Christmas!!!

Yes, I know this is a bit late but we had a wonderful Christmas this year. The kids are all at such fun ages. We had lots of family here through the holidays which was nice and my best gift was having Joe home for an entire week. I had told him all I wanted for Christmas was him for 24 hours with no blackberry or laptop. I must say he gave me that and more......he didn't touch either for the entire week (at least during my waking hours). It was so nice having him here and we were all sad when he had to go back to work after New Years.

Our Christmas Eve was not very eventful....we spent the day at home (and at Walmart) and the kids opened their gifts from one another earlier than we usually let them.













As much as I love having the kids home on Christmas morning I always miss being at Patti K and Jim's house on Christmas Eve as that has always been my very favorite day of the year because of their Christmas Eve party. So if you got to be there know that I am jealous! After the kids went to bed Joe and I got started on Santa's visit. Joe put the dollhouse together in record time while I got everything else out and arrranged. We were in bed much earlier than last year and told the kids to not come downstairs in the morning but to just yell for us and we would come up to get them. Well, about 7 30 or so I hear little feet running towards my room. Owen is standing there beside my bed saying, "mommy, mommy, something happened....Santa came and brought me the batcave, and mag's dollhouse, and we all got chairs....blue ones and pink ones....... come on....there are lots of presents, let's go" It was so cute. So up we go to wake up Maggie. She usually cannot be drug out of bed but as soon as Owen said, "maggie, santa came" her feet hit the floor.
























They were downstairs and into thier gifts in no time.

















Owen opens gifts like I did as a child, and I can only assume my husband did as well. Rips them as fast as he can and off to the next. Maggie opens them like Amanda did...slowly tears the paper off and examines each gift before moving on. Needless to say Owen was done much sooner tham Maggie but was already getting things out of the pakages so he didn't care. Poor Josie slept through the entire gift opening as she didn't get up till late but was pretty happy with her gifts and mostly the paper when she got up.









Owen didn't waste anytime getting his new spiderman costume on, and Maggie was very excited about her Barbie princess.













They all got Pottery Barn chairs from Santa...which were my favorite gifts!



















Owen spent a great deal of his morning switching outfits (spiderman, superman, peterpan) and then he and Joe hopped into the shower to try out his new shaving kit.














He thought it was so cool that he got to shave like Daddy....somehow shaving turned into a shaving cream battle and here is how Owen came out.














(well, Joe was covered as well but I figured it would be best not to post those. :)


I began getting dinner ready and Mom and Dad got to our house a little before noon.










It was like Christmas all over again as they brought in a ton more gifts for the kids. As you can see, Owen changed right into his lighting McQueen outfit he got and loved trying out his boxing gloves from Ja Ja.















(Keep in mind this is only noon and he has already had on 4 outfits.....my typical Owen day, ask Mom and Patti K!)
We had a great dinner and spent the afternoon just relaxing and Mimi and Jaja spent it playing.
That night Joe's family came up so the kids got to have another Christmas with them the next day. Poor Josie slept through every single gift opening. The kids loving having everyone here and so much attention. We hadn't seen Matt in almost a year so it was great having him here as well and the kids loved playing with him.









Joe's family headed back Saturday morning and Mom and Dad stayed to keep the kids while Joe and I went to IKEA in Cincinnati for the day. We had a great day and enjoyed spending the time kid free shopping and having dinner. We need to do that more often as I forget how much fun it is until we have a date day/night. Neila Susan and I are working on getting our monthly date nights back.
Well, that is all of our Christmas news. We had a wonderful time and enjoyed everyone being here. We missed having Aunt Amanda here...but we got to celebrate a few days later with her which was so muchfun. Here are a few more pictures to enjoy and next comes New Years!!

New Year

Okay, so I am off to a horrible start as far as blogging goes this year. I have no excuse really other than I ususally blog at night and anymore when the kids go to bed I am too tired to stay up to blog! I read an article the other day that talked about how being a mom really isn't a hard job....who can't make breakfast lunch, and dinner or read the same book 10 times in a row. But it went on to say it isnt' hard....as long as you don't plan on getting anything else done. And I must say the past month or so that is exactly how I have felt. Between 3 meals to 3 kids (plus Joe and I), 3 baths, diapers, bedtimes, naps, playing, laundry....not to mention Christmas I feel like I have a list of things I need to get done but have yet to get to. So my blog has been on my list and I am now trying to get to it. I am going to start where I left off last month....with Christmas parties. Maggie had her Christmas party the week before Christmas but Owen's got snowed out so we just had it this week (yes, in January) They sang songs, which they both enjoyed singing quite loudly, especially Owen. And then had pizza and treats. Maggie got to go to Owen's party so she had fun getting in on the fun twice.




























The day Owen's party got snowed out we had a pretty decent amount of snow so I bunlded the kids up in their snow gear (which took about 30 minutes) and we went outside to try to make snowmen or sled down our hill.















Well, the snow was not the good snow...it was basically frozen ice that wasn't good for much. They played around in it for awhile and Josie watched from her stroller in the garage. How funny does she look....







I tried to slide them down the hill on a make shift sled (the top to a huge rubbermaid container) but it didn't work at all. So after about 20 minutes Maggie was ready to come in.

















Owen took his cars to the deck and played out there about 10 more minutes or so and he was finished. So they hopped in the tub to get warmed up.





















Josie loves bathtime but is impossible to keep ahold of. The more she is slipping and sliding the funnier she thinks it is.

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!

Santa has arrived at the Burke household and has now headed else where. Joe and I are off to bed in hopes of a late wake up.....we shall see. Merry Christmas to you all!!

Maggie's dance recital.....and other fun

This past week flew by it seemed. I cannot believe it is a little over a week until Christmas. I worked 3 days last week and Mom and Patti K came up to keep the kids for me. It was WONDERFUL having them here. First off, I knew the kids were in excellent care and having so much fun, and secondly, they were wonderful! Not only did they do the laundry, take care of the kids, I got to go to my Christmas dinner for the office I work at, Joe and I got to have a date night alone, and I love being with both of them. The kids also loved having them here, Mimi made them their favorite foods and played everything imaginable, and Patti K added to the playing and it sounds like made sure Josie never had a "want" for anything. :)
Mom took the kids to preschool in the mornings and I had friends that brought them home for me at noon. Neither Maggie nor Owen wanted to go to school while they were here, but I made them go since it was the week before their Christmas parties so I knew they would be doing things to get ready for that. Thursday was Owen's day to go and I guess he was quite the grump at school and on the ride home with my friend Shannon. His teacher said he just kept telling her he wanted to be home with his MIMI. And when shannon picked him up he looked at her and said, "Where is my MIMI." Mom said once he got home he was as good as gold though, so I guess that really is all he wanted. Now that PK is online I can send both she and Mom a THANK YOU!!! for all you did. It meant so much to me. I wish you guys lived here so I could have that help closer. :) Maggie asked me today why Mimi and Jaja couldn't just move here. I told her to ask them.....so get ready to answer that one mom and dad.
Mom and Patti stayed through Saturday afternoon so they could go to Maggie's dance recital. It was really cute and she did a great job. She really likes it this time around and looked so cute in her costume.









She loved her hair pulled back in a bun and the sparkles in it.














I took this picture for her so she could see it from the back.







Here are some shots of Maggie in action. Sorry the pictures on stage weren't great. I couldn' figure out which setting to put my camera on to take them.








































After the recital they had cake and punch for the girls. Here is Maggie with one of her friends from class


























Bella and Kylie




















her best buddy, Isaac





















her teacher, Miss Tara

























and her brother.




















Saturday night we had our friends, Jeff and Sheila,over and played the funnest game, called Settlers. It was so much fun and the kids all had fun running around together until almost 11. Sunday our LIFE group got cancelled so we made another night of it and played at their house. Anyhow, if your big game people this is really fun.

Today was maggie's Christmas party at school, but Owen's is tommorow so I will wait and post pics of them both together. We are supposed to get a ton of ice and snow tonight so I am hoping his party doens't get cancelled.

My Christmas cards came in today so I have been working on those and hopefully will get them in the mail tommorow....so they should be coming soon!!