Family Sleepover

I don't know how we won the friend jackpot! We feel so blessed to have MANY wonderful friends, like the Wildes. Our families were able to have a family sleepover to kick-off Christmas break. The men were in charge of the meals. Jeremy made killer pizzas for dinner and Ryan my out of this world omelets for breakfast! The kids had a great time playing and being with their friends. The adults had fun hanging out and playing games on the Wii. Rochelle and I even were able to run to target while Jeremy and Ryan played games on the Wii. We had so much fun and look forward to doing it again, often!

The boys had fun posing for these photos

Jayne with the bed to herself (at least for a couple of minutes)

Goodnight! The kids did great going to bed! It was amazing!

I am posting this a little while after the sleepover... Rochelle is being induced today and we are so excited to meet their new little one! The Wilde kids spent the night last night so Jeremy and Rochelle could go to the hospital early this morning. Grace was so cute when see woke up she said "I wonder if my Mom and Dad are at the hospital". All of the kids are so excited to meet their new brother or sister.

The Reason For The Season

The other morning Lincoln and Eve decided to play "baby Jesus". Eve is Mary and I am guessing Lincoln is Joseph. They set up their own little manger scene.

Gingerbread House

Have I ever said how much I love this time of year?I love all of the traditions, the excitement and happiness that comes this time of year. I must admit it is definitely a little bit more stressful now that I am an adult and mother of four. I put a lot of pressure on myself to make it the "best" Christmas for my kiddos and hubby like the ones I had growing up. But in the end everything always turns out great, this year is no exception. I am so thankful for all of my many blessings!

One of our traditions that we have done for the last couple of years is putting together a ginger bread house. Ryan was home last night and we didn't have anything scheduled, so it was the perfect night. This year Lincoln really got into helping decorate the house with the few candies he didn't eat. Kaitlyn and Reuben really brainstormed some good ideas for the house this year! It was fun to work all together!

Ryan was the mastermind behind the fence. I love it when the light shines through it like stained glass.

Country Lights

Last night we were able to go to Lake Farm Park for their Country Lights. We started out with the kids making their wooden toys with the help from an Elf.

Kaitlyn decided to make a panda bear with her Elf.

Reuben made an airplane. He took a long time painting his plane to make sure it was just right. It looked great!

For Lincoln there was no question about it. He made a tractor.

Eve had a wonderful Elf helping her. She was one of the first kids that started her toy and was the last done by far! He even had his own special stamp to stamp on the bottom of her toy. Our good friends the Smith's and the Greenway's went with us. Eve and her friend Madelynne both made castles and painted them pink. Eve's Elf even let them press the button to make it snow in the workshop.

Next stop was to visit Santa. There was a line to see him, but Lincoln sneaked up to the front of the room and sat down to watch and wait for our turn. He told us he was going to ask for candy but ended up really asking for Woody for Christmas.

After the kids were able to talk with Santa we went on our tractor pulled wagon ride to see all of the pretty Christmas lights. Last stop was the barn with the horses, sheep, pigs and goats. It was a great night. We love this tradition of going every year.

My Boys

The last two weeks Ryan has worked A LOT which is really an understatement. One night last week I was getting ready to hop in bed after midnight, Ryan was back at the hospital because he had been paged, when I heard Reuben crying. I went in to see what was the matter, his legs were hurting him so bad. He said he couldn't even straighten them. Reuben couldn't come down his top bunk because he was in so much pain. So I carried him into my bed and told him that he was growing and that even though it hurt a lot it would go away. So I rubbed his legs till he fell asleep. In the morning Reuben hopped out of bed excited and announced that he definitely felt taller! He even wanted me to measure him because he was convinced he had grown. I had to smile! That night we went over to our good friends' house for dinner and Jackie asked Reuben if he had grown taller. He was so excited she had noticed and of course said YES!

The night that Reuben had the leg pain I had had a girl scout leaders meeting which I brought the kids to, because Ryan was still at work. The meeting lasted longer than normal and Ryan ended up coming home and getting the kids. Then he put them in bed while I was still at the meeting. The next morning I was excited with Reuben that he had grown taller :) and then Lincoln woke up... When I went to get him out of his crib I saw that he had gone to bed with gum in his mouth the night before! I just had to keep smiling because my poor husband has been SO tired and didn't even notice that Lincoln had had the gum in his mouth. Luckily the gum was all over his hands, chin, neck and shirt. But not in his hair or sheets! What a blessing! I just couldn't stop smiling about what an eventful morning it had been and it wasn't even 8 am yet!

(This picture is from a different day but you still can see Lincoln's mischievous side)

Undercover Turkey

Eve came home with a homework worksheet that had a picture of a turkey on it. The instructions said that turkeys don't want to be caught this time of year so please help your turkey with a disguise so that no one will be able to tell they are a turkey. Eve immediately thought of dressing her turkey up as a princess. This was a "family" project, so I helped a little. I love projects like this!

Halloween 2010

We were able to go trick-or-treating with a couple of friends this year. It was a beautiful but chilly night but we all had a lot of fun!

James was amazing and wore his stilts trick-or-treating. Our sidewalks around here are not the most even, so we were all pretty impressed! He was the B.F.G.

Here is the run down of costumes:

Lincoln was Nacho Libre (his all time favorite movie) in the picture he's wearing a sweatshirt because he was freezing. We will take some solo pictures of him soon.

Eve was Ariel/ a mermaid

Reuben was a mad scientist at Jayne's party, a secret agent in the school parade, a baseball player at the church halloween party and a cowboy on halloween. (As you can't tell he couldn't make up his mind)

Kaitlyn was a s'more. (A little bit of bragging here, but she won for the best costume worn by a girl, at her school halloween party.)

School Halloween Parade

On Friday the Elementary put on a parade around the streets surrounding the school. I love this yearly tradition to see all of the cute kids so excited and dressed up in their costumes.

When Eve woke up that morning she could hardly contain her excitement for the parade. She was convinced that she was going to be able to ride in a truck and wave to everyone and throw candy. (She has watched Kaitlyn and Reuben in our town's Memorial Day Parade for a couple of years and thought that this parade was the Memorial Day one.) It was pretty cute.

Eve wanted to be Ariel this year. I totally lucked out and found this costume at our local grocery store for $3.99! (I love a good deal!!) Reuben had a hard time making up his mind this year. He ended up being four different things, one costume for each party/event we went to. Luckily he used stuff we had at home because this had potential of getting pretty expensive. So, at school he dressed up as a spy (suit coat and Ryan's fedora). Reuben did such a good job blending in that I didn't get a good picture of him during the parade. This is the best I was able to get.

Blue Man Group

I am a little behind on my blog posts... The other weekend Ryan and I were able to go with our awesome friends to see the Blue Man Group. It was so fun to go on a double date and have a night on the town! Rochelle is the best at getting the smart seats (only $10!!). The performance was even better than I had imagined! Afterward the Blue Men were in the lobby to give "autographs" (a blue hand print) and take pictures. Rochelle made the night even more memorable when she had the Blue Man put a handprint on her tummy. None of us were ready to end the night so we went out for some yummy frozen custard. Mmm. Here are a couple of pictures of the night. Rochelle was so nice to email me these because I forgot our camera.

These huge balls were thrown out on the audience and passed back and forth. They had different colored lights that would turn on in them to sync to the music. The tech. people for the show were amazing!

This Blue Man couldn't stop starring at Ryan and how tall he is. The Blue Men don't even break character in the lobby, they keep their expressionless face and don't talk at all. So all he did was motion lots of times with his hand how tall Ryan was and did a lot of starring.

Holden Arboretum

We ventured out to Holden Arboretum the other day as a family and went on a walk/hike. I have no idea why we haven't been there before! It is GORGEOUS! And was so relaxing to go on a walk with all the beautiful autumn colors around us. We are definitely going to have to go back soon.

Lucky Buckeye

Eve was Lucky Buckeye in her class last week. (kinda like being star student) Her wonderful teacher is a HUGE Ohio State fan so she has made her whole classroom into an Ohio State theme. Being Lucky Buckeye, Eve was able to make a poster to hang in the classroom about herself on Monday, bring in pictures to show on Tuesday, bring in a bag full of stuff for her class to estimate the number of items which were inside of the bag on Wednesday, on Thursday she was able to show and tell, and on friday Eve was able to bring Brutus home for the weekend and write a journal entry of what they did together to share on Monday. So if you having gathered by now, being Lucky Buckeye is one of the best things ever! It was a fun week!

I love my Man!

On Monday night I selfishly asked Ryan could you do something special for me this week. I have to say Ryan does stuff for me all the time; always washes the dishes that need to be hand washed (because it is not my favorite), works an unreal amount of hours every week, helps with countless other things around the house where needed, he is always giving me a hug just when I need it, I could really go on and on. But for some reason I was pms-ing, tired and feeling sorry for myself. Yeah poor me right :) So Ryan comes home on Tuesday after working 13+ hours and brings me this...

Yeah he loves me! Not just that he "got" me something did it mean so much but that he really has a stressful week at work and even had to stay up late working on a paper to present today. Anyways. Now that you see how selfish I am, you can see that my husband is a saint! I love you!

My Boys

I love my boys (and girls, of course)! When I came back in the house after taking Kaitlyn to the bus stop I found these two cute boys laying on the couch watching a show. Reuben had gotten Lincoln out of his crib for him.

Pinkalicious

Evie was lucky to be able to celebrate her birthday with one of her best friends. Evie and Lilly are only two days apart which is kinda fun. The girls had a Pinkalicious Party themed after the awesome book.

We played find the pink things in the room, painted fingernails, and made pink necklaces.

For lunch our menu was: pink waffles, pink yogurt, pink lemonade and strawberries. For dessert there were pink cupcakes with pink frosting and pink sprinkles. We threw some Strawberry Shortcake cupcake sticks in some of the cupcakes because Evie really wanted to incorporate Strawberry Shortcake.

Pink and red balloons. Kids and balloons are always a hit. The boys had fun making a pile of them and jumping on the balloons.

I love these girls. I can't believe that they are five already and are in elementary school! Check out this photo of them two years ago!