Sheep Guarding Llama

I took yesterday off from work so that we could drive down to League City.  Today, though, I am working from my laptop.

We got up and went over to the Grices’ as quickly as we could so that I could set up on the couch with the laptop and work from there.

Today is the end of the month.  That really snuck up on me.  I had no idea how late it was getting.  So I had to frantically pay bills today to make sure that we had everything paid that needed to be paid before May 1st.

Not too much to write about today.  We spent the day visiting with the family and playing with the kids.  Liesl is having a grand time with all of her cousins.

We are planning on returning to Las Colinas on Monday evening.

I have today off of work and we are spending the day driving down to League City.  I was able to sleep in a little this morning.  Dominica did most of the packing although there isn’t all that much to do for this particular trip.  Then, when Liesl woke up, we were able to just head out to the car and hit the road.

I believe that it was about five minutes till ten when we pulled out of the parking garage and got onto the road.  The weather is pretty nice today, but it is very windy which makes driving a huge pain.

We grabbed breakfast at Jack in the Box and walked Oreo and were back on the road.  We made pretty good time and arrived at the Grices’ around three in the afternoon.

I got to see little baby Clara, not even a whole week old, when we arrived.  I held her for probably an hour.  She pretty much just slept.  Liesl loves to give her new cousin kisses.

We hung out with the family till around ten in the evening.  Then we went down to Bayou Vista because we are staying with Joe and Britt while Oreo stays at the Grices’.  Liesl was quite tired by the time that we finally got her to bed.

I was up and off to work quite early this morning.  Today starts my early morning coverage on a regular basis.  This will also work out well for walking to work in the brutal Texas summer as it is only so bad if you can get over to the office before the sun really comes out and starts cooking everything.

It was a busy day and I ended up working through lunch and not having any time to go home today.  I did manage to get out a little bit early though which helped as we did not have much time after work to get ready to go to La Cima for dinner tonight.

We tried to meet up with Brian at six thirty but it was almost seven by the time that we arrived at La Cima.  We got there and sat down for drinks in the lounge before going in for dinner.  There was only one other couple in the lounge while we were there so when they went in to the dining room Liesl was able to walk around with Dominica and burn off some of her excess energy while Brian and I enjoyed our drinks.  Wednesday nights are a perfect time for Liesl to go to La Cima as it is very slow there and she doesn’t interfere with other people’s dinners.

It was probably seven thirty when we went into the dining room.  Just early enough that there was sunlight and Dominica got to see the view before the sun went down and then she got to see the lights of the metroplex come on which is pretty cool from the top of the Williams Tower.

Liesl had a great time playing with the staff.  She really liked it at La Cima.  We decided to join tonight so that we can use La Cima all of the time.  It is perfectly situated for me to be able to get there easily from work during the day so I hope to be able to take advantage of the lunch buffet on a regular basis.  There are several people from the office who are considering joining as well which could equate to regular car pools going over there from the office.  It is very close.

After dinner we went home and went right to bed.  Liesl was tired and we want to get moving on the early side tomorrow.  I took tomorrow off from work so no need to travel before or after the workday.

My schedule is really crazy this week and today is the closest thing that I will have to a normal day at all.  I went into work at my usual time today instead of going in really early.  We talked about this today, though, and there is a lack of early morning coverage so starting tomorrow I am just going to be working earlier than I have been – attempting to get into the office around seven.  This actually works pretty well because I can get up and out of the house before Liesl and Dominica are awake and that cuts my time to get ready roughly in half.

Liesl is doing much better with her sleeping schedule now.  While she was in Houston this past week she finally learned how to go to bed when we tell her “Night Night” and she doesn’t get upset but happily goes and lays down to get some sleep.  It doesn’t work perfectly yet but she is getting better and better at it and we are on the road to a better sleep schedule.  She takes her blankie and her Cheer Bear and a pacifier and snuggles up and just goes to sleep.

Liesl has been obsessed with her blankie ever since she started watching Elmo in Grouchland over and over again.  She is addicted to that movie.  She gets up in the mornings and starts the day by saying “Elmo?”  It has been her favourite thing to watch for the last two weeks and she watches it five or six times per day.  She suddenly loves all things Elmo.

I came home for lunch today and then back for a normal evening.  Tonight was another night just hanging out with the family.  Tomorrow is our last day in Irving before we all go back down to Houston for several more days.  Tomorrow evening Dominica and Liesl are coming along to La Cima for pasta night to see how they like it there.

I’m in the office very early this morning.  Oreo did not like that one bit.  I had to come in early to help out with all of the expected issues that are likely to arise from this weekend’s COB testing.  So I was up at six this morning, showered, dressed, walked Oreo and into the office by seven.  I had to dress a bit nicer than usual today because I have that lunch scheduled with La Cima to talk about membership for the office.  Originally Brian was going to be going with me today but we figured out that that was pretty silly so John from work is going with me instead.

It was a pretty busy morning.  I do like going in at seven or earlier, though, as it does give me a chance to get a jump on things and there is very little going on in the office at that time so it is a lot more relaxed and quiet.  If I go in at nine or later then there are people waiting to pounce on me the moment that I walk through the door and it is much better to have time to get caught up on emails, see what has been going on all night, get oriented and prepped for the day, etc.  I hate walking in in the middle of things.

At a quarter till noon John and I ran out to drive over to Williams’ Square for lunch with La Cima.  John had never been there before and hadn’t thought that it was something that he would be interested in at all until he went and got a look at the place.  We got a tour of the facility and then La Cima treated us to an amazing lunch.  I had the mango iced tea, corn chowder, fish tacos and the Jack Daniels chocolate ice cream.  Very impressive.

It turns out that La Cima has some really amazing member dining privileges during the day as well.  When we were there with Brian last week we had gotten the impression that they were only open in the evening but it turns out that they are extremely busy during the day and less so in the evenings.  They have free breakfast and a very low cost lunch buffet for members which is really awesome.

After lunch John dropped me at home so that I could walk Oreo and then walk back to the office while he took off to go buy a new car.

I worked for several more hours then around five Dominica and Liesl swung in to pick me up from work on their way home from Houston.  I haven’t seen them in eight days!

This evening was just spent hanging out at home with the family.