Dan got a call a few weeks ago telling him the good news...he had won a "cantina party" at Casa! Funny, because he didn't ever remember doing anything to win it, but who are we to turn away free margaritas and appetizers?

So last Saturday night we gathered at Casa! And of course, I had the camera!

Here is Luke resting his head on the table...thanks to Uncle Steve for snapping this one!!! I love this...especially his reflection on the table!
Dan and I enjoy our FREE margaritas! I must say, not as good as our Mexican place we go to every week after sign class, but good none the less!
Nana and Aunt Jackie enjoying the night!
Sharon was able to make it to the party...her wonderful husband, Terry was busy deer hunting, so she got to hang with Cam and Syd!
My dad ALWAYS messes with Angie...here she got him back...
Jennifer was busy with Kate, but luckily I got to walk around Casa with her as she was a bit fussy when her mom and dad were eating!
While the girls were feeding babies and chatting, the boys were well, being boys and watching the football game that was on! Uncle Steve, Bob, Papa, Dan, and Robb all hanging on the "TV watching side of the table!"
While the little boys were busy "hangin" in the corner!!! Jack, little Luke, big Luke and Nick all take a minute from their wrestling to pose for this one!
And, like anyone else would do after any fun night of drinking margaritas, two of our little ones fell asleep on the drive home...
What a fun night...too bad the little ones woke up when we got home....not yet a silent night at our house!!!

Hangin' with the girls...

Our good friends, Bob and Angie, have two beautiful twin girls, Camryn and Sydney, who are just 2 months older than Nicholas. We did a little Christmas party babysitting swap over the past two weeks. We got to watch the girls last weekend and they had the boys last night. Whenever we have the girls I always try to do something fun! This year we made reindeer food and then made and decorated cupcakes.

Here Cami and Nick are helping scoop out the oats for the reindeer food.
Jack and Syd dishing out their oats...
After we put some delicious oats in our baggies we then had to put the red and green sprinkles in there...so the reindeer can see the sprinkles from the sky of course! Here Luke is saying "cheese!" as he dumps in his sprinkles!
After we made our reindeer food, we ate our pizza!!! Then it was time for dessert! We made cupcakes and of course I had lots of little helpers! Thanks to Cam and Syd for cleaning the mixers!

Surprisingly Jack, Nick and Luke weren't interested in licking the batter...whew!!! I was seriously stressing for a quick minute when I realized I had 5 kids and only 2 mixers!

They all had fun decorating their cupcakes with sprinkles!!!

Doesn't Luke look intense???
And of course, the best part was eating their masterpieces! Here Nick is blowing a kiss to the camera! He is such a ham in front of the camera!!!
Jack can't wait to eat his...
Cami giving a beautiful smile...
And Syd...of course making sure she looked great for the pic! We even had to put her necklace back on for this one, since she had taken it off when she put on her pj's! What a cute girlie girl!!!
What a GREAT night! We are so lucky to have such good friends in our lives!!! Here's hoping the boys were as good for Bob and Angie last night! :)

Three little chefs...

So, far all who know me, know that I am by far no iron chef! It is so bad on some nights that I'm thankful that Dan has a special place in his heart for cereal, as do I! :) With that said, Christmas cookies are certainly different! I LOVE to make Christmas cookies. I start early (I made a few batches on Black Friday after an early morning of shopping!) and then put them in the freezer until I need them...works out great that way!

Well, this year was the first year that I had 3 little helpers. Jack, Nick and Luke all got into the mix...literally!!!! Here we are mixing the cookie dough...their favorite part by far. Luckily, I mixed in red and green m and m's which got their minds off of the hand mixer!

On a quick side note, today was our Sunday School's Christmas Program at church, so Nana, Papa, Uncle Steve, and Aunt Jackie all came out to watch Jack, Nick (well, he cried and then ended up sitting with us!) and Luke in their program. They then took the kids to McDonald's to eat lunch and play a bit while Dan and I feverishly wrapped presents. ANYHOW, because I had to buckle the three boys into their carseats, everyone else beat me home. And, can you guess what I see as I pull into the garage??? Papa and Uncle Steve raiding the Christmas cookies....good thing I made MORE than enough this year! I should have asked how they tasted???

Look who made an early visit...

Every year, during Alyssa's birthday party, Santa Claus always seems to make a visit! This year was no different. Once we finished our dinner and got everything cleaned up, and on cue, right at 7:30, we heard bells outside of the window and in came Santa!

We unfortunately had 3 criers....Nick, Luke and Alyssa, but not Jack...he was right there and ready to jump on Santa's lap!!!
As you can see from the picture, Nick certainly warmed up...
But poor Luke just could not be persuaded! He did enjoy his GeoTrax train Santa brought him though!!!

Here I am with Luke desperately clinging to me for dear life....I could seriously have let go and he would have hung on! Oh and on one FANTASTIC front, Luke can now SAY /s/!!! That sure is the hardest sound for him to hear and subsequently say and our little dude did it!!! Here comes SSSSanta!!! :)
Daddy enjoyed Santa's visit too!!! :)
Hopefully next year, we'll have less little ones crying! :)

So Thankful for....

We had a fantastic Thanksgiving at Aunt Jackie and Uncle Steve's house. Aunt Jackie and Aunt Allie did an AMAZING job with the turkey...
And Uncle Steve did an amazing job at carving the turkey (with Papa's ever present watchful eye!)
After a wonderful meal (we all ate too much!!!) we had to do our next Thanksgiving custom...check out the ads and plan our Black Friday shopping trip!
After we finished looking through the ads, we opted to head outside to enjoy the wonderful, sunny weather! Nick, Jack, Alyssa, and Luke all had fun playing outside!!! (Look, no coats on the big boys!)
Of course, just hanging out got pretty boring, so in stepped PE teacher, Aunt Jackie with the simple game, "What time is it, Mr. Fox?" We all had fun with this one!!!
Uncle Bryan and Nana were pooped after a few rounds of the crazy fox game, so they sat out a bit!
After we ran off some of the calories from lunch, we headed inside for what else but coffee and dessert! Here, Dan enjoys some coffee...
And here is a picture of one of the many desserts...a Peggy Brown carrot cake!
And here, the women (aka "the workers!" of the day!) pose for a quick picture before calling it a night! (Aunt Jackie, Nana, Aunt Joy, me, Aunt Allie!)
Happy Thanksgiving to all! We have a lot to be thankful for this year...a successful cochlear implant surgery and excellent progress thus far for Luke, a cancer free Aunt Jackie who is now pregnant with her first baby...due in April (close to MY birthday!), Alyssa is making great progress in speech therapy...she is SO smart, Gigi is THRIVING in her new apartment and seems more alive than I have seen her for years, and of course, we can't be anymore thankful for Nana and Papa who are ALWAYS there for us whenever and wherever we may need them!

We love you guys!!!

Happy Birthday, Alyssa!

Thanksgiving is the one holiday when our entire family is together because Bryan, Allie, and Alyssa are able to come visit from Memphis! It also happens to be the time we celebrate Alyssa's birthday (November 16!) We celebrated in style this year with Wow Wow Wubbzy! Nana made some delish lasagna and of course we had my favorite cake lady's cake!

Here Alyssa is covering her ears (she musn't like our singing!) before she blows out her '3' candle!
Aunt Allie cuts the yummy chocolate cake for everyone...
Papa and Jack stop eating for me to take this great pic...smiles all around!
Here Dan, Uncle Steve, and even Nick get crazy with Gigi!!!
Happy 3rd Birthday, Alyssa! We miss you guys and can't wait to come down for a visit over Christmas!!!

America Runs On Dunkin....

Two weekends ago I had the opportunity to travel to Chicago with my friend and fellow speech pathologist, Jan, for the American Speech Language Hearing Convention! We had a wonderful time - stayed in a great hotel, found some fab places to eat, and had time to shop on Michigan Ave! Who wouldn't LOVE a 4 story Crate and Barrel? Oh, and not to mention that I learned TONS to help me at work in the school district, as well as some great networking opportunities with others in the Deaf and Hard of Hearing Community - educators from Gallaudet, audiologists from the makers of Luke's cochlear implant, the Phonak FM System sales rep that actually ordered Luke's FM System, and a really cool guy from the A.G. Bell Associatation for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing. Unfortunately these all paled in comparison to what I saw on almost every street corner....

DUNKIN DONUTS! Many don't know this, but we actually named our dog, Dunkin, after our favorite coffee joint. And, we have definitely been missing this place since we moved to the midwest from New Jersey! There and in New York City they are as common as tractors are here in the midwest. Dan even has Dunkin' coffee shipped to his office for him to enjoy!!!

Anyhow, Jan and I stopped at this particular Dunkin, just behind out hotel, but their Coffee Coolatta machine was broken....UGH! They said it would be fixed in about 2 hours, so we returned after our morning session at the conference was over and get this, now they said they just cleaned it and we would have to wait 10 minutes.
Since we were in a hurry, we decided to continue on our way and what did we find....this Dunkin' Donuts mecca!!! I actually took this picture from Jan's car as she was pumping gas...I'm a true geek!
I rushed inside and asked if I could have 2 skim milk coffee coolattas and the Indian guy behind the counter said, "OKAY!" I was in HEAVEN!!!!! I wish it wasn't such a long drive or I would have bought one for Dan. I did however, manage to grab 2 dozen donuts for all my boys to enjoy!!!

Here is Jan enjoying her delish coolatta! She had never had one before and LOVED it...but then again, who wouldn't!
And here I am posed with mine....ah.....FABULOUS!!!
We are planning a few trips out to the east coast this summer. We'll definitely have to track down a Dunkin! For all my friends on the east coast, enjoy a Dunkin Coolatta for me! :)