The Garcia Novela: May 2011

Wednesday, May 25, 2011

5k Culinaria Wine Run = 2nd Place Medal:)

Garcia Family post race

I had this fire inside of me when I registered our family for this run. I told myself this was it. I was going to run like I'd never run before! Oscar was gracious enough to let me start at the front and he started in the back with Xia and the other runners with strollers.

Xia with dad & mom:) Pre-race

My goal was 21 minutes. I knew it was an aggressive goal, so I gave myself some room and agreed on 21-24 minutes. I ran my little heart out the first mile at 6:57, and the second mile at 7 minutes flat... then the third mile came upon us and so did a progressive hill! Not one woman had passed me until we neared the 3 mile marker. Little did I know that girl was in my age group and took first place from me by 5 seconds! I ran with no regrets and ran my very best. I finished in 22:27. Fasted 5k I have ever run in my life. I beat my previous time (3/2009) by 2:30 minutes! I killed that 5k! I've never been this competitive in my life, nor knew that I could be. When they were calling out the winners, I never thought that I was going to place. There were over 1200 registered for the race. I listened for my age category just in case and am glad I did...they called first place; I noticed it was the girl that passed me in the final seconds of the race. It then occurred to me that I PLACED SECOND! Oscar was off visiting with friends and I was holding a very fidgety little Xia when they called my name. I couldn't have been happier! I grabbed my medal and hurried to tell Oscar...he was very proud :) Oscar did very well, also. He had never run a 5k with Xia before. Xia was so cute and cooperative in the stroller:) She had this serious look on her face as they crossed the finish line!

Proudly posing with my 2nd place medal!

Little Xia and Mom... I want Xia to remember that hard work ALWAYS pays off, not only for mom, but one day for her as well:) Can't wait to pull these pictures out at Xia's first 5k run!

It was a great event. Plenty of food, beer, and wine to go around. We were even given commemorative wine glasses!

Happy Mother's Day 2011

Mother's Day was awesome this year! I don't know, like, maybe an AWESOME NEW CAMERA and SLEEPING IN LATE helped make it pretty spectacular! Although, those two gifts compare dimly to my precious little, loving girl, Xia Bliss who makes me the mother I am. She made my Mother's Day perfect (and daddy helped!).

Xia and I started Mother's Day wkend off with a trip to Aggie Park for their BBQ cookoff. Boy, was the BBQ yummy! Xia enjoyed herself, as did I.

Love, Love, Love her little "Aggie Chick" t-shirt! So cute!

Priceless grin!

Scott Wiggins Band

On Mother's Day morning, Oscar let me sleep in while little XBG was "golfing" on the patio in her pjs!

We split Mother's Day up over two weeks. We took Oscar's mom out to a late lunch on actual Mother's Day and spent the following Sunday at my Mom's to celebrate a belated MD w/ her.

Oscar, his mom, and Xia

My darling daughter and me:)

My sweet little family

Oscar's Parents and Xia

We spent the rest of Mother's Day outside enjoying the fresh air with relaxed family time. Ahhh, my favorite way to end the day, me, my family, and the outdoors:) Of course some cold watermelon and some tunes help!

Mother's Day keeps getting sweeter every year:)

Wednesday, May 4, 2011

Mama is 15 months!

Mama, as we affectionately call Xia Bliss, turned 15 months yesterday. So much has changed since 14 months... crazy how time flies and development is increasing by leaps and bounds.

She had her 15 month check up today and has gained 3 lbs and grown 2 inches in the last 3 months! Our little pumpkin has been doing a great deal of growing and stretching lately.
She weighed in @ 25.31 lbs and is now 31.5 inches!

Here are some new things she has been doing as of late:

Feeding herself oatmeal in the am and yogurt in the pm with her spoon
Goes straight to the door when we say "wanna go outside?" and waits for us to open the door
Has to have her glass of milk first thing in the morning
Prayed along with me before breakfast a couple mornings... it was so precious, it made my heart melt!
Sings to her baby dolls and sways back and forth
Sings and dances along to her tv shows, musical toys, and the radio
Puts lids back on her food, teething tablets (supervised, of course!!), toys, etc.
Say's "MOM" and "Da-E" for her Oscar and I... yes, we melt!!
Her third tooth is coming in!! Yippee! Only one front tooth...hopefully her other front tooth isn't far behind:)
Walks and nearly runs everywhere!!! She loves being outdoors, so we take her to the back yard and she will walk and walk and walk around until we take her in
Does very well in HEB, does not do well with multiple errands in a day
She could live on oranges, grapes, pancakes, muffins, and eggs.
She LOVES "Kiss, Kiss" and now kisses along with me when I read the book!
She can kiss - purses her lips together, makes the smacking sound, and everything!!
She just started blowing kisses! Oh.My.Goodness - way too cute!
When we visit our neighbor, Jo, Xia walks over w/ me now and stands in front of her glass door and waves until Jo opens the door! She knows who Jo and Karl are and LOVES going over there for visits.

Love you, Mama, Xia Bliss, Baby Bliss, pumpkin, monkey, and all the other little love names we call you! KISS, KISS :)

Zoo Trip

Last year I bought a 1 year San Antonio Zoo pass on Groupon.com for $30. I knew it was a steal and bought that amazing deal (very glad I did as family passes went up to $70 this year!)! Well, we figured Xia was old enough to enjoy the Zoo, so we finally cashed in our groupon ticket for the SA Zoo pass last week and went:) The weather was amazing and little Xia and I had so much fun!

I pushed her around in the stroller as long as possible until she decided that she wanted to walk around like all the children that were there! She liked the bears, monkeys and birds. At one of the monkey's cages, they were very active and even came up to the glass right in front of Xia! Oh, she thought it was great!

They look a little lazy, but at least they were out! The bear on the right looked like it was eating dry dog food - yum!

Xia talking to the monkeys !

These White Checked Monkeys were sooooo active, swinging around their cage, coming up to the glass... it was so cool! The monkey on the left was licking and scraping a peanut butter jar clean!

Little Miss Xia loved her hat and sunglasses. I can't keep a bow in her hair, but put on a hat and shades and she'll leave them on all day!!! I promise she did smile a lot that day, she is just so serious for photos! She's my little monkey:)

Hard to tell what's going on in this pic, but Xia loved watching the bird on the right ruffle it's wet feathers and let the sun dry him off.

I think she also appreciated the elephants. It was hard to tell as she would just stare at all the other school children that were running, yelling, walking, eating, etc. At home, she's learned to put her arm to her nose and "do the elephant"!

There were so many bright, pretty and colorful birds at the zoo. Xia loved them all!

"Let me lead the way, Mom"!!! Love this next photo!

Xia reading the map!!! LOL!

I learned that she has no fear when it comes to animals! We entered the petting zoo and she just walked right up to the sitting goats and started "talking" to them. She then walked right up to the goats that were walking around and petted it so sweetly. She then chased down another goat that was in the distance! I was very proud of her confidence, but also very proud of her taking instruction. The goats were small and they were nearly at eye level. Xia was so close to them, I was nervous that with one turn of their heads, their horns would hurt her face. So I would say "mama, don't get too close" and she would back off and stand away. What a darling:)

My fearless daughter walked right up to him w/out hesitation!

Xia talking with a seated goat (off to the left). It was hilarious!

"I'm gonna get you"!!

We ended our visit at the toddlers area. Some of the parts need to be worked on and were over grown with weeds. But it was nice and quite over in that section (aka no 1st graders that had taken over the rest of the zoo!) and Xia and I had one area all to ourselves to eat our picnic.

Maybe this is why some of the weeds were overgrown...it's the tots job to mow?!!

picnic time!

We stayed about 2 hours and then it was time to head home! We look forward to going again and next time with Daddy:)

Monday, May 2, 2011

Sad that Spurs Season is Over

We are VERY SAD and dissipointed the Spurs season is over soooo soon. Better luck next season.

But, boy did Xia look cute in her new Spurs shirt!

Xia sporting her new spurs tee and roaming the front yard!

Cheering on the Spurs yet another time. This time w/ her cool new shades!

She loves the Spurs and her Tokie!

Happy Easter 2011

We celebrated Easter at our home this year. We had a spaghetti lunch; yummy, casual, and easy!
We went to church with Xia in her Sunday best...can you believe that I didn't even get any pictures of her in her darling Easter dress?!! What was I thinking?! Xia was napping during lunch and the older kids Easter egg hunt. Thus, she was the center of attention when her turn for hunting eggs came around! My cousin, Preston and his girlfriend, Hannah joined us. It was very nice to celebrate with family.