Happy New Year!

Am I the only one that can't believe it is already 2010? Allison always listens to Radio Disney and one of the teenage stars said "Like, I can't wait to be like, wow, 2000 was like so long ago...". I remember New Year's Eve 1999 like it was yesterday. I lived in North Georgia and was crying in that shady duplex b/c Y2K was going to end life as I knew it, luckily Aleks got there before I decided to lock myself in the bomb shelter.

Michigan was really fun, the snow was there and to us Floridians it was more than enough. Aleks' grandma and aunt were great hostess' to us and we even got to visit the Henry Ford Museum in Detroit (Deerborn, actually, but who is keeping track of city limits?) where the Kennedy limo and the Rosa Parks bus both reside.

New Year's was fine. We watched a few bowl games (I think) and played with some fireworks. Gabriel didn't come close to staying up for the ball drop so we just woke him up 5 minutes before. I think the 3 hour power nap helped, last year when he fell asleep 30 minutes before the ball and we woke him up he was crabby, this year he just came to the living room like he'd been awake the whole time.

*****After choosing pictures for this post (I chose too many, shoulda made a slide show...) I remembered a lesson we learned that needs to be shared with all you who have boys. We got all the kids' presents in Detroit rather than trying to check enough luggage to fly them up with us, but it made for a crazy 23rd and 24th because we didn't even get there until the 23rd at like 8:45. So, Aleks and I split up to grab stuff and I picked 2 cool looking Transformers for Gabe. Christmas morning he wants to open them and we couldn't even figure out how to turn it into a robot, and once we did it was a huge problem to put it back to the car. Aleks, Grandpa and I all tried with no luck, even after looking at the directions. Our 85 year old grandma says "What skill level are they?" Hmmm, there are different levels? That would have been good to know. "Uh, I don't know Grandma. Oh, (sheepish grin) they are level 3 out of 4." Yadda, yadda, yadda I finally got them back together before we left and dared anyone to open them back up. In the airport on the way home Gabe wanted to play with one so I showed him how to open it and made a joke to Aleks that it would never be a car again, but who cares as long as Gabe enjoyed playing with it and I went to cruise the terminal. When I got back 20 minutes later it was put together at Aleks' feet and I thought he figured it out. Nope, Gabriel did it. Unreal.

Update

I have been pretending to be really busy lately and not "had time to blog" (although, I can see that I'm not alone, ahm Marcie, Nicole, Nichole and Jenna). We are leaving for Christmas in Michigan this afternoon, hopefully the kids will see some serious snow. I plan on getting some really fun footage of them meeting that side of the family and turning into popsicles, but until then peep my UF graduation on the 18th.

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Trick or Treat!

Last weekend Aleks took Allison and Gabriel to block party on Central Ave so Allison could dance to Thriller (my wisdom teeth still had me out of order). MJ came at Gabe like a zombie and he hid by Daddy's leg, Aleks said it was really funny. There is a commercial for Party City that has the cast dancing to Thriller and Gabe always screams for me to come see it...

Mikey and Justin came to Trick-or-Treat with us and we had a really nice time. Remember that last year we didn't get to do this, we'd just met and had a supervised visit at a "Fall Festival" with a Jesus monster truck. Allison saw lots of kids from school, Gabriel and Justin were afraid of most the yards and we now have more candy than any household needs. Perfect.

Allison is 11

Allison's birthday was Thursday and Aleks got tickets to the Rays game from someone at work, so it worked out that we'd go there then do the big rat on Saturday with friends. The Rays game was awesome from the first second. We entered at a gate where the coolest Rays Girls were and got a picture with them (Allison loves anything cheerleader-esque) and told them that it was her birthday. They said they'd come see us in our seats and they actually did. I also think they were behind the promotion lady picking Alli and Gabe to sing the 7th inning stretch rendition of "Take Me Out To The Ballpark". We were on the Jumbotron 2 other times, too. Chuck E. Cheese's was exactly what you'd expect so I'll leave you to making up your own commentary on those pictures.

Make video montages at www.OneTrueMedia.com

Back to school

I got lazy about saving photos to the computer...and maybe a few other things too. But we did have swine flu (type A for all the PC people out there) and had to go back to school myself. So, is that an excuse? Aleks was on first day duty and I think he did a great job!

Another Family Pic

Laura and Brad got married!! This was my first wedding as a bridesmaid and it was very exciting. The reception was beautiful and worth every minutes of planning that went in ;) Shae snapped a great shot of my darlings and now I am sharing with you, enjoy.

Toothless Wonder

Well, Gabriel was going to call 911 on me for pulling his tooth out, but I showed him Izzy's post about her first tooth and he felt better. He already lost his bottom teeth, but the trama of his first front tooth was still very dramatic. When he was screaming I asked him if he was in pain and he shook his head no, but continued to cry for like a minute. Like I said, Izzy's post really helped him turn his frown upside down so we have to post one, too.