Happy Valentine's Day!

Who doesn't love a holiday that is all about LOVE (and candy)? There was so much anticipation for Valentine's Day this year with both kids having a Valentine's celebration at school and at home.  

They always come home with so much candy and junk from their school's valentine exchange, so I wanted to be sure to do a non-food Valentine this year. The kids agreed on making these crazy straws and they were a hit!

I made them pose for a picture before they could open their gifts from Mommy and Daddy on Valentine's morning.  

Avery enjoyed her ring bling...a Hershey Kiss ring made from a pipe cleaner 

(Daddy did not like this one)

 They each got a new shirt (how could we pass up a shirt that has a Guster look alike on it?), a heart shaped bowl,

 and certificate for a movie theatre date with Daddy...

 which was quickly redeemed the following week to see the Lego Movie.

The rest of the day was filled with as many heart-themed things I could think of...

 Words can't explain how much we love these kids!!

Hope you had a fun celebration with your loved ones on Valentine's Day too!

Table Manners

We are constantly trying to work on table manners....then something like this happens and we just give in and let him to what he feels he needs to do.  On this particular day, he wanted to eat noodles with his hands while refusing to take Avery's helmet off. 

The Avery Workout

This girl LOVES to be active!! She has her own set of weights and will do my work out videos with me (and often ASKS to them, which gets me to do them even on days when I really DON'T want to!) She's a great motivator! But this night in particular, I let her do all the work and I just took pictures of her many moves...

Before you look further, I must tell you that she picked out her own outfit that day and I would never let her leave the house in something like this!

 She even does some tricks...

and gets some assistance here from her trainer...

Just look at those flat abs...Mommy is jealous for sure!

Black eye

 A few weeks ago, the kids were running around the house (as usual) and Grayson (accidentally, kind of?) slammed the bedroom door in Avery's face.  He got her pretty good, so we knew it was going to be bad the next day....

 We told her to make a tough girl face and Daddy taught her to say "you should see the other guy" if anyone asked her what happened. 

 Here she is covering it up when going out in public.

Ice Skating

Avery had been asking to go ice skating since her birthday in July.  Finally, we set a date for her and her BFF, Polina, to go together for the first time.  

 The Winter Olympics had just started and she was watching a lot of ice skating on TV.  She wanted to do spins and leg lifts her first lap around. I was amazed at the confidence she had out there!

Yes, we had the girls wear their helmets "just in case" - we didn't know what to expect for their first time!  They did great and we left with tired, happy and injury free little girls!

We even went again two weeks later on a warmer day to meet up with Madi and Tori.

Going back to the Municipal Ice Rink after all these years really brought back great memories! I spent SOOOO much time there as a kid and I loved to see Avery enjoy it too!

Chocolate entertainment

We don't normally keep chocolate out for fear of children (and parents!) eating it all day long...

But Grayson entertained himself for hours "lining" up the Dove Promises and then filling the bucket up with them (and he didn't even sneak and eat one!)

This worked out well until one was dropped and Guster tried to eat it, wrapper and all. Don't worry - Mommy saved the day and reached in Guster's mouth to retrieve it!  

Snow Days!

I'm quite a bit behind on the blog. As I recall what our backyard looked like a month ago...

 I can't help but think how pretty the freshly fallen snow was, but I'm really hoping that it is over with!

Lots of snow falls this winter meant lots of snow days stuck at home!  On one of those days, we invited Madi to come over to spend the day with us.  The kids were thrilled to have their big cousin over for the day and Avery was double thrilled that  I didn't make her take a nap.  While Gray napped, the girls had some great time together. 

Painting... 

 doing calisthenics in the basement...

 followed by hot chocolate, heart shaped Peeps and lots of laughs...

We love having Madi over! She entertains the kids and also gets them to listen...she's going to an awesome babysitter in a few years (and we are so lucky to have so close by!)