The night before...

It was a year ago tonight that
I couldn't sleep.
I couldn't rest.
I couldn't be calm.
I couldn't relax.
All I could think about was "Is this really going to happen on Halloween?!" It was a long night of paceing the hall and doing squats - literally! I remember thinking "should I wake Gordon? No, it's not time yet." So being the loving wife that I am, I let my husband sleep away the night all snug and warm in our bed, while I sweat out the night just waiting for the inevitable to happen - LABOR!
Claire's due date was just days away and I knew it could happen anytime now. I kept replaying the day in my mind...you see I was a little sick that day because I got a little - okay A LOT - carried away with eating some popcorn. In fact, I ate so much popcorn that it made me sick and I was throwing up popcorn the entire day before Claire was actually born. There was just not enough room in my belly for an entire tub of popcorn and a baby! So something had to go...thankfully the popcorn went first!!! YUCK! Then sometime around 5am the following morning on the First of November, my little Claire Abigail was born. Healthy. Beautiful.
And saturated in butter!

Claire is ONE tomorrow. Happy early Birthday baby!

Preschool Halloween Party!

Make a Smilebox slideshow

Pumpkins in the patch

Here are my little pumpkins at the pumpkin patch! Aren't they cute?!?!?!

We went to the pumpkin patch with our preschool class and we had so much fun running around and playing in the straw - well, Claire mostly ate the straw, but we still had fun!!!!

CURVES

I JOINED CURVES!!!!!!! I don't know how anyone else feels, but I am so tired of not seeing the pounds drop off after baby number 2! I watch what I eat (except for the occasional ice cream night!) and I try really hard to at least walk every day - but I am not loosing weight and I am so done! I joined Curves on Monday night and had my first work out!!! A real one!! Not just walking around the park or chasing kids up and down stairs or lifting kids into the car seat or highchair...I'm talkin' a real sweat dropin', muscle burning, body acheing kind of work out! I loved it! I went again for day 2 last night and worked it even harder! I can't wait to see results and watch those baby pounds and maybe a little extra shed off! GO ME!

WS Bon Fire

Every year our sister-n-laws family hosts a BonFire at her parent's house. We always get invited to join the festivities and we missed the last year because I was ready to pop with Claire! But we didn't want to miss out on the fun this year! We arrived around 5pm and the bon fire was up and roaring! We roasted hot dogs and marshmellows and stuffed ourselves with KrispyCreme halloween doughnuts! Then the highlight for the kids is the hay ride that "PA" takes them on. The kids got these adorable little lanterns that lit up so they could see in the dark! We had an awesome night and the hay ride really was the best ever! Thanks A and L for a great kick off to Halloween!!!!

International Dinner Night

A couple months ago we had an International Dinner Night with some friends and we had so much fun and the food was so good that we decided to have a REAL international dinner night!! Not that the one we had before wasn't 'real', but it was with our local friends and we each made something from a different country. Well the one we had Friday night was AUTHENTIC! Gordon's work is a global company and he has the opportunity to work with people that are living in America, but actually from different countries! We invited about 4 of his co-workers with their spouses to come over and have dinner. We were each making something to represent our native country.

There was Aurelien - the HILLARIOUS French man - and his wife Rita. They made a homemade vinegrette, ham and poached egg salad with this crispy french bread- to die for! And they also made a dessert cake roll with raspberry filling. I loved this guy, because when he got to the house he jumped right in the kitchen and went to work. He put on his little apron that he brought from home and he started cooking and doing all these elaborate things in my kitchen! He was funny and he talked with the BEST french accent ever!

There was Vince - the former-college football player with Hungarian ancestry - and his wife and their new born son Lorenzo. They made the most delicious chicken dumplings in broth that I have ever tasted! They also brought homemade mozarella cheese slices as an appetizer. The cheese was so soft and melted in your mouth - it was to die for!

There was Bruno - from Belgium - no he didn't make waffles, but he did bring a Kiesh with pecans, a rich, chocolate mousse, a tapioca pudding with real brown sugar, and they brought a box of Belgian Assorted Chocolates. I have never tasted such yummy chocolates in my life! His wife and their two kids Louise and Max were so adorable! Their kids are exactly the same age as Evelyn and Claire so we'll be getting together in the future to play for sure!

There was Greg - he made our mouths water with homemade Italian pizza dough and pizzas! I ate way too many slices of his pizza! He brought his two girls, Clara and Sara-Jane and his wife showed up in time for dessert.

Then there was my little American dish - I made a Pampered Chef recipe called Chicken Broccoli Braid. It was good, but did not compare to the other dishes at all!!! (Gordon doesn't agree)

Everything was so delicious and the company was the best. Everyone was so nice and they brought me flowers to thank us for hosting. It was such a wonderful evening!! The little people were up late (like 10:00pm) and the crowd left around 11pm. We can't wait to do something like this again!!!!!!!!!

Funny story about the picture of my drawers below....At work, the boys are constantly coming up with practical jokes to play on each other and Gordon seems to be the brunt of the jokes most of the time. He'll get his desk moved around, his computer screen flipped upside down, his password reset without knowing - they even go so far to take car keys and move the persons car from it's parking spot to a different one so when the person leaves for the day they can't find their car - too funny! Anyways, the boys left their mark in my kitchen. They switched drawers on me!!! The next day, I went to get something in my plastics drawer which is noramally on the right and I looked in and was like what? Then I realized what had happened and I laughed out loud!! I love that Gordon works with such warm and happy people that make me laugh!!

Cute Claire

She loves to suck on the wet wash cloth that I use to clean her up after a meal. Don't worry - it's always a clean one!!

ICE CREAM CONE

SOOOO excited to get her ice cream!!!

Evelyn has had the traditional BOWL of ice cream, but we have never givin her a cone before and when we finally did - she LOVED the idea of putting her ice cream in a tasty cone. It was hillarious watching her lick her ice cream cone makeing a mess of herself! Why did we wait so long before giving her a cone?? It's how we'll always give her ice cream from now on - just because it's so funny to watch!

Baltimore with the Bros

BOY TRIP!!!!

The Air and Space museum

Yes - the above plane is actually a Decepticon from Transformers!! HA!

Oriole Park at Camden Yards

Every year Gordon, his dad and his brothers take a trip up to Maryland to catch an Orieol Baseball game. Two of Gordon's brothers were unable to attend this year, but they still had just as much fun. The boys always do a museum visit before the game night so this year they went to the new Air and Space Museum...this is the same museum that had an appearance in the new Transformer movie. After a fun filled day of looking at old planes and jets and space shuttles, the boys headed off to the game. Gordon had a lot of fun and really enjoys getting away for a couple of nights with his brothers.

Field Trip

Last week, we took the kids to the local Fire Station to take a tour and of course the favorite part was getting to see the big, red Fire Engine!!! They loved it! They got to climb inside and sit in the drivers seat and sit on the front of the truck - it was great!! The fire men even let the kids try on their huge and heavy fire coats!! It was a great field trip and the kids learned a little more about fire safety!!