Why I Love My Family

There are a MILLION reasons why I love my family but yesterday and today gave me a few more reasons why:
Yesterday I looked at the calendar and realized Valentines Day Weekend ALSO is Presidents Day Weekend so we have Monday off. I sent a quick email to Tim and asked him what he thought about taking the kids and Mickey (our dog) down to Gatlinburg for the weekend, I got an email back within minutes saying "WHY NOT, we love to travel, let's do it, heck yes!!!" So we booked a BEAUTIFUL 3 bedroom cabin in Gatlinburg for 3 nights that is pet friendly. We will leave Friday afternoon and return Monday night. I love my families love for travel and how important it is to us. For us, it is all about making memories that last a lifetime for us in our marriage and our kids, which actually leads me to the next point. . . . . . .
FRIDAY NIGHTS IN OUR HOUSE! It has become our tradition that on Friday nights we go out for dinner which is awesome (tonight we went out and celebrated Luke's b-day and they sang to him which he loved) and then we usually hit Target or Walmart for a bit to get stuff for the weekend or for Family Night (candy, snacks, etc.). Then we head home, put on comfy clothes and play a family game. These games usually consist of made up things like foil baseball, etc. Tonights game:

That's right, a TEENIE TINY baseball bat and a nerf football- we used it to play homerun derby. Tim and I took turns pitching to the kids and to eachother:


The rules were, if you hit the back wall of the dining room HOMERUN. We put a laundry basket on the dining room table: if you made it in there a bonus 5 runs : )

The kids stayed pretty even the whole game, and enjoyed the game emensely:





Tim was schooling me until the final round where I got TWO in the basket. Tim then came back in the final round and beat me by 2! Bummer, but what a fun night.
This is one of the MANY reasons why I love my family!!!!!
So....... this time next week we will be in a beautiful cabin in Gatlinburg, wonder what games we will think of for family nights there!?!?!

Tomorrow............ my baby turns 8 years old, I can't believe it!!!!!!


I'll update with his big day later on this weekend, I'm sure it will be great. I am so blessed to be his mother!

Dinner Gone Wrong and the Small Things in Life

So Tim, being the wonderful husband that he is was going to prepare dinner for us tonight when I got home from work. He was so proud of the recipe he had found on his iPhone for blackened chicken. Well, I noticed the kitchen filling with smoke as he cooked:


Then the whole house filled with smoke and we had to open windows and cover our noses and mouths due to the overpowering smell of spices, poor Tim:


Needless to say we ended up getting dinner from LaRosa's : ) After the smoke cleared we did taste the chicken however and it wasn't that bad, I think he saved it for his lunch tomorrow.

THE SMALL THINGS IN LIFE:
My best friend Kristen who I grew up with married an airforce lifer and they currently live in Germany. Several years ago when they were stationed in Washington D.C. Tim surprised me with a ticket to go visit Kristen for a weekend in D.C. long story short we got lost on the way to the airport and I missed the flight. Luke was 4 at the time and VERY upset I was leaving without him and we ended up buying him a ticket and the two of us went to visit Kristen. It was such a wonderful and memorable trip. One thing that is funny is Kristen had the most UNBELIEVABLE soft towels EVER!!! Luke and I talked about them forever and we told Kristen that in every store we are in we feel the towels and say "nope, not as soft as Kristen's". We honestly do this ALL the time, in EVERY towel section in EVERY store.
Well.................... Kristen sent Luke a present for his b-day and since he wasn't feeling well this week we let him open it early:

She bought him his own set of towels : ) Have you ever seen a kid so excited to receive a towel for a b-day present in his life.


He immediately wanted to shower. He has set the towels aside and has instructed us that they are "his towels" and no one is allowed to use them.

You HAVE to love GREAT friends, good memories, and the simple things in life!!!!

Superbowl and an uninvited new pet

Well, we hosted this years Superbowl party at our house. We ended up having FORTY PLUS people over. Tim and I worked hard to get the house ready, here are some of the decorations I put up:




This doesn't even touch it because I didn't take pics of the basement with the big screen where we showed the game or all the food after it was all put out, but it looked pretty good.
Here are Tim and Luke before the big game:


We had an incredible time, I think we hosted a pretty good party : ) and fun was had by all. I still can't believe the amount of people crammed in here but it was very fun. I wouldn't mind hosting again actually, it was kind of nice having it on our home turf. The Steelers won which made Tim (a HUGE Steelers fan) VERY happy!

Then onto our "uninvited new pet" part of this post. . . . .. . . . . . . .. .
Lauren went to a birthday party on Friday. Now maybe I am "out of touch" but normally when you go to a birthday party and party favors are handed out they aren't living things........................... not this b-day party. My daughter arrived home from the party absolutely thrilled that EVERY SINGLE CHILD AT THE PARTY was given one of these:

Lauren and Luke have named him (if it is a him : ) "Goldie" and they are thrilled with their new pet. I really don't mind that much, he's obviously pretty darn easy to take care of but COME ON!!! If you were giving out fish as a party favor wouldn't you ask first???? I've never owned a fish before but am hoping he doesn't last until Spring Break when we go out of town for a week, I don't want to have to manage "fish sitting", I already have a dog and a cat to deal with on that end.
As I type this we are in the middle of another HUGE snow storm, it is snowing 2 inches per minute and my poor mom is stuck in it trying to get home, this weather is crazy! I'm ready for the beach, come on Spring Break!!!!

Snow Day #2 and #3!!!

Well, this has been an interesting week. We had THREE snow days. We had a great time hanging out together and doing fun things together. I just love being with my family and this week was fun having "us" time.
We let the kids sleep on the pull out couch after snow day #1 and we knew snow day #2 was a done deal:



Tim and Luke headed out on a long hike in the ice and snow to the park to sled while Lauren and I stayed inside and watched a movie on the pull out couch. Here are the boys venturing out:


Then we made snow ice cream, that was fun to do too. Here is Luke gathering a bowl of snow for our creation:



Here are the kids mixing up the ice cream:




Then last night we got a call that I was on a delay and Luke and Lauren were cancelled for day #3. My call for today came early this morning. Our streets are still like thick skating rinks - they just can't get the ice off. We did venture out together today though for a nice lunch at McAlisters and we saw Paul Blart Mall Cop, that was a funny movie - I love Kevin James- he reminds me of Tim : )
Then today I was soooooooooooo excited because this came:

MY iPHONE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I am sooooooooooo excited! Tim got one a few weeks ago and I slowly was sucked in and saw it's potential and wanted one of my own. I was so thrilled when Fed Ex pulled up tonight and I have one of my own now.
Well, we have a 2 hour delay tomorrow so back to school for a 1/2 day and then a weekend, gotta love teaching : )

SNOW DAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Today was such a wonderful day, I just looooooooooooooove snow days.
We had big plans to go to a neighborhood school and sled, but when we got all dressed and looked outside we realized that our street hadn't been plowed and it was still coming down pretty hard so we just walked up to a neighbors house to sled down their hill in their front yard:


We each took turns sliding down, it was a fun time:

It was Mickey's first time out in the snow and he LOVED it. I remember Loomis (our Golden Retreiver we had to put to sleep in May) absolutely loving the snow so I was happy to see Mickey enjoying it as well:


Luke continued to sled and Tim, Lauren and I headed back the house to start shoveling. Lauren started complaining she was cold so she headed inside and Tim and I finished up the driveway. We kept piling snow on Mickey as we shoveled:



Then some neighborhood kids came out and Luke was thrilled to have kids to sled with. Lauren, Tim and I headed inside for warm hot chocolate and soup, ahhhhhhhhhhhh, talk about your comfort foods : )
Luke lasted outside for another hour and a half outside with the neighborhood kids before he came in for his soup and hot chocolate.
I enjoyed a nap this afternoon, and playing "dance class" with Lauren.
We just took the garbage out but now we are being pelted with tons of freezing rain so our driveway will be a skating rink. Looks like we may get ANOTHER snow day out of this storm, incredible. I just love this time of year!

The "R" Word

Most of you who read this know that I am a special education teacher. I also have an aunt who is very close to my heart who has Down Syndrome. This is me with Holly:

In 2008 a WONDERFUL senior honors student, Soeren Palumbo gave a speech during Writers Week at Fremd High School in Wheeling, Illinois. He has a sister with special needs and was offended when his friends used the word "retard" or "retarded" so casually.
Here is a news clip from it: (take a moment to hit "pause" on my music player to the left before viewing this clip so you can hear it properly)

After I viewed his speech for the first time, it gave me a higher awareness of the "r" word and I have vowed to remove it from my vocabulary and spread the word about how hurtful this word can truly be. Please take the time to watch this incredible speech:

I hope this will change your awareness a bit about how important these members of our society are, how we should try and watch our use of this word that is used too often flippently in our society. I hope that maybe, just maybe this post has opened your eyes a bit, I know this speech opened mine : )

Not as we had hoped

So Luke and Tim worked hard on his boat for the big Raingutter Regatta for Cubscouts this week. They decided on the S.S. Yankee and the boat looked sharp! Here is Luke before leaving for the event (see how happy and excited he is):

We headed to the event with high hopes- this was our first time ever at a boy scouting event like this so we didn't know what to expect. Luke did a few trial runs with his boat and everything was going great, his boat seemed to do well and he understood how to make it go, he even beat a boy in a fake race.
Then it was time to begin. Luke was in the first race for his den. Here he goes:

Well, he was doing great and then he kept looking at the boy next to him and his boat got behind and he lost (it was a close race, but he lost). Tears welled up in his eyes as he realized he was losing and he grabbed his boat after the finish and was so upset. The den leader, seeing how upset he was assured him he had 3 more races. We all breathed a sigh of relief knowing he would get another chance.
Well, poor Luke then lost the next three races. It is hard to blow and cry at the same time:

It was one of those moments as a mother that you just want to protect your children from. I wanted him to have some sort of success on this night so badly and it was ripping my heart out to watch him have to go through this.
A WONDERFUL woman came up to him at the end and said "Luke, your boat may not have been the fastest but it sure was the best looking." That put a smile on his face. Thank God for encouraging people in this world, that really made his day. We treated him to ice cream after and that also brought a smile on his face. We will definitely be enlisting help when it comes to the soapbox derby in March ; )