Christmas 2012

Our 2012 family Christmas Day was a big success:) We were able to stay home and have Christmas Day at home with just the four of us again and it was great! I"m not sure what time everyone was up and at 'em because I really didn't even look at the clock, but it was light out so it couldn't have been too early;) Alton was into opening presents this year so it was fun for him and Athena of coures was ready to start ripping into presents!


Alton is really liking books lately so we're taking advantage of that and making sure he has lots of great books that we can read to him and he can sit and page through.  He seemed to like these board books right away and paged through each of them before opening more presents.  His big gift was an awesome new play rug for his room and a bunch of trucks and cars to go with it. 

Athena has been wanting a bigger dolly carrier/carseat for her babies Colton and Paisley.   I found the perfect one, and her face lit up when she opened it and saw what it was:)  Here she is modeling it with baby Colton.   

Amber got several gifts this year too.  Here she is having one of her breakfast snausages that Athena helped her unwrap:)

Rock On girlfriend!  Though poor Amber in the background seems to be saying "Seriously?  WHY?  WHY?!?!"

Alton really loves the book Alphabet Rescue so Athena gave him the other 2 books Alphabet Adventure and Alphabet Mystery. 

When Athena started playing with her guitar this afternoon Alton ran and got his drum for a little impromptu jam session:) 

Check out this after lunch pig pile!  Daddy with all 3 of his little ones. 

Ena reading Alton one of his new books:)

After the boys fell asleep for a nap and before Athena fell asleep for a nap, her and I made some pretty Christmas chocolate covered strawberries.  We had them later in the evening along with our delicious babyback ribs that were braising in the oven for dinner. 

We have had such a great Christmas already and we still have a lot more celebrating to do:)  Because of work and travel schedules, we will be celebrating with with all of the extended families over the next 2 weekends so the fun has just begun!!

Happy 6th Birthday Athena!

We had Athena's birthday party today and it went great!  It was a princess spa party and it was a ton of work, but Athena had a blast so it was SO worth it:)  I absolutely could not have done it without the help of my friends and MIL. We had a manicure station, pedicure station, hair salon and a snack station.  Each station was run by 2 adults while I expedited and rotated the kids through the stations. 



There were 16 girls total. 

The manicure station.  Each girl got to choose the colors for her fingernails and also pick out a flowery emery board to keep.

The hair salon.  This station was stocked with a plumeria flower hair clip for each girl, hair glitter, and each girl also got to choose a lip gloss to keep. 

Alton even got in on the salon action.  He actually kept his hair clip in for quite a while!

The pedicure station!  Everyone loved this one-they got to soak their feet in the spa, then choose the colors for their toes and also got to choose the colors for flowers or polka dots drawn on them. 

For snacks everyone got a cupcake and also got to eat the snack kabob that they each had created at the snack station. 

All day long without a  nap and so many pretty girls to flirt with wore out this big guy!  He zonked out on daddy's lap before 7:00:)

Halloween 2012

Once again we were lucky enough to have friends come and join us for trick or treating.  Each year as the kids get older they enjoy it more and more and it gets more and more fun to take them out and watch them enjoy themselves:) 

Ena was Princess Jasmine.  She wanted this Jasmine costume somethin' fierce when we were at Disney World this summer  so we shelled out the cash for it with the understanding that it was also going to be her trick or treat costume:) 

Alton was the cutest little pirate ever!  He rode in the wagon for about the first 10  minutes, but once he warmed up to the whole trick or treating thing he was off!  Running to keep up with the big kids:)

Coolest picture ever!  We got all six of the kids to pose for a picture under the big moon as it was starting to get dark.  Alton looks so big in this picture!

The 3 big girls.  All dressed as princesses of course:)

Afterwards everyone headed back to la casa de Zuge for yummy chili and dilly bars! 

A Summery Fall Day:)

I had a weekend home with the kids this weekend while John was out doing guy stuff up north.  We didn't do too much exciting.  Mostly just ran errands, hung out at home and got regular weekend stuff done:)  We did run and pick up some pumpkins to carve since this is one Athena's very favorite things to do!  We did one on Saturday and Alton wouldn't get anywhere near it.  He wouldn't even sit by it for a picture let alone touch it.  The following pictures are from when we did another one on Sunday.  He finally warmed up to it and ended up having a great time with sissy:)

He sat and watched Athena for the first few minutes, then finally reached out and touched it with one hand from as far away as possible. 

Finally he inched in for a peak inside. 

A little bit closer inspection and...

He was ready to join in the pumpkin gutting!  Squealing with laughter along with Athena...I should have taken a video instead of just pictures because these 2 were hilarious:)  After all the guts were out they sat and played with the guts like playdough for quite a while.  After a quick bath for both of them and a clean-up of the counter we carved it and set it out on the front steps with a candle to light it up at dark. 

We headed outside for some pictures by the front bushes since it was such a nice day out. 

I was very happy to get some pictures of both of them together with both of them actually cooperating!!!

So gosh darn handsome!

Little cutie pie!

Beautiful princess:)

Happy Fall!!

Athena started Kindergarten!

Athena started 5 year old kindergarten this fall!  She was so excited the night before the first day she didn't fall asleep until after 10:00.  I could hear her in her bedroom tossing around in bed, playing with her stuffed animals and singing to herself:)  Lots of nervous energy! She was running on adrenaline the next morning though, excited to put on her new school shoes and outfit and pose for some great pictures outside so early in the morning.  I need to get her up by 6:30 to get her and Alton dressed and out the door by 7:00.  Our good friends who live in our neighborhood offered to drive her to school in the morning along with their daughter.  The bus doesn't come through our neighborhood until after 7:30, so there isn't enough time for me to get her on the bus and still make it to work on time. After I drop her off at our friends, I then drop Alton off at daycare and then I make it to work by 7:30.  After school she takes the bus to the after school daycare program at our daycare that Alton goes to so I can pick them up together after work.   

Posing with the new backpack.  Of all the backpack choices out there, she wanted a plain pink one.  She loves it because it's Puma, which her big cousin Kailey likes.  I like it because it's nice and BIG-fits her lunchbox, folder and any extra school stuff with plenty of room for when winter comes and we have snow clothes to stuff in there for recess too.

Big girl ready to take on kindergarten!  Love love love her confidence:)

Can she be any sweeter or cuter?  Hair is a little wonky since she's growing out a super short layered inverse  bob. 

We got Alton in on the photo action even though he was NOT feeling it!  Ena had to hold him down in this picture to keep him from running off.  I'm glad we got one decent picture of the 2 of them together:)

Her first few weeks are going great!  So far she likes everything about school and her favorite part is Art class.  She also is continuing to do dance class this year one night a week and fall swimming lessons on Saturday mornings.  Life is good for our busy little princess:)

Our first voyage into organized sports!

Athena tried t-ball this summer!  We signed up through the rec department and she was on a t-ball team for 5-6 year old boys and girls.  The experience was great!  She had a very fun time and started learning some great skills.  Her coach was awesome-focusing on basic skills and having fun:) We LOVED going to her games and watching her play. She was even on the same team as 2 of our good friends kids, so we got to hang out together with the other families during the games and watch the kids together:)

Here's our little slugger.  Always with a smile on her face:) 

Water break on the bench.

Lookin' good in the outfield!

Grandpa even made it to a game!  Of course Alton was all over grandpa the whole time being the big grandpa's boy that he is:) 

The gardening adventure continues! 2012

We added on to our backyard garden quite a bit this year!  We wanted more gardening room and also wanted to cut down on the amount of lawn to mow and trim so we pulled out the lawn in about a 12' radius all around the boxes, butting all the way up to the deck on the house side.  That side probably got at least 15' ripped out.  We then mulched in the whole area using the free city mulch.  It was quite the project that took several weekends to do-cutting and hauling sod takes a long time!  With the extra space we hope to build and add at least 2 more garden boxes, but that addition will be saved for next year.  This year with the empty space we added 3 big sunken in flower pots for decoration and also planted 3 vining plants that we hoped would spread all around the boxes and make good use of the space-one pumpkin, one watermelon and one squash.  None of the vine plants are really taking off though, so we'll see how they do!  

A view of the whole thing from the side of the house.  Notice our COMPLETELY brown, dead lawn.  We are having a horrible drought here and haven't had any rain since May. Some of our trees have already lost their leaves too and we've even been soaking the trees to try to save them.  Luckily while we were gone on vacation our friend was so kind as to water the garden for us.  I'm sure absolutely everything would be dead otherwise.  8 days with no water and 90+ temperatures would have done everything in for sure. 

A close up of one of the flower pots:)

This year also saw the addition of a rain barrel which is pretty laughable since it's only gotten filled and used ONCE with the drought we're having.  Not the year to spend the time and money on a rain barrel hoping to save money on the water bill;)  The little green plant in the mulch to the right of the barrel is the pumpkin plant. 

We wanted some type of border around the garden.  I'm hoping to eventually have a beautiful fence, cloaked in beautiful perennial butterfly garden flowers all the way around with an even more adorable arch covered gate entry.  This year we settled on a thick row of marigolds.  Baby steps:)  Never underestimate however, how long it takes to plant 2 full flats of marigolds!  That was several weeknights every night after work. 

The view from the deck, clockwise starting from the bottom left: box # 1 has 2 bell pepper plants and 2 tomato plants.  So far we have gotten 3 bell peppers and one tomato from this box.  box # 2 has 5 more tomato plants in it which are doing great!  Lots of blossoms and little green tomatoes on them so far.  box # 3 is half sugar snap peas and half green beans.  The peas are doing great, we lost about half of the bean plants to some type of bean plant eating critter though. box # 4 has 2 rows of carrots that are looking good so far and also had a row of radishes that we already picked.  The barrel in the middle has basil in it.  Just today I bought all of the necessary olive oil, parmesan cheese and walnuts to get my first batch of pesto in the freezer using some of the basil:)

Good Morning Sunshine!

Now that I'm on summer break with the kids, I have more time to do fun food with them again.  Here is a cute idea for a pancake sun:)

One big circle pancake surrounded by strawberry slice rays with a blueberry smiley face. 

You can see here how big I made them with Ena in the picture. It's as big as her head!  You can also see Altons little hand and chubby little cheek trying to squeeze in there to snitch a strawberry and Athena's lean & push technique to keep him away. 

Here's a bento lunch that I made for the kids today.  Jasmine rice with a little butter, salt and pepper (seriously one of Ena's favorite things in the world to eat!), blueberries for Alton, raspberries for Ena, a little handful of Pirate B00ty, and a thick chunk of swiss cheese cut into a bear.   NOT the most nutricious lunch I've made them, but I was happy to get out and dust off these cute bento containers that I haven't used in ages and it used up the last of a few things from the fridge:)

Disney World 2012

We had a wonderful time on our Disney vacation last week:)  We kept it a surprise for the kids until the day we left!  Athena and I had just made a summer activity bucket that we filled with ideas of fun things to do over summer break. The night before we left, after the kids went to bed, I replaced all of the slips with ones that said "Go to Disney World".  The next morning she was excited to reach in and pick out our activity for the day and she of course pulled out one of the Disney slips.   She was a little shocked at first and I don't think she thought it was for real, but after a few minutes the excitement sunk in and a couple hours later we were headed off to the airport! 
Since Athena is at the age where she is very into princesses we spent a good amount of time doing princess activities.  We met and got pictures of her with most of the princesses and went to a magical dinner at Cinderella's Castle.  Alton really enjoyed seeing Mickey Mouse all over the park and the highlight of the trip for him was getting to pick out a Mickey Mouse stuffed animal that hasn't left his side since he got it:)  Well actually, I think the highlight of the trip for Alton was riding the shuttle buses from the resort to the parks!  This boy loves busses:)

Alton spent a good amount of time parked on John's shoulders throughout the trip.  Here we are waiting for the nighttime show to start.  First an electric parade, then a lights show on the castle followed by fireworks. 

Family picture with Micky and Minnie.

Ena met Tinkerbelle in the fairy grotto.  This was really cool!  The grotto was adorable with everything being so cute and 'fairy sized' down to the smallest details.  Check out the thimble table behind Ena with all of the tinker tools set out on it. 

Ena meeting Ariel during our meal at Cinderella's Royal Table.  Ena was dressed as Jasmine when she met many of the princesses. 

Ena and Repunzel. Love this picture:) 

Ena meeting Cinderella.

Ena and Snow White. 

The chitlins strolling around Down Town Disney:)  They're both happy as clams clutching their treasures we bought them.

Monkey See, Monkey Do!!  Little cuties!

I think Alton had a little crush on Belle:)

A piece of advice I would give to anyone going to Disney is to get up and going early in the morning and get to the parks when they open.  We got to ride so many of the rides, including this magic carpet ride, without waiting at all.  We actually went on this one twice in a row back to back since there was no wait.  Later in the day when we came around this way again the line was huge.  Same with most of the others also. 

We had a wonderful time and hope to go back again in a few years when Alton is a bit older and can enjoy it as much as Athena did this time.  We spent 3days at Magic Kingdom, then one day each at Epcot, Hollywood Studios, and Animal Kingdom.  The time at Magic Kingdom was well spent with the ages our kids are:)  We loved most everything we did at that park.  Lots of little kid rides and attractions.  Can't wait to check out more stuff and spend more time at Animal Kingdom and Epcot next time we go back.  From the time that we spent at Hollywood Studios, I could take or leave that one next time.
On the last day of our trip I asked Athena if her Disney trip was everything she hoped it would be.  I was surpised when she said "no" since she had had such a great time and we did all of the princess stuff she wanted to do.  I think she saw the surprise on my face because she then explained that it wasn't everything she dreamed because she wished we could "stay for another 30 days and not have to go home" :)