Winter Break Starts Today!

What a busy day we've had. Ryan had his holiday dance at school this morning at 9:15am. They did dances to songs from around the world like Germany, Russia, and France along with the normal frosty the snow man and jingle bells. They used colorful streamers and parachutes for some of the dances. Then to my surprise they also danced with partners. It was very cute and entertaining.







Then at 1pm we had to be back at the school to help with the class party. They opted for a pizza party and also had cookies, cupcakes and lots of presents from friends and teachers. They also made gingerbread houses. It was a lot of fun but messy.

Drummer Girl

The movie of the week is Piglet's BIG Movie. Kaitlin has watched it many times. Which has been helping me get a lot of stuff done this week like wrap presents, bake cookies and the normal laundry and cleaning routine. During the movie Piglet gets lost and Christopher Robin and the animals set out on an expedition. He leads the line playing his drums and marches along. Kaitlin has become facinated by this and one day decided she wanted to be like Christopher Robin. She got out her drum and asked me to strap it on, she stood in front of the tv and marched and drummed along to the song. It was very cute. I'm just glad she was still doing it by the time I got my camera out.

Christmas is Coming....

We are counting down the days now!! I finally finished all of my shopping today. I do have to get a few gift cards on Saturday while we are out but that's easy and not at the mall!! I only had to go to the mall once and that was today. Kaitlin has been really good for the most part. She normally hates the shopping cart or her stroller but the past few outings we've had she's been a real trooper.



This week we had a quick visit from my sister Stacey and her daughter Meagan. They had been visiting Great Wolf Lodge again and since they were so close they decided to come and see us. She left yesterday morning and I went to a cookie exchange.



Saturday morning I was able to get Ryan and Kaitlin dressed up in Christmas/Holiday attire and take their picture in front of the tree. Kaitlin was of course bribed by chocolate but the end result was ok. Here are the pictures we sent out to family and friends.

Decorating for the Holidays

The tree is up!













This past weekend we decorated our house, inside and out. I did the tree and inside decorations while Chris took care of the outside lights and decorations. See, we have a neighbor across the street that has a house that lights up the street, we couldn't be underdone! Here is their house:










Chris went on Saturday to Lowes and got an 8 foot snowglobe for our front yard. Here's our yard:










Our neighbors to one side also got into the holiday spirit and decorated their roof with santa and his reindeer! Here's Jen and Jason's yard:










We'll see what's next!

A Happy Thanksgiving and Ryan Turns 7

We went on a trip up to my mom's to celebrate Thanksgiving and two days later to have Ryan's family birthday party. We had almost no traffic getting up to moms. We left Suffolk about 10:30am and got to Annandale about 1:15pm. WE had a great dinner with Turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes and all the other trimmings. After cleaning up it was followed by desert! Stacey, Bob, Meagan and Jack joined us at mom's so we had a full house!!

Saturday was Ryan's real birthday! He's now officially 7 yrs old. We went to Chuck E. Cheese to celebrate with family and friends. After playing and having lunch we went to Aunt Stacey's house for cake and presents. Let's just say I think when ever Ryan has a playdate we are going to make it manditory for each kid to take home something! We don't know where to put all this new stuff! He got game boy games, movies, puzzles, toys -his favorite a Robo Reptile!! He also got some clothes which he needed regardless if he wanted or not. He even made himself a hat to wear for his special day.

Ryan's 7th BirthdayParty

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What a day we had!! Six little boys running around having fun and playing games. We were happy when those parents came back! Ryan had a lot of fun at his sports themed party this year. We were suppose to have 8 boys but 2 were no shows. They boys made a pennant of their own as a craft. We then went outside and played a few sports related games and of course we had a pinata! I wonder if we will ever have a birthday again without one. After playing outside we came inside to make our own ice cream. It's called shake and make. It was messy but good. Everyone sang to Ryan and we had cake. Then we moved on to opening presents. Ryan liked everything he got and couldn't wait to open the packages. The party was from 1:30-4pm and Kaitlin slept through all of it! She woke up at 3:30 just in time to have a cupcake!

The Dismal Swamp

Saturday morning the Tiger Cubs had a "Go See It" to the Dismal Swamp. We needed to fill 2 requirments - to go on a nature hike and to visit a historical place. We met his den at 8am and when on a hike through the swamp (on a boardwalk). We saw a lot of interesting things and signs of where bears had been. We are glad we didn't actually see any! We learned that George Washington used the swamp for logging. We walked along the Washington Ditch (there are about 12 ditches) where the slaves dug the canal to bring the logs out of the swamp. It was very interesting.

Principal's List

Friday Chris and I got to have a Parent/Teacher conference at Ryan's school. They were handing out report cards and SOL testing results. Ryan got straight A's and that puts him on the Principal's List (Straight A Honor Roll). We are so proud of him. But it didn't stop there. We next got to see his SOL test results. He got perfect scores! On the math test he is ranked in the 99th perctile for the Nation and for Reading in the 97th percentile. (Meaning he is smarter than 99 and 97 % of 1st graders)! He is reading as well as a 2nd grader in their 5th month of school and his math skills are of the same level as a 3rd grader in the 7th month of school! He's learned all he can for 1st grade as far as math goes so he's pulled aside with a few other students and they have their own advanced class. After the good review we went to the school library where they were having a book fair and got a few books for a reward. (I think he's already read 2 of them)

Raking Leaves

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Ryan didn't have school on Friday so he wanted to rake the leaves. Fine with us of course! We had a bad storm the day before with a lot of wind and it seemed to have blown all the leaves to the fence line. All he really had to do was rake right down the side. He was doing a great job until Kaitlin wanted to help and started spreading the leaves everywhere. Ryan decided he wanted to jump in his pile so I told him to go inside and get some play clothes on. I was going to be going in to so I could put Kaitlin down for her nap. We were in her room reading books while Ryan went back outside. The next thing I know he was running back into the house and his face had NO color! He had seen a snake! He was so terrified. We had never seen snakes in our yard before. From that point on he wouldn't go outside. He was also very concerned for our dog Jessie who was outside at that time. He did calm down but it took a while.

Stacey's Birthday Celebration

While up in NoVA we had dinner and a surprise party for Stacey. Her real b-day is on November 16th. We went out to Red Lobster and had a good dinner (only thing bad is that it could have been a little faster). Kaitlin and Meagan enjoyed looking at the lobsters. They took many trips up to see them. We rushed back to Stacey's after dinner to beat her to the house. Her neighbors were suppose to be waiting inside to say surprise but only one family was there. The rest were at her neighbors house! It took a little stalling and coaxing but it all ended up ok. She was surprised. We had cake, ice cream and presents.

Visiting with Nonnie

This past weekend we went to stay with my mom because we were going to celebrate Stacey's b-day. We went up on Thursday after school got out (no school Friday b/c of Veteran's Day) and came home on Sunday. We visited Aunt Stacey and Meagan on Friday afternoon and had dinner with them on Saturday. Kaitlin did very well in the car this trip. Usually about an hour into the drive she's had enough and wants to get down. She has learned a new trick - how to get one arm out of the harness on her car seat! Good thing I even noticed it and when I did we were only about 5 mins from my mom's house. Ryan loves going to Nonnie's because she has so much fun stuff for him to play with. And he likes his "routine" at her house. Playing with all the same toys he did when he was a baby and he's getting a kick out of seeing Kaitlin play with the same things. Some of the things though he thinks are still "his" because he's the only one that ever played w/ them and now he technically is too old for them... oh well. Jack came over and Kaitlin loved that! The next day anytime she thought she heard someone outside the door she's say "Jack?"

Happy Halloween 2006

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We hope everyone had a great Halloween. Ryan went this year as the Human Torch from Fantastic 4 and Kaitlin was a Witch Fairy. She wouldn't wear her hat but if she did it would have been a lot cuter. We went out trick-or-treating about 6:15 and were done just after 7pm. Ryan and Kaitlin both had a really good time. Kaity was in the wagon most of the night but at the last few houses she got out and went up to the doors with Ryan. She loved the pumpkins she and Ryan carved and wanted to look at them very closely all night. All day today (the day after) she has wanted her pumpkin and the candy in it!! A lot of people had a hard time guessing what Ryan was. Most of them thought he was Dash from the Incredibles.

Brotherly Love

Yesterday Kaitlin was being very clingy. I was so tired of holding her, my back was hurting, my arms were hurting. I just couldn't pick her up any more. So Kaitlin decided to go and beg Ryan to hold her. This is the first time this has happened. He was very willing to show us how strong he was and that he could pick her up w/ no problem. I'm so glad the camera was close by because these are some of my favorite pictures to date!

Carving Pumpkins

Saturday we carved our pumpkins to prepare for Halloween. Kaitlin's is cute and Ryan's is scary. Kaitlin didn't know about putting her hands in the pumpkin but she saw us do it a few times so she dove on in. She got pumpkin all over her. She does love pumpkin seeds!!

Slide Show Experiment

Clark Farms Pumpkin Patch

This past Saturday we went to get our Halloween pumpkins. We went to Clark Farms which is about 30 mins from our house. It was a chilly day so we got pumpkins that had already been picked. It was very had to decide but we finally came to a decision. Kaitlin loved looking at and touching the pumpkins. She picked out a few and we chose which one was best. Ryan found his almost right away. After finding our pumpkins we went on a hayride. It took us out to the patch and back. Kaity wasn't so sure about the "hay" and wouldn't smile for any picks. Next weekend we will carve the pumpkins. Ryan has already sketched out the scary face for his.

Ryan's New Bedroom Set

Here it is. For all of you I've been telling about this. Here is Ryan's new Flexa bed. We had such a hard time deciding which of the combinations we should get but this seemed to work out best. It takes up a lot of room but he loves it. Last night was his first night in his new bed and he could spread out in every direction and not touch anything! He also did his homework on his new desk and found a few other things to do up there too. He even went to bed early last night because it was going to take a while to find a "comfy spot."