They need to have POWERS!

Gabby recently asked Rocco if he was going to marry some of the little girls we know. Rocco immediately said "NO!" When asked why he wasn't going to marry them, Rocco replied "Because they don't have POWERS!" We asked what kind of powers his future wife needs to have and he said "fire powers!"

Gabby thought this was hilarious, as did the rest of us. This little guy is obsessed with super heroes and powers. OBSESSED!! Batman is like the ultimate everything in this house and there is constantly background theme music playing in our house... not from the TV or radio... but from little Rocco's mouth... "Er er er errrrrrrr... dun dun dun duunnnnnnnnn". It is constant.

We've asked Rocco numerous times since if he might marry someone... mommy, Gabby, his little friends. But, he continues to stand strong that "no, I will not marry anyone who does not have powers".

So... little ladies of the world... please know that if you would like to ever marry Rocco, you must have powers. No powers. No Rocco.

Oh, and apparently Gabby is obsessed with weddings or marriage (probably due in part to the recent royal wedding!), because this morning Gabby told Rocco that she was going to marry Batman someday. Rocco got really upset about this and said very loudly "you can't marry Batman cuz he's my best friend!"And so it begins... let's hope there is no future "love" interest in each others friends 12 years from now!

Visit from Gammy & Papa in May

My mom and dad visited us at the beginning of May. It was my mom's second trip to visit us, and my dad's first. They decided to visit us over the Mother's Day holiday and my birthday. I think this is the second Mother's Day I've spent with my mom in the past 12 years.

We really didn't do anything special... but rather, just enjoyed time together in our new house and the yard. The kids were excited to take Gammy and Papa on walks, show them the forest, play with them on their new swing set, cuddle them while watching cartoons, they read lots of books together, and just enjoyed easy, unplanned fun.

Rocco got to ride the tractor lawnmower with Papa... Giuilana went on numerous wagon rides with Gammy, and Gabby showed everyone her dance routines and gymnastics moves.

Dan was in the midst of making chicken tikka for our Mother's Day dinner and the glass P.yrex pan he was using to broil the chicken literally exploded into a million pieces the second he took it out of the oven and set it down. So... we spent the next half hour cleaning up all the glass and keeping the kids away from the excitement. And, then we ended up getting takeout for dinner.

We also managed to get two half-decent photos of my parents with the kids. Seems like it is next to impossible for all of my kids to look in the direction of the camera at any given time.

A New Swing Set!

We got a new swing set for the kids... at the beginning of April. Yes, I am very behind in my blogging!

I have been very busy with the kids, being a taxi drive, being a wife, doing part-time contract marketing work, training for a marathon, interviewing for new au pairs, organizing our first ever benefit for Matteo's Dream Fund, and living, breathing and trying to get sleep when I can. It's been BUSY here!!

So, here I am.... trying to catch-up!

The kids love the new swing set. We got it from Costco and had them build it so we didn't have to stress daddy out since he's been REALLY busy with work these days too.

The kids LOVE IT!! It has a double slide, swings, a climbing wall, a fort, and monkey bars. Gabby's favorite thing is the monkey bars, Rocco loves the slides and swings, and Giuliana likes the slides best too.

The big kids love to hold their baby sister down the slide. Gabby is literally like a monkey on the monkey bars... it amazes me how strong this girl is. And, Rocco just recently was able to go all the way across the monkey bars without any help - he was SO PROUD of himself, as he watches his big sister do this all the time and constantly tries to do what she's doing. Rocco still makes us push him on the swing (for some reason, refuses to pump his legs... lazy?), but is the biggest goofball on the slide going down headfirst on his tummy, climbing up the slides and just being his usual clown self. Giuliana watches the big kids and laughs and eagerly tries to do the things that they're doing.

The kids still also use the old clubhouse (Giuliana now uses this most, of course) and the trampoline. But the new swing set has sort of stolen the show in recent months! It's nice to have the space to have a big play area for the kids right in our yard.

Here are a few photos of the kids having fun!

The Easter Bunny visited...in April! Just catching up!

The Easter Bunny Came…. in April, of course!

In typical fashion, we colored eggs with the kids and our au pair on Easter eve. We colored eggs, painted eggs, dropped eggs and broke eggs. We put on bunny ears and took goofy pictures and just had a lot fun together.

The kids went to bed VERY excited to find out if the Easter Bunny would visit. Gabby told me she asked the Easter Bunny for a puppy… so I had to tell her that puppies and dogs sometimes “catch” bunnies. So, the Easter bunny might not bring a puppy because of the conflict of interest. Let’s hope that excuse keeps working for a few more years. Last thing we need to add to our already chaotic lives right now is a dog!

Easter Sunday was nice. The kids woke up and were of course very excited to search the house for their Easter baskets. The Easter bunny usually hides the baskets in funny spots throughout the house. And, this year, he hid a lot of eggs filled with candy outside in the yard… so we spent some time searching for those as well. The kids had so much fun with this and Gabby and Rocco raced around the yard trying to find eggs. We had to put Giuliana in front of a few eggs and point at them to get her interested. She was hooked after she opened one egg and found a jelly bean. Gotta love the power of sugar, right?!

Good friends joined us that afternoon for another egg hunt with all the kids (7 total). Everyone brought more eggs which resulted in a giant egg hunt in our yard. We must have hid 100 eggs and the kids spent a good 30 minutes running around the yard filling their baskets with eggs. It was a lot of fun to watching them run around with so much excitement. Then, we had a really nice typical Easter dinner… ham, scalloped potatoes, asparagus, salad, etc.