Don't eat Kaiky's cookies!

Every year, we never bake cookies. We don't roll out the dough, cut them out and decorate them. Now I know why. It's because it's work, not fun. The kids fight over cookie cutters and only want to decorate 4-5 cookies before they are "done".


The kids did return, though, an hour or so later and things were going wonderfully until I looked up and saw Kaiky licking the cookies!!


Don't worry, all licked cookies have been removed from the inventory. Or not. It's your gamble.

Sledding with K&K

With the impending freezing temps, and the kids begging me to take them sledding, Saturday morning seemed like a good day to go. We had a great time!

There's no fun like snow fun!

Last Saturday the kids got a bit stir-crazy inside, so I sent everyone out for a good romp in the snow. To our surprise, Yorkie Katie really likes her pink coat and the snow! Kaiky and Katie had a great time playing chase.
Check out the video


Kaiky also made a very cute, one-dimensional snow man!

Deck the Halls

...or living room if you have no halls.
Kaiky and Kyle worked together and put together the tree all by themselves. They also did all of the decorating. Mom helped put the lights on, though. Very nice job!

Kyle is very serious about the placement of his ornaments.

"I think I saw an Elf!"

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas!

No "Black Friday" shopping for us! We were busy readying the house for Santa's arrival. First, Kyle and Daddy put Santa and his Elf out on the front lawn. This year, the Elf has to pitch the presents to Santa over the side walk. Watch out, Mr. Mailman!

Hockey 1-2-3!

Kyle's first-ever hockey class, "Hockey 1-2-3" started last Saturday. We were all very excited and he did very well considering it was only his third time on skates, and second time on hockey skates. Nothing like throwing him right onto the ice! He hung in there and skated very well and I was very proud.



Kaiky's a great skater, too, but doesn't want to take any classes.

Canine reading buddies

Recently, Kaiky and Kyle participated in a program at Deerfield Library called "K-9 Reading Buddies". It was our first time, and we didn't know quite what to expect. It turns out that the kids read privately with a tutor to a Certified Therapy Dog.

Kaiky was so excited to get downstairs, choose a good book and read to her "buddy", that when the time came, she FREAKED. Literally ran away crying. Ay yi yi.

To make a long story short, Kaiky finally did read to Sunny, a 150-lb. long-haired dog of a breed I can't remember. He was a really cool dog and everyone was very patient with Kaiky. She took so long to come around and start reading that she only was able to read to Sunny for a few minutes until her time was up. Then, of course, she cried because she "didn't get to read to him!"

The whole time this hullaballoo was going on, Kyle read to Jaxon, and enjoyed it very much.


We did sign up for the next "Reading Buddy" session and hopefully Kaiky won't freak.

Trick or Treat!

Halloween was great this year. Bob sewed - yes BOB - the kids' costumes. Kaiky was a dalmatian and Kyle was a Jawa (from Star Wars). I had the task - no pressure - of painting Kaiky's dalmatian face. I knew it had to be perfect or we were done before we even started.



We kept Trick-or-Treating to a minimum this year, we did not go to any downtown areas, festivals, etc. which was very nice for us parents. We stayed in our own neighborhood on the very day of Halloween. No more of the kooky scheduled Trick-or-Treating on the nearest Sunday to Halloween. Phew!
I was a little worried about whether or not the kids would have fun without Cori, Eddie and Leah this year and who they would ToT with. I figured if this means getting free candy, they should be fine going it alone.


However, there was no chance of them being lonely. We traveled in a pack of at least 30 kids at all times. Kaiky wasn't shy about dancing, either! Watch her video below:

Random outdoor shots

As I mentioned before, this Cape Cod style house is circa 1920s. It was completely rehabbed in 2008 and we are the first to live in it since the rehab. Therefore, it has some chinks in the armor.

The first chink is the landscaping. As in there is none. Which is a huge issue for me since I had finally gotten the last yard to where I could just enjoy it and it pleased me. This yard is certainly not pleasing. Let me show you...

At first glance, it's cute. We wish the shutters were replaced to give the vinyl siding some character, but they can be replaced later. Lots of trees here, unlike the other neighborhood and NO flowers! I'll suffer through the rest of this year, but next year there will be flowers!


The house faces south, which I like, but there are so many trees we won't get much sun on the flower beds. I'll be going from full sun to shade gardening. Should be a challenge.


Here's the side bed which is full of Lilies of the Valley. I will dig all of them out. To the right are three very overgrown bushes. So overgrown that you can't get the car down the driveway and expect to be able to exit said car. I'll chop and thin those!


Here is the Lilie bed from the "deck" you saw in the last picture. Lilies, burrs and pricker weeds...can't wait.


Lastly, here is the fenced-in back yard. Love that. Not having a fenced yard with two dogs is a night mare. I only have to patch a few holes and we're good to go. All the Daylilies on the side of the garage will be pulled and I'll put perennials from my other garden in there since that looks to be the place with the most full sun. (Except in this picture!)

Random house shots

Kaiky and I took some pictures around the house, ok, no only pictures of my room. And one of her in bedroom. That's pretty random to me.

This is our room. One of the two rooms on the second floor of our circa 1920s Cape Cod style house. I believe it used to be only one long room that someone divided and added a bathroom into. It's a very different layout and the ceiling is low. Initially, I hated the room and wanted K&K to share it, kinda like a Kids' Clubhouse.
But Bob had a vision and hauled our huge, 4-poster bed upstairs all by himself and cut the legs off the bed frame to make it fit. He used the extra legs to make matching side tables. Pretty ingenious. These pictures were taken on the day he presented the room to me. I was at work and hadn't seen it. It turned out awesome!


Kaiky's room is the best one. On the first floor with three windows, it gets a lot of morning sun. If the kids were to be upstairs, this is the room I would have wanted! Looks like these three are happy there.

Tuesday, August 26 - First day of school

So you may have noticed a jump in dates on the blog? Well, we moved out of Round Lake! We did it just in time to start the kids on-time in their new school. It was very exciting...and tiring for mom and dad!
Kyle and Kaiky in front of the house.

The neighborhood crew at the bus stop: Kaiky, Jordana, Kyle, Carolyn, Dylan and Ethan.

Here comes the bus!

Friday, August 8 - Party at Patti's!

We all got together after work for a Party at Patti's! We all had a blast!
I only brought Kyle's head to the party. He looks like a coconut.
Oops, there he is!
The trampoline was the hit of the evening!
Patti, me, Jen and Dory.
Patti made awesome asian salmon, pasta salad and roast beef sandwiches.
MM mm good!

Tuesday, August 5 - Go Cubs Go!

Today was a big trip to the Cubs Game with Grandma and Grandpa!

Go Cubs go!
"I'll have popcorn, cotton candy, coke and, oh yeah, a foam finger!"
Cubs win!

Monday, August 5th - Corn!

Call me crazy, but growing our own corn was VERY exciting for me. Bob planted it, I tended it and the kids picked it. It was sooo sweet and awesome. It's so fun to just go to your back yard and pick it right off the stalk whenever you need an ear of corn. Next year we'll plant more!
Kaiky pickin' corn amongst the mosquitos.

Check out all those ears!

Perfectly straight rows of kernels, no fertilizer or pesticides. I guess I'm an organic farmer!

Kyle's big birthday bash!

Kyle's 8th birthday party was one of the best we've ever had and on the lowest budget! We filled over 300 water balloons, many buckets of water and provided squirt guns and the bounce house and just let the kids go crazy! They had a great time!
Here's Kyle peekin' out of the bounce house.

BFFs Cori, Kaiky, Kyle and Chris

"I love it!!"

"ooooh ahhhhhhh......"

Happy Birthday, Kyle!

Kyle is 8 years old today! Happy Birthday!

Happy 4th of July!

We had a really great 4th of July this year, it was actually NOT hot!
We started with the Northbrook 4th of July Parade.


Then we played in the Annual Mikey & Friends Softball Game at Northbrook Junior High. It was cute to see the second generations starting to play - our Kyle and Matt and Kelly's boys Connor and Tyler. Kaiky and Madison were cheerleaders.





We had dinner at Grandma & Grandpa's house and did some monkeying around there until it was time for fireworks!