Guerra Family Updates!

Okey dokey, so I obviously failed at my goal of updating the blog a minimum of once a week. Part of my procrastination was because of several reasons, those being 1) my job search 2) planning Sybilla’s baptism & Michael’s birthday party and 3) motherhood can be quite consuming, resulting from sleep deprivation and temporary bouts of amnesia. This is supposed to be a family blog, and I chose to wait to post until after Michael posted something about his birthday party. And that of course, took some time since my husband is the king of procrastination! I finally got him to write it after I proclaimed what MY version of his blog entry would have been. Now that he has accomplished his task, on to our family updates!

We washed the devil out of Sybilla on June 14, 2008 at St. Austin's. The baptism was presided by Fr. Rick Walsh, who is the same priest that married us, so it was quite lovely to have him back again. (Funny side note… the shoes I wore with my outfit were the same shoes I was wearing the last time we saw him… my wedding day!) Sybilla did beautifully and was so enthralled by Fr. Rick and never cried one bit. She was absolutely adorable in the dress that I made her for the occasion and the bonnet that I bought to go with it.

From Left: Godmother Debi, Mommy, Sybilla, Daddy, and Godfather Chris

In case you have not heard yet, I am, indeed, employed again at last! I am a little sad at having to go back to work full time, but I am very excited about my job and will be working as a Project Mgmt Coordinator for a market research firm. I will update you with more info as I learn more about my responsibilities and tasks!

And finally, Little S had her 4-month doctor’s appointment today. She weighed in at 15.84 pounds, or 7.2 kilos. She is in the 50th percentile on height, 90th percentile on weight, and 50th percentile for head circumference. Our darling daughter is quite the little monkey and has mastered many developmental skills, among them rolling over both ways, standing on her feet, and reacting to voices around her. She has even begun to respond to her name (or so we think… that really could be coincidence!). We started sleep training her the day of her baptism and she can now fall asleep, in her crib, without a paci, within 15 minutes. Yay! We started solids the same day as sleep training and she took to rice cereal ok; she’s been wearing more of it than actually eating it. (A little tip if you want to be crafty: if you plan on doing papier-mache, use baby rice cereal for your paste, because when that crap dries, it's not going ANYWHERE)

She got the go ahead for other foods today and we gave her oatmeal this evening, which she gobbled down like it was going out of style. And this was after consuming a double boob shot! We’ll probably move to barley in a week and then start trying some squash or sweet potatoes. I’m going to attempt to prevent my child from getting the same sweet tooth I have, so veggies yum yum here we come!

Now you're caught up to speed! We will post photo albums on our Picasa page soon, which you can link to through clicking the slideshow posted in the left hand sidebar on this blog. Take care and we’ll write soon!

To infinity and beyond,
Kelly & the Gang

Michael's First Blog Entry

This being the Guerra Clan blog, it is about time that I wrote one. The big news is that my birthday party was amazing! There were beef and chicken fajitas, which my father-in-law and I grilled out back. The meat came out soooooooooo good! We had beer, wine, sangria, punch, soda, and a few other choice drinks on hand to make the merry-making possible. There were baked goods a plenty, which my amazing, beautiful wife produced. The cheesecake and Mexican wedding cookies were a huge hit.


As for entertainment, I’d say it was a total win: Rock Band – 5,000 points, Michael’s jokes – 0. We all took turns playing and singing to the very loud music, and everyone had a great time. There was a piñata (essential for, if you haven’t guessed yet, a fiesta), which didn’t last very long. It came off the rope on the second swing. After that we just tossed it like a baseball, and, like any good baseball game, the bat broke. The bat in this case, however, was my father in law’s driver from his club set. Awesome!

The highlight of the evening may have been my sister’s boyfriend. Actually, it wasn’t Matt himself, but what he so amazingly did. My mother-in-law cries out that the sour cream tastes like whipped cream. Now my wife, doubting her mother’s opinion as she usually does, swears that it is sour cream until she takes a bite of it herself. Nope, it is really whipped cream! My dad chimes in with, “I wondered why my fajitas were so sweet!” Thanks, Matt, for putting the whipped cream in the sour cream dish.

It was a freakin’ sweet party, and I got some very nice gifts along with my friends joining me for a fun-filled evening: A three day pass to ACL from my father, a new cigar humidor from Carl and my mother and my wife, a new lighter and some very choice sticks from the Marino Clan, and a fiesta I will never forget from my wife and her family. I had such a great time that now my wife wants a huge party for her next birthday. I hope I can top this one!

I finally gotcha Kolache!

Ok, so we're going to divert from baby news for a moment here and talk all about kolaches...

I've been craving kolaches since our last trip to Eagle Lake at Christmas. These trips not only result in visiting Michael's grandparents, but a stop at Weikel's for kolaches in La Grange, TX (They Gotcha Kolache!). If you have not had a Weikel's kolache, you have not lived. There are those that would say that about that the kolaches from the Czech Stop in West, TX, but I've never been there, so until I do, I heart Weikel's!

Since some folks may be wondering what the hell a kolache is, here is the definition according to Wiki (Thanks be to Wiki!): 'a type of pastry consisting of fillings ranging from fruits to cheeses inside a bread roll.' It's then usually topped off with posypka, a topping that is made from flour and sugar cut into butter and then crumbled over the top. They can also be made to contain sausage and cheese, a glorified pig-in-the-blanket. While these are marketed as kolaches, they're really klobasnek, and just as tasty!

Kolache: a Czech pastry filled with fruity or cream cheesy goodness.

Since I am a still a student at the University of Patience, and a pretty damn good baker, I decided to give it a go at making kolaches. It took me three tries before I finally got it. The first two times I used a recipe that was total crap. It's from some Czech woman called Grandma Rosie who lives in Corpus and owned a bakery for years. Either she doesn't really want to share the success of her recipe or the reporter who wrote it down got it wrong, 'cause that recipe was a disaster both times I tried it. I had my mom look over it to make sure I wasn't crazy, and she thought it was off too. So I scrapped that one and found another on a blog by the Homesick Texan: http://homesicktexan.blogspot.com/2007/03/sweet-escape-kolaches.html The author's a funny gal and if you love food like I do, you'll enjoy reading her many posts devoted to Texan cuisine.

With new recipe in hand, I finally managed to pass go, collect my $200, and actually place dough balls on my greased cookie sheets. After having had to wash my pre-greased cookie sheets from my first two attempts without ever placing dough on them, I vowed that I would not grease this time until I was REALLY ready.

What I learned from this adventure: to mimic the Weikel's kolache, one must make BIG dough balls and place them really close together on one cookie sheet (I got 30 small ones out of the recipe and used up 1.5 cookie sheets). Mine came out a little too dense since I had to keep adding flour to the surface when kneading the dough, so maybe baking on a less humid day might be a good idea too! I have to do some more research on what the consistency of the dough should be like; I was basing my experience off of bread making.

All in all, my kolaches were finally a success and they have made a delightful addition to my baking repertoire. I am one step closer to having my bakery some day! If I can just muster up enough cash and get over the whole waking up before the butt crack of dawn thing, we're in business. In the meantime, back to mommyhood!

Kelly

Pool Party and Hot Mama

On Saturday we went to a pool party that was being held for our godmother's daughter, Taylor. Congrats, Tay!While there, Little S got to experience her first pool party. She actually did really well for her first time. I think she is a genuine, bona fide water baby. I hadn't bought any swim diapers yet, but one of Debi's older daughters had some for her little girl, who is much older than Sybilla. We made it work though and Little S had a blast. See pictures!

Little S in her new swimsuit...love the ruffles!

I spent the first part of the day doing part of my birthday shopping with my best friend Kellie. Our husbands watched the kids while we went to various shops in Bee Caves. They live near the Hill Country Galleria and since we got an early start it wasn't too hot to be shopping outside. We made out like bandits at Ann Taylor, one of my fave places to shop. We got coffee at the 'Bucks afterwards. I had decided early that morning that I wanted to get my haircut, and so we made a beeline up 620 and stopped at nearly every salon along the way to see if they had any openings. We found one near Kellie's house that had an opening for a little bit later, so we booked it and went to Target to kill some time. I got some cute tops from Target and a ridiculously cute swimsuit for Sybilla too. Best part? It's not pink! Mwahahaha!!! It's a 12M suit though; she's getting too big for almost everything 3-6M right now!

Water baby!

Anyhoo, after Target, we went back to the salon and I received the most awesome haircut in the world! The gal who did my hair is named Katelyn (check out her website at www.LadyKatelyn.com) and she is the bomb diggety! She's worked the last 5 years in Beverly Hills, and me being the little gossip whore that I am, we hit it off chatting about celebrities, etc. After finishing the 'do, she told me that I couldn't leave until we'd made sure that I could get more than two or three looks out of the cut. Her biggest pet peeve? Coming home from the salon and not being able to recreate what the stylist did. I nearly died, I was so happy! If I had been a man, I'd have asked for her hand in marriage. Four days later, I can totally do what she did and more with my hair. You can see the results below. I totally feel sexy and ready to take the world by storm! Now if I can just land an interview somewhere...

What the back of my head looked like...
we called it a reverse mullet because it's
business in front and killer party in back :o)

Speaking of job search, it's still going and so far, nothing. Bummer. I think I am going to send my resume to several staffing agencies and see if that doesn't at least land me a couple of interviews. If anything, they can at least help me tailor my resume and cover letter some more. To infinity and beyond!!

Love,
kelly and the gang