Peter's Surprise 30th

If you want to experience one of the most precious sights in the world, throw a surprise party for someone with Down Syndrome. Watching my brother-in-law Peter's face as he walked into our home and saw his friends and family yelling "Surprise" was one of the best moments of my life. Too bad I pressed "stop" instead of "record" on my video camera as soon as he came in!

The theme of the party was obviously "Peter" and he sure got a kick out of it. I took some goofy pictures of him a couple of weeks earlier and I added all sorts of hats to the images. My sweet mother in law provided the food, and a ward member even did a magic show. It was a great night to enjoy each other's company and to celebrate this guy who we are all crazy about. At the end of the evening Peter even came up to me and said, "Thank you sooo much for inviting all my friends". Precious.

Above, Peter conducting as we sang Happy Birthday. Below, Peter cheering as soon as we finished. I think this image will always bring tears to my eyes. Best. Picture. Ever.

Luke's 7th Pirate Party

I love having home birthday parties. Love, love, love them. Unless I am hosting a party of 10+ little boys who have a major problem with losing good o'l fashion games like hot potato...and then not so much. There were definitely some tears, some threats (not by me!) and boys refusing to eat over game eliminations.  At one point in the party Andrew had to go get the pizza, thus leaving me solo. Things got a little crazy, and when my parents walked in 10 minutes later (they came down for Luke's big day) I sent a silent prayer of thanks.

But for Luke...I would do it all again. Sore losers and all.

I've said it before, and I'll say it again- Luke is one of a kind. He is such a good kid who loves making people happy. He is definitely the peacemaker in our family, and boy, can that kid melt in your arms. For years I have been dreading the day when he would outgrow his outward show of affection, but 7 years on, and he is still the most affectionate kid alive.

He is inquisitive, daring and energetic. He is usually always up for a challenge, and has a smile on his face while doing it. At the present moment he loves being a risk taker when it comes to eating. I don't find it so amusing that he considers eating my dinners a "risk", but he'll eat anything you put in front of him. He also has made such a tremendous effort with school, and his hard work is really paying off.

Little Luke is a light in our lives, and one that we are grateful for each day. Love you buddy!

New York, New York

You know when you realize something, and you wonder why you didn't think of it earlier? I'm wondering why it took Andrew and me so long to ditch our kids with our parents and go away. We've done it on the rare occasion of a wedding or something, but only once before for the heck of it. BUT, about a month ago, we did do it just for the heck of it. We dropped the kids off at my parents house and then we headed up to NYC. We crammed in lots of sites, took in a Broadway show, and relaxed as much as two people used to traveling with four kids are able. 

World Trade Center Memorial

The last time I saw this site was about 8 years ago when it was still just a pile of ruble. I honestly was not prepared for how sobering the memorial would be. I thought it was absolutely perfectly done.

We also hit up Wall Street-

The Brooklyn Bridge-

a showing of Wicked (LOVED THIS SHOW!)

And a tour around Times Square and Rockefeller Plaza. I was seriously dead on my feet at this point- just another testament that my children have sucked the youth right out of me!). This place is stimulus overload at night.

We spent the better part of the next day at The Met. Holy Cow. You could spend days- weeks- in that place. It is crammed with so many amazing exhibits, and after several hours of trolling, I still felt that we had barely scratched the surface. I would love to take our kids here one day.

We ended our day with a stroll through Central Park- it was perfect. And since we had such a great experience, we made arrangements to do it again this summer. Only this time it will be for 9 days and we are headed back over the Atlantic. If I can get my anxiety in check with will be awesome. Thanks Mom and Dad!

Random Moments

"Oh really?" Afton yaps. A lot. Nonstop. Pretty much all day long. And when you have a child who talks that much you tend to tune it out at times. Apparently whenever I go into "tune out mode" I say, "Oh really?" over and over again. Afton has recently caught on to this trend and has determined that what I am really saying is, "I'm not listening to you" (she's correct). I am therefore banned from the use of "Oh really". Acceptable responses now include "Wow!", "Neat!","Cool!"

And lest you think Afton yaps nonsense all day long, last week at breakfast she randomly blurted out, "You know what I love about you Mom? How you are a nice mom." Melt my heart child. Melt my heart.

Speaking German While living abroad Afton absolutely refused to speak German. It's not like I expected much from her, but I did expect her to say the basics, you know, "Danke" and such. However whenever a stranger would try to speak to her in German she would yell back things like, "It's not danke! You say thank you!" Charming, I know. Now that we are back in the US the girl constantly asks me how to say things in German. Some things I know, some I don't. She did ask me how to say "I don't know" the other say, which was an easy one for me- "Ich weiss nicht". I said that one a lot.

Getting Physical I recently bought Jillian Micheal's Body Revolution program. I've been trying to knockout the workout in the morning before the kids go to school. A couple of days ago while I was doing one move that makes your backside shake (a lot) Sam sat behind me saying, "Ewwww, Mom! Look at your butt! Ewwww! Grooooosss!" I wanted to kill him.

Birds and Bees As a form of punishment for the above comment I decided to shock Sam with a discussion on the birds and the bees. No, this talk was really overdue. I kept catching the kid kissing the air pretending that it was his "imaginary girlfriend". All things considered he took the talk really well- his eyes only got wide during one part- you can guess what part that was. Why didn't Andrew have this discussion with the boy? Because when I first broached the subject with Sam, Andrew was in the other room and started yelling, "No! No! He's too young! It's too early!"

The Spelling Test  When Luke started kindergarten we discovered that he needed additional resource learning. He has had a hard time learning to read, and often struggles to retain information. We've been really blessed to have extremely supportive schools and teachers who know that Luke is a smart kid. However, now in the 1st grade, Luke is given a spelling test every 2 weeks. It's been a little disheartening to see him get most of the words on the test wrong and know that the next week the words will only get harder. BUT for the last list I tried orally telling Luke how to spell the words. He retain the information much better and received A 100% ON HIS LAST SPELLING TEST! I was so proud of that kid that I cried.  He was so proud of himself that he jumped up into my arms and gave me a huge monkey hug.

Sam's 9th

Sambino turned nine a few weeks ago. That means that next year he will be 10, and in 3 years he will be 12! (Are you impressed with my counting skills?) I'm not sure who gave my baby permission to grow up but it certainly wasn't me. Signs of the pre-preteens are already showing and I'm feeling woefully unprepared. 

For the big event Sam decided to invite his Cub Scout friends over and to have a "space themed" birthday. Cool, except his mom didn't go to the party store until 4 days before the scheduled party. I was soooo confident that they would have the supplies that I needed. Surely there would be a spaceship pinata, and matching paper supplies, right? Nope, not even anything remotely space related. What they did have was green face paint and blue hairspray, which inspired me to change it to a "martian themed" party. Practically the same thing in my book. 

So we painted the boys, sprayed up their hair, had them make antennas and changed their names to Skeel, Lorak, Dar Kova, ect. The food was typical party fair, you know, crater crunch, martian munchies, galaxy green juice and liquid hydrogen #20.  And since I like good old fashion fun, we spiced it up with games like hot potato.  

We just love this little guy to pieces. I love Sam's personality and his happiness in the little things. For his birthday present we gave him $20 and Andrew took him to a discount book store. When he came home Sam said, "This is the best day ever!" (He really is my child.) Aside from reading, the Lego obsession is still strong, and it is one obsession that I'm more than happy to nurture. 

We are going to be navigating some uncharted territory here during the next couple nine years, but I can't think of anyone I'd rather do it with. Love you child!

5 Month Recap- part 2

I recently started reading a novel where the author simply dedicated her book "To My Favorite". It was brilliant and left me feeling inspired. I've therefore decided to dedicate this blog "To My Favorite". Let that keep you guessing family and friends.

I've got the second half of the past 5 months to get caught up on- and we've got everything from birthdays to the kid's first black Santa- so lets get this thing started!

Birthdays
The kid's birthday marathon starts in November with Clara and ends in February with Luke. It gets busy,  but I try to keep is simple- especially for those who won't remember the occasion. Clara turned one this year and while this year has gone by impossibly fast, I also can't remember life without this little doll. She is possibly the happiest baby alive, and her three word vocabulary actually includes the word "hap-py!", which she says all the time. She started walking on Afton's birthday in December and hasn't slowed down since. I can't get enough of this red headed child!

Clara's favorite pastime- squeezing herself into tiny little spaces. 

Let's just get this on the table right now- Afton's 3rd year of life was a little bit trying for me. There were tantrums and power struggles, BUT, that all seems to be fading into the past! This (now) sweet little firecracker somehow manages to get more and more personality each day. She adores her family and I love hearing her little off-key voice voice singing songs about "sisters". She keeps asking when she will be five- but I want to savor every moment of this 4 year old Afton.

The Christmas Season
My father has become obsessed with the reality TV show Duck Dynasty.  (If I'm going to be completely honest, so have we.) The show stars millionaire rednecks who hold a great distaste for all things "yuppy". So, when my dad found out that we went to a tree farm to cut down our Christmas tree, we were labeled as the ultimate yuppies. We should have been offended, but as I reflected upon those cutting down trees with us (all in fancy SUVs, children in matching Christmas colors, fancy DSLR camera hanging from their necks), I couldn't argue his point at all. And really, compared to the others, we really are just wanna-be-yuppies. See dad, there is still hope for us!

Yuppy or not, we love our Christmas tree tradition, and no one had a better time than Andrew who spent a L-O-N-G time selected the perfect Christmas tree for us.

Luke's perfect tree selection-

Ah, the memories!

Next up on the Christmasy-things-to-do agenda was a trolley ride with Santa. Now here's the thing- if you are PAYING good money for your kids to go see Santa, then Santa better live up to some pretty high expectations. However, as soon as we stepped on onto the trolley (with my Dad and sister Becca) we were greeted by a skinny black Santa! It was all I could do to hold a straight face. Luke didn't manage as well. As soon as he got onto the trolley he yelled, "That isn't the real Santa! I can tell by his face!"

I'm not gonna lie though, it was hysterical and I'm glad we have the memory.

A couple of weeks later the kid's faith in Santa was restored.  On Christmas Eve Santa came around on a firetruck through our neighborhood passing out candy. As soon as the kids saw him, they were besides themselves shouting, "It is the real Santa!". Even my nearly 9 year old said, "I knew the real Santa would come!" Think what you will, but it was a magical moment.

Children, you make my heart swell. 

On Christmas Eve day we got together with Andrew's family at our home. As is tradition, the cousins made their gingerbread houses while the adults enjoyed each other's company. It even started to snow- which counted as a Christmas miracle in my book! That night was a low key affair with Thai takeout and a reenactment of the Nativity story.

Christmas Day was lovely and packed full of family. A couple of hours after waking up, Andrew's parents, brother Pete and Aunt Coco came over to exchange presents. Then in the afternoon my parents, sister Becca, my other sister Ashley and her husband Jacob, and my brother Joe and his new wife Vanessa came down to stay for a couple of days. We were spoiled rotten to be surrounded by so much family.

After a few days we all went back to my parents house to spend the rest of the Christmas break. It was wonderful, but also a little tense as we eagerly waited for Becca's mission call to arrive. It finally came the last day were we there! Becca has always wanted to do service in a 3rd world county, so she was besides herself when she found out she would be going to Paraguay for 1 1/2 years.  I'm so incredibly proud of that girl! Becca is going to be absolutely amazing ...even if it is going to break my heart to give her up during that time.

 Between two weddings, a baby due in June for my brother and sister-in-law, and now this mission call, it has been a wonderful year full of blessings.

Family Outings
We are trying to resume our "Saturday Adventures", and in November we took a trip to Fort McHenry. This is where the Battle of Baltimore took place in 1814, and is also battle that inspired Francis Scott Key to write the Star Spangled Banner.

(above right) I love nothing more than to see these kids running free. (above left) Afton and Luke stuck in jail, and (below) the kids taking a break in the bunk house).

Then a couple of Saturdays ago we took the kids to the Natural History Museum and ice skating at the National Sculpture Garden. Andrew stayed out with Clara, but I look turns with the oldest 3... it was hysterical. They didn't much like sitting out waiting their turns, but for the most part, they were good sports about.

Last Saturday it was a trip to some art museums and the Air and Space Museum (as you can see- we've been having a very mild January).

But I think the horse rides at home just may be what the kids enjoy most.