i borrowed my mom's camera yesterday

it was life changing. my birthday is in june.

snow visit!

poor jack was sick and had a black eye from a little incident the day before we left

the snowman also caused him some tension (i think he was wondering why we didn't just let him sleep in peace in the car at this point)

when you're not sick, the snow is awesome, especially playgrounds

at the sled park...notice we're all as white as the snow

julie again

here are some more pictures of julie from before christmas. they're a little fuzzy, i'm a work in progress, but we're hoping that she'll get at least three decent enough shots for 1) the awesome 2x3s (or whatever size) that you hand out to all your friends, to the creepers that ask that aren't your friends, to a few teachers and to whomever else is left when you are down to your last 4 pictures 2) the enormous whatever size to adorn the walls of the parentals and 3) the in between sizes for grandparents, priests, etc. happy saturday.

new year's

there is no way i'll get another post up here tomorrow or the next day, so to finish out the year i present a loose roadmap for the next year. a lofty proposition and i can assure you it will be a work in progress for the next 10 years: the happiness project.

my 3 big goals:
* spend less (um, or make more)
* cook a wee bit more often (and the meals cannot be 12 different variations of tacos-as an aside, you would really be amazed at what i can do with mexican)
* lastly, avoid the computer during non-allotted hours (hours still TBD, but they surely won't be all 16 waking hours)

the end.

christmas

john made a gingerbread house with the boys. good daddy. (i enjoy the windows with no panels myself).














jack watched forlornly out the window as daddy mowed the lawn and aidan got to be outside to help. he really stayed in the window the whole time.














all the kids spent christmas eve playing in a box. the age old 'why did i even buy anything for them for christmas?' crossed our minds during the second hour in the box.














more fun in a box. (patrick's chin had a fight with the floor a few days before christmas. i think he was bandaged with extra precaution on christmas. i'm not sure if that's because he was going to be spending time with my kids, but i'm thinking ... yes.)














ahhh ... and for my favorite moment of the afternoon. aidan kicked/shoved/somethinged the box while casey was in it and patrick jumped in to save her honor. a hot chase ensued and i caught a photo of the last leg. i particularly enjoy the smile on patrick and the look of sheer terror & horror on aidan. when aidan stopped running patrick did a little half tackle/half hug. very gentle retaliation in defense of his big sister. i think the real retaliation was in scaring the crap out of aidan for once instead of it being the other way around. good on ya patrick, it worked.

the shortest distance between halloween & christmas ...

... is reading this blog.

we camped at the ocean. it was really fun. it was also cold.

aidan took a good picture.

we picked out the christmas tree that smelled the best. it looked pretty good too.

halloween

it was an equal opportunity costume halloween this year. aidan was a horse until it was time to go trick or treating, he then opted for lion (presumably so he could roar). for his school party he was a clown. jack was a zebra. however being a part of 'team monkey see, monkey do', he too was a clown at some point.

you can't really read what i typed in the picture above, but aidan spent endless hours sitting on the pumpkins (trying to hatch a jack o lantern?) and jack just kept trying to eat them. what did i do for entertainment before kids?

some recent pictures

i love this picture so much. it's aidan with his best buddy emma. it just reminds me of being a child and being happy. not to spoil it, but john did make a point worth mentioning ... it's too bad they weren't feeding apples to the horses instead of carrots.






















jack's pictures either look super serious like this or (see below)





















and this kid just won't bloody pose for me. i wish i had the time to count how many pictures i have of a) his back b) his tongue and c) his eyes closed. it's a lot.

















... and following on from two pictures ago. you get my point.





















aidan & emma actually feeing the carrots to the horses. (they are wearing their casual post-hot tub attire consisting of a lovely purple swimming suit and no shoes on the lady and character underwear with sockless -black- character shoes on the gentleman).