Hello and welcome! I’m Jill from Houston, and this is JillBJarvis.com! Here we explore, write about and post pictures of Houston.
If you see a post on JillBJarvis.com, you can know for sure that we took the big family circus and did it. We packed the bags, pushed the strollers, searched for the bathrooms, broke up a few sibling arguments and took our own pictures. No fancy stock photos or generic lists of ideas here!
The website has always been upbeat, positive and dedicated to making our big city feel small. I provide the weekly events list, family friendly restaurants, Houston area parks, mural maps, field trip ideas and resources for parents and lots of things to do with kids. I am also an engineer, former Navy wife and proud mom... so you will see that sprinkled around JillBJarvis.com.
What I want you to know about JillBJarvis.com
For seven years, I was a working mom with one, two and then three kids. I did a lot of business travel and I missed more big moments than I can even remember. I definitely missed my daughter's first steps and I was definitely gone when my toddler son split open his lip and he should have gotten stitches.
I created this blog to be more intentional with the time I did have with my kids and because I was tired of constantly cleaning up the same mess in the family room.
Another mom showed me that I could just go do fun things in Houston, without hours of planning. This changed everything about how I spent time with my kids.
With JillBJarvis.com, I would make a list of all the events happening around Houston and then pick ONE to enjoy with my kids. And instead of thinking of all the things I was missing, I started to enjoy the things we were doing together.
I now have four kids and I feel very fortunate to be able to run this website full time. I now have the opportunity to do a lot more things around Houston.
That said, if you are a parent that is feeling overwhelmed by all the things you could be doing in Houston... please just use our weekly lists and daily posts as suggestions. Pick ONE thing to do with your family and intentionally ignore the rest!
Finally, I know there is a lot of information on JillBJarvis.com, so please go HERE to get started!
Thank you for visiting!
Contact me at Jill @BigKidSmallCity.com
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David L. says
Hi there. We were talking about Merry Go Rounds here in Houston today and I remembered a link I saved to a blog post of yours from 2016. You had the location to THE final merry go round in Houston (tomball) that you could find. Well, sad news (and you may know this): It's gone. I checked google streetview from Ulrich Rd and their last photo with it was 2011. If you look at the google satellite view, there's a green patch of grass where it used to exist. Sad. As a kid in the 1970's I loved merry go rounds. Thought I'd share. -Take care.
Jill Jarvis says
Thanks for the update! I guess we'll have to expand the search for old-school merry-go-rounds. 🙂