O's Closing Ceremony

"The tiger in the jungle says Roar, Roar, Roooaaaaar!"
 And once again the 2 year-old's steal the show at the pre-school closing ceremony.  I live for this.

"Hey Sis! What are you doing way up there?"

With her faaaavorite classmate all clad in seersucker (and mommy's pearls).

Suffering through relentless torture from mamarazzi--with fake smiles. Hilarious.

Lucas Moments

Good times. Lucas' personality has fully emerged as a loveable, cuddly, happy, pick-eating, family-oriented, shy to strangers, fiery to friends, and destructive to anything his sister tries to construct. Ahhh (sighh).  A true little brother. And when he started walking at ten months--there was no turning sitting still---ever. The boy is wearing a path into our wood floors.

His daddy thought he was sleeping but he was peeking at me. LOL.

This is how Lucas took his first steps. While Olivia didn't like the lion much, he LOVED it.

Solitary Snow...

It really only snowed with a little accumulation once this year. Atypical for Maryland but then again the very definition of Maryland weather is "atypical."

Little-to-no snow didn't keep us from having s'mores about 432 times starting in October and well into March!

January - Celebrating "The King"

Aside from something charitable, we started a new educational tradition this year with the kids to celebrate Dr. Martin Luther King.

We took the short (but long when you're 2 with a 2 year old bladder) road trip to D.C. will go on record as THE COLDEST day of the year (and in my memory) other than the day of Obama's Inauguration (UNREAL--and I didn't even leave the house).

We had a great time...MLK, Lincoln, and Vietnam memorials, and finally National Harbor--for lunch and kiddie crafts.

I love this one. Had no idea what I was capturing at the time.

These kiddies never once cried or complained about the cold.

Merry Excess

Santa overdid it. I'm going to have a long talk with that fat old man because it will be impossible for us to continue what we started this year--nor do we want to.

The problem is we never, ever buy toys. Nearly all of our children's toys have been gifted to them. However, this Christmas, it became obvious to me that Olivia and Lucas could use a few nice toys when I:

A. Realized it will peacefully distract them and allow them to learn, discover, and imagine--independently.

B. Observed Olivia listening to her brother's hearbeat just like their doctor does--but with a leftover silver ribbon from an old gift box. ( I'm actually proud of her for this one.)

C. Caught Olivia and Lucas fighting over (and nearly decapitating) this...

What is this you ask? Flat Stanley? No. This is a fake baby doll that came with a shopping cart that a friend gave Olivia for her birthday in August. It was merely a placeholder in the packaging to demonstrate where you put your baby doll in the shopping cart. Just a mere piece of cardboard to us, but to Olivia and Lucas---a dear, dear friend. If you could only see how excited Lucas gets when he sees this little girl. Olivia has a real baby doll, by the way.

So, a generous Kmart gift card spending spree, and two over-the-top grandmas later...this was our Christmas set up (BEFORE the grandma's added even more presents vtech stuff, pillowpets, tents, play tunnels, art supplies and play food, etc. ).

That damn (beautiful) doll house was my bright idea and nearly ended my marriage. It took us 5 hours to put that bee-otch together. We had planned to drink wine and enjoy our rite of passage as parents on Christmas Eve.

• Olivia's Dora Tricyle? Easy (I did it). 
• Lucas' Baby Car? No Problem (Charm City Daddy did it).  
• Personalize and Set up Olivia's InnoTab? (Fun! me again) 

About 30 minutes into assembly of the doll house...how do I say this...shit got serious. It was only in hour 3 that I finally burst into hysterics laughing myself to tears when I realized we hadn't even touched our glasses of wine.

We made it but many lessons learned for next year.

Santa Pic 2011

Now featuring a much happier Santa AND toddler, Olivia, and the nervous infant,  Lucas, in his first-ever Santa picture....

I think the only thing that gave Lucas comfort was that his sister was arm's length away. See him nudging her? He's like "hey sis, should I be worried?" Olivia's first reaction when she saw the picture was "Lucas was nervous."

Olivia's Christmas Program

We were gifted yet another school performance for the holidays.  He are the kids in the kitchen just before we headed out. Note: Lucas wearing his breakfast bib as a cape. The little man has full command of his walker maneuvering it through narrow areas forward, backward, diagonal and sideways with awesome precision.

This time I tried to outsmart my performer by getting a sneak preview of the song that she would perform, but she was on to me. She instead kept performing her Thanksgiving routine. To my surprise--as it should be I guess--her actual performance included two songs, "Merry Christmas to You," "Jingle Bells," and the class recited a nursery rhyme, "Little Jack Horner."  I've been trying to get a solo performance of the nursery rhyme on video with no success, but take my word for it! It's so CUTE!

Also during the Christmas break, we got a mysterious piece of mail. It was a thank you note from Olivia's teacher thanking Olivia for her Christmas gift (a Starbucks mug and hot cocoa) and that she looked forward to seeing Olivia after the winter break. Um, am I the only person that thinks this was AMAZING and NEVER, EVER, EVER got a stinking thank you note from any of my teachers (and I was a big kiss up--let me tell you)?! I was so impressed and excited for Olivia.  She, of course, thinks this is normal. But give me some time and I will overdramatize this (as I do many important lessons) and it will set in for her.

Lucas 8 months old

One afternoon, amidst a hectic and busy work day, I received this picture in a text...

...and I nearly lost it. My little baby is becoming a little boy before my eyes!

Somehow, Charm City Daddy got the little man to balance long enough to take this picture. Very cool, but also very scary.

Olivia's Musical Debut -Thanksgiving 2011

Olivia made her musical debut in her school's Thanksgiving Program. It was 30 seconds of pure delight, joy, pride, excitement.

Olivia smiling and clucking her arms in the middle.

 I wish I had video to share with you but it was only her clucking her arms like a chicken saying "Gobble, Gobble, Gobble, Gobble, Gobble, Yuuuummmy! Gobble, Gobble, Gobble, Gobble, Gobble, Yuuuummmy!" The end.

Olivia's cute LBD and Cheetah ballet flats.

They close and open the curtains between classes/performanes and her expression and beaming smile when she realized there was a live audience was priceless. We didn't run to the front or wave so she didn't see us and seemed okay with that. She waved back at other waving, smiling parents, however. Afterward she couldn't wait to tell us she was "on the stage!"

Lucas is an excellent spectator. He really gets into the performances, sometimes trying to sing along.

Lucky for us and her grandparents, Olivia does excellent private performances, on demand. I had her going non-stop all Thanksgiving weekend. Hello stage mom.

Lucas is on the Move

Lucas began crawling on December 17th, a date I'll never forget as it was witnessed by one of my dearest friends (thank you, pageants!) who my kids will always call Uncle Kevin! "Kevin Zoe- baby stylist" as I jokingly call him, was dropping off his usually carefully curated Christmas gifts for the kids.

He is fast and he crawls the textbook way, unlike Olivia who went side saddle on our hardwoods and then adjusted back to normal for rugs.

He crawls only to get to furniture or people he can pull up on and then he cruises around from there.  He is fearless. I'm afraid walking is weeks away.

Growing and Bonding

Lucas' big head and big personality is emerging and I could just eat him up.

He has a little temper. Likes to mimic screams and is not the shy guy we thought he would be. He's all smiles and tilts his whole body to the side (like a little teapot) when he really wants to be cute. He  loves to cuddle unlike his big sister. He lights up when Olivia walks into the room or when we walk into her empty bedroom simply because it is associated with her.

He LOVES her and the feeling is mutual. She introduces Lucas to everyone strangers, waitresses, and the teachers of other classes in her school tell me about her daily reports about her little brother Lucas. She's a protective and doting big sis.

She's only wanted equal opportunity lap time in the last week. She's rough with him, wrestling, tickling, and pinning him down every chance she gets and he just takes the abuse like a champ--laughing all the way. He's so strong I find myself warning Olivia less about being gentle with him because he can almost hold his own with her.

Olivia's is in an interesting phase. She's giving lots of compliments (she likes my eyebrows! lucky me) She is also asking "why? what is that? where does that come from?" OFTEN. We answer lots of random questions on a daily basis. Today, among other things, she asked me why our backyard was fenced; why I chose a certain route to her Spanish class; and why I was putting our patio furniture in storage.  Sometimes I impress myself with the explanations I come up with. Without prompting she also told me at breakfast today, "I'm thankful for you, mommy." Needless to say, we are pleased with her school which claims to only be teaching Civilization 101 at her age, but we couldn't be more impressed. She never wants to leave the place when I pick her up after a full 8 hour day--a good sign.

I enjoy watching their bond mature and strengthen as they learn more about themselves and each other. They are "beeest friends" as Olivia often says---and I hope they always will be.

The rest of October

Let's not waste any time with long apologies or explanations----I'm swamped!

Without further ado, here's what we've been up to...

We went fishing at one of our favorite city parks, Robert E. Lee,  which was recently taken over by Baltimore County and got a $6.1 million makeover.  The park looks great.  Olivia has been asking to go back to fish since we left.

Charm City Daddy ran the Baltimore marathon, aka Under Armor Running Festival and we cheered him on at Mile Six with our noisemakers.

He did well with very little preparation. This was his 5th marathon, I think--and the second time he's done the Baltimore event. I remember the first time he did the Baltimore, because we were still dating. We partied and danced the whole night before and he got up the next morning and ran the thing in no time and met me for lunch. That's not normal. He never does extensive training or preparation and does well. It makes you sick. I'll never forget the first time he ran the Baltimore marathon because it was the day I had my weave removed after 2 years of investing time and money every 6 weeks. It was my farewell to my pageant image and transition to natural, professional me . My hair was sooo thin, and he made me feel good about it, because after all it was all mine!

This time around---his cross at the finish was so symbolic for our family is so many ways. He was in tears--and I was in tears when he recounted the story to me in our kitchen--telling me how much pain he was in and all of the things going through his head about our lives, our beautiful children and all that God has given us.  What a difference 6 years makes...

My niece (my oldest brother's baby girl) made Olivia's day when she came over for a playdate on race day, too.

Then before we knew it, it was Halloween!

 And I decided Lucas wasn't just any ordinary skeleton (that I got on sale and figured would be most comfortable for him and usable as pajamas aftward), he's a Karate Kid Cobra Kai! Love my 80's movies.

O was a pirate at home and then a ballerina fairy (Thanks Uncle Kevin!) for school since she was already a pirate at school this year for annual pirate day.

 
My sister and nieces came to visit. We made s'mores by the fireplace and carved pumpkins in the basement while it snowed outside.

We all crashed the kiddie Halloween Parade in my parent's neighborhood--while they were out of town! My neighborhood has a parade--but we never go. Too stiff. And we gave them a chance with the 30-second Easter egg hunt, but HUGE disappointment. By disappointment I mean, we missed the event entirely because they didn't even hide the eggs! They just sat them down in a small roped off grassy area to keep the children from trampling over (or anywhere near) the precious tulip beds. Give me a break. LIVE a little.

Anyway--just look at this REAL family fun. No exorbitant property taxes required. Imagine that. (clearly it's time for us to move. I'm becoming a tad bitter). 

And that...for the most part...was October!