Texas Tech vs. Kansas

Texas Tech vs Kansas

What a game!









Linly learned real quick what she was suppose to do. She yelled like a Cheerleader throughout the game. She sure did like the cheerleaders too!






This is the effect of the win. Notice the people in the white shirts and khaki pants in the bottom left corner. Standing there like they were gonna keep people off the court. Ha - they didn't do so good a job.

Walking in a Winter Wonderland

Finally some snow to play in. We built a snowman earlier in the week, but I didn't have a camera to take a picture with. These were taken this weekend in Lubbock at our hotel. We were the first to get to step in this snow.
Linly did NOT like the snow flakes getting in her face.
Rick was scrapping ice and warming up the car for us. When we got out there he had a pile of snowballs ready for us. Ha Ha. Jace took off after him ready to play.
This is Jace paying Rick back with a snow ball of his own. Linly sure does look like she is in a dangerous place.

Crime Doesn't Pay

To begin with let me say I am leaving parts out in order to make this as short as possible. As Rick would say this is the Readers Digest version.

I guess it was 3 months ago when I had a very strange encounter at school. I had just taken Jace to his classroom when I was returning to my room and caught a man coming out of my room. He didn't seem particularly startled, I asked if I could help him and he told me he was looking for the Gifted and Talented classes. Well, he was in the right area I suppose so I ask more questions trying to be the ever helpful teacher and improve those community relations. The whole time I had a very strange feeling in my gut. The guy finally tells me he has papers for my class in his car. I'm very confused at this point. He knows little English, he is not making sense in what he is asking for and when he says he will get the papers he heads off in the opposite direction of the front door. I immediately go to the office and ask what is going on and they had no idea (He told me that the office sent him to me). I am now even more suspicious. I thought about it all day and just didn't feel right.

The day ends and as I am getting ready to leave school I check my purse for money because I'm heading to the grocery store. Oh no where is it? Exactly! He took my cash ($200) and credit card. I let the office know and file a report with the police. Rick looks up the credit card account and he has charged over $200 on it. The credit card company froze the card at 11:00 because of suspicious activity.

One week later I get a letter in the mail from Midland PD. "No investigative leads" - whatever! It just wasn't important enough to try to find them. I let it go and figure that was the end of it. WELL - last week I see a Midland ISD police officer in the office and he asks if I've heard. "Heard what?" I say. "They caught the guy!" I'm thinking this is amazing! Get this he did it 6 other times with the same line. When they caught him he admitted everything. He's going to the pen for at least 5 to 8.

"How do you like me now Mr. Leyva?"

The NEW Wink Sink

You may have hear a few years ago about this sink hole that developed just outside of Wink. Well, here are the up close and personal pictures. This sink hole has already "eaten" 3 fences. This sink hole started as a hole the size of a baseball and was discovered by an oilfield worker who saw it falling in and took off for his truck and left to get his company. When they returned it had already grown significantly. This sink hole is now 10 - 12 acres I believe. I can't remember exactly. My dad knows better.

This is a crack in the ground around the hole. There are hundreds of cracks around this thing. It won't be long and the left side of this crack will be gone. It is a very scary feeling walking on this ground. You can't help but think about what part is gonna fall in next.


















This sink hole is so large that I could not even get close to getting the whole thing in one shot. Notice the piece of ground at the bottom of the picture. It is leaning in to the sink hole a lot.















Again, I can't remember the exact depth of this thing. But you can kinda tell that it is deep.














In this picture there is another large piece of land about to fall in.

These pictures show how much of a drop there is in the land. The land to the right of the crack will soon fall in. Notcie the pipelines and in the picture on the bottom there is a large corner post.












This picture gives me chills every time I see it. That is Jace in the green shirt standing right next to the edge of the piece that can fall at any time. My brother-in-law is the one further out. He was throwing large rocks and seeing if he could hit the water. It is harder than it sounds.










One last picture of a large crack. See our shadows on the other side :)

This explains a lot

Well, I have to say that I knew it from the day he was born. Jace has always exceeded our expectations and amazed us. I knew he was "different" but I just didn't know why. He held his head up and looked around the day he was born, he crawled early, he was walking by 7 1/2 months, he was talking very well at a year old, he knew the sound for every animal God ever made. Yet, he challenged Rick and I to the limit every day. He has always amazed us with his imagination and creativity. I knew it was something special, but it seems to give validation when it is verified. We recently received news that Jace has been selected as a Gifted and Talented student. This means he is in the top 5% of all the Kindergarten students in MISD.

I have to say I'm not usually one to brag and brag about my kids, but this was something that I felt was important. That doesn't mean I don't think they are great, I do! My kids are fun, witty, have personalities that never end, and are handsome and beautiful. I know that, but I guess I just don't go on and on about it. Ya know the one thing that makes this even sweeter is that Jace has no idea what all this means. To him it just means that he gets to go to a special class where all he gets to do is research service dogs and find out all the information possible on them. Like I said he is "different". Jace loves non-fiction and thrives on learning new information on things (that he is interested in). Rick and I are extremly proud of Jace and just wanted to share our news with everyone else.

I understand how ya feel

My feelings exactly. Tomorrow is my last day of "freedom". I start back to work on Grad school Monday. I certainly have enjoyed having the time off. At least I only have until the first of March. I can do this.

This picture of Linly was taken at the rodeo. She loved the horsies until calf roping came up. She was yelling at the horsies to stop pulling on the cow and to go to time out. Funny girl. The rodeo was a blast. We take the kids every year. Jace of course loves all the animals and cowboys. Linly really got into it this year. She did have a hard time keeping up with "her clown" though.

Check one thing off the list!

Well, I've finally done it. I finally have set up a blog account. Guess we will see how well this goes. I have never really been into journaling or that kind of thing, but who knows maybe this will be different. Hopefully this will at least keep my family up to date on our adventures. Yes, I said adventures. That is exactly what each and every day turns into for us. You are never really sure what you're gonna get when the Mitchell's come to town.

BTW - This is Jace at his school Christmas party. Loved the pic minus the busted lip :)