Christmas at Grammy's!

Today we celebrated Xmas at Grammy's house. Olivia was soo happy to be with the family and to open up all of her presents.

Here's Santa bringing all the gifts. He was a great Santa and I CAN'T BELIEVE how he let us put this outfit on him without taking off the beard or the hat. He wore it for most of the time!

Here is Evie and Olivia. Evie, Aunt JuJu & Uncle Kevin bought a wonderful gift - an annual Columbus Zoo pass for the entire family! I am soo excited that I'll be able to take the kids to the zoo anytime and all the time - the Columbus Zoo is one of the best zoo's in the country. What a great gift for the fam.

Evie and Luca

Santa is a Dancin' machine!

It's so hard to get a pic of all three of us...this is the best one.

Mini Santa

Look at me! Olivia, once again, beat Luca. She is holding her bottle on her own at 5 months. Luca was able to hold his own bottle at 6 months. Wow, she's very competitive! She gets it from her father and me too!

Luca is always soo happy to spend the weekends with his DAD. They got a little bonding time since I had a nice lunch with an old roommate and sorority sister from college. He even went to Target with BOTH kids and an old lady in line said to him "are you here alone with both kids...without your wife? I've never seen that before!" ZIP IT LADY! ;)

Mrs. Claus - Well, technically, she can't be Mrs. Claus b/c that would mean she would be married to her brother!

What a Handful!

Wow, these kids sure are a handful! Here's all three of my babies!


We just got back from doing a little Xmas shopping since we are celebrating Xmas tomorrow with Grammy, Aunt JuJu, Uncle Kevin and Evie. I think we are set to go just need to do a little wrapping! Next...shopping for my parents. I think shopping for parents is the hardest thing - I never know what to get!

Parties, Parties and MORE Parties!

Today was a day full of parties! I hosted a Moms Night In "Holiday Traditions" themed party. Everyone brought a dish that they typically eat on Xmas. It was great! We had all sorts of different foods: Sushi, Potstickers, Pasta, Eggnog, Arancini, those were just a few of my favorites and there were many more!


We started the morning going to Carson and Griffin's 2nd Birthday Party. Carson and Griffin are Luca's great pals. They are super smart little boys and I always want Luca around them b/c they are very sharp. Carson (on the right) already knows his colors, can spell his name and can talk in complete sentences! Griffin (on the left) is also a very smart boy, too he says the cutest things! They are great kids. Carson is going to be a big brother in June and Griffin's mommy is hoping that he will be a big bro soon!


Here are the Party Animals - Olivia and her friend Spencer. They kept calling Olivia a cougar b/c she's 3 months older than Spencer and she kept leaning on him. Isn't unbelievable how they are only 3 months apart and how big she looks compared to him?

Night Night!

I heart Xmas and my babies!




I know, I'm crazy. I can't stop taking pics of my kids. I just felt like when I had Luca I was enjoying my time with him and realized I didn't take as many pics as I would have liked. So now I am going picture crazy because I don't want to miss anything and I want to see the kids grow and keep all of these wonderful memories for them. I have pictures of myself when I was a kid but wished I would've had more.



I love this one of them reading a book together.

Wow, can you see Luca's tonsils? He has really big tonsils. I wonder if he will have them removed...I did when I was 4 years old.

For all you moms out there...I bought these PJ's AFTER Xmas last year for around $2-$3! I'm definitely doing it again this year. I love getting bargains - I even bought Olivia's Xmas dress which was originally $49 at Gymboree for $10! I already have my eye on a dress for her next year at Macy's!

Christmas Pictures

I took the kids to get their Xmas pics. Wow! It's definitely hard to get a good picture with 2 kids especially, with an active 21 month old. Luca would not sit still. They took great individual shots of the kids but I didn't like the ones with both of them together so I figured I'd try to take some shots at home but I still didn't get a good shot. Oh well.

This was a good shot of Olivia that I took.


I was trying to tell Luca to give Olivia the gift but he started to open it, instead! AND it's not for him!! It looks like Olivia is laughing at him like "your gonna get in trouble!"

This is my best shot with both of them. It looks like Olivia has her hand on Luca's lap.


I turned on the Fireplace but it looks like Olivia's hair is on fire and even though she's smiling it kinda looks like she's screaming b/c her hair is on fire!

This one is cute.


I used Luca's suit that he wore for Olivia's baptism but I bought him a new red tie to be a little more festive - you can tell it's a young boy tie in this pic b/c it untucked and it's soo long!


I love him in a suit. I wonder if he'll become an attorney or work on Wall Street...he's so handsome in a suit! Wait...I wouldn't want him to move to NYC!

Pre-Xmas Pictures

I'm taking the kids to get their Xmas pictures taken tomorrow on my own. Hopefully they both will co-operate and I'm hoping for some good pics so I can make them into my Xmas cards this year. I was just practing with Olivia while Luca was napping.


I was super excited to get Xmas stockings especially since I never really had Xmas stockings when I was a kid. I never had a fireplace in the house that I lived in until we moved when I was a teen but we didn't have a mantle. When we built this house I knew I wanted a fireplace even though I know we will rarely have it on...I just wanted to be able to put stockings up.

We had to take the stockings down because Luca would pull on it and I don't want the stocking holder to crack his head open since that actually happened to my friends kid and he had to get stitches. We'll just put them back up on Xmas day when they are filled with gifts.

I'm thinking Olivia will do great for her Xmas pics tomorrow! She's such a happy little girl. I'll just have to bring her boppy so she doesn't fall backwards! She is getting much better at sitting up but will still occasionally fall backwards. It must have been that chicken neck soup I ate! My mom is SOOO superstitious and made me chicken NECK soup - apparently that is supposed to make your kids strong when you are breastfeeding. I guess it worked!

Our friends, Alisha and Mike bought this cute vest for Olivia. Today was a great day for her to wear it especially since it snowed!


I had to take a pic without the flash so we could see the pretty lights!

Strawberry Thief Caught Red Handed!

Today I watched my niece, Evie. The day actually goes faster when she's here b/c Luca and Evie play so well together. It's so cute because they chase each other around the house and laugh. Evie is on a different nap schedule than Luca. She naps around 11:30 and Luca naps around 1:30 so by the time she's up I'm finished feeding Luca his lunch. Well, he hasn't had strawberries for a while and Aunt Ju Ju packed strawberries as part of Evie's lunch and he wanted them so bad! He crawled up on his high chair behind her and would grab a couple of strawberries and Evie didn't even notice. It was so funny I grabbed my camera and was able to catch him red handed! Hilarious!




By the way....this isn't the 1st time Luca stole something! One time Corey and I and Olivia went to CVS to pick up a couple of things and they have those carts that have the car in the front of the cart which Luca LOVES. As we were leaving CVS Luca snatched a bag of chips. I noticed as we were leaving the store and we returned it. I don't know where he learned these things but watch out people....he's becoming a pro!

Santa Visit...A Success!!!

I was so nervous about both kids co-operating with Santa. Olivia is a little shy and she sometimes cries when strangers hold her or even strangers at the grocery store who try to say hi she'll get her pouty lip and start crying. I was also nervous that Luca might not co-operate but I was wrong about both of my kids! They were perfect! Luca went right up on Santa's lap and Olivia was content.

Today I took the kids to the mall to let Luca play in the kids area with the Moms group and saw that there wasn't a line for Santa so I figured let's just try this and see. I'm hoping to go again since they both have little Santa outfits and another time with their Xmas outfits.

Good times!

Luca LOVES apples. I think because Nonno has an apple tree and this summer he would drive Luca on his mini tractor to the apple tree and they would pick apples together. My dad even grafted the apple tree to make both red and green apples on the SAME tree. Here's Luca eating an entire apple.

Black Friday Experience...

When we arrived back in Ohio from Michigan, I decided I wanted to experience Black Friday for the 1st time. I used to think people who shopped on Black Friday were crazy, but now I am one of those people. They just had so many great deals! I was not one of the crazy people that waited in lines for hours. I basically got up at 4:45 am and showed up at Target right at 5am when they opened the doors. I did have to get in a line to get in but it was less than 5 minutes. I got everything I wanted so I was very happy with my 1st experience. The only part I didn't like was the electronics department was crazy busy! So I stayed away from that area but was still able to get a digital pic frame for only $29. I also went to Kohls afterward. The lines to check out was wrapped around the entire store but I guess it was worth it with the deals that I got. When I came back home I told Corey how there were a lot of 40" TV's left at Target. He decided he wanted to go to Home Depot hoping to get a $20 wet vac that was worth over $100 but they were all gone. Instead, he came back home with the 40" TV for our bonus room! He thought since I told him about the TV's that meant I wanted one? Hmmm... not sure about that one? LOL

We were practicing taking some Xmas shots. I want to get professional pics taken for them for Xmas but I am nervous about both of them co-operating at the same time.

Olivia kept sliding off her butt since this is on the hardwood floors. Good thing the Boppy caught her fall!

Christmas Time!!

Olivia is soo excited about Xmas she wants to do the splits!


She's very excited about Xmas and loves looking at all the Xmas lights.


Christmas Tree #1


Christmas Tree #2


And finally...Xmas tree #3. This is our new purchase. I bought this from Crystal's mom who didn't use hers anymore. Now, I understand why! This thing took forever to put up! Plus it seemed like we had a ton of ornaments but the tree still looks like it needs more.

Thanksgiving

It's amazing that this time last year I was about 12 weeks pregnant with Olivia and was able to share the news with my family and friends! Last year, Luca was able to eat the Thanksgiving meal...I just put it in a food processor since he wasn't able to chew on foods yet...he was only 8 months old. Olivia didn't really get to try any Thanksgiving food...next month she will get to try some veggies!

Traveling with 2 kids is definitely difficult. We went to Zia's and Uncle Chris' house for Thanksgiving this year. We planned on staying there from Wednesday until Friday. The car was jam packed for a 2 day/night trip with Pack N' Plays, toys, excersaucer, diapers, you name it, we brought it! We planned on taking the kids during their nap time hoping they would sleep in the car. We even took Luca to Graeters before we left so he could play for 2 hours and hoped it would wear him out. He fell asleep right as we crossed the Michigan border. Ten minutes later, we arrived and he woke up. Fortunately, Olivia slept but when Luca started screaming she would just stare at him. She was a little angel and took 3 naps throughout the trip.







Luca was so interested in Zia's dog, Bear (which confuses him because now he calls all dogs "Bear"). He also loved playing with their mean cat Mossimo (Luca calls him "MO") who doesn't like anyone and actually growls instead of hisses. Luca thought it was funny when Mossimo would swat at him and growl.

Dinner was great, Mary and Chris did a wonderful job making all the food...we made the apple pie, it's starting to be a tradition that we make this pie...3 years in a row. Immediately after eating we decided to go straight home. I was exhausted chasing Luca around and nervous that one of the animals was going to eat him. Plus, Luca doesn't sleep well in his pack n play and wouldn't take any naps so I was ready to go home. Once again, I didn't take any pics because I was chasing Luca and telling him "NO MO". Zia & Uncle Chris took pics and I'll post as soon as they send them to me. They actually took some great ones of Luca hugging Bear...I really think he misses Bianca. One of his first words was "Ba Ba" for Bianca. Sometimes, I miss her too but Luca can definitely breath a lot better without her here.

She's Gonna Get You!

Here's a short video of Olivia chasing Luca around our kitchen island. For some reason any clips over a minute will never upload so I have to do the short clip. Enjoy!

5 Months and 4 Days Old...

Okay, so Corey read the blog and fixed the printer so I could print Olivia's 5 month old sign. :) She's 5 months and 4 days old here but at least she'll know how many months she was when I put her album together.

Here she is...Ms. Olivia!


The outfit she is wearing was a Baby Shower gift when I was pregnant with Luca and we didn't know he was a boy. Corey came across it in Luca's clothes bin and he thought it would be cute on her. I finally was able to put her blue bow in her hair. Thanks Matt and Crystal for the outfit. It has gotten some good use! :)

I had to post this pic of Luca b/c it's hard to get him smiling now. He's more interested in seeing himself on the camera whenever I try to snap a pic of him. He will smile if you ask him to but just not for the camera. Grammy brought over a Xmas book and he can point out and say Santa.


We are sooo excited for Xmas this year! Can you tell by the new blog background? We are going to Mary's house (Zia's) for Thanksgiving and which we are very excited about. When we get back we are going to put up all of our Xmas decorations and we have 3 Christmas trees! Can't wait...I love Xmas and I think Corey is starting to like it now that we have kids. He's even going to put lights outside of the house for the 1st time. The kids will love it. :)

Olivia is so excited that she needs to dance.....




Nate, I saw your request for more Luca vidoes. I will try to get some tomorrow - it's really hard to get him to co-operate b/c he wants to see himself on camera so I'll have to try it when he's in his high chair and hopefully I'll get a good clip. ;)