What Happens When The Kids Stay Up Too Late

A weekend of cuteness overload!

I love dressing up the kids. Being a mother is kind of like the fulfillment of every little girls dream: dressing up a baby doll that is alive!! Wee!! It's so fun. Sunday was my parents anniversary (whoa! 34 years!!) AND the Feast of Christ the King. Major dress up in this house. My mom bought Christopher and PeterXavier super cute dress coats and hats. Now, the down side of treating you children like your very own toy dolls, is that they get older and tend to protest. Christopher refuses to wear his coat. But PeterXavier is totally loving his. Can you tell?

I love this picture because it sums up the boys so well. Christopher is telling a long drawn out story and PeterXavier is completely focused on his food.

My parents took us all out to celebrate their special day, which was super fun. PeterXavier enjoyed licking Anja and stealing her bite sized food. And Gracie liked that last piece of chocolate cake. It sure looked good!

Our parish goes all out in celebration for the Feast of Christ the King. We clebrated the magnificent Feast with trumpets, Vespers, and a Eucharistic Procession through the streets of town. And of course a big feast afterwards!

And NOW Andrew has the rest of the week, through the Thanksgiving holiday, off! Woo! Hooray for Vaca! When we were first married and he worked at the school in Florida (boo), they had this lame policy that you couldn't tack your vacation days onto holidays. So now I think we'll do it all the time, just because we can!

A Weekend Recap

We spent the bulk of our weekend cleaning and organizing our newly emptied basement. Eventually, it will be a cozy place to play games and relax, but it might take a while! My mom went to an auction on Saturday and got us a really nice game table, which fits perfectly! I am very excited to have to LARGE craft room complete with sink and built in cabinets. Grace has already begun stocking it with all of her craft supplies. I am excited to paint and decorate the room, but the challenge is making it not feel like a basement.

Andrew called me Friday from work saying that he had six tickets to a Thai dinner fund raiser for the Wabash Valley Youth Symphony. We scrounged up two "couples" -- my cousin Phillip and his wife and Matt and Jeremy. (Bachelors are always up for a free meal!) The event ended up being a goofy combination of raising funds for the WVYS while also advertising this new restaurant and a travel agency. The presentations were interesting and the music was nice as well. The food was great. It was a really fun night, with an interesting group of people!

Last evening was spent with my hilarious cousin and his wife (among others, more later!). I was telling him about the goofy way my mother broke her foot (she was playing a game with my kids and took a litle jump, which broke her foot). Our conversation went something like this:

Me: Yeah, my mom broke her foot . . . .
Him: I heard! My dad told me, (rolls eyes) Aunt Roseanna broke her foot doing a kartwheel!!

Good old Uncle Johnny. You can always count on him to make a good story better!

Baby Legs from Baby Snazz!!

I LOVE to get a good deal and great product while supporting small family businesses. So when I went searching for a great pair of Baby Legs Iwas thrilled when I also found Baby Snazz. And then when owner, Sara, offered to send me a free pair of Baby Legs to review on my blog, I could barely contain my excitement!

With the cold Indiana winter setting in (ugh) I needed something to help keep my little monkeys warm. And I hate when I get them all bundled up, but then when I pick them up their pants get pulled up to their knees and their sweet little skin is exposed to the freezing cold air. Baby Legs solves this problem. They are trim enough to be worn comfortably under pants and stay put when the child is picked up.






And have I mentioned how cute they are?? There are tons of patterns and prints to choose -- I had a really hard time picking my favorites!


When I got them out this morning, the striped pair that Grace is wearing was intended for Isabella, but Grace was so excited that she snagged them claiming that she and Bella would share them -- but she would wear them first! Needless to say, Baby Legs were a hit in this house. Head on over the Baby Snazz and get your own. Support Sara, her home business, and her four princesses! Use coupon code "blogreview5" to get 5% off order over $40 AND make sure to sign up for her latest giveaway to win TWENTY PAIRS of babylegs!!!

ETA: My kids did this nerdy posing all on their own!! I was going for a more natural look . . . .

Reading with Oompa

My kids are currently enjoying the wonderful Roald Dahl book "BFG" read so marvelously by my dad. He really gets into the vioces and bizzare Dahl language, making it the perfect bedtime read aloud!

Big Weekend

Wow. What a weekend. We just kind of partied our way right through it. Saturday was John and Elisabeth's beautiful wedding. The ceremony was fabulous and the party afterwards great fun. I am always so pleased with the group of friends we have at Church. We have about four times the children that anyone else has, but everyone is always so nice to them. It is so nice to be able to give our children such a friendly and happy vision of the Catholic Church.



One Sunday, after Andrew steam cleaned every carpet in our house (that's a lot of nasty carpet!) we wento the Annie's to celebrate Anja's first birthday!! Woo!! I can't believe she is ONE! Annie made her the cutest shirt -- it was just a onsie that said "I am ONE today!" and the date. The whole point was for her to get it covered with chocolate cake and make a nice souvenier. Of course, Anja was neat and tidy with her cake eating and got nothing on her cute shirt. (Probably the only time she's ever done that!) It was a great party and Anja scored a lot of loot!

And now back to the grind. But at least my carpets are clean!

And now back to our regularly scheduled broadcasting.

I finished with political rants.

Today . . . . I am tired from staying up so late, but that is beside the point. The kids had their first "gym class" today. We met up with our friends for a picinic beforehand (I am LOVING Indian Summer) on the lawn in front of Lambert. "Gym Class" is actually the Purdue Ed students learning to teach PE and using our little homeschool kids as practice. (Ok, I was going to call the kids that giant rodent that is kind of like an overgrown rat that twisted parents let their kids have as pets ** pigs, but how do you spell that word??) Anyway, the kids love it and it gives them a chance to hang out with their friends and learn to follow directions! And it gives the mothers a chance to chat. It's a bit chaotic because the little kiddies can't participate, but it's not too bad.

After gym, I was going to take the kids to Hobby Lobby to get some craft supplies. We got all the way out there (after much whining from the back seat) and then one person started complaining that I wasn't buying him anything, another person tried to sufficate the sleeping baby with love and made her scream, and yet another person had kicked his shoes off AND had somehow gotten himself entirely covered in melted chocolate. I turned right around and came home.

A Turning Point in Our History

Tomorrow marks a turning point in the history of our country. Never before have we as Americans faced such a crucial election. Never before have lives literally been at stake to the degree that they are right now. We have to opportunity tomorrow to place our country into the hands of a killer, a socialist, a man not worthy of holding the important seat of Commander in Chief of this land. This country founded on the very principle of freedom and the right to life. Is is Freedom or Free-dumb? I am a bit fearful to find out.

As Deal Hudson points out, one man here claims he will "save the world" and another knows, that is humanly impossible. But McCain will do everything he can to keep this nation and all of its citizen -- even the most defenseless -- safe. One man claims to be the Messiah, the other a humble servant of this country. We need to ask Christ to accompany us into the voting booth tomorrow. Beg Him to be with every Free American as he walks into that booth that he may cast his vote for the silent, the innocent, the one quietly begging for a chance to exercise his freedom.

Last week, Andrew and I -- total crazies that we are -- took the two littles and drove down south to see Sarah Palin! It was GREAT! The crowd was huge, which gave me a renewed hope for this election. No pictures, but she was wearing some killer boots=)



The kidders wore the requisit red shirts on which I wrote 'World's Cutest "Punishment"' and on the back of Bella's it said "Vote For Life!" They were super cute!