Sunday Dinner

Larry started a Pot Roast on the slow cooker this morning and I thought it would be nice to invite Adam and family over for dinner tonight. It was such a nice afternoon that the kids were able to play outside some. Olive was beyond tired and was running around like a little wild child, but she loves when Isabelle comes over and follows her everywhere. I think she knows she's a girl like herself. When she goes to the Raible's, she is surrounded by all boys, and only having a brother to hang out with, she enjoys being around girls. Somehow I don't count though,as she prefers Daddy over me any day.

I was able to get some cute shots of the kids. Lucien slept like an angel the entire time he was here. In fact, I had let him use Olive's old bouncy seat and Adam and Bev took it home with them. Evidently, he hasn't slept well in quite some time and the seat may be the cure. When your desperate, sleep deprived, you will try anything. I remember putting my kids in car seat carriers in the bed, in the crib, a bouncy in the bed. There comes a point when you are so tired, that you will do anything out of desperation in order to get the kid to sleep for just 2, maybe 3 hrs. straight. I remember with Spencer, I finally put him in another room, put earplugs in and said screw it.

Oh the good old days. I don't miss that part one bit, but I do miss having a sweet little baby to cudde with, but not enough to revisit those days again ;) I'm content with my 2 and thankful that they are good sleepers. And..Spence is my "best snuggler" after all, as he calls it. In fact, when he is upset about something, he uses it as leverage. He will say "well then I'll never be your best snuggler again...." It's his trump card....and it works. Normally he says it through tears, and it just breaks my heart. It breaks his heart too b/c he loves that more than anything. I will cry my eyes out the day he decides he's too big to snuggle with me anymore....unless he's like 15 obviously.

My Funny Valentines !!

When I woke up on Thursday, I had the best intentions of getting the kids dressed in their Valentine's outfits and getting some pictures. But, as usual, I was rushing, and it didn't happen. By the time I arrived home from work, the kids were already eating dinner....and spaghetti at that. Olive, who had on an adorable red/purple dress was covered in tomato sauce despite being a double bibber...Spence was at least salvageable.

Determined to get pictures for albums/videos (that I never finish), I cleaned them up as best as I could and took some snapshots. The one at the bottom left is of Spencer after going to sleep with wet hair the night before...this is a usual look for him on mornings after bath night and requires much hair gel to look halfway decent/presentable for school. The one of Olive in the box shows her favorite place to be...she climbs in, then out, then in, then out, then in,......

Recently, Spencer and I had been reading the book Charlie Brown's Valentine. In the story, Pigpen makes a special Crunchy Munchy Valentine Snack for the Peanuts' Gang. Spencer decided that he wanted to make the snack on V-day, so I picked up the ingredients for the crunchy munchies and we made them as soon as I got home. The main ingredient was marshmallows, which were a big hit with Olive (as seen above). I was also showered with wonderful Valentine gifts and cards from Larry and the kids. I received a Diamond heart necklace, a flower windchime and a cool ceramic wall clock/thermometer for the deck area..oh, and a whole bag of Ghirardelli Dark Chocolates. I can't wait until Spring to put out the clock and windchime!

Let it Snow!!

They are predicting anywhere from ...oh... 3 to 10 inches tonight. Who knows though....back in 1992, they predicted 1-2 inches of ice and we ended up with 22 inches of snow. The flakes began coming down around 4:30 this afternoon. Spencer was excited to go out and have a snowball fight. But...the snow was too icy and wouldn't cooperate. Olive made an appearance and liked walking on the slippery stuff too!! Hopefully there will be enough left tomorrow for the kids to ride the sled/saucer down the hill in the backyard...or at least build a snowman. I hope the Subaru comes through for me in the morning!!

Olive is walking!!

I haven't posted in a week. So much has happened, that I don't know where to begin. First off, the biggest news of the week is Baby Lucien entered the world on Jan 30th!! Mother/Father and baby are doing well. I will post some pics soon. Every time I go over to visit the little guy, I forget my camera.

As far as my crew, we have made it through another week, sickness-free! Although, Spence and I went to a birthday party yesterday at Gattiland, so that could all be ending soon. Say some prayers!!

This past week, the little Olive finally grew tired of crawling around and began taking steps....Watch Out World!!! She is growing up so fast now. I'm realizing how different boys and girls are. For example: Olive loves babies. She walks around the house babbling "baby baby baby". She carries any stuffed animal and loves on it. She also loves books. She brings me books to read to her. I used to have to literally hog-tie Spencer down to read him a book. Not Olive....she just sits patiently and then points to the pictures. She is a jealous little thing though, and doesn't like to share me with her brother. If I'm reading her a book and Spencer joins us, she hits him. Luckily, he is very easy going and thinks it's funny!

Roller Skating is still Fun!!!

Today was a great Day!! I got to be a kid again today, reliving my youth through my Son. This morning, Mom called with the bright idea to take the kids roller skating. It has been so cold, and the kids have been basically sick and stuck inside the past month, we all needed to get out and have some fun. Honestly, I didn’t know if Spence was old enough or would have enough balance to roller skate, but I thought..what the heck, and with that, we headed down to Champs Rollerdome. Larry and Olive came too and Adam and his kids met us there. I hadn’t been skating since I was in Elementary School…

Turns out, things are a little different now that I’m 35. For instance, I don’t have my own skates like I did when I was 8, so I had to use rentals. At 8, I hadn’t yet stretched my abdominal region out to a frightening diameter, leaving myself (to put it nicely) with a slight decrease in muscle tone. The music they play these days sucks! I didn’t recognize one song. Back in the day, they used to play classics like “Rappers Delight” by the Sugar Hill Gang, or various hits from the then ultra-popular movie, “Xanadu”. Also, the roller rink seems much smaller than it did when I was 8. But, other than that, everything (i.e.: disco ball, strobe lights, video games, snack bar) was exactly as I remembered it.

Larry doesn’t roller skate, or ice skate, or ski. He says he doesn’t like the sensation of having no control over his feet. So, he was of no help out on the rink today, but he did have the important job of watching Olive, who, but the way, was shaking her little booty the whole time, loving the music and the lights. Mom was there to help him/us too! Adam skated, so it was up to us to help guide Spence and Isabelle. Jenna, who is 8, has been skating for quite some time and did her own thing.

Going into this, and seeing other small children around Spence’s age skating fairly well, I figured Spence would be a natural like his Mom, but I was mortified when I saw that he could not even stand up. I mean, it was like his legs were made of Jello. One trip with him around the rink and it felt like my back/abdomen were ripping apart (I know, pathetic) because I was constantly pulling him up, getting on the floor, helping him balance, etc. There’s no way I can explain just how terrible the poor kid was. Isabelle looked like a pro compared to him. She would scoot along, and hardly ever fell. I couldn’t understand how he could be so bad….it had to be Larry’s genes. Finally, he gave up and wanted the skates off. I couldn’t blame him. His poor arms have to be at least 2 inches longer with all the pulling I did on them today. When I went to take off his skates, I realized the problem….Larry had tied them on so loosely that there’s no way the kid could balance himself. He had no support around his ankles. Larry argued that tying the skates tighter would not help the poor guy, and it didn’t matter anyway, because Spence was done…he wanted to play air hockey.

While they played, I went out and did some more skating with Adam and Isabelle and, not to brag or anything, but…. I’ve still got it!! It’s like riding a bike I guess. I am still able to skate as well as I did when I was a kid. I mean, since I hadn’t skated in so many years, I didn’t know what to expect.
Eventually I was able to talk Spence into putting the skates on one more time….and would you believe it…it was like a new kid. He was so much better. He had great balance and was able to skate around the rink with me, no problem. I would skate backwards and hold his hands while he was facing me. It helped with his balance. He was so proud of himself, and I was so proud of him..and relieved that he hadn’t inherited Larry’s genes after all, it was just poor shoe-tying.

It was getting late and we were talking about leaving, but then they announced that they were going to have races. Of course, Spence and Isabelle couldn’t race..you have to be able to skate on your own. Jenna decided she would race and she did great!! She didn’t win, but came close. Adam said he wanted to race and asked me if I would. Now…..let me tell you…..at age 8, there was no way in hell I would’ve gotten out on that rink in front of all of those people to race. But, at 35, I said “what the hell” and decided to do it….I’m breaking down walls here people !!!! When they announced that it was time for the parent’s race,I didn’t really mind going b/c I thought it was a co-ed race. Turns out, that’s just a rouse to get people out there. Once out on the rink, they divided us up. Of course I couldn’t leave at that point, I’d look like a coward. So, I had to be tough, and do it. I looked to Adam for support, he gave me the “kick some ass look”, but then we both looked to my right….. and there stood a woman in a muscle shirt, cut-off jeans and her own pair of speed skates. We both knew I was already defeated. I tried to stay strong, standing timidly in my cords, turtle neck and some cheap rentals. My only solace was that the other Mom’s in the race seemed normal like me, I thought I would have a good chance at beating them…they had rentals too. But, alas, I didn’t do so great…I came in 5th out of 6. Muscle shirt woman beat everyone by a landslide. The best excuse I have for my weak performance is that I didn’t have good pole position. I had a great start, but you had to skate around cones, and I was way on the outside. I was also kind of cautious taking my turns, because the one thing I didn’t want to do was fall. When Adam’s turn came, he got off to a bad start, but still finished in the top 3 and just like back in 1980, received a free Coke!! I was very proud of him and of both of us really for getting out there and trying. That’s something I never really had the chance to do as a kid since I didn’t play any sort of organized sports. After the races, we took a few more spins around the rink and then decided it was time to call it a day…and what a wonderful day it was!!

I know the pictures aren’t great…they were taken by my phone, but I thought I’d post them anyway.

Surprise!

Yesterday we threw a Surprise 30th Birthday Party for Adam and a Surprise Baby shower for Bev! It's hard to say if they were really surprised...with so many people in the know, somebody was bound to slip up and say something. But, we had a great time nonetheless. The kids played Wii downstairs while adults enjoyed the playoff games upstairs. Olive had a great time, despite skipping her afternoon nap.

Long Time Gone

It has been too long since I posted. My best excuse, and it's legit, is that I broke yet another camera. I had so many pictures I wanted to put on here, but couldn't. I bought a new camera this weekend, so now..problem solved. Olive's first birthday!! She had 2 actually. One on her actual birthday, which was held in Texas and another party we had for her here at home. Unfortunately, she was sick and running a fever at her party at home. But she still managed to eat some of her cake. In Texas though, she had a ball and made a huge mess with chocolate brownie cake !!

The rest of the month has been spent with our family fighting another flu-like virus. This weekend, we find ourselves healthy, and thankful for that. Olivia is still not completely walking, but is taking small steps unassisted. She also says the word "baby" now...she likes playing with her baby dolls...she has a love-hate relationship with them. One minute she loves on them, the next she chews on them and finally she beats the floor with them. Spencer's newest love is the Nintendo Wii, he's been spending some quality time at his Uncle Adam's playing Wii bowling.