Chicago!

This past weekend we headed to Chicago with Eric's entire family. This is no small feat when you are talking 11 adults and 3.2 kids. We headed out on Friday morning for the long drive. It seemed to take forever, especially with the 1 hr delay just trying to get into the city. But we finally made it and met up with the whole fam.
Dinner on Friday night was at Texas de Brazil. INCREDIBLE!! That's all I have to say! It was also Eric's birthday and you can see he got a tasty treat on the house. YUM! I think we all could have rolled ourselves out of there when we were done. Good thing we had to walk back to the hotel.
Saturday morning we hopped onto the city bus and headed over the field museum. The first thing you see is 'Sue', the big T-rex. The kids thought that was great. So much to see. We also enjoyed the baby mammoth, the diamond exhibit and all the dinosaurs. Both of the kids fit nicely into the big dino footprint. They tired like heck to fill up the whole space! They also had a fun time downstairs in the kids play area. They dug up bones, played music, picked corn and played with Dad.
After the ride back to up town we headed to the Lego store and American Girl store. Both of the kids scored pretty well on that deal. Alexis was sleeping (fell asleep on the bus) but managed to wake up in time to get all her goodies at the "baby store."
Dinner Saturday was Chicago style pizza. YUMMY! Again, soooo full! We did walk over to the bean to check it out. Cole refused to go to the bathroom before we left the restaurant and of course then had to go when we were walking around. He looked at Eric and said "I didn't know we were going to Bean Dad, or I would have gone." Like it's all the Bean's fault!
Sunday we went to the Shed and saw the dolphin show. It was ok. The kids thought it was great, so that's what really counts. It was so crowded that it was hard for us to really enjoy the whole aquarium.
We headed home around one and after many stops - the list is crazy! - we finally made it home. But it was a good time, and the kids had so much fun with the whole family. We are very blessed to be able to spend a vacation with all of us together at one time.

First Loose Tooth - Gone!

Ok, so when did this happen? My little boy is growing up so fast I can hardly believe it. This morning the 3 of us (Cole, Alexis and myself) went to the dentist for our routine cleaning and check up. Cole has been talking about his loose tooth forever, but until the check up when Sandy looked at it and said "I'll be surprised if he makes the day with that one!" it didn't really sink in that he would actually lose the tooth so soon. He wiggled on it all morning, then headed off to school. When he came home he had a little red envelope from his teacher that read
"Cole tried to pull his tooth at school so I bribed him to stop. This is a special tooth holder inside (he wanted to pull it so he could get one). It is loose!"
They must get this special little plastic tooth holder to put their tooth in if it falls out in during school. Ok, we then headed outside to play. He comes over when I am and says "Mom, look at this" and has his tooth all the way bent over. He REALLY wanted it out. So I told him to just grab hold of it and yank it out. AND HE DID!!! I couldn't believe it! I held on to it for him until we headed inside. Both the kids hopped in the tub, but before could would get in he climbed his naked little butt up on the stool to look at the "hole" in his mouth in the mirror. He was so amazed and proud of himself. He did the same thing after he got out of the tub, like he just couldn't get enough of that missing tooth!
So I had to get busy to make a pillow for his tooth for the tooth fairy. We looked on-line and found a cute pattern. It's a tooth shaped pillow with a little pocket on the back for the tooth. He's now sleeping with that pillow and his tooth under his bed. But also a note to the tooth fairy asking if he can keep his tooth just one more day. ( we think he wants to show his teacher )
Here's some pix of our monumental event.

Sunday

Today we had Ryan and his daughter Kennedy (we missed you Sarah and Kinley) and Jennifer, Graham & Autumn over for lunch. The kids had a blast playing together. Cole was so happy to have a boy to play with and Alexis was in heaven with two little girls to play princess & babies with. It was a lot of fun for everyone.

Yesterday I handed Alexis the hand me down Harley Jacket from Julie's girls. She put it on and I told her she was tough. Also that Papa had a Harley motorcycle, and that's the kind of jacket it was. She then said she wanted to ride on Papa's motorcycle. Think she'll have to wait a while on that one. But she did pose for me and have some pretty "tough girl" looks. I think she did a pretty good job looking tough - at least I don't think I'd be messing with her.

She even thought it was pretty cool that her shoes have black and orange on them so she matched (she's very concerned with that lately).

Also, last Friday was Pirate day at Cole's class. They built a big pirate ship (and I mean big!) out of cardboard. It's large enough that everyone can be "inside" the main part of the ship's deck. So on Friday they had their official pirate day to celebrate the ship being done. Cole dressed up like a pirate and didn't have to use any manners all day at school. Here's a picture of Cole giving me a good "arrrrrr"

He's pretty cute with his eye patch (thanks to Nana & Papa), his bones pirate outfit and a small tatoo on his cheek.

When he came home I asked him how his day was and he told me that he wouldn't tell me until dad came home. So I waited...then he said "it was fun". It's like pulling teeth to get him to talk about school! Luckily his teacher is great at taking lots of photos and sharing them!

New Dress for Alexis

So I had a crazy idea to make a dress for Alexis. It started when I saw this shirt at Wal-Mart for a buck. Loved the phone booth and numbers on it...but being it is a Milie Cyris shirt a women's small is really for a 10 year old. So I though "what can I make from this?"

I picked up the shirt and on my next trip to the fabric store found this faded looking super soft red knit that matched perfect! Best of all, it was only 1.95 per yard!!

So I took it home and let the ideas get started. I cut the dress from a jean jumper that I like the fit of. Took the sleeves off the original t-shirt and re-attached and trimmed them down on the new dress. I then made two very large ruffles and attached them to the bottom of the dress. A small band of the red around the neck (which I'm not totally happy with it flipping over) and I was done. No hemming since I re-used the existing hem on the sleeve and the bottom has the ruffle covering it. I even made a matching headband out of the extra fabric from the bottom of the T and the left over red fabric from trying to cut it straight. (man that fabric was cut SOOO crooked it was unbelievable!!)

All and all, I think it's pretty darn cute (especially on such a little cutie!). A totally custom dress for a whole 3 bucks! Can't beat that!