Happy New Year!!!!

WOW, I can not believe that the decade is over. In the past ten years so much has changed in my life but so much has stayed the same. I have been so blessed over the past ten years to have married my best friend after a very long wait, had two beautiful healthy boys & one more baby on the way, made some amazing new friends because of my boys, and been surrounded by my friends and family through a lot!

To ring in the new year Cookie and I stayed home and enjoyed each other company. We worked on getting the soup ready for New Years Day and Cookie enjoyed some very large king crab legs that I surprised him with. I would say it was a perfect way to bring in what I am sure is going to be a wonderful new decade full of greatness!

Merry Christmas!!!

Finally, the morning we had been talking up had arrived! I think this was the first year I actually realized how much work and effort my parents put into making Christmas amazing and I was hoping that Cookie & I were able to do the same for Elijah and Samuel. Well, I think we came pretty close! Elijah's favorite gift was Spike the dinosaur & sadly Samuel hates him and cries whenever he is on but I am sure they will become friends soon. Samuel loved his vacuum and has been cleaning since opening it. Another big hit was the sleds that Uncle Jay got them and now everyone even me is hoping for some snow to test them out. It was an amazing day for the boys and I can not wait till next year when there will be one for Popotte kid opening gifts!

Visit with Santa!

Since there are only a few days until the big guy, Santa arrives we decided to head down to visit him at The Bass Pro Shop. What are great choice to go there it was perfect, hardly a wait, plenty for the boys to look at & do, and a restaurant for us to eat at when it was all done. Elijah was very excited to visit him and tell him his wish list; bike, splaster, and a remote control dinosaur. Elijah has held strong to his list of three things so I hope Santa listens and brings them!

While we waited to sit on Santa's lap Elijah & Samuel wrote letters to him and colored some pictures. Once it was our turn Elijah rattled off his list and Samuel's and then was not in the mood for pictures at all but I did snap a few....take a look!

Kids, Cookies, & Craziness!!!

Today was hopefully our 1st annual Christmas Cookie play date! Elijah, Samuel, & I had a few of our friends over to make and decorate cookies in hopes of having some fun, catching a few photos, and getting in the spirit. It worked we had a blast!!!! All together there were four moms (Kimberly, Keri, Tanya, & myself) and nine children (Emma, Ethan, Colin, Landon, Ashton, Lucy, Jack, Elijah, and Samuel). It was so much fun, the kids had blast and were much better than I thought they would be. Emma and Lucy became instant girlfriends, Elijah and Landon thought tools and dinosaurs were great for decorating cookies, Jack climbed on top of the table and stole some cookies, and Samuel was happy to get his hands on whatever sweet he can!

I hope we can do this again next year and maybe even a few more of our friends can join us!

Five on Friday....

Here is the early morning edition of Five on Friday since Elijah decided to start his day at 5:15am because according to him he is just "way too excited about the holidays to sleep" this is after finally getting him to bed at 10:48pm last night. Anyways moving on to the five on Friday.............

1. I can not believe that Christmas is only a week away which mean that there is only two weeks left in 2009 and even more excitingly 3 weeks till my birthday!!!!!!!!!!!

2. Today is Cookie's last day of work before he is on vacation till the New Year. Yup you read it correct we are going to have him home with us for two weeks straight for the most part I think this will be good but then on the other hand him being home always screws with my schedule. On a positive note it will give me the chance to get some much needed lunch and dinner dates in with some fantastic ladies!

3. I have class this weekend which I am very excited about but who the hell did the schedule and made it so we had class the weekend before Thanksgiving and Christmas, my guess is it was a person who does not host Thanksgiving or leaves all their wrapping and even some shopping to the last minute like myself.

4. We are having a cookie playdate this morning and I am hopeful that is goes smoothly and the kids have a great time and actually want to decorate the cookies. It would be a big bust if they had no desire, fingers crossed it goes off without a hitch and it becomes an annual tradition.

5. Elijah has added a few more things to his list this week just as my mother had predicted and they are, a watch, lobster, ice skates for hockey, legos, remote control helicoptor for him and day, and most importantly a wife. Sadly Santa has closed the workshop and he will not be getting any of those additions but good thing his birthday is only 6 weeks later!

Well there is it another five on Friday on what is a freezing morning with no hopes of getting warmer today! I hope everyone has a fantastic week of holiday happiness!!!

Christmas Cards....

Christmas cards make me say BAHUMMM BUGGGG!!!! I tried and tried and tried to get a decent picture of my two beautiful boys and nothing. For days I tried to get the "perfect" picture of the two of them to send to friends and family for the holiday season and nothing except everyday I went to the mail box and pulled out yet another perfect holiday card of someone else's children. I had reached my last straw and today was the deadline to get the pictures I was searching for so I enlisted the help of.....Uncle Jay! Together we tied the boys up in Christmas lights and shut all the house lights off....I just knew this was it & it was going to work! YEAH RIGHT....complete bust nothing first I had my camera on the wrong setting, then they would not stand still, then the wanted to run like crazy people with the lights. For over a half hour we tried to get something but as you may have guessed we did not except for a headache and two over stimulated boys.







I did however meet my deadline and order cards with pictures I already had....Happy Holidays!!!

'O Christmas Tree!!!!!

We finally got around to getting our tree on Friday night which for all who are not local would have been the coldest night of the season so far. Cookie was home on the earlier side so once the boys got up from nap we bundled them up in their snow coats, hats, & gloves and ventured off to Lambert to get our annual Christmas tree. After the short drive across two looking at the lights Elijah was more than excited to get his Christmas tree, so we strapped Samuel into the stroller and away we went. Elijah and Samuel were so surprised at all the trees and Elijah commented more than once how hard it was to pick out a tree. This statement was very strange to me since I had no intentions of letting him picking out the tree, that's my job! While this year I let go a little more of my control and let Elijah pick out the tree. He has told us he picked out the perfect Christmas tree and it looks just like a dragon, I personally do not think it looks like a dragon at all but who am I.

After picking out the tree it was a bit down hill from there suddenly my child who only eats to survive was STARVING and then suddenly freezing to death!!! I brought him & Samuel back to the van but could not get him in fast enough because now he was complaining that he could not feel his fingers and his tears were burning his face and turning to ice!!! I have no idea where in God's name he gets his drama from but it makes me laugh! Finally, after what seemed like forever Cookie was back and we were headed home. We brought the tree up and successfully got it into the stand straight on the second try and without snapping at each other I was so proud of us.

Elijah was anxious to decorate but I explained that we would do it tomorrow and that the tree needed time to warm up before I could put the lights on it. Well, 5 am this morning Elijah was wide awake and ready to decorate the tree! Later, much later as in after nap we did decorate the tree where again I had to let go of my control and let him put this ornaments where he wanted. I love pulling out the ornaments every year and thinking about the friends and family that gave them to us at different milestones in our lives it makes me smile and even sometimes cry. We finished the tree with topping it with our new star that Elijah had the honor of placing and even though it was not exactly straight and the tree was not decorated exactly how I would have wanted I left it as is and took a minute to think about how lucky I am to have Cookie and our awesome boys to share this with!!!!

Maybe the I am getting a little bit of the holiday spirit in me!

Five on Friday!!!

FIVE ON FRIDAY!!!!

1. This week two people I know lost someone very close to them and it has really hit home. One of them lost her mother after years of illness and the other lost their husband who was only 35 years old to a sudden heart attack. I can not imagine how you deal with either one of these losses, it makes my heart physically ache and me cry thinking of the emptiness that they must be feeling. What it has made me do is be much nicer to Cookie and appreciate my mom a little bit more if that is even possible!

2. We really need to get our house decorated for Christmas we have nothing up except Buddy our Elf. I just can not seem to get the spirt so if anyone wants to come over and decorate feel free to come on by!

3. Speaking on Christmas I am excited to say I was able to get Spike the dinosaur half off and he will be under the tree Christmas morning. I hope Elijah loves him and that the new baby is not scared to death of him.

4. Baby #3 has been moving like crazy and is now often waking me in the middle of the night because if it, I hope this does not mean he/she is going to be a night owl.

5. I need to get focused and get a decent photo for our Christmas card and send them out next week (I hope). See I told you I have no Christmas spirt I hope it shows up soon!!!

24

I can not even believe it as I type it....we are 24 weeks along already with baby #3!!! I had a level two ultrasound today which would of been my sixth ultrasound of this pregnancy and more than I had with the boys combined. Finally, we got a clean bill of health & the baby looks perfect! I love it when anyone calls my kids perfect even if they are still in utero. I had a very tempting moment at my ultrasound to find out the gender of the baby I actually had to look away because the tech had to type it on the report which shows on the scream. I am proud to say I resisted but I did however count her key strokes which was 9 which is too long for boy, girl, female, or male. The 9 key strokes really confused me and I told her that and she smartly reminded me she could just tell me I didn't need to crack a code....but nope we won't be finding out until the Spring! Speaking of when the baby is due (April 1st) I noticed that the following weekend is Easter so with my luck I will end up in the hospital over Easter weekend and miss the boys, their baskets and egg hunt. So again I am faced with let nature take it's course and see when the baby wants to be born or schedule a date to work around the holiday.....I think I will be gambling and seeing if things might happen on their own!

A few other baby #3 updates, I still have awful heartburn, have a giant belly and look like I should deliver tomorrow, I am measuring 3 weeks ahead of schedule, crave cranberry juice, baked goods, and peanut m&m!!!!

Also we still have no name for baby #3 so please feel free to make any and all suggestions we are open to anything!

Back in the Saddle.....

Here I am back to blogging, I often wonder how I stop and fall off track because I have so much stuff to share and hundreds of blogs already written in my head but just have not found the time to sit down and share. So I promised myself and a few others that this week I would blog at least 2-3 times and since it is already Wednesday I figured I should really get on it!

A brief recap of the past few weeks...

We were very lucky to spend Thanksgiving with my parents and sister Kiki it was a blast to have them here but I often felt that something was missing & it was, Shannon and her family were not able to make it and therefore left a bit of an emptiness for me. The boys had a wonderful time with Grammie, Papa, & Kiki and were sad for days after they left! Elijah asked me what he did wrong to make everyone he loves live so far away, try answering that question to a almost 4 year old.

While the family was here I had another ultrasound for Baby #3 because it has not been so cooperative in it's position and we have not been able to get all of the vital info we need but this meant my sister and mom were both able to get a sneak peak at the baby. I was so excited to share this with them and let them hear the amazing sound of a baby's heartbeat and watch it wave and yawn from inside of me! Sadly, we were still not able to get all that we needed in the ultrasound so next step is a level 2 to make sure all is good! Also if we wanted to know the gender we could not even find out because baby is tight legged and crossed at the ankle no peaking for us!!!!

We are now in the midst of getting ready for Christmas and Buddy Santa's scout elf has come to stay with us and keep an eye on the boys and report back to the big guy. Elijah is very excited about Christmas and has kept his list very short:
*Bike
*Splaster
*Spike the Dinosaur
This child is 100% confident that all three of these things are going to be under the tree Christmas morning, this I struggle with because Spike the Dinosaur cost $129 & is really noisy. I have this awful feeling I am going to cave in and purchase the dinosaur after all who needs groceries the week of Christmas anyways!

Five on Friday!

1. Cookie is off in LA visiting Elijah's Godfather Bill and Dave is meeting them out there tonight, he won't be back till late Monday night and strangely I miss him already!

2. Elijah has been working on the skill of drinking out of a cup without a lid or straw so the other night he commented on his own milk mustache and then informed everyone at the table the he was a "man"....I almost spit milk out my own nose.

3. I started my Teaching Literacy class last weekend and I was please to find out that my boys are right where they should be or even ahead when it comes to literacy.

4. My parents & Grandpa arrive tomorrow, Kiki comes on Monday night, and it makes me very sad that The Kepperling family will not be joining us for Thanksgiving....it is never the same when a Kelly Kid is missing.

5. We have reached 21 in our pregancy, I am feeling great and tons of movement from the baby. We have a repeat ultrasound on Tuesday and I am so tempted to find the sex out since Cookie and I have not come anywhere near a name decision.

An Afternoon Ride...

This year for Cookie's birthday the boys and I got him a bike seat that he has been wanting since we had Elijah and since baby #3 will be here before we know it I figured it was time to get it. The intention is for Samuel to ride in it and Elijah to ride along side on his own bike that I think Santa might be leaving under the tree but Elijah had to try it out first to make sure it was safe for his little brother. The first ride out was a blast, father and son had a fantastic time but Elijah is very concerned that Cookie did not wear his helmet and so am I. I keep telling my husband it is all in the examples that we show!

My Favorite Superhero!!!!

We knew at 33 I would fall in love with a superhero!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY PAPA!!!!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY PAPA!!!!!!

Today is the day the world's most original Papa was brought into this world! I am so happy to say that my boys have the best papa in the world and when it comes to his children and grandchildren there is nothing he would not do. This amazes me at times considering he is an only child and never really had to give anything up for anyone else. I want to take the chance to thank my father for a few gifts he has given me in life that he may not even know about, thank you for giving me the gift of gab that I have, my love for travel, my appreciation of music, and my guilty love of ice cream and little Debbie snacks! Thank you for introducing me boys to matchbox cars and always having a new one for them when you seen them, thank you for giving Elijah his first fishing experience, and thank you for getting down and playing with them even after you have worked hard all day. Daddy, overall thank you for being you and as much as we pick on you and jab you about certain things we love you for who you are and the entertainment and great stories you bring to our family!!!!

We love you Papa, Happy Birthday!!!!

FoF

I am not really sure where the week has gone and I have not blogged about anything so here at the very least is Five on Friday!

1. We had our "big" ultrasound on Monday which was very exciting because finally Cookie was able to see the baby. Although baby #3 was being lazy and did not move very much and we were not able to get all the measurement we needed so we have to have a follow up in two weeks. A plus to the follow up is Grammie and Kiki will be here and get to go!

2. We are officially half way through our third pregnancy! I can not believe that we are already at this point and how different life is about to become in the Popotte house.

3. Elijah thinks we should name the baby, Spiderman Baby. This is top of our name selection so if you have suggestions please feel free to offer them.

4. We had a wonderful time celebrating Cookie's birthday last week with a nice family dinner out, some yummy cake, and we surprised him with a seat for his bike to ride around with Samuel. I think and hope he enjoyed his 35th birthday!

5. I start a new class this weekend which is on literacy and I am so excited about it!!! I can not wait to learn how to actually teach children to read, I am so happy I went back to school!!!

OK well time to do the afternoon clean up and get ready for the weekend!!

Five on Friday

1. HAPPY BIRTHDAY COOKIE!!!!!!! My darling husband's birthday is today and we are so excited to celebrate him!

2. Elijah thinks that everyone should have a bounce house on thier birthday is is very upset that we did not order one for Cookie.

3. On Wednesday November 4th it has been 9 years since our friend Matt passed away, I can not believe how much time has passed and how much things have changed. What I find even more unbelievable is how his mother gets out of bed everday and functions, Joan Hunt is truely one of the most amazing women I know & I am very proud to call her my friend!!!!

4. We were exposed to the H1N1 this week and so far so good everyone is still healthy, I am praying we stay thay way PLEASE!!!!

5. Week 19 in the pregnancy & I can not believe it. We have our "big" ultrasound on Monday morning I will be breath and rest a little easier once we see a healthy baby! Oh and side note I can not get it out of my head that it's a girl, why???

Family Pictures

Sunday we were lucky enough to have some family pictures taken with the sweetest woman, Molly! My girlfriend Carla had used here a few months ago and we were lucky enough that she had a cancellation this past weekend and was able to fit us in. We had a lot of fun but Samuel was not in the best of moods with the time change and he bumped his head after only about ten minutes of being there but I think we will get a few out of it. We are going to try again in the spring after the baby arrives, I am already looking forward to it!

Trick or Treat!

The excitement that was in the air the days leading up to Halloween would have made you think that it was Christmas. I am happy to report that the boys love Halloween as much as I do & that Cookie has also learned to love it too!!! We had a busy day carving pumpkins and playing outside in the nice fall weather and then after nap time we headed out to trick or treat the neighborhood with Elijah & Samuel's friends Ava & Micheal. It was so much fun to walk around with Carla and Anthony and share the holiday with good friends, I think I might be getting corny as I get older and have more kids! Here are a few pictures of the evening, ENJOY!!!!

FoF

Friday it is so here is my list....

1. I LOVE Halloween, always have & I thank my parents for that. Every year we could be whatever we wanted, we trick or treated for what seemed like hours, and then back to our house for a neighborhood Halloween party.....it was awesome & I hope the boys grow up to love it as much as I do!

2. I am still getting use to Samuel's new hair. Most mornings when I go in to get him I still pause and look at him & think I really do miss his afro.

3. My baby belly is really starting to get bigger and bigger. The baby is moving alot these days & I can not believe that I am already 18 weeks and almost half way there.

4. I think I am the only mom I know that did not enter her kids into the Gap photo contest.

5. It was fourteen years ago this week (26th) that Cookie and I had our first date. I wish we had a babysitter that lived close so we could have had a moment out for a decent meal to reflect and enjoy eachother, I miss going on dates with my husband!

Mommy confessions

I have a few mommy confessions I need to get off my chest! Some of them seem to be on going and some have only happened once. Prior to becoming a mother I thought this job would be a piece of cake, I knew there would be some hard days but what I did not realize is there would be so many challenging days. So here is my list:
~My house house is never clean, no matter how hard I try I can never get it to stay clean!
~Elijah has a fresh streak in him that truel only comes out on me and I often feel responsible for it because I did not address it sooner!
~I am very nervous that baby #3 is going to be a girl and not going to be as beautiful as the boys, yes I think my boys are beautiful!
~Samuel and his climbing drive me crazy and I often put him in his chair and offer him a snack just to be able use the bathroom!
~Some days I am jealous that Cookie gets to go to work!
~Sometimes I use homework as an excuse to get out of the house to have some quiet time and a soup at Panera Bread!
~I long for the day we live near family that wants to be a part of the boys life and actually give us a helping hand!
~I find that I am sometime jealous of moms who do have family that can and will help them with no strings attached. It is REALLY hard to do this without any help, somedays
~Hardly ever do I sit an eat a meal I just seem to serve the entire time and that is getting old really quick.
~My boys survive on chicken nuggets, bagels, and Annie's Mac & Cheese!

I know that none of these things make me a bad mom but if I could fix just a few maybe I would be a slightly better mom for my boys!!!!!

Fall Frolics....

In an effort to get the boys out and burn off some of their endless energy Uncle Jay was kind enough to build us a giant leaf pile! I was so excited to take them out and see what they did with it and how they liked it. Elijah loved it and could not get enough and did not want the fun to end when the rain started to fall. Samuel on the other hand kept a distance, ventured into the pile once & discovered he hated it and never returned. I wonder will he like the life pile more next year & how much bigger does the leaf pile need to be for three kids???

THAT IS MY HAT!!!

Today while getting ready to go outside I was putting the boys coats and hats on, simply enough right???? Yeah well then I put the hat the Michelle made Elijah when he was a baby on Samuel and all hell broke out. Elijah instantly ripped the hat off his brother's head and put it on his own and FIRMLY informed Samuel that it was his hat not Sammy's! I never knew he had such a strong attachment but who could blame him it is beautiful and cashmere, he is so my son!!! I wonder if maybe over Christmas vacation on her lack of free time if Auntie Michelle might make Samuel a special winter hat too?????