a couple things...

So, Daddy built them a swing set last weekend and it's been the cause for lots and lots of giggles all week...from everyone in the house. It's 10ft tall. No joke. Because Josh thought 8ft wouldn't be quite tall enough for our 3ft tall children lol. We've both been making jokes about it ever since it went up. He came in the house and goes "uhhh hey, could you call Labron James to come hang up these swings for me". I go out there and see it with my own eyes. I say "hunny, you know the kids are ours right?" (he's 5'5" and I'm 5'2"...and Maria has a medical condition literally called "short stature"). He hung up the swings with the original chain that they came with and they came up to the girls heads...cue jokes, and jokes, and jokes... Anyway, after 8ft of extra chain, it's great and I can't wait until next year when we build the tower and slide part.

Me and Pia pants hanging out outside. (no, I wont cut her bangs, I'm trying to grow them out, they're just in an awkward phase right now)

This picture cracks me up. I love the teeth and the squinty eyes. Precious.

Maria had her last day of school on Wed. Yes, I cried...I sobbed in fact. Hey, they played the song "let them be little" and read a poem entitled "we give them back to you". Trust me, they wanted some tears...and they got them. She has grown sooooo much since the first day of school. She has really come a long way in the last 9 months.

Maria on the first day...

and on the last.

The girls on the first day...

and on the last day.

big tear...

My favorites

I got this idea from Danifred (though, if I remember correctly she got it from someone else).

In honor of my birthday, I'm going to do a list of my favorite things.

Hearing "you're the best Mommy in the whooooole world" every day This one's self explanatory. Who wouldn't love that?! However a close second is when they tell me "I will miss yoooou" 15 times in a row, every time I walk out the door. It's precious.
Moose Tracks Ice cream I used to eat it all the time in high school, with my friends at lunch time, and it still brings back memories when I eat it now.
Pawn Stars This show is awesome. It's all my favorite things rolled into one. I'm always drooling over all of the historical stuff people bring in there and I'm always yelling at the TV when they sell it too cheap...or at all (I'm talking about YOU, guy who sold his revolutionary war bond made by Paul Revere for a couple grand and a guitar!!).
Falling in Love by Philosophy. It's my signature scent. Honestly, It's the only perfume I've worn in years...I'm actually running low in case anyone's looking to get me a belated B-Day gift ;-)
History ANY kind of history. I'm always reading, researching, googling, watching documentaries, any way I can get my brain around some good history is good with me. It just really fascinates me how different and yet how similar we are to the people that lived hundreds or even thousands of years ago. I always tell Josh that if we win the lottery, our new house will be like a little mini-museum with all kinds of cool artifacts and antiques.
Jeopardy I know it's corny, but I love watching to see how many answers I know in a show. Everyone's always telling me to try out, which IS on my bucket list, but I've got at least another decade of learning to do before I'd feel really comfortable going for it.
Edward S. Curtis. He's my all-time favorite photographer. Even though he really only photographed one particular genre (Native Americans) he did it so incredibly well, that I can't help but cry when I look at some of his photographs.
***side note*** my birthday gift this year was 2 of his books, a book about our founding fathers and a travel book about Europe...and I couldn't be happier :D

Mothers day gifts, big and small

When Maria came home from school on Wednesday, she was sooo excited to give me her gifts. I told her that she could wait until Sunday, but she insisted. What I got was BEAUTIFUL and perfect.

This is my mother (and there is a picture she drew of me). Her name is Mom. She is about old, old, old years old (gee thanks). She has green eyes and black hair. She weighs 2 pounds (ok seriously thank you for that one). Her favorite food is mac & cheese (no, that's YOUR favorite food lol). She's smart and she knows all about saving me from Pia because she hits me. (I LOL'ed so hard at that). When she's not with me, she spends her time cleaning up. Best of all, mother likes to turn off the TV. Mother takes care of me by giving me good food and hugs. I think my mother is best in the world because I love her. If I could wish for anything in the world for my mother, it would be flowers. Love Maria

And this one made me bawl my eyes out...which then upset Maria because she thought I didn't like it...epic "mommy" fail. I then spent the day explaining to her that sometimes we cry because we are soooo happy and love someone soooo much.

Sometimes you get discouraged because I am so small
And always leave my fingerprints on furniture and walls

But everyday I am growing up and soon I'll be so tall
That all those little hand prints will be hard to recall.

So here's a final hand print just so you can say
This is how my fingers looked on this Mother's Day!

I'll have pics of Mother's Day and a recap of the day, tomorrow.

leftovers and wordless wednesday...all on the wrong days

This is really just a hodge podge because I haven't really had anything interesting to say in the last week that would constitute an entire blog.

• How cute is this picture of Jack? Seriously, I love it. It's definitely worthy of WW status.

• Speaking of pictures, yes, this is in fact a strawberry shaped like...uhh...well, a rack...I'm sorry, I know it's juvenile, but it has been cracking Josh and I up for two days. that's just the immature sense of humor we have, and I LOVE it.

• We had to reschedule our family pictures because they were supposed to be Sunday, but because of the storms, obviously that didn't happen. We are actually doing them at my moms house with all 10 of us for her 50th birthday gift. She's been talking about having family pics taken for years and just hasn't done it, so we thought we'd do it for her. lol. Of course I have no room to talk since I wanted to get them since last year for my birthday, but Josh didn't want to spend $700 on pics. (tangent: this I THINK, is what my EPSIL (evil psychotic sister in law) was referring to one time when she said that I "forced Josh to buy $700 patio furniture"????, when in actuality that furniture was cheapo stuff that Josh wanted and got from big lots. I guess since she wins every argument in her house, she thinks I do too. It must be unusual for someone like her to understand a couple making decisions TOGETHER. lol. ok tangent over.)


• Sophia has been calling Maria "Somia". I think this is what's going on in her head...if Pia=Sophia then Mia should=Somia. Pretty good logic if you think about it.
• It's officially 100 days until our vacation!! And if ANYONE deserves a vacation, it's us! We've spent the last 5 1/2 years having babies, taking care of them, paying our bills, working hard & doing the right thing. So now that we are practically debt free (obviously we still owe on our mortgage and car) we can finally go on a vacation the RIGHT way. Without having other bills we can't pay or paying for it with a credit card. We are so excited and now our kids will appreciate it so much more. Hopefully they will grow up to be responsible like us and not grow up feeling entitled to things like that.
• Josh got all of our plants for our garden yesterday. Last year was just a trial run to see what we liked/used so this year will HOPEFULLY be totally used. We got 24 tomato plants, 2 peppers, 1 cucumber & 2 strawberry. Also, I got the seeds the other day for corn, pickling cucumbers, pie pumpkins & carrots. I'm hoping to get a little more spaghetti sauce out of this years. We just ran out a couple weeks ago and I had to get store-bought. Once you've had homemade, the store stuff is like eating plain tomato sauce out of a can. LOL. For some reason, my green beans from last year all have a funny...like pasty? kind of taste, so I don't think we'll do them this year, however I did get some seeds. It'll really depend on if we have the space.
• When we went to pick up the plants last night, we stopped at the place where we used to go get ice cream after Maria was born. We'd walk up there every night, and it was just really nice. However, they closed it down a while back, so Josh was all excited when he came home from work last night and said "they opened it up again, we have to go tonight!". It was so cute. The problem now becomes that we sold the double stroller and IDK about having the kids walk the mile on a rural road with no sidewalks. But it would be stupid to drive a mile, ya know?
  

Don't forget...

Danifred did a post a while (is it awhile or a while?) back where she listed things she doesn't want to forget about her kids right now. And I'm a cheater cheater pumpkin eater, so I'm going to copy her paper and do one of my own, however, mine will just be about LIFE right now.

• Jackson does this thing where he holds onto a table or the couch etc. and sort of bounces and giggles so hard he can't catch his breath. It's hilarious and sooo stinking cute, but Josh always has to go and make it dirty and he says that it looks "just wrong"...men! lol
• I was just talking to a friend about how I think that Josh and I are the definition of opposites attracting. We are always teaching each other things and opening each others eyes to new things. And I think we really do bring out the best in each other. After being with him for almost 8 years, I honestly don't know how couples who are really similar can be happy (or get anything done) that way.
• Marias teacher tells me that "I wish every child had maria's sense of humor" at least once a week. I love it. I think she is just a genuinely happy kid so she will laugh and giggle and carry on about literally ANYTHING.
• I think Sophia has a future as an exercise instructor. She's always gathering us up and giving orders for different "moves" she wants us to do. "circle you head", "lift up you arms", "shake you booty", "flap you wings" (this one is her favorite and she just looooves it if her "wings" touch the person beside hers.) And it's always totally random like if we're all in the kitchen after dinner she'll just start doing it.
• On the subject of jobs, I'm almost positive that Jack will be a garbage man. I CANNOT keep the kid out of the trash. It's ridiculous. And it's not just the trash, it's the recycling, the girls toys, the DVD drawer, the picture boxes. Anything he can get his sticky little hands on, is fair game. I love him, I really do, but by the end of the day, that boy is working my last nerve! (my hope here is that in 10 years when I read this, I'll be thinking "Oh, I'm sooo glad he grew out of THAT!"...but I'm not holding my breath)
• When Jack walks it's HILARIOUS. He takes the smallest steps ever. It takes him 500 steps to get 5 feet. I love it. The difference between the way they all walk in the beginning is really interesting to me. Sophia used to not move the top half of her body and it was soo funny. And maria started running the day after she started walking. I kid you not, I actually have video to prove it. LOL
• The girls ask to play with play-doh and to color every.single.day. And it's always before 8:30am. I started telling them that the rule is, not to ask until after I get done with my breakfast so that my eyes can be fully awake. So now they come into our room at 7:am asking if my eyes are awake yet. lol
• Last night while the girls were going to the bathroom before bed, Josh layed down in Marias bed. I layed down next to him and I said "awww. are ya happy honey, both of us squeezing into a twin bed, just like when we were first dating" lol. Then the girls both climbed into bed with us and Josh says "No. This is SOO much better". My heart melted.

I wish I could remember everything about them forever. The way they say every word and the things they just have to have a certain way. In 15 years, I will be wishing I could go back and remember all the little things, hopefully posts like this will help remind me of the simple things about our life that make it SOOO amazing and such an incredible blessing.

Enough pics to sink a ship...or just 9

We had a GREAT Easter (hopefully you all did too!). After the kids opened their Easter baskets, I made breakfast (of course). Then my sister came over (the rest of my family was in WV visiting my Grandparents) to give them the baskets my mom made for them. She ended up hanging out, playing with the kids etc. Then Josh's whole family (minus one cousin and of course the brother whose wife doesn't allow him to see his own family) came over and we all ate lunch/dinner and talked and played cards. It was lots of fun and the kids had a great day (which is what really matters). Later that evening we were hanging out on the deck and Josh's dad and his girlfriend came over to give them their baskets and we all hung out for a little while. The weather here has been AWESOME the last couple weeks, (80's in northeast Ohio in April is almost unheard of!) so it was perfect weather for Easter (usually we have snow lol). Here's some of the pics from the day.

We colored eggs (of course!)

(Sophia made weird faces in every.single.picture. It's just soooo her. lol)

Here's their baskets.

This pic cracks me up. She looks like she's still asleep!

And this one cracks me up even more. If you can believe it, this is the best out of 3!

And of COURSE Jack without pants. The boy can take pants off faster than an adult lol.

Maria with her basket from "Gam"

And Sophia with hers

And all three in their Easter outfits (again, best out of 3) :D

Birthday recap

Instead of my way back Wednesday post this week, I will instead dazzle you with pictures from Maria's Birthday week.

(yes when you almost die on the day of your actual birth you get an entire week...)

(and your mommy gets to be lazy and buy all the food from the Giant Eagle deli...)

(hey if anyone deserves it, IT'S US!)

Anyway, on Sunday we had her party and of course she had TONS of fun and got lots of really nice gifts. However, her favorite items from the party were THE CAKE (of course!). Gotta love the Backyardigans...

This picture is so Pia, it's not even funny. I love it (even though it's disgusting and every time I look at it my OCD kicks in). It's just her personality in a nutshell. She doesn't care what anyone thinks, she just wants to have fun.

...and the CARD! it was a musical one (also Backyardigans). She played with that more than any of her toys I think. It broke yesterday and I had to perform "open-card" surgery to try to fix it.

(yes, I am in fact, corny enough to find that funny)

(Don't worry, it survived and is now resting to let his "stitches" heal)

She also got all kinds of other fun stuff like a Leapster2 with a Dora game,

And clothes, and shoes, and chalk, and bubbles, and Chixos, and crafts...She loved it all. But alas, I was so engrossed in the actual day, I didn't take very many pictures to prove it. But the nicest thing of all, was that she got to see her family (one of whom, hasn't seen her in almost a year).

Then last night her only set of grandparents that didn't make it to the party, came over to visit.

She got BARBIES! and better yet, it was...BARBIES WITH BABIES!! Oh my goodness, it's so stinkin cute you would not believe it. I only wish I was a little girl again (of course that's how I feel with ALL of the cool new Barbie stuff they have now). There is actually a lever on the back of the nurse that will move the arm so she can rock the baby! AAhhhh soo cute.

But I digress....

Also, both of the girls got cute necklaces with a dog and a cat on them and books that match. This is a horrible picture but it's all I could really get at the time without annoying them too much so, it'll have to do.