Lauren at gymnastics - the last day for this 9 week session. There are only 3

girls in the class and they got awards. Next week starts the next session and

Lauren just loves it!

Long time, no updates!

So we've been busy August and September with Nathan in 1st grade and Lauren starting preschool. Both kids are doing great with school. Nathan's 1st report card shows him ahead of grade level for reading and right on target with all of his other subjects. He is playing flag football and loves it. He does awesome on defense and focuses in on getting those flags!

Lauren is constantly talking about her friends in school and she is SO into princesses and dressing up. She is also taking gymnastics now and she absolutely loves it. She wears her leotard outfits ALL the time!

During Nathan's trackout, he attended a horse camp and he loved it. He got to help take care of the horses and they rode every day. Such an adventure. Last weekend we took them to the new Great Wolf Lodge and water park. We had a great time! So now we are looking forward to getting back into the school routine.

Nathan with his team - 1st game.

Lauren in her favorite "nastics" leotard. Love the boots?? Such a fashion statement.

Nathan's birthday money bought him yet another BIG star wars lego - 800+ pieces. Watch out Santa, he's asking for the Death Star for Christmas (14+ years and about $400)!! yikes

Lauren hiding with all of her "friends".

The Tinkerbell princesses! Is it really possible to have so much fun in a sleeping bag??

The Princess turns 3 while in NY

So it's been awhile since I posted anything on this blog! We were in NY for 2 1/2 weeks, and had such an awesome time with both families. We spent a lot of time in Old Forge, and spent 5 days in New Hartford as well. It was so neat to see how things have changed or haven't changed over the years (like the Utica Zoo!!) While we were there, Bob and I celebrated our 10 yr anniversary (in Lake Placid alone!), and our baby girl Lauren turned 3 the very next day. I can't believe how fast the last 3 yrs have gone. Here are some pictures of her party, held at the Timm's house on 1st Lake in Old Forge. Both families were there to enjoy, including my Grandma Rye and her companion Ed, and Bob's Granny and Grandpop. There were 21 adults and 9 children! Good thing Gramma and Grandpa have a BIG house!

Lauren and "pink baby" in their matching dresses

My lovely store-bought ice cream cake! It was phenomenal and devoured quickly!

Keller, Lauren, Jake, and Nathan

Love that cake!

Here she is standing on the coffee table to thank everyone for her gifts.

Gramma bought her a princess dress that came with wings, push a button and they twinkle...too cute!

And the crew in the hot tub after a chilly swim in 1st lake. They had such a blast! Very easy to "maintain" 9 kids in an enclosed area!

I have tons of pictures to post from NY, including Enchanted Forest ones, hopefully I'll get to it soon!

HAPPY EASTER!

The kids in front of my phlox.  We're loving spring right now!

Coloring Easter eggs - what fun with a 2 yr old!  

Nathan found it more fun to just put the same egg

in every single color, making it a nasty brown color!

YUCK!

The Easter bunny sure knows how to do boy vs girl

baskets.  Lauren had lots of pink and yellow, and Nathan 

got lots of blue and green.  Books, bubbles, baby chicks,

and of course candy!  Lauren also got a new baby and

Nathan got the Indiana Jones Lego he's been wanting

for months!

The kids found over 50 eggs in the backyard!  A chilly

start to the day but it's going to be beautiful.  Happy Easter

to everyone, we wish we were with family today :(

We went to the park for awhile this afternoon and topped

the day off with an awesome ham dinner.  Now the kids are

in bed and Bob and I are enjoying quiet time!

Hugs and kisses to all - xxxooo

Picture day at Lauren's preschool

Anytime I put a dress or a skirt on Lauren, she gets giddy and calls herself either a princess or a mermaid.  It's adorable.  Nathan put on some nice shorts and a collared shirt, but he refused to take his picture at the school because it "wasn't his school"!  Such a brat....

And then we were off to mall to burn energy, which is where the waterfall shot was taken.

Tina, Jake and Grandpa visit

Sorry the quality of these pics are not great.  The camera had a huge fingerprint across the lense...wonder how that got there?!

The top pic is Nathan's finished lego - almost 500 pieces, he did all by himself.  Thanks Grandpa! Jake was so funny watching Nathan build his lego.  And boy did he love Lauren's kitchen stuff! Not to mention the Thomas trains.  We hope to see Jake and Tina in April??

Just an update...

Well I've got lots of pictures to add, but just haven't done it yet!  What a crazy month we've had here.  We had an awesome visit with cousin Jake, aunt Tina and Grandpa.  The kids loved playing in the backyard, and Jake was quite fond of Nathan's old Thomas trains!  We hope to see Jake and Tina again in April?

We then had a visit from Nana and Papa.  They stayed with us for a week until their beach house was ready!  And we were so thankful they were here, because Nathan ended up in the hospital with pneumonia!  My tough healthy ox was knocked down a peg.  He is fine now, but what a crazy and scary experience.  We hope he continues to stay on the recovery road.  Doctors say it takes a lot of time for lungs to fully recoup.

We are now looking forward to Myrtle Beach!  The kids and I will probably go over there Monday and spend the week.  And hopefully Bob can get some time off towards the end of the month and we'll head over again.

That's all for now - hope all are well and not getting any of the winter funk going around.  We'll see some of you soon, others maybe in the summer?!

Love to all - 

I promise pictures to come maybe later today!!

Bob took Nathan to the Monster Truck Jam last night. He went with Dave Palmer and his two oldest boys, Justin and Ryan. The boys had a blast! They had passes to the pit prior to the event, so here's some pictures of all the trucks and a couple drivers. Nathan's favorite truck is the Predator! I believe this will be a yearly event for Nathan and daddy!

Big milestones!

Nathan lost his second tooth last night just before dinner! The bottom center right, just next to the one he lost over Christmas break in a snow bank! He was quite concerned when he got home from school because it was wiggling so much, he thought he might swallow it during dinner. All is well though and of course he was very excited this morning after seeing the tooth fairy had come.




And little miss Lauren is now potty trained. She started last week after returning from NY. It took her 2 days to get the pee-pee perfected, and after a few scary attempts of #2, she is now going poo-poo as well. We are very proud and she is quite excited at her newest accomplishment. I took her to Target to get something "special", and the picture below shows what she picked out! Who knew, another stroller!! Even after getting the oh so sought after pink polka dot stroller from Santa, she insisted this was the special gift she wanted.


And here's a couple pics of the kids eating spagetti just because it makes me laugh at how much they love pasta! Are all kids addicted to spagetti like ours?? Hope everyone is adjusting to 2009 and getting back in routine.
I have lots of thank you notes to send, but thanks to all for a great trip to the chilly north!

A tribute to Kathy - love the Seattle background or what??

What an awesome vacation we had in NY! We had such a beautiful drive (11 hrs) up and hit New Hartford just in time for dinner. And the very next day we enjoyed several inches of snow - the kids loved it! We had a great time sledding, spending time with our cousins and Nana and Papa and taking walks to Grandma Rye's! Looking forward to the next visit with everyone - hugs and kisses. Thank you to Mom and Dad for all you do! Love ya and miss ya -

Our next journey was up to Old Forge on Tuesday. Even more snow! Keller, Wyatt and Jake were already there and we were so excited to see them. We had such a great time. Nathan and Keller did a lot of catching up and getting to know each other well. Lauren tried out her senority (age # of course) on her poor unsuspecting cousins Wyatt and Jake! She has learned well from the master of how to ruffle feathers. Bob and I truly enjoyed our visit and thank everyone for their gifts and conversations and biting their tongues with our children! haha Thanks to Mom and Dad for everything. It was all perfect! Love ya -