Firehouse Tour

The Mom's Club did a tour of our local Fire Department today. The kids got to walk around the firehouse, explore the trucks and ambulances, talk with the firemen, watch them slide down the pole, and even leave on an emergency call in the middle of our tour.

Isabelle was one of the kids that got to drive the ladder truck.



Inside the ambulance. (Brings back memories for Mommy and her EMT days.)

The firemen put on all their turnout gear, masks and air tanks, so that the kids could touch it all and see what they looked like all dressed up. This way the kids will hopefully be familiar it and not afraid if they ever end up needing to be rescued.

Zach and Emily stayed in the stroller during the tour. Next year they'll get to climb all over everything as well.

Emily - Dr. Jekyl and Ms. Hyde

This is the cute, sweet, loving "who me?" innocent look of Emily. We see this about 40% of the time.

This is her alter-ego, otherwise known as "devil child"! We see this side about 60% of the time. =) No one would ever guess that such a cute little girl could be so mischevious - but she is. Here's an example, she got her 15-month shots on Mon - one in each leg. She didn't even flinch, not a wimper or whine, looked at the nurse afterwards like "is that all you got?" then jumped down and continued running around and playing in the exam room. Zach - on the other hand - screamed bloody murder.

Fall Leaf Clean-up

We put off cleaning up all the leaves in our yard long enough. There was probably 5-6" of leaves covering our acre of grass - and there's still some leaves on the trees. So we bundled the kids up (it's a high of 32 today) and started raking. =) It took about 5 hours, and I can guarantee Steve and I will be very sore tonight and tomorrow, but it's done.

Zach wasn't sure what to make of it all. The kids were outside for about 1.5 hours and he just sat or stood and watched everything.

Emily took off the minute we were outside. She ran around and explored everything - her typical self. Even managed to fall on her noggin' once again and bruise/scrape her forehead. What's that - the 3rd time in a week?

Izzy didn't like the loud noise of the leaf blower, so she opted to wear her earphones for most of the time.

Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving Day - this was the best picture I could get today - they just wouldn't sit still!

Our typical Thanksgiving at Granny's beach house. Here Zach has removed a leg from her turtle table and is about to cause who know's what kind of havoc with it.

Stephanie and Izzy (cousins) - sharing dessert. (No, they didn't get wine with the brownies!)

Daddy was nice enough to share his dessert with Emily.

3-Season Room Update

As many of you know, our "summer" project was to enclose our porch into a 3-season room that we can use year-round. Well, summer is over, so is fall and winter is fast approaching, and we're slowly nearing the finish line with the project. Below is the progression of BEFORE to AFTER pictures, with the most recent first - the sheetrock was finished this weekend! That leaves sanding, painting, trim and refinishing the floors, then it will be done.

Final sheetrock!

This is the finished exterior with cedar shingles. We also added new outdoor lights - a flood light on the corner, and a doorway light over the slider.

The shingles will eventually age to look like the ones already on the house.

Insulated - so it's now nice and warm!

Running the electrical for the new recessed lighting, ceiling fan and wall heater.

Windows and new exterior slider door installed. (We also replaced the old slider from the porch into the house with a new one as well.)

Framing done for the walls, windows and doors.

BEFORE: A covered porch - we had a roof and floor, that was it.

Izzy's 3 year stats

Isabelle had her 3-year check-up yesterday. She's grown 4" in the last year (from 32" to 36") and put on 6 lbs (from 20lbs to 26lbs.) This is great news! At 2 years old, she wasn't even on the charts, she was so little. Now she's 25th% for both height and weight. A definite growth in the last year.

Emily's ER visit

Yesterday, I got to make a trip to the ER with all 3 kids - by myself! Fun, fun. Emily decided to do a head-dive off the table in the kitchen. I didn't see it, was outside getting the mail, so all descriptions of the event are courtesy of 3 year old Izzy - who's first response was "she did it all by herself." Can we say CYA!?!? Within a minute, she had a black and blue bump a little bigger then a quarter and it was sticking a good 1/4" out of her forehead. The pediatrician said to bring her in to the ER, just to make sure there wasn't a concussion. She's fine, thank goodness. That's what she gets for being such a climber. Thankfully, the ER staff got us in and out in about an hour - fastest ER visit I ever made! I couldn't get a really good picture, and the one below is a few hours after the event, when it had already started to go down and look better. (Taking pictures while trying to rush all 3 kids into the car and to the ER wasn't at the top of my list!) But it gives you an idea. I'm sure this won't be our last ER visit with Emily.... she's got no fear and is quite the risk-taker.

Isabelle's 3rd Birthday

This week Isabelle had her third birthday. Our little girl is now 3! So we went to Grandma and Grandpa's house to have her party. And the best part, she got to stay the night ALONE with them, now that she's a big girl. We took the twins home Sun. night, and she stayed. Grandma will bring her back Mon afternoon, but she was so excited to get to stay at their house all by herself!

"Aren't I cute - I'm 3!"

The whole family. (Mommy cut 10 inches off her hair that afternoon before the party!)

Izzy with her cake.

She LOVES the new PBS show "Super Why". Begs to watch it all the time. So this is Mommy's attempt at doing a cake with those characters. =)

This is Daddy's way of letting her eat her birthday cake!

One of her presents was a cleaning trolley - all 3 kids are enthralled with it. If only they could really clean the house.

Their favorite part is the vacuum. Although in real life, Izzy hates the vacuum, this one she loves. She's already worn through an entire set of batteries. The thing does suck, but just enough to pick up little foam pellets - nothing really helpful for mommy.

Apparently Zach needed his head cleaned.

She also got lip gloss - that she kept putting on - and Hokey Pokey Elmo - the song that I've now heard 10 million times; plus some books, stuffed animals and a TV learning console that we'll have to set up back at home.

Her last gift was this set of tunnels that you'd normally climb through. Zach and Emily decided to go out the middle!

Zach is finally walking - he's so happy!

Our resident trouble-maker for the weekend.

The kids

Here's a couple new pictures of the kids.

Emily decided it would be fun to sit IN the toybox to play with the toys. Easy access. =)


Yes - that's a milk/drool mixture running down his chin.