Staycation

We've been having lots of fun & relaxation on our "staycation" I came up with the term & thought it was pretty clever!  Vic had to use or lose his vacation time by February so he took time off work and we didn't have any plans for a vacation so we've been enjoying a staycation!  It's actually been really good for both of us to get our much needed sleep, exercise, & quality family time in.  After 6 months of crazy busy schedules & living apart this is just what we needed.  This update is very out of order, but here is the last month:

Whitney got her first major haircut last month so here she is after cutting off her 3" side wings.

Then last week I decided to finally try pig tails and Vic and I LOVE them!

So after 2 cute pictures I can show you this gross picture... Here she is right after waking up. I wait to give her a bath until after breakfast... Seriously... zoom up on this picture & see just how insanely messy this girl is when she eats.  It's like she enjoys threading food through her hair. It cracked me up when I walked in & saw a cheerio sitting on her head & had to capture just how messy she is & why I despise meal time!

 This is Tommy's devil face.  I always know I am going to find an unpleasant surprise when I see the sheer look of naughty JOY in his eyes. I never can catch it on camera, but I got lucky cuz he thought I was taking a picture of messy Whitney & not him caught in the act of feeding his sister and making a mess of her.  It is so weird to see how being naughty can make him so happy.  Hopefully that is a 2 year old thing and not part of his permanent personality!  All day long he is looking for trouble or an adrenaline rush.  He is constantly trying to climb higher and jump farther.  He even stands at the top of his balloon pit, turns around backwards, and falls without blinking or trying to brace himself.  He doesn't care if he jumps in the pool and has to drown a minute before we catch him... he comes up with a big grin & does it again.  He is so scary!

 This kid will never fall asleep anywhere but his bed or the car seat.  Lately he is struggling with trying to stay awake from 7am to 11pm with no nap.  We had to take a picture of proof that he will fall asleep elsewhere!  This is the first time he has done this.  One second he was wide awake, hyper, & begging for more food & we turned around to get it for him & when we came back with the food this is what we found.

 We fed Tommy's train obsession by taking him to Purdue's train tour of campus.

 He really loved it and gibbered the whole way about different things he saw.  Right now Tommy is speaking Donald Duck's language w/ a few English words thrown in here & there.  We keep wanting to get it on video, but every time we pull it out he stares at it & says "cheese".

 We took the kids to free Friday family night tonight and they both loved the swimming.  I was surprised there wasn't more people there.  Whitney adores Tommy & chases him all over the house, but lately she has been really funny and if he gets too close to her then she throws a fit.  This picture is no exception!  I was in the tube with her & she was really happy & Tommy saw Vic pull out the camera so he jumped in the tube to be in the picture & she just started bawling. (and of course was fine as soon as he went away)

 Here favorite part was the little geysers and gnawing on the tube. She is teething like crazy & gnaws on anything (even us!) She is making major changes this last month.  She took her FIRST STEPS on Tuesday, started climbing up the slide & now loves going down it (we have a little one in Tommy's room.)  She is signing "all done",  says mama, frequently says dada, and if you ask her for a kiss she'll start smacking her lips over and over.  She is also loving music. Anytime she hears ANY beat she starts bobbing her head and if she happens to be standing she'll bounce her little bum all over.  She is at such a cute stage right now!!!

 This one is blurry as Tommy was running back and forth too fast, but just wanted to show what a cute little center it is for free!

Tommy made this back in December.  I swear the uglier a craft is the more it makes me smile :)

 And like most crafts of Tommy's... here it is 10 minutes later!

 We made a valentine set for each grandparent (later had their picture in the heart). I made the ones on the right for Whitney's picture & he made his own.  He did pretty good.  If you have time you should try to spot the differences!  He is constantly thinking that everything he does is hilarious & he kept putting the nose on the eye ball, pointing to it, and snickering.... another thing I wish I could get on camera.  He laughs at himself all the time and it is the funniest thing in the world!  It takes a lot of control to not giggle when it for something naughty, a part of parenting that I never thought would be so challenging!

Superbowl Time!

We are lucky enough to have the superbowl here in our home court this year!  We went down to Superbowl village to check out the excitement. (Sadly our budget didn't fit the $6,000 game tickets price!!) We did however enjoy free concerts, games, & ice sculpting.  I had no idea how painfully slow ice sculpting is and how perfect it all has to be to balance it all right.

 We were lost & walked up to the Marriot RIGHT as the teams were loading onto their buses.  You would have thought the president of the United States was coming out with all of the police & security guards!  They are definitely treated like royalty.  I was so struck by the scene that I didn't think to take a picture until they were driving away.  This building in the background reminded me of how much I loved SLC when the Olympics were there.

 I had no idea how tiny a real race car is!  I guess watching Cars 20 times a week warped my view on race cars!

 Here we are outside the Kinect 360 dome.  They let you play a bunch of their games for free. It was pretty cool, but too much of a workout for me!  However, that is what will sell me on it in the future when deciding what system to get for Tommy when he's old enough.

 We were trying to decide what team to get our picture by when I saw my Grandma's favorite team right next to my brother's favorite team so that decided it for us!

 However, Tommy wanted it to be known that he is only a Chiefs fan.... thought that would make my brother smile :)

 They had the street lined with free games.  Tommy liked this one.  Vic & I were terrible at this game! We definitely won't be joining a horse shoe league any time soon!

 They had LOADS of different entertainment and what did this kid like the most?  The high burst of air blowing through the vents.  It was nice to sit down while he went wild all over this thing... and he was nicely entertaining for anyone that went by as he was throwing his head back in laughter every time he ran across it.

Happy Birthday Victor!

When I first met Vic he wasn't big on birthdays at all as all he ever got growing up was to pick what they had for dinner that night.  I grew up the opposite with my mom hosting the best themed parties that my friends didn't want to miss & being spoiled rotten with gifts.  Well I spoiled Vic for the first couple of years to show him just how wonderful a birthDAY can be.... and he somehow has charmed his way into a birthWEEKEND! ...with some pretty high demands, haha!  I of course would set him straight immediately, but he's been working so hard at work with long hours and then coming home and trying to still be super dad to the kids so how could I not give into his birthday demands?!

Here he is with a stack full of Atlanta Braves gifts.  He loved them all! I forgot to get a picture though.  Also, notice Tommy hasn't forgotten how wonderful it is to blow out candles so he is happily helping & had to have them lit one more time just for him.

 Vic loves his brothers & sisters like CRAZY.  Sometimes it seems a little too much, but I can't blame him cuz I'm crazy about my siblings too :)  Anyway, every year when I ask him what he wants he says he wants to see all of his nieces & nephews, brothers & sisters, (and mom & dad of course).  They now live across the nation from us, but LUCKY for this boy his sister lives in Virginia so he of course wanted to spend his birthday week with her. Here we are with her cute family. (Her husband is taking the picture)

 Vic & I went on our first real date since Tommy was born.  It is crazy that we waited this long!!! Our perfect little nieces watched the kids & put them to bed while we went on a SIX hour date!  I didn't think that would ever happen.  It was SO fun & we were both reminded why we should definitely get away more as it felt good to have a free hand to hold each other's hands and enjoy each other's company without baby talk mixed in every other sentence.  Here is Vic waiting for the show to start.

 What show you might ask?  Fiddler on the roof!!!  This is one of those plays that you can't leave without being in a better mood.  It is SO fun and energetic!

One of Vic's other birthday requests was to go skiing & snowboarding.  It was a pretty high demand seeing how it hadn't snowed anywhere & there wasn't a mountain in view.  So we found a hill that made their own snow.  It was weird to sit at the top of the ski hill and have snow all around and then look down & see fields of green!

 Vic & his nieces Alli & Izzy

 And since a vacation to his sister's, a show & skiing wasn't enough for this spoiled birthday boy we went to an inside water park afterwards!!!  Check out those wind burnt cheeks of mine!  I promise the kids were all having fun even though they all look grumpy in this picture!

 cute cousins

 Tommy LOVES water parks.  He especially loved the "frog pond" for toddlers.  Check out the JOY on this kids face... over, and over, and OVER.  He never tires of the same thing. Fact, as I'm writing this he is pointing, laughing, & making frog sounds :)

 Tommy & Aunt Kaylene

 Vic on the boogie board.  It's a pretty cool surf type ride.

 When we came home we finally had snow so we had to make sure Tommy got to see some just in case it didn't snow again!  He loved it.

 Whitney only liked it for about 1 minute and then she'd had enough.

 Vic loves teaching everything wild to Tommy so Tommy had fun throwing snow...

 ...and then eating it (as Vic taught him to do). So of course that is all he wanted to do until he froze his little face off & I made him come back inside. 

It was a great week in Virginia.  I loved that we went far enough away that Vic couldn't go into work on his days off and especially because Vic's sister really knows how to spoil her company!  

Friday the 13th

Happy Friday the 13th! (2 weeks ago!)  I went to a fancy Friday the 13th dinner party a couple of years ago & since we were going to be with Vic's sister this year I couldn't wait to recreate it!  Of course it wasn't so fancy & didn't have a band, but it was still fun :)

We laughed in superstitious' face by breaking all the rules.  Black is the color of death here and white is the Chinese color of death so I did everything in black & white w/ touches of red for gore!  That little white lantern had a light in it so it glowed without the flash on it.  We entered the room on the "13th" floor. (We were supposed to walk under a ladder too, but my sister-in-law was panicking a little with the open umbrellas so I didn't add that touch!)  Then a broken mirror and "spilled salt" around the centerpiece. 

I had that umbrella hanging from the light & another by the entrance.

Friday the 13th (by Christian belief/tales) is unlucky is because Judas was the 13th guest at the Last Supper  & he betrayed Christ (making #13 unlucky). Friday is unlucky as this was the day Christ was crucified.  Add them together for one unlucky day!!

                                     

That little piece of rolled up paper on every person's plate had a superstition on it.  Here are the tidbits:

*Step on a crack, you’ll break your mother’s back

 (a crack is the entrance to the grave)

*Break a mirror and you’ll have 7 years bad luck!

Why 7 years?.. You just broke the soul of whoever’s reflection was in the mirror and it takes 7 years for the body to fully rejuvenate.  Don’t want to wait 7 years?  Make sure the mirror can’t see any reflection by grinding it up & burying it in the moonlight!

*Walk under a ladder & you’ll have bad luck

(a triangle represents life & when you walk through a triangle you are awakening the spirits that live in it… even the evil ones that won’t be happy with being disturbed)

*Spill some salt, you’ll have bad luck

toss it over your left shoulder into evil’s eye lurking by

(Salt has always been considered a valuable substance capable of purifying and warding off evil spirits and evil spirits wait over the left shoulder)

*Release a sneeze & you’ll release your soul 

call out “bless you” to keep it safe! 

*Feel a shiver? 

Someone is walking over your future grave!

*An open umbrella in a house brings bad luck

The sun god will be very upset with you for offending it as you only need an umbrella to protect you from true sunlight

*If a black cat crosses your path you’ll have bad luck!

Black cats were believed to be witches that had been burned or helpers to witches, either way being a very evil animal

There are still TWO more Friday the 13ths this year so have some fun with them! :)

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year!!!  

How could we not bring in the new year on a good note with these 2 cheesers?!?

We planned on these two being in bed by midnight, but they must have known there was a midnight party coming because here they are at midnight happy as can be!

We went to Olive Garden on New Year's Eve. Tommy was so cute drumming those 2 bread sticks and as soon as I pulled the camera out he dropped them & shoved his hand by his mouth... when has he ever been camera shy?!

Whitney got a lot of compliments on her party dress. It has lots of fun sequence all over it that you can't see in this picture.

We didn't know anyone yet so we went to Faith Community Church and they had free swimming, sports, movies, a game room, and board games so we jumped in on game of Ticket to Ride with a couple people & another family that moved here only a few days after we did!

Vic was too busy with KMart during Christmas so we did our gingerbread houses really late!  I was so impressed with Tommy as I put the house together w/ the snow and he put the rest of the stickers on.  It looked really good a few minutes before this and he started adding and taking away in a destructive way so I hurried and snapped a picture!

We really got our money's worth out of this gingerbread house.  Here it is a few days later with the stickers rearranged a bit... and yes that is a train stuck in the side of the house! 

I snuck up on him a bit later and found him rearranging again.

The close up of his art work.  He is such a BOY!

Here is the final day of his house.  I thought it was cute he made it into a train house (I guess he was pretty determined to make that train get in there somehow!)  After this it was a tunnel, but it wasn't very sturdy so that didn't last long & Whitney kept trying to eat the leftover pieces so it finally made it to the trash!

We tried making a real gingerbread house and as you can see that didn't go over too well.  Now I see why people just hot glue the house together.  The frosting didn't do much & it drooped all over.... and Tommy wasn't as helpful with this house because all he wanted to do was eat it!

We had a train show come through Indianapolis and Tommy is obsessed with trains so we just had to drive down there.  Here he is with wooden trains.  I love wooden trains.  It is wonderful to see all that talent & detail that is put into them. 

They had a million Thomas the Train tracks & trains for the kids to play with.  Tommy was in heaven.

When we got home we got his out that we thought he was too young for and he LOVED it for day.  Then Whitney showed too much interest so he hid it and 2 weeks later we still can't find it! 

Tommy's favorite part was this underground train that made noises and had buttons for him to push and pick which train was going to come out of the tunnel.  He didn't take his paw off the pad for at least 20 minutes.  I had no idea he was so obsessed with tunnels until we came here. 

Another one of Tommy's favorite exhibits.  I made tunnels out of his mega blocks after this and he loves that! 

I couldn't have a post without Whitney!!  Here is her last picture before she got her hair cut!  She was having a ball in her jumper this day and we got some pretty cute video of her.   

Time to hide the pens

Um... guess it's time to have to start hiding the pens!  He's also been very interested in my markers this week so I should have known this was coming.