Weekend away

This first picture has nothing to do with the rest of the post. Just a funny picture of Mark in Gianna's Ariel sunglasses!

Now, on to the weekend events. On Saturday morning, we met Doug's brother and his family at the Crayola Factory. It was an awesome place! There was so much to do and take home. You could definitely spend a lot of time there. Especially with crafty kids like ours! This is a cool little tunnel where you can write on the walls. Mark didn't much care whether his marker had a cap on it or not.


After a fun morning there, we went on to Doug's brother's house. We haven't seen each other since before Christmas and Gianna and Isabella have been begging their moms to play again. Boy did they have a great time!

Gianna is finally getting more comfortable playing with other kids. We hardly had to intervene in their play at all. It was great to have lots of adult conversation while the kids entertained each other. Mark and Jack were there too, but I didn't get any evidence of it!

St. Patrick's Day

St. Patrick's day was full of green and Irish-y things. Here's Gianna all decked out and eating her green applesauce and green juice from green dishes with green utensils. (She wouldn't eat things that were naturally green, naturally.)

I promise you, Mark begged me to put this on him, despite the expression on his face. And I also promise myself that he will be very upset with me for this one day.

While these pictures seem un-noteworthy, they are in fact momentous because of Gianna's attire. This is Gianna wearing (gasp!) jeans! This is the first time since she was one. She doesn't like buttons on any article of clothing, but I suggested that jeans were good for climbing trees (and big kids wear them) and after destroying a pair of leggings on the tree below, she put them on! AND...she's worn them since then too! It's a St. Patrick's miracle.

NYC

A few weekends ago we went to Manhattan to visit some college friends of Doug's. We had a lovely time! Gianna and Mark loved Baby Grace and maybe Grace's mommy even more!

How could they not love her? Check out those baby blues!

After a delicious brunch, we all headed to the playground for some male bonding.

And for Mark to display his dire need for a haircut. Not to worry, he got one two days later!

A few cute videos!

I haven't posted in a while and this is sort of a non-post, just a few videos until some real posting.

Here is Mark making his animal sounds, in spite of his fascination with himself and the video camera.



Here are Gianna and Doug making pasta this weekend. It was delicious!




And here is Mark spinning, his new favorite activity!

Grandma is 60 and Mark is 1 1/4

On President's Day weekend, we headed to Virginia for Grandma's 60th birthday (sorry to make that public Grandma :) on Sunday. Gianna loved celebrating with Grandma. She did not, however, want anything to do with the lemon meringue pie I made for Grandma, so we got her her own cake to celebrate. What can I say, she's a girl after my own heart with her love of icing. Oh, she also insisted we have hats.

Mark liked the cake too. 

On Grandma's birthday, Mark turned 1 1/4. I tried to capture the craziness of his hair in the morning. I know a lot of this blog is devoted to his hair, but I just can't get over the insanity.

And here are his stats and what he's up to at 15 months. He's in the 90th percentile for height and the 75th for weight...he's a lean, mean, fighting machine. He's starting to climb on things a bit. He's starting to talk more, really mastering "hi" and "bye" in the last few days. His other words are: up, hop, more, Mama, Dada, Sissy, pig, apple, ball (his favorite), balloon, spoon, and baby. His favorite things to play with are doors and keys. And he loves to run around with no clothes on at night with Gianna. He likes almost all food, especially those that can be stabbed and eaten with a fork. He's such a happy little guy. We all love him so much!

Valentine's Day

Nonna and Pop-pop came to visit for Valentine's weekend. And nothing says love like a giant lobster. Two of them actually. Our grocery store sometimes sells them for super cheap and it's Doug's favorite food so he can't pass it up when it's such a good deal. They were without question the biggest lobsters I've ever seen...and super delicious too!

Gianna loved making Valentine treats for all of us with Nonna. And she loved handing them out too!

Here are my two littlest Valentines on the actual day. Gianna looks like a human Valentine, I think. Boy does she get into these holidays. It's fun for me too. When you celebrate as much as we do at home and at school, it means there's always something to look forward to. They are even going to learn about Presidents Day at school. She was displeased to hear that that one does not involve crafts and parties.

And here's my mop-head Valentine. I swear his hair has grown faster since his haircut!

Christmas in January

Mark's godfather, Uncle Randy, sent some Christmas gifts last week. It was fun to have some new toys again. And with all this snow and cold weather, unwrapping presents and playing with them was a great indoor activity! Thanks Randy, Mary, Elizabeth, Joe, Tony, Jake, Julia, and Rocco!

Gianna was all too happy to help. Mark LOVES this Elmo book. His obsession with Elmo is intense, especially since he has basically never seen him on TV or anywhere other than his toys or books.

They both love these Muppet Star Wars figures. I showed Gianna some YouTube videos of Beaker. She finds him hilarious.

The toys were great, but nothing beats trying to plug Daddy's shoes into the elliptical. You may have seen a similar picture on Facebook. He literally spends probably a total of 30 minutes a day doing this. It is both sad and funny.