My Frakkin Blog!

Okay - finally - I was wondering if the frenzy was ever gonna end.  Well, Christmas and the New Year festivities finally ended today.  All the decorations came down and were put away.  The house really looks bare now.

Christmas was a big hit with the kids this year.  As stated previously, Ryan was really in to the whole spirit of it this year.  While I totally expected him to get us up at 5am - he actually woke up at normal time - 8:00 and then got us all up.  Mary’s parents came in and were staying with us - they were actually up before Ryan.

Anyway - he came in all excited about Santa coming and all the presents that were there.  Kylie slept through it.  After Ryan opened up a few presents - we decided we really needed to go wake her up.  She had a great time opening up her presents as well - but - she still hasn’t really figured the whole thing out just yet.

I spent Christmas day doing what I usually do - putting together all the toys that Santa brought.  With the exception of about a 3 hour break when Mary’s Uncle’s and Aunt came for dinner - I pretty much spent the whole day doing that - into the night.

But - I got a Wii from Santa.  After everyone went to bed and after I finished with the last of the toys that needed to be put together - I spent the rest of the night playing Need for Speed and Nerf N-Strike.  Wow - time really flies when you’re playing those games.  Before I knew it - it was 4:30am.  I had to just shut the thing off or I would have been up all day.

I spent some serious time on that thing over the past week - so - I wouldn’t say I’m burned out - but - I’m definitely over it and ready to incorporate blogging back in to the routine.

So - I hope you all had a Very Merry Christmas, Hannukah, Kwanza, Boxing Day, etc and a safe and Happy New Year.  I’m really looking forward to what 2009 will bring!

Also - I see that BSG will be on Jan 16th for those of you that are interested.  Unfortunately, it appears it will be the last episode of the series.  Bummer!

Yes - the countdown clock is getting closer and Ryan is almost over the edge - which, in turn - is about to drive me over the edge!  His excitement is getting so built up he doesn’t really know how to let it out other than running around all over the place, not listening, and just being a regular 4 year old in anticipation of Santa’s arrival.

Well - I had to pull the old “I’ve got Santa’s phone number” thing.  It worked for a little bit.

He was poking his little sister in the head.  I told him to stop.  He looked at me, then poked her again. Here’s how the rest of it went down:

Me:  If I have to tell you one more time, I’m calling Santa Claus

Ryan: You don’t have his phone number!

Me: Oh yes I do!  Every parent gets his phone number as soon as we become mommies and daddies.

Ryan: Right! What’s his phone number?

Me:  1-800-North Pole

At this point - he had that kinda cocked-head quizzical look on his face.  Then he decided to test it - he didn’t even take his eyes off me.  He just kinda reached out - then poked his sister in the head again.

Me: Okay. That’s it.  I’m calling Santa! (as I’m walking towards the kitchen to the phone).

Ryan: Nooooooo! (he’s following me now)

Me:  I told ya if you did it again I was calling! (picking up the phone).

Ryan: I won’t do it again.  I promise!  Don’t call Santa!

Me:  Fine.  But, I swear - if you’re mean to your sister again, I’m calling him.

Ryan: Okay.

I think that lasted a couple hours.  But, now - I only have to threaten to call Santa one time then he stops.

Okay - got them downloaded!  Here are just a couple pictures of the outside of our house, at night.

Hopefully, you guys can make out these pictures okay.

These are the best angles I could get.  I was thinking about taking these at twilight - but - wasn’t sure if the full effects could be seen.  I think I will try to take some twilight pix tomorrow and see how they look.

After looking at all of these pictures, maybe you have noticed the same thing I have  - it is noticeably dark on the right side of my home.  Looks like I’ll need to put up some more lights, at least on the right side of the house.

I’ve also noticed that the corner of the house, just behind the choo-choo train needs something else.  Mary has to work tomorrow - so - I told the kids we’d hit target or walmart and see what other kind of lights or light-up yard ornaments we can find.  They’re really looking forward to it.  In fact, I think I’m looking forward to it too!

Alrighty - got the first set of pictures to show you guys - these are from the inside of the house.  Mary is still buying things to put up on the inside - so - as she continues to add - I’ll take a few more pictures and post them up.

First - a couple different angles of the Christmas tree.  Also - if you take a look at the mantle to the left - you’ll see the countdown calendar that I referenced in an earlier post.  Also - you’ll see that mantle is very bare - well - long story short - while I was putting the Angel up on the top of the tree - I hit the mantle on the way up - which knocked down and broke all the ceramic figurines.  I owe Mary a new Manger with all the pieces, a couple Angels, and one Santa Claus.  Oops!!

I also had to repair the mantle - I knocked it loose!  Also - you’ll notice there are only two stockings - Kylie’s and Ryans.  We actually have 11 - one for each kid, one for Mary, one for me, and one each for the dogs.  But, we figured with a 2 and 4 year old - it would be safer this year if we didn’t put them all up around the mantle.  I would rather have had the stockings up - at least I wouldn’t have broken all the

And - here’s one of the steps.  Mary likes to collect different figures - here’s the beginning of them.  I’m sure there will be more by the end of this Christmas.  Anyway - this is the last of the pictures for tonight - I don’t want to overwhelm you all!

Also - you’ll notice a gate around the stairs - some of you may remember the whole Kylie saga last April when she broke her arm.  For those of you that are new - she fell down from the third step there and broke her left forearm.  I’m kinda lazy and don’t want to hunt through the archives to post it up here - but - if you follow the tags for Kylie - you’ll find the broken arm posts.  Anyway - that gate is now our and her protection.  She can’t get up the steps any more on her own.

Well, of course, what is the next thing that happens all around this country after Black Friday?  Yup - the Christmas decorations start going up.  Well, I always do mine in two phases (mostly because I only have one day a weekend to do it.) - Phase I is all the outside ground ornamentals and decorations and Phase II is Outside lighting and inside.  Mary always does the inside work and decorates the interior.

So, like I said, I completed Phase I today.  I will put the lights up around the house next Saturday.  So, rather than post pictures of a half-complete decorated house - I will take all the pictures next weekend after I’m done.  I’ll take some pictures of what it looks like during daylight - and a set of what it looks like at night all lit up.

So - if I actually have any readers who follow this blog - you can expect to see some pictures next weekend!  Now that there are some decorations up - Ryan is getting extremely excited.  Kylie likes the decorations - but - she still doesn’t have an understanding of it yet.

Can you believe it’s less than one month from Christmas already?  Holy Frakkin’ Cow!

Well - better late than never!

Mary had to work today - so - it was just me and the kids all day.  We’re actually going to celebrate our Thanksgiving feast tomorrow.  The day is going to be quite busy.

Anyway - Mary tells me that working on Thanksgiving day in a hospital turns out to be the same as any other day - extremely busy.  I can attest that hanging out with the kids on Turkey day isn’t any different than any other day I have them when she’s at work - extremely busy!

We had a good time today.  However, I realized that this is actually the very first Thanksgiving where I did not watch any football games!  And..you know what?  I hate to say it, but I didn’t miss it like I thought I would.

Considering how busy tomorrow is going to be, I’m not entirely sure I’ll get back out here - but - we’ll see.

Hope everyone had a great  Thanksgiving.

Hi All - as promised - here are a few of the pictures I took at The Wiggles Concert this past Saturday. I’ll only post a few up here tonight - I’ll post more up over the week - I got a lot!

First up - We got one really happy and excited boy here!

And..if you recall from yesterday’s post - I mentioned that Kylie started coming down with something just as we were leaving…here she is at the start of the concert - she laid in my lap the whole concert

And…here’s The Wiggles coming out in The Big Red Car

And..then I got a really great shot of Wags The Dog

And - this last one here is of Captain Feathersword. He slid down these silk …whatever? As you can see - by the time he got to the bottom - he ended up head first…that guy is a nut!

You can also get a good look at just how close we were to the stage! Way to go Mary! She bought the tickets. Anyway - that’s it for today. I don’t want to fill up the whole page today with pictures.

Like I said, I have many many more - but - I’ll go easy! LOL. I’ll just post up some of the really good ones. And..as I said yesterday, if you have young ones and haven’t experienced it yet - I highly recommend catching a Wiggles concert when they come to or near your town. These guys are great and the kids just love them!

I promise to have the pictures up tomorrow and Wednesday.  This past Saturday we took the kids to see the Wiggles in concert.  Both of them were absolutely excited the week leading up to it.

First - I have to admit - we’re Wiggles Groupies!  This is the 7th concert we’ve been to over the last 2 years.  In fact, the very first concert we went to was over in Orlando.  Kylie was only 6 weeks old and Ryan was 2.  One year, we went up to Carlisle, PA for my 25th reunion - yup - we planned the trip so that we stopped in Richmond to catch a Wiggles concert on the way up.  We’ve actually seen them in 3 states! LOL.

The very first concert we went to - we were up in the nosebleed section.  We’ve actually become insiders now and we get early release tickets.  We’ve been down on the floor every time since then.  This time, we were in the 3d row from the stage.  Wait until you see these pictures!

Ryan had a really great time.  Unfortunately, for Kylie - she wasn’t able to enjoy it.  She was fine on Friday.  When it was time for us to leave, she was just laying on the couch.  We knew she was starting to come down with something.  During the whole concert, she just laid her head in my lap.  By Saturday night - we ended up taking her to the ER at around 10:00pm with a 104.7 temp.  Poor thing - they had to catheterize her to get a UA sample.

Apparently, she caught some kind of virus.  She was fine on Sunday - and - apparently, she was able to get more of that concert than we realized.  All she could talk about was The Wiggles and Wags and Dorothy and Anthony!  Mary took her to the Pediatrician today for the follow-up.  She was talking up a storm with the Doc about seeing the Wiggles.  So - while it appeared she was out of it - she did in fact see and remember a lot more than we thought.

We don’t have any pictures of the kids because they didn’t get out in the aisles and dance this time - but - I will put up some of the pix over the next couple days.  If you’ve never been to a concert and you have little ones - I highly recommend it!

One of the great things about living in Florida is the great weather we have in “the winter.”  The weatherman says our high for tomorrow should be in the low 80’s!  Gotta love it.

This past weekend we went to Ryan & Kylie’s pre-school Fall Festival.  It is a fundraiser and festival all rolled in to one.  The kids had a really great time.  There were two big bouncers, a balloon guy, a karate exposition, a fire truck, lots of crafts and games, and lots of food!

The biggest draw was the raffle.  Since the beginning of October each of the classrooms have had the parents of the kids bring in items for the raffle.  Each classroom had a theme.  Kylie’s class was camping outdoors and Ryan’s class theme was cooking out.  There are 9 class rooms so there were 9 different things to choose from for the raffle.  Each raffle ticket was $5 apiece.

I bought 5 tickets and later Mary let Ryan buy another ticket.  I placed 3 tickets in a raffle for Toys for Girls and Boys - there must have been close to $300 worth of stuff in that one.  I put one ticket in A Day at the Spa - hoping to win something for mommy - and then one ticket in for Family Fun Night - which included lots of games, tickets to movies, gift certificates to places like Chuck-E-Cheese, and other family fun stuff.

The ticket that Mary let Ryan buy went in to the Toys for Girls and Boys.  Well, when the raffle started we were hanging out next to that table with all the toys on it.  At each table they went to they chose the nearest kid around that table to draw the tickets.  When they got around to the table with the toys - they were reaching for Kylie to come up and draw the ticket - she wasn’t having any of that!!!  So, they asked Ryan to pull the next ticket.

Ryan so much wanted to win all those toys that when they asked him to draw the ticket I was preparing myself for the big let down.  I was thinking - how could they possibly ask a 4 year old little boy to pull the ticket and then have them announce that some other kid won all those toys.  My chest was already tightening up just thinking about the look on his face as some other little boy or girl came up to claim that wondrous prize.

They held the bucket up above his head - he plunged his little hand in there and fished around a bit trying to grab on to one.  He pulled it out and was getting ready to look at it - mind you - he’s still 4 - so - he can’t really read yet.  He didn’t even get a chance to look at the ticket he just pulled out.  The head of the school grabbed the ticket from him before he could pull it down.

As soon as she looked at the table, her jaw dropped.  The D.J. with the microphone didn’t even get to put the mike up to her to announce the winner.  She just turned and looked at my wife and I with a stunned look.  Mary looked at her and said “Is it us?”

Yup - that’s right - Ryan pulled his own ticket in the drawing!  My first reaction was - whew - what a relief!  Then, it hit me too - Holy Cow!  He drew his own ticket!  Not one of the three that I put in there - but, the one that he “bought.”  Talk about a lucky boy!  He instantly became the most popular kid there.  Mind you - there had to be close to 50 or more tickets in for that raffle.  That was the biggest and most popular prize going.

I could list everything that was on that table - but - it is a VERY long list.  There was a sheet that came a long with the prizes that detailed everything on that table.  It filled up a full 8 x 10 sheet, single-spaced.  There were some toys that were beyond Kylie and Ryan’s age - we’ve already talked to Ryan and told him we were going to give those away to kids that don’t have toys - he was perfectly fine with that.

Now - on to the subject of this post - it was a beautiful day - not too hot, not too cold - sun shining all day long.  Later that evening while I was getting read for bed, I looked in the mirror.  I actually did a double-take.  Was my face a little pink?  Funny, I didn’t feel flushed.  Then I looked at my arms - and looked closer at my face - yup - I actually got a bit of a tan - on November 8th!  Awesome!  I’m never leaving Florida!

Well - there aren’t really a lot of them!  Sorry!  But - I have two separate sets - the first set is of the costume we got Ryan specifically for Halloween - that he asked for.  The second set is what he actually wore!

He said he wanted to be Wolverine for Halloween - here he is trying on his costume and posing.  Lil sis wanted in on that pic also!

Another pose for the camera. Watch those claws!

Our little Pirate Princess!  Unfortunately - this was the one and only picture she would let us take of her that night.  She’s finicky like that!

If you guessed he reverted back to his Batman costume for Halloween - you are correct!  I don’t know - he was sooo excited about being Wolverine - until the day finally came.  I guess he likes Batman over Wolverine.

If anything - he just has one more costume to wear now when he’s playing superheroes.

I tried to coax him in to getting a Superman costume also - but - he didn’t want it.  Not because he doesn’t like Superman or anything like that - his reason?

“I don’t have that curl on my head like he does.”

Oh well!

And - lastly - if you haven’t already done so - regardless of who you support in this election - GET OUT AND VOTE!  It’s your right and you earned it!