Christmas Eve

Well, here we are, it is hard to believe that Christmas is upon us yet again. I am super excited for this year. Since I have left home, Christmas has been missing something and until recently I wasn't sure what it was. I still gain that lovely holiday weight from all the delicious cookies and other fattening goodies and I still spend more then I should on Christmas gifts but it was not until Jack came running out of his room the other morning and stood in sheer surprise at our huge and gorgeous Christmas tree, let his mouth hang open and yelled "CHRISTMAS TREE, It s pretty", that I fully realized that it is the pure joy, awe and excitement of children that make Christmas as magical as it us. Now, mind you, there are no lights or decorations on our tree and no presents underneath it. See Santa loves our house, so Santa will bring the lights and decorations with him, along with the presents and decorate the tree on Christmas Eve. This is a new tradition for me, not one that I was too sure about in the beginning but I think it will be amazing to see Jack's shock and awe when he comes out tomorrow morning to see the decorated tree and all the presents that surround it. I am super excited for Christmas this year! Happy Holidays to all!!!

Almost There

There are officially two days left until Christmas vacation! We are almost there and then it is 17 days off (including weekends) yipee!!!!! We are all very excited. It will be so nice to be home with the boys and spend some quality time with them. I cannot believe how fast they are growing. Charlie is already 7 months and growing fast, before we know it he will be up and chasing after Jack. Jack is talking up a storm. I remember when he was not saying anything and now he says more then I even knew he could. I told him he was being Crazy Silly and he looked at me as serious as all get out and said " No Mommy, I am not crazy, I am Jack." From the mouths of babes. You got to love it. I cannot believe how fast it goes though, Jack will be three this summer and Charlie will be one. It seems like just yesterday I was graduating from high school and then college and somewhere along the way I blinked and I got married, had two beautiful boys and everything changed; good changes all of them. My, how the time flies. Well, now that I have gone off on a little tangent here. Happy Holidays to everyone and may God bless you! I hope to see everyone over the break!

Picture Perfect

So here is the photo from my Christmas card, don't you love it? This is total Jack. He is so full of life and usually always happy! The picture totally captures him, even at 5 in the morning when I had to sneak a photo in. Happy Holidays and Merry Christmas !!!

Holiday Spirit!

Here are the boys in their santa hats being festive!!! It is has been a while since the last post but life has been very busy and there is not much free time for blogging plus I have not been good about taking photos lately! (bad mama) Well the boys had a busy day today! We spent the morning at grandmere's, off to see Santa, daddy had his big dry-land dog race, then to grandmere's 60th birthday party (Happy Birthday Grandmere!!!) and then we went to Little gym for Maggie's happy second birthday!!! It was a busy day!!!

ELMO

A new Super Wal-mart opened in our area so we had to of course go and check it out to see what kind of deals they offered. It was a quick trip because I had all my boys with me but we had a wonderful surprise when Elmo was there. Charlie was not so interested but Jack was elated. He went running up to him screaming E-L-M-O!

Happy Halloween

Here are the boys in their costumes......Jack was a froggy and Charlie was a tiger. Jack went to every house and proudly said "Trick or Treat", his goal for the night was more candy!!! Charlie came along for the wagon ride and was lulled to sleep long before we made it home again. Overall I would say that it was a successful night in Galena; for candy!!!

Pumpkin Patch!!

Jack wanted so badly to go to the pumpkin patch and we finally made it! Jack was so tired while we were there but he snapped out it enough to pick out his favorite pumpkin and to ride the tracties they had there.....Charlie picked out his pumpkin too but he was not quite as excited about the adventure as Jack was.

Sled dogging MD style

Here are some pictures from a training day too! For those of you that do not know, Mike races sled dogs, hence the small pack we have living at our house. He trains on weekends with dryland rigs and they hope for snow in December and January. Last year we had a total of 1/2 inch for the season! The boys and I like to go and see the other teams and watch them race, plus we think that Jack in in training.

Here are some fall pictures from the boys at the playground, if you can call what we are going through fall, one minute it is 45 and the next day it is 80+, the weather here is crazy. Here is Charlie with a new haircut!!! His new dew is cute but it was not me who got the clippers out....MIKE!
Sorry that I am not better about the posts, it is so hard working full time and being a full time mom, as many of you know. When I do get a second to myself I am usually sleeping...heheheh. Stay tune for Pumpkin patch photos and spooky Halloween Pics!

Baby Blues!

Here is a shot of Charlie is in his favorite color.....blue! Charlie has hit the four month mark, where does the time go? We just went yesterday for our checkup and a set of shots. My brave little solider only whined when they stuck him with the needle and then resumed his flirting and smiley ways with the nurse. He is the happiest baby ever and I have to admit, darn cute to boot. Well, Charlie weighed in at a whopping 17 lbs....Jack only weighs 27 lbs at 2 1/2 years!!! I think that we have a bruiser on our hands......Check out the baby blues!
We want to send out a hey there and love you to Uncle Jason who have been shipped somewhere over seas for yet another tour.....hopefully this is the last. Be careful and come home safe!!!!

AARGH!!

Here is my little pirate! Jack loves to play dress up; sometimes he is a pirate, a frog, a dragon and at times he is a combination of all of them! Charlie is growing so fast and has started teething...yuck. so not my favorite or his I am sure!
I cannot believe that it has been about a month since my last post. How the time flies!! We have been adjusting to our new schedules and are still working on it. Mornings are especially rough but we have almost found our grove! I have to say that the boys and mom and dad absolutely love our new care, Ms. Tammy. She is awesome. She is so good with the boys, is big on manners (which I love) and is teaching the kids Spanish. Jack can say goodbye and see you in the morning in Spanish, it is too cute. He loves going there! It is such a relief.
Well look for Halloween posts....we are going to be a froggie and tiger this year!!! Trick or Treat!

Crocodile tears

Summer is over. How sad. I cannot believe how fast 3 months have come and gone. Tomorrow I will take Charlie and Jack to daycare and say goodbye. I am lucky that I have found a small program with a wonderful teacher but alas it does not relieve the sadness that I feel about leaving my babies. We had a wonderful summer, a plane trip to Maine, a long van ride to Ocean City, we went to carnivals, Fairs and tractor parades, we had play dates and pool parties, we took walks almost everyday and played on the play ground at least once a week, we played trucks in the living room and set up a school bus in Jack's room, heck, we even baked cookies once or twice . (what a mess that was!) I will miss it. I will miss hearing Jack ask "What are you doing here?" every time he enters a room, I will miss rocking miles a day as Charlie snuggles close and I will miss making bottles, getting "drinkies" and finding missing toys that are right under a two year old's nose. I know that I will still get to do all that on the night shift, but trust me when I say, it won't be the same. I know that it will be ok and I know that the boys are in good hands and that they will love the social interaction but still, a part of me is sad. I am already fighting back the big old crocodile tears that are welling up just writing about it, I can only imagine the floodgates that will flow tomorrow. There is always a silver lining....pick up time. I am already counting down the hours!!

Final Horrah

Well as our summer is coming to a close we spent a few days in Ocean City, NJ. We lucked out and had beautiful weather the entire time we were there. The boys loved the beach, Jack was not a big fan of the ocean or the big waves that splashed that nasty saltwater in his face!! He did however, love the boardwalk where he got to ride a Thomas the Train ride with daddy...several times. It was nice to get away from Galena for a few days, thanks Meme, grandmere and little meme.
I cannot believe that another year begins on Monday, I am sad to see the summer go but grateful that my career gives me the summer each year to spend with my boys. I am getting teary eyed just thinking about dropping them off at the sitters.......

Dog Days of Summer!

Here are Jack and Charlie enjoying the beautiful weather at Grandmere's pool!!! Charlie is sporting his doggie towel and Jack was having fun in and out of the pool...that is until he was chased by a giant toad! Even Charlie went in swimming, he will be another water baby; he was spalshing and laughing and loving it until hunger got the better of him. It is so hard to beleive that summer is almost at a close. How fast time flies when you are having fun with your babies!!!

My Turn!!!!!

Jack is a wonderful big brother and loves to do what he can to help. Jack insisted that it was his turn to feed Charlie and that he could do it without HELP. Jack is quite the little helper, always willing to go get Charlie's blanket, bottle or diapers as long as he is not busy driving his car or talking on the phone to his best friend Robbi. The John Deere wallpaper that you see is the new paper in Jack and Charlie's room. They have graduated from the Old Fashioned Pooh and Friends that has decorated the nursery; it is now a big boy room. Jack loves the truckies (truckies is Jacks lingo for tractors) that decorate the walls, wears grandmere's award winning tractor boxers whenever he can or driving his "truckies" around the house.

Growing Fast

Here is our little man smiling....probably at Jack. He finds Jack to be very entertaining and just sits and watches him sometimes. We wonder if Charlie will be our quiet one, Jack could def do the talking for both of them! Charlie is growing fast, it is so hard to believe that he is almost three months old, where does the time go? It seems like just yesterday I could not wait for him to get here and here he is laughing and smiling, holding his head up like a champ and rolling over. With the new school year looming too close for comfort it is going to be hard to not be home with both my little boys full time.

Jack Loves Tractors

Our son loves tractors. We must have tried them all at the fair! We also saw lots of different animals at the fair and had a good time visiting with the rest of the Uleaus.

Checkups

So we went to the doctor for our two month and two year checkup....Jack weighs a whopping 27 lbs and are you ready? Charlie weighs 13 lbs....crazy huh!!!!Both boys are doing well and we are now allowed to introduce Jack into the world of peanut butter, yum!!! He does not know what he has been missing. Luckily, the doctor has confirmed that waiting is no longer recommended and that we won't have to wait quite so long to introduce Charlie to the yummy world of peanuts!!!!

Charlie has really come into his own. He is rolling over, only stomach to back but he is ahead of his time......such a proud mama!!! He has started smiling and giggling and cooing. He wants to keep up with his big brothers constant dialogue. He loves to rock and his new favorite thing is patty cake, it always makes him smile.

Goodbye to an old friend!!!

Well, today we put all our binkis in a plastic bag and gave them to the trash man. They are finally gone and we are very sad!!! Jack has been walking around asking for his binki and cannot seem to understand that they went bye bye. I do not think that he will ever like trash men or trucks again. Alas, it was time.
However, an ice cream cone seemed to cheer him up a little, check out that smile!!!! (just like his mama, has a weakness for ice cream yum!!!)

I AM 2!!!!

Today was JAck's second Birthday!!!!! Where does the time go. It is so hard to believe that our little man is now two years old. We had a fun day complete with birthday pancakes that sported our #2 candle, spend most of the day in grandmere's pool (jack loves to swim) and wrapped the day up with some funfetti cake. Jack scored a My First Art Set Easel and a bubble blowing mower from Mom, Dad and Charlie. They are def a big success; I am not so sure about the dry erase markers they might be leaving thier mark all over my house!!!!!

Our Maine Vacation

Maine Vaction Photos

Here is the link to our Maine vacation photos.

MEME'S Goats

Jack is our outdoor baby and a farmer at heart. He loves to go to grandmere's house and play with the baby goats, help to mow the lawn or ride around in one of the tractors. Here he is giving the goats some love. He knows the names of all his farm animals and could spend hours in the barn or sitting in the Caboda!

Char-liee

Jack said Charlie's name for the first time today!!! Up until now he has been known as Mama's Baby. He is saying more and more everyday forming short sentences and everything. His two new favorite words are NO and Mine. Lucky us!
Charlie is doing well, growing fast, he is already surpassing 10 pounds, he is a very happy eater!