Merry Christmas!!!!

Yes, this is actually my teenager smiling!! It doesn't happen often, but it does happen :) especially when he gets what he wants. Hope he will be smiling more often it looks good on him. Joey smiles a lot, but it is usually because he is trying to get away with something! This time I think its just cause he is happy.

Alli opened her pillow pet, and said, now I want the turle,and the penguin, and the...... and named about 5 more, I tell you the girl is never happy!!! but I guess Its a good start.

Jason wasn't sure what he had, but he liked opening presents! After we showed him, he was so much happier!!

Abby loved this hat that was made for her, and she looks soooo adorable in it!!! but her favorite present was her pink laptop, (I got carried away watching the kids, and forgot to take pictures)

yes its me whining again!

Ok, so here it is December 8 days away from christmas, I am usually wrapping presents, baking up a storm, singing carols, and so excited I am driving the kids crazy! So aparently this year I have a serious problem, well several of them. I have a new dishwasher that is broke, so all dishes are being done by hand, which means very little if no baking because I hate doing dishes by hand especially when you bake like I do and dirty every dish in the house. So no baking. Second After Zachs month long illness in October, it threw off my schedule and finances, and well the wrapping is not where it should be, I will just leave that at that! and third, I just don't feel like singing!! fourth, We got our family pics taken last month as many of you know I showed a preview in an earlier post, Well my friend and fell dance mom took them for us, we saved up to have them taken by a "professional" we have actually never had them professionally taken, so we were so excited!! Well due to some aparent personal problems, she has fallen of the face of the earth, with my family pics. and my $. So no christmas cards, and no family pics for presents for my family (I know that was cheesy, but it was what I was going to do sorry) so I have been very depressed, and have been very sad over this, and very emotional. I am sad for my friend that I don't know what has happened to her, and sad for me and my family that we have been taken advantage of. I hope we eventually get them, but who knows. All this along with some personal health challenges I am dealing with and some childrens health and school issues, leads me to just want to scream so hear I go aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!!!! ok I feel a little better thanks for listning. Next post will be happier I hope!!
p.s. if you don't want to listen to me whine, you should have got a clue by the title of the post and not read on!!

trying real hard to get into the christmas mood

Ok so here we are one week into December, we actually have snow, my tree is up (and finally decorated) not too much done in the way of shopping, but for some reason I am just not feeling it this year. So I was surfin the web the other day, and I came across a blog where a lady was talking about Nikolaus day. It is Dec. 6, its a German holiday where you put out your shoes by the front door, and Nikolaus, the German Santa Clause comes and puts a gift in them and some candy, I thought what the heck we should try it!!! So I gathered the kids around last night explained what we were going to do, tried to calm them down a little bit, laughed at zach and joey as they rolled their eyes at me, but then laughed more as they got their biggest shoes. Then felt extra loved when jason made sure I had a pair of shoes ready too. Then we all went to bed hoping it would work (since we are irish not german) but really hoping it would............ And sure enough.........
The kids each got a little gift..........

which totally thrilled them..........

even if they didn't want to wake up.......

And some candy :)

And what was really fun, was he left me some really cool German noodles so now I can experiment with some new dinner tonight I hope my kids will eat them, they look so cool, they are black, yellow, and red noodles, way fun. Don't know what to do with them, they may end up with Italian sauce on the german noodles hehehe. oh well what do you do right?

Early Christmas at grandma and grandpas!!

Abbys grandpa and grandma invited us down to celebrate a little early, and we all had a blast!!

We enjoyed a yummy dinner, great company, and got spoiled rotten!

We had a great time especially with Tom and Jamie and the boys, so glad they made it up to hang out with us! thanks guys. The kids had so much fun playing together. Here is little miss Abby opening her present. She got 2 new dolls this year so far, and she is soooo happy! She has been playing nonstop. What a happy little girl!
Zach, well you know teenagers. thats his big smile, lol! he got a gift card to aeropostle! (he really is excited, ) when we left he asked me when I can take him shopping!

And joe-man got a gift card to cal-ranch, he is debating in his mind on what to get, he says its to bad they don't sell cowgirls there!

Alli-oop got some new barbies (is it possible to have too many) they tell me no! but she is thrilled! she has added them to the collection. She is happy as can be.

And Jason, who informed me yesterday, I have to start calling him Jett. has now added 2 more transformers to his collection! He tells me there are a million of them so he has lots more to get! He was so happy too. We all made a pretty good haul. Thanks so much! We love you both bunches!

top ramen and chopsticks

So whats a mom to do when I don't feel like cooking dinner?? Well I cook the 10 cent Ramen noodles and serve them with chopsticks and the kids have a blast!!! And The parents get a pretty good laugh too. Here is little miss allison she did pretty good. It may not be right, but she got the food in her mouth, in fact, that was how they all did it!! Joey however did get the hang of it. He tried and tried till he got it right! He did a great job, with a few giggles inbetween.

Jason was the most inventive, he tried to put them together and use them like a fork, then he placed them over his bowl like a big x and slid them in to pick up the noodles, in the end, he ate all the noodles thats what mattered.

Abby tried to hold it like a pencil and the top one kept slipping, but she sure did figure it out too. She had a lot of fun figuring it out.

And of course the teenager just got as close to the bowl as he could and slurped!!!! We has so much fun. What a crazy night, but we succeded not a single fork came out and all the bowls were empty!