Michael Turns Seventeen!

Wow, it's very hard to believe that I'm the mother of a seventeen year old young man. We had a lot of fun celebrating Michael's birthday ... twice. Of course. Saturday night before his birthday proper, we trekked to downtown Fort Worth - which beats downtown Dallas on the fun-factor by a mile - and had dinner at Uno Chicago Grill.

Gabriel was a bit of a pill, prompting me to declare that we will not attempt special dinners out unless we can leave him at home with a babysitter. Despite that, and navigating crazy traffic because there was a free concert in town that night, we managed to have a pretty good time.

On his birthday proper, we just had to have chicken curry. It's his favorite meal, and I'm not sure we could actually celebrate his birthday without it. And, of course, what's a birthday without a cake?

You can also check out the full birthday slideshow!

Summer Fun

Gabriel just loves to play in the backyard. I bought a sprinkler toy and it has turned out to be money well spent!

He is definitely more "two" every day and his talking is getting better all the time. He'll stand at the backdoor and yell "Want 'side! Want 'side!"

If we tell him no, it's too hot to play outside he usually wails "MY 'side!! MMYYYYY 'side!"


"My" being his way of communicating everything from "that's mine" to "how dare you deny me that which I so obviously want!"