South Padre Island 2011!!!

We headed out to the beach on Sunday for a couple of hours to catch some sun. The water was very cold at first but with the sun, we quickly warmed up.

Sydney most importantly had a blast. My little kiddo is constantly saying she wants to go to the beach and though half the time she associates that with going to the pool swimming, it was wonderful to see her enjoying herself in the sand, sun and water.

Here are some pictures of our stay:

Such a serene view!

Dathan managed to get stuck digging himself a whole and Erica came to his rescue.

Sydney looks so grown up in this picture! Love you mammas!

Sun-bathing.

My little angel & me.

July 2011 RGV Trip.

Back in November when we visited my dad in Donna for Thanksgiving, we were informed that my cousin Briceidy would be contracting nuptuals in the summer.

We planned to use this occassion for another trip to go down to the valley, visit with my dad and spend time with our relatives.

Liz, Andy, Rebecca, CJ, Sydney & I packed ourselves into Liz's truck for what would become an eventful ride down south. Two hours into our trip, after having froze nearly to the point of a popsicle (no joke) the first part of the trip, all of a sudden the air conditioner went from being super cold to feeling sort of muggy.

After several minutes of trying to mess with the air in hopes it would start working again, we gave up until our next stop at an Auto Zone where we determined (for real this time) that the remainder of the trip would be traveled under the warm sunny conditions of mother nature in Texas. Andy put in a whole can of freon only to watch it quickly drain out of the compressor.

Luckily God was on our side as we had a pretty cool ride all the way to Donna.

This is Sydney & CJ enjoying the ride to Donna with their hair flapping in the wind. :)

We arrived in Donna around 9:30 or so and finally called it a night. On Friday, we literally spent all day with my dad at his house - relaxing, which was nice.

Then Saturday came along. They day quickly flew and it was time to get dressed for Briceidy and her new hubby-to-be, Raul's wedding. The ceremony was very beautiful. Briceidy was of course radiant. As the pastor officiating the ceremony made mention - it is refreshing to see couples now a days make the formal commitment before God and friends & family to remain true to their spouse, when a lot of us for distinctive reasons, choose not to. My wish for the couple is many years filled with countless blesssing and lots of love.

Mr. & Mrs. Raul Mendoza!

The reception was just as beautiful and fun. We had a great time visiting with lots of relatives from Mexico and the valley that we had not seen in a while. I was able to capture lots of memorable pictures.

Here are a few of my favorites:

These are my four cousins (L-R): Daisy, Briceidy, Melissa, Nallely.

My beautiful family.

Mi tio Gerardo & mi tia Elisa with the girls.

My grandma Aurelia with 21 of her grandchildren and missing if I am not mistaken...7 more. What a blessing.

I Don't Have Time.....

A long time ago there existed this enormous apple tree. A small boy loved that tree so, and everyday he would go and play around the tree.

The little boy would climb the tree branches all the way to its highest point; he would eat his apples and would even take a nap under its shade. The little boy loved the tree and the tree loved the little boy.

As the time passed, the little boy grew up and never returned to play around the enormous tree. One day the little boy, now a young man, returned to the tree and heard the tree tell him very sad, “Have you come to play with me?”…but the young man responded, “I am no longer the little boy that used to play around enormous trees” what I want know are toys and I need money to buy them.

“I am sorry, said the tree, but I have no money...my suggestion though is that you take some of my apples and go sell them, this way you will get the money you want to buy the toys you’d like,” and the young man felt very happy. He took all the apples from the tree and got a lot of money and once again the tree was happy.

But the young man never returned after getting his money and the tree once again got very sad.

A time later, the young man returned and the tree got real happy once again and asked him, “Have you come to play with me?”… “I don’t have time to play, I must work to support my family, I need a house to live with my wife and kids, can you help me?... “I am sorry, said the tree, I don’t have a house, but…you can cut my branches and build a house.”

The young man cut the tree branches and this made the tree happy once again, but the young man never again returned…from that point on, the tree got very sad and lonely.

On a warm sunny day, the young man, now a grown man, returned to the apple tree and the tree was ecstatic. “Have you come to play with me?”… asked once again the apple tree.

The man answered: “I am sad and becoming old, I want a boat to navigate around and rest, can you give me one?”…the tree answered: “Use my trunk so that you can build your boat and that way you can navigate where you’d like and be happy.” The man cut the tree’s trunk and built his boat, then he left to go navigate for a long time.

Finally, after a long time had passed, the man returned and the tree told him, “I am very sorry, but I have nothing more to give to you, not even my apples.” The man replied, “I don’t have anymore teeth to bite; nor strength to climb your branches…for now I am simply old.”

Then the tree with tears in his eyes told him, “I honestly cannot give you anything else, the only thing that is left of me are my dead roots.” The man responded, “I don’t need much anymore, only a place where I can rest, I am so tired after many years.”

“Well, the old roots of a tree are the best place to lie down and rest, come sit with me and rest,” said the tree. The man sat beside the tree and the tree with tears in his eyes smiled at the man and was filled with happiness.

This story makes me think of each one of us, the tree is like our parents, when we are children, we love them and we play with mom and dad…when we grow up, we leave them…some of us only return to them when we need them or when we are in trouble. It doesn’t matter what the circumstance is, they are always there to lend us a hand and give us all we need to make us happy once again.

You might that the young man was cruel with the tree, but it is in this very manner that we have at times treated our parents.

Remember, if you are not a father or mother, yet, pretty soon you will be. Take advantage of the time you have them with you, and don’t wait until it’s too late and you can no longer turn back time.

Exodus 20:12 “Honor your father and your mother, so that you may live long in the land the Lord your God has given you.”

Sizzling Summer!

We are under a heat advisory day for the 5th time in a row this week and contrary to what the meteorologist believed that it would be lifted by yesterday evening, it looks like it has been exended into the weekend.

Coming from someone like myself who loves the summer and it's very warm and sunny days, the month of July has really been extremely hot with record breaking temperatures. The only place that anyone wants to be in at the moment is the nearest pool to cool off.

I know that if I read this a couple of months from now when it's unbearably cold for me, I will wish with all my might that it was warm again, so I will not complain. Just to document, here is the forecast for the next few days.

Anthropology 2302!!!!

I finally got a response from my professor late Friday afternoon telling me that I got a 95 on my webpage. I was so relieved, I don't know what happened to the first like 20 emails I sent him but I was glad he finally got one of them.

He advised for me to check the campus website later on that day for final grades and I did and this is what I found. Happy times!!!!

I am officially done with school until August 29th when the Fall semester begins. So looking forward to the break. :)

Life is so busy.....

sometimes I just don't know how I manage to keep up with it. Here lately it seems I have had so much going on with school, work and life in general. At the current moment, I am stressing out because though I thought I had finished with a killer Summer I class (Anthropology), it seems that my last and most important assignment worth 20% of my grade was not received by my professor. I am worried that I will be docked for this and get a zero and have no chance at getting an "A" like I worked hard for all month long. I guess I will have to wait and see.

On another note, last Thursday, a week ago today, Frank & I went to go see one of our favorite groups, MANA at the American Airlines Center. The concert was fantastic. I had a really good time and enjoyed the music like no other.

Also for Frank's 30th birthday, a couple of weeks ago, I managed to pull off succesfully a surprise dinner for him. I must say all the planning and hard work paid off - he was truly surprised when he showed up at Liz's house like he normally does on Wednesday evenings expecting to spend no more than 5 minutes getting Sydney and going back home. Can you believe we didn't leave that night until 1:30? :)

I am seriously going to try and be better at this posting stuff on my blog. I find that like cleaning, it helps relax my nerves. Until soon.