Easter 2013

Not too much to say about Easter this year except that it was fun as usual and the kids were thrilled for a visit from the easter bunny!

 

 

Lucas lost his first tooth!

I still need to post about Easter and Lucas' birthday but then I forgot that I forgot to post about Lucas loosing his first tooth (like I did with Addison). Addison didn't lose her first tooth until right after she turned 7 so I didn't expect that Lucas would lose one so soon. He lost it on Easter...a few weeks before turning 6. It was a bottom tooth and he already had an adult tooth coming in behind it. I imagine he will lose the one next to it soon since there is a tooth growing there are well.

 

So, here is my little guy after loosing his first tooth...and now he is 6! How can my baby be this old???

 

Winter in review!

I can't believe I haven't posted all year. We have been busy but not THAT busy. Here is a quick review as to how the first part of the year has been.

 

 

I spent many weeks preparing and helping with the kids school auction. The auction items took over my dining room and den but it was well worth it and the event was a success.

 

 

I forgot how much the kids love the Magic House. We had a great day there earlier this winter.

 

Bob and Addion had a great time at this years school Sweetheart Dance. They even went out to dinner on a double date with Addison's best friend Bella and her dad. I am sure Bob and Joe loved getting a few drinks in them before heading to the dance. :)

 

We got a decent amount of snow this year. This past weekend we went to Hidden Valley and went tubing and had a ton of fun!!!

 



 

We went to the 1st grade musical and Addison was thrilled to have the role as one of the adult pigs.

 

Bob and I tried to keep running outside a little this winter. We ran in a 12 mile trail race earlier this winter and last weekend we ran in the St. Louis St. Patty's day 5 mile run. That was fun!!! 

 

Mostly this winter has been spent with the kids in school, doing homework, Lucas playing soccer, Addison going to dance and then just hanging out with friends and families on the weekends. Bob is working a massive amount of hours but he is loving it. We have made a decision to not finish the basement anytime soon but instead we are replacing some of our furniture and making a few changes on the first floor. The furniture buying process has been interesting and fun.

 

We are very very anxious for spring to arrive and nice spring weather!!! We had one good spring-like day last week but we need more!!!

 

 

Come on Spring!!!!



Christmas 2012

I always look forward to Christmas each year and watching the kids open their gifts and spending time with family. This year the holidays took a turn for the worse just a few days before Christmas. We made the best of it but it just was not the same. Without going into too much detail, our nephew Brendan (he is 7) was hospitalized suddenly and it was very serious. We made the best of it but it was so hard to not have him there with us. I am happy to say that after 3 weeks in the hospital, he is back home and he is going to be ok!!!

 

 

Here is our family pic from Christmas Eve at my parents house.

 

 

 

Christmas morning was a hit. Addison loves her first pair of heels!

 

 

What would Christmas morning be for Lucas without some new legos!

 

 

Christmas was special for my nieces Molly and Katy...they got American Girl dolls. Now the 3 girls just love playing with their dolls together.

 

 

Our family pic on Christmas day.

 

 

 

Now that the holidays are over, the kids are in the swing of things at school. Lucas starts a new season of indoor soccer soon and Addison will be preparing for dance recital at the end of the year soon. I am getting involved with the kids school with helping out with the school auction. Bob and I are running a 12 mile race soon so we have been braving the cold. Things are good but especially good now that our nephew is home and doing well.

Our Disney World Vacation

This is going to be a long one because I have a lot to say about our amazing vacation to Disney World. First of all, my parents did a really great thing and treated us to this week long vacation!!!! All we had to do was pay for our flight and they took care of everything else! How great is that!!!! The weather was amazing for the entire week (high in the mid to upper 70s and sunny). The crowds weren't bad and the lines were not long at all. We waited maybe 5-10 minutes at times and took advantage of using fast paces which was great! We had breakfast each morning at the house, had one counter service meal per day at the park and had dinner at the house a few nights when we made it back early enough.

 

I will do my best to go over a lot of the details from our trip and what made it so special!

 

We spent our first day at Epcot!

 

We got a single stroller (from Disney) and the kids took turns using it. It worked out well until about 10 long hours into our day and the kids were just too darn tired. Anyways, we walked in and quickly got to meet Daisy Duck and Goofy. We took a chance on this trip and didn't book a single character meal in hopes that we would be able to meet plenty of characters at the parks since it is a pretty slow time of year so we were happy to be able to meet some characters so easily and fast!

 

 

 

Some of the highlights from our day at Epcot: The kids loved Spaceship Earth and The Seas of Nemo & Friends. I was amazed at how funny Turtle Talk with Crush was. Lucas and I went on the less intense version of Mission Space and Bob did the more intense. Wow, even the less intense was too intense for me! Maelstrom was pretty cool. Our FAVORITE ride at Epcot was Soarin'!!! Test Tracks was closed so that was a bummer.

 

Later in the day we went all throughout the World Showcase. The kids got passports and visited the Kidcot Fun Stops (which they loved but it was a ton of work for me). Bob and my Dad REALLY loved getting a drink in all the countries.  We tried to stay for the fireworks show but only made it a few minutes into the show and had to give up since the kids were exhausted from 12 long hours at the park. Overall we loved Epcot. It would have been fun to do the World Showcase without the kids and I wish we would have gone on Soarin' a 2nd time because it was just so cool.

 

 

Day 2 we spent at Magic Kingdom.

 

For the rest of our trip we upgraded to a double stroller. I know our kids are 5 and 7 and a little old for strollers but it sure made things easy to have a place to put all our stuff and not have to hear the kids complain about being tired.

Our first ride for the day was Space Mountain! The kids weren't so sure about it but Bob and I loved it.  I guess we should have warned the kids a little better. We even got my Mom to ride it with us. We spent a lot of the day at Tomorrowland and loved the Buzz Lightyear ride (Lucas met Buzz), Speedway, Stitch's Great Escape (it scared Lucas), and PeopleMover. The kids loved the talking/dancing trash can there...actually they were pretty obsessed with it.

 

We then went over to Adventureland and went on the Pirates of the Caribbean, Jungle Cruise, Swiss Family Treehouse and The Magic Carpets of Aladdin. For some reason we weren't totally thrilled with Adventureland but of course still had a good time. We finished off the day in Frontierland. We loved Big Thunder Mountain Railroad and the kids had a blast over at Tom Sawyer Island. We had a great day at Magic Kingdom...obviously it offers so much for the kids!

 

 

Here is a pic of our whole group in front of the castle. As you can tell, my 2 nephews are not fans of getting their picture taken!



 

The Christmas lights and the castle all lit up was just amazing!!!

 



 

We spent day 3 at Animal Kingdom. Our first ride was Dinosaur which was an awesome ride. We got to ride it twice since there was no line! It was one of my favorite rides!!! We went to the Finding Nemo-The Musical. It was great but it took me awhile to get over the fact that people were walking around holding and talking for the fish. Kinda strange but still a cool show. Next up was Expedition Everest. Lucas and Avery were both just barely 44 inches and boy were they happy they could go on this roller coaster but wow, this roller coaster is no joke. It was one of the best and craziest roller coasters I have ever been on. One of my favorite rides but wow did it make me feel a little sick! Some of the other rides and attractions we liked was the Kilimanjaro Safaris (so cool), It's Tough to be a Bug and the kids had an amazing time at The Boneyard (they could have stayed in there for hours).

 

Here is a pic of the kids in front of the tree at Animal Kingdom.

 

The 4 kids on the train.

 

We all REALLY enjoyed Mickey's Jingle Jungle Parade.

 

A highlight of our day at Magic Kingdom was meeting some characters. We saved it for the end of the day and the lines were pretty short. I am not sharing the pic yet of meeting Mickey since it is part of our Christmas cards that are being mailed out soon. Animal Kingdom was a great park and we really enjoyed our day!

 

 

 

On to day 4.....it was a BUST for me. I woke up in the middle of the night sick. Everyone else went to Hollywood Studios and I finally got myself out of bed and met up with them around 4pm even though I was still feeling pretty darn sick.

 

The kids got to meet some of their favorite characters......



 

From what Bob tells me, they really enjoyed the Indiana Jones stunt show, Star Tours (one of their favorites), the Muppet show, Honey I Shrunk the Kids Adventure, Lights Motors Action Stunt Show, the Toy Store ride, and The Legend of Captain Jack Sparrow (didn't love this attraction). Bob was able to get the kids the courage to go on the Tower of Terror and they did well with it and since Addison is 48 inches tall now, she went on the Rock n Roller Coaster and loved it. We ended the night at the really great Fantasmic show!!!

 

 

Oh, but before we left we checked out the Osbonrne Family Spectacle of Dancing Lights. It was so cool and one of our favorite parts of our trip!!!

 

Our 5th and final day at the parks was spent at Magic Kingdom again. 

 

We spent most of our day at Fantasyland and Liberty Square. We loved the Haunted Mansion, Peter Pan's Flight, It's a Small World (Bob and Lucas were not fans AT ALL), The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh (it was just ok), and the Mickey's PhilharMagic show was pretty cool. The kids had zero interest in going on the Dumbo ride. All in all, the Fantasyland area was a little boring for the kids since they kinda seemed like rides more for younger kids. We did get to go on the new Little Mermaid ride in the new part which we really liked!

 

Since we had time, we went back again to Tomorrowland and went on Space Mountain again (the 2nd time went a little better for the kids), the Buzz ride and Speedway. We never did go to Monsters Inc (not sure why).

 

We then went to the Dream Come True Parade which was awesome. By then Addison was finally ready to meet her first princess. She feels like she is too old to like princesses but she was thrilled with meeting Merida (from Brave).



 

Here is a link to the house we stayed at. It was just a few miles away and it was a nice big and beautiful house.

 

http://www.vrbo.com/257985

 

Here is a pic of the room Addison and Lucas stayed in.....

 

As you can tell, we had a great time. We were at the parks by 9 or 9:30am everyday and stayed until pretty late most nights. We took advantage and got to see and do just about as much as possible. We very much appreciate my parents for taking us on this trip. We made some great memories. I am not sure if we will go back since we have so many places we want to take the kids one day but you never know.

 



Halloween 2012

 

I totally forgot to post about halloween....oh, from 6 weeks ago. Better late than never.

 

So here they are.

Lucas was a swamp monster. He wanted to be something scary and it was his favorite costume he saw when we looked at target. He got a lot of attention on halloween for his scary costume!

Addison was a witch. She insisted on having her face painted green.

 

 

Chicago marathon.

About a month ago Bob and I ran the Chicago marathon. Wow, it was an amazing experience!!!

 

Bob and I both ran the St. Jude Memphis Marathon back in December and we didn't exactly have the best experience during that race. We were both battling a stomach bug and our race didn't leave us with that great feeling of accomplishment. I was devastated.

 

So, we went at it again and trained for another marathon in hopes that the 2nd time around would be much better. It was very easy to select the Chicago Marathon since I am from there, Bob and I lived there while Bob was in law school and we just love the city. Bob battled through his training after healing a sprained ankle (he only had 9 weeks to train....from zero miles to a marathon). Pretty crazy. My training went good. It was a big commitment for both us of and come race day, we were ready.

 

The Chicago Marathon did not let us down.  

 

The crowd support was out of this word. Just amazing and through just about all 26.2 miles too. Running down the streets where we had so many memories was so great. We ran through our old neighborhoods and even past Rush hospital where Addison was born. The weather was PERFECT (high in the 50s). Both Bob and I felt pretty great until about 20 miles in and like many, kind of hit our wall. We were both very very pleased with our finish times. Bob finished in 3:53 (8:54 pace) and my finish time was 4:14 (9:42 pace). Bob's goal was to finish under 4 hours and my goal was to finish under 4:20. We both got our goal...and then some!

 

Our good friend Brad ran the marathon too (his wife and my amazing running buddy Lara was there to cheer us on). Kris and Mike came from Ohio to run it as well. Becky, Pam and Marina came to cheer us on. It brought tears to my eyes each time I saw them during the race. To have them there to cheer me on made this marathon experience truly one of the best days of my life. Yes, it was hard. I wanted to give up at times....but I can't wait to run it again next year!!!!

 

 

Here is a picture that the marathon posted. I love it. It gives you a small glimpse as to just how big of an event it it. I think there were about 38,000 finishers!!!

 

 

We did it.....and feel good about it!!!!!!

 

Kris and I.....running mommies!!!!

 

Chicago Marathon 2013...I will be there!!!