February 28 - I Forgot Perfume!

Spring picture day was this past Thursday. I walked into the house after my morning walk with the dogs and Jillian was ready for me with a hair tutorial pulled up on my laptop. After spending 45min on her hair (she was very particular), she got dressed, applied her lip gloss, put on jewelry, slide into (my) wedges and was ready to go. As we walked to school, she commented that she's a tomboy (I almost burst out laughing) and then halfway to school exclaimed "I forgot to put on my perfume!" I told her she'd be okay. This girl will keep us on our toes!

The Hair

February 25 - All Hail the Chief

Luke has been putting in crazy hours with Robonauts recently:

Saturday 12pm-11.30pm

Sunday 3pm-10.30pm

Monday 3pm-11.30pm

Tuesday 3pm-11.30pm

Wednesday (today) 3pm-???

He's essentiall a full-time student with a full-time robotics gig. We barely see him these days but he's keeping his grades up and absolutely passionate about robotics and loves what he's doing. All of his hard work and dedication are paying off. The Robonauts mentors (primarily JSC NASA Engineers) announced the Chief Engineers at practice 2 days ago. There are 4 Chief Engineers named out of 90+ kids on the team and they are usually seniors. Occasionall a junior. A rookie freshman? Unheard of. Until this year-congratulations Luke!!! Chief Software Engineer. First freshman rookie chief in 29 years. We are so proud of you!

I don't have any pictures of Luke (because I so rarely see him LOL) but here is a beautiful sunrise picture I took the other morning walking the dogs. 

February 23 - Friday Night Heights

My favorite thing on a Friday night January through March? Friday Night Heights. Most (all?) of you reading this are probably wondering "What are Friday Night Heights?" It is the best time of the year-college gymnastics! I am a HUGE fan of Gator gymnastics and LSU gymnastics but I record and watch almost all of the college meets. I have a friend here who also loves watching college gymnastics and she has a son who is a junior at OU (Oklahoma University). OU is the #1 ranked team in the country and LSU is #2. OU and LSU have won 8 out of the last 11 national championships. We decided to take a quick trip to Oklahoma and watch the meet. 

We flew up Thursday night and it was a quick hour flight. The university is only 15min from the Oklahoma City airport. We met up with my friend's son on Friday and he gave us a tour of campus.

The campus was really pretty with a library that reminded me of Harry Potter and lots of open green spaces. There were also a lot of restaurants within walking distance. We went to a nice lake and walking trail after lunch and then after an early dinner, we headed to the meet. 

The meet was AWESOME! There were over 11k in attendance and the arena was electric. The meet was close and OU came out on top but every routine was a hit (no falls). It was so much fun and I was so excited to see one of my favorite LSU gymnasts score not one, but TWO, perfect 10s!!

Beautiful library

Biggest Greek houses I've ever seen

Cool phone booths on campus

OU Gymnastics

Perfect 10

Exploring Oklahoma

February 15 - End of an Era

Julia's swim career came to an end last week at the region meet. Regions is comprised of the top swimmers around Houston and she did great. She placed 10th and 11st in the 50FR/100FR as well as 4th in the 200FR relay and 5th in the 400FR relay. 4 years and 32 swims at this meet (meaning she qualified for finals in every individual event and relay over the course of HS). There are 9 senior swimmers on our team and she's the only one who achieved that honor, we're very proud of her. But I'm most proud of her hard work, dedication, early mornings (she never overslept or missed a practice), her grit this past year (I know she was burnt out and ready to be done) and managing swim with a pretty hard course load. 

Julia, Ava, Mia

Julia, if you are reading this one day, I hope you remember. 

Orcas: 12 years of fun, the Dream team, swimming and then coaching with your best friends (Reese and Kennedy), creating team cheers, Coach Abby, playing games in the tent, Kennedy's mom screaming from the stands at the champ meet 'Put on your goggles!", dad bellowing 'Let's go JULIA' every time you were on the block. 

Aquastar: laughing in the car driving to/from swim practice with Reese and Kennedy, Reese faking injuries to get out of practice, swim camp at TAMU, multiple swim camps at UT, hiding in the bathroom during winter practice near the heater, learning how to work hard and challenge yourself. 

HEAT: competing at the All-American LC meet in Dallas with D1 college swimmers, staying at the sketchiest hotel ever in Dallas (what a memory!).

Lake: Team bonding, overnights at TISCA and region, dying your hair red, the year the hair dye did not come out of your hair and we had to have the hair stylist fix one patch on your head LOL. Most importantly: Mariam, Imina and Mia. 

We love you Jules-congrats on an awesome swim career. Super proud of you. 

February 8 - Fenway and Hattie

North Pointe's 3rd annual "Readers Theater" was last week and our little actor was 'Goldie', a neighborhood dog. She auditioned in early January and was super excited to get this role. The kids rehearsed every Thursday morning at 7.30am and Jillian loved every minute. So proud of our little actor!