Disney on Ice

We got tickets for Disney on Ice and took the 2 little kids today.  I figured Emily would enjoy it, but was excited to introduce Vinnie to the experience and let him see Buzz.  I was surprised when earlier in the week Emily was saying that she didn't want to go and was asking if one of us could stay home with her and one could take Vinnie.

But as the day came Emily wanted to go, but I was worried that she wouldn't be able to as she has been fighting a fever.  No other symptoms, just a fever.  She woke up with a fever still this morning and she wanted to make sure she could still go and wanted to make sure that she wasn't going to ruin things for Vinnie.  But her fever stayed down with motrin so we made the decision to still go and to take her.

So we get there and the show starts and I was out getting snacks, but when I came back Vinnie was buried into Brian's shoulder and not exactly enjoying the show.  We had skipped the nap today and we thought he may have falled asleep at one point in time, but it certainly wasn't the fun time that I had envisioned him having.  He's always had a tendency to shut down when he gets overwhelmed by sights and sounds and today was proving to be more of the same.  Between no nap and the loud sounds and flashing lights, he was checking out.

I don't remember what changed, but Brian did get him engaged about a quarter of the way into the show.  Vinnie finally unburied himself and started watching and - dare I say - enjoying the show.

Brian did it just in time too, because one of the next groups on was the Toy Story group.  Vinnie was cute to see watch them.  He kept pointing and saying "Buzz!  Woody!  Jessie!"  It was well worth the trip.

And little Miss Emily who didn't even want to come watched it all and enjoyed every minute of it.  She was guessing what was coming next and correcting me when I was guessing wrong and explaining to me why I was wrong.  I was glad she felt okay and ended up enjoying herself even if she wasn't thinking that she would!

Oh and at the finale they had all the characters come out onto the ice and Vinnie was so cute trying to find Buzz, Woody and Jessie.  He would find them and point them out and then he'd lose sight of them and throw his hands up and ask, "Where'd go?"  It was cute.

It was a fun afternoon for all of us!

Girl Scout Cookies

Thanks to those of you that ordered Girl Scout cookies from Emily.  We are picking up the cookie order tomorrow (Wednesday), so we’ll be delivering the cookies soon.

 

 

 

Rails of Fun

I guess I should probably explain that we started limiting Emily's "screen time" (meaning TV, Nintendo ds and computer time) this week, so it has been interesting to see how she has filled her time without the constant entertainment of other devices.  And it has been fun to do more together!

Tonight Emily decided that she was going to build a train track for her and Vinnie.  It was quite elaborate where is split off into two separate tracks.  I was impressed.  She put a lot of time and effort into it.  At one point I thought that there was no way she was going to be able to bring that 2nd track around to meet back at the beginning, but somehow she figured it out!  I don't know if it was luck or design, but she pulled it off without much effort on her part.  I've often sat and struggled (and cursed) trying to get those pieces to meet in the middle and I think she could have done it with one hand tied behind her back.  (Maybe that will be tomorrow night's activity!)

I don't think Vinnie quite appreciated the complexity and effort, but I am 100% certain that he loved spending time with his big sister. I don't think she can grasp it at her young age, but he is absolutely her biggest fan. When he gets up in the morning and we walk into his room, the first word out of his mouth is always, "Emmy?". He can't wait to see her and play with her.

And she is so, so good with him. I remember when I was pregnant with Vinnie I was worried about the age difference between the two of them and wondered if they would still play together and they really do. Emily even got out her Whack-a-Mole game tonight and who did she want to play with her? Vinnie, of course.

I guess I don't really know who had more fun. The kids building the track or me watching them? I guess it was a win/win for the family!

Building Fun

Yesterday was yet another day of being snowed in ... at least for the kids (and Brian). So when I came home from work I sat down with Emily to finish up her lego project that she had worked on earlier with Brian. Earlier in the day she had finished up the crabby patty mobile, so Emily and I started work on the Crab Shack. I didn't realize how much I enjoyed putting together legos until we started working on them. I am glad that Emily is finding it enjoyable too. We had fun putting it together.

Of course, a certain little boy thought that he should be involved too so I got his legos out for him to put together. He had fun playing with us. Although his fun with legos turned into dumping the tub on the floor and then throwing the rest of the legos off the table. But - hey - whatever floats your boat.

Here is Emily's finished project. She's pretty proud of it and so she should be. What a great project - she got to spend quality time with Mom and with Dad.

I just wish legos weren't so expensive! I want to go buy more to do together, but dang!!

Craft for a Snowy Day

Originally I was hoping to get the kids out of the house today and do something fun, but the snow storm curtailed those plans pretty quick. Emily decided she wanted to do a craft. I thought that was a great idea and envisioned doing one of the many craft kits that are in the newly organized craft closet.


But my little creative, free-spirit had other ideas. The type of ideas that she couldn't put into words as she said things like "let's just start and then it will make sense to you". I caught something about decorating an origami dog?!?! All I knew is that she had up almost ALL the supplies: construction paper, glue, scissors, crayons, paint, paintbrushes, stamps, ink pads, markers and stickers.


She started by showing me how to fold the paper in the shape of a dog. She knows what she is doing! It was a cute little puppy. Then we had to color it and then paint it. Well, about this time little Vinnie thought that he should be in on this action. If Emily and Mommy were doing something, then he needed to be involved too. So I got out some paper and found some finger paints, put him in the highchair and let him to to town.


He started out just fine. He had paint up to his elbows, but he was having fun and was painting his pretty picture. And, more importantly, he felt like he was a part of the happenings!



Then he wanted a paintbrush, because Emily had a paintbrush. So we gave him a paintbrush. And then I was taking pictures of him and the need to perform came out and suddenly his hands were in his hair and he was painting his forehead. *sigh* I should have known that we wouldn't escape unscathed, but it was funny!! Vinnie had a good time too.


Until we stuck him in the sink and poured water over his head. He wasn't too thrilled with that to begin with, but eventually he even warmed up to that. But he even got paint on my roses in the process!!

Eventually, Emily and I finished our dogs. We had to do it in several phases as we had to wait on them to dry. But they are cute and Emily had a great, great idea and I loved spending the time with my girl!

Emily's Valentine Party

I don't remember if pictures come thru this way, but this is emily all ready for her valentine party at school. She was worried school would be cancelled again.

Okay, I'm trying this way of uploading a video and see how this plays. This is another video of Vinnie, but to tell you the truth I don't remember which one it is anymore. I just grabbed one and uploaded it.

Vinnie's Animal Sounds

Vinnie loves to make animal sounds. He has two books where he just loves to turn the pages and make the sounds of the animals. In this particular book in the video, he has the book memorized and now says the animal sounds before we even turn the page. I thought I'd capture it on video to share with everyone.



By the way, I think Vinnie's individual blog may be coming to an end soon. My plan was always to keep his blog separate until he turned 2 and then stop it and post his stuff over here with the other kids. But the AboutMyBaby company that hosts the other site is shutting down and is going to be gone by August. I thought that I could hold on until the end of May, but their email notices aren't going out and videos aren't processing. Added to that they aren't responding to any emails and I don't think they are going to since the company is shutting down in six months. I will let you know when the official cut-over is ... You should have received an email earlier today letting you know about new content at Vinnie's site: http://vincentmichael.aboutmybaby.com

Grandparents reminder: if you get an email of the blog post and it is a video (such as this one) you have to go visit the http://donatokids.com/blog/ site in order to see the videos as the videos do not get emailed out.

Winter Band Concert

We always appear to be late in finding out about Tony's band concerts, but I think we are ahead of the game this time. The Winter Band Concert is at his high school on Wednesday, March 3rd at 7pm.

Making Valentines

Emily has been hard at work on her Valentines for her class. She is making "ipods" for each of her classmates. You take a box of sweethearts and cover it with construction paper and then we added Hershey kisses to the end of strings for the ear buds. On Family Fun's website they had a template for the front dial and screen. I thought they turned out cute and Emily's happy with them. We stuck a sticker on the back and Emily did the To:/From: dealio on them and she's ready for Thursday's party!!

Vinnie's Birth Video

There are some advantages to foot surgery ... I finally worked on Vinnie's birth video and finished it. We had video and pictures that we used this time around. It is long, so you might want to watch it when you have some free time.

Songs are: A New Day Has Come by Celine Dione and My Wish by Rascal Flatts

Snow Days!

Just FYI - the snow is cancelling most of the activities this weekend. Emily and Tony's basketball games are cancelled on Saturday. They will not make a decision until later about Kristen's Sunday game.

Also, Tony & Kristen both were scheduled to go to the Sweetheart Dance at their school this weekend. Tony with his sweetheart and Kristen with a friend - but that dance has been postponed until Febuary 27th.

Have a good weekend and stay warm and drive safe!