New Year's Eve

In a stunning, unprecedented display of sociability, the Aho's hosted a New Year's Eve Party!! I'm embarassed to admit that, in our nearly 13 years of marriage, we have celebrated New Year's Eve only ONCE... in 1999, to mark the millenium. And even then, we were home by 10 pm. Given that it's the start of a new decade, we decided to throw our hermitoid tendencies to the wind and have a New Year's Pinochle Party!!! (I know, I know... for all you die-hard revelers out there...BUT, we're not spring chickens any more, and we had 14 children under the age of 7 in attendance, so... pinochle it was ;)). We had a fabulous time with 3 other couples, while the children vegged in front of an endless supply of movies in the basement. At the stroke of midnight, we watched the ball drop via internet, then banged pots and pans and toasted with champagne. If you're wondering about the rifle Rob is toting... that was used as a midnight noise-maker, and not as a reaction to a bad play by his pinochle partner.

  

An Actual Fun Day

Our stragery worked, and we had a much funner, less stress-filled day today.  Yesterday, Rob likened entering the waterpark to landing on the beach at Normandy.  Today, we hit the park as soon as it opened at 9am, stayed for a few hours, left for naps and lunch, hit the outlet mall, then returned at night.  Off peak hours = much less busy = much more fun.  Still difficult keeping tabs of kids, but I am proud to say that no one got lost this time around.  And no one nearly drowned.  There was an indoor playground as well that was amazing, and all three kids played so hard they were red in the face.  You'd think after all this gross motor they'd be exhausted and crashed, but... no.  It's 10 pm, and all three are still wide awake.  Oh well.  We're hoping they all fall asleep and we have a quiet ride home tomorrow!  Poor grandma LaVerne has had a headache since entering the minivan yesterday afternoon and is NOT having even the remotest bit of fun.  We're hoping she feels at least a bit better tomorrow, so she can handle the ride home.

Disclaimer:  If there is a disportionate amount of pictures of Reagan as compared to her brothers, it's because she was the only one moving slow enough for me to photograph.  The boys were whirs of frenetic, dripping energy.  That doesn't photograph well. 

Vacation

Holy Overstimulation Batman.

No pictures, because if I slacked for even a second, someone would've drowned or gotten lost, but... we are at the Country's Largest Indoor Waterpark.  Google it.  We got an awesome rate on the "Jacuzzi Suite" at a hotel that also got us free waterpark passes.  Only problem is, approximately 96 zillion other people had the same idea for Christmas Break.  Within 30 minutes of arriving, we had already lost Reagan once, and each boy had been "rescued" from near drowning.  Actually, the same man "rescued" both boys in succession, and was really irritated with me, because he thought that he rescued the same boy TWICE, and that the boy just had a careless mother that let him get too deep in the wave pool immediately after he had brought him shallow.  I actually really appreciated his help, because I had Reagan on my hip, and the boys were going deeper and deeper amongst the crowds in a wave pool that was WAY too vigorous for small children.  Rob was gone at the time, getting his swimsuit, so I had solo duty for about an hour or so.  I don't recommend that AT ALL.  I don't know HOW there aren't daily drownings in that place.  The waves go for about 10 minutes or so, during which time there is NO WAY a lifeguard could rescue anyone.  Really, all they could do is look for floaters afterwards. 

We're going to have a definitive strategy for tomorrow's ALL DAY venture back to the waterpark.  We need to determine offpeak hours, zone defense for child herding... you know.  A PLAN.

Vacationing with small kids is hard work!

Boxing Day

Can you tell I'm in to video lately?  I make a book from this blog, so don't know that the video's going to translate well into THAT medium, but I love being able to take snippets of our lives and see them moving in real time.  ANYHOO..... the day after Christmas, I took the boys ice skating, as Grandma LaVerne and Grandpa Al had gotten them iceskates.  We have a local rink that's nice and handy!  The boys did great - I think they're getting the hang of the gliding thing.  It's that STOPPING that seems so hard!

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Santa was good to the Aho clan this year.  The boys were so excited, they woke up at 12:45 am. Yes.  A.M.  They crawled in to bed with me, and I played the "wicked mother" card, forcing them to stay there until 6 am.  It took two hours  for them to fall back to sleep.  It's tough when the Christmas tree is right outside my bedroom door.  All that magical "Santa was here", and they have to SLEEP????  UGH.

Once the day actually started, we had a really lovely time with family, and enjoyed the snow with some high-speed sledding.  Those boys got to test out their new snow tubes, snow coats, snow hats, snow gloves, and bike helmets - all in one fell swoop :).  Here's some snippets from the day.....



Christmas Eve

A Christmas Pageant

The kids have been practicing really hard for the big Christmas pageant at church.  Quinn was the Serpent from the Garden of Eden, and Colby was John the Baptist.  They did such a good job. I should've let Colby know that the mic was "live" even BEFORE his lines started - he was making some funky noises with it while waiting for his "cue", but... well... it is what it is :).   I was so proud of those little men!  There was a quick costume change, and Lo and Behold, two shepherds appeared as well.  Just a beautiful night.  I apologize for my shaky video.  I'm not a videographer to begin with, and when I'm laughing at the same time, or trying to wave at Colby to tell him to give the mic to the next kid, it all just falls apart. 

Christmas Concert

Annual Christmas concert tonight.  There was a modicum of singing and clapping this year... each year a little better!  Quinn had his nose in a script the majority of the time.  Still, awfully cute seeing those little kids singing up there!!  And I was really proud of the boys sticking with it, given their LOOOONGGG day today... we left the house at 9:15 this morning, and got home after 7 pm.  Good job, little men!  Oh, and if you look closely, you can see Rob's ingenuity in doing Reagan's hair... that's a zip tie holding her left pig tail.  Such an engineer!

 

Evenings I Want to Remember....

...the children dancing around the living room to Christmas music, as we do our Advent wreath and read from our Advent Calendar. I want to remember Reagan as a ballerina, and Colby listening intently to "The Little Drummer Boy".  I want to remember Quinn reading about the magi bringing gifts to the baby Jesus.  Whenever I am overwhelmed as a mother, wallowing in a messy house, plowed under by responsibility, frustrated by misbehaving children... I want to pull out THESE memories.  Because they make me smile, and it makes every last second of being a parent worth it. 

A Visit With Santa

The kids met up with the big guy in red today.  Reagan was not a fan, and even the boys were a little shy.  Santa had to ask them to repeat themselves SEVERAL times.  Apparently, Quinn and Colby now want completely different things than what they wrote in their LETTERS to Santa (which we haven't mailed yet, they were so helpful to remind me).  Santa was a little confused when both boys asked for a Wii and a DS.  In fact, I think his actual words were "There's still a family that doesn't have a Wii????"  Yes.  That would be us.  Maybe you've heard rumors of our existence.  We're Wii-less.  And surviving surprisingly well, even if the boys don't believe it. 

Grandma Aho joined us for cookie decorating and craft-fairing as well.  It was a fun (crazy!) time!