Camera is broken!

No pictures for you all because my prized Canon G9 is not working! Rotten timing! My plan is to use the old Canon for the holidays but it will be a very big difference in quality of pictures. Oh well!

BTW, I had a great birthday last week. Thanks for the flowers, Seattle Porters! They still look great in our kitchen! Another highlight of the day was the tasty cake that my lovely husband and 5 year-old made!

Everyone please send positive energy to Grandma Cathy! She fell and broke a hip bone! She had surgery (on my birthday of all days) and is recuperating in a rehabilitation center! Hopefully, she will heal quickly!

Love you all, T

Sneaky Recess!

It snowed today! There was a lot of excitement about this as it doesn't happen very much here! I have heard rumors of snow in the 11 years that I have lived here, but today is the first day that I saw it with my own two eyes.

Donovan reported that he had "Sneaky Recess". Sounds like the teachers took the kids out so they could see the snow.

Great Turkey Day!

Hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving.

Ours was nice. We had perfect weather (70's and sunny) and good food. Gertrude was very tasty! :)

Nickolas leaves to head back to CA tonight. He had a great week. Mainly just relaxed but did get in a Monday night football game with his Dad. He also went to the gym with Christopher to lift some weights. D loved having his brother here. As expected, the 12 year-old didn't always appreciate the affections and attentions of the 5 year-old, but they got along pretty well overall. Here's some pics from yesterday.

Baking a pie with Dad.
Waiting for dinner!

Gerturde was pretty and tasty. Christopher did a good job with her.

Last picture of all of the boys before we started our feast!

Prime example of the effects of tryptophan!

Poor Gertrude!

Hello all,

I thought I would share artwork from D's Turkey Day at school. It was last Thursday. Parents were invited to attend so I was able to go and do some arts and crafts with him. We had fun.

Nickolas got here yesterday morning. He was pretty tired but said he was happy to be here. D was superhyped up to see his brother. He told me the other day that he did a good job writing "Nick" at school. I asked why he was writing his brother's name and he said it was because he was writing what he was thankful for! Aww!

For his part, Nickolas seemed to be happy to see his brother too. He even gave his brother a Pluto pen that he won at school (he won two...a Pluto and a Goofy). Aww again! Its a Brotherly Love Fest in the Porter house! :)

The title of this post is due to my lovely husband declaring this morning that he's named our Thanksgiving turkey Gertrude! Its obvious why I put that particular adjective in front of her name! We love you all, T

PS Click on the slideshow and then my name to get to my picture albums. You'll see that I uploaded more soccer pictures from the season.

31!

Hi all!

We picked up 31 issues of the Cy-Fair magazine this month. If you add the two that came in the mail yesterday, we were actually at 33! We've sent many of them off in the mail to the grandparents along with school pics but if you want more, just let us know! We'll be able to hook you up! :)

D has his photo and a little write up on page 26! D's school picture is below. Its not my favorite because he's got the fake smile and clenched teeth thing going on.

Nickolas gets here first thing Saturday morning! D is the most excited about this although we are all looking forward to it. Our plans for Thanksgiving are to relax (except for school for D and me on Mon. and Tues.), play outside, have some family boardgame nights and cook/eat! I love the holidays!

We saw the winner!

Hi all! So this is the mag that D will be in! The kid who won the contest and is on the cover took his picture right before D! We watched his entire photo shoot. He was a really cute kid and very well behaved and agreeable for a 2 year old! T

Not a Cover Boy yet!!

Just saw on Facebook that D did not win the cover contest for Cy-Fair Magazine....

"Congratulations to the winners of the Cy-Fair Cutest Cover Contest! 1st Place – Kaleb Matusek, 2nd Place – Hope Vanderburg, 3rd Place – Azariah Hardy; Honorable Mentions – Anabel Valenzuela, Isabella Castillo, and Donovan Porter; Finalists – Aliyah Presley, Avery Conklin, Evan Ann Woodward, Dakotah Pool, Cole David Wood, Isa Lammie, Davis Treese, and Grayson Goeden"

I am super excited to see his picture in the mag though! Hopefully we will get an issue soon. T

Happy Friday!

Hello all,

We are having a good Friday. Donovan and his Dad are watching the new Spongebob movie (on tv) to celebrate another good week! D's had nothing but stickers on his behavior chart these last two weeks and had the great report card (see previous post) so we are letting him know often how proud we are of him! He is eating up the positive attention like candy, of course! :)

Nickolas' report card should be coming soon, I think Christopher is signed up for a phone P-T conference in a couple of weeks! Nickolas has reported that he's doing well though!

Christopher got an email today from Nickolas' mom....it was kind of a shocker! She got married today! To a gentleman named Guy Jenkins. We don't know anything else (never heard of him before today), but we are hoping that he turns out to be a great stepdad to Nickolas.

Well, that's the latest. We love you all, Tamiko

Donovan's First Ever Report Card!

Its a really good one! I was only able to upload one page of it but click on the image below to see it full size. The boy is really doing well! Love you all , Tamiko

Halloween pics!

Hello all,

Donovan went trick or treating with his friend Faith last night. He had a good time, but we went a little too far which was my fault. I forgot that they had ran around a good part of the afternoon playing soccer and at the playground. So at the end of the night I had one tired little guy! Oops!

We haven't heard from Nickolas yet so not sure how his night went, but Christopher said that he was going to go trick-or-treating last night as a wrestler.

I did not dress up, but my lovely husband picked a kid-friendly costume....the football player Plaxico Burress who famously shot himself in the leg! I told everyone that I didn't know which was worse..... his blue-tracksuit/gold tooth/money chain getup from last year or this one! Poor, mistreated Morehouse was Diego (last minute choice since we couldn't find the pet superman costume)!

Hope you all had a Happy Halloween too! T

Cover contest and Nickolas update

Hello family,

Well, I took D to take his picture on Sunday. He did a great job. Here's the outfit he wore....

And another pose for you....

The editor emailed me this "We plan on notifying the winner of the contest in a few weeks. Even if he is not selected as "the winner" of the cover contest, all of the children will be included in a photo page in the Winter issue." So that's pretty cool! Lucky for us that the magazine is free, so we will not have to incur any costs when we snap up a "few"! :)

For those of you wanting a Nickolas update, here's what I know.... Nickoas is playing the drums this year and still doing taekwondo. His goal is to make black belt! Sixth grade has a lot more homework. Also, he turns in a big project on Magdagascar this week! If you talk to him, ask him to share some of his new hard-earned knowledge on the country! We learned something new when he told us that it was an island!

Nickolas comes to Texas the Sat. before Thanksgiving. D asked me how long to Bubba comes the other day so we broke out the calendar and counted 5 weeks!

Well, we love you all! Tamiko

Cover Contest!

Hello All,

A local community magazine has selected D as a finalist for their cover contest! He is one of 15 who will get their picture taken on Sunday. The picture I submitted for the contest is below!

We are excited about this but are really over the moon about how well he has been doing lately. He is feeling good and has had great behavior at school and at soccer! I will post the latest soccer pics soon. Love you all, T

Nickolas' Sixth Grade Pictures

We just got the pictures a few minutes ago. Our kind neighbors brought them over to us because the mailman got our addresses mixed up again. 18806 and 16806 messes him up everytime!!

Poll question to be answered in comments section....In your opinion, how much does he look like his Dad? We love you all, T

Funny Sunday!

Today is our weekly football watching day! Hands-down its the Porter family's favorite day of the week in the fall! Donovan likes to see his favorite player Donovan McNabb play and Christopher enjoys back-to-back-to-back games. We were disappointed because our Texans lost a close one today. Too bad fans don't get to make suggestions on how to make the team better....we'd both suggest that they get a new quarterback!

Anyway, I found my misplaced camera battery charger (I don't know when I decided to put it in my spare purse). I looked and saw that I have some pictures to share. I put them in the slideshow in the corner. Below is a video I took today of Donovan being silly doing his wiggle dance! For the other football fans (Jonathan and Grandaddy), I uploaded a video of Donovan making his CBS Sportsline picks with Christopher on my youtube channel. Just click link on the right frame. We love you all, Tamiko

Another Spongebob Picture

Spongebob, his house and his pet snail, Gary!

Geez Louise!!

The not so quite subtle hints have been coming my way about posting! I will do my best to get back in the groove again! :)

Not much out of the norm has been going on. Donovan has been enjoying school, Christopher has been writing and I have been teaching. The report from Nickolas is that he is enjoying school as well. The sixth grade teachers send frequent emails updating parents on homework/activities so that has been helpful for Christopher.

I haven't taken many pics lately, but I will be giving the camera a work out soon as soccer season is now here!! The kids picked the team name of the Sharks! Their uniforms are the colors of the UofM which makes us quite uncomfortable (we are loyal to MSU)! Two of the kids from D's Spring team are on the team with him again. Kennedy and his special "friend" Faith. :)

Donovan enjoys reading (almost done with K sight word list, going to start first grade list soon), but his favorite activity these days is drawing and writing! One of his masterpieces is below. We think anyone who is a fan of Spongebob would be able to identify the characters and buildings in his picture! We love you all, T

First day of school!

I picked out a green polo for him to wear today, but he deemed it too long and requested a Spongebob shirt. Its his day, so that's what he has on! And that's also why he went to school with pickles, mini muffins (substituted for his requested mini cupcakes) and chips as part of his lunch! :)

He was very quiet and stoic at the bus stop. This was the only time he cracked a smile!

This is how he stood the whole time at the bus stop! He was definitely a little nervous. But, he was acting like a big boy by answering people's questions and he got on the bus without any problems.

Here he is in line to get on the bus. I sure hope I was smiling at him! I can't remember. Too busy trying to document it for posterity!

And he's off to the exciting world of Kindergarten! Yeah!

Meet the teacher!

Hello all,

Today was meet the teacher at Donovan's school. He loved his classroom and seemed to like his teacher. He was pretty shy with her, but played well with a few of the kids in his class. He did not want to leave! I think he's going to be super excited come Monday! Here's some pics of our day!

This morning, there was a neighborhood gathering so the kindergarteners could practice getting on and off a school bus! The bus driver drove them around the parking lot. When Donovan got off he proclaimed the whole thing "BORING"!

After the bus, the neighborhood kids played a name game.

First picture of Donovan at his desk in his new classroom!

A look from behind so you can check out his nametag.

This is the view from Donovan's desk. Donovan and Christopher are kind of in the way, but you can see that somehow the teacher already knew that he need to be right by her desk so she can keep an eye on him! :)

More dog tricks!

Just call us Dog whisperers!

We (mainly Christopher) have taught the dog to sorta almost kinda ROLL OVER! Exciting stuff! Check out video!

Best pics!

This picture was added as a special request from Christopher due to a certain someone being totally distracted by the pretty ladies! :) That's me, Nickolas, Donovan, Kenna, Kylie, Lisa and half of Cindy (oops!) at lunch in Chicago!

Kenna and Nickolas at Navy Pier in Chicago

D rode his bike up to our mailboxes to mail a letter to himself! :)
This picture says it all. It was taken during the performance of Snow White.

Grandpa Freddie and Nickolas

Nickolas and D at a car show in Conroe, TX

Click slideshow in upper right corner to see more pics!

End of summer is here!!

Hey Everyone,

Wow, time flies when you are having fun, huh? I cannot believe that summer is over already! The Porters definitely lived it up this summer. We had trips (NC, MI and IL) and lots of good times (museums, swimming, camps (kids) and much more)!

Nickolas went back to CA last Friday (aug. 14). Check out my youtube channel at www.youtube.com/nealtami44 so you can see one of his accomplishments.....diving into the swimming pool's deep end! At the beginning of the summer, he was not comfortable in any water that he couldn't stand in. So he has come a long way!! He did pretty good socially this summer as he played alot with his neighborhood friends Austin, Dionte and Marshall! At the beginning of this month, we also celebrated his early 12th birthday along with Christopher's early (by 2 days) 36th birthday!

Donovan had a great summer as well. His biggest achievement was being in his first play (at the end of the Bridgeland drama camp that he did with his brother). Too bad that he had his arms crossed and was frowning for much of it. :) But he was there! He also completed his Headstart to reading class. He has a good base of sight words to begin kindergarten with!

Can you belive he is starting Kindergarten on Monday (aug. 24)? I can't! We are excited and ready. I say we because we all know that its a bigger deal for parents than the kids! I will be sure to post his first day of school photo as well as pics from the Meet the Teacher day this Friday.

I don't have much to report new for me as I was primarily a taxi driver, but Christopher had a good couple of months workwise. Seems to me that he's been in a good writing and getting papers out mode which makes him (and me) very happy!
Hope you all are well, Love you, Tamiko

More pics

The boys and Patrick at Carowinds.

Nick, D, Christopher, Grammy and Gramps on our way out of Carowinds.
One last family pic before heading to the hotel the night before our flight out.

Morehouse, the new addition to our family. Morehouse is a purebred Australian Shepherd that we rescued from the Houston SPCA.

Catching up!

My Uncle Mike and the boys yesterday!

Mining for gems at the farm in NC.
The boys are playing in corn at the farm. Its the first and last time they will get to do this activity! I am sure that girl who stuck her whole head in the corn had it in places that it shouldn't be! :)


Christopher and Nickolas on the plane.

That's Donovan's rear you see as he hikes the ball in one of their playoff games.

Nickolas in front of Tracy McGrady during the camp's award ceremony.

Howdy Y'all!

We've been busy busy busy. In the pics above and in the slideshow you can see some of our activities. Below are the highlights since my last post.

All of my boys ended last month with a bang. Nickolas won the two on two basketball championship at the Tracy McGrady basketball camp. Donovan's team, the Cowboys, won the flag football championship for the summer league. Christopher got a revise and resubmit for one of his articles.

We started this month with a trip to North Carolina to visit Grammy and Gramps (CP's mom and grandmother). Our activities included going to a farm, an amusement park (Carowinds), bowling and just hanging out. We had a great time. Thanks Grammy and Gramps for having us!

Now that we are back home, the boys have resumed their activities. Nickolas had Oozing, Bubbling science camp this week and Donovan has been to his reading and music classes. Next week they start swim lessons and Nickolas also attends a Drama camp. My dad, the newly retired Grandpa Freddie, arrives on Tuesday! We are looking forward to that.

Grandpa Freddie's brother, Uncle Mike, was in town this week so we got to spend some time with him and his girlfriend Pat. They got to meet Christopher and Nickolas for the first time which was great. Unfortunately, I think they might have no choice but to report back to the folks in Detroit that we are raising a wild child here in TX. Donovan was definitely showing his true colors! :) Its funny how 5 year olds can be cute and so unruly at the same time!

We love you all, T

So I forgot...

...to upload pictures!! Sorry about that! I will do so when I get back into town! I am in Williamstown, MA until Friday. The workshop I am attending is very interesting and informative but let me tell you, MA is way different than TX. Its chilly, I have been wearing a sweatshirt! I guess I should appreciate the break from the 98 degree weather at home, but I kind of miss the warmth. Also, the landscape and architechture is very different as you might imagine. Unfortunately, I left my camera at home, so won't be able to share the images with you.

Nickolas has done so much already considering that he hasn't even been back for two weeks yet. He seemed to really enjoy robotics camp last week and this week is the Tracy McGrady Basketball camp. Some of you may know that we decorated the boys' rooms in Houston sports team themes, NBA Rockets for Nickolas and NFL Texans for Donovan. Thus, it is pretty exciting for Nickolas to be able to go to a camp hosted and attended by the superstar player who is in the poster hanging up on his wall! This was Nickolas' reward for keeping his tardies down again this year and improving on time management (he actually wore his watch most days!).

On Sunday, the boys went to the pool to hang out with Nickolas' buddy Austin. Austin ended up inviting Nickolas over for a sleepover for that night. Nickolas was so excited that he could barely sit while he waited to be picked up (it was his first night staying at a friend's house). Donovan was devastated when Nickolas left as he has been wanting to have a sleepover with a (any) friend for months now! Poor kid!

To give you the back story, Austin is from CA but is in town visiting his grandmother who lives in Bridgeland. Nickolas and Austin met last summer at a drama camp held at the activity center. They hung out quite a bit last summer, so its nice that they will get to do so again this year as well.

I just erased the statement "nothing much new to report on Donovan" as I forgot to tell you all that he is officially READING!!! YEAH! He just "got" the concept a few weeks ago and has been improving exponentially. He started a Headstart to Reading Class as well that has done nothing but increase his excitement about reading. His face just lights up when he reads....he's so pleased with himself. Its always so fun to watch him learn something new. He knows about 20-25 sight words that gets him very far with simple early reading books (or ones we make up ourselves)!

I can say that there is not much new with my husband. He's been working and hanging out with the boys. I will speak for him and say that he is pretty happy these days and having a blast! Data analysis and the two knuckleheads are definitely high on his list of favorites.

We love you all, Tamiko

Summer in Full swing

Well, summer is in full swing in the Porter household. Nickolas has been here since about 5:30am on Saturday morning. He seemed pretty excited and ready to go as soon as he got off the plane. Two of our neighbor kids, Sierra (age 10) and Dionte (13) happened to stop by that afternoon to see if he was in town just as Nickolas was heading outside to go for a bike ride with Christopher. They had good timing! Later, we went to the pool in the evening to meet up with Sierra and Dionte and ran into the Marions who have FOUR boys. I have finally gotten the names straight.....Bryan (5), Braxton (9), Brandon (11) and Bryce (13)! Thus, Nickolas had a great first day of playing with lots of kids (including his brother).

Donovan has pretty much hung out with Daddy this week while Nickolas has a Robotics camp at the local community college in the mornings. It ends on Friday and it appears that Nickolas is enjoying it and meeting some interesting kids. One of them, Nick, gave him some good advice. The gist of it was to make good choices because if you don't things could get pretty bad. Pretty wise advise from a 7th grader.

Today, Nickolas also went to the pool to hang out with another neighbor, Marshall (he's almost 10). Seemed like they had a good time. I have a feeling that we will end up at the pool again tomorrow and Friday since it is SOOO H-O-T here!

I leave on Sunday for a workshop in Massachusetts. I will try to remember to add pictures before I leave. Hope everyone is doing well. We love you all, Tamiko

"Camping" and flag football pics

As promised, I posted the proof that D and his dad know how to "rough" it! :)

Nothing much new. Soccer has ended and now Donovan is playing flag football. He's had two practices so far, and one more on Monday before the first game on Tuesday. He's the youngest and smallest on his team, but his behavior and listening is so good that we are really enjoying watching him. If you click on the slideshow to go to my other pictures, you'll see more of my football images.