spring is here, summer vacation to follow soon!!!

I’ve seen these all over the blogosphere, and decided I needed one of my own.  It took almost 2 packages of those mini plastic eggs, and LOTS of painting time, but I love it.  It’s not an easter wreath; well, it could be, I reckon; but I made it because I’m in love with birds and nests and such (just following the current trends, I suppose).

I spend more time on facebook than I do here on this blog, and it shows.

this past wednesday, my son kris and his girlfriend ashley moved in with us.  she’s 3 months pregnant, and they need a place to stay.  so, soon we’ll begin a few renovations upstairs.  the advantage of rich being unemployed, is that he’s got lots of time to do the things around the house that need to be done.  the disadvantage, obviously, is fundage.

this last friday, tony was suspended from school for 3 days for fighting with his arch nemesis.  they were best friends from kindergarten thru 4th grade.  alex has always been a bully, and tony has always been a pushover.  then one summer day, I was standing in alex’s yard, talking to his mama, when tony comes running around the house, all kinds of upset.  he and alex had a dispute of some adolescent boy type, and alex punched him in the eye and sat on his chest.

that was the end of the friendship.  alex tried real hard to get tony to be his friend again.  he apologized over and over.  his mother even called and said that her husband just couldn’t understand what the problem was.  when he was a young’un, he and his friends were always beating each other up.  I explained to her that rich and I never  had friends who hurt us.  if they did, they weren’t our friends, and we’ve always raised our children with the same beliefs.  friends protect, not inflict.

now, with puberty rearing it’s ugly head, alex’s anger issues bubble a little closer to the surface.  when they encounter each other, he talks junk to tony.  on friday, playing dodge ball, it quickly escalated to physical warfare, and tony finally stood up to him and punched him back.  our school has a zero tolerance policy, so even defending yourself gets you 3 days.  so, after spring break is over, tony still has a few extra days at home.  Le sigh….

life is nothing but interesting at casa de hockett!

 

the keddy and momo show

this is keddy                                                                                                                      this is momo

emma calls kennedy ‘keddy’ and kennedy pronounces emma ‘momo’.

they are bffs and get along almost all of the time, which is somewhat surprising, when you take into account that they’re 2, and 2 year olds are notoriously self centered.  emma is moreso than kenni, and kenni is more independent than emma.  she’s also more affectionate and loving, although emma is affectionate and loving enough.

sometimes kenni wants to play with emma

but sometimes emma wants  to do what SHE wants to do.  emma doesn’t like to share toys (EVERYTHING is hers, by the way, even when it’s not) and I have to get involved more often than I’d like.  I don’t think I’ve heard the word ‘mine’ come out of kenni’s mouth.

but all in all, they’re best of friends, and it’s all good in the end.

there’s something rather heartwarming about these 2 little sweethearts sharing their time with us 😀

 

stuck!!

 

what was I thinking? or, a good time was had by all, but thank the baby Jesus it’s over!!

so, last wednesday, being the glutton for punishment that I am, I boarded a bus with a few other adults and a hundred million 5th graders (or maybe 40) bound for the great city of washington dc.  after many days and weeks (6ish hours) on the road, we finally arrived at the national cathedral.  it was beautiful in all it’s splendor.  the cathedral has an elementary school and 2 high schools, one for each gender.  we learned that a person cannot get married in the cathedral unless one of them graduated from there.

this is tony, bradley, and tony’s bff peter.  don’t they look like little dufuses?  see all the peeps from our group in the background, looking all touristy?

we got to dc around lunch time on wednesday, and left around supper time on friday.  in between those times, we visited EVERY monument and memorial ever built.  we toured the capital building, we saw the white house, complete with a rooftop sniper.  we ate in food courts, with hundreds of other people, all on tours like us.  most were school groups, but some were a bunch of adults, looking like they were having much more fun than  we school chaperones.

in all fairness, it would have been way more enjoyable had we not been so rushed.  on wednesday, we spent 45 minutes each in 3 different smithsonians.  now, really, how much can you possibly see in 45 minutes?  although, our tour guide said he wanted us to have a sampling of many things, rather than going home and wishing we had seen something else.

outside of the white house, we saw these hood figures in orange jump suits walking slowly towards us.  all the kids got real quiet and watched the men as they took up a stance in front of the white house fence to protest gitmo.  I’m somewhat confused, because I thought I heard on npr that obama gave the gitmo people until august to close.  maybe I misunderstood…it wouldn’t be the first time.

each parent had 2 or 3 kids, depending on which gender their child was.  since my young’un is a boy, I only had 2 girls, so I had a bed to myself.  tony was in peter peter punkin eater’s group, with peter’s daddy, buddy.  so, peter and his daddy shared a bed, and tony and bradley had the other.  about half the time, we hung out together.  my girls were tomboys, so they liked hanging with the boys.

at the korean memorial, there is a big pool (that’s one thing I noticed, almost every memorial had water of some sort) with coins in it.  so, I dug around in my pockets and gave the girls a few coins to toss.  right away, I heard one of the annoying teacher’s pet girls saying, ‘aww!  you’re not allowed to throw money in there, you’re gonna get in trouble!’  then I saw this:

oops!  we hurried around to the other side of the memorial, and acted like we didn’t know what was going on.

we went to arlington to see jfk’s grave, and the tomb of the unknown soldier.  we saw the changing of the guards, which was extremely cool.  4 kids were chosen from our school to lay a wreath at the tomb of the unknown soldier.  then another soldier played taps.  it brought tears to my eyes, to see the kids from our school.  especially the little boy, who is mildly autistic.  he’s so sweet and precious, I just wanted to squeeze him.  the teachers submitted all the names of the kids who were interested in doing it, then the principal pulled 4 names out of the hat.  unfortunately, one of the girls left her shoes back at the hotel, and no one had dress shoes she could borrow, so only 3 kids were able to do it.

westley was so proud and happy.  I hugged him and told him how handsome he was, and he told me that he had to borrow his daddy’s dress shoes because none of his were dressy enough.

doesn’t he look so sweet??

on friday, it poured rain.  wednesday and thursday had both been drizzly all day, but friday it rained buckets.  we went to yet more memorials, and were scheduled to go to the zoo.  it never made sense to me that we should go to the dc zoo, when we’ve got a great zoo here at home, and from what the principal said, our zoo was bigger.  well, I reckon she put a bug in the tour guide’s ear, because he said there was no sense in keeping the children outside in the rain for 3 hours.  hmm, seems like common sense would have dictated that.

so, we were given 3 hours to spend in any of the smithsonians we wanted.  the girls and I wanted to visit the museum of modern art; I because I love art, they because there was a giant iron spider outside.  the bus dropped us off outside of another museum, so the tour guide gave everyone directions to the museums of their choice.  well, in the chaos, we were directed to the national gallery.  by the time we got inside, we were dripping water from our shirts and hair.

the girls weren’t very impressed with a bunch of photos, but I could have spent some serious time there.  oh, well.  after about 20 minutes, the rain let up to a sprinkle.  this elicited lots of  whines, ‘man, we could have gone to the zoo after all!’

since the gulleywasher eased up, we decided to head over to the hirshhorn art museum.

the girls and the giant spider.  the artist, Louise Bourgeois, has 2 other spiders inside, in her exhibit.  she also has a fascination with body parts, so I tried to limit the girls’ exposure to alot of her stuff.

then we went downstairs and saw some AWESOME atwork, alot of it too graphic for the girls, again.  the downstairs exhibit is called something like ‘our bodies’ or some such.  I tried to enjoy as much as I could while protecting the girls.  I didn’t want them to go home and tell their  mamas I had taken them to a porno museum.  I could have spent all day at this place.  hopefully someday I’ll have the opportunity.

the most awesome magritte sculpture I’ve ever seen.  actually, it’s the only one I’ve ever seen in person.  there is also a sculpture called big man.  it’s fiberglass covered in pigmented resin.  this guy looks so realistic, from the veins in his arms, the wrinkles on his toes, to his expression.  he looks like if he stood up, he’d be 8 feet tall.  he’s also naked.  and uncircumsized.  so, I won’t put his picture up here, but I love this guy.  I really want to go back to that museum.  I’d really like to revisit dc, this time with my hubs and a young’un or two.

all in all, it was a good trip, but I’m not sure if I’d do it again.  maybe with some time, my answer may change…

gratuitous napping child

 

tealess party

last thursday, I had both of them…I wasn’t sure I was going to make it through the day, I don’t mind telling you.  just one of them wears me out (I’m getting old, I fear) but 2? well, that’s just a recipe for masochism a la mode.  thankfully, it was a nice day, and they were able to play outside for a bit.  they actually play rather well together, save for the fact that emma is a little too rough and aggressively affectionate.  however, kennedy tolerates it fairly well.

 

more cute than you can shake a stick at

 

just a little something to smile at

 

of headbangin rock, and kind hearted children

last night, we took a few of our youth to the winter jam concert.  I haven’t gone for a couple of years, and it’s gotten right much bigger since then.  there were a little over 20,000 people there last night, they turned people away because they didn’t know just how many seats were left until later.

Family Force 5 was very frenetic and bass heavy.  those boys jumped around on the stage like mexican jumpin beans, and the screams from the crowd were deafening.  I felt like my mama, when she used to ask me why I was listening to ‘that’ music (ozzy, ac/dc) when she couldn’t understand the words.  I could, and that’s what mattered.  well, I apparently can’t anymore.

I enjoyed Brandon Heath muchly, there were a few other artists, and then THE MAN, Toby Mac, performed a handful of songs.  I’ve never been much of a fan of his, but last night he was awesome.  Tony enjoyed the concert, but loved Toby Mac.

right before the intermission, the tour pastor spoke~what a powerful speaker!~and urged people to become ‘bridges of hope’ for orphans thru Holt International.  these children are waiting to be adopted, but in the meantime, they need financial assistance, $30 a month.   so, we discussed  with the youth, the option of sponsoring a child as a group.  if everyone were to contribute $3 a month, we’d have it covered.  don’t you know, those girls weren’t sure they could come up with $3 every month!

so, laura, our oldest ~and way mature~ youth, jessica, and I decided to do it between the 3 of us.  so we went to the booth, accompanied by tony, and picked out a 5 year old chinese girl with down’s syndrome.  then we realized that neither laura or I had any cash and jessica didn’t have enough.  we would have to sign up online.  so, that was that.

until back at our seats, tony started asking questions about the girl, like ‘what are verbal commands?’ ~the paper said she understands them~ and ‘why can she only bounce when held in a standing position?’  and ‘what if nobody else picks her because of how she looks, mama?  what if she doesn’t find someone to take care of her?’  and finally, ‘what if someone does pick her and she’s not available when we sign up online?’  his eyes grew wetter with each question.

my heart broke, thinking that she may not get picked, and that this boy, flesh of my flesh, was so worried about her.  so, I told my skinflint husband that I needed his debit card.  and tony and I went back downstairs and filled out the paper work.  he was over the moon, and carried yue yun’s picture back upstairs and showed his daddy and laura.  then he held onto that picture until the end of the concert.  when jessica woke up this morning, he told her all about yue yun, glowing all the time.  now he’s wondering if there’s a way that we could adopt her ourselves.

 

watching over us

halloween ’08, originally uploaded by hockamama.

from his perch on the well. lots of fun was had by my younguns, and way more candy than we need was pilfered from neighbors and friends.

 

Happy Halloween!!

Happy Halloween!!, originally uploaded by hockamama.