybe replace the piece of roof rack I lost

Merry Christmas! This year Christmas has been so weird. For one thing, the holidays themselves have been thrown off with no traveling. I was really looking forward to traveling over Thanksgiving, but that ended up not happening. We were home for Christmas Eve at the in-laws which is normal feeling, but I don’t even think we will make it up to the property which we LOVE doing between Christmas and New Years. Its a smaller trip, but I don’t think we can do it very easily. We will see. It’s OK to have an off Christmas. 

I am not even getting the deer hunting trip for my hubs in Mississippi. I really want a freezer full of meat, but clearly it’s not my year for that either since we didn’t get any at the property either. 

I feel like the whole holiday thing has been off for us. My gifts to Florida for my whole family are apparently missing in the postal system. I spent almost $130 to get the box there on Sat so that is frustrating. The whole packing up the box was even hard for me. Not sure what’s up. The in-laws stuff worked out well so that’s good. Gifts for the kids are next since Santa came overnight. I hope they enjoy what they get and that we have a nice morning. I am pretty sure the hubs told the kids they could have pumpkin pie for breakfast. I still want to get some stuff to the people that help us drive car pool so that’s another gift goal for today.

I am just ready for Christmas to be over (and that box to be delivered). The thunder I have been listening to overnight just about sums it all up. 

Ok…time for a car update. Yep. A car update. I came home from work the other day and the hubs was researching Explorers. He was thinking I could get a used one with the new body style and we could give mine, which is a 2013 model, to my son. I think he’d like the newer body style and better wheels. I don’t really care. I’d rather be worried about the bag I am carrying. 😜

When we got mine I ended up going for a new base model after we shopped for used models with bells and whistles. The only upgrade I got was the up charge for my red paint. The red paint I still like. Anyway, we have a while before we need another vehicle, and I still really like mine. It works really well for my life style. 

I bought another set of Christmas light magnets to decorate it this year, and Hank was going to wash my car for me this past weekend. But no car wash for me now!

I drove the hubs to the Woodlands to meet his buddy who was going to take him up to get his truck from the property. While I was driving back on the Hardy Toll Road, I got nailed by road debris!  It looked almost like a 90 degree angle of a 1.5″ diameter pipe from what I could see. I had no clue where it came from but I saw it bounce from near a box truck in the lane to the right of me and then behind a car in front of me and then it bounced up and hit my windshield. It hit hard enough that there was glass shattered in my passenger seat. I had Pepper with me but luckily she was in my lap and not the passenger seat. She was scared and didn’t want to leave my lap after it happened either. 

When I got home, I was able to better assess the damage. Not only did it nail my windshield, but it also hit my roof and the interface between the roof and the windshield. Doh!!  So more than just a windshield replacement. We started the insurance claim and we will see what happens with it. 

I got an oil change yesterday and thought it was nice that they didn’t put the new sticker on my windshield but put it in my cup holder so I can put in new windshield when I get it. 

Hubs said my car is only worth $8k. That’s so crazy considering it has less than 80k miles on it. It has given me zero problems in the last 11.5 years. I had been looking to replace my arm rest cover and once the current one got glass in it, I threw it away. Now I have a new cover to put on and I also got an organizer for the console under the arm rest. Little things like that keep it fun!  Hopefully we can get it repaired by Christmas. I am worried that repairs will have it out of commission for a while. I can’t believe I have a damaged roof! Always something!!

At my daughter’s swim practice. I have gotten a bunch of work done so things are going well. She’s in the pool, and I worked on my laptop for a while. I buttoned up some loose ends I didn’t get to at work. It’s fun watching her when she’s having fun. At water polo she smiles a lot which is great. We are still going to have her swim though because we like it for her. I am thinking about signing all 3 kids up for water polo in the winter but just doing practice for the boys and signing her up for games, too.

My mommy stress peaked today when my son needed a ride home from middle school because he didn’t have any good carpool options. The kid is not willing to take the bus, but I can’t just leave work every day to drive him home. I really don’t like that I left work early because he doesn’t know how to ride the bus. It is for sure frustrating. It makes me feel so bad to leave work like that. Plus it was raining and driving in the rain is not at the top of my list of things I enjoy. OK, let’s be real – we might get more stress tonight when we review homework status. 😛 

Two more days until I take my hubs to the doctor to follow up with his orthopedic surgeon. We still do not have his truck, but that’s OK. I don’t know if he will even be cleared to drive although that would be nice. It is my understanding that they will just be giving him a limited range of motion on his knee. He is still in a lot of pain so we will see. I need to cancel my dentist appointment for that day. I am too busy trying to juggle it all for the dentist. I love clean teeth, but it will have to wait!

I am mentally planning to not travel for Thanksgiving, but hubs still has not cancelled the hotel room. Luckily we were planning to drive (we were considering renting a car but had not) so that we could take the dogs. It’s actually a nice break before water polo starts again. I guess we will see what happens.

I do have a girls trip coming up in December so hopefully he’s in better shape by then. He could survive without me around, but i make things easier. Kids would also have to behave while I am out to make it all work. Wish me luck!!

Had a good chat with my sisters last night which inspired me to update my blog! 😄

We are trying to decide what our family is going to do over the holidays. The big unknown is how mobile my hubs will be for any of it. I really like our Thanksgiving plans of the whole family going, staying in a hotel, and even bringing the dogs! Pepper and I both have Thanksgiving shirts to wear. Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday!! The other sisters are planning to go over Christmas. Who knows what will happen at this point! The hubs is the big unknown on what we can actually end up doing. He has not left the house other than going out on the driveway to enjoy the outdoors a little since he got home from the hospital.

His truck is still up at our property. It’s perfectly fine up there. It’s next to the shipping container on the gravel. I dropped his keys off with his buddy on Wednesday because they are trying to devise a plan to go get it. The road to get to our gate was pretty muddy when he was up there so 4-wheel drive will definitely be needed to recover the truck. 

When I dropped his keys off, his coworkers had just been finishing up their Thanksgiving party and sent me home with TONS of leftovers. We have been eating them though! It’s nice to have so much food already prepared that we just have to heat up. 

Last night my younger two had a swim meet. My son did OK although he lost his goggles when he started his 200 IM so he DQed to fix them but he was still happy with the event. Love his attitude! Although now both of my kids still need a 200 IM on the books. My daughter did only 50s in Fly, Free, and Breast. She got PRs in all of them but I am hoping to see a little faster times in Free and Breast. She would have had reserve times on those in our summer swim league so I let her know. She was excited. I need to teach her USA swim time standards, but I’m just keeping it in the language she knows as we move into swimming 50s as her shortest possible event (and what she will swim in summer league). On Fly she got a Champ time for summer league and a B time per USA swim standards so that’s goood. Its her best stroke but she doesn’t like it as much as the other two she did. We will just keep working on it all. Hank didn’t get any B times and his summer league is 50s and he swam all longer lengths last night. 

My daughter had a swim meet last weekend, too. I had her do some long races. Each day she did one 200 race and two 100s. The only ones she needs to repeat for her season goals are the 200 IM and the 100 Fly. I think she DQed on the Fly because she got tired and lazy. She DQ’ed on IM because she didn’t know how to legally do the transition from back to breast. If we stick around for Thanksgiving, then she will get private lessons to work on her turns. She is not excited about that. 😂 

The plan for tonight is that the boys are supposed to go camping with the scouts, and I am taking my daughter to see Galaxy Lights at Space Center Houston for opening night. 

My hubs asked me what I want for my birthday. I really want to go to Monument Valley, but that’s not really an easy option. I would also like a trip to our property camping with friends so we are making plans for that.  That one is a lot easier. 

I wasn’t really sure if there was anything else I wanted as in a traditional gift. I am super happy with my handbag game right now so that’s not on the list. And, let’s face it, I am not good at gifts. But…I think I found what I want!

I was poking around on Amazon in preparation for a Halloween party at work, and the new Oura ring caught my eye when I hit the homepage in the app. I have been a long time Fitbit user and at Christmas started using my Apple Watch, but the ring seems cool and has some additional appeal to it. It’s a new way to track health in a new app and with a new reminder right there in your hand. I really want to try it out. The app seems pretty cool, and it does integrate with Apple Health for whatever that’s worth. Sadly, the biggest thing I do with the watch is just look at the rings. I think Apple makes it too difficult to just look at steps. Curious how the Oura ring is in that respect. 

The Oura app seems to be better at sleep tracking and readiness which I am excited to see. Sometimes I am awake for 30 minutes in the morning, and my watch asks me if I am awake. Clearly I don’t feel like it is as good at determining if I am awake. Oura also does cycle tracking and integrates body temp. I just feel like I have so much to learn!!  And the ring is designed for health and fitness whereas my watch is designed for productivity. 

You can order a ring sizing kit to see what size works best for you and see how you like the feel of the ring since it’s a little chunkier than a normal ring. I really like that because sometimes it’s just hard to know how the sizing it let alone the feel for something like this. They suggest you wear a sample ring for 24 hours so you capture how your ring size fluctuates throughout the day. I think I know which I want, but I am wearing the sample size to make sure I like it and it’s comfortable.  The $10 cost of the sizing kit is automatically reduced from the price of the ring if you buy from Amazon so it’s totally worth it to really try it out. 

I think I will order myself the silver ring for my birthday.  🙂

What a crazy, stressfull week! The hubs is out of town, it’s Homecoming, the younger two had a swim meet, and we decided to try water polo with the younger two. I planned everything out, but that’s really hard when things can change so quickly.

On Tuesday, I had a super stressful day. I thought I was prepared. I got up early and got my daughter up early so she could ride with me to drop off her brother. Kids were all moving, and we left to take my middle schooler to violin sectionals. The high schooler said he’s be ready to leave for the bus, and everything was looking good. We were waiting in the parking lot of the middle school (got there early) to listen to an answer to a question on the radio when the phone rang. It was my older son – he missed the bus. 

So my daughter and i went back home and grabbed him. As we were driging to the high school, my daughter pointed out that if we drop him off she will be late for her bus. So we turned around and dropped her off at the house so she could finish getting ready and then went to the high school. My middle schooler called and said he didn’t feel good and wanted to go home. I told him to do his violin sectional and then I can pick him up. I dropped off my son pretty easily, but the light to leave the high school was doing this thing it does sometimes were it never let’s teh people leaving the school go. Luckily I know how to navigate that once unstuck, but it took way more time than needed to leave the high school.

So…I drive to the intermediate school and have to wait for sectionals to finish. I grab the kid and take him home. I wanted to be at work at 7:30 that morning, but I ended up being there at 8:15 and having a very stressful morning. Coffee engaged. Then I started getting texts from my high schooler that he didn’t feel good. I ended up picking him up at lunch time.

I was super bummed out because it was the water polo game (3x district champs!) that night and then the party. And we missed it all. I fed the kids noodle soup and got everyone to bed early. During the night I started coughing and then Wednesday and Thursday (today) I ended up being sick. Of course. The kids went back to school Wednesday. I dialed into a couple of things yesterday, but today I ended up crashing before the younger two kids even leave the house. I was exhausted. I am up now and plan to knock out a few work things because my boss is out of town for two weeks starting tomorrow so I need some inputs from him. Plus, I will be in charge so I need to make sure I know what all needs to be transitioned.

I have some soup being delivered soon which will be nice. Last night I had chick-fil-a soup which was yummy. This soup is part of a Walmart delivery that includes stuff for my daughter’s bday party since I need to start prepping for that.

Life is busy. It’s extremely frustrating when I plan things and the plans don’t stick for reasons out of my control. I don’t see things slowing down any time soon. This week has made me question my career choices (more like plans for my next step) which is not like me. It must be hard because the hubs is out of town and I got sick and my perfectly laid out plans did not work. I can only improve going forward!

I signed my two younger kids up for a two week trial of club water polo!  We went to their first practice tonight!

We have been talking about it, but over the past few days, a lot of people in my village started talking about it and asking about it.  I decided it can’t hurt to try!  I have built such a great community around our summer swim team, and I am sure this will expand on those relationships.  

They currently swim from 5-6 on any weeknight we can get them there with their year round swim team.  They are in different swim groups, but luckily are always at the same time and same pool.  Water polo will be the same way if we do this longer term (at least a couple of years it looks like).  It will be from 5:45-7:15 Mondays and Thursdays even though they are in different age groups.

They both had a lot of fun tonight. Maybe we found our thing? A ball sport that also requires their swimming skills? Definitely worth a try. I had fun with the other parents, too. 

So, even more water polo might be in our future. I am having fun with my kids and their aquatic activities. ❤️❤️