Christmas Lights

I love to drive around looking at Christmas lights. We put the kids in their pajamas last night and drove around for a while. We saw a lot of pretty lights but thought that our neighborhood was the prettiest. We have a small neighborhood but a lot of people went all out with the lights this year. It looks really nice and it seems like you didn't have to drive by too many homes before you see another one lit up real nice.

Today I found out about a house in Stafford that has their lights synchronized to music. It is really cool! Dominic and the kids and I headed out when he got home from work. When you pull up to their house, you have to tune your radio to 103.9 FM and then watch the show. We sat there for at least 15 minutes watching it. And we weren't the only ones there in line. They have four songs and they are all so good. You can watch it on their website, just click on videos. It looks really good on the website but of course, it is even better watching it from in front of their house. The kids really enjoyed it too.

Neighborhood Holiday Cookie Exchange

Lenny and I went to a cookie exchange in our neighborhood over the weekend. We had a wonderful time and met a lot of new people. Lenny even met two kids that he will be going to kindergarten with next year. I also found a few new recipes to add to my holiday baking list. The entire family was invited but Dominic stayed home with Brooke and Nathan. They had fun spending the evening with Daddy. He even gave them a bath. Yippee for me!

Christmas Pageant

Friday was Lenny's Christmas pageant at preschool. Dominic and I went while my mom stayed home with Brooke and Nathan. It was a very cute pageant. Too bad Lenny is a lot like me and won't sing in front of other people. Sweet little guy only sang a few parts of the songs. I know he knows the songs but he got very shy at the pageant.

Lenny is in the back row at the end on the left.


After the pageant we went to their classroom for cookies and a visit from Santa. Here Lenny is showing me his wreath bagel that he made.


We are all getting very excited for Christmas in this house! I hope everyone has a wonderful Holiday!


I just had to post this picture of the boys in their matching outfits. This turned out to be quite a neat coincidence that they both have this outfit. When Lenny was two years old, Kristi bought it for him. He wore it and it was still real nice so I saved it. Now it is Nathans.

My cousin Lorie passes on lots of clothes to Lenny that no longer fit her son, Luke. This summer when Lorie gave us more clothes, I almost fell over when I saw that same outfit in the bag that would fit Lenny now.

Of course, I had to dress them in them at the same time. They had matching shoes too but I searched the house for 15 minutes looking for one of Nathan's lost shoes. I found it today. Exactly where Nathan was trying to tell me it was. He put it through the cat door down the basement stairs.

The pants look very shiny in the picture but they are really very cute in person.


Lenny wanted a picture with his sister. Brooke was trying hard to not smile for the camera. There was nothing I could do to get her to look at me and smile. Goofy kid.

National Christmas Tree

This past Sunday we took the kids to see the National Christmas Tree. We were going to try to do it Saturday afternoon and evening but it was way too cold so we decided to go Sunday morning. We bundled the kids up and headed to Springfield where we hopped on the Metro. Can you believe that as much as Lenny loves trains, this is the first time he ever rode the Metro? I can't believe it either. Edited to add: He has been on metro before when we went to see Disney on Ice. I completely forgot about it. And evidently, he has never been on an escalator before either. After I thought about it, I guess any mall that we go to is only one level and I don't know where else we've been with Lenny that has an escalator. That was his favorite part. He told me that he wants one in our house. That would be cool. I wouldn't mind laundry so much if we had one.



Look how bundled up Brooke and Nathan are.


Yes, we are a little camera crazy in our house. We go out with my camera and the video camera. We don't want to miss anything. Dominic was hoping that he would see the President's helicopter land. No such luck this day.


Lenny and Dominic in front of the National Christmas Tree.

Me and the kids in front of the White House. Well sort of. Okay it's a good ways behind us but it is back there. Lenny was too worried about going back to watch the trains under the tree. Which by the way he loved and we could hardly tear him away from them.


While we were there Lenny and I went into Santa's workshop.


Lenny was able to talk to Santa and tell him that he wants lots of Thomas toys and Proteus (a new Thomas engine).

I just had to post this picture below because I forgot to earlier. This is one of Lenny's ornaments. He hung it on the tree and told me that it was chugging on the garland.


Twin Stories

The other day I noticed that Brooke lost the back to one of her earrings. I got another one and was putting it on. Nathan noticed and wanted me to put an earring in his ear. I told him that boys don't wear earrings. I said that Lenny doesn't and Daddy doesn't. After I said that Nathan ran to the other room, got his little Captain Feathersword doll and brought it to me. He showed me the earring in Captain Feathersword's ear. That boy amazes me! It was hilarious. I guess he proved me wrong.

Brooke or Nathan neither one talk a lot yet at all. I did have them evaluated in September. They were 22 months old. Brooke was talking on the level of a 12 month old and Nathan was on the level of a 15 month old. Yeah, they were starting to worry me. Within days of the evaluation, they both started talking a lot more. They are still behind where they should be but their pediatrician is not worried. Nathan says about 60 words and Brooke says about 40 and they will both try to repeat anything.

Anyway, Nathan has no problems communicating with me. They both know a few words in sign language. But Nathan has made up his own sign language. It's hilarious but also very good. He would be very good at charades. He acts out everything and I do mean everything. And when you figure out what he is trying to tell you, his acting makes complete sense.

Here's a Brooke story. I never ever wear socks in the house. I just don't like them or shoes. When we came back from the national Christmas tree, I hadn't taken my socks off yet and I was sitting at the table. Brooke came over and was touching my feet and acting like she was scared. Then I put her on the floor to change her diaper. My feet was next to her head when she looked over and saw the socks on my feet. She would not lay down. Dominic and I laughed about it.

Christmas Tree Decorating and Santa Claus

Lenny was so excited to decorate for Christmas this year. He helped decorate the house and could hardly wait to help decorate the tree. He did a great job. We decorated it pretty fast this year because I had to keep up with Lenny otherwise all of the ornaments would have been on the bottom of the tree. Our tree is huge this year. We love it! This is the first year that we put it in the family room and we have a vaulted ceiling in there so we were able to get a bigger one.

I'm also thinking that this might be the first year that we have a tree tumble over. I sure hope it doesn't happen but Brooke and Nathan aren't that gentle with anything. Brooke has already broken a bulb. I wasn't one bit surprised that it was Brooke. She took one off of the tree and was running away from me with it when it dropped and broke. That girly!


On Wednesday Brooke, Nathan, and I went to a Christmas party for the MOMS club. It was at a local assisted living home and we arranged for Santa and Mrs. Claus to be there. We had a great time with songs, snacks, and crafts.

Brooke was so afraid of Santa. I couldn't believe it. She did not want to have anything to do with him. She did finally go to Mrs. Claus. Nathan surprised me and wasn't afraid of Santa. He even gave Santa a high five and thinks that he is the coolest for doing that.

Brooke made quite a few of the residents very happy. As I've said before, she is our little social butterfly. Each time I turned around she was sitting on the lap of a different senior citizen. She would go to them and put her arms up for them to pick her up. It was so adorably cute. They kept telling me what a doll she was. She does have a great personality and likes to make people happy. I was very proud of her. Nathan even sat on someone's lap. I almost fell over when I saw that. He is completely different than Brooke and is very shy.

Brooke was not happy that I put her in Santa's lap. My friend Bridgette helped me get both of them up there. Bridgette was holding Brooke and Brooke would not let go of her. Nathan was acting shy for the picture but at least he wasn't crying.

After they opened their presents from Santa.


Nathan was actually talking to Santa.


Brooke with Mrs. Claus.


Having a snack.


Making a craft of a Christmas tree. They had a lot of fun doing this project.


One of Brooke's new friends at the nursing home. He was so happy and just kept smiling the entire time she was sitting with him.



Lenny will get to see Santa next week at preschool. He was fine with us going to see Santa without him. He didn't want to miss preschool. I hope he continues to love school that much.

Thanksgiving

Yes, I do realize that I am very far behind in posting about Thanksgiving. I will try to catch up with posts soon and then stay caught up. I'd like to say that but I'm sure it won't happen.

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving. This year Dominic and I were the hosts even though we did none of the cooking. That was the great part. My sister, her kids, my mom, and Ernie all came to our house this year for Thanksgiving.

Because everyone was already going to be at our house for Thanksgiving, we decided not to have a separate birthday party for Brooke and Nathan. Instead we had it the morning of Thanksgiving. It was kind of crazy to set up for a birthday party and then take it down and set up for Thanksgiving. It was fun though.

We had a wiggly Wiggles party for Brooke and Nathan. They LOVE the Wiggles. Can you believe that it is almost impossible to find anything for Wiggles anymore? My mom was the only one that could find something.

We had a light meal for the party since we still had a Thanksgiving dinner set for later. We had turkey and cheese wraps, fruit salad, and cold spaghetti salad. I tried to stick with the theme. We didn't have the hot potatoes though.

When it was time for the party to get started, we had all of the attendees line up from shortest to tallest. Aleah is 12 years old and is already way taller than me! Brooke and Nathan were in the wrong order.





After the party, Brooke and Nathan went upstairs for their nap. Time to get ready for Thanksgiving!

That morning everyone came to the house with all of the food. I was in charge of the turkey but didn't need to put it in the oven before everyone came, so mom ended up taking care of that too. Things were working out in my favor. Mom had made lots of dishes before she came that just needed reheated. Ernie made several dishes beforehand too.

My sister was in charge of the most difficult dish to prepare for the meal. It was the cranberry sauce out of a can. Boy is she particular when making that dish. The temperature in the house had to be just right and she needed a special utensil to get it ready. It took her all day to prepare this lovely dish. She even had a nice little heart in the mold. She is so very talented.


I must say that this was the least formal Thanksgiving dinner that we have ever had. We might as well have been having a picnic outside. You can tell that I now have three kids and like to make life easier. The little kids sat at the little picnic table. Dominic got our dining room table out of the basement and the adults and big kids sat at that table in the playroom. Can you imagine how formal that would be with toys all over the place and art work from kids on the walls. Pair that with paper plates, no table cloth, and food dishes on the table in the kitchen. I had a terrible headache and couldn't think clearly. I realized after we all sat down that I didn't even offer anyone any drinks with glasses. I have never been this informal with something that I've had at my house. But it was nice company and that's all that matters.



Dinner was excellent!! We had turkey, ham, scalloped pineapple, corn pudding, more mashed potatoes than I've ever seen in my life (thanks Ernie), delicious gravy, stuffing, green beans, a broccoli casserole, mac and cheese for the kids, cranberry sauce, bread, purple stuff, pumpkin pie, and banana pudding pie. It was delicious. Thanks mom and Ernie for doing all of that cooking!

Sinus Headache Pain

The only thing that I did not enjoy was the terrible sinus headache that I had starting early Thanksgiving morning that lasted at least 36 hours. It was terrible. I was able to take the edge off a little bit with tylenol throughout the day. When it was time to eat dinner, the tylenol wasn't working anymore and I could hardly keep my eyes open or move my head. Mom and Ernie left right after dinner and by that time I was just sitting on the couch about to cry from pain. But how lucky that I was able to get out of cleaning up the kitchen. I really planned things perfectly.

Kristi and I were going to try to get up Friday and go shopping early that morning. My head was still terrible and we didn't make it. Finally that morning Dominic was able to get something from the pharmacist that actually worked.

Shout Out

I have to give a huge shout out to Dominic. He is always so very good about running out to the store to get me anything that I need. I feel terrible because he will head out for milk and as soon as he gets back I say something like, "Oh, I just realized that we need eggs." So back out again he goes without complaining at all. Well, I can't tell you how many trips he made out to the store Thanksgiving day for party supplies and anything else that we needed. Thanks Dominic, for always helping out without even being asked. You are pretty awesome!

We Were On TV!

My mom just called me and said that she saw us on Fox News this morning at 5:30 a.m. Yesterday Dominic and I took the kids to a local Cut Your Own Christmas tree farm to look for our tree. I didn't even know that there was a camera anywhere in sight. I guess there was. Mom said that I was carrying Brooke. Nathan and Lenny were walking with Dominic. She said that it was a close up of me and Brooke and then of Lenny. I asked Mom if she was dreaming because I didn't even see a camera. So I asked her what Brooke was wearing. She said that she was all in pink. That's exactly right. Mom said that as she was watching the news she said, "That looks like my family!" and it was us. I called Dominic to tell him and he said that he saw a camera.

How funny that we were on TV and I didn't even know that we were being video taped. I'm sure we were all red faced because it was FREEZING out there. Poor Brooke and Nathan could hardly walk because of the grass and because they were all bundled up.

I'm guessing it will probably run again for the evening news. The sad part is that we didn't even cut down a tree there because we couldn't find one that was big enough. We ended up going to our usual Christmas tree lot.

Here are the pictures that I took while there.

Preschool Thanksgiving Feast and Birthday

On Brooke and Nathan's birthday we also went to Lenny's preschool Thanksgiving Feast. It was so much fun for us to see Lenny with his friends. The 3 year olds were dressed like Indians and the 4 year olds were dressed like Pilgrims. They each sang songs with their class. It was so cute! Lenny must have had stage fright because he didn't hardly smile at all. When he looked over at us he would smile real big though. I think that he didn't realize that there was going to be a huge room full of people when he walked in the door.

Here is a picture of the placemat that Lenny made along with his turkey and cornucopia.



Lenny has another admire-er. There is a little girl in his class named Brooke. She is very cute. I know her mom and we usually talk at the get togethers. Brooke's grandma came over to us and asked if she could get a picture of Brooke and Lenny together. She said that Brooke wanted a picture of them together. Dominic then started video taping the kids because it was so adorable the way Brooke was acting with Lenny. She would not leave his side. You can tell that she is the little girl that will tell the boys what to do--including Lenny. Dominic and I got such a kick out of it.

I was trying to get a picture of Lenny, Brooke and David. The boys weren't standing still for the picture so Brooke pulled Lenny over and put her arm around him. She also had to pull David over for the picture.


There are two girls in Lenny's class that he talks about the most and they are Brooke and Elizabeth. Wouldn't you know since his sister's name is Brooke Elizabeth. I thought that was kind of neat.

Brooke and Nathan had a great time at the feast too. Lenny's teacher even came over to wish them a happy birthday. I was so very proud of Brooke and Nathan, they were so good the entire time. When we were finished eating, all the kids were running around and playing so Brooke and Nathan decided to run off too. We looked over and shy little Nathan was standing in the middle of the room watching all of the kids running around him. He's so shy around other kids. He's getting better though, at least now he will leave my side.

Then we looked over at Brooke and she is standing in the middle of a group of three year old girls. The girls are all picking Brooke up and playing with her hair. Brooke was smiling and loving it. It was so cute because she was so much smaller than they were but she was looking up and smiling the entire time. Lenny noticed and he walked over there and watched to make sure that they weren't hurting his sister. He really did look like he was watching out for her. We have it on video and it is very cute.

Me and my babies. Sorry, toddlers. It's hard for me to believe that they are toddlers and not babies. I have to work on getting rid of those binkies.


After the party Dominic had to go back to work and the kids and I went home. Dominic worked late that night so we waited until he got home for Brooke and Nathan to open their presents from us. It was about 7 so it was after their bedtime but they were not complaining at all.



They love their new trikes and ride them all over the house.


I even caught them sharing one the day after their birthday. Dominic and I had to laugh at this picture because as always Brooke looks a mess and Nathan only has on a diaper. That's the story of our life.