Christmas Time

Can you believe there is only 3 days left till Santa? I keep telling the boys that we don't have long to go. Lots of fun stuff going on here. Minor setback this weekend and we had a late start getting in to the spirit of things...but I think we have found our groove. It might not be full swing this year, but we will have our fun. Lots of fun stuff planned to do with friends...and Patrick always keeps us entertained. Patrick and now Smudge. Smudge is stealing Pizza and ice cubes...running away from snowflakes and taking long naps. I am starting to look forward to the holidays...I think they will be fun! Hope everyone has a great holiday full of family and friends, and we hope to catch up with everyone in the new year! Enjoy!

How much longer until Christmas?

What a long week it has been....

Learned a lot I have...wish it made my week better...but it was definitely better than Nicole's...

Nicole taught me 7 very important things this week...

1. Do not leave mushrooms found in nature in your classroom overnight hence they will have small disgusting creatures crawling on them come Monday morning.

2. an old cell phone without a sim card given to a preschool class to play with can still dial 911 and the police can find...the school...your class...the child...and you...now had this been an actual emergency...who knows?

3. it is better to to just put the small child with the very annoying father out of your class in to someone else's at the first sign of trouble...because it only gets worse as the year goes on....

4. picking up a glass table top all by yourself with one hand to dust under it with the other hand is probably not the best of ideas and it would have been a better idea just to avoid cleaning all together...

5. the driver's ed video where the guy in the lane to your left starts to move in your peripheral vision and you do too just to discover it was a left turn arrow and the car in front of you was still at a stop is quite accurate and you do feel quite silly.

6. steaks do not need to be turned over at least once while cooking to have a nice even charcoal flavor, you can just get drunk with your friend and leave them to your own devices and they do quite well...

and 7....as much as you want to you can't drink all the beer from the beer fridge that blows up in the basement, and after all this you really don't feel like explaining to you mother what skunk means you just want to use her fridge for a few days!

so with all the things that were on my mind this week, with home and work, and everything else, it's good to have a friend like Nicole who will have an even worse week..just to make me feel better! Thanks girlfriend!

It's a girl! ... and a boy....

...and we are thrilled! Tim finally popped the question and Maggie said yes! Tim has never been one to settle for anything, if he feels something should be a certain way..it is! No question! It is one of his most frustrating and admirable qualities...but in this case, I and the rest of my family are so glad he didn't. I can't think of anyone I would rather have as a sister in law than Maggie, and I know for a fact that Tom is so excited that he will have her around permanently to laugh at his dumb jokes. Maggie brings ART and laughter to our crazy family and that is just what we needed. The boys are crazy about her, she has a way of making them feel like whatever it is that they have to say or show her is the most important thing in the world at that moment..

So thank you Tim, for not giving up the search, and congratulations to both of you. May you have many many years of the love, laughter and happiness you have today.

THE Bulls!

Well...I didn't make the first game...the heat was just too awful! But I wouldn't miss the next one. It was a beautiful day...the boys played their hearts out, and they lost anyway. I guess that is a part of live, learning to lose, so they did and they did it with grace.

Patrick played too, I did not get photos of his team this week, but I can't wait to get him in action next week.

Smudge is doing well...we had an incident of chasing him around the house with muddy feet. And she still likes to steal shoes...but she loves us and we love her! It's been a learning experience for all of us!

Meet Smudge...

Meet Smudge...

Smudge is the newest addition to our family. She is a 5 month old Pomma-poo, she likes sunshine, open laps, tickles behind the ears and stealing shoes. She does not like cars...or I guess her stomach doesn't we are hoping she grows out of that!

William has wanted a dog for as long as he could say the word, and we have been putting him off for just as long. So he "borrows" dogs...Cricket & Cody at Josh's house, Cody across the street from my parents house...Teddy at Aunt Patty's house, and Finn and Bandit down the street. He wants to be a pet shop owner or a scientist when he grows up...so we are suggesting a Vet, then it is a little of both!

Two years ago he asked for a dog for Christmas and Santa brought him a hamster. His "practice" pet. The hamster came with a note explaining that he needed to take good care of Oreo and if he could show he was responsible enough, we would talk about a dog. Well, some stuff happened in the last few weeks that has made me stop putting some thing off, one of them was William and his dog. A dog was the last thing I needed in life right now...but the first thing William needed.

While Smudge is the family dog, William has taken such responsibility for her, he takes her outside, changes her water, and picks up the poop! What more can you want!

We got her at a pet store after visiting adoptions agencies and the SPCA, but with Tom's allergies we were limited in what we could get comfortably. Smudge is perfect. She was considered a spinster...born in April, they wanted to get her out of the store, not one seemed to want an older puppy! We did! She is wonderful, not hyper, so loving, and Tom does not seem to be having too many problems with her. She is perfect for our family, and that is what we told William we needed. So here she is...our Smudge, all 10 pounds of her, scared of her own shadow and the fasted tongue in town. She is going to fit in perfectly.

What an amazing month it has been!

So many exciting things have happened to me. I spent a really fun week with Friends and family in North Carolina, I was reunited with some really great friends online, a fun charity event with Maggie and my brother, the possible purchase of a motorcycle!!!!! and I have a scrapbooking even coming up!

What could be better!

I am getting enthusiastic! Tommorow I thing I will start with the Trip to North Carolina. The wedding was so much fun. Weddings always take you back to your own wedding...the stars in your eyes, they new joy...the hope. I love going to them so we can take a look back and then bring a little bit of that honeymoom phase home again.

Stay tuned! I will!

SLEEPOVER!

I am not a sleepover kinda person...chaos is not my thing. But If I were going to have more kids Aiden and Cathleen would be them, I am sure Patrick and Cathleen will end up together, and Aiden is just great with William. I love having them around. Recently they came over for a long awaited sleepover - SO MUCH FUN! Popcorn, movies, chess, lots of giggles, and NO SLEEP (sorry Nicole!). I hope we get to do a lot more weekends like this!

Champions!

What an exciting week! William's basketball team made the finals! This was a first for William, none of his teams have made it this far in the past, and we were all really excited. It was a double elimination and they entered the final game undefeated, so with Maggie, Uncum, Grammy, Pop-Pop, Tom, myself and Patrick present and cheering they played their hearts out on Tuesday unfortunately still losing 23 to 26.






Since it was double elimination, they had to be beaten 2x so off we went tonight to face St. Joe's once again. What stress! They were neck and neck all night they were never separated by more than 4 points and William made 2 shots, got a rebound and was fouled! No points...but he really tried! He has made such progress this year, thanks to some special pointers from some super sports moms and Coach Tom, he has really been working hard. We have now invested in sports glasses and some new gear , and it has made a difference in his confidence on the court. He even played hard enough to foul someone last game! When he came off the court he felt really bad, but I tried to explain that if he never ever fouled he wasn't trying hard enough. One foul all season was nothing to be upset about. And it was a reaching foul for goodness sake...like those lanky 8 year olds can keep track of their arms!

So in the end they came out on top winning by 1 point in the last 30 seconds (27-26)! It's sad that they can't win them all, but I am glad that they can win some! And we are so proud they won this one!







Anyway, as we were leaving, all the team members older sisters waved goodbye to Patrick...as always he had made "friends" with the other siblings there and the older girls love dragging him around.

Saturday is baseball assessments, and Sunday is Lacrosse evaluations...the "busy" season starts now. Baseball, Lacrosse, and Boy Scouts...and Patrick in T-ball...Spring has sprung!

It's been forever! Can you believe it!

I had to take a break... as much as I love my blog I needed to put it on a back burner for a bit while I took care of some stuff! I have to tell you I missed it. Every once and a while I even went to the site myself and felt disappointed that it wasn't updated. It's funny, I love it, it makes me feel good and it is good for me, but it is like exercise, once you skip a day..then another...then a week and you keep saying you'll get back to it soon..and here I am many months later finally kick starting myself. Thank goodness!

Well, the boys had their first snow day...we only had 4" and my friends from the Midwest are laughing at me for us getting a snow day for such a pittance...they got their day non-the-less. I wish I didn't have to work on snow days, not much fun for them, but they got out later in the day when daddy got home...Dad always gets to do the fun stuff!

looks like they had fun though! That's what counts, then they came in and I made hot chocolate with bunny marshmallow's in it. You have to love snow days!

Saturday night was fun too, we got to go to Tom's sister's house for a fun 50's party! We really had a lot of fun - and so did Patti! She made her singing debut, it really looks like everyone had a really great time! Sounds like it will become an annual thing so we are looking forward to next year. Next year we will remember to dress the part!

So hopefully everyone else has had a great couple of months, I am glad to be posting again, and I hope I still have friends reading, I loved getting the responses hearing about how everyone else was doing! Talk to you SOON!!!