Our little boy is not so little anymore. Happy 5th Birthday Mario! You are and always were very cute!
Saturday, January 16, 2010
Wednesday, January 13, 2010
Our quick trip to London
I am a terrible mother who abandoned my 13 month old who I encouraged to sort of stop nursing... all 3 children on the brink of getting the chicken pox, with my mother who must be insane for taking on our mess...for 3 1/2 days. We left Saturday morning for London and I returned Tuesday morning, and everything went superbly well! The kids loved having my mom around b/c she actually pays attention to them. Sheila did give me the cold shoulder when I returned as Mario had predicted, but after a few minutes of holding her with her not looking me in the eye, she agreed to let me nurse her again and all was well.
Quick recap
Saturday: spend first 6 hours crying on and off for having left our children
Saturday night: arrived late, went out for a bit
Sunday: walked around a lot, Brittish Museum, found a CATHOLIC church - Westminster Cathedral, amazing Indian dinner
Monday: Mario worked in the morning while I walked around more: Trafalgar Sq, St. James Park, Buckingham Palace, Westminster Abbey, Big Ben. Parliament, National Gallery; lunch with Mario's boss, Imperial War Museum (spent a long time there, I guess Mario likes history), ice skating outside of the Natural History Museum, then took the tube to the East side of London to see the Tower of London at night.
Tuesday: get up at 4am to catch the plane back home in time to see MJ's Christmas program which had been rescheduled due to snow before Christmas.
(It was worth it!)
Quick recap
Saturday: spend first 6 hours crying on and off for having left our children
Saturday night: arrived late, went out for a bit
Sunday: walked around a lot, Brittish Museum, found a CATHOLIC church - Westminster Cathedral, amazing Indian dinner
Monday: Mario worked in the morning while I walked around more: Trafalgar Sq, St. James Park, Buckingham Palace, Westminster Abbey, Big Ben. Parliament, National Gallery; lunch with Mario's boss, Imperial War Museum (spent a long time there, I guess Mario likes history), ice skating outside of the Natural History Museum, then took the tube to the East side of London to see the Tower of London at night.
Tuesday: get up at 4am to catch the plane back home in time to see MJ's Christmas program which had been rescheduled due to snow before Christmas.
(It was worth it!)
Friday, January 1, 2010
Christmas continued
Other highlights from the trip were a few home improvement chores. Mario shared his electric skills by replacing 7 light fixtures in my parents' house. My mom gave us permission to remove the wallpaper in the upstairs guest bathroom. But once that was down, we just had to finish the project by painting the walls and cabinets.
Also, we were sad to leave the feet of snow in Virginia, but managed to get snow after Christmas in St. Louis which turned out to be 2 great sledding days. We took the boys to sled on the old sledding hill I went to as a kid (my parents live in a neighborhood with a golf course...hole 2 has a nice big hill!) The second great snow-sledding day happened the day we planned to leave, but Mario let me take MJ out while he packed up the car. We still were able to leave by 11:30am and arrived at 3am in Ashburn, just when it started to sleet/snow there! So, we unpacked the car, and woke up to MORE snow (I'm in snow heaven this winter!)
And as a final note of fun, my parents bought us a Wii and sent it to our house (they did not seem happy with us doing renovations on their home for free). The boys' tried canoeing together. MJ got the nickname "strong-arm" and Joey "left-turner" as holding his oar in the water seemed to be his best move.
Also, we were sad to leave the feet of snow in Virginia, but managed to get snow after Christmas in St. Louis which turned out to be 2 great sledding days. We took the boys to sled on the old sledding hill I went to as a kid (my parents live in a neighborhood with a golf course...hole 2 has a nice big hill!) The second great snow-sledding day happened the day we planned to leave, but Mario let me take MJ out while he packed up the car. We still were able to leave by 11:30am and arrived at 3am in Ashburn, just when it started to sleet/snow there! So, we unpacked the car, and woke up to MORE snow (I'm in snow heaven this winter!)
And as a final note of fun, my parents bought us a Wii and sent it to our house (they did not seem happy with us doing renovations on their home for free). The boys' tried canoeing together. MJ got the nickname "strong-arm" and Joey "left-turner" as holding his oar in the water seemed to be his best move.
Merry Christmas!
This year we spent Christmas with the Keppel side of our family in St. Louis. The 15 hour drive is long but definitely worth it. We had a great time... poor Ceali had the chicken pox, but she may end up giving it to our family (I did not vaccinate Joey and Sheila in the hopes they would get it naturally and build up their own immunity to it). So we'll see how that goes. We had a delayed Christmas dinner b/c of the illness, but it worked out well b/c then Kathy was able to join us (she has been working in Japan and spent Christmas in Seattle with her boyfriend's family). Suzanne and Bobby hosted an AMAZING dinner and then we were able to exchange our family gifts.
Saturday, December 19, 2009
Lots of Snow!
It has been snowing...wait, let me check...yes, it is still snowing. It has been snowing for 26 hours now (I can't say for sure if it snowed all night last night, but it started at 8:40pm Friday night and has been snowing since we woke up this morning). We really do love snow, and have had a lot of fun with it, but this is really a LOT of snow.
MJ loves to play in the snow. I think Joey wasn't very happy with snow being higher than his knees. Sheila is still trying to figure out how to walk well in her boots. After working so long on the driveway only to watch the pavement disappear before our eyes with continuing snow... we decided to stay in for the afternoon and keep warm. We wanted to decorate the trees (I just picked up our second one from freecycle...yay!) but we are going to work on that tomorrow. We are sad to be leaving all this snow as we are heading to St. Louis on Tuesday...maybe it will snow a *little* there.
MJ loves to play in the snow. I think Joey wasn't very happy with snow being higher than his knees. Sheila is still trying to figure out how to walk well in her boots. After working so long on the driveway only to watch the pavement disappear before our eyes with continuing snow... we decided to stay in for the afternoon and keep warm. We wanted to decorate the trees (I just picked up our second one from freecycle...yay!) but we are going to work on that tomorrow. We are sad to be leaving all this snow as we are heading to St. Louis on Tuesday...maybe it will snow a *little* there.
Wednesday, December 16, 2009
I guess we need to move the ladder
Sheila is quite the climber and can already make it up and down the slide in our basement by herself. She decided to raise the bar however by trying to climb ladders. Last night we managed to get a video of this. She had PJs on at first, but the feet were slippery. I thought I shouldn't post a diapered baby on the blog, but after Mary's post I guess naked babies are okay.
And this is not at all realated to the ladder, but a month ago during their K4J class, the boys made these churches. K4J is a really cute religious ed. program and last month their virtue and mission was to "love the church" I was pretty impressed with MJ's stained glass noodle window which he did entirely by himself (a teacher wrote the words on the bottom)
And this is not at all realated to the ladder, but a month ago during their K4J class, the boys made these churches. K4J is a really cute religious ed. program and last month their virtue and mission was to "love the church" I was pretty impressed with MJ's stained glass noodle window which he did entirely by himself (a teacher wrote the words on the bottom)
Tuesday, December 8, 2009
Sheila's birthday
Sorry for the delay in posting this. I really love snow, and if there is any on the ground, I make sure my family spends as much time in it as possible, and that usually means neglecting any chores that must take place inside the home.
Sheila woke up on her first birthday and I think she realized she was a big kid. First, she helped herself to some cheerios. We relaxed most of the day (except for my crazy idea to go to the post office to renew my passport which lasted from 12:30-2pm and everyone was going crazy). We finally had a late dinner and birthday celebration. I think she enjoyed her dinner and cake. Her brothers were desperate to try to help her unwrap her presents but we insisted on letter her try it herself. I think she got the hang of it near the end and was particularly interested in trying to rescue this furry thing from the red box.
Of course the day after her birthday we all got such a great gift...it SNOWED! We all played outside a little, but then I realized Sheila had a fever. I think it's just a cold and fever, but she's been hanging in there (and is cutting her 2 top front teeth).
Sheila woke up on her first birthday and I think she realized she was a big kid. First, she helped herself to some cheerios. We relaxed most of the day (except for my crazy idea to go to the post office to renew my passport which lasted from 12:30-2pm and everyone was going crazy). We finally had a late dinner and birthday celebration. I think she enjoyed her dinner and cake. Her brothers were desperate to try to help her unwrap her presents but we insisted on letter her try it herself. I think she got the hang of it near the end and was particularly interested in trying to rescue this furry thing from the red box.
Of course the day after her birthday we all got such a great gift...it SNOWED! We all played outside a little, but then I realized Sheila had a fever. I think it's just a cold and fever, but she's been hanging in there (and is cutting her 2 top front teeth).
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