It Has Been A While!

This blog is in major need of an update. The Cobbs have been pretty busy since January. I have felt so settled these last several months. The boys and I had a great summer, although it would never slow down despite my wishes. I love having them at home. I love the company, seeing them play together, taking them places, and seeing them try new things. We swam. Nathan took Latin for a week and loved it. Michael took wood working for a week and loved IT. They both went to a weekly art class that made for a fun perk. My father-in-law retired. We played in the yard (until it just got unbearably hot). It was great fun. 

Now, I share them with their teachers. And although I miss them, I have settled back into my school-year routine with some fresh new things too!

Christmas 2012

Merry Christmas!

HESS 2003 - 2011 Commentary

As I was going through the specific family pictures from the annual HESS Christmas brunch, there were a few things that stuck out for me. First, the boys always had new clothes on while Nick and I recycled--particularly his rust red shirt and my big collared cream shirt--outfits throughout the year. I actually saw Nick in that same rust red shirt last night as he went to a seminar. Second, I ought to settle on a hair style. Some styles I just should not have dabbled with. And I've not done a thing with altering color, but each year is quite different looking. Some years I look really tired. A few years I was so tired that I didn't even put on make up for a nice Christmas-y outing. Nick's hair changes too. Our youthful faces in 2003 morphed into mature faces from last year. We've gone from holding one child, to holding 2, wrestling with at least one of them to hold still, to sitting calmly with both boys able to stand and support themselves with ease. I look happier in the more recent photos. More content. More confident. I do know one thing for sure: each time I look at any and all of these photos, it makes me an extremely proud and grateful mama. These represent our beautiful little family. This is what we've become. Each blessed day has gotten us to where we are now. This weekend, we'll add another picture to this group. :)

HESS 2003 - 2011

2011

2010

2009

2008

2007

2006

2005

2004

2003

My Pumpkins among the Pumpkins...Over the Years

 

 

Nathan about 3 months old. He couldn't sit up by any means, but we propped him up on the hay and the pumpkin kept him from rolling forward. I'm pretty sure that I was inches away from the edge of this photo to catch a floppy baby.

I took Nathan to the Floydada, TX, pumpkin patch and festival. It was a big deal because I took him by myself while Nick was in Ohio for work. I remember it being a great day of pumpkin discovery. He toddled around in a very soft baby flannel romper, explored tractors and studied the varieties of pumpkins.

Our first pumpkin patch in Houston at a church. It wasn't the same as the one in Floydada, but it still made for a great experience. 

 

We never went to a pumpkin patch in 2006, so this is 2007.  I would have just gone back to work from having Michael, so I guess I was probably too exhausted to drag myself to the pumpkins. Michael was just barely toddling around in these 2007 pictures. 2008, 2009, and 2010 didn't get us to a pumpkin patch either. Oh yeah!--I was still working. The thrill of the pumpkin patch was fizzled, and I guess they learned that a trip to the pumpkin patch meant I'd be taking pictures like good LA paparazzi, so they were less than thrilled to appease me. It makes me sad now to see that those years went by without some pictures to fill in the blanks, but I must forgive myself or I'll be eaten up with guilt. This means I missed Nathan's kinder field trip to the pumpkin patch...I'll focus on the positive. :)

 2011: Michael's kindergarten pumpkin patch field trip! It's a far cry from his 2007 picture! My big boy!

 These last 2 pictures are from today. Michael's first grade field trip to the pumpkin patch. It makes me sad to think that the pumpkin patch days with my boys will get less and less. Today I savored the day with my baby. The same baby who toddled through the rows of pumpkins just a few pictures up from these. He's my great big boy now. I love my pumpkins. They make me smile and they make me proud. I'm inspired to drag them to the pumpkins again this year, force them to sit within inches of each other, and snap away at my camera. I'm sure it would go over well! :)

Goodbye Summer, Hello School Year

The end of summer and beginning of school sort of blur together. It's a whirlwind skittering about tackling the must-dos. Before I knew it, my boys were well into their first days of school and I was back home in the quiet. Although we had no monumental moments this summer, it was filled with what we needed most, a perfect balance of activity and vegging out.
The new Waco Hawaiian Falls water park brought us plenty of entertainment this summer. It was just the right size, we went at just the right (uncrowded) times, it was clean, it was cool, and it gave us a great place to have some fun. What I loved about this summer is that the boys spent a lot of time playing together. They balanced electronic games with toys and reading, swimming, building, and imagining. Together. Sure, we had meltdowns and catastrophes, but those were a side note and not the theme of the summer. We had a lot of playing time together.
We have now ridden the wave of acquiring (another set of) new renters for the Houston house. That is a chore. After a houseful of new paint (thank you, Jeff!) and steam cleaned carpets (Oops--you are my new "go-to" company), the place looks like a million bucks. Well, not that much in rent, but I like that house and it is important to me that it looks nice. Before the revamp, the house was dingy, dingy. Sticky, yet oily, film on all the tile surfaces, crumbs and bits of trash on the floor from who knows when. I could go on and on about the icky details, but I'll save the rant. It was dirty. And they managed to do that in 7 months. Yikes! Now it is sparkling clean and ready for the new couple who are set to move in at any moment. We are really impressed with our realtor, Toke, who is just a real go-getter. She's prompt with communication, and seemed genuinely eager to help us move quickly with this. I'll use her again, definitely.
The boys are off to a nice start with school. Their teachers seem to love their jobs and interact well with the children. The school and church buildings went through a facelift and addition, and the facilities look great. It is a loving--and beautiful--environment for my children to spend their days at school.
My own schedule is crazy already! I'm juggling various projects and trying to remember to type them all into my phone calendar so I don't miss something...although I feel like I've forgotten one or two already. I still wonder how I did all of this AND worked full time...oh yeah, I didn't usually get to do the fun stuff! I must have been a raving lunatic...really.

So, here is the deep breath for the start of school. I'll blink and it'll be Christmas, I'll sigh and it'll be May. The time will pass quickly, despite my wishes to slow down. BUT, then I'll have my boys again--all to myself--and we'll just make more memories.

My Gnocchi Story

Once upon a Thursday morning, Martha Stewart had a guest chef named Lidia who happens to hail from my grandmother's home town of Trieste, Italy. Chef Lidia is now famous for her northern Italian cuisine, has a few fine dining restaurants, several cookbooks, and a line of boxed pasta that she was plugging during her appearance with Martha.

 On Thursday, Lidia was making--perhaps my very favorite meal, or definitely in the top 2 or 3--GNOCCHI. Light, delicate potato pasta pillows in a bed of homemade marinara. I have my own biological link to the dish, even though I've never made it to Trieste. I feel connected to it, but I rarely make it because it is complicated and messy. It looked so good on TV and I knew it would inevitably end up on our dining table within a few days.

Baking the potatoes, peeling them, RICING them--Michael did help me with that, hand mixing the dough, forming each individual gnocchi, boiling them, and sinking them into my homemade marinara...it is all a spiritual process made completely out of love.

 Aren't they pretty?

 Contrasting Cuisine: Boyardee VS homemade gnocchi goodness

 All plated...bowled...up. A dinner masterpiece.

  I hang my head in disgust, though, because my boys won't have anything to do with it. I'm not about to make them eat it because each little piece is hand made with love, and if they aren't going to love it back, it's going in MY mouth. Nick and I can easily snarf down a husky bowl or two. This last picture is a crying shame of a meal: Chef Boyardee meat ravioli...an embarrassment to Lidia, I am sure. It's the boys' consolation prize of a dinner. Ekk ekk ekk. 

The gnocchi was divine. It was a beautiful experience. My kitchen is a wreck, but I ate so much that the clean up will just have to wait a while.