SANTA CAME EARLY

Santa stopped by last night and made a delivery. I always make a special request for Santa to stop by before we travel to family for the holidays. I am opposed to the idea of hauling all of what you see in this picture only to haul it home plus what the children receive from other family members. We had a great evening. Keenan's main gift from Santa was the pop-a-shot as shown below. Kira's main gift was a digital camera and two very specific, and very hard to find, Star Wars figures. Keylee's main gift was the Disney Mega Castle.

Photo of the kids with most of their gifts piled up.

Keylee's reaction when she saw that Santa brought her the Disney castle she wanted a/k/a "the pink castle." Keylee is in costume for the arrival of the castle. She wears this outfit all the time, which most of you know from my previous posts.

I will draw your attention to the package just behind Keylee, which is wrapped in newspaper. Joe has taken wrapping tips from his father as often times Joe's dad will wrap his mother's gift in newspaper. The tradition continues as that is my gift behind Keylee. I will say under the newspaper wrapping was a great pair of boots. Keenan's pop-a-shot: I bet he already shot 100 balls last night. It has been non-stop fun for him. He is doing his shooting in his Peyton Manning jersey that he received for Christmas. He loves jerseys. He asked for the Minnesota Vikings jersey and stated "I want the jersey because I like the Vikings jersey and the helmet not because I like the team" :) He doesn't know but he is going to get the Vikings jersey from my parents.

THESE ARE A FEW OF MY FAVORITE THINGS

I attempted to attend a "Favorite Things" party last night. A friend organized a party where each person brought three identical items. Then, a name is drawn and that person shared their favorite things with three other people by drawing three names out of a bag and sharing a short story as to why the item they brought is their favorite thing. It was a fun and different idea so I thought I would attend the party. My friend Julie picked me up. I am already running late. I made one trip out to her car with a bag, which I believed to be durable as it had a cardboard bottom, with three bottles of wine. The three bottles of wine represented my favorite thing. I run back into my house to get the buffalo chicken dip I made for an appetizer. Finally, Julie and I start toward out destination in Aggieville to meet up with the other party-goers. We park, I throw the bag of wine over my shoulder, I grab the buffalo chicken dip and off we go. Then, I hear a "boom, boom, boom". Yes, it was the sound of shattering glass. Shattering wine bottles to be exact. So, my favorite things were now shattered in the alley (near Starbucks so be careful when going down that alley). I looked down to examine the glass and thought . . . . this just sums up my week.

BEFORE

AFTER

I did attend the party where I saw some good friend, had some good food and shared many laughs.

Our "baby" is 3 today!

Despite the heartbreaking loss Friday night, we DO have something to CELEBRATE! Our princess Keylee turned 3 years old today. It is so hard to believe that three years have passed. Keylee brings such joy to our house. She seems to learn so much from having older siblings. She always has something to say and always keeps us laughing. Keylee loves to draw, color, dance, sing and wear her Cinderella dress. Keylee always wears her Cinderella dress. I have decided there are some fights worth fighting with her but telling her she can't wear her dress isn't one of them.

Keylee's second birthday

Keylee's first birthday

The day Keylee came home from the hospital . . . . . . where does time go?

New Season

This past Friday the MHS Indians managed to accomplish the following: 1) Retain the Silver Trophy 2) Centennial League Champions 3) District Champions 4) Host Derby Friday night for the first round of playoffs

Happy Halloween

We had a great Halloween and lots of fun with the neighbors.

Halloween School Parade

This year Kira's classroom had to select a historical character to dress up as for Halloween and present a written report to the class about the person they chose. Kira chose Sacajawea. I felt like the costume I found for her actually turned out really cute and she did a great job presenting her report.

Kira reading her report to the class.

Keenan's class could wear their Halloween costumes for the school parade.

Keenan as Obi Wan Kenobi.

Each class walks through the school and the crowd of parents to show off their costumes. Keenan threw out a little a Jedi Master judo chop at the camera. ha

Chicago Marathon - Bitter Sweet

10/10/10 has come and gone. The Chicago Marathon is over. I had an absolutely great trip to the "windy city" with some great friends. This was the largest Chicago Marathon to date. The streets were constantly filled with people for the marathon. I was truly amazed at not only all the runners but all of the international runners. As I stated, the trip was fantastic. I was disappointed with my time as I finished ten minutes slower than my goal. I managed to convince my friend Debbie to run with me and I managed two other friends to join us in Chicago for a "girls weekend." I said I was not going to run another marathon but just continue to run half-marathons. I have changed my mind. I have already looked at the marathon calendar and picked out two marathons that I may run. I told Joe before Chicago that if I didn't finish under 4 hours I was running again. When I told him I had two marathons picked out to run I got the predictable sigh and eye roll. Don't get me wrong, he was very supportive of my recent efforts. However, I think he needs time to recover from the marathon, ha.

me and my friend Debbie

Debbie, me, Tanna and Darci in front of an incredible little breakfast cafe. Yum. Reminded me of "The Chef" here in Manhattan. I didn't post pics but we also ate at Harry Caray's, shopped on Michigan Avenue and went to see The Lion King. I was so happy to have my friend Darci with me. She is an expert traveler. She travels so much for her work that she is so efficient in her use of time and transportation. She had the CTA map memorized.

A couple pics from the Marathon Expo. I was OVERWHELMED by the number of people. WOW. People... People ... and more People!!

Beautiful view out by Lake Shore Drive.

Getting ready to fly out of Manhattan Regional Airport.