Christmas Eve

Christmas 2009

Christmas Eve at Grammy & PopPop's

The boys - Anthony, Wil & Gordy

The girls - Georgia, Sophia & Lily

Sos w/ Baby Wil (doesn't he already look so much older than he did in the Thanksgiving pics?!)

Joel, Shan, Gigi & Gordy

Jer, Erin, Lily & Wil

Sos & Grammy - American Girl!

Anthony with Optimus Prime - gift from G&P

Lizzie!

Grammy & PopPop opening Kindles!

Our Christmas Project

For the last couple of years, Jon and I have been talking about creating a play area in the basement for the kids. Our basement is unfinished w/ a low ceiling and quite ugly, so I think this is why we just talked about it for a couple of years. We finally decided to tackle it as a surprise for the kids for Christmas. Until this morning, they had been locked out of the basement for over a month. Here are some before and after pics, along with a video of "the reveal"

Cookies! and Snow!

For the past 10 years, my friend Kelly and I have been getting together to bake Christmas cookies. It has become a highly anticipated tradition! Several years have brought challenges to getting together due to new babies or schedules, but to my recollection, I believe we have made it work every year one way or another! This year, the morning of our planned day, we were expecting a major snow storm. The kids and I decided to brave it anyway and bring clothes to spend the night. We did just fine getting there until we got to their driveway. Kelly lives up on a very steep hill and the driveway had yet to be plowed and there were several inches on the ground. Here are a couple of pics that might help you appreciate what I was up against (although in the 2nd & 3rd pics, the driveway had been plowed). Anyway, I ended up getting stuck in a ditch, but with Kelly's help via play-by-play on my mobile phone, I got out of the ditch and back on the driveway!

The view from Kelly's front door

We were so glad we made it work! We easily baked over 500 cookies!!! Here are some pics of the fruits of our labor.

Almond-glazed sugar cookies

Ricotta cookies

Cut-outs

The kids had some fun out in the snow - what a great place to be snowed in at!!!







Another year of cookie baking in the books and a great time with some great friends! Love you guys!

Kelly & Dawn - the bakers

little 'Raz and Anthony - the tasters

Sophia & Gracie

Happy Thanksgiving!

We had a great get-away with [Jon's side of the] family! We got to spend 3 nights together in a huge, awesome house! Since we all live relatively close to each other, we usually only spend a few hours at a time together, so it was so much fun to get to have such extended time to just hang out. Here are some of my favorite pics from the weekend.

Jer w/ the little boys

Lils & Sos

Dils (Lily), GiGi (Georgia) & Sosi (Sophia) (we have a lot of nicknames in this family!)

sweet baby Wil (I challenge you to find a more content baby!)

Wil w/ Uncle Jonny

Erin & Dawn

The kiddie table

Shan & Grammy

JErin :-)

Auntie Lizzie

6 cousins!

Gordy (could he be any cuter?!)

Georgia w/ Aunt Dawnie

Bubs w/ his Daddy

Classic! Joel and his boy!

Wil w/ Aunt Dawnie

Wil w/ Aunt Lizzie

handsome boy!

silly boys!

s'more please!

Halloween - the Star Wars Era

As I look back on my 7 years of having kids, there are definitely movies that define years or at least months for us - it started with Baby Einstein videos, then Sophia went through her Dora phase and her Princess phase and her HSM phase and Anthony had his Cars phase and this year has definitely been the Star Wars phase - not just for Anthony, but for Sophia too! Our neighbor Chloe (a.k.a Obi-Wan Kenobi in the pics below) got them into it just by telling them stories in the driveway - she must be a good storyteller! Well, when it came time to decide on Halloween costumes, there was no other option but to be a Star Wars character. I was so surprised when Sophia said she wanted to be Master Yoda. I said (to my shame), "why do you want to be an ugly little green guy?" and she looked at me in horror and said, "Mom, Master Yoda is good and wise!" How can you argue?! I think she made a pretty little Yoda! :-)

Some SCARY Pictures - Boo!

I mentioned our camera was on the fritz, right? Well, these are the only recent pics I have - the kids and I were having some fun with photo booth!

Soccer and Sickness....

....that pretty much sums up our late summer/early fall! Before we left for WI in early August, I came down with sinusitis (sp?) and it just kept going and morphing into other things (strep throat etc.) I didn't really start feeling better until about 2 weeks ago! Such a bummer because fall is my favorite time of year and I didn't get to enjoy it this year!

While I wasn't feeling well, life continued to roll on...the kids signed up for soccer and really have enjoyed it. I was able to work out something with a friend so that I only had to do practice 1 night a week and then the Saturday games. Overall, it has been a great experience - they have both improved so much over the season and enjoyed getting the exercise. Jon got to come to last week's game and it was so much fun to watch Anthony score 4 goals!

In other news, our camera is on the fritz, so that's another reason I haven't been blogging lately. I'm kind of freaking out because tomorrow is Halloween and as you may know, I'm crazy about costumes! So, I might be out shopping this evening! :-)

A Visit with Mama/Great-Grandmother

My grandma came from Florida to visit us - we had a great time with her! We had not seen her in two years and so it was fun for the kids to reconnect with her. This is my mom's mom and I call her Mama (as does Jon) and the kids call her great-grandmother. I've always had a special relationship with Mama. For several years ('98-'03), we were blessed to live only 30 minutes away from each other and we spent a lot of time together. We love you Mama! We'll come down to Florida to visit you someday soon!

First Day of School

Well, the first day of school has come and gone, and we are now officially done with our preschool years - it is so weird! We feel like we just had these babies - how is it possible that they are both in full-time school already?

Here are some pics from their first days (Sophia started on a Monday and Anthony started on a Thursday)

2nd grader

Sophia w/ neighbor friends Talia & Chloe

Kindergartner

going to the same school as big sister is awesome!

Anthony with neighbor buddy Jack

such a big boy!

High-View Neighborhood Extravaganza

The week before school started, Jon planned a night of fun for the neighborhood kids. We are blessed with some great neighbors and lots of kids that are all around the same age. Jon put together a fun competition for them as a last hurrah of summer.

Jon and Galen - the masterminds of the event

Sos & Chlo hammin' it up