Our little graduate!

We attended our first graduation event for one of our children last weekend. Gabby graduated from pre-school and will start kindergarten in the fall.

The graduation ceremony was so nice. The kids were all wearing green caps and gowns, and they had a nice little processional in (& out) and all the kids had very big smiles. The kids sang and danced to three songs... Yellow Submarine, Tortillas (in Spanish) and The Adios Song. There was a really cute slide show that had a few funny photos of Gabby in it. Next, each child received their diploma and was asked what they wanted to be when they grew up. It was funny to see "trends" develop as the kids were asked this question. One kid would say something different... and if it got a good response from the audience, then the next two or three kids would latch onto that career choice. Gabby latched on to an interesting one... telling everyone that she wanted to be a horseback rider. This is the first time I've ever heard her say this, so it was pretty funny & cute.

So far, included on Gabby's list of what she wants to be when she is older are: horseback rider, stylist, teacher, doctor, scientist doctor, cowgirl, nurse.

Gabby is able to read all by herself now, and we're going to continue to work on this skill as kindergarten approaches. She does so well when she concentrates on it and believes in herself! She also wants to write everything... from her name to full letters to people. She is constantly writing words that she sounds out on her own and it's so fun to watch this interest and desire to communicate with writing develop in her.

She is SO EXCITED for kindergarten to start. She keeps reminding me that she wants to ride the school bus. To which I fret, of course... because how do you just put your kid on a bus and expect they'll be ok?! Freaky concept to me right now! What if she falls asleep, what if she gets off at the wrong stop, what if someone is mean to her... ugh! But, then, Gabby always quickly reminds me "Mom, I've waited my WHOLE LIFE for this!!"

Don't mess with Giuliana & the baby stroller!

We were at a fun birthday party today to celebrate the 2nd birthday of our friend's twins. It was a great time and the kids had no problem jumping in and finding kids and toys that they liked playing with.

Mid-way through the party, Giuliana found a baby stroller and a baby... and suddenly, she was hooked. She wouldn't go anywhere without the stroller and the baby. She pushed the stroller through the house, down the sidewalk, on the grass... everywhere. And, she would frequently take her baby out, hold baby tight, then sit baby down in the grass... maybe in a chair, then put baby back in the stroller to push her around again.

There were a lot of little babies at this party and Giuliana was fascinated with these real-life little babies. Every time she came near one, she would stop and stare at the baby... say "baby" and watch intently what the mom or dad was doing. She saw babies getting diapers changed, burped, nursing, cuddled, and crying. It was obvious that she was completely entertained and interested in all of these little people. Then, she would go back to pushing the stroller around.

Several times, other little kids tried to play with the stroller. Giuliana did not like this. A 4 year old girl came up to her and sort of took the stroller from her... and Giuliana wasn't happy. But, she didn't cry - she actually looked more shocked. But, she was not about to go away. The mom came over and told the little girl she couldn't take the toy away from Giuliana.

Then, we witnessed other little ones 18mnths-2yrs of age go up and try to push the stroller. Giuliana would quickly motor along pushing the stroller not allowing the other little ones to touch it. A little guy, nicknamed Lucky, came up at one point and started pushing it and Giuliana could quickly be heard yelling and screaming "HEEEEEEEEEEEY!! HEEEEEEEEY!". We had to go over to her and try to explain that he could push it too, she had to share. But, she didn't care to hear that. A few minutes later a little girl started pushing the stroller. Giuliana went up and grabbed the little girls arm and yelled "Heeeeeey!" and quickly swiped the stroller from the little girl, and strolled off quickly. I hustled over and tried to tell Giuilana that she couldn't take the stroller from someone else, she had to share. But she didn't want to hear it and continued crying and screaming after I picked her up to let the other little girl use the stroller.

We decided it was time to leave. As we were gathering all our stuff, Giuliana got her hands on the stroller again. Ugh. I knew this was a bad thing. How were we going to leave without her screaming her head off when we took her away from the stroller?

Let's just say it didn't go so well. She screamed so hard and was so upset... my heart was torn! She screamed all the way to the car. Dan put her in the car seat, and she continued sobbing, screaming and pointing out the window. She wanted that stroller! She wouldn't even look at Dan or I, and wouldn't let me touch her leg to console her. She was SO MAD that we took her from that stroller. Eventually, she cried herself to sleep.

So, being the sucker that I am... we stopped at Target on the way home and bought her an $11 baby stroller. The second she saw it - she smiled sooooo big.

Giuliana LOVES the baby stroller!!

Sugar & Spice... and PINK TUTUS!!!

Gabby had her very first dance show this past weekend and we couldn't have been more proud of her. In January, she started doing a combined ballet and tap dance class. She is constantly doing her dance moves at home and can frequently be overheard telling me how much she loves her dance class. She is also often asking anyone and everyone to watch her dance, and then she'll tip toe across the floor in very graceful form with a dreamy look in her eyes. It is so fun to watch her do things like this and know that she is truly enjoying and learning things at her dance class. This, of course, coming from the girl who at age 3 (just 2 short years ago) would not allow me to leave her alone in a dance class!

Anyway, we all went to Gabby show on Saturday night. He costumes were the pinkest of pinks, and her ballet tutu was the biggest, fluffiest tutu I have ever seen. Seriously. For her tap performance, they just had to swap out to tan nylons, tap shoes and a frilly 50's like skirt. I took a ton of photos and we also recorded each of her performances (3 total). It's fun to hear Gabby tell us that she was "SO nervous when the first curtain went up" and how "I heard you yelling my name and clapping for me". And, as much as she did a great job and impressed all of us with how much she remembered of her routine, we still managed to get a wave from her during each of her performances. And, we also had a good giggle during each of the performances when something silly would happen. So cute... I swear, the younger girls really steal the show at these dance show productions.

Rocco fell asleep shortly before Gabby's second dance and Giuliana did really well and seemed to enjoy the show until intermission and then Dan took Giuls and the rice-krispy-bar-treat-revived-Rocco out to the lobby to run around.

Gabby's performances were all complete prior to intermission, so she came into the audience with us but insisted on sitting in the very front row with her little dance classmates to watch the rest of the show.

After the show we gave Gabby flowers and took her out for dinner. It was a really fun night and she is already looking forward to dance class again next year!!
and has really LOVED it. This, of cou

Gym Jam!!

We are so proud of Gabby and her little team Mighty M.unchkin friends. They did such a great job at the Gym Jam last month. It was so much fun to watch the girls show off all their hard work, strength and the skills they've been working so hard at over the past year (actually, 6 months for Gabby since she started at this gym last November). All the girls received special medals and certificates at the end of the show. Gabby LOVES her medal and was so proud and happy about it.

I have been so impressed with this gymnastics program. They really work on a lot of conditioning, coordination and strength building skills with the girls. The instructors do a great job with keeping the girls focused and also making sure they have fun. Gabby loves that they consistently get to work on all of the different apparatus.

This might sound crazy, but over the past few months we've even noticed Gabby to have built a lot more muscle on her long & lean body. She's very coordinated and Dan & I both thought she did best on the balance beam (the teacher barely put hands on her to help her keep her balance).

If you asked Gabby what her favorite apparatus is she would tell you the bars. (She also LIVES on the monkey bars in our back yard... so no surprises there!) Gabby seems to really enjoy gymnastics, so we'll let her keep doing it as long as she's still loving it. She was in the twice weekly invite/developmental program, and has now officially advanced to Level I classes. So, we'll continue going twice a week to Level I classes throughout the summer and then see how it fits into our life when she starts full-day kindergarten in the fall.

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.

Hawaii Vacation!!

Someone stop the clock! I literally do not have enough time in the day anymore... 10 extra hours per day would be perfect.

Time to do some catching up with the blog...

We took the family to Hawaii back in mid-April. It was such a great trip and we all had a great time. We stayed at the perfect place for our family right on Waikiki Beach. Our resort had 6 pools, water slides, several kid-friendly poolside restaurants with great food... and of course, Waikiki beach which is super kid-friendly. It was perfect for us because all we did was go to the pool, the beach and eat.

Gabby could not get enough of the pool and the ocean... I think she became part Mermaid on this trip. Rocco was timid in the water at first... but by the end of our trip he was also swimming like a little fish (with his Speedo jacket on, of course) and getting so brave as to jump into the pool and try to swim to the wall himself. Giuliana just loved playing in the pool on the steps with her water toys, she liked me holding her in the water while chasing the big kids and she LOVED playing in the sand on the beach. Rocco's favorite part about the beach was digging in the sand... he wasn't a huge fan of going out in the ocean and preferred to be held when we went out deep. Gabby preferred swimming in the ocean to playing on the beach... and she probably was more brave with going out farther than her daddy would have liked her to be doing.

Gabby and Rocco made their very own lei (flower necklaces) and I made one for Giuliana. Then, the kids wore them around the resort for the rest of the afternoon/evening. Gabby and I also took a hula lesson. Gabby didn't want to do it at first and she ended up telling us later that the only reason she didn't participate at first was because she wasn't wearing a dress! What am I going to do with this girl when she becomes a teenager!? Yikes!

We ate ice cream every day and the kids got to hold real, live parrots... and we told them the guy who owned them was a real live "good" pirate, as he very fittingly had a missing tooth, some tattoos, a bandana on his head, no shirt, ratty shorts and a leather pouch hanging off his side.

We had numerous embarrassing moments. One night at dinner Rocco got bored so he thought it would be a great idea to throw food at another table during dinner one night. Thankfully, they were not offended (they thought it was funny, which was good - but not good). The next day during lunch, Rocco spilled an entire tall glass of chocolate milk all over our table, his chair, himself and the floor... seconds after it was delivered. Not even 8 minutes later, just after the milk was cleaned up, they delivered food to our table and Gabby somehow flipped her entire plate of food off the table... food everywhere, plate shattered.... Dan and I just looked at each other and started pinching each other hoping it was a bad dream. You know... lots of funny moments like this. But, nobody got lost on an elevator (last summer's drama), so it was all good.

We ate off the resort one night with Kevin and his wife. Kevin and Dan have a long history and since Kevin grew up on the island... he knows the great "local" restaurants. So, we met him at a hole in the wall Japanese restaurant one night... and the food was AMAZING. Thank goodness for that... because we met them for dinner when our kids were used to sleeping. So all 3 of our kids literally fell asleep during dinner and Dan and I both had a child in arms, and one in the stroller. The food was soooo good though - it was worth it.

It was a GREAT trip! GREAT memories. Lots of fun. Well worth the money and energy it takes to travel with 3 little people. We sure do miss our little Matteo though. Dan & I couldn't help but comment a million times how we missed him, how he should have been there. And, of course we find ourselves commenting about what we thought he would have liked, or what he would have been doing, and how things SHOULD have been. No matter how much fun there is to be had... there will always be a hole in our hearts.