Tuesday, December 30, 2008

Have You Ever Had One Of These Moments?


This photo was taken just prior to opening Christmas presents at home. (The first of our three Christmases.)

I LOVE this picture because it so accurately portrays our life. No matter what Mommy and Daddy smile! The boys may......have an explosive diaper, two year old tantrum, scream with belly aches, wake in the middle of the night for the 5th time, throw up all over the back seat, etc. AND STILL we SMILE!

This evening I had one of these moments. Lucky, Rolly and I were with a friend and her daughter at a hands-on toy boutique. It was time to go. Lucky did not want to go.

I said would you like Mommy to carry you or would you like to walk? *Mind you I was carrying 22 lb. Rolly in my arms too.*

Lucky cried and lay on the floor at this question.
So what did I do?
I posed the question 3 more times....and Lucky threw himself on the floor again and again.

Then I decided to tell him I was leaving. As I took my last step out of the store I looked at my friend and said "I hope this works." And guess what? It actually did!

We made it. No crazy outbursts (on mommy's end) and smile firmly, if not plastered, in place.

Ever have one of these moments?

Sunday, December 21, 2008

Christmas At Home

"Merry Christmas to God!"


We want to be able to start Christmas traditions of our own, which isn't so easy while traveling. So today we celebrated Christmas at home. It was really nice. We ate breakfast together (something we almost never do on Sundays before church). We went to church together, came home to my first-ever, home-cooked Christmas meal (that I prepared with Pongo's help-It turned out really well!) Then everyone took a nap before we had "Kissmiss."

We read the Christmas story to the boys and talked about the reason we give gifts at Christmastime. Jesus was God's gift to the world, the best and most important gift. We give gifts to everyone we love, just like God gave his son, Jesus, as a gift to the whole world because He loves them. At this point in our talk, Lucky ran over to the tree and proclaimed "PRESENTS!" Pongo and I looked at each other and shrugged, we tried. So the boys opened gift after gift. When we were all done Pongo asked Lucky why we opened gifts and Lucky said "Because of Jesus!" So he really was listening.

At dinner later Lucky very sweetly began to tell everyone at the the table "Merry Kissmiss!" Pongo looked at Lucky and said, "Merry Christmas to you too!" Lucky said, "No! Merry Kissmiss to God!" Now if that isn't what Christmas is about I don't know what is. Merry Christmas to God-indeed.

Saturday, December 20, 2008

So This Is Christmas

I can't get the lyrics, "So this is Christmas, What have you done? Another year over. And a new one just begun." out of my head. What have I done? Well.... I think the better question here is what have I not done? (except keep up with my blog) To say the LEAST we have been busy. Everyday is jam-packed with activity. So to get you up to speed...


Thanksgiving- We drove 7.5 hours to visit my mom and family (FYI: they only live 4.5 hours away-I suppose I don't have to tell you that driving with two little men is no fun at all). Then we went to see Pongo's parents. Thankfully they live sort-of on the way back home, which helped break up the trip some....still driving=no fun!

When we finally got home I had to marathon clean my house. Packing=disaster area. Unpacking=Even BIGGER disaster area.

The following weekend Pongo's parents visited. They helped fix problems with both our washer and dryer that we totally wouldn't have known how to fix otherwise. Poppy (Pongo's dad) helped put up the Christmas lights on the house too. Mimi (Pongo's mom) went to a Christmas Brunch with Rolly and me at the area country club. It was nice.

In our "spare" time Pongo and I have been members of a YFL team at the YMCA (get the "Y" part now? It's set up like football with professional football team names, playoffs, and super bowl). Anyway we competed and when I say competed I mean, we tried to completely obliterate the other teams. In fact, there was one team that was so completely die-hard that we had to stay at the gym until it closed on the last day to ensure victory during the playoffs. Come to find out, one of that team's members is actually handicapped. I felt bad about trying to annihilate them, but that didn't stop us. We made it to the super bowl, and WON! Not that I'm at all competitive. :)


We had to crazy rush around on Monday-driving at ridiculously high speeds (literally and figuratively) to make it to our Christmas Pictures appointment. We made it and successfully mailed cards out on Tuesday. Most of you should have received them by now.


Every weekend in December we've had a Christmas party/event to attend. So yes...we are busy.

The boys are doing well. Rolly is rolling all around, talking up a storm. At Rolly's 6 month check up on Tuesday we discovered that he is still in the 90th percentile for weight and 75%ile for height. So he's still a bit chunky for his height but not too disporportionately so. He says the following letter sounds: l, g, m, b and just today started with d. He also does this really funny thing when you ask him questions....he says "oh" real loud. It's pretty funny. Of course he's still teething. And since he's teething has a cold. His 3rd tooth is nearly, officially in. I'll keep you posted. (I know you'll be on the edge of your seat until that announcement!) He's sitting pretty well, but gets a little over excited still. He stands constantly holding on to my hands. Overall he's doing well.


Lucky is a ham-plain and simple. His vocabulary is off the charts. This week he used the following words correctly in sentences: underneath, backwards, upside down. Impressed? Me too! As far as Santa goes he has no idea what's up with the guy in red suit, he just says, "Mommy, Look at that man with the long hairs!" when we see him.

So this is Christmas-or rather this is the lead in to Christmas.


Here's a few pictures from lunch with Santa yesterday. It was fun, even though we don't know who Santa is.


This is the only shot that I got. Lucky very quickly decided holding his brother's hand was not worth being so close to the man with lots of hairs.

This is Lucky's first attempt to talk to Santa. He came up to Santa's leg then walked about 5 feet away from him and shouted. "I like toys, Santa!"

So Lucky decorated his cookie like he was supposed to, then proceeded to eat a spoonful of icing before I could snatch it away. He now thinks that all parties are excuses to eat cookies. He said tonight when we told him we were going to church for a Christmas party, "We go to church and eat cookies, Mommy?"