Happy Halloween!

We can't believe how fast the time is flying this year. We were so busy this month, and with Aaron out of town on business, we didn't have any time to get our house all Halloween-scary. We did manage to get the kids dressed up and take them to Aaron's office for some trick or treating, as well as BelleSquare, which by the way was crazy so we left about 15 minutes into it, and then we hit Factoria Mall on the way home - it was much more our pace.

Nolan, The Dragon, was just passing out kiss after kiss as long as you were feeding him some chocolates. It was so cute, I kept giving him little bites - I couldn't resist. Nolan also insisted on carrying his own pumpkin bucket, no matter how full it got. It was so cute to watch him walking in front of us, tilted to one side, and with every step he took her heard a 'bump' which was the pumpkin bucket hitting his leg - haha, it was too cute.

Elaina, the Princess, had so much fun, it seemed like we weren't walking fast enough while scouting out the candy. She wore her dress up shoes out for day, and by the time we got home she was so ready to take them off. I think she now realizes heals are hard to walk in. The price we pay, the price we pay.

I dressed up for a party the week before Halloween. I was....well, I think a scary purple winged death angel. Aaron didn't dress up this year. This was his only free pass. Back to dressing up next year. As usual, we let the kids have a few pieces of candy, and then their buckets magically disappeared. They never even asked for them the next day.

Vegas, BABY!!

It's Vegas, Baby!

Aaron and I got away for 3 nights, sans kids. Gramma came to watch the kids and we jetted to Vegas for a long weekend. What an adventure we had.

We stayed at the Signature at MGM - so great - totally will be staying there again! We had lots of fun at the slots, tables and all that. This trip we decided to do more than just spend our days/nights in the casinos - we went on a private winery tour. A beautiful limo picked us up in the morning, greeting us with champange, oj, 2 bottles of wine, and roses. The drive to Puhrump, NV was about 1.5 hours - it was really beautiful. Once at the winery (Pahrump Valley Winery) we were given a private tour of the winery by the owner, Bill. He was so nice, and even gave us a bottle of Reisling from a friends winery on the house. After being our host for wine tasting we are lunch in their resturant. Bill came over to our table with glass in hand, and asked if he could have a taste. (Apprently he had not opened that case of wine yet) Bill took a sip, swirled it, and smiled. He said 'this is a bottle I'll enjoy drinking'. HAHA.

It was time to say good-bye to the winery and Bill. We got back into our Limo and headed back to Vegas. About 15 minutes on the road we started to hear this strange noise - as if our limo driver, Ty, was driving on the grated part of the freeway. A few seconds later he pulls over, we look behind us to see smoke and little parts flying down the freeway-haha! As it turns out, the rear axle fell off - haha. Enjoy the picture for the full effect. Not only were we now stranded - we (including our driver) had Verison, and there was one cell tower, which was not Verison - haha! So here we are stuck in the Nevada Desert having to try and get a cell connection. We had a few drivers pull over and ask to if they could help. The first guy - a Refrideration Guy - he pulls up in his Van and asks if he can help, and then offers Aaron and I a ride back to the strip ...um, I don't think so - HAHA! We've all seen that movie, right? Anyway, he was sweet - in a creepy way - here's a picture of me, creepy guy and Ty. You are in the middle of the Nevada Desert, you have to make the best of it, right? So we pulled out the champane and oj. we enjoyed drinks and dancing on the side of the road, while waiting for another limo to come get us. About an hour into our wait, Aaron and I both had to go to the bathroom - haha - yeah, the side of the road, baby! About an hour forty-five minutes later we get our new limo and are back on the road. Ty got us back to our hotel in time for us to run up and freshen up and then drove us to the Bellagio. We had tickets to see 'O', which was fantastic. We got tickets that day from some guy off of CL and we got 2nd row center - it was crazy. These seats were perfect. A real treat! Our last day in Vegas was spent in 'Old Vegas' - Freemont Street. We had a blast. I think we played Black Jack for 3 hours or so all one $50 each (well, I needed to steal some of Aaron's money for a few hands). We walked off the tables with almost double our money. While that might not seem like much - the fact that we were able to play that long on such a small amount of money - and we walked off the talble with more than we started...that's success for us! Vegas was good to us, and we were good to Vegas. It was a much needed getaway, and we are so thankful to Gramma for coming to watch the kids for us. Here are a few other random pictures from our trip.

Eileen and George Get Married

Eileen and George exchanged vows in Gramma's garden in September. This was an nice family affair, and a good time was had by all. The reception was at a winery nearby and it was a bunch of fun. Congrats guys! This picture of NoNo was taken just before the wedding.

The last several months

Hello all!

It's been a long time since I've found some real downtime to blog - The kids are sleeping and Aaron is in LA on business for the week. So here's a recap.

April/May/June

Elaina and Nolan had a great birthday! Nolan turned One and Elaina 3. She had a blast making her birthday cake, and Nolan loved eating his cake! Our house was filled with family and friends, and the noise level was high.

Nolan starting walking in early April, but really didn't master it until mid May or so. His eyes filled with excitement one he was able to walk without falling.

July/August/September

We took our first Family of 4 vacation this summer. We spent 12 days taveling the East Coast and Mid West. A family wedding took up to New England - so beautiful, and we had a wonderful time visiting family and enjoyed a great wedding. While traveling we made sure to do something every day for the kids. Our last day on this leg of the trip we spent the day in Boston, and took the kids to the Children's Musem in downtown Boston. Seriously the best Children's Museum we've ever been too!! I wish it was in Seattle! Both kids had so much fun, and so did we!

Our second half of vacation was spent in Chicago visiting family and friends. We had so much fun! The kids loved the Chicago Aquairum and the Zoo! Oh, how I have missed things like that. We staying with Aunite Biskit for a few nights (thanks again) and we stayed in the city for a few nights - at a great hotel. I was so exicted I got to spend time with my girl, Brooke and her family. I have missed her dearly, and hope we can see each other again soon.

While we had a great time, we have to give props to our kids! Lambs and NoNo traveled so well. I thought we'd have some rough nights with them - all goes with travel and small children - but really, they were wonderful. They adapted to every place we stayed (several hotels and homes) without any trouble. Lambs' favorate thing to do was to make a 'princess bed' loaded with pillows and keen-kits (blankies) and thought it was so special. NoNo just slept in each crib like it was home. Truely, they did so great.

Nolan did get sick while we were in Chicago - so sad - he just started thowing up one night in our hotel - just after Aaron and I got back from a date (Sissy was watching the kids) (thanks again, Sissy!) It was so sad to see him jsut not feeling good. That night he was sick a few more times, and the next day we took slow and didn't do much. He was sick on our last day, which was a family BBQ at Aunt Biskit's house.

All in all, we had a wonderful, fun-filled vacation, and I can't wait to see what we do next as a family.

August was a month to note. Our sweet Lambs woke up one morning and told me 'mommy, I'm all done with pull-ups'. That was it - it was awesome. Really, she had only been wearing them at night for the last few months, but I guess that was it. It's the coolest thing - I love that she's such a big girl! Now - if we could just get NoNo started on the potty training now - haha.

September 8th - Aaron turned 34. I successfully pulled off (for the most part - haha) a surprise party for him. It was so fun to be out at a bar, play darts, pool and enjoy some drinks with family and friends.

Recap Jan-March

We seem to have been so busy, we've not had much time to post things that have been going on.
Maggie added another year, celebrating her 37th birthday. She enjoyed a great girls night out to celebrate.

Sissy came to town for a week. It was so fun to visit with her. She helped us out around the house and with the kids. I know she loved spending time with them.
We managed to get away for an overnight and Sissy watched the kids. We found this very secluded B&B on Bainbridge Island. It was so nice. Here's a nice picture of part of the garden at the B&B. We look forward to going back there sometime (soon). We didn't take many picture.



NoNo started to show signs of walking. It's so great. He's only taking a few steps at a time - it's so cute. He's getting so big, we can't beleive he's going to be 1 next month. We took the kids to the Seattle Aquarium - they both had a great time. Here are a few pictures from that afternoon.

New Appliances

We finally got new appliances, and could not be happier. We've been living with our old and cranky electric stove, broken dishwasher and small microwave since we moved in. We've upgraded and are both just in love with our new toys. We are now the proud owners of GE Cafe series gas stove, microhood and dishwasher. It's so nice to have these pretties in our home. Our stove has a double over, and bottom drawer can be used as a warming drawer. The microhood is just plum cool. It's super huge and does lots of fancy things. Our dishwasher is so cool - who knew you could load it up with dishsoap and it would wash load after load and then will tell you when you need to add more soap. It's so quiet, too. We can't beleive how quiet this thing is. Now that we've got these fancy new appliances the rest of our kitchen looks so outdated. Ah, does it ever end? We also plan on doing counters, but not sure when that will happen. I think we'll also look into refinishing our cabinets - give them a boost.

Time Keeps On Tickin'

Here we are!

We got so busy,I'm just finding some time now to check back in and update what's going on in our lives.

We finally sent out our holiday news letters (today) - haha.

NoNo isn't crawling yet. He seems interested some days, but most of the time he'd rather stand. He's even walked a little with a kids walker. We think he might skip crawling and go straight to walking. He's got 6 teeth now, and loves to eat and is getting the hang of feeding himself. He's talking - of course DaDa was the first thing he's said. It's very sweet. He also still gives the best hugs ever - although sometimes he forgets that your face is 'yours', and he tries to take if off.

Lambs is doing just great. She's still potty training, but more seriously now. She also just got her very first haircut. It was really cute. She enjoyed it just as much as I did. We've got a pic and some of her clippings to put in the babybook. She's doing great in school. Jr. Preschool really keeps her going and she's making some really good friends.

Speaking of baby books - OMG they are so hard to keep up with. I still have to put the writsbands in the books. I keep coming across them and tell myself - yikes, I better get these in those books before I loose them - and a week later, I say the same thing. ARG. I would love a few hours, some sissors, glue stick and some pictures. I could get both the kids books in order and up to date. Then the challenge would be to keep it up - in a few months I'll be behind again, oh how the pattern goes.