Lunch with Santa!

I know, I know, it's been a while since I've posted a new blog. We've had one sick kid after another, and I think the colds are now making another round! So unless Spring comes tomorrow, it might be a while before I have three healthy children all at the same time!

Gamma & Papa came up for the weekend for Dominic's birthday. We had such a good time, despite the snow and Sprout card fiasco. I'll get in to that on my next blog.

Saturday we had such a fun lunch. A local resort here has a lunch with Santa. For $12.95 for adults (the kids are young enough they ate free), we got to have lunch with the big man himself. While the food is average, however very kid friendly (chicken fingers, hot dogs, mac'n cheese) it really is a fun event. They have a characture artist and a guy there doing balloon animals. We had the cutest little characture done of the three kids. When Santa actually "arrives" you hear what sounds like his sleigh and reindeer landing on the roof. I was a little freaked at first, until I realized what it was. It was sooooo cool to see the kids excitment when they realized what was happening.

We attended last year, and this year we didn't make the same rookie mistakes we did last year. Lines got a little long early on last year, so this year, before Bryan even had our table, I took Christina & Dominic and we went and got in line to get our characture. I think he did a really good job, but by the time he finished ours, the line was huge! We did the same thing for lunch too. Everyone was in line for pictures and balloons, so we actually made our way right up with no waiting. Santa is what we need to work on for next year. Once that sleigh lands, I'm going to go up and wait at his chair because by the time he made his entrance, kids were EVERYWHERE waiting! All and all though, it was well worth it. Dominic went up and sat on Santa's lap. Ethan joined him and my big girl Christina stood with her brothers and told Santa what she wanted! No tears from anyone! It truly was a Christmas miracle!

Ok, this is it for tonight. I'm going to do a blog tomorrow about Dominic's big day. I won't leave you waiting though. The card DID NOT make the show. Needless to say, I'm not happy! Fill you in on the rest tomorrow!

Here's some of our favorite pictures from Saturday:

Dominic, Christina & Ethan's characture! Isn't this the cutest!?!

Christina & Gamma drinking their lemonade at lunch.

Christina & Dominic waiting in line to see Santa.

And I saved the best for last (drum roll please):

Dominic, Ethan, Christina & SANTA!!!!!

Our trip to the Fire Station

Dominic loves fire trucks. I would even go so far as to call him a fire truck fanatic. Well he just happens to be lucky enough to have a grandfather who is a volunteer fireman in the area here. So we called Papa Phil last week to see if we could come over and show Dominic the fire trucks. Papa said he'd be more than happy to show us around. So on Saturday we made our way over to the fire station and had a wonderful time! Even Christina was getting in to it.

Here are some of my favorite pictures.

Christina wearing Papa's fire hat.

Dominic "driving" the fire truck.

Dominic, Ethan & Christina sitting on the truck.

Dominic playing with the big tire (you can see his reflection in the center).

All and all we had a great time. Can't wait to do it again when Ethan is a bit bigger and he gets into it! Thanks Papa!

Dominic James

Ok, so my last post was a little long winded on Dominic's card. My husband was the only person to post a comment. And his comment was filled with sarcasm. However, in his defense, he has had to hear (and see) me check my blog and complain that no one is commenting. So thank you, I think, dear for posting.

I just want to let everyone know, I have finished my work on Dominic's card. After this, you will no longer have to hear about it until I start work on Christina's card for her 4th birthday. I take that back, you may actually hear about it again on December 7th (Dominic's birthday), when we find out if his card made the show or not. I really hope it does. Let me know what you think. I personally think it turned out pretty cute!

Anyway, here's the card:

On another Dominic issue, he truly is the funniest little guy. For the most part, he's so easy going about anything. It's always, "Ok, mama" which is nice. At some point I'm sure he's going to get tired of all the things I do to him, but I had to do this one and he happily took part.

Bryan brought home a box the other night. When we asked what was in it, he said Lee at work gave him an old Halloween costume that both of her kids wore. I was a little skeptical, but thought we'd check it out.

So this is Dominic as Humpty Dumpty.

Now I had previously wanted the kids to be the Wizard of Oz next year (Christina as Dorothy, Dominic the Tin Man and Ethan as the Cowardly Lion), but I've changed my mind. Someone WILL wear this costume! It is tooooo cute! I think I can even put white tights under the pants to make them more like knickers (I think that's the word). So if anyone has any good other nursery rhyme characters for me for Christina & Ethan I'd love to hear them!

I'm done for the night. Let me know your thoughts!

Planning Dominic's Birthday Card

I'm a little behind in my planning of Dominic's birthday card for this year. While I have about a month until his actual birthday, I need to get the card done so that I can get it sent in for the birthday segments on Sprout Network.

This year it WILL happen. Dominic's card HAS to make the show. I'm obsessed. I should back up and tell you what this is all about.

Sprout network used to have a show called "The Birthday Show" that was all of 10 minutes long, and they showcased like 6 or 8 home made birthday cards that were mailed in. Christina watched this everynight before going to bed. So for her 2nd birthday I used construction paper and made a really hokey Elmo card and mailed it in. As luck (or as I like to say, my artist skills) would have it, my card made the show. It was by far the coolest thing on TV that day! We TIVO'd it and have since put it on DVD so we'll have it forever!

The outside of Christina's Elmo card.

The inside.

So needless to say, I was cocky, if I got Christina's card on TV, I could do a better card for Dominic's first birthday, mail it in, and it would for sure make the show. Since he really wasn't in to anything Sprout character wise, I decided to do Bob the Builder. I spent weeks cutting out orange and yellow squares to make Bob's shirt. And gluing them down was even more of a pain. But I was certain this card was going to make the show.

Outside of Dominic's card.

Inside of Dominic's card.

I'm sure by now you've figured out Dominic's card didn't make the show. I was so bummed. (Now that I look back, the card was kinda dorky.)

So anyway, I again decided to make Christina a card for her 3rd birthday. Afterall, she made the show last year. Well, Sprout has changed the format now, and it's a part of a 3 hour long program and they do birthday's throughout it. So now we were going to have to sit through a super long show just to see if my card made it. I'll save you the suspense - IT DID!!!! She even had some cute little comments on the pictures from the girl that hosts the show!

Here's the card:

So now if you're keeping score (which I am) it's Christina 2, Dominic 0. Dominic's card is going to be the COOLEST card this year. We went to two different stores to find paper, and I'm in the process of finding the best picture of Thomas I can copy to make the ultimate birthday card.

Ok, yes, I'm a little obsessed. But I will get Dominic's card on TV this year. With that being said, I'm going to go start looking for my Thomas picture and I'll keep you all posted on my progress. Say a prayer for me and my card!

The things I've learned from preschool

Christina walking to school in early September.

For those of you that don't know, in September of this year Christina began preschool. Bryan and I debated long and hard about the decision to send her. For me, I wanted her to go so that she could interact more with other kids, it wasn't so much for the learning. Bryan supported my decision, however I knew he was more nervous than I was.

We had so many reasons that said she didn't have to go, she had just mastered potty training, she had a new baby brother at home, she's never been left with anyone since she was 6 months old, the list could go on. We both cried but told ourselves that at any time we could take her out and send her next year.

Hanging up her coat and backpack on her hook with Mrs. Wollf.

Fast forward 3 months and after the first week of tears by all three of us, Christina is loving it. She talks about all the kids in her class, brings home the cutest little projects (and even makes things for her brothers), but I think the best part has been the fun songs she's taught us! Bryan, Dominic and Ethan may disagree, but I've enjoyed learning my months of the year put to music, about a squiggly worm in an apple and now the latest one stuck in my head is "The Family of the Sun" (to the tune of "The Farmer in the Dell").

It goes like this:

The family of the sun, the family of the sun,

there are nine planets in the family of the sun.

Mercury is hot. Mercury is small.

Mercury has no atmosphere. It's just a rocky ball.

That's all I'll post of the song, I'm sure you get the idea. If you would like the rest, I do have it memorized, and I could always email it to you if you really want it.

All and all school has been a wonderful experience for us. Christina is loving it and learning to be a little more outgoing and independent. Mom and dad are learning that our little girl is growing up and she can do well without us. Dominic just loves the fact that sissy's school has a playground that he gets to play on when we pick her up. And Ethan, hopefully is absorbing some of the solar system knowledge!

Ethan the thumb sucker

I have to start this by saying it truly is the cutest thing I have EVER seen!

Within the last few weeks Ethan has turned into our little thumb sucker. I was a little aprehensive at first, but seeing him with that little thumb in his mouth has won me over.

Christina and Dominic both took a pacifier. I should say take, since Dominic still has his, and Christina uses hers still at naps and bedtime. We've tried several different options to get rid of them, but in the end, we buy more or give them back. We're wimps.

I said this time I'd try and go without. See if we could get him to NOT take one. But with nursing, and him constantly sucking or crying, we went ahead and tried. When he took to it we figured we'd have another one with a "mouth" (Christina and Dominic's name for their pacifiers) and for a while there we did. But he's very happy now with his thumb instead. Infact, if you try to give him the pacifier, which I usually try to when I go to put him to bed, he spits it out and in pops the thumb.

It's actually nice that he can "find" it in the middle of the night and sooth himself back to sleep. I still sometimes get screams from Christina that she can't find her mouth in the middle of the night!

I guess I need to remember that no kid (at least none that I know) graduated from high school with his thumb in his mouth. I know at some time we're going to have to break all three of them of these yucky habits, but for now, well I'm just happy they sleep!

It's time to Trick or Treat!

We just got in from what was by far, my favorite trick or treating experience EVER! I probably said the same thing last year- or the year before that, however, I now know that I was mistaken.

All day today the talk has been about going to get candy. What do we say before and after, holding hands when we walk down the sidewalk, etc. Around 4 o'clock, Christina was jumping up and down saying, "I'm so excited, I can't wait for Halloween to come!"

Christina was a bumble bee, Dominic a pumpkin and Ethan wore his pumpkin onsie. Christina had to bring the big pumpkin canvas bag to dump her bucket in as it got too full. Dominic on the other hand feared he would never see the candy again if it got dumped, so he opted to scream "NO, MINE!" at me as I tried to dump it!
We only hit about 15 or so houses, but the best was Christina telling us, "this is so much fun guys" over and over. She even came out of her little shell and was quite loud in her "Trick or Treat" and "Thank You". Dominic was also a hit, if he was offered the bucket of candy to choose, they would actually have to pull it back or I would have to stop him, because he just kept filling his pumpkin!

All and all the weather was great, the kids were adorable, and everyone had a super good time. The best part of all is I didn't even have to dress up and I now have a great stash of chocolate!

I know next year will be even better (because Ethan will get candy too)!

Happy Halloween!

So I've finally started that blog

I've been thinking about starting a blog for a while now. But with three little ones underfoot, and the OLDEST being 3, my spare time is usually spent - oh wait, I don't have any of that! So I've decided I'm going to make time to do this.

With so much of our family out of the area, it'll be a nice way for everyone to see what the kids are up to. Thanks Mandy for blogging about your two cuties- you've been my inspiration that this will work!

With that being said- here's what's been going on at our house lately!

We've recently been making some changes to our bed time routine. As you can imagine, getting a 3 year old, a 22 month old and a 3 month old to bed it night is not an easy task. Multiply that with the older two sharing a room, and for a while it was party central in the kids room until 11:30 some nights (starting this at say 8ish)! I'm convinced they would have gone on until the sun came up if we wouldn't have gone in and stayed there until they fell asleep.

So now, it's Ethan down by 8, Dominic up to bed by 8:30, and Christina gets to stay up with Mommy & Daddy to watch one of "our shows" until Dominic is asleep, then she's up to bed. It's worked out really well. With that being said, the conversation she and I had yesterday at nap time cracked me up.

I told her that she needed to take a nap, or she wasn't going to get to stay up late and watch mommy & daddy's shows. After several attempts to get out of napping, she finally said,"I'm GOING to take a nap, but what's on tonight anyway, Surbibor (Survivor)?" It was too funny!

Ok, so I'm going to try and post this, and maybe attempt a picture or two before I call it a night. Hope everyone enjoys!