Caiden Karate

Caiden started karate at the beginning of the year. He had been asking to go for the past few months and was super excited to start. He's been going almost every day since January 3rd and received his first yellow stripe on Monday, after only nine classes! The things his instructor said about him in front of the entire class brought me to tears. He talked about how he has been working hard each class and not giving up. And how if he keeps working hard he can participate in the belt test in March to receive a black stripe on his white belt. Needless to say he is super excited to keep working and is aiming for that black stripe. He really loves the idea of getting to the next "level". It's so sweet to see your kid work hard at something and succeed...such a proud parent moment!

Christmas 2017

We had another wonderful Christmas back in Nebraska. We had a couple of days before the snow came and the temperature dipped into the single digits for the remainder of the trip.

The chickens are always a hit. The kids were champs at sticking their hands under the chickens and checking for eggs. 

Grace could stare at the dogs all day. She would watch them eat, drink...lick. And every time they would come up and put their nose on the door she would squeal with excitement and thought it was so funny. 

We had a couple of hours after it snowed to play and the kids had a lot of fun. Caiden played outside with my old dump truck for probably an hour after everyone else went inside. He pushed it around the yard, picked up snow and pushed it around to another spot to dump it. And Grace is still talking about making snow angels.

My Dad dressed up as Santa and it just gets more hilarious every year. He tries so hard but seriously I think the kids kind of know. Apparently when he walked in and said, "Ho ho ho, let's go sit by the fire kids." Theo said to himself, "OK, Grandpa!"  And Caiden was just staring at him in the most interesting way most of the time and after he left said, "Grandpa kinda looks like Santa, huh, Mom?"

On Christmas morning Caiden was a champ at reading the name card on the gift and handing it to the correct person.

We made s'mores a couple of nights...they are always a huge hit!

We took the kids to the movie theater for the first time and watched Ferdinand the Bull. Caiden sat in his chair with his ICEE and bag of popcorn and didn't make a single noise the entire time. Grace was a bit more squirmy. She was more concerned with who she was having to share her ICEE with than the movie.

We played lots of shuffle board and tug o' war in the basement.

After a week in Nebraska Marc and I headed to Las Vegas! It was a much needed vacation for both of us. I hadn't been away from the kids longer than a date night here and there since last year when we went to Vegas after Christmas. It's amazing what a couple of kid-free days can do for the soul.

We stayed at the Aria, ate at some of the best restaurants and saw a couple of entertaining shows. Thanks so much to my entire family who took care of the kids while we were gone. It's seriously amazing when you're able to leave the kids and not worry. Love you all!

Holiday Photos 2017

B got so many good shots in the one hour we did this shoot. It was hard to only choose a couple for our holiday card.  Merry Christmas, everyone! 

Here are the additional photos, I think this is the year I'm going to blow a few up. I can't wait to see some new pictures hanging our house...it's about time our engagement photos are stored away..haha.

Thanksgiving 2017

We headed back to Virginia for Thanksgiving again this year. The kids did so great on the 5 hour plane ride across country all thanks to the iPad!

We spent Thanksgiving night at the Bahrami's again.

On Friday we took the kids to the Natural History Museum in DC. Caiden was in a bit of a funk the entire time because he wanted to go to the pool and play air hockey at the community area in Fery & Osi's complex but Grace loved it. Every single thing we went by she had the sound of excitement in her voice saying, "Mommy, look at this!".  EXCEPT, for the dinosaur exhibit. She did not want to go near them and made us hold her and she buried her head in our shirt the entire time.

Friday night we went to Farhad and Jill's house for their annual get together. It's always a great time, complete with fireworks!

On Saturday we went to Great Falls Park, just 15 minutes from Fery and Osi's house. It was our first time going and it was beautiful. There are a number of trails that run along the Potomac River and watching the kayakers on the falls is breathtaking. 

Saturday night we went out to dinner with Sule and Katie to a Brazilian Steakhouse. When we left at 11pm we were all so full of food we had to walk around so we went to the National Mall. We walked from the Washington Monument past the WW II memorial, reflecting pool to the Lincoln Memorial, two-miles round trip. I'd say the midnight stroll was a good choice after that meal.

We stayed super busy the entire time and the kids had fun. The first thing Caiden asked for when he woke up was if he could play air hockey and go to the pool, unfortunately I didn't get any pictures of this even though we did it every day. It was a great Thanksgiving break!