too much

Chris and I are currently househunting. We would LOVE to have a contract by April 30 and get the tax credit but........ We've already looked inside 11 houses, drove past half a dozen more and put 3 bids in. Tonight we put a bid in on my dreamhouse.....just not my dream price. We spend many of our few hours together looking and dreaming at houses. Below is the house I hope to call home.

The boys are keeping me very busy. Braedon has started climbing up stairs, and whatever he can get his hands on. He also will put ANYTHING in his mouth. Most of my days are spent chasing him around the house and getting him down from furniture and taking stuff out of his mouth. Glamorous I know. Robbie's talking so much more and learns at least 1 new word a day (today the word of the day was "sausage"). He also started translating Braedon's baby talk and according to him Brady's favorite phrase is "I want Papa".

P.S. I realize that this is all underlined but after spending 3 hours on the computer today trying to scan our contract I give up and will post it like this!

Spring has Sprung?

Chris and I are both in agreement that snow is to be hated everyday except for Christmas. I know as a kid I had a different outlook on snow so I wasn't surprised when Robbie took a fascination to playing in the snow. These pictures were taken in early February during a massive snow storm.

Climbing up Mt. Roco

and sliding down Mt. Roco (it's not that big of a hill but it keeps the kids entertained)

Due to throwing snow in the face and cold fingers Sophia and Nik came inside early while Robbie made no plans to leave the snow.

Meanwhile Braedon was busy just being himself

But evidence that spring is around the corner? This picture was taken less than a month ago on my birthday. And yes I realize that Robbie's hat is a little on the snug side. That kid has one big head!

Happy Spring

PJ's, Pluggies and Pictures

Life has been crazy. I haven't had time to blog. But here's some of the latest pictures of the kids (most of the time in their pj's, I'm not sure why).

It's very rare that all kids are looking at the camera much less "smiling"

Robbie refers to Sophia as "LaLa" (her middle name is Ella and Chris and I sometimes call her "Sophia Ella" or "Sissy Ella"). He also calls Braedon "Brady" which is soo cute!

We LOVE our pluggies (pacifiers)

I know the time is coming to cut Robbie off of pluggies but I'm dreading that day

This is typical Braedon, just being silly. He, like his brother, likes to fake cough and the reaction it produces for the people around him.

A sweet lady from church made Robbie (for his baby shower) this hat and gave him a summer outfit that had firetrucks on it. I wasn't sure when to pull out the hat for Robbie to play with but this day he discovered it by himself and wanted to do everything with it on.

PJ movie night! Nik was really excited over the premier of "Chuggington" the newest show on the Disney Channel about trains. So we had a pj party to watch it.

Happy March!

The Flu!

It's been over a week and the stomach flu has been sweeping through our family. Chris and I got it first and boy was it brutal. A few days later Sophia and Braedon got sick. Luckily it's only a 24hour bug but this morning Nik got sick. Robbie's still holding on strong but I'm spending most of my time washing hands and blankets and separating the "clean" from the "unclean" ;) Sp this post is short but sweet and hopefully we will all be healthy again soon. Until then here's a pic of our only survivor of the flu......

Clearance!!

So due to the fact that the costume party was such a hit I decided to check for Halloween costumes on clearance. I was thrilled when I found costumes for 75% off! I was at toys r us forever deciding which costumes to get. Unfortunately I also needed diapers so I had to limit the costumes to 2. I was really bummed out because I found a Transformer costume without a pricetag. I scanned it at a price check and it said $19.99 and was excited that it was on sale for $5.00. Then I found out that $19.99 was the CLEARANCE price and the costume originally cost $80.00!! Yikes! Anyway Nik loved his Obi Wan Kenobi costume (even though he can't pronounce it). It's a little big so he'll be able to enjoy it for years to come.

Robbie wasn't a fan of his costume or the camera

Trying to get a group shot

His true identity revealed

Check out his cute buckle "shoes"

This cracks me up because Robbie kept on chasing Nik around the house. It reminded me of one of Chris's favorite TV shows, Deadliest Warrior. It takes warriors of history, i.e. Apache Indians and Gladiators, studies their moves and enters them into some database that determines who would have won. All I could think of was an idea for their next episode "Jedi's vs Pirates".

Halloween

For those of you who don't know I'm not a fan of Halloween. However when Nik found out that Sophia was having a party at school on Oct 30th he got understandably upset. So at the last minute I threw together a costume party. The only problem with the party was the fact that only Nik had a costume. So during nap time I threw together costumes for Robbie, Brady and myself. Who else could throw together costumes at the last second but "supermom" which is what I dressed up as.

Yes the "s" is homemade. Oh and my cape is a pillowcase.

Braedon went as a little brother (not a far stretch)

Robbie was a Bear's fan (again not a far stretch). I did also have games and candy prizes and Robbie attempted to play them.

Below are pictures of Nik doing Spiderman poses. This one is him climbing up a wall.

Shooting a web.

DisneyWorld

In early September we went on vacation w/Chris's family to Orlando. My mother-in-law has a timeshare w/Marriott and we were able to stay at the coolest place, Marriott Harbour Lake. It had a pirate theme, and 2 separate pools with their own interactive water play areas. We really didn't have to leave this resort to have fun, since it offered free and cheap activities for kids and families all day, everyday. The first day, Sunday, we got there they had free balloon animals and face painting.

Below is a picture of our favorite part of the pool (from the website, not my kids in the pic)

My little dinosaurs Nik and Kassidi

Sophia (on right) and her cousin Che Che

On Monday we went to Animal Kingdom and got baptized by fire w/the Florida heat. Animal Kingdom tends to be the hottest of all the park due to all the trees that don't allow breezes. It was in the 90's everyday and we NEVER needed a jacket, even at midnight. I was worried about how the boys would handle the long days and the heat. Braedon was only 2 mos and Robbie 17 mos, but they both did FANTASTIC (except for the day when I forgot Robbie's pacifier and I literally passed it back and forth from Braedon to Robbie, whoever needed it more!!).

We ate at Yak and Yeti which was an Asian restaurant and it was a little hard to accommodate Robbie's allergies. As you can see french fries were a hit. The only time Robbie was really crabby was when we were waiting for food. I don't blame the kid though, he was hungry and he didn't want to waste time and miss out on his favorite, Mickey.

Silly face boys. Notice me and Braedon (in sling) in the background. That sling was my lifesaver and Brady's sauna!

Can we say sugar high?

On Tuesday we had a day of rest and we all did the timeshare presentation thing. Hey for 25 Marriott dollars and 75 Disney dollars I'd listen to just about anyone talk! Wednesday we were back to the parks at Magic Kingdom. We were so blessed by how empty every ride was. The kids were able to jump on ride after ride after ride. Niklas and my niece Kassidi (who are exactly one week apart) were anxiously waiting to ride the Goofy rollercoaster. When they finally were able to ride we couldn't get them off of it. They rode it at least 5x and was by far their favorite.

Robbie and Chris on Dumbo

Look at my cutie in his little hat!

Kass (and Nik behind her)

On Thursday we went to Epcot. They have really changed the park a lot since I've last been there and spent the whole day in the FutureWorld part and only went to the WorldShowcase for a wonderful dinner in Japan.

Robbie in front of the tank at the Sea.

He loved looking at the fishes

On Friday we went to Hollywood Studios and Sophia experienced her first upsidedown rollercoaster, Rockin Rollercoaster. She didn't like it. She also went on Tower of Terror and was scared but rode it a second time anyway. My 91 year old father in law also joined us on Tower of Terror. I was a little worried about him riding as we were breezing through the lines and I kept on seeing these warning signs about the ride, but he survived.

Characters galore at the Hat!

Robbie loved the characters, when he was carried. He didn't like them towering over him.

On Saturday we enjoyed our resort and had a wonderful BBQ dinner outside. It was a fantastic vacation and my kids keep on asking when are we going back.