last weekend:

typical friday evening at brooklyn's...

i love the expression on my mom's face here: "help!"

a grandma moment

heather's "baby" turned 1! little miss lauren is growing so fast! feels like just yesterday we went to the hospital to meet her for the first time...

i think natalie was staring at the cupcakes.

they were so beautiful, you almost didn't want to eat them...almost ;)

another trip to the beach --

i think just about everyone in jacksonville thought it was a good day for the beach last sunday, because it was ridiculously crowded.

and ridiculously windy too!

this boy loves his watermelon!

following grandpa to the water

natalie wanted to be buried in the sand:

she sat like this for quite some time. i would have been dying of claustrophobia!

fishin'

russ has been taking the kids fishing in the back yard lately. when he was younger, russ was pretty big into fishing. he would fish all the time and even had a boat. when i was dating russ and heard that he enjoyed fishing, i thought it was the weirdest thing. it's just not something that my family ever did, let alone something i imagined myself doing. for some reason i thought it was a southern thing, but of course i was wrong and can laugh about that today. but fishing was definitely in his blood, so now he enjoys passing it down to the kids. they love it. and i'm so glad they aren't afraid to touch those slimy [disgusting] fish, like i am!

they caught one!

an important message

to all my "blog" readers who only read the notification e-mails (instead of going on the blog itself), do you know that you're missing out on other updates?

please click on this link to see (because i know you will be reading this message via e-mail, haha):

http://calascione.blogspot.com/

comments welcomed :)

thanks!

and thank you for being loyal readers!

love you guys

our trip to the MOSH

The Museum of Science and History, that is.

a new exhibit all about the human body

this was the entrance, through a mouth:

not quite looking like a turtle...

this one's better:

natalie said that this is where the princess sings out the window:

a lot of the facts in this museum go way over their head, so when i saw this carousel horse, i asked natalie if she wanted to take a picture of it to get her excited about something:

bon voyage!

yay a picture with me in it! thanks natalie:

posing under the baby whale's tale:

outside the museum, on the river:

walking to the car, i called out to russell to turn around so i could take a picture because it just hit me how big he's gotten!

finally -- THE ROOM

i said i would post some pics of the kids' "new" room when we first got the bunkbeds, and i finally remembered to take some last week!

view from the door:

natalie's nook:



russell's area:

the view from their windown

the garden we planted -- sunflowers, green onions, tomatoes, cucumbers and something else i can't remember...

broken pizza

for the longest time, that's how natalie would pronounce, BROOKLYN pizza, our friday night family spot. i think she might say it correctly now but we certainly got a kick out of hearing her say it the wrong way. i never wanted to correct her :)

a few other things about natalie:

she pronounces "regular" regleeur -- no matter how many times i tried to correct her and get her to say it right, she just couldn't. so i decided to let it go for now. if you ever hear her say it, you just might think it's the cutest thing ever. i know i do.

when she smells something in the air (for example, brownies cooking in the oven) she says: "I smell like [brownies]"

she has been making up songs to sing for no reason, just to sing a song about whatever she is doing in particular, or whatever is on her mind.

at the park with the cousins

big cousins shelby and cheryl spent the night at nana & papa's house (across the street) a few days ago and we all took a trip to the park together.

russell being shy:

russ flying the kite.

it took awhile but he finally got it up in the air, higher than i expected!

last night natalie really wanted us to read her favorite snow white book at bedtime, but it is a really long book and it was really late, past their bedtime. so i told her that if she reminded me tomorrow, i would read it to her before she went to school.

so morning time comes and i am awoken by natalie calling out "mom!" from her bed. she eventually gave up the yelling and climbed into bed with us. the first thing she said to me is "here mommy" as she threw her snow white book into my half asleep face. (thanks natalie). she must have been dreaming about it all night.

hello out there!

just wondering if anybody is still listening...

i've been feeling a little stressed lately between russ's new business and trying to manage our expenses, but russ always reminds me that there is a light at the end of the tunnel, and i'm doing my best to maintain a sense of hope.

i know i haven't been on here lately but i just wanted to break the ice and finally get something written since it's been so long!

today was pretty much an ordinary day which ended a little chaotic, as it always does when russ gets the kids hyped up RIGHT before bed time. that's what daddy's are for though, right? so after he hyped the kids up from playing hide and seek, he bathed them (thanks hon!) and left to meet up with the guys for bible study. i had two wound up munchkins who were only interested in running around and making each other laugh. not that i'm against laughing or anything (contrary to some people's beliefs) but it was time to settle down and get calm so that the kids could get into "sleep" mode. well, that wasn't exactly what happened and the kids ending up losing a few privileges tonight. they are finally sound asleep and i'm about to start my workout, then sit down at the computer to work (thank the lord i finally have some--it's been so slow lately), but before i did i felt the need to document some of these feelings on my blog. particularly, the highlight of my day, which was when natalie and i played chutes and ladders this afternoon. we were honored to have snow white, herself, play with us (natalie's doll, of course) and guess who won [the longest game in the history of long kids' games] -- none other than snow white! natalie was delighted and, for me, it was a delight to watch. i love my kids.

happy monday everyone :)