I wrote this post on Thursday, but finished Friday just in case it doesn't make much sense

The past few days have been pretty brutal as far as the weather goes. We only ventured out last night (Wednesday) for mom to hit the gym. All schools were cancelled today (update: and Friday too) due to "inclemet weather" as were the classes the boys have through the park district. It's not technically a "snow day" since there is no snow falling, but a check of the internet weather channel site said that our area's current temp is -14 and feels like -40. Wow!! Thank God there is no snow today...I would hate to shovel or snow blow in this!!


The wives from our August Cabo trip came over last night after the kids were all in bed so we could finish working on our vacation album. Looking at it together was a blast and made us all wish we could go there again...preferable now when it's SO fridgid out (I guess we could take the kids this time and save us all from this crazy weather!) Anyway, we decided to get together today if schools were closed so I heated up the car for a good 15 minutes and we RAN from the car into Anna's house. I picked up McDonald's for everyone later in the morning before we came home for naps. At least it wasn't yet another day stuck in the house!! When I called Anna first thing this morning, she cheerfully answered the phone with, "Welcome to the frozen tundra!"

Wednesday, we spent the whole morning inside. The boys were restless. I suggested that they play knights and I built them this castle to defend. AS I was building it, they said "no! That's the naughty dragon's castle....we have to knock it down". I made them wait for 10 seconds while I ran to get my camera and then....

....this is my castle 30 seconds after I finished building it! Ok....so um....now what do you guys want to do?! Boys! :)
I took a few more pictures of the snow in our back yard. Here is Fort Houck (more like snow fort Houck).

I kept looking out at the patio during meals thinking "those lights look kinda like snow cones right now!"

I think these walls are 2&1/2 feet tall and the snow has almost reached the top.

I was actually excited last weekend when the snow came back. We had a bunch during Christmas, but it rained for a few days and all that beautiful white stuff melted away. Now...if only it was actually warm enough to go out and play! That's the bummer....when we get the snow, it's too cold to do all the fun stuff like sled, make snowmen, "romp and stomp" as we like to call it. Driving the boys around tonight, my car said it was 1 degree outside and it's supposed to get MUCH worse! I sure do wish that the boys would sit and watch movies because I'm afraid we're not going anywhere tomorrow. I just checked weather.com and the current temp is -11!!!

Anyway - back to last weekend! We did some shoveling on Saturday (as a family!) and it wasn't too bad so Brian suggested heading over to a local sledding hill. Well....by the time we got there, conditions had worsened! We took everyone out, put Brady back in the car almost immediately and let the older boys go down a big hill about 4 times before going in search of some hot lunch!


I love the way the snow settled on the bushes in the front of our house. One looked like it had long streaks of snow on it, the other ones looked dotted with little puffs.

There's daddy yielding the snow blower! He likes to wear goggles when he clears the driveway. I think it's pretty smart even though our friends drove by and called him "scuba Steve".

Here's Logan helping clear the sidewalk. Look at that shoveling form! The kid is a pro already (better be since he's gonna grow up here!)

And then there's Aiden and HIS shovel. In his defense, the other kid's shovel was the backyard and this was pretty resourceful, but I don't think it's going to be much help with the driveway!

Here we are at the sledding hill. This will probably be the last year we need the little baby sled. I think it's been used a grand total of 4 times!

Daddy and the boys.

I had put Logan's hood up on his head until Aiden started yelling "no no...I haffa hold on to Logan's coat!" Logan also totally thought that holding on to the yellow cord in the front meant that he was steering the sled.

With Brian traveling all week it's woman against nature. We got about 2-3 inches yesterday so I put some salt down (per Brian's advice) before the snow even started and then shoveled once after the kids went to bed. This morning, there wasn't much so I ran out and did it again before literally wolfing down my breakfast and rushing the kids out the door so that we could make it to Logan's preschool by 9:00. Good thing the school is literally behind our house or we would have been LATE! I had to take a picture of my handy-work. I seriously don't mind shoveling as long as it's relatively warm out. Last night I had fun clearing the drive. This morning it was FRIGID and windy -boooo!

Driving around today, I was reminded of a wedding we attended in Breckenridge, CO a few years ago. We made it a long weekend, rented a place with about 10 other people, did some skiing etc. I remember looking at the driveways there and noticing how the entrances were sort of walled with these giant piles of snow from the plows and shoveling. Our driveways are starting to look that way! I tried to pretend that I lived in a gorgeous, mountain town for a while today...

the illusion didn't last for long. Finally, here is a video of Aiden getting ready to go shovel last weekend. He has said something really funny and I wanted to get it on camera. Something like "when you want to go outside...you say 'mommie...i can go outside? and she will say yes!'" He was also calling his snow pants a "snow diaper". At the end of this video, he says "let's go" in Chinese. It's a great side-effect from the boys watching the show Ni Hao Kai-lan.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=plmZm_b-EDM&feature=channel_page

Last Saturday we ventured downtown to hang out with some of our friends from "back in the day" (aka: when we were younger, child-less and living in downtown Chicago). We went to a fantastic restaurant (although I really wish Brian had asked about the dress code in advance. Nice jeans are acceptable anywhere these days though so...it was all good). We spent over 3 hours eating, drinking wine and talking before heading across the street to a cool Irish bar. We ordered a drink, I looked at my watch and noticed the time...11:30. It was almost like "code 23" <--- see future post. I said "Brian it's 11:30" and we basically RAN out to get home and relieve his parents. Being more than an hour away, we felt guilty and knew that the ball was over (thankfully the Pilot did NOT turn into a pumpkin on the way home). Hot topic of the evening: facebook and how all the wives (plus Brian) are on it and how all the men (plus Lorna) are not. hysterical.


And yes, I was the dork with the camera despite the fact that my kids were not around. After I add my pictures, I think I'll go post them on facebook. HAHAHAHA (no...seriously...I'm going to!)

Me & Bri

I think the imagery says it all. This is how he earned the nick name monkey.

He ran around to do it again because he thought he was so hysterical. I had to explain to him that I was only taking pictures to show daddy....and that, although it was pretty funny, he really shouldn't do that anymore. Really though - who am I to tell him not to climb on counters? I used to do it ALL the time when I was a kid....and now if I can't reach stuff! :)

In a related story, I took this picture a few weeks ago with my iphone to email daddy in NYC. We were SO happy when Aiden started to undress himself (like big brother Logan) before bath time. This joy sort of back fired when, a few days after our first "you're such a big boy" celebration, Aiden decided to take all his cloths and his diaper off as our friends from down the street were leaving after a play date. I was walking them out when, here came Aiden, running in, totally nude, yelling "I'm naked!" Thankfully, my friend's children ADORE being naked so she understood and we all had a good laugh. After they left, I tried to get cloths back on the child, but he kept running away. I had a pack 'n play set up for Brady in the living room / dining room because I had to shovel the driveway that week and was forced to leave him in the house for 10 minutes alone. I had put him in there with some toys to keep him safe. This is Aiden in his attempt to run away from me and thus avoid being re-clothed:

In October of 2007, I hosted a party for this at-home-business called Once Upon a Family. It's a really cool line of products built around building family traditions, creating family values and preserving family history. I got a TON of cool stuff including a couple of things that we use every New Year's Day. The first is a hand print book. It's meant for a single child, but I improvised and use mine for all three. Last year was the first time I did the book. At that time, Brady was only 4 weeks old. This year, everyone had a really fun time making the hand prints and answering all the questions (things like favorite color, favorite food, "sayings", favorite book and favorite music).


Here is the book all set up with the three colors I used last year. Green for Logan, Blue for Aiden and Orange for Brady. When we got started, I asked them which colors they wanted to use and...let's just say that a mom is usually right!

Since this was the day after the big "no-sleep over party", we were all on the mend and really didn't bother too much with the getting-the-kids-dressed thing. Here is Aiden, at around 4:00 in the afternoon...still in "balls jammas" (as he calls them). Blue paint ready!

Here is Logan with his green paint....

...and then his green hand!

Aiden with his blue hand....sort of reminds me of Blue Man Group ;)

Here is Bray in his chair....examining the orange paint bottle.

Now look at his right hand. He wouldn't let me wash it before he was finished with his milk!

The arts and crafts inspired the boys to paint. I brought up some of the paint stuff we had from Aiden's birthday party last year and they went to town for a while.

My friend Kristina lent me (and then gave me) all this cool paint stuff - trays, rollers, dot things that go on your finger, stamps etc.

And here is the final result.

As you know if you read my blog, I can be quite wordy. Look at how I had to type up the answers to the questions (which are supposed to be written on the bottom of the hand print page...albeit only for 1 child and not 3). I folded it and glued one side down on the facing page so it can be opened and read. So cool - I love this book!

So what's the other New Year's Day tradition you ask? (and no mom...it's not eating black eyed peas....they are yucky and hard to find! We did eat black beans, peas and I's out of alphabet soup one year when we couldn't find actual black eyed peas, but I honestly didn't try that hard this year!) Anyway....the other New year's day tradition is to measure the kids on the growth chart. The only problem is that I think the growth chart is hanging incorrectly and Brian needs to readjust it. Soooo...we'll do another post on that as soon as we "motivate to measure"!

I was reading Aiden his bedtime stories tonight and was inspired to write down a few things that have been happening lately. Nothing of consequence or importance...just funny stuff that I don't want to forget. I plan to make this blog into a book each year (in lieu of a family photo album) and so I'd like to include a few silly memories like these:

We have this drawer full of cups, containers, fake food etc. that the kids can play with in the kitchen. The other day, Brady was toddling back and forth between this drawer and the fridge with various things and "filling" them with water. He obviously can't reach, but he would get something, toddle over and hold it up to the water dispenser. It was so cute because I'm sure he's just mimicking what he's seen me do a gazillion times a day (have I ever mentioned how THIRSTY my kids are!?)
Here he is picking out a container....
I just missed the really cute picture of him holding it up to the fridge.

Here he comes for more!

And now here are the stories I was asked to read Aiden tonight. The first is one of his recent favorites. He calls this "the puffy one". It's supposed to be a photo album, but I never actually put pictures in it....so it looks like....

...this on the inside....blank!!

When he first asked me to read it, I tried to reason with him that there were no words...no pictures....it's supposed to be a photo album. But no, he would have none of it. So I started to make things up on each page like "this is a snowman in a snow storm". Now the story goes like this: "This is a knight, riding on a white horse through the snow covered forest. He comes upon a white castle. Up high in a white tower is a princess in a white dress who must be rescued from the white dragon who breathes white fire. Here is the knight defeating the dragon and rescuing the princess." The last page is always "this is a picture of Aiden, Logan and Brady wearing white snowsuits playing in the snow". I usually have to read this book twice.



The second book we read was Polar Bear Polar Bear, What do you see? We've read this book quite a few times and now Aiden can name all the animals himself. What I do is say "polar bear polar bear what do you see? I see..." and then flip the page for Aiden who tells me the next animal. I'm always impressed by how quickly kids pick up this kind of stuff. He got things like"whooping crane" and "spider monkey" the second time we went through the book. This picture, however, is always "a nawdy (naughty) eagle!" He always calls things naughty when they have serious faces, and no matter how many times I try to convince him otherwise. Guess that's something we'll have to work on since we want the kid to be patriotic and everything. :)

The other animal he refuses to say correctly is "the macaroni penguin" he calls this guy a "macaroni cheese penguin"....hysterical! I think it's fitting with the hair in the picture and all...looks like Kraft to me!

And finally....today's daddy picture. Since Brian travels so much, we like to take pictures of various things and send them back and forth. The boys and I got lots of cool pictures during Christmas time from NYC! This is a picture I took with my phone (to send to daddy) of Logan and Aiden getting ready to go to the gym today. Logan ALWAYS wants to take something with him and he has recently attached himself to this cat he won with one of those "crane grabber" games (right Nana?!) Yesterday, he named his cat Checkers (all by himself too!). We've had to do many many things for Checkers including giving him fake cat food in a bowl at night when Logan got his "bedtime water". Anyway....no child in our house has EVER attached himself to something other than a pacifier. No "lovies" to speak of! This is the closest thing we've ever seen so Brian and I think it's super cute. In this picture, Aiden has chosen to take a tiny car with him. Aiden....a CAR??? That's strange too. Mixin' it up I guess!

So...sometime last summer, Memaw and Grandpa took the older boys to the Children's Museum for the day and became members. Somehow, I got a hold of an events calendar and saw this New Year's Eve celebration called "Bubble Bash 2008 - Bach to Bubbles". Um.....how much does Aiden love bubbles??!! That's all he asked for on his 2nd birthday! We went through at least 5 gallons of bubble solution in the back yard last summer! He's completely obsessed (as am I .... a little maybe) with Susan's double-bubble machine! He even collected all the bubble wrap from the Christmas ornaments, called them bubbles and carried them around for 2 days. So we're thinking, based on the name and the illustration on the calendar showing a little cartoon character conducting music with bubbles ALL around him that this is going to be a BUBBLE FEST....OF COURSE WE'RE IN! Um....it wasn't like that at all. It was FUN...don't get me wrong. But...it was basically a day at the Children's Museum with all these different activities going on like bands, crafts, snacks etc....but no major, crazy bubble action to be found. In fact...the only OUT OF THE ORDINARY bubble thing we got was our parting gift....a bubble blower and a bottle of bubble solution for each kid. Cool! Not as cool as we THOUGHT....but cool!!

Before we delve into Bubble Bash - let me back-track to Monday morning when Brady slipped (as a new walker) at a friend's house during playgroup and managed to ding his poor sweet head on the corner of a lower cabinet. We called the pediatrician...ran down the typical signs (no passing out, no vomiting, eyes not dilated, acting normal, swelling came OUT.....etc). They suggested that we take him to an urgent care facility only because of the location of the injury and the fact that he might get a scar if we didn't get any necessary stitches etc. He didn't need stitches....but they put a little skin glue (dermabond) on his laceration and we came home. Thankfully, Memaw was off for the week and watched the older boys and, thankfully, Bri was home to go with me. It was so not a big deal, but nice to have the help! While we were at urgent care, I told Brady that I gave him major props for having his spill when he did....at playgroup with 6 mommies around ready to rush in! Without having to do a thing, I had ice in my hand for his head, Anne packed up my diaper bag and put it by the front door, Susan and Kristin got the older kids dressed...Kristin even found my shoes and put my coat on for me. Way to go little dude! Brady's after-accident nick names: little warrior and son of Frankenstein.

I included this picture because of Brian. Every year, he takes about 2 weeks off around Christmas....and stops shaving. He calls it his "Christmas Beard". For some reason, he was also particularly found of wearing his new northface beanie hat around the house all day every day...he looks like such a thug! Sexy honey! hee hee.

Here we are arriving at the Children's museum. The boys were so excited to see this giant aquarium. I was laughing because it's the least impressive thing about the place!

Even cousin Jack wanted to check out the fish. Onward boys!!
Aiden loved the tubes of air. You can put balls and scarfs and other stuff in these compartments and then open/close doors to make them fly around these tubes that have forced air in them. Pretty cool

Ah....the water table....always a popular spot! And what a super sweet jacket too. haha.

It's kind of hard to see, but Logan is surrounded by a giant bubble. You step inside of a ring that rests in the solution and you use a rope to pull it up.

Daddy got in on the bubble action too....um....for the kids obviously.....to amuse them....not because bubbles are really fun to play with :)

They have several little baby areas and poor Bray kept getting dragged, against his will, out of them because his older brothers wouldn't stay in one place for more than 5 minutes.

The ball run (that's what I'm calling it anyway) was Aiden's FAVORITE thing. He stood there for quite a while.

Bray liked it too.

Downstairs, they had some cool music (well...there was some cool drumming for a while). There were also snacks and some craft rooms too. Here is Aiden with a shaker he made. I didn't take any pictures, but they had some cookies that were frosted white that you could color on with food coloring markers. Aiden made his with stripes and I drew a hockey stick on cousin Jack's for him.

We finally convinced Logan and Jack to make the shakers too

Seriously, the only reason I was able to convince Logan to make one of these was to tell him that they could close it with green tape.

Ah....mommy's boys playing the drums.....you make me proud. Someday maybe I'll let you play Rockband with us ;)

Aiden stuck the sticks down the middle of this giant, heavy, iron drum thing. I had to scoot it over and fish them out. Not surprisingly, I found more than just the 2 he stuck down there. I guess some other kids had the same inclination.
Brady was having a BLAST playing this thing. I only moved him because he's a bit wild and, when some other children came over, he whacked a couple of them by accident.

This is always my favorite thing....the giant "lite brite" display (it's not really lite brite, but it's similar in concept). Look....someone on the other side of this one is making a cool sailboat!

OH! It's Daddy and Aiden! (are you wondering why Logan isn't in any of these pictures? That's because he was off with Grandpa who was his own personal escort that day. They were moving so fast through everything that we couldn't keep up).

The museum thing ended around noon and everyone went home for a nap before our 2nd annual neighborhood New Year's Eve "sleep over" party at Chad & Anna's house. The kids all arrive in jammies, eat, have a fake countdown (which we actually forgot to do this year) and then we try to convince them to watch a movie downstairs and fall asleep in sleeping bags while we do adult things upstairs (like play games - haha!....like Rockband.....and Scene It). Here, Aiden spends some quality time with daddy and Mr. Chad (an ex-Iowa football player) checking out the scores on TV before bedtime.

Whatever Chad was talking about had Aiden captivated. I'm sure he was saying something involving the word "ball"
Time for the movie - here are all the kids in their sleeping bags. There were 12 of them in total downstairs with 4 babies asleep in various rooms upstairs (including Brady).

From left to right: Logan, MacKenzie (who requested that she lay by Logan) and Aiden.

For some reason, instead of taking pictures of the party people, I took several of the TV. 2009 Hooray!

Also missing from my camera - a shot of Brian and I! What DID I shoot instead? Two strangers on TV kissing and wearing large goofy hats. (shrug)