The other day we were at Mindy's house and Ben said "Alissa you can go home, but Zach can stay and sleep over" (or something to that effect ha ha...nice!) so Zach has a sleep over at Ben's and Sophie came over for a sleepover with Alissa. Sophie and Alissa are so great together. They play so nicely and you don't even know they are here because they are just good girls together! It's so nice to have so many cousins that are close in age and close in distance! The next day, the girls where practicing the song on The Polar Express and came down to sing it to me. It was very cute!
Cousins
12/29/2011
12/25/2011
Our Christmas
We had a nice Christmas! The kids were told not to wake mom and dad up until 9am, but they are KIDS...we woke up at 8 (I'll take 8 and not 6 or even 7am)! We went right to opening presents and the kids (heck, we all) got spoiled (even though Santa didn't realize he was spoiling until we saw everything we got). But it was fun...I have to admit, I love Christmas and gifts...I do! LOL! I am really not one to buy a tun of things through out the year and it's fun to get a lot of fun things on the same day. I do however, want to spend more time teaching my kids that giving back and helping others is important too, I just didn't do such a great job at it. But let's not get into all the things I don't do "such a great job at" as a mom! Anyways, we opened presents, had some breakfast and then played! Zach got right to Lego making (Legos are seriously the best toy invention ever) and Alissa rode her scooter and played with her new Rapunzel doll. The kitties even got a little stocking and enjoyed the goodies inside!We headed over to Christi's house for lunch around 1:30 and spend a few fun hours over there eating yummy turkey, ham, rolls, mashed potatoes and just sat around chatting. It's so nice to be around family! We (the kids and I) then headed to Mindy's to give Grammy, Ryan and Mind their gifts and spent a few hours hanging out there. We got home just in time for bed and we enjoyed out Christmas! Lots of pictures, I love pictures! Alan got me a new Nikon Coolpix and I think I've finally found a point and shoot camera that I will like when I'm not using my big camera! Both of the kids sang at school, but it was for all the other students and not parents (dumb), so I wanted Alissa to sing her song on Christmas, so she sang us her song! Zach takes after his mom and was a little too shy to sing his song, but it's okay! We love both of our kids and their differences!
[gallery link="file" columns="2"]12/23/2011
Holiday party
So for the past years, we have done a fun holiday party with a group of our closest friends/family. We always have a lot of fun!! This year it was planned for the weekend, but because of some sickness we rescheduled to yesterday (which meant not as late as night as It normally would have been, but it's okay, still fun). Everyone brought their own soup, a white elephant and then their family gift to exchange. The white elephant is the funnest, although, with 30+ people (most being kids) it got a little crazy!! It must be CHRISTMAS!! Lots of pictures and lots of laughs!
[gallery link="file" columns="2" orderby="ID"]12/07/2011
Grammy ' s house - celebrating!
The weekend before Thanksgiving, we headed to Hurricane to Grammy's house for some celebrating! Alan, Zach and Great Grandma all celebrate birthdays in November and Scoot is Dec 1st. My Grandma knew that Mindy and John were staying at my mom's on the way to AZ, but she didn't know we were there, so we got to surprise her again! She came over and we had dinner, opened presents, at cake and ice cream! Of course, I had to get some pictures with Great Grandma, Zach and pup-pup. She doesn't remember that she gave it to Zach, but Zach will always remember because we've made it known to him that he got his special pup-pup from Great Grandma! We tried some other pictures and well...they were fun! My mom got some words from the Sound of Music lady and changed the words up a bit to go with things my grandma likes! She got a fun little song (Alissa was so cute trying to sing it) and then we watched the same DVD slide show we watched for her 90th birthday! Good times! The rest of the weekend was just hanging out at Grammy's house! I will always have wonderful memories of my grandma and we have been luck to have her around for so long! She turned 92 on Thanksgiving! I called her to wish her a happy birthday and she was just so cute. We spent about 25 minutes on the phone...her talking about how she wants to play bridge again and her feeding her kitty!
[gallery link="file" columns="2" orderby="ID"]Zach turns 9!
Our little baby boy, Zach, turned 9 on November 16th! I can't believe how fast time goes and how big our baby is! Since it was a school day, I decided to take Zach out to lunch and I think he really liked that! I checked him out of school and we headed to Wingers so he could use his free birthday lunch! It was quick, but we had fun! After school we got ready for our party people to come over and celebrate with us! I love that even with out "friends" parties, we have cousins galore that come celebrate with us and we always enjoy it! We had everyone over for cake and ice cream and I think Zach's 9th birthday was a success! We are so blessed to have Zach in our lives. He is a smart, sweet, sensitive, energetic...loves legos, cars 2, toy story, star wars, the Diary of a Wimpy kid books. He likes to listen to music or books on tape at night, he still loves his pup-pup. He is our early bird and wakes up before me every morning! He plays kickball at recess and doing well in school. He likes to pretend he doesn't love hugs from mom, but he loves it! He loves playing Ratchet and Clank still and is a great little video game player. He's very creative, making all sorts of things out of Legos. He plays well by himself and will quietly spend hours (well, maybe not hours, but a long time) just laying on the floor in the living room playing with his toys. He loves throwing the football around with Alan and playing card games. He still doesn't get a long with Alissa, but maybe one of these days he'll realize we should get a long with our sister (coming from the girl who was very mean to her sister! yep, it's true...but now we are friends). Zach loves his cousins! He's a little goof ball and we love him! Happy 9th Birthday Zach!
[gallery link="file" columns="2" orderby="ID"]12/04/2011
Decorating the tree
This year we did a quick job of decorating the tree! I wanted it up, Alan didn't care LOL and so Ben, Alissa, Zach and I just quickly decorated it. The kids ended up finding all the old ornaments a week or so later and throwing those on too and it looked better with all the home made and old ornaments on it! It always feels good to have Christmas decorations up and I just want to keep them up year round!
[gallery link="file" columns="2"]Got to love playdough!
When Mindy and John went to Chicago for John's work Christmas party, we watched Ben and Scoot. It was fun, I like having them around, but I tell you what...I had forgotten how BUSY a two year old is! I was following Scoot around from one mess to another! But this time was the "big kid" mess! I brought out the playdough which was a HUGE hit! HUGE! They played for, and I am not lying, about 2 hours! It was a MESS...but a fun mess! I just said "go at it" and didn't mind the mixing of colors etc. When they were done, I went up to my room to do something...take a shower, bath...something and when I came back down, It was clean! I thanked Alan for cleaning it, but it turns out that Alissa cleaned the whole mess all by her self! What a surprise...I like that kind of surprise!
[gallery link="file" columns="2"]
11/24/2011
Thankgiving
We had a nice Thanksgiving this year! Alan's family got together (Sharon and Patty and their kids) for some yummy good, good conversation and fun running around the church! It was just kind of a stress free day and I always should take more pictures! I did have Chantelle grab a picture of Alissa and I when we were just sitting around! Some of the older kids and grownups played some "speed" basket ball and it was actually a lot of fun and a good work out too!
11/23/2011
Shooting with Dad
Alan & Tim took Zach & Jordan shooting. Zach was a little nervous at first, but with some safety lessons by Dad, he was able to have fun and do some shooting! I like when the kids get that one on one daddy time!
[gallery link="file" columns="2"]11/19/2011
Catch phrase
We are at my moms playing catch phrase. We are letting the kids describe stuff....
Zach: where someone that speaks Spanish is from?
Us: Mexico....Spain...
Alissa: China
Zach: Yes! It's China!!
Alissa: Someone like God
Us: Jesus, angel...Hmmm...what?
Alissa: The godfather!
Pictures and more later...just thought was worth sharing...
