Let's celebrate Hanukkah

For the past 8 days, we have been celebrating Hanukkah to the max!  The JCC had an event where the kids did activities with the parents, performed their songs and shared snacks.  We lit candles at home and Riley proved that he can do it on his own (while Asher kept trying to blow them out), Chris and I went to a Vodka Latke party and we have had enough latkes to last us for the whole year. 

We have had gifts for the boys each night and there have been some top winners!  Riley got a loop-de-loop race track, Legos and lightsabers.  Asher got a train set, books and toys.  Tonight we went to the JCC for an 8th night celebration and tomorrow night we will be celebrating with the family for a bonus night of Hanukkah.

Asher now officially knows the word 'present' and knows to ask for them after we light the candles.  I think it will be a tough habit to break and he will probably expect a gift every night after dinner. Riley also thinks that the gifts will continue on Christmas, so that will be something to look forward to.

Turkey Day

This year, we were lucky to have the family come to us for Thanksgiving!  We were on our own turf, on our own schedule and we got to see everyone in one place.  It was a lot of prep and a lot of planning but the Thanksgiving dinner was delicious, everyone had fun spending time together and it was nice for the boys to have the chance to spend time with the Herman side of the family.

Besides Thanksgiving dinner, we had very few plans, so it was nice just to hang out, be low key and allow everyone to do what it is that they wanted to do.  On Saturday, everyone came to our house for pretty much the whole day to watch football (Ohio State and Alabama) and eat loads of food.  The boys had a great time playing together and we really made great use of the space in the house with two TV's going and play stations upstairs and downstairs. 

It's nice that we had this time to spend together and the boys are really cute together.  Although Leo isn't pictured, he was here too and it was fun to have both of my nephews in my house at the same time.  Now that everyone is back home and settled into their own schedules, I am sure it will be nice to get back to normal life after a very busy, but family filled, weekend!

Happy Halloween!

Happy Halloween from the Star Wars gang!  This year, since everyone was in town and old enough to go trick-or-treating, we decided to make the holiday a family affair.  We asked Riley what he wanted to dress up as and with his decision of Storm Trooper, we built from there and decided to make the battle of parents vs. kids a show of good vs. evil.

Although it was a chilly night, we really lucked out with the weather as it has been raining almost every other day.  We put on a few layers under our costumes, put a bucket of candy on our porch and headed over to Bibi and Zee's neighborhood.  There were hundreds of kids and we were told how much people liked our outfits the whole way around the block.  It took a full hour to make our way around, and I ended up carrying Darth Vader for most of the event, but it was a good experience.  The hardest part was trying to explain to Asher the concept of trick-or-treating.  At first, he didn't understand that you put candy in your bag for later - he thought you were allowed to eat it as you go.  Once we stuck a lollypop in his mouth, that took care of him for the next dozen or so houses.  We also went to a few houses that had dogs at the door so he thought that part of going door-to-door was also looking for dogs.  Riley asked for candy at each stop and Asher looked for dogs - it was a good combination.

At the end of the night, the boys helped Bibi hand out candy.  This was also a little bit of a challenge for Asher.  At one point, he started taking candy out of other people's bags.  Good thing he looked so freaking cute that he was able to get away with it with the middle school girls.  

Chris and I decided that we would have been able to hit up a lot more houses had it not been for the kids, but they completed the crew so it was nice to have them with us.  Now we get to start thinking about what costumes we can wear together next year!

Riley is 5!

Well, it may be a little late, but things have been very busy here - especially in celebration mode!  I can't believe that I am saying this already but we celebrated Riley's 5th birthday!  I can honestly remember so vividly the day that he was born and it is crazy to think that it has already been five whole years!

In the past, we have had family birthday parties but this year we decided to let Riley have his first 'big' birthday party.  We let him invite friends from both last year's class at school as well as this year and at the end of the day, we had about 20 kids at the JCC for Riley's sports party.  I had fun being creative with the details of the sports party and enjoyed putting together the concession stand.  I don't think the kids got the idea but I thought it was cute and made for some good pictures!

The kids had a great time playing on the playground, taking part in the group activities and of course, eating cake!  We lucked out and the weather was absolutely perfect so we were able to spend the whole time outside.  It was exactly what Riley wanted with his friends and everyone had fun.

In lieu of birthday gifts, we requested that the kids bring in sports equipment that could be donated.  The families were all so generous and we had bags and bags of things to share.  We brought them to Jewish Family & Children's Services and they accepted them for the Refugee Services department and said they would have great use for them.  We were so proud of Riley for sharing his gifts and I think the idea of donation and giving to those who have less is really starting to sink in.

Believe it or not, Riley is already starting to plan his 6th birthday, but we are just enjoying every day of him being 5!

Back to school

After a brief hiatus, things are back to normal and everyone is back home.  Chris got home from Israel and 10 days later, I was off to Scandinavia & Russia for two weeks.  In my absence, the boys all had a great time together, but I know that having everyone back home and together works well for us all.  The boys are happy having both of us around, we are happy to have each other back and the daily operations run a little more smoothly when we have all hands on deck.

Last week, the boys started back at school and each had a great first week!  Asher is in the Tots room with Ms. Kathy and Riley is in Pre-K with Ms. Elif.  They are back to their regularly scheduled program rather than camp and have made the transition easily.  

On the first day of school, Asher's teacher gave him a paper cup with milk.  I told her that he had a sip cup in his bag and she said "no, we use regular cups now" - who knew?  Asher has been doing a great job (mostly) and has only come home with a new outfit once so far.  His speech is also improving and he is learning new words every day.  We were a little concerned with his lack of vocabulary but not only can he say mama and dada but also has words like bubble, waffle, uh oh, baby and just today, said his own name.  I think he will be using sentences before we know it.

Riley is working on letters and words and is getting pretty good at it.  He came home on the first day of school and could spell "bee".  I think he has forgotten already but it's not something that we will give up on.  He loves reading and the more we work on letters and words, the closer he will get to being able to read on his own.

The boys each start swimming lessons next week, Riley in level 4 and Asher in level 1.  I am so impressed with Riley's swimming level and how comfortable he is in the pool.  Asher loves being in the water and hopefully learns to swim just as well as Riley.  Who knows?  We may have the start of a swim team on our hands.

My month as a single mother

Today marks the start of the last weekend of Chris' month-long hiatus!  I always approach his time away with apprehension because not only will I miss him while he is gone, but it also means that our parenting game plan changes from man-to-man defense to two-on-one offense.  I approach his month in Israel as a challenge (because it certainly is) but if you get in the right headspace and just take one day at a time, everything is manageable.  I am happy to announce that with only three days until his return, I am proud of the way the month has gone and it wasn't as terrible as some people think it would be.

Sure, there are times that I am counting down the minutes until bedtime or stressing to walk Addison before the rain starts and I have to get the boys from camp, or I forego dinner and just wait until the house is quiet to eat some cereal - but as a whole, the time has gone pretty quickly and we have had a lot of fun!

We have had lots of fun playtime at home in the backyard, we went on adventures to the pool, the Children's Museum, the grocery store and birthday parties.  We have watched movies, had dance parties, read hundreds of books and watched our plants grow.  We have waited for garbage trucks, walked the dog, done art projects and watched the rain.  We have really all enjoyed each others company and I think I can say with a pretty high level of confidence that the boys had as much fun with me as I had with them.

Would I choose to do this on my own all the time?  Of course not!  But if you approach each day at a time and not look at the month as a never ending chunk of time, you can do anything in little pieces.  That being said, the boys and I are all really looking forward to Chris' return in just a few short days!

Asher is 1 1/2

If you need an indicator to confirm that time is flying by, just think for a second that Asher is 1 1/2!  It is crazy to think that he is that old already but sure enough, he is no longer a baby but every day he is more and more a little boy.

And to prove that he is no longer a baby, he is showing the growth charts who's boss.  He is now at the 90th percentile for height and 75th percentile for weight.  I measured him to Riley's growth chart the other day and he has at least an inch on where Riley was at 18 months.  I even told Riley that I think Asher might be taller than him one day, but he was pretty skeptical of the thought.

At 18 months, Asher is very, very active!  He is able to jog (or really fast waddle sometimes), he loves to swim at camp, he has favorite foods (these pictures showcase his love of waffles) and his absolute favorite thing is to play baseball.  We go in the backyard and he either watches Riley and I play or we set him up with the tee and he can take some swings himself.  He says 'baseball' and gets pretty upset when I don't let him go in the backyard and play as soon as we get home from camp.  Try explaining a rain delay to this one - it does not go over well! 

The doctor was a little concerned that he didn't have a lot of words yet, so we are going to talk to a speech therapist and see what steps can be taken.  His is super communicative and gets his point across - we just play around a little until we get there sometimes.  And he has a mouth full of words just bubbling at the surface, and I know that as soon as he figures out how to get them out, he is going to have a lot more to say!