Holidays are over...back to life

Well it is the Tuesday after the holidays and things are returning back to normal. The tree is on the curb, other decorations are in the basement, the kids are back in school, our holiday desserts are almost eaten, and D went back to work. Well that is life and life does go on even when you really enjoy some rest and relaxation time. Going back to work tomorrow will be hard because I will miss the kids and the routine of being around the house with them. Our house will go back to being chaotic once basketball season starts, which is this week, but there is also fun with those crazier times as well. Seeing the kids participate in activities, helping them learn, and watching them with their friends are also special times. I just love having a simple life (not a lot of activities) and that just does not go hand in hand with four kids. So I will morn our simpler life, transition into that life quickly and will enjoy that as well...but I will miss the less chaotic times as well.

We had a great holiday season. It was full of lounging around, getting caught up on household items (like hanging pictures) and hanging out with the kids. The kids enjoyed themselves and we rarely heard, "I'm bored". Julianne watched the "Little House on the Prairie" show at school with week before school got out so we continued the movies at home. The library was full of the videos and we also noticed last night that one of our channels has the series running at night. So they may pick up more of those throughout the year. They also watched their first 15 minutes of "The Brady Bunch". What a great TV show for all ages. It does not have snotty girls on it, provocative teenage girls dressed in inappropriate clothes, materialistic images, etc. It shows a blended family and normal everyday brother/sister issues. So hopefully we will be able to catch that show more often instead of other cartoons. Granted the older girls do not watch those new Disney shows but their friends all do. The girls act and look like high schoolers and we think it is just not appropriate for our girls at this age. So age appropriate cartoons/movies and maybe the Brady Bunch is all they will be watching now.

Here is another visit with Santa. We went with my parents and had a great time. My mom was able to join us with her fiance it was a great time.



Nathan was still not sure but at least got closer to him.


Christmas Eve dinner with Mom, Gigi, Mimi, Roger and our family. We had Ohio raised, grass fed steaks, Martha Stewart's "Perfect" mac-n-cheese, salad, Bob Evan's mashed potatoes, banana cream pie and Marci's peppermint ice cream cake.

Our Christmas Eve pajamas





Christmas morning wake up. We got them up at 7:00. Julianne was up in no time the others took awhile.


We woke Lindsay up after the kids opened most of their gifts. Sh... don't tell her.


Santa gifts. Julianne got an American Girl violin, Mallory received a nutcracker, Nathan a guitar and Lindsay a handmade doll.




Nathan got the girls earring/jewelry holder

Nathan and his guitar. Too bad no one knows how to play it.

Christmas dinner at Lisa's. The kids had fun. Santa got them a Wii so the kids enjoyed playing that.

Gigi received an iPad so she was excited when she opened it, even though I think she knew she was getting it. I think she was overwhelmed but hopefully she will get the hang of it.


Some Gigi watching a movie time.


Lindsay taking a bath in the sink.

Things I am grateful/thankful for:
-Holiday celebrations and traditions
-Spending New Years with the kids (we made pizza's, ate chocolate fondue, played Monopoly and all laid on the floor to see the ball drop.
-Having Nana and Gigi come for a visit
-Lindsay's first Christmas

Holiday celebrations

Well we have been busy celebrating early Christmas activities. We had a great Thanksgiving with our family and that was followed by an early Christmas celebration. The kids enjoyed connecting with their cousins and it was great to see everyone again. The atmosphere was stress and drama free. So that was great. The weather was great. D and I also ran the local turkey trot and had a great time. I think it was the first time that we officially ran a race together. So that was nice. His goal for us (or me) was to run the 5 mile race under 40 minutes. We did succeed. We made it at 39:39.




Some Let's Dance fun



The next weekend Julianne's class sang in the local Holiday Tree Lighting gathering. This is the first year we attended and it was really fun. They had smores, hot chocolate, carriage rides, and caroling. Julianne was really excited and the class did a great job. Santa even came to visit the gathering.


We brought Mallory's friend along.

Mallory dancing the night away. I think she learned some of those dance moves from Let's Dance.



That same weekend we were able to visit the real Santa. This Santa knew everything about the kids. We all walked in to the room and Santa said "Hi Julianne". She was floored and her uncertainty about Santa turned to reality. She is on the brink of trying to figure out everything about Santa but this kept her believing a little longer. He talked about her class, Mel and Tucker, playing basketball, etc. He knew all this information about the kids that surprised all of them. We did not sign up to see this Santa last year so it was great to be able to make it this year. We also visited the talking tree and he is always fun and tells lots of jokes. He can also secretly see the kids so that was fun for them also.



The Talking Tree. He could not hear us because he had too much sap in his ears. :)

The entire gang.

Mallory chose to be the first to sit on his lap.

She is thinking hard about what she wants for Christmas, which is a Nutcracker.

Lindsay is not too sure about this fellow. Nathan refused to go up to Santa or really talk to him but he still knew lots of stuff about him.

Things I am grateful/thankful for:
-running a fun/competitive race with hubby.
-Having a fun eventful holiday extravaganza with family
-our great warmer weather (except for yesterday which rained all day)
-Keeping Julianne believing in the spirit for one more year (it may be the last)
-Our spinning bike bending and calling the customer support and they sent us a free crank arm and petal. Very nice and friendly. We were finally able to fix it after it being more difficult than first thought it would be. We learned a lot about crank arms in bikes.
-Lindsay's starting to play more with the kids. She now crawls away from the kids when they chase her and she laughs.

The simple things in life

With our crazy household and not a lot of time to do simple things Lindsay has adopted well by tolerating the shower. Her bath days are long gone. We plop her into the shower with use and make use of that time while we are in there. The first couple of times were great. She would sit on the floor, crawl around and was memorized by the floor drain. She would stick her tongue out and try to catch the water on it. She would play with Nathan. The last few times have not been so smoothly. I have had to hold her the entire time. Once I lean down to put her down she starts to cry. What I really realized to day is that it is the simple thing of having her in my arms that soothes her. She loves for us to hold her and why not when you are 9 months old and exploring the world. It is more familiar and safe with an adult holding her. So I held her in the shower for the entire time. I adapted by washing my hair with one hand and was not able to shave my legs. There will be a time when I will put her down and she will cry, and I am OK with that, but for now why not indulge her and her neediness. It is such a short time that the sense of calm and comfort come over a child or baby when you old her. They grow up and move on and a hug and a hold are nice from mom and dad but it is not the same. The leaning down to put the baby/child down only to begin a frightful cry of "don't leave me" goes away. So for now I am accepting it and embracing that bond that we have with her and embracing and fulfilling her trust and security she has in us.

Nathan had another douser of an asthma episode last night. On Sunday his eyes were red and puffy. On Monday they still were and he complained that his throat itched or tickled. So I got a little nervous and bought him some zyrtex. That seemed to help even though he kept coughing. I went out of town Monday night to Tuesday night and he threw up with our babysitter from coughing too much, had diarrhea, and kept coughing. I finally got home late Tuesday night and checked on him in his bed and he was coughing and really hot. About 2 in the morning he came in our room with his labored breathing. He wanted to sleep with us. I gave him a treatment and we put him back in his bed. it is hard to listen to him breath that hard. He takes a quick inhale and then pushes it out fast but laboriously. The he work up again about 6 and was complaining that he could not sleep. I gave him another treatment and then gave him some liquid steroid. Now is his doing much better. I have to admit that the liquid steroid really helps to shorten the duration of his labored breathing. I hate giving it to him and it is actually left over from early winter but it does work. I may talk to the doctor to see if she can just give me some chewable pills that I can give him when he gets like that again. the nebulizer helps with the wheezing but I think the internal steroids help with his overall constriction.

I don't know what triggered this episode. We did go to the hockey game on Saturday night and he had a cookie with M&M's. I checked it but I was also distracted so I did not look at it well enough. The other thing may have been the leaves. The mold is high right now and that could be it. He usually never has red puffy eyes (except in the spring) and a scratchy throat. So that is why I think it was an allergic reaction instead of a cold/virus.

Well I am glad that I am home today to be with him it was heartbreaking to hear all this information about him from our babysitter.

Well that is for now.

Things I am grateful/thankful for:
- a smooth business trip with good on time flights (I am a bad traveler by myself)
-a beautiful sunset that lasted the entire plane ride
-missing my kids and having them wait up for me when I got home
-my fantastic husband that keeps the house going and takes charge of everything while I am away.

Trick-or-treat

We had a great trick or treat experience. Our neigbhor has a great pot luck and we end up hanging out at their house most of the night. The kids have sackfulls of candy and counted and tallied them last night.


Where's the bee going?



Mallory at her school party

Captain America attacks the tree.




Our double rainbow just before we went out for Halloween.

Naked butt picture. I need to take more. I love these pictures but have not taken as much of her since we have been so busy. More naked butt pictures to come.


I love to suck my thumb with anything, leaves, lovey's, mom's shirt, plastic bags, trash, whatever.


Julianne is done with soccer for the season. They had a great season. Their tournament was not as successful. They lost all the games mostly because they were not passing as much as the other team and they were bumped up to the higher division. So these teams were better and I could tell that their passing game was much more sophisticated than ours. Nathan also finished his season. He had a great time and loves it. He definitely gets the game and the concept and it was great to see his progression from being clueless the first game to trying to pass too much the last game. Mallory still has one more game. Their poor team has not won one game yet but they still try hard. They are looking good the last couple of games they just have a hard time scoring. Mallory is progressing she is still a little reserved, she has her spurts of aggressiveness and getting into the game and has other times where she is not as into it. She started tap dance, once a week, and is liking it. She has only taken two classes so far but seems to enjoy it.

Lindsay is standing up and cruising, well she has been doing that for awhile now. She puts everything into our mouth and loves her dad. She loves going over to him and having him hold her. She was crying the other day in her bed and I had to finish something before I got her so she cried hysterically for about 5 minutes. I finally made it up there to find that she had dropped her lovey's on the floor. I think she was crushed that she could not get them. It was too cute. Her top two teeth are coming in slowly. Since she is our fourth I now stick her in the shower with me. So we are over baths and she will probably grow up not really taking baths. We do not have time for baths. :)

I think that is a great wrap up.

Things I am grateful/thankful for:
-Another nice weathered Halloween
-Seeing the kids enjoy their candy
-Eating their candy
-Finishing painting Julianne's room