the syrup story

what a mess..... i have seen some very sweet interactions between each of our children. once i watched annelies sweetly brushing sofia's hair or the time they were cuddled up in bed together reading books and snuggling. or the time i walked in on nico rubbing oliver's back and singing him a lullaby. but nothing tops what rob saw today. this is sweet in a whole different sense of the word. as the kids were playing and running around like they always do, rob decided to peak in and see what they were up to. to his surprise he saw something he couldn't believe!! sofia and jakob were taking turns taking swigs out of the syrup bottle. GROSS!! as soon as they saw me coming to stop them, they scattered like little cockroaches when you turn the light on. rob and i got a big laugh out of that one!!

christmas in the south

Well our christmas started out on christmas eve when my side of the family came over for a big dinner with roast beef, yorkshire pudding and all the fixings. we opened presents from family members, read the night before christmas and tucked the kids in only to have them come downstairs to see if they could catch santa in the act. luckily they fell asleep before the fat man came. unfortunately that was not the end of the evening though, there was lots of clean up and preparation for santa.

......oh and the kids spread out the deer food in the lawn so the deer would find our house and some yummy treats for santa along with lots of carrots for santa to give the deer.

once i got snuggled up in bed..... i found it didn't last long because annelies was up with an ear infection all night!!! poor thing, she was in agonizing pain. luckily i had left over chewable antibiotic from jakob and some motrin. she was not a happy camper once morning came though, hence the absence of her presence in the family pictures on the stairs. she was actually in her bedroom yelling at the kids to leave her alone!

unlike all my in-laws, we did not wake up to a white christmas, but something amazing did happen....quite miraculously rob was the first one awake and slowly crawled out of bed at 8:30 to wake the other kids up. ollie popped right up and jakob was at rob's side helping with the wake up calls. sofia was so eager to see what surprises santa left for her. all she asked for this year was presents, so she was sure to be happy with whatever she got.

once we got downstairs at about 8:45, the kids started with their stocking and soon moved to the tree where their presents were wrapped with their own paper. nico was transformers, jakob of course was spider-man, annelies was princess, sofia was dora and ollie had cute reindeer paper. this makes it much easier to identify presents not to mention the hassle of name tags. sofia caught on quick to the paper pattern and started handing out gifts while nico assigned everybody who's turn it was to open. they were so cute how organized they were. after all was said and done, rob and i could only come to one conclusion..... the kids are spoiled rotten and they got way too many presents. oh well.... nico's big gift was a keyboard (piano). jakob got a truck and trailer and an xbox 360 game (spider-man friend or foe), annelies got a stamp set and a barbie magnet fashion set, sofia got a dora doll and food for her play kitchen and ollie got a little scooter. then rob and i took turns opening presents. rob put nico in charge of wrapping mine, but nico got confused and long story short... none of my presents got wrapped and i got to just take them out of the bags. oh, well.

it was a fun christmas and we finished it off with our biggest tradition of all.... WAFFLE HOUSE. so yummy. the rest of the day we watched movies and ate! MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYONE!!

PLAYING DRESS UP

the girls love playing dress up. the other day they came down with some of the wigs in their dress up bucket. they were trying it on themselves and me, but the funniest was ollie. they thought it was absolutely hysterical and ollie loved their reaction.

ANNELIES' CHRISTMAS PROGRAM

Annelies' little school had there christmas program and it was so sweet. they sang several christmas songs and each of the kids dressed up like animals except for annelies and her friend natalie. apparently they ran out of costumes or something so they were pretty little girls. it was so cute and afterwards we got to eat cookies and sandwiches. this was ollie's favorite part!!

ANNUAL COOKIE BAKING DAY

Well another christmas and more yummy cookies to bake. we always choose a day that all us cook girls can get together and our little helpers are home from school. (except the boys...) we have so much fun baking our family favorites and the girls love licking the bowls and spoons and apparently sofia loves to play and clean up in the bathroom. it is always so much fun and the end result is so yummy!

VISIT TO SANTA

two saturdays ago we went to tell santa what we wanted for christmas. Nico told santa he wants his puppy that is in tennessee, annelies wants anything hannah montanna and jakob said something that only he understood. sofia shied away and ollie only says ba ba. The santa was very patient and very REAL looking as nico and annelies said. there was absolutely NO wait to see santa and the experience was wonderful. the kids were satisfied that they got to see santa and rob and i were happy that there was no wait. it was a win/win afternoon.

SINTER CLAUS

It was a very busy day. the roast went in the oven at 10 am and the house got straightened up all day with all the little ones coming behind me just to destroy what i had cleaned. rob, lorna and andy came over to eat dinner, get a christmas tree and do our sinter claus traditional stories, hot chocolate and speculas. YUM!! while the boys and annelies left to get the christmas tree, lorna and i finished up dinner. the boys came in with a beautiful tree and we sat down to eat shortly after. we had such a yummy dinner with roast beef, potatoes, carrots, yorkshire pudding, gravy, spinach salad, and rolls. VERY TASTY and rob was in heaven. after dinner poppy told his history of sinter claus story and put jakob in the naughty sack. then rob sang songs with the kids and lorna finished with the bakers dozen. we then opened presents and then finished the night with hot chocolate and speculas. it was a fun night. oh did i mention there was a heated debate between rob and robert (i won't mention about what) and i got stuck with the clean up at the end. i will say the boys did clear the table. other than that, it was a picture book evening!

JAKOB IS OUT OF SURGERY

READY TO GO HOME!!! the procedure went well, but he was so sad to go back into surgery. he had a really hard time. he was very happy to get in the car and go home! now for the next few days he has to wear a little pager that monitors his acid levels and i have to log all the times that he eats, coughs and throws up. fun stuff.

RESTING AFTER SURGERY

DONE FOR NOW...

JAKOB READY FOR SURGERY

jakob is going under...AGAIN

well- tomorrow (thursday) jakob is going in for yet another surgery. this time it is concerning his acid reflux. jakob has a lot of problems with vomiting under stress or in extreme excitement, sooooo..... the GI doctor is going to place a small chip at the top of his esophagus to measure the acid levels and the damage that is being done to his little body. this will make his 2nd surgery in the past month so i am a little nervous, but he is always so brave. he is very good at getting as much sympathy as possible after all is said and done. wish us luck and say a little prayer.

pictures of the yellow river game ranch

our fun thanksgiving weekend

our thanksgiving was so much fun. we spent time up at rob and lorna's cabin in the blue ridge mountains. we got to visit with melanie and tyson (once tyson got there) and all the kids had a blast. my kids LOVE spending time with there cousins which doesn't happen often. finally we ate an amazing thanksgiving meal with two huge turkey (lots of left overs), rolls, potatoes, brussel sprouts and my yummy sweet potatoe souffle. YUM!!! it was a very fun weekend. once we were home, rob and i took the kids to the yellow river game ranch where all the animals are out of there cages and just roaming around the property. the kids got to pet and feed the animals. they had so much fun and ollie was in heaven just being outside!!! it was great family time and it is always so rewarding as a parent to see your children having so much fun!

HAPPY HAPPY BIRTHDAY

well another year has gone by and jakob is another year older. he waits for this every single year and pretty much counts down the days..... he gets so excited. he knows that mom and dad always come to school with cupcakes and party hats, he LOVES his birthday!!! he got the spider-man III movie and the new guitar hero with the karaoke, drums and guitar, and a new suit for church. Birthday time is always special, but for jakob it is his favorite time of year!!

it has been a crazy two weeks, we are preparing for thanksgiving and Jakob had his IEP (his education plan) and now we are planning on moving him to a new school and steering away from sign language. because the school that he will go to is so close to us, we are going to be moving nico and eventually annelies there as well. this will be so great for the kids. jakob's cochlear implant has been SO successful that we are going to start dropping sign and focusing on speech. super exciting. he has come a long way!!! those of you who haven't seen him in a while would be amazed. Nico is so excited for the school change, he has a very strict 2nd grade teacher this year. they go outside maybe once a week and they do A LOT of testing and paper work.... BORING!! jakob's birthday is on monday and he is soooo excited. he is counting down the days and sings himself the happy birthday song everyday. he has put his spider-man cake order in and wants hamburgers and french fries for dinner. poor little guy is suffering right now with an abscessed tooth. his jaw is really swollen and strange looking!! he is not letting that interfere with his birthday excitement. Ollie is enjoying all the excitement in the air. he is so cute, he found a pencil the other day and decided to join nico in homework time. he is of course sporting knuckleheads from head to toe!

the charleston

Star in Your Own JibJab! It's Free!sofia and jakob are so talented!!

my little mexicans

Star in Your Own JibJab! It's Free!annelies and nico are so cute in this

potty training frustrations!!

It has now been a good 2 months since we have introduced potty training to sofia. we have done the potty dance, we have done treats, we have tried reasoning with her, we have tried EVERYTHING!!!! i am willing to try whatever anyone else might have up there sleeves. i have never had a child this stubborn before. HELP!!!

The New Baby

My sister and her husband, Scott just had their first baby on November 2nd. He was a whopping 8 lbs 15 oz!!!! HUGE. He is so cute and the kids are so excited to have a cousin nearby. His name is Beckham Scott Parker and so far he is a very sweet little baby. Marissa is getting too much sleep (in my opinion) and Scott is way too helpful!! J/K. they are all doing very good

our new campfire

We are in the process of finishing and upgrading our yard. first we took out all the bushes and are now putting in an irrigation system. (now that we have a HUGE drought in GA, we can't do much with the sprinkler system and we can't put any plants in.) Rob spent a lot of time building a new dog kennel and it is finally complete!!! Next we are planning on putting in a nice pavillion with outdoor seating and a great grill and kitchen area. next to that will be the basketball court!!! it will be an amazing backyard when it is all done, but in the meantime, rob built a pretty amazing fire pit in the back of the yard by the creek. it is huge and we got to enjoy it friday night for a fun family evening. rob told a funny ghost story and we roasted marshmallows and hot dogs. we finished the night with a really yummy peach cobler made under hot coals in the dutch oven. sooooo good. nights like this are priceless. once we were done with our fun outside family time, rob and the boys stayed up playing guitar hero III and me and the girls crashed in my bed watching the wizard of oz.