Ballard Bunch

Lucy Elizabeth 30 months What you are into right now: ballerina dancing, picking out your clothes (usually a dress or skirt), pink, your Princess spray (detangler) after your bath, reading library books, butterflies, talking about going to Disneyworld, singing our "Ballard" song and your "L-U-C-Y" song, finding bugs in our yard, going to IHOP, closing the garage door (we just got new garage doors and a new opener) What you have said lately: "Daddy, I am the princess and you are my prince. Will you be my prince, Daddy?" "I love my Minnie dress, mama. I am SO GORGEOUS!" "Bubba, you want to lay down with me? OK, and you can tell me a story about Princess Lucy." "Mommy, can you turn on your blog?" She calls my iPod a blog. I don't know, either!?! Walker Adrian 44 months What you are into right now: Ben 10 Alien Force, Power Rangers Jungle Fury, talking about going to Disneyworld, singing "Sweet Home Alabama" in the ...

I thought it would be fun. This is not a "tag" but if you would like to copy and paste, then add your own one-word answers, I'd LOVE to read yours! Leave a comment and tell me if you do one. 1. Where is your cell phone? counter 2. Your significant other? strong 3. Your hair? red 4. Your mother? greatness 5. Your father? caring 6. Your favorite thing? my kids 7. Your dream last night? forgotten 8. Your favorite drink? sweet tea 9. Your goal or dream? patience 10. The room you're in? living room 11. Your kids? hilarious 12. Your fear? loneliness 13. Where do you want to be in 6 years? here 14. Where were you last night? home 15. What you're not? driven 16. Muffins? blueberry 17. One of your wish list items? iPhone 18. Where you grew up? Texas 19. The last thing you did ? cook 20. What are you wearing? shirt 21. Your TV? HD 22. Your pets? dog 23. Your computer? Mac 24. Your life? lively 25. Your mood? good 26. Missing someone? yes 27. Your car? Trail Blazer 28. Somet...

I got a call on Tuesday, an unexpected call. It was from an Israeli family that I was very close to when I taught at the Day School. They were in town and wanted to see me!! I hadn't seen them since they left for Israel in June of 2004. Thank goodness for being able to keep your same cell phone number... Anyway, we met today and it was great to see everyone. The Hebrew Day School was an amazing experience. I had 6 kids in my class and was teaching 4th and 5th grade. Half of my class was Israeli and didn't speak much English, but were very bright. The American kids I had were brilliant, and way above their grade level. At one point, every student was taking a different spelling test every week. It was crazy! But, we were all very close, and on top of being their teacher, I tutored most of these kids a couple of times a week (this was before Walker and Lucy). Dana was in my class for 2 years, and she is very special to me. She is the shyest person I have ever met, but we had a bo...

My thoughts on... Blog Protocol When someone asks me a question or says something I want to reply to, I usually reply in my own post, under their comment. Is that right? Since they added the "email me other comments" feature (which I LOVE, I am so nosy, this is greatness for me!), I figure that the person who asked a question would choose that feature, and then get my comment in an email. Or, should you respond to their question in their blog? Another blog... I am seriously considering doing another blog about cooking/recipes. I think people that do a blog that is only about one thing is really neat. I love cooking and recipes, but I haven't gotten it all figured out yet. It would also be neat if it was a group of us, I know you can have multiple authors for one blog. I don't know, like I said, I haven't gotten it all figured out yet... Fav pic of the week Aunt Donna's bluebonnets 2008

7 Random things about me... 1. When I eat chips, I eat the broken, smaller ones first and then the larger ones, and then the whole ones. 2. I LOVE trailers. We record a trailers show every week on HDNet and I HAVE to watch the end of every TV show, where it shows, "Coming up next week on..." 3. If I could have ANYTHING in the world it would be a housekeeper. It is really hard to get motivated to clean house. 4. My feet grew after my two pregnancies- I am now a size 10. UGH! 5. I love sports and listen to sports talk radio whenever I am in the car. 6. I eat ketchup on my hot dogs. I used to be a mustard ONLY girl. 7. I love kids foods. Fruit snacks, goldfish, grilled cheese, chicken nuggets, and McDonald's! I am supposed to tag people to do this on their blog, and put their name as a link. I tag... Caitlin Jojo Jennifer R. Ashley C. Crissy

This was our second year to do the zoo run. If you have read much of this blog, you know how we love our zoo. We just did the One Mile Fun Run, and it goes through the zoo, so it's pretty neat. They have booths, snacks, bouncers, and it is just a fun (and early!) morning. Jojo, Walker and Lucy Walker ran with us the whole way! I was so proud of him. Having fun in the bouncy obstacle course

Spring Pictures Super Walker and Super Princess Lucy The Ballards with Governor Rick Perry he was at the TCU bookstore for a book signing Spring Thunderstorms Look at that hail. It was only pea sized, and the storm was only over us for about 15 minutes, but it was intense!!! The kids were intrigued, wide-eyed, and concerned, but no meltdowns.

Today was Blue Day at ARK School. Somehow, it also ended up Sports Day for us. Walker didn't keep his jersey on for long- "it was making him SO hot." It's ok, I made sure he had a blue shirt on underneath it. What? No, I'm not obsessed.

I cook almost every night of the week, and to keep things exciting and yummy, I like to have a lot of different recipes so we are not eating the same things every week. I buy ground beef a lot, because it's cheap and versatile. But, recently, I have gotten the ground beef blues. I just can't think of ANYTHING to do with my beef! I will share one of my recipes that we like, and that is super simple, and I hope you will share some of yours with me. I can ALWAYS use a new recipe!! *Sloppy Joes 1 lb. ground beef 1/4 c. dried chopped onion 1/2 tsp. garlic powder 1 tsp. yellow mustard 3/4 c. ketchup 3 tsp. brown sugar Brown beef (season with salt and pepper) and drain well. Return beef to pan and add remaining ingredients. Stir together and simmer on low for 15-20 minutes. Spoon onto toasted hamburger buns. *This is not a tomato-ey sloppy joe. This is a ketchup-y, sweet and tangy sloppy joe.

**Jennifer- This is my You've Gotta Try This** Resurrection Bread is something fun to do with your kids, and goes along with the most important story in the Bible. I had never heard of it until this year, so I wanted to share. I made it with my 2 year olds last Wednesday night. Obviously, this is best around Easter, so I am a few weeks late, but I just loved the idea so much! Enjoy. Put three small marshmallows (or one large) in a flattened biscuit or triangle of a crescent roll. The marshmallows represent Jesus body, and the biscuit is his tomb. Roll the biscuit around the marshmallows and pinch at the ends, COMPLETELY covering the marshmallows (it won't work if you don't completely cover them). This represents wrapping Jesus in linen cloth and placing him in the tomb. Bake biscuits as directed on package. When biscuits have cooled, take a bite or open them. The marshmallows have disinegrated. This represents Jesus rising, and not being found in his tomb. He lives!!!

We have some bushes (I am not a garden person, I have no idea what the name of it is) that really attract butterflies and bees in the spring. Yesterday, they were flying all over the place, so I put my super zoom lens on my camera and tried to play photographer. They were moving pretty fast, but it was fun to play with the camera and try to get a good shot. A little bee A butterfly

Some of my kids favorite things right now: Mickey Crocs They want to wear them everywhere, everyday. I think they like them because they are colorful, have Mickey on them and they can get them on by themselves. Animals Animals have always been a favorite in our house, but lately they have been playing this specific game. They get the Diego animals and their regular animals together, and play animal family. The Diego animals are smaller so that the Diego elephant will be the "baby" and the regular elephant is the "mommy" or "daddy". This is what you might hear while they are playing animals: - yelling, "Mommy, Mommy!!" I come running in: "What??" And they look up at me, "what, mommy?" I have finally learned to see if they are playing animals before I answer a distress call, because it's usually the "baby" calling for it's mommy. - "Mommy, where were you? I was worried about you!!" - crying, "I...

Replacing the waning Friday Favorites, it's Tuesdays Thoughts!! My thoughts on... The loss of our beloved in-car DVD player. A few Wednesdays ago, on the way home from church, Walker got sick and the DVD player suffered the biggest blow. We have been without it for two weeks now, and it has been interesting. My kids are very loud. I will whole-heartedly admit I loved the quiet times in the car, when they were caught up in their movie and I could just think or sing along with my iPod. It's not SO terrible, and we have discovered some new favorite songs after getting tired of listening to Backyardigans and Wiggles CDs that we have. They love The Monkees!! I remember watching The Monkees on Nick at Nite and loving them and I really liked their songs. I have some on my iPod, and they really enjoy the theme song to the show and "I'm not your steppin stone". They also love "Lucy in the sky with diamonds". They think it's so cool that a song has her name in...

My favorite activity right now is going to the library. The Hebrew Day School I used to teach at was right across from the public library and we went once a week. Since we don't live close to one anymore, I hadn't gone in a while. I have started going again, and it's so fun. When I go, I get overwhelmed in the children's sections. It's just so many books!! And, feeling overwhelmed is one of my least favorite feelings , I have decided to start a system: The books are organized by authors name, so I just sat down at the A's, and picked out all the books I thought my kids would like. So, now I won't be overwhelmed by the whole section, I just look through one letter. Now, I am very excited to go the library and get books for the kids!! We have a lot of books here at home, and the kids do enjoy reading, which is one of my favorite activities too. I also get books for me! I have tried to find Francine Rivers books there, but they don't have a great selectio...