I am back

I am sure all of you out there have been wondering "where in the heck is Nicole? Did she fall in a well? Off the face of the earth?"

Well, sort of. I am slightly overwhelmed by the amount of work I am doing. Hours every night writing papers. 16 hours spent painting letters for my mural. Of course, even though it hasn't rained in months here in Houston, it rains on the day I have all my stuff out to paint. This slowed me down some.

That having been said I am loving painting. Even though I have called every person I know, almost, to break up the monotony I am enjoying it. Darren on the other hand has been a single dad this weekend. Thanks honey :)

My camera has broken ARGHHH! I don't know what to do without my camera. I need it! Any suggestions on the kind I should get to replace it (hopefully in the next day or two).

As for the boys.
Daniel has gone the last several days without a diaper (except when sleeping). This new freedom down below has helped him to make note of the size of his penis. You know how it gets bigger and then isn't. So, if you come to visit be prepared to hear "I have a big penis". I could make many jokes from this point but I will leave it to you all.

Alex and Ian took a cooking camp at HEB Central Market. They learned to make finger foods, dumplings, home made pasta and all kinds of fun stuff. I loved it because then they ate their creations for lunch (one less for me to make).

Ian has spent the last week contemplating the state of America. How do we help those who have nothing? We have discussed this and he told us his solution at dinner last night. His solution...

COMMUNISM

No he didn't use that word but it was definitely his idea. You know, don't pay people but give everyone a job and they get what they need thought process. Darren spent the next hour explaining to him why this doesn't work. The fact that people aren't motivated to work hard when everything is handed to him. When Darren starts a sentence with "When I was in college a professor once asked us...." you know the conversation is probably higher than we should be discussing with a 7 yr old.

Well, now Ian knows more about our democracy and the idea of capitalism. He went to bed last night with a paper and pen to write down more ideas and a letter to President Obama.

Darren and I took very different views away from this conversation. I felt bad for bursting Ian's bubble. He worked very hard to come up with his ideas. Darren felt proud that Ian came up with something at 7 that it took Marx much longer to come up with. He is a genius is Darren's thoughts.