Tyler turns 5!

I have no clue where the past 5 years went. Somehow we have a 5 year old who everyday seems like he's getting older. There's so much to say about Tyler I'm not sure where to start. He's so sweet, kind, caring, funny and can be also be a firecracker when he wants to be. He has tons of energy. He always has. He loves reading, playing outside, fighting bad guys with his many weapons, watching tv and the ipad and America's Funniest Home Videos is topping out as one of his favorite shows these days. Lately, he's been really great at trying new foods for us. He eats really great anyway and eats a variety of food, but recently he's had Cheeseburgers, turkey tacos, chicken tacos, and roast beef he's expanding his palette :) He's a smart cookie and a great big brother.

For his birthday he asked for a drum set and zombie strikeblade. He also asked to go to Scoogies to eat and to have a candy cake. So that's what we did on his actual birthday. The weekend before his birthday Uncle Richard was visiting and brought him a cake, then we had his actual birthday celebration, then Alex and Sydney got to spend the whole weekend with us and he's having a birthday party with friends this coming Saturday that he's sharing with his friend Kyle because their born 2 weeks apart. One lucky kid.

And I'm one lucky Mama to have this boy as my son. Love you to piece Buddy ♥

New Years!

Ahhh a new year! It's always exciting to feel like you start fresh. 2014 was a great year. We did lots of things that I can't possibly recap but it was a good one.

Here's some highlights from our new years celebration. We kept it low key this year. Great dinner, banging pots and pans, tent in the house to play in and a dance party with my boys. In a house full of testosterone you would think dance parties wouldn't exist, but all these guys could shake it!

We got to visit with the Tizers who will soon be home from London for good. Gosh we miss our neighbors and it's so nice to see the kids pick up right where they left off.

We also took the kids to the Franklin Institute. We rode the train to the city and they absolutely loved it. The found some musicians in the train station and they would've watched them all day if we let them. Good stuff.

And then there's a picture below of my wooden blocks that spell 'Peace'. I put them out every Christmas and laugh every time I look at them because they never actually spell Peace with little hands around. It's things like ace, epac, cap, ceap you name it it's been spelled and it makes me smile as much as it makes me cringe every time I have to pick up the blocks and rearrange them. That goes to show you how much peace we really have in this house lol.

It's all good though my kids are awesome ♥

Merry Christmas 2014

Finally, I'm getting around to posting some Christmas pictures! Lots to share here. We had a very low key Christmas Eve Wigilia. Pierogies, stuffed mushrooms and spinach casserole. Looks like a bare table but that's ok I didn't want to fuss too much this year. Although I did roll 100 meatballs for Christmas Day while Tyler some rolled meat logs and Zac rolled "tooneys" which Tyler interpreted to mean "Mom, Zac rolled a penis! That's what tooneys means". Boys! Zac ate popcorn and we had some telepathic sessions going on where Tyler believed Dave was truly reading his mind as to what was hiding behind his cup each time. We shared little bitty pieces of oplatki because that's all we had left. Last year I said I have to remember to get more and somehow Christmas Eve was upon us once more and I never got more. We still shared and wished good health and happiness for each of us and Tyler dipped his lips in to the last remnants of oplatki. Mom, note we need more for next year please! We ate dinner and walked to our neighbors house for a little more fun before getting ready for the big guys arrival.

Tyler took care of everything this year. He got the Santa and the reindeer food ready, poured the milk, put it all by the fireplace and then we sprinkled our homemade reindeer food in the yard. It was warm and not feeling oh so Christmasy since it was 50 degrees out but besides that it was magical.

Tyler woke up Christmas morning and was running in place at the foot of our bed saying "Santa came!" We went downstairs to start the chaos of opening and their present opening strategies are being well observed. Tyler is like me. He saves the big ones until last. He opens, looks, takes a minute, makes sure he still has more presents left to open than his brother and encourages Zac to open more or offers his help in opening all to make sure he has the last stack of big presents left to open. Zac on the other hand goes for the big ones first! Rips it open, on to the next, go grabs a piece of gum because really that might have been what he was most excited about and then on to the next present. No rhyme or reason behind his opening strategy yet. Then off to Grammy's house, then to Aunt Kris's for Christmas day. Food, family and lots of laughs...can't beat that!