More Snow Pics!

First Big Snowfall of the Season!

From late Saturday night through Sunday we had a great snowstorm. The only reason it was great though was because I didn't have to drive in it! Luckily it didn't start snowing until I was almost home from work on Saturday night and then by the time I had to go back in Sunday the roads were pretty clear.
We got probably close to 18 inches maybe and had 3 foot drifts. It was hard to tell the exact amount with all the drifts. Of course all the 3 foot drifts were where I told Scott I would shovel while he did the snowblowing. I agreed to this before I went outside so I had no clue what I was getting myself into! Luckily the snow was light and fluffy so it wasn't too bad.
The boys had a blast playing in the snow! Tanner even helped me shovel. Poor Braden kept getting stuck in the snow because it was so deep. After the boys played for a couple hours outside they came in and hung out by the wood stove and enjoyed some hot chocolate! Perfect winter day!

My summer boys in the winter

So for some absurd reason my boys feel it is necessary to wear shorts and short-sleeved in this frigid New England weather. Thankfully I can get them to wear appropriate clothes when it is necessary to go out in public but at home it is a different story.
Today they were dressed in their t-shirts and shorts (Braden wearing 3 shirts, but all short-sleeved) and I was cold in the house wearing a sweatshirt and sweatpants!

So Scott was heading outside to ready the snowblower and shovels for the storm and the boys wanted to go out with him but they were adament about not changing their clothes or wearing jackets. So Scott made them sign a waiver stating " I will be cold!" which they both signed and out they went ( Braden did add a winter hat and mittens to his outfit) Within minutes I witnessed them both shivering but trying to be strong since they said they would be fine without jackets. After about 5 minutes they did come in and retrieve their jackets and even with those they only lasted another few minutes outside with Dad!

I think this adventure helped proved the need for proper winter attire! (Although I bet they will dress in shorts and t-shirts in the morning even with a foot of snow on the ground!)

Livy and her motor skills..giving Dad and I gray hairs!

So Livy has decided she has a need to keep up with her big brothers and is EVERYWHERE! She can now climb the stairs from the family room to the playroom, has climbed out of her play tent and also decided to climb on the first step, lay down and almost roll off ( but Dad saved her!) She also pulls herself up to stand on the side of the tub.

She went for her 9 month well child check up and passed with flying colors. The doctor said she is hitting all the milestones she should and is still in the
50th percentile for weight and 75th percentile for height (no wonder all her pants are short!) So she is now 18lbs 7oz and 28 1/2 inches long. Plus no vaccines this appointment!

We have a climber!

Livy has learned to climb and boy does she go fast!

The other day the boys were making a fort and had a pile of pillows and blankets on the living room floor. She went right for the pile and climbed up it in about 5 seconds, onto the ottoman and onto the couch! Yesterday at a friends house she even went to try to climb up the stairs.
She has also learned to pull herself up on the side of the tub. That was the first time she ever pulled herself up! I think she is trying to get at all her bath stuff in the tub. (my guess is she'll be falling in the tub next as Tanner did that one time around her age fully-clothed while we were filling up the tub!)
I can't believe my baby is already 9 months. After the holidays I am going to have to start planning her first birthday party:)

I have been slacking

Well I haven't been keeping up with this blog very well(sorry Gramma!) So my goal tonight is to do some catch up. With all the Christmas preparations and working we have been a busy family.
Last week we had a great time with the boys making gingerbread trees and candy canes, for some reason I thought I had gingerbread people cookie cutters, but I didn't. The boys didn't mind and had a blast using the cookie cutters and decorating the cookies, with all the decorating goodies I could find in the pantry.

We also got a nice surprise of the Elf on the Shelf set with the book and elf so we have started that tradition for the kids. The kids have named the elf "High High Big Big" Not really sure why that name, but that is what it is! He is a creepy looking elf but it works wonders in curbing the kids less desirable behaviors as we tell them that the elf will be reporting back to Santa any bad behavior. The boys have fun searching for "High High Big Big's" new perch every morning.

Tanner told Scott and I that we were on the naughty list because we yell. We in turn told him that we wouldn't have to yell if he was behaving and that Santa puts him on the naughty list too!

Lots of Lights

Monday night we went to LaSallette Shrine in Attleboro to see the Christmas light display. It was beautiful and the kids had a great time walking around, seeing the lights and the donkey and sipping hot chocolate.
Livy stayed all bundled up in her stroller and actually stayed awake and enjoyed the scenery as well.
My parents used to bring me to see the lights when I was young and we lived in Attleboro. I used to call it "lots of lights" instead of LaSallette. It really is a lot of lights!

Breakfast with Santa

Yesterday we had an awesome breakfast with Santa experience at the Highfields Country Club.
When we got there Santa was seated and waiting for us so they kids went over to see him.
Of course Tanner jumped right on his lap and told Santa he wanted a flip over car for xmas and Santa gave him a matchbox car which he loved. Then we had to coax Braden to even get close to Santa, but once he saw that Tanner had gotten a car we got him on Santa's lap for a brief moment too!
Now Livy on the other hand was not so happy. She sat with Santa for about 10 seconds staring at him before she started to scream. But that was expected and Santa gave her a puzzle.
We then headed into breakfast which included a great buffett with really yummy food.
Grammy and Bumpy joined us for breakfast and we had a wonderful time. Livy was all about the pancakes even though she had already had breakfast at home. Grammy gave her a whole pancake and we couldn't pry it away from her.

Lunch is my least favorite time of the day

So my little cutey Braden is causing my lunch time (and most dinner times) to be very stressful.
For lunch everyday I let the kids pick out what they want. They can have PB&J, PB& fluff, oatmeal , cheese and crackers, mac and cheese, salad, tuna, yogurt etc. And everyday Braden picks what he wants, I make it and he doesn't eat it or eats only half..so annoying. I purposely only give him a small mid-morning snack, so it isn't like he is too full from that. I think he likes to push my buttons (and everyone elses for that matter)
At dinner time I try to get the kids to eat what everyone else is eating and lately they have been really good about it which makes me happy..but of course Braden has to be a pain about it sometimes. I will make something I know that he likes and he will refuse to eat it. If I am cooking something that I know the kids really don't like I will make them something different...and usually in these cases Braden decides he wants to eat what is on my plate. I swear he is just trying to be difficult. Hence why I drink a glass of wine at dinner time!

Not quite sure what to do with this..maybe he'll outgrow it..but right now it drives me bonkers!

Our Annual Christmas Tree Day

So every year on the day after Thanksgiving we get our Christmas tree. So of course this year that was the plan..even though it was going to be rainy and cold. Scott (aka soon to be a Clark Griswold..he gets more xmas intense every year) got all of our tired butts out of bed at 7am to go meet the fam at our fav breakfast place (rebecca's too in Mendon). So off we all went moaning and groaning about how tired we were and Scott blasting the xmas music all throughout the house and in the car at 7am.(In his Griswold Family Christmas t-shirt) Mind you we love xmas but we were all tired from a long Turkey Day.
So we met up with my parents and Jessie and Adam and had a yummy breakfast and off to the xmas tree farm we went so we could get there exactly when it opened..in the rain. I honestly thought we would be the only crazy ones in the rain getting our tree..but no..there were a few other families.
Jessie and Adam found their tree first while Scott and I split up to scour the farm for the perfect tree. The trees weren't as tall as we would have liked this year but it fits our living room pretty well and smells amazing. The boys had a blast running all around and getting wet and muddy. Livy stayed with my Dad in the car so she didn't have to get wet and it was close to nap time.
The tree is up and Saturday is our day to stay home and decorate for Christmas!

Thanksgiving

We had an awesome Thanksgiving! Great family time and food! The funniest part of Thanksgiving was the mad dash for the tupperware containers at my parent's house so we could pack up leftovers after dinner. The tupperware cabinet was empty when we were done. My sister definitely took the majority of it....since her excuse was she had to bring it home for Adam. I didn't even get any of my own mashed potato leftovers. Note to self for next year...leave some at home to insure leftover mashed potatoes.

I have been slacking on my posting!

Ok so I haven't blogged in almost a week..but hey I have 3 kids and a sick husband so that is my excuse!

Livy is a woman on a mission now..crawling all over the place and super fast! So all the gates are up..huge pain in the butt with gates everywhere but we have to keep her away from all the boys toys and we have too many staircases.
The other day I walked out of the living room for a minute..came back to find her covered in chocolate..I had no clue where it came from until Braden told me had spilled his snack and Livy grabbed a chocolate Cat cracker and ate it!

Excited for Turkey Day tomorrow! The boys said they are eating turkey, corn and dessert and that is it. I am in charge of the mashed potatoes..I made them really good last year..now to just remember what I put in them LOL. It think I did cream cheese, sour cream and butter..so we'll try that maybe.

Scott is feeling better today so hopefully no one will get sick in the next 24 hours and we will all be healthy for tomorrow!

Scott was right, I am going blind

So I went for my eye exam earlier this week and it turns out my vision is slightly going down the tubes!

It isn't awful but I do have to wear glasses all the time now. Of course the only frames I liked were some of the most expensive, but I got them at Walmart so not as bad as it could have been. Scott's prescription changed as well so both of us will be sporting new glasses next week.

No TV Day!

So today is a No TV Day in our house. The boys were up at 6:30am making way too much noise after I had been up 3 times during the night with a teething (maybe?) Livy. So the boys are not allowed to watch tv today since they were not listening this morning after multiple warnings.

I don't think they really care too much about tv as they have not complained about it yet. They are having a great imagination day, going on nature walks in the house with their Shrek babies and backpacks full of play food, water bottles and binoculars. It is so cute watching and listening to them play.

We are going to head to the library this afternoon so we will have some new books to read today and to get us out of the house for a little bit.

Our super buy of the weekend!

Scott and I did some serious shopping this weekend but we saved a bunch of $$$!

We stopped in American Eagle on a whim and they happened to be having a 30% off all clearance items sale...so we went in to take a peek and I am glad we did!

Scott got 5 polo shirts and I got 6 shirts, a pair of jeans and a pait of shorts for $96.00! Regularly it would have all been $360!

It was a Christmas kind of weekend

Saturday we had a busy, rainy day.

Tanner had a birthday party for one of his classmates at Playtown Express so Scott and I brought him to that and he had a blast. All the kids wore their Halloween costumes and of course they were all super heroes so they were running around at warp speed fighting crime!

Then Scott and I went to go check out the proofs for our holiday portraits..they didn't come out great but not too bad either. The photographer had them on a widescreen monitor for viewing which is definitely not a flattering way to do it. I looked like I weighed about 40lbs more than I do. Definitely not a smart selling technique..I probably would have purchased more poses if they looked good to me!

Homemade pizza and some wine rounded out a rainy Saturday.

Sunday we dropped the kids off at Scott's parents in the AM and Scott and I headed out Christmas shopping. We got all the kids done in one stop at Toys R Us! It was so much fun buying for them this year. Then little did they know, they were inches from all of their Christmas presents on the ride home last night. They had no clue!

Now today I get to go get an eye exam to see if my eyesight is really as bad as Scott claims it to be!

Tanner the Protector

We have just started to notice Tanner being overly protective of Livy. Everytime I sit her on the floor, Tanner will go over to her and lay her on her belly or back because he is afraid she will fall back and hit her head. Yesterday he closed my bedroom door while she was crawling around in my room because he was afraid she would fall down the stairs. And last weekend Scott put her in her walker and Tanner told Scott to take her out because he was afraid that she would walk herself over to the tall cabinet we have in the living room and bang against it and the decorative blocks on top would fall and hit her in the head. Not sure where he gets this worrying from because most people who know me know that I am not a big worrier and neither is Scott.
So I think Tanner will make a good babysitter some day!

Livy's Favorite New Game

Today we went on a playgroup field trip to the Grafton Fire Station which is brand new and super nice. The kids had a blast and Firefighter Ed was a hit with the kids


Livy LOVES to play peek-a-boo now. It is absolutely adorable. She will grab any blanket or piece of clothing that is near her and hold it over her face grunting until someone starts saying "peek-a-boo". I don't remember the boys doing it this early but then again my memory is horrible.

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Let's see how long I can keep up with a blog

Throughout the day my kids do some funny, adorable and memorable things and I always mean to write them down in my journal but never do. So here I am. I am going to attempt to blog them all in a last ditch effort to preserve these memories. My memory seems to be decreasing as my age increases so blogging seems to be the only way t0 retain the little day to day happenings that mean so much to us. ( my vision also seems to be decreasing as Scott is mandating an eye exam for me!)