Weekend trip to Columbus

Sammie will be one tomorrow, but I am running behind schedule with my pictures. Stay tuned for new pics of our cute little one yr old! Hard to believe that the year has gone so fast!

These pics are out of order, but hey what can you do! At the beginning of October we took the kids on a weekend trip to Columbus for my cousin Anthony's wedding. They had a great time seeing their cousins and some of mine too! The kids and I first started at the Columbus zoo (awesome!), then visited some friends and fed their alpacas, then we met up with Mark and my family at the hotel for dinner and that was just on friday. On Sat the kids swam at the hotel pool, stayed up late watching Toy Story 3 (which isn't as kid friendly as the other two), had a babysitter, and then had delicious ice cream on sunday and also played at the mall playground! We packed a lot into that weekend! Our kids had a great time despite the fact that Samantha was a little under the weather. Not sure what she had, but she has been teething and had a low fever, and then a rash when we got home...(maybe roseola).

Papa Joe holding the sick Sam and Caden chowing down on ice cream in Dublin

Jeni's ice cream is the best!!!

On the way to get ice cream!

Gigi, Cade and Aunt Jen

swimming at the hotel

kids swimming with papa Joe

(samantha was feeling a little under the weather, if you cannot tell)

Eating at the hotel with my cousins Theresa and JuliAnn

Pajama party at the hotel watching Toy Story 3

Visiting my college friends Karen, Lane and their baby Wolf (born on Mark's bday 3/30)

Sam and Lane playing with the pots/pans set

pic with us and the kids

feeding the alpacas

Sammie checking out the alpacas

Bats at the zoo

Sammie along for the ride

Caden was all about the polar bear statues...

lots going on...

I am not sure when I stopped posting Samantha's week to week pictures, but I thought I would catch back up! We were having camera issues and ended up missing a week in there...so sad, I was doing so good and almost to the 1 year mark! Samantha is growing so fast! She has made huge strides since she passed the 9mth mark. After trying some chunks of our food, she has pretty much decided that she doesn't want anything to do with baby food. No thanks mom, stage 3 foods are not for me. Oh well, easier for me anyway. Around the 10mth mark she took her first steps and now we are 2 weeks later and she is going about 10+ steps at a time. At first she was very unsure, but is now liking it a lot more! So is her brother...he just doesn't understand why she cannot chase him around the house yet! Ha!

A couple of years ago, before kids, we took Nia out to Xenia for the Doggie Dash n' Splash. So now that the kids are a little bit older, we thought we would treat Nia to another trip to Xenia. If you have a dog and live close to Xenia...I would recommend going! It is so much fun. It was such a perfect day to be outside and watch all the dogs run around in sprinklers and a little baby pool. They also have border collies that do tricks and jump in the air to catch frisbees. So much fun!

Dad and Caden after running through sprinklers with Nia

Mom and Samantha (good shot of her 2 teeth)

I am constantly telling Caden not to let Sammie have any of his snacks because she is a baby. Almost immediately after I say that he comes back with "baby...2 teeth". Cracks me up every time!

bunny was spending some time in the corner...I guess he did something bad too!

We just went through a huge project with our house...we had a crew put on new siding! Caden absolutely loved "the guys" as he called them and was so sad when he would wake up from his nap and they would be gone. I wasn't so sad to see them go. It can be a little much when Caden wanted to help them and show them all the bugs that he found out in the yard. It was a great and interesting day when they replaced our back patio door. Caden and Sam were so excited to see what they were doing and Nia was even confused by the easy access into and out of the house. Right side of door removed.

Both doors gone and so happy with our new sliding door. So much better than the old door that always got stuck on the floor. And it seems so much lighter in the room now. The house looks great now that we have our new front door as well...looks like a totally different house. I need to take a pic of the whole house and put it on here.

so much junk mail...

Just wanted to post something about junk mail since the holidays are just around the corner and the catalogs will be coming in by the truckload! If you are sick of getting catalogs which you never buy items from then check out this free site and help the planet out a little bit.

www.catalogchoice.org

Yes you do have to register, but it is free and can help get rid of the amount of junk mail!

Hope everyone is doing great and enjoying the nice cool weather...I love fall!

And I will be posting new pictures soon...we just bought a new camera because our old one broke and then our backup to the old one broke a couple weeks after that!

Happy Fall!

A trip to Vegas

Now that August has come and gone...here is a little of what we have been up to!

I took the kids down to Cincy for a visit with my OU girls! It has been a little while and plus we thought the party may get little Baby Geiser anxious to come out! (Our plan worked! Tyler was born a week early.) Our good friend Andy was in town from NYC to experience the craziness of all the kids together and the moms running around.

Tricia and Kristin, Me with the kids, Andy, and Amy with Erin and Andrew (Isaac stayed at home with Dad)

Erin, Kristin, Samantha and Andy

The kids and I went for a visit to McD's and this was Caden's first meeting with Ronald...wasn't sure what to think about him. He did like climbing all over him though!
Sammie's favorite treat this summer has been to gnaw on the corncob. She goes crazy for corn when she see the cob!

Mark and I took a trip out to Vegas with some couples and had a blast! It was my first trip out there and I can say it was big and busy! We had so much fun looking at the hotels, took a trip to old vegas (below), spent a day at the pool, and of course gambled a little bit. It was nice to get away for a little bit but always good to come home too! A big thanks to Papa Dave and Grammy Clarice for watching our little rascals.

Thought I would take a pic of (scary) Shrek for the kids.

Mark and Jeff Reed went on 2 of the Stratosphere rides. You can see them right out front, Jeff has his hands up. They looked like they had fun...not for me though.

Not our pool, just one that we stopped to see on our walk.

I think these garden pics were at the MGM.

And back home again. Here the kids are crawling around and chasing each other.

Sammie is showing signs that she may walk sooner than Caden did...not sure if I am ready for that yet!

They love hanging out by the front door and of course closing each other in between the doors.

We have been undergoing construction at our house for the past couple weeks, so it has been a challenge to keep the kids out of the workers way. I think they are about finished with putting our new siding up on the house, and we are just waiting for a new front door.

I will post before and after pics of the house soon.

Weddings, Nashville, and Caden turns 2!

Me and the SamSam girl.

Her hair is getting so long in the front that she almost has to wear a bow now.

Mark's cousin Kelsey got married in Nashville, TN at the end of July and we took the kids down there for the weekend. It was a great trip, a little hectic, but great! Here we are at the Adventure Science museum, it was fantastic!
Caden really thought he was driving the ambulance in the museum, I think it was his fave thing!

Sammie in the school bus

We took the kids to the Botanical Gardens in Nashville also. Not very kid friendly, but enough walking around and things to look at to waste a half hour of time before the science museum opened. Dad wasn't too happy that the gardens weren't very stroller friendly. A lot of lifting the stroller up on a nice, hot, humid TN day...dad had so much fun! They had a glass blowing exhibit throughout the gardens that were actually pretty cool. Caden could have cared less about them. You can see them on the pond.

And they were mixed in with the bamboo also. You can actually see the humidity in the pics.

Sam was a big fan of the basketball hoop box. She knocked it down and climbed on top to play with it!

For Caden's actual 2nd birthday, I took him down to the Greene to go see his first movie and to play in the water then to lunch. We had a pretty good time, only made it through a half hour of the movie, but if it was Shrek I am sure we would have stayed for the whole thing!

Using his new mower to help dad cut the grass

Caden's 2nd bday party was a blast! He woke up on the wrong side of the bed...so that was fun. I don't think he knew what to think of all the attention. The entire fam was around for the occasion so it was great!

Here is the train cake!

Caden opening presents, he was very distracted so it was great that his cousin Izzy was there to help out! Much better than me opening all the gifts!

Embarassed and mad after opening gifts...so he threw the cars down.

cousins

(Left to Right) Payton, Brooks, Izzy, Maddie, Sammie, Elle and Caden

Playing in the train

Maddie and Izzy enjoying the hammock

Aunt Jen and Uncle Brian (or Dubbitabee as Caden calls him) with the grump

Setting up the train

The diaper hat kids, this cracked me up!

After swimming in the pool

Friends and their kids

Jeff and Addyson - Tony, Josie and Grant - Mark with Caden (sammie was sleeping)

The kids have been having more fun playing now that they are a little bit older.

Caden trying to tackle Grant with no success.

Addy loved the motorcycle