Christmas 2010

We had a wonderful Christmas this year! The boys both had a great time and really got into celebrating the holidays. Payton is all about Santa and Easton loves the lights!! The weeks leading up to Christmas though seemed to be exhausting! The week before Christmas, Payton had a musical at school. It was called a Barnyard Moosical! It was pretty cute! It was just Kindergarten and First grade. Then, the next day he had a party at school that I attended and Easton had special treats at day care. I had signed up to bring sweet treats for each party, so I did lots of baking. Including baking treats to go along with all of the teacher gifts. It gets so exhausting because by the time we get home at night and do dinner, etc and the kids to bed. I can’t really start anything until around 8:30!! So lots of late night (or middle of the night) baking, wrapping, cleaning, online shopping, etc! Also a week or two before Christmas my mom and I drove the boys to a park in Missouri that does amazing Christmas lights and to see Santa. They lights were awesome, but we had to sit in our car in a line for two hours until we got to the lights! We learned our lesson for next year to not go on the weekend!!
On Christmas Eve I made a big dinner of turkey, etc. I have done this for a few years now and whomever is around is welcome to come! I think I would even go all out if it was just the four of us. If you can’t use your fancy dishes on Christmas, then when can you use them!! It was a good time and everyone stayed and played some games with Payton. Then we picked out some goodies for Santa and went on the internet to track him. When Payton saw that Santa had already done all of Europe and was in South America he decided that he better hurry up and go to bed!
Bright and early on Christmas we were up and went to see what Santa brought! Paytons big Santa gift was a telescope and a puppy pillow pet and Easton got a little kitchen and a cow pillow pet. They both were so excited! We then spent the morning opening all of the wonderful gifts. Later that afternoon we went to my moms and spent the rest of the day over there and opened more gifts! Payton told me he was so lucky to get presents. I have been telling him that the most important thing about Christmas is not getting gifts, but giving them, so I had him get a gift for Easton and daddy and he just told me the other day that he felt happy when he got them presents. (Melts my heart!!)
Many of Eastons gifts were Elmo related! He loves Elmo right now! He also got lots of books. (Books seemed to be a theme for everyone). He really likes playing with this soft roll up piano that my mom got him. That little boy loves any kind of music. He was a lot of fun this Christmas! He gets so excited when he sees something he likes. He has been playing with his kitchen constantly and likes to take any of Paytons new presents!
Payton received quite a few books on astronomy. He also got lots of brain teaser like games such as a Rubiks cube and sudoko and a 3D puzzle that is shaped like an apple and some chapter books. Right now he is really into his tornado lab that makes a tornado in water! He also got a set that has chess/checkers, etc that he had been asking for. Can you tell he is my little whiz kid!!
Some of the highlights for Justin were some audio books that my mom and I had each gotten him. He always wants books but never gets them, so he was thrilled that we thought of audio books that he can listen to in the car.
All in all we had a wonderful holiday!! I then took Monday off of work so we pretty much spent all of Sunday and Monday in our pjs playing with new toys! It was great to be able to stay home and hang out with the boys with nothing else planned. Next week school starts back up (Payton has been at the day care with Easton over break), and we get back to basketball on the weekends. So a little break and then we are right back to our normal hectic lives!!

Happy Heart Day

Today, and every year on this date we will celebrate Happy Heart Day in our house! (I stole, or borrowed, the term Happy Heart Day from a dear friend who's daughter had a happy ending to her heart defect as well). It is hard to believe that one year ago my energetic 18 month old was just a little baby undergoing heart surgery. I can vividly remember the drive to the hospital in the dark very early that morning and waiting in the waiting room with all of the other parents who had babies and children undergoing surgery that day. We will always be so greatful that his defect was diagnosed when it was and was able to be corrected with no complications. We went out to dinner tonight to celebrate and plan on celebrating this day for years to come!

Payton is 6!!

Yesterday was Paytons 6th birthday!! I can not believe how fast time flies. It is amazing though when I look at pictures of is birthday last year how much he has changed and grown up since then! He was very excited to turn six because now you have to use two hands to show people how old you are! And he already told me that in 12 months he will be 7!!
He woke up Friday morning to a birthday donut waiting for him! He brought little Krispy Kreme donuts to school for a treat and then I came to his school and met him for lunch! What an interesting experience that was! It is so funny to be in their environment and hear all of the little kindergarten conversations and questions!! After school we went bowling! We kind of struggled as to what to do for a party this year. He hasn’t really been in school long enough to determine who is good friends are as it seems to change weekly. I also was not wanting to do something that invited all the kids in the class. So we decided to do something simple and just go bowling with family. (Bowling was his choice!) Payton had a fantastic time!! It probably even worked out better. He tends to get overwhelmed when there is too much going on, so just being with a small familiar group worked great.
We did a Lego theme, so I made a lego cake and candies and most of his gifts were lego themed! Lego games, lego books, lego wii game and lots of building sets!!
Even though his birthday was yesterday, I am still having a hard time believing that six years ago he was born! He has turned out to be such a wonderful boy and makes us so proud to be lucky enough to be his parents.

Thankful for medicine and fire trucks!

This Thanksgiving season I am thankful for ….antibiotics! Just kidding, well... sort of!
In the past two weeks, all three guys in the house have been sick and been on all sorts of medicines. I think I could probably qualify for a pharmacist at this point! Justin had been fighting a bad cold for a month and a half (yes, you read that right, 1 ½ months!) I finally convinced him after about 3 weeks of begging, to go to the doctor before Thanksgiving and sure enough he had bronchitis. Not to mention the fact that he has severely hurt his ribs from coughing so much that they put him on codeine as well! Payton had a cough that was keeping him up, so he went to the doctor and was found to have a sinus infection! Now Easton is on meds for a severe case of pink eye! I think they are all on the upswing though and hopefully (knocking on my desk) they will be all better soon!
We had a good Thanksgiving and celebrated it low-key at my moms, and of course she made Justin his favorite pie! We were going to go and see the Plaza lights, but Justin was pretty miserable and it was too cold for the kids, so we just stayed at her house and watched it on tv instead. Payton was very upset, but I promised him that we would go and see lots of lights sometime before Christmas. On Friday, we got to go to a fire station! My mom has a friend who is good friends with a fireman and they invited us to come out and see the trucks and Payton got to go on a ride! He loved it! He asked lots of good questions and was very interested in everything. What kid doesn’t like a fire truck! We also got all of our xmas decorations up this past weekend. Easton has been babbling to the tree and lights ever since it went up!
Things are starting to get very crazy busy around here like they always do this time of year. Between a school musical, school Christmas parties, basketball starting and various other holiday activities, we pretty much have something going on or that has to get done almost everyday between now and Christmas! And somehow I have to finish Christmas shopping! (Thank goodness for online shopping!!) I love the holidays, but wow, they are exhausting!!

Halloween - Finally!

I am finally getting to my Halloween posts! It is only two weeks late! I think I have finally gotten the website all set up, so I can now get it updated. (See post below).
I know the kids love Halloween, but by the time it is here I am so ready for it to be over! This year Payton was a fireman and Easton was a dalmatian puppy. On the Friday before Halloween, we had 3 events to go to in one day! In the morning we went to the party at Eastons school. Then is the afternoon we all went to the trunk or treat and party at Paytons school. Then, straight from there we went to my work for the kids to trick or treat on lots of the floors. Then, on Saturday Payton went to a Halloween themed birthday party next door and then Sunday night was trick or treating! (See why I was ready for Halloween to be over!!) Payton loves this holiday, Easton wasn't really into it. I am sure next year he will be when he figures out that he can get candy!
In other news, Payton went to his first sleepover birthday party last night! A friend of his that he used to go to day care with had a party with a few boys. He has been friends with a few of these boys since he was just 3 months hold! He is pretty tired today, but I think they had a great time!! It was so strange just having one kiddo in the house. We took full advantage of him being gone though and went through all of the toys in the house and cleaned, organized and purged!
He seems like he is getting so big! We also had a book fair at his school this week and a little girl that I think he has a crush on was there! He gets giddy when she is around. It is so cute to see them all interact together. He is also almost ready to lose his third tooth! It is just barely hanging on!
Easton is getting so big too! He loves to do whatever Payton is doing. We try and keep Paytons bedroom door shut so he can keep some things out of Eastons reach. But if we forget and Easton realizes it is open, he will make a mad dash into his room and just start grabbing whatever he can! I have even seen him hide Paytons mp3 player in his laundry basket!
It has started getting cold, which has put us in a festive mood. We are all getting ready for the holidays and started getting some shopping done. It will be here before we know it!

New website!

I think I may have finally found a new home for our blog. I was previously using MSN Live, which I really liked, but I got a notification that it was going to be going away after the first of the year. So, I had the option to transfer mostly everything to a new platform. I did that, and didn't like the options or functionality of that one. So, now I am going to try Blogger. So please make sure and replace any links or bookmarks you may have to this new one. Sorry about that, I know it is a pain in the behind!
I had contemplated whether I should keep the blog going or not, but I decided that I like it mostly for myself. If other people read it, great, but if not, that is okay! It is a way for me to record moments in our life, like a diary of sorts. So I periodically look back and reminisce about moments in our life.
It make take me a little while to get things where I want them, but bear with me. Time has not been my friend lately!

October 2010

I can’t believe that Halloween is almost here!  Time goes way to fast!

Two weekends ago, Justin and I were able to head up to Iowa for the homecoming game!  I was able to get tickets through the Alumni Association since it was my 10 year reunion.  This time we left the boys at my moms house for the night.  This was the first time we had ever left Easton over night.  I knew they would do great, but I still hate leaving them. They had a great time with Grandma Joy and spent a lot of time playing outside and at parks.   We like it that she can play and have fun with them, without having to get them all hyper and riled up.  I am not sure who enjoyed the time more, the boys, or Grandma! 

Justin and I had a lot of fun at the game.  We drove up early Saturday morning and pretty much went straight to the tailgate where we met our good friends Erin and Ryan.  I forgot how much fun taigating in Iowa City is!!  Then the game was at night and it was so much fun!  I love night games!  After the game we were so exhausted we just went back to the hotel and then drove home on Sunday.  So, it was a quick trip, but so worth it!

This past weekend the weather was so beautiful that we took full advantage of it!  The city has completed these great new bike trails near our house, so we went on two separate walks and Payton rode his bike.  It was wonderful to be outside all day!  On Sunday we went to the Deanna Rose Farmstead and went to their pumpkin patch.   They boys got to pet baby goats, Payton went on a pony ride and we all went on a hayrack ride to get the pumpkins. 

We had Paytons parent-teacher conferences this week and he is doing outstanding at school.  He has had some attitude issues at home, but luckily at school he is wonderful.  The teacher is going to get with some of the other teachers to find things to keep him challenged as the year goes on.  She told us to be very proud because we have a very bright special boy on our hands!  Which is easy, because we are always so proud of him!

 

(I added pictures to the Fall 2010 and Hawkeye Football albums)