Easter Weekend

We had a great time with our families over the holiday weekend. I took the kids to Easter Sunday service and then we all had dinner at Tom's parent's house that evening. We spent a second Easter at my parent's house on Monday.

Gloria was really into the whole Easter Egg hunt thing and it was a hoot to watch her! She did such a great job finding the eggs at the several Easter Egg hunts that took place over the weekend. Leo had fun playing with all the eggs, most of them empty because his sister got to the goods inside! :)

Visit our Easter 2012 album for all the photos from the weekend.



I made an attempt to get a few photos of the kids together...boy what a challenge! This is just one of the few shots I took. The face Gloria is making is, according to her, the face you make when you look at boys!! haha Leo thought the leaves were much more interesting than getting photos taken. :)

Language of Love

Jeg Elsker Dig - Danish
Ik hou van jou - Dutch
Je t'aime, Je t'adore - French
Ta gra agam ort - Gaelic
Taim i' ngra leat - Irish
Te quiero / Te amo - Spanish
Jag alskar dig - Swedish
Wa ga ei li - Taiwanese
Ikh hob dikh - Yiddish

10 different languages, one translation...I love you!

We had the most wonderful Valentine's Day this past week. It was a busy one but pretty awesome! We didn't do anything too extravagant. I made breakfast that morning (heart-shaped pancakes), I even got up early enough to make them for Tom which he loved. Gloria thought it was pretty cool to have such a special breakfast. I even threw some decorations up for the occasion since I had a few things laying around. It was a sweet morning with the loves of my life! Too bad we all had to be off to go to school and work.

Gloria had a fun day at school with her friends. They played games and made some fun art projects, all Valentine's related of course. G was really excited! Leo had a great day with Gramma and Papa at their house during the day. I'm pretty sure his day was filled with tickles, raspberries, giggles, silly faces and more. He always has so much fun with his grandparents. :)

For dinner I made steaks with Roquefort Sauce with garlic herb mashed potatoes...delicious! (I definitely recommend the recipe if you want to try it out!) Tom had taken me out to dinner to The Gill Tavern a few weeks prior as an early Valentine's Day gift so it was my turn to treat him to a special dinner. :) We had a nice dinner and some dancing with the family and Gloria even initiated a group hug. We had a really nice evening, it couldn't have been any better!

We topped the night off with some super snuggles with the kiddos and read the new books. I love my family so very much!

Visit our Valentine's Day album to see all the pictures.


These two love each other so much! We have two amazing little kiddos!

Party Time!!

Leo is six months old! So hard to believe, the time has just flown by. He is doing super well! He is so good natured, a very happy little man. He truly is! This boy is just so sweet! He is developing very quickly. He has found his vocal chords and has been babbling away. He is saying "da da" and "ga ga" and making all sorts of fun screeching sounds! He is sitting up on his own (with an occasional toppling over) and he is starting to scoot ever so slightly while on the floor. He is so good with his hand eye coordination, loves playing with all sorts of objects, materials and, of course, he explores everything with his mouth! He loves to be tickled, just like his sister and he thinks Bridgette is so much fun to watch.

Leo had his six month appointment on Wednesday. He was a super star! He got one shot this time around, more to come with the next appointment. He didn't even flinch! What a trooper. He charmed the nurses and the doctor and was so cooperative. He weighed in at 16 lb 6 oz (you would never know he was a 10 lb baby!) and he measured at 27 1/2 inches tall. He is a healthy boy and we are thrilled! The only thing he has a bit of is eczema but hopefully we'll get rid of that very soon.

We were so excited about Leo turning six months that we decided to throw a half birthday party for him! :) Ever since the day Leo was born, Gloria has been asking when we were going to have a birthday party for him. She was so confused why we didn't do anything when he was born. So...I thought a party was in order. We were planning to start him on solids on his six month mark so it was perfect to celebrate that as well. He has been exclusively fed breast milk up to this point so starting solids was a big deal.

We were all excited to celebrate! I didn't go nuts though with props and such, just used some spare things around the house but Gloria and I did make cupcakes together. :) Gloria was so excited about this party ever since I had mentioned it to her. I said she could wear a party dress, which made her day! I made mini crustless quiches and smoothies for dinner...always love breakfast for dinner! We even sang happy birthday to Leo (at Gloria's request). We had SO much fun together! It was the perfect family night!



To see some photos from Leo's 1/2 birthday party, visit our February 2012 album. I've also posted some pics in Leo's 6 Month album of him.

We are excited to celebrate Valentine's Day coming up. Gloria has a fun week ahead of her at school and we'll do some fun things at home as well. Gloria and I spent this weekend making special Valentine's Day gifts for our loved ones and Gloria can't wait to give them away! :)

Have a fantastic week and much love to you all!

Speedy Season

The Holiday season just zoomed by! December was packed with so much! Gloria's dance recital, family Christmas parties, birthdays, Christmas, we have had an amazing month!

Earlier in the month, Tom and I had a great night out together when we went out to my work Christmas party at the Putney Inn. The food was delicious and I was so excited to get out and dance! :) We had a great time with everyone! We also celebrated my mom's birthday this month as well as mine. We took my mom out for breakfast that morning then Tom took me to The Farm Table for dinner which was really good. We tried Oysters Rockefeller, which was interesting. They were okay, but I wouldn't have them again. :) It was a great birthday!

Then, of course, there was Christmas. We spent Christmas Eve at Dave and Irene's and then stopped by Matt and Tricia's for a bit after that. Christmas Day started at 5:00 AM since Tom had to work at 6:30. (boo!) Gloria was not impressed with getting up that early, Santa or no Santa! :) I can't say I blame her. Once she was with it though, she was thrilled to get up and see what was in store for her on Christmas morning. Her hope was that she was going to get a Princess Fishing pole from Santa. Good thing Santa brought her one! ;) She was so excited!! It was the only thing she asked for from Santa. In fact, Santa brought daddy a fishing pole too! Gloria and Tom can't wait to go fishing together this summer! Leo was up and alert too and got into crinkling paper and drooling all over his new goodies. :) We had a lot of fun together before daddy had to head off to work. After he left, we spent some time playing together then it was off to church for a bit then home to prepare for Christmas dinner. The family was all coming over to our house for Christmas. We had a fun evening with everyone—my family and Tom's parents.

Some of my favorite Christmas Day moments included Gloria telling us to "Go away" when we were trying to wake her up so early, sleeping in her new Princess Tent during her nap and her excitement about playing her new game, Candyland. Leo had such a good day too, although he had no clue what all the commotion was about. He was perfectly content hanging out in someone's arms which wasn't a problem with so many people around. :)

We've uploaded many new photos to our December 2011 album as well as our Christmas album. I can't believe another year has flown by! More to come...

Happy Holidays!!

Happy Halloween!

Happy Halloween everyone! For us, Halloween will extend into November. Trick-or-treating was rescheduled in Greenfield due to the storm and all the damage and danger of downed power lines and such. Probably the best thing. We want all the kids to be safe! So we'll look forward to trick-or-treating next Saturday! :)

We still had a fun Halloween though. We made more Halloween cookies, went sledding and had hot dog mummies for supper. Gloria loved it!

In lieu of Halloween photos, here are some fun and incredibly artistic carved pumpkins to take a look at. We carved pumpkins this year but they are no way as good as these! haha The artist who did them is Ray Villafane. Pretty impressive!



I am happy we had such a great family day together today, especially since it was the last day of paternity leave for Tom. He starts back at work tomorrow and we are all very sad. :( It has been wonderful to share so much time together at home with our baby boy and to celebrate the time together as a family. We are heartbroken that the time has come to an end but we feel very fortunate to have had the time off that he did. We hope daddy has a great first day at work tomorrow and we'll all look forward to his coming home at the end of the day! :)

Fourth of July Festivities!

We had such a busy holiday weekend for the fourth but it was totally worth it!

Saturday was clean out day! We had a tag sale at our house and were thrilled to get rid of lots of STUFF! We did really well too...got rid of most everything. It is so nice to free up some space in our basement. After all, we need to make room for one more in our house! :)

We were able to enjoy the evening portion of Saturday at a few parties. We stopped by Tom's parent's house to visit some family and friends. It was great to see everyone! Gloria had fun with her friend Janine and she even got to play a little with her cousins Teagan and Brady!

After we visited for a bit, we headed to Barney and Shannon's house for their annual Fourth of July BBQ. We always have a blast with the crew and all the kiddos. The party keeps growing as we keep multiplying! ;) After sunset, we all headed to watch the fireworks. It was a long day but worth every minute of it! It was such a memorable day!

Sunday we headed to another Independence Day party at uncle Frank's camp. We try to attend this party every year because it is just so much fun! We love getting a chance to visit with everyone. Gloria was very excited to make a new friend too. She bonded with a 6-year-old girl. They were two peas in a pod! Too cute! This year, we ended up staying for the parade they have. We usually head home in order to get G into bed but we thought she could handle the late night this year. She did great and was thrilled with the parade! :) We are so grateful to Frank and Prescilla for hosting such a great party!

Monday was our last event of the weekend. Gloria was especially excited about this one because it was a party for her dear friend Bre! Bre turned 3-years-old on the Fourth and her parents invited us over to celebrate! We had a blast!

We ended the weekend with some family time Monday evening which was really nice. We had homemade strawberry shortcake for dessert and roasted marshmallows by the fire. It was the perfect ending to a fun-filled weekend!

It was an awesome weekend but we were zonked by the end. We need a holiday weekend from our holiday weekend! ;)

Visit our Fourth of July album to see many photos from our weekend. I just love this photo below. It captures the joy of the weekend! :)

Happy Fourth of July!

It has been a busy Fourth of July weekend for us! I'll post more about our weekend full of activities but for now, I thought I would share a video from today's festivities. Today is not only Independence Day, it is our little friend Bre's birthday! We were thrilled to have been invited to celebrate with the crew at Matt and Dawn's house today. We had so much fun! Below is a video of the potato sac race the kids did. What fun! If I wasn't pregnant, I would have been jumping along with the kiddos! :)



More stories and photos coming soon. Until then, we hope you had a wonderful holiday weekend! God Bless America!!

Memorial Day

We had such a fun day with our friends on Monday! It was great to see everyone. We even got to meet the newest member of our little friends, Maddie! She is Matt and Tricia's little girl who is four weeks old. She is just so precious!

The kids had a blast playing together and us adults enjoyed ourselves too. Visit our May 2011 album to see the few photos I took that day. I got some fun ones of William who was camera shy in the beginning but by the end of the day, he was asking me to take his picture! :)

Summer fun!



Memorial Day was a fun day indeed. However, I would like to take a moment to remember why we celebrate Memorial Day. We wouldn't be The United States of America if it wasn't for the brave men and women who are serving and have served our country. They have protected us, given us our freedom and have provided us a lifestyle most can only dream of. Thank you to all the brave men and women who are and have served this great Nation. May God Bless our Soldiers and may God Bless America!

Photos

I've uploaded a bunch of photos to our May 2011 album if you are interested in taking a look.

There are pics from the Brimfield Antique Show from earlier in the month, some photos from our trip up to Frank's camp last weekend, some random photos and some from yesterday's adventures at the Jill Harrington 5 K benefit.

Here is one of my favorites!



We hope you are enjoying your long weekend so far! We are still in house project mode around here but are planning to enjoy ourselves at the annual Memorial Day BBQ at Matt and Dawn's house tomorrow. Can't wait to spend some time with our good friends!

Mother's Day Pics

I've posted some photos from our Mother's Day adventures in our May 2011 album if you are interested in taking a look. We hope you all enjoyed the rest of your weekend!

#1 Mom!

Today is Mother's Day. A very special day to celebrate mom!

My mom has always been and will always be the #1 lady in my life! She has and continues to be incredibly supportive, loving and encouraging. We share a very special relationship that I can only pray to have with my children throughout their lives.

The first words out of my mouth in prayer, for every prayer, are "Thank you God for my family!" I feel truly blessed not only to have an amazing mother, but to have the honor of being a mom myself. It truly is the most beautiful gift in the world and I'm so thankful for it!

Today, we were able to spend time together as a family since Tom had today off. This is unusual because I don't think he has ever had a mother's day off since Gloria was born. A most precious gift to me on mother's day! :) The celebration started today with yummy pancakes made by my wonderful husband. Since it was so gorgeous outside, we ended up doing a hike through highland pond. It was a perfect way to spend the day together!

Tonight, Tom and Dave are hosting a dinner at the McDonald house where we'll get to celebrate Irene! Another amazing mom in our lives! We're looking forward to the evening together.

Although today we didn't get to spend the day with my mom (as she is in Albany, NY at a bowling tournament), we look forward to spending some time with her next weekend.

I'll post pictures later of our day today. In the meantime, Happy Mother's Day to all the moms I know out there!

Easter Photos

We had such a wonderful Easter! Well, actually, we had two Easters. :) Sunday we spent the evening at the McDonald house and Monday evening we were at the Sund house. Two wonderful evenings spent with our families!

Visit our Easter 2011 album to see photos from our Easter events.

Happy Easter!!

Gloria, baby boy, Tom and I want to wish you all a very happy Easter holiday!!

Gloria and I were blessed with a wonderful production at church today. It was a beautiful reminder of what Easter is all about. I especially loved seeing my mom perform in the play today. :)

God Bless! We send you all our love on this very special holiday!

Mark 14:27-28 ESV
And Jesus said to them, “You will all fall away, for it is written, ‘I will strike the shepherd, and the sheep will be scattered.’ But after I am raised up, I will go before you to Galilee.”

Ghost of Christmas Past

So I'm just realizing that I've paid no attention to the fact that I never posted the photos from Christmas Day. I uploaded them a few weeks ago but never posted here. If you haven't already seen them, you can take a look in our Christmas 2010 album.

One of my favorite moments from that day was when Gloria woke up, she came into our room (Tom was already at work) and got into bed with me to snuggle. I asked her if she knew what day it was, she said "Christmas Day!" I told her yes it was. Then she said to me "Santa must have brought presents!" haha Can't get anything by her!

Here is my favorite photo from that day.

Christmas Photos

We hope you all had a wonderful Christmas! We've been very busy with all sorts of fun Christmas activities. I've posted some photos in our Christmas 2010 album. These are all from the week of Christmas. I've got day-of photos coming soon too.

It was such a magical week with our family and friends! We are so very blessed with the people in our lives! We love you all so much!!



This is one of my favorite photos from Christmas week. We spent time together Christmas Eve making gingerbread men. Gloria loved it so much! She had her own roller and everything. :) She was so focused and did so well making her own cookies. It was a beautiful family evening together!

Family Time

Above all else, we are grateful for the people in our lives. We were able to spend some time with loved ones this past week and weekend. It was especially nice to have Tom's brother Jon and family in town for the holiday. Gloria and her cousin Lauren had a chance to spend time together and boy did they enjoy each other! After the first night we saw them, we were headed back home and Gloria says to us in the truck, "I love baby Lauren!" It was very sweet! :)

The holiday comes to an end much to fast. You can view some fun holiday photos in our Thanksgiving 2010 album.

Be Thankful!

We have so many things to be grateful for this year. Our family, health, our home, our jobs, and so much more! We are so thankful for what God has blessed us with! We hope you all have had a wonderful day with family and friends.

Happy Thanksgiving to you all! Life is good!

Halloween Fun

I know Halloween was a week ago now but I still wanted to share about our week of activities. It was such a fun time!

Gloria had a great week at school with all the Halloween treats planned for the kids. They made Halloween crafts, had a party, got their faces painted and so much more. Gloria loves school so much and we're thrilled that she gets to participate in so many fun activities there.

Our first Halloween event as a family was the Rag Shag Parade in downtown Greenfield. Gloria was so excited for the parade. She kept saying she was going to be IN the parade! We hadn't really planned on her walking in the parade but we didn't say anything. Instead, while we were walking down the sidewalk, she looked up at us and said "Gloria's walking in a parade mommy and daddy!" She had the biggest grin on her face, it was too cute! Gotta love a kid's perception. :)

We did do some trick-or-treating downtown while we were there. This was Gloria's first time collecting candy. She was so sweet! She was pretty shy about the whole process but still got a few pieces of candy. I think she only got 5 pieces but that was enough for her! She was thrilled! She didn't even want to put the candy in her bag. She wanted to carry it the whole time. :) We had fun walking around downtown and seeing all the very cool costumes.

On Saturday we spent the day with my aunt Kathy and uncle Bob. They were up from Myrtle Beach visiting for a week. We went to the Bernardston common to see all the scarecrows they had displayed then played at the elementary school with Gloria. After lunch, and once Gloria went down for her nap, we played dominoes! After all, it wouldn't be a good visit without some games involved! It was so good to see Kathy and Bob! We haven't had a visit with them since June of last year. I miss them so much!

Sunday G and I got to spend the day with our friend Liz. We went to a special Halloween event in Historic Deerfield. It was filled with lots of Halloween treats! They did a really nice job putting a fun day together for the kids. It was great for the adults too. I just wish we could have spent more time there. Nap time comes around too fast! :)

Of course we went trick-or-treating Halloween night but only to a few houses. She got plenty of fun out of it though and was pretty exhausted by days end. It was so much fun this year! Each year just gets better!

To see more photos from our Halloween week, visit our October 2010 Album




These kids are the cutest! Happy Halloween!

Happy Halloween!!

This year has been a lot of fun with all the Halloween activities. Gloria is at the age where she can really participate in many fun things! We've already had lots of Halloween fun and there is more to come! Gloria is a Princess this year and boy is she loving it! :) We are planning to take her to a few spots tonight for tricks and treats but mostly to visit.

We hope you all have a very safe and fun night! Happy Halloween!!

Long Weekend

It was so nice to have a long weekend! We got some things done around the house, got ready for Gloria's first day of school and had lots of fun family time together. We've been super busy all summer long and finally, things are settling a bit. This weekend was refreshing and such a good end to the summer. More to come on our summer adventures but for now, we'll focus on this weekend.

The weekend was perfect! We had picnics, went to the park a couple of times, spent time with friends, Tom went to a Red Sox game with Craig, we had dinner with Tom's family and enjoyed walks and lots and lots of running!! Have I mentioned that Gloria loves to run? Well, we did A LOT of it this weekend!

I'm sad to see the weekend end though. Having Tom off for Sunday and Monday was a really nice treat! We don't usually get the holidays off together as a family. I get greedy and want more!! :)

A few fun photos from the weekend...









Visit our September 2010 album for more photos from our weekend.