Hanna Montana is in the house

Isabella and Mary had a big surprise for everyone when they came upstairs with Mary covered from head to toe with a blanket. When she was finally unveiled she was no longer Mary but her alter ego: Hanna Montana! She put on quite a show. Leo was so impressed he got to go back stage and dress up like Hanna himself. Quite the superstars. 12.26.09

My sweet little shepherd

What a happy and sweet little boy we have! 12.25.09

The newest member of the family

Last year we welcomed baby Sarah Elizabeth into the family and this year we welcomed baby "Dominic". We tried to persuade Isabella to name the baby something other than her brother's name but she insisted that the little boy looked like Dominic so he should be named Dominic. I will be working on making matching outfits for the little kids so they will look like twins. Right now she is a very proud mommy of two sweet babies. 12.25.09

Watch out Gotham Batman is here!

One of Dominic's favorite presents this year was a Batman costume. Luckily he didn't open it until the end of the presents because once it was opened he wanted to BE Batman. When we got the costume we had read that it was for ages 5-7 years. After Dominic put it on we decided it was most likely for ages 7-9 instead...since it was so enormous. But despite the baggy bulkiness of the costume he had a great time climbing and running around saving the day. He even age lunch in it. 12.25.09

Fashion Statement

Nothing goes better with a 3 piece suit than bug boots. He spent the rest of the present opening in the boots. Gotta love little boys. 12.25.09

Christmas morning 2009

One of my favorite pictures from Christmas is the first shot of the kids after they run out and look at their stockings -they always have sleep faces mingled with excitement. Here are some links from 2008 and 2009. 12.25.09

Merry Christmas Everyone!

Wishing everyone a Christmas filled with the peace and love of Christ. Hope everyone can embrace the real meaning of Christmas and be grateful for the true gifts that God has given us. Love the Paoletti Family!

Christmas at the Bray's 2009

Won't you guide my sleigh tonight?

What do you get when you cross Batman with a red nosed reindeer? One tough sleigh leading creature that can not only help deliver presents but deliver justice as well. Enough said. 12.16.09

Feast of St. Lucia

On December 13th every year we celebrate the feast day of St. Lucia of Italy. I learned about this wonderful saint when I lived in Sweden because that is where the feast day is greatly celebrated. Isabella gets the honor of dressing up as St. Lucia and making breakfast for the family. She made eggs and started the coffee pot. Both the kids got to help make the special Lucia buns the day before and Isabella got the table ready for our Lucia feast, which we always eat listening to Swedish Christmas music. It is a tradition that the kids really look forward to every year, especially Isabella since she loves the fact that she is "in charge" of so much on that morning. She takes her job very seriously! 12.13.09

The Gingerbread Village

This year instead of doing one gingerbread house we decided to do a gingerbread village of 5 little houses. It was a lot of fun for the whole family. Although after about an hour I was the only one left still working--which was fine since I like the tedious work. 12.13.09

A sneak peak at the Christmas photo 2009

Nothing says Merry Christmas like these sweet faces!

It's a bird, it's a plane.....

It's a flying Dominic. Too bad he didn't have on his Superman pj's for this one. 11.21.09

The spectrum of emotion

This Thanksgiving at Grandma & Papa Paoletti's was a fun one. The kids had a great time chasing the kitty cats all around the house. Especially since there are now 6 cats to chase. Unfortunately not all the cats are that friendly. But the little black one, Mia is quite lovable and tolerated being held and loved a lot. Here is a picture of Dominic holding Mia in all his happiness. The second photo is when Mia ran away for some much needed alone time. Poor boy! 11.28.2009

1st Snowman of the Season

The kids had a great time making a snowman with Michael. They couldn't decide on whether the snowman was a boy or girl so we took pictures with both hats just in case. 12.12.09

Rosey Red Cheeks

This winter has been one of the coldest winters that I can remember and one with a LOT of snow. I let the kids play out in the snow the other day for about 45 minutes and poor Dominic had red cheeks for about 4 hours after wards. This picture was taken on 12.10 so that was long before the -20 degree wind chill that we are facing today! It has been over 2 weeks since we have been above freezing and we have a mountain of snow in our driveway. The other night I had to walk two blocks home with groceries, uphill, in the snow with the kids because I couldn't drive up the hill to get to our house due to the icy roads. Luckily my husband with his mad-driving skills got the car home later when there was less traffic around. We tried unsuccessfully for 40 minutes going up and down the hill. The bad thing is that if you have to slow down for another car on the road you lose your momentum and there is no way to make it all the way up...which means you have to back all the way down. But hey at least I didn't end up in the ditch!

Contemporary Advent Wreath

After being married for over 7 years and complaining how we just couldn't seem to find a Advent wreath that we really liked....Michael decided to make one. Didn't it turn out lovely? His contemporary design mixed with the classic Advent wreath. Too cool. 12.19.09

A visit from Fr. Chiola

What a tremendous blessing to have Father Chiola from Springfield IL stay in our home not one but two times this year! He stopped by and stayed the night on his way to Colorado for his sabbatical in August and then he stopped in on the way back and got to celebrate the feast of St. Nicholas with us.
Fr. Chiola is the wonderful priest who married Michael and I 7.5 years ago and the priest who baptized Isabella. We had a lovely visit and the kids absolutely adore him, asking me "when will Fr. Chiola come and stay with us again?" soon after he left. For some strange reason Dominic found great pleasure wrestling and fighting with the priest while he was in our home. Fr. Chiola seemed to think it was great fun.....I was a bit troubled by his incessant attacks luckily no one got hurt. 12.6.09

Cobweb Christmas: the legend of tinsel

Our first week of advent we always read about the legend of tinsel in several different books that tell the story of how spiders made beautiful decorations on the tree for Christmas. In honor of the three different books that we read we also make chocolate spiders that are ever so yummy to eat. It is a fun way to start off advent every year. Click here for a picture from last year. 12.3.09

Behind is the story of my blogging life

So I am trying to catch up some of the highlights from this summer/fall. I hope to post some of them before the new year so I can start afresh again. We will see. Since this is the beginning of a new year in the church I suppose this could be my advent resolution? Its a thought. I have added some new posts but I have already put them in chronological order so start at the bottom and scroll up to see them all.

Making popcorn garland

Isabella was determined this year to have strings of popcorn on the tree like they do in so many Christmas books. So I bought some dull needles and gave the two kids a bowl of popcorn and some string and amazingly enough they strung the whole bowl of popcorn! We had enough garland to do most of the tree. I have to say that I kinda like it. Except for the giant popcorn explosion mess that was incurred in the process. (nothing the vacuum cleaner couldn't handle) 12.2.09

Poor little, tired, boy

After spending 5 days at my in-laws and a 5.5 hour drive back to be at a family Christmas party and then several hours at a Christmas party, this is what Dominic looked like the next day in the middle of the afternoon. We were decorating for Christmas and putting up the Nativity set when I looked over and saw Dominic falling asleep on the floor. He slept for almost 3 hours (don't worry I moved him to the couch after he was really out). He ended up with a fever that night but was better by the next day. 11.30.09

How sweet is this?

Most of the time the kids do a lot of fighting at night running back and forth between each others beds saying "mom, Dominic is in my bed again" or "Bella won't leave me alone!" So you can see why this is so sweet to find them asleep together especially with the row of stuffed animals above them.
The kids told Michael once that some times at night they like to play "mommy & daddy" Michael said how do you play that? The kids replied: "you just lay in the bed next to each other and snuggle"--pretty sweet. 11.19.09

Dominic is turning 4

To no surprise Dominic requested a Superman cake for his 4th birthday party. It took a LOT of food coloring to get the vibrant colors worthy for Superman....but in the end it turned out good. Dominic was happy even though the icing was bitter from all the food coloring. He was so cute going around all day asking when his party would be and proclaiming "today I am the birthday boy!" I loved it. He was thrilled with every gift he got and went to bed tired but happy as he clutched his light up batman figure while he slept. This morning I watched him force himself to wake up so he could change into his new Superman shirt and go play with all his new toys. His real birthday is Wednesday so we told him he can be the birthday boy for three more days. I can't believe he is really 4 years old! 11.15.09

Isabella the model

Last year Isabella got to be part of Hallmarks Christmas decor in the stores. She had gotten selected to be a model for their photo shoot after we were referred by a friend. Here are some of the pictures that were displayed in the stores. (we asked if we could have them after Christmas and the manager gladly let us take them home). So in case you missed seeing her in the stores last year here is a glimpse of the photo shoot. How sad is it that it took me almost a full year to get pictures taken of them!! 11.09