Do not underestimate the powers of the Dark Side.

Here is our newest 6 year old. For Hudson's birthday we had a visit from Darth Vader. The kid's arrived and were able to decide if they wanted to be a Jedi or a Sith. The kids loved it.

Hudson, wanted to be a Sith. Luckily, the rest of our kids wanted to be Jedi. Isn't this the cutest little girl you have ever seen next to a garbage can?

So, we literally have 17 lightsabers in our house. What did Hudson want for his birthday? A new lightsaber, of course. Here he is with new Darth Vader lightsaber, which was his favorite until his birthday party, where he got a Mace Windu lightsaber. The kid is in heaven.

For Valentine's day I gave Shelly the gift of a Sunday nap. During her nap it was just me and the kids. I got bored and gave Sammy a haircut. She'll think twice before taking a nap again.

The boys have been begging for "exercise shirts".

This piece of art was made by Gracie. She called it "Gracie's shadow"

We thought that if we got Gracie some new underwear, that she would show more interest in wearing underwear instead of diapers. Good news: she is showing more interest. Bad news: this is how she wears it.

Happy Birthday Sam! Here he is after cake.

Before cake.

Jonah calls this his ninja look. I call it Jimmie Hendrix.

Back to Hudson's Star Wars party. Jonah really got into it. I was actually surprized, with 20 kids, each with his own lightsaber (mostly ours). The kids were fantastic. There was no crying and no one was hurt.

This is next Christmas' family photo, expect this in the mail around December 15th.

This is as close as Gracie would get to Mr. Vader. It is actually funny to see Darth Vader in a kitchen. I bet he makes a mean eggs benedict.

Teaching Moments

We introduced the kids to The Princess Bride yesterday and we were watching it a little today. Which can I just say, what a great show!! Anyway, remember when Vicinni was telling Wesley about how smart he was? He asked if he'd ever heard of Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle? Hudson turned to me and said "Hey Mom, we have playdough." Which made me laugh. I started to tell him that it wasn't playdough, but Plato...a philosopher. He then asked what a philosopher was but then Vicinni was about to drink the drink poisoned with iocane so he stopped paying attention to me. I guess he'll have to assume the man in black was uneducated about playdough.

Happy Grandpa Day!

Our sweet Gracie is a crack up! I decided I should start recording some of the silly things she says. Today, as I was going through her backpack from preschool I noticed a cute cup with a paper groundhog she had colored and painted. When I asked her what it was (meaning the groundhog) she replied matter of factly, "a grandpa". To which I replied "you mean groundhog?" She said "no Mom, it's a grandpa." Then walked away shaking her head like I was so silly. So happy grandpa day...I'm not sure if I should share this with my Dad.

Putting a lid on 2009

Two very rare things: A photo of the whole family and a picture of the kids, with all of them looking at the camera.
The girls have been in dance this year. They had a Christmas recital were they did great.


We went to Thanksgiving point to see the lights and reindeer (both were a disappointment), but the night was great and memorable because of the chocolate, vanilla, strawberry banana split with hot fudge, caramel, whip cream, sprinkles and cherries.


This is a picture of Gracie from the dress rehearsal of her dance recital. She did not dance the whole time, she just stood there and picked her nose. We bribed her with ice cream for the recital and she danced her little legs off.

These are the boys' mean faces. We were making funny hairstyles with their hair using water. Jonah's doesn't do as much as he would like it to.
Emma, with Grammy and Shelly at the nutcracker.
This is evidence of Hudson's obsession, boxes. He collects them and stacks them in his room, he had all sizes, from toothpaste sized to the sizes you see here. Until I "intervened" he had 27.
The kids entered art into last years reflections contest. It was hard because Hudson and Jonah won awards and Emma did not. It was mostly hard for us as parents, Emma couldn't have been more excited for her brothers.


This is Emma and me at a They Might be Giants concert. It was a family show, and Shelly was more than happy to step aside so that Emma could go with me. I was so excited to buy Emma her first concert shirt. We went up to the t-shirt table and Emma looked long and hard at all the shirts. She finally looked up at me and asked: "So, Dad, if you buy me one of these shirts, do I have to wear it?" Needless to say she didn't get a shirt.

The rest of our trip to California

Everyday, on my way to work, I drive past a travel agency. Outside, they have a sign up that says "Disneyland is the best Christmas present." I couldn't agree more, with how cold it has been this week, it would be nice to be in California.
While we were at Disneyland, Grammy and Grandpa took the kids to Build-a-Bear. There is nothing in the world that goes together better than Disney and Build-a-Bear, not because of Childhood magic, but because they both have overpriced toys.





We spent one fabulous day at the beach. My Aunt and Uncle told us about this great beach. It was a public beach with access through a neighborhood. We were the only ones there for most of the day.
We build a sand castle and the incoming tide started taking it out. We built a wall, and the kids guarded it from the incoming waves.







There were tide pools with hermit crabs and sea urchins.













Sea World was a lot of wet fun.


Hudson wasn't tall enough for a lot of the rides at Disney and Sea World, so we stuffed his shoes with napkins. The next day we improved it by having him wear flip flops inside his shoes.

After getting soaked by Shamu, Gracie found a warm piece of concrete to lay on.







We bought a camera for the kids to use and each kid got a day to use it. Hudson really wanted a picture of a dolphin and tried, with little success, for about 10 minutes by this glass. Seriously one of the funniest things I have ever seen.

You drive all the way to San Diego to see Shamu and the kids are more excited about a very aggressive Pigeon.

We watched the Whale show from up high so that we would not get wet. The kids saw all the people get wet and so we had to come back later, we sat on the second row and got soaked.

Hudson and Jonah could not get enough roller coaster. Hudson and I went on splash mountain 5 times and after the 4th time he lamented that he wasn't getting wet like everyone else(they always had him sitting behind an adult, which shielded him), so on the 5th time I took matters in my own hands and made sure he got wet. After that he went out proudly to show his mom how wet he got.








Oh the Star Wars Training Academy. We went first thing one morning knowing we had three kids who wanted to participate, and luckily all three were chosen that first time.






What a trip!