Thanksgiving Montage

Here are the rest of the pictures from our eventful trip back to Idaho and Utah. Heidi and Brandon's wedding was beautiful! They are a neat couple with a lot to offer! Congratulations you guys! We are so happy we could make it! It was a lot of fun to see the family as well. Joel hadn't been back for two years! The older nephews (Brandon, Cody, Tyson, and Zach) have grown so much and even Brandon is taller than Joel! It gave Joel the opportunity to be a boy again and play lots of video games! We also got sick. Joel and Allegra both got strep throat... Thanks Ra Ra! Allegra was also getting in her molars, so lets just say that sleeping was pretty much non-existent. She got used to sleeping with us too, and now she doesn't want to sleep in her crib. I don't know what to do about these kids and their sleep problems! Gianluca... I rarely saw him. He had a blast with all of his cousins and now that we are home, he is bored out of his mind! I am not as much fun as them... go figure. We had a blast seeing all of you! We love and miss you very much!
P.S. Make sure to click the pause button on "my music" down on the right hand side before you watch the montage.

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Part of Heidi's Wedding...

I'll be posting more, but here are some of Heidi's wedding when we were at the temple. Of course the dude just decided to defile the Holy Temple grounds and pee!!!

My Baby is Walking!!!

 

I wasn't expecting my sweet girl to start walking today, but she just decided to. It's so cute. She looks like a little old lady that needs a walker. Her legs are wide apart and she walks really slow, but she's doing it! At 16 months, but I am so happy for her! Now she can start to keep up with her friends. She is also talking up a storm. She tries to repeat what you say and it is adorable. She says: hi, bye bye, daddy, ma ma, ba ba, more, no, it's hot, what's this, this, that, bankey (blankey),ball, kick, yummy. She just is figuring things out this week! We are proud parents! When I get a chance, I'll put a video up of her walking.

Circus Circus!

 

Well, last Monday I took the kids to the Circus while Joel was out of town. It was fun and interesting. When we got there Gianluca got to ride a little pony. He loved it, but of course wanted to ride the Elephant and Camel when he saw them. Unfortunately for him, good for me, that we didn't have the money to let him. We had already spent it on popcorn and cotton candy. He and Allegra loved it for the most part. They really loved all of the animals. It was pretty amazing all of the tricks that they could do. I still wonder what attracts people to want to be in a circus. But it was a good show and most of the people in it were not from the U.S. So all in all, I'm glad we went, but I'm not going to be running back any time soon!

The Bane of My Existence!!!!

Okay, we all know that I hate... HATE mosquitoes! I am like a magnet for those blood suckers who love to feast on my sweet Idahoan blood! If there are 100 people around me, they will sniff me out and hunt me down. There is no running, no hiding from these angry beasts of prey! I also learned an interesting side note from Gianluca's "All About Bugs" book by Dr. Seuss, that only female mosquitoes bite. I don't know if it's true, but I don't doubt it. That is something a woman on a mission would do!!!! I always joke that my new favorite perfume since moving to Texas is "Off" bug spray. I put it on practically year round, every time I go outside. Just ask my girlfriends at the park, I never leave home without my bug spray!!! It is November-- NOVEMBER PEOPLE!!!! And I am still getting bit by these nasty low lives! So now I have another insect to add to my list of things that get under my skin... LITERALLY!!! FIRE ANTS.

Gianluca has been bit by these nasty things a trillion bazillion times. Last year he stuck his hand in one of their piles and got bit over 25 times on one hand. Of course his hand blimped up three times the side of the other hand and I had to dose him up w/ benadryl and cortizone cream. Well about a month ago, it happened again. I swear these things just draw him in w/ their mesmerizing ways. He loves to watch them crawl around and also try to kill them. He and a friend were running around at the park and ran into a giant ant hill covered up by pine needles. There were tons of these ants all over his little ankles just attacking him. His shoes were covered by these ants! I ran over and tossed off the shoes and socks and soaked his feet in the doggy water thingy. He was up for two nights because he couldn't sleep. He had over 46 bites on his poor little feet!!

So this week I felt his pain. We went to the circus, and I knelt down to talk to Gianluca (it was dark) and knelt on a bunch of ants. I got about 11 ant bites on my knees. They are still bothering me to this day. It is a burning itching feeling that just drives you bonkers! Even I had to get up and go take Benadryl so I could sleep. I can't imagine the poor dude with his 46 bites! He's a tough dude! So this week was my week of "attack of the killer insects" I had 11 ant bites, 5 mosquito bites, and three spider bites all on my legs. These are the BANE OF MY EXISTENCE!!!!


Here is a pic of Gianluca's hand. The ant bites form little blisters all over.


My camera has been really blury, but here is a pic of his legs. Poor Dude!

The Many Alter-Ego's of Joel

This is white trash, redneck, mullet-loving Joel. This is a very aggressive backwoods type of fellow you want to avoid! He will eat all of your Kentucky Fried chicken if you leave it unattended! Do not mess with the mullet! He has a very high MPSI (mulitude per square inch). After all he has the calm before the storm, or as some like to say "Buisness in the front, party in the back" DON'T MESS WITH THE MULLET! Actually this was Joel for Halloween last year. He found a facination w/ mullets while living in Idaho and Utah and of course seeing my kindergarten pictures w/ my sweet mullet. He will never let me live it down. I think he studied mulletsgalore.com for a year while we lived out west.



Meet Matt Foley, motivational speaker who "Lives in a van down by the river!!!" This was Joel's work costume this year. He even used Gianluca's pillow for the gut piece! (For those of you who don't know Matt Foley, it's a skit on Saturday Night Live).



Last but not least, here is a picture of Dr. Evil and Frou Fabrissima in the last Austin Power's movie "Goldmember". This is taken from the jail scene when Frou visited Dr. Evil. I guess a few people actually thought I was The Nanny, Fran Drecher. This was from a party we went to on Saturday night at our good friend's Eddie and Samantha (pictured below). I think we were the only one not drinking. We had our own special punch bowl. No one else was drinking out of it! It was a blast!

HAPPY HALLOWEEEEN!!!

AAAHHH another year of trick-or-treating has come and gone! This year was a lot of fun as Gianluca is really getting into it. He loved helping me with the decorations and hanging our ghosts up in our tree. I loved it too as it has always been one of my favorite holidays. (P.S. Mom, I'm still a little sad you gave all of the Halloween decorations away while I was not living at home to have any say in it!!! I'm getting over it). We started the night off by going to the Panther Creek shopping center where all of the stores give out candy. My friends Betsy and Kristin and all of their kids went too. It was fun and CRAZY!!! Kristin and I decided to get take and bake pizzas, and waited for what seemed like an eternity to get them. So I was finally making my way back to my sexy mini-van w/ Allegra in my arms, the pizza, all of the candy. I put the pizza on the hood of the car while I load up my crying baby who is very cranky and buckle the kids in their car seats. I was just happy to be going home and pulling out of my parking spot when I realized "What did I do w/ the pizza?" It wasn't in the car, OR on the hood of the car. I jumped out of the car and can't find it anywhere. I was really mad, because I thought someone must have picked it up and I just paid $8 bucks for that thing! All the while Allegra is screaming and the Dude is tearing through his candy. Finally I turned around and there it was smashed and run over in the middle of the road! So I took my crying baby, my hyper 3-year-old, and my smashed pizza into the pizza place (Nick and Willey's) where the owner was nice enough to make me a new one! Thank you!!! That pizza was amazing! Next up we got home ate the pizza and then went out trick-or-treating w/ Nicole, Sean, and Elijah and Issac (1 years old). We went clear around our circle and by the end Gianluca could barely haul his candy around so we stuck it in the stroller. He then entertained himself w/ Elijah's cool flash light. When we got to my house, all of the trick-or-treaters were dwindling off, so I was hurrying to get the rest of my candy out to a big group of kids. I thought Gianluca was right behind me. I knew he was mad because I made him give Elijah his flash light back. Well, he wasn't behind me. I was calling out his name (Joel was at the church) and asking people if they'd seen him, and finally saw him on the side of our house just pouting. He said "I run away mom! I was borrowing that flashlight!!!" Man did he get a talking too, where he then said "You don't love me anymore?? You don't want me??" and started crying. What in the... where does this kid get these things!???? Too much candy and not enough sleep! So anyways, all in all it was fun and the kids were so cracked out on candy that they stayed up until 10:00 pm. It was a crazy time!




Here is my adorable little witch who refused to keep her witch hat on. I guess she just wanted to show off her adorable hair! She had a pretty good time as long as she had a sucker in her mouth!



I think I said before that the Dude decided to be a pirate instead of a ninja at the last minute. The little boy in the picture is Elijah.


Here is a picture of Allegra and Bode (Betsy's son). They are two days apart.



Candy Candy Candy!!