Christmas 2010

A couple days before Christmas it snowed a lot of wet snow. It was perfect for building a snow man. This is Aaron's first ever snow man. He loved it!

A rare moment of being cute together just before bed time.

This is Aaron's first year of really getting excited for Christmas. He had so much fun ripping open his packages. In all honesty I don't believe in buying a lot of presents for your kids, so they got some toys from DI and were perfectly happy.

Here's Jordan's present: some sun glasses. He still loves wearing them.

Ironically Aaron's favorite present of the morning was a sucker that he got from one of his little friends for Christmas.

#3 on the way

Just announcing that we're expecting baby Palmieri #3 towards the beginning of August. I was going to wait until I at least went to my OB, but since Paolo posted it on facebook... I'm only 7.7 weeks along, and feeling nauseated. My first pregnancy was worse by far. Merry Christmas!

more sewing projects

This is about my 3rd finished quilt. I tried to show the loopy stitch I did.

I didn't have a great place to take pictures of this blanket. I usually do it on my front fence, but considering everything is covered in snow, I couldn't. I most post a picture in a few weeks when we are no longer snow covered.

It's satisfying to FINALLY be done! Now on to the next one.

Rough Day

So have you ever had a frustatingly hard day? That was me yesterday morning. I'm trying to get ready to go to preschool. Aaron had stripped naked and was running around the house (something we don't usually allow). He was running away from me and laughing. So I locked him in his room in time out and told him he could get out when he was dressed. In the mean time I'm trying to hurry and take a shower. My bathroom was disgusting and I hurried and washed the sink. Then I went down stairs to switch the laundry before showering. Jordan had been playing really well by himself.

I came upstairs and found him like this. The only thing that kept me from flipping is a promise I made to myself to not cry over spilled milk with the kids. So I hurried and took a picture and then quickly undressed Jordan, washed him off and made him drink water before calling poison control just to make sure I didn't need to watch for anything.

They recommended that I give him a bath too. So as I get ready to give Jordan a bath, Aaron calls me from his room stating he is dressed. I open the door and he is still buck naked, and is so excited to show me that he peed in the little potty. He also had pooped all over the floor. How on earth did he do one in the port-a-potty and the other on the floor?

So then while they were bathing I'm trying to clean up Comet, and it wouldn't go away. Sweeping it was like moving it around. I tried to vaccum it. That was a little better, but still all over. So then I had to wash my whole upstairs, plus vaccum the whole upstairs, plus do at least 3 loads of wash because the powder was all over his bed too.

THEN I got to clean up poop. We were really late for preschool and I was exhausted!

Thank heavens most days aren't like that. I also realize that I have so much to be grateful for- that I have two happy, healthy children that still do relatively small damage. That are able to do damage (verses being in a hospital or otherwise handicapped). Now that it's the next day I feel a lot better about everything. So bad days don't last forever.

walking in a winter wonderland

This is Thanksgiving 2010. This is also the first time Aaron has enjoyed playing in the snow without him crying because he's cold or other reasons.

Our trampoline was covered and we tried to remove as much snow as possible.

Paolo hates having his picture taken, let alone me publishing it online. Oh well. He looks better than me in the picture. :)

A visit to the temple grounds to remember what we're most grateful for- an eternal family, an opportunity to know our Savior and to try to become like Him. We fall short a lot, but certainly feel His love as we are trying.

Who cannot resist such a cute face?! Jordan is talking in 3-5 word sentences and will say a prayer. So cute to hear his little voice.

Halloween 2010

We got these spiderman spectacles in a hand-me-down bag. I wouldn't have ever gotten them, but the boys love them! They love to put them on mom and dad and have a good laugh at us. Sorry, no pictures of that one!

When we went trick-or-treating it started to rain at the house next door. I think we hit a total of 6 houses and came home. The boys were happy anyway. Aaron enjoyed giving out the candy to all of the kids more than anything else.

Here they are: Dinosaur (or crocodile, I'm not sure which), and Superman. Aaron calls superman "superpan". It's quite funny to here him yell it at the top of his lungs.

On Saturday we went to Hogle Zoo to trick or treat in the morning. This is Aaron's friend Roberto (who is also Italian speaking). They love to hang out together.

And this was Italian preschool dressing up. The boys loved dressing up this year. Aaron actually understood that he was getting candy in his bag this year and was almost over the edge with excitement. Fortunately he's young enough he didn't even realize his bag of candy disappeared that night.

Sewing projects and My Boys

This is my second quilt that I've finished. This one is for my mom for Christmas. No suprises for my mom is she checks my blogspot. I was just so proud of myself for not screwing it up. It fits a twin sized bed.

Aaron's new drama: going potty. Will it never end?! I can't let him go to the bathroom by himself because this happens about 80% of the time. It's expensive and annoying.

Say cheese! And don't do that again!

Jordan my ever happy child.

This is Aaron at 2 weeks...

And Aaron at almost 3 1/2 years old. What a difference.

The boys hanging out before church.

Jordan is adorable when it comes to saying prayers.

Eating an Onion

I was trying to chop of a bunch of vegetable for a soup I was making. Aaron told me that he wanted to eat the onion. I told him he didn't want to eat it. He kept insisting that he really did want to eat that onion so I told him to go ahead. Then I hurried and grabbed my camera. Enjoy! I had a good laugh.

boys will be boys

These two love to wrestle together (in their own sort of way). It is so fun to see them play and love each other. Although truth be told they are already starting to fight and bicker over toys too. I guess there must be an oposition in all things, right?

Go Jordan!

Funny things your kids do (or gross things): yesterday I was trying to get Aaron dressed (this is not my favorite part about 3 year olds- nothing is ok. If you choose their clothes they have a melt down. If you try to help them they have a melt down. If you don't help them they have a melt down. ) For no reason at all Aaron just looks and me and says "abbraccio mamma" (translation: "hug mommy") and then comes to hug my neck. He threw his arms around my neck and then proceded to wipe his nose in my hair with a nice back and forth cleaning movement. I swear kids think that moms are their own personal nose rags! So much for the anticipated cute moment.

Guess that shape

We made a cake for our neighbor as a birthday joke. It didn't look like the animal it was supposed to. Can you guess what it is? If you guess right, the prize is being the best interpreter of modern art. Answer is at the bottom of the post.

Kids are growing. Aaron started preschool this week. We are still doing Italian preschool too. Here's to hoping this kid will eventually be bilingual.

Jordan repeats EVERYTHING he hears. He says 40-50 words now. It is so fun to listen to his little squeaky voice say things.

We went on the little train at This is the Place State Park with our friend Roberto. The boys loved it!

I can never get these guys to simultaneously look at the camera. The answer is: skunk. It is supposed to be a skunk. Oh well, we can't all be good at cake decorating. :)

Sewing Projects

So I started to sew a little in Italy, and I've recently joined a quilting group to start getting a little better. I made this apron very last minute for a bridal shower for a cousin. My cousin Kim is getting married and the bridal shower theme was "honey-do list". So I whipped this up out of my fabric stash (because I decided to go 2 days before and didn't have time to go to the fabric store).

This is my first quilt from start to finish that I did everything all by myself. I paper pieced the top. I then did free motion quilting to quilt it together, and then sewed on the binding. It was a lot of work for a novice like me. Modesty aside I'm quite proud of myself and I really like this quilt.

Jordan's first haircut

We started out trimming Aaron's hair so that Jordan could see. Then we moved on to Jordan.

Before.

That smile quickly disappeared.

After.

This is our little garden. We've got zucchini and pumpkins up to our ears- or at least up to our kid's ears. Paolo thought it would be fun to take pictures of them in our gargen to show how tall the plants are.

I rarely get a good smile out of him. It's usually forced and with a scrunched up nose.

I love their faces. An expression can be worth a lot of words...

Paolo's comment when he saw this picture: baby squirrel.