Week One in Shreveport

This has been a mostly uneventful week in Shreveport. The kids have been sick, more so on Monday and getting better as the week progressed. I did some nanny duties on Monday and Tuesday. Gave Brent, Autumn, DJ, and Logan most of the gifts I brought with me. T-shirts for all four of them, dried red chiles from Hatch, New Mexico for Autumn, 5 shot glasses for Brent (he has a collection), a Panda bear for Logan, a pop-up picture book for DJ, turquoise earrings from Santa Fe for Autumn.

I filed a claim with my insurance company for the hit and run damage to my car that happened Sunday night in the parking lot here at Brent's apartment complex. Think I will wait with repairs until I return to Saint Paul. Brent agrees.

I got all caught up on my blog - finally. Even with all the photos. I also took advantage of the opportunity Autumn provided to have a desktop computer to download a lot of video footage from my camera. I made movies in Photo Gallery and then uploaded them all to YouTube. I finally downloaded the movie of the New Ulm Glockenspiel from last September's camping trip with "the girls." That was a trip because I kept messing it up in Photo Gallery and had to start over 5 times. Once I had the audio set at double time in one of the three segments and we sounded like chipmunks. How does that even happen? However, all this work allowed me to delete the original videos from my camera, freeing up almost 1,000 MB of memory. I have been noticing for a while that not all my photos are "taking" in the camera. I suspect that I am running short on memory. So, this is a big help. I also deleted excess photos this week.

Only went shopping twice this week. Aren't you proud of me? I had to make a trip to Lowe's to get supplies to fix the cabinet in the camper that got damaged when I ran over something on the highway on the way to Carlsbad. Also got some paint supplies to help Brent paint an addition he made to their living room shelves, and a plumbing snake. They needed a plumbing snake.

Autumn and I took the kids to Buffalo Wild Wings (where Daddy works) for family night on Tuesday. DJ was excited because they had a balloon artist making balloon toys for the kids. DJ got Blue from Blue's Clues.

Brent, Autumn and I celebrated National Wine Day on Thursday by staying home, watching movies, and having some wine. Brent and Autumn did a staycation night on Saturday to celebrate Valentine's Day and - of course - Chinese New Year. They had dinner at Copeland's and stayed at a hotel. So, I played nanny again for the boys. They were both very good. After dinner, which DJ did not eat - again - we watched Monsters Inc and Kung Fu Panda over and over and over again. Then we all had a battle with plastic coat hangers. Logan decided that Mommy needed him to wash the carpet with a dry wash cloth, but face planted and dropped off to sleep in the middle of it at 7 pm. DJ also decided to put on his PJ's and watch Monsters Inc in my bedroom. He drifted off the sleep about 9:30 and was snoring like a truck driver. Photo below is of my funny little Valentines.

Sunday evening we all went out to the newly opened Grub Burger on East 70th Street. The burgers were juicy and delicious, and I loved the adult milk shake. They also had my favorite local beer - Reasonably Corrupt - so I had a glass of that too. Logan ate everything that wasn't nailed down. His appetite is back! And we took lots of adorable family photos, one of which is provided here for your viewing pleasure.