The Fight Begins Again

Keely was born in Arizona which I can only presume is the main reason for her distinct aversion to all things cold. She is a happy go lucky girl when she can wear a bathing suit, flip flops, tank tops, shorts, you get the idea -- anything summer like. I dread the winter months with her. The snow has already flown in our neck of the woods and the temperatures are dropping. Which means one thing for me. The fight has begun. Wardrobe issues, as I like to call them. Thank goodness for school clothes because it is the one thing I don't have to fight with her about. And she's way into wearing her pants these days. Yes, I said pants! This from the girl who wore her jumper for one entire year it seemed. But on the weekends and in the outerwear department, I struggle so. She seems to be allergic to socks. She hates her winter coat. She just doesn't want to wear her winter gear. She makes me freezing just looking at her when she's in the house with a summer nightgown and no socks! Warm blooded for sure and most definitely not my offspring in that regard. So the fight has begun and it's no fun. It will continue until say, March or April except for the few warm days that we are graced with before Spring. Oh, and the time we are in Las Vegas. And the time we are in Florida. See why I want to move somewhere warm??? At least this is one thing I wouldn't have to fight about, since she gives us fits and trouble with many other things...

Girls Night Out

On Saturday night, Keely and I had a special night out with her friend Annika and her mom. The girls have birthday within 2 weeks of each other so we decided to treat them to a fun night in honor of turning 6. We took the Trax downtown and headed to The Gateway for dinner. We dined at a "lovely" restaurant (the girls declared it such) called Thaifoon. Both girls are adventurous eaters so we ordered a couple of main dishes, rice, pad thai and lettuce wraps. Oh, and a couple of fruity drinks for the adults (hey it was our night out too!). After dinner we headed over to Energy Solutions Arena for our main event, Disney Princesses on Ice. I have never been to a show like this before but it was actually pretty well done. The girls were mesmerized the whole show. Lots of other girls at this show were dressed in princess gear and I was surprised that most of the people around us were not children but young adults and women. The show lasted about 2 hours with a short intermission and then we hit the Trax back to Sandy. I enjoyed reliving all of the Disney movies and singing along to the music. Keely said she did not have a favorite Princess but she enjoyed the whole event and evening. It was fun and I look forward to more events with my girly-girl :)

The Main Event

The last day of our trip to New Jersey (minus travel day on Wednesday) was the entire reason the trip had been planned at all. I spoke of this event way back in January! It seemed to have arrived all too fast for something that long in the making, but time flies as it always does. The confirmation was scheduled for 2 PM. It was a very well planned event and it moved along smoothly. I especially liked the Bishop's homily about what confirmation means, he really aimed it at the 8th graders and I hope they got as much out of it as I did. He spoke on their level and made some jokes that I think they mostly got. I don't remember having a funny Bishop when I made my confirmation but certainly it's not the same person as it was 20 years ago (holy cow, that makes me feel old). After the ceremony, we went to a lovely Italian restaurant and had a great dinner. The kids enjoyed spending more time with their cousins. In particular, Keely was happy to be with a girl. Let me explain...all of my cousins are boys. Danielle is the only girl and the next girl born was Keely, nearly 7 years later. And Keely lives 2,000 miles away so they don't often get to spend time together. They were both pretty excited to have another girl around, as evidenced in this picture!Thanks to Suzie for taking the pictures, since I did not have a camera. I think this family picture plus Danielle & Michael came out really nice.
Here we are with the Bishop. It was very orderly and since Danielle is one of the shortest in her class, we were practically the first out of there with pictures and all.
I am so happy that (a) Danielle asked me to be her sponsor and (b)we were able to make the trip to New Jersey for the event. It was an honor to stand up with her in such an important milestone in her religious life. We enjoyed the time we got to spend with all the family as well, so I'd say it was a perfect trip. Tiring, but fun!

Action Packed...

We don't visit NJ all too often. When we are there, we cram as much as possible into whatever time we have. We visited with family. We visited with friends. We visited with Grandma and Grandpa. We ate pizza. We ate bagels. We had Dunkin' Donuts (there aren't any out West). We had good ravioli. Can you tell we ate a lot?!?! Pretty much ate and visited, then ate more and visited more.

The busiest day was Monday, when we visited New York City followed by Staten Island. The kids have never been in the City before. Heck, I hardly went there even when I lived in NJ. We took the train in and had a lovely breakfast with Jessica. We walked to the Empire State Building and waited in line with all the other tourists to take the elevators to the 86th floor observation deck. We walked down (or maybe up) 5th Avenue to the American Doll Store. Keely got a doll of her choice from Nana & Papa for her belated birthday gift. She initially named the doll Julie, but changed it to Amy Jasmine. We walked all the way back to Penn Station. We met up with Dan for a quick visit. Then we headed back on the train to NJ. It was a busy day, but then we drove to Staten Island for dinner, dessert and two different groups of family visiting. Wow, a busy day but so much fun.

Our day in pictures in no particular order, Keely got to hold my cousin's baby. In family relations, this would likely be Keely's 5th cousin. Her name is Emily Marie and she is a little peanut, about 6 lbs. and just precious. Keely looked just huge holding her!
Quinn on the 86th floor of the ESB, and notice the man's hat flying off in the background!
Now Keely but she's inside the glassed area because it was mighty windy out on the deck.
Quinn admiring the view.

That was most of the trip, minus the entire reason for it. I'll tackle the Confirmation next...

Only in New Jersey...

...do you see a ~12 year old boy dressed up as a Hasidic Jew for Halloween?!?! :) We trick or treated in New Jersey after our late late arrival on Friday night.

Oh wait, I cannot discuss Halloween without an event that occurred first. On Thursday evening, we got home and were headed back out to get some pizza for dinner. The kids both saw a silly piece of paper stuck in our front door and immediately wanted to get it. So I thought I would head off the collision at the door by asking Keely to get the mail, which is in the opposite direction. Silly me. What ended up happening may ruin Quinn's modeling career. They collided, Keely's forehead and Quinn's nose. Oh boy, did he get hit. Immediately bled profusely and I got some ice on it. The swelling started the next day, followed by black eyes. He couldn't breathe through his nose for the first few days and I was really nervous. But we consulted with our family medical personnel and it was decided that (a) it was probably broken and (b) there was nothing a doctor would do but tell me to ice and use ibuprofen to keep the swelling down, which I was already doing. He looked like he's been in a hell of a fight though. Perfect for his ninja costume!

So back to trick or treating. We went to my cousin's house and joined up with 4 cousins and some friends. We had some lunch and then hit the streets. And boy were those crowded streets. I have never seen so many kids out at once. They even have a neighborhood party in a cul-de-sac with music and free food. There was even a Robert DeNiro and Tony Soprano sighting. Good times! We also bobbed for apples, even me -- which I don't think I have ever done before. Here's the evidence...Keely after soaking herself in the first try for an apple...The kids lined up eating their free Italian Ices in the cul-de-sac. From left to right, a ninja, two hippies, a rapper (who may have been a pimp...), a scary dude with a Scream mask, pirate with muscles, and a joker with another scary mask. Cute group, huh? Quinn was the only one missing.
Here they are, my two ninjas. This was the only time that they have picked the same costume. Aunt Annie (A.A. as they've started calling her) ordered them online and I was a little nervous that they would not fit. But they were perfect and the kids loved wearing them! If you zoom in, you can see the nose swelling.
Keely loved to pose in her costume with her knives. All weapons were fit into the suitcase and made it home safely.
That was Halloween in New Jersey. The rest of the action packed trip to come...