More of December

This year we not only made decorated sugar cookies. We decorated Gingerbread men. Johnnie was very particular about the placements of his candy buttons, the sprinkles & the icing. Jimmy happily let me help him & well Joey put all his decorations on just so he could eat them off. It was a fun evening & even Holly enjoyed watching her brothers decorate & create messes. And the boys were very proud & so was I.

Finishing up the Christmas Blogs

Time seems to go faster & faster but I did want to finish sharing our December moments. Christmas Cookies are a tradition in our home. Every Christmas Eve we roll out those sugar cookies, let the boys press out the shapes they want & decorate them any way they want. We always have lots of fun. And Johnnie has taken over showing the smaller boys what to do.

And once the cookie was ready for Santa the boys went outside to play in the leaves. And if you look closely you can see that it's still warm out.

5 Months & A Whole Lot Different

Our girl is 5 months old now. Crazy how fast time flies. I swear she was just born yesterday but no, in fact it has been a very quick 5 months. She is still a little baby but each day she becomes more of a little person with her own great personality. This month she found her feet

started eating solid food

finally started enjoying tummy time

watched her 1st football game with daddy

started reaching for her dangly friends

spent lots of time with her biggest brother (he's still the only one who truly enjoys her company)

& started trying to learn to drink from a sippy cup.

And the most important thing she did this month was made me realize that she is our last baby. There will be no more sleepless nights just enjoying my alone time in the quiet with her so I have to enjoy all the quiet times I get with her now. I need to spend less time worrying about the new wrinkles I have gained & how much older I look & instead just relish each moment I get to hold my baby girl (& boys when they will let me.) Happy 5 Months little one!

Ten on Tuesday- Grandparents Visit

1. What better way to share our visit with Rick's mom & stepdad better known as gramma & grandpa Joe. They arrived 5 days before Christmas & stayed for a week. We had so much fun & already miss them & look forward to our next visit.

2. We were lucky enough to have beautiful weather. Being from Connecticut the weather was a little different than they were used to at Christmas time so we took advantage & spent lots of time outside. Sitting with gramma & Holly.3. Playing on the swingset.4. This visit Johnnie spent lots of time enjoying his grandparents.5. And they also enjoyed meeting their newest granddaughter. And getting lots of cuddle time.6. Lucky for us they celebrated Christmas with us. And they helped make the holiday so special for the kids. 7. Holly felt a little under the weather & gramma with her special touch was able to soothe her to sleep sitting on her lap.8. Johnnie was really excited to show gramma his newly acquired writing skills.9. The last morning of our visit took us to Manhattan Beach to enjoy one last breakfast before gramma & grandpa Joe had to catch their plane back to the cold. I kept trying to get a photo of Rick & his mom alone but Johnnie really wanted to be in the photo & I'm so glad because I love how happy he looks here.10. And the final photo taken on their visit was Johnnie sandwiched between them which is exactly where he wanted to be. Miss you both already!

Happy New Year aka Joey's Birthday

In our house the turn of the new year is always a special occasion because we celebrate the birthday of our 2nd child. Jojo, Joseph & Joeeeeeeeeey (his new reference to himself). He is even more stubborn, more playful & feistier than ever. It's hard to believe that so much personality can be packed into such a small package but if you have ever spent even just a few minutes with our boy then you know he's hard to forget. Just the faces I captured in a matter of 30 seconds shows how full of life he is. He is still all about daddy. Can't get enough of his trucks. Inside the house or outside. Adores chocolate. Loves playfully hitting. Can't say the word NO enough. And overall is just such a joy when he's not being naughty that is. We love you Joe & can't wait to see what changes your 4th year will bring.

4 Month Baby

Holly actually turned 4 months old almost 2 weeks ago & I didn't want the holidays to get too far away before I gave a quick update on our baby girl. She is now 12 pounds 14 ounces (35%) & 24 1/4 inches tall (50%). She started daycare this month & took about a week to get used to her bottles but is now drinking them like a champ. She celebrated her 1st Thanksgiving, her 1st holiday party & rolled over from her back to her belly for the 1st time. She laughs out loud when her neck is tickled, sleeps 10-11 hours with one feeding & she is always trying to sit up. Holly is such a calm baby & has adjusted to her new daily routine without a hitch. I had so much fun taking her photo this month. What better way to celebrate the holidays than with a Christmas baby.

Merry Christmas

from our family to yours! Now that all our Christmas cards have been sent out I wanted to share some of the photos on the blog. We were so happy with our family photo because it's never easy to get the boys to look at the camera & now we have a baby to worry about as well.

We decided to let the boys be themselves wearing superhero shirts even though we wanted to let Holly stand out as our only little girl.

She already has a hold of daddy's heartstrings & this is my favorite photo with her.

Christmas is a whirlwind of crazy chaos in our house but we love it. I will be back to share more photos later. We hope you had a wonderful day spent with family & friends.

The Stockings Were Hung

by the chimney with care. The entire family was decked out in new Paul Frank jammies. The cookie was ready for Santa's visit. And the tree was surrounded by gifts just waiting for the pitter patter of little feet in the early hours of the morning. I hope your family is as blessed as ours this Christmas Eve.

10 on Tuesday

1. So last week was a big week for Holly Moon. She started daycare. She spends her day under the watchful eye with the same 3 ladies that took care of Johnnie, Joey & Jimmy. She was happy watching all the other babies & smiled most of the day as long as there was not a bottle in sight. The sight of those caused many a tear. But by the 2nd day I think she realized that she had to drink the bottles to get food so she happily drank all of them. She is adjusting well & although I miss spending my entire day with her I'm happy that I trust & care deeply for her caregivers.

2. We had a wonderful Thanksgiving. Lots of yummy food, football, family & friends. No pictures of us from that day because we take the opportunity to take our Christmas card photos each year on Thanksgiving since we are dressed somewhat nice & have lots of family around to motivate the kids to look at the camera.

3. My sisters were here of course. 4. Us girls made sure to pull our dad away from the football game to get a photo with him.5. Kayci's boyfriend Christian spent part of his day here. Eating the 1st of 3 Thanksgiving dinners. 6. Kim & Joe ate the 1st of 2 dinners with us. 7. And Jen spends every year with us.8. The boys weren't interested in turkey dinner so they feasted on cereal in the evening & paused for a few seconds to smile at my camera. 9. And Holly Moon is now 15 weeks old. Such a happy baby with dark big eyes with long lashes, chubby cheeks & pouty pink lips. 10. After taking pictures of each of the kids for the Christmas card I decided to try to get some more photos of Joey . I don't like to use bribery but I'm not above offering candy to get a good photo. As soon as Jimmy heard the word candy he came running outside yelling I'll smile. I already a great photo of him for the card but I absolutely adore this picture of him. He looks so happy but he also looks like such a big boy.