Why; Yes!

In our life full of children, jobs, classes, and other insanity we often say the word "no".
"No. you cannot eat that"
"No, you cannot jump down the entire flight of stairs"
"No, you cannot jump from couch to couch"
"No, you cannot skip showers this month"
"No, you cannot keep that as a pet"
"No, you cannot trade your sister for a brother to get your own room"

and so on.

A while ago (a few years?) Connor took the book "Yes Day" out of the library.
Taking a cue from that book, we decided to have our own yes day. (After years of begging...)

We began with polling the kids with what they wanted for lunch. They were a little slow to the idea though. Siobhan and Aisling wanted chicken noodle soup and hot chocolate; exactly what they had for lunch on Sunday! Connor wanted chicken strips... We asked them if they wanted to go anywhere and they said they just wanted to watch movies all day. (My kids can be so boring!) Finally, we suggested Pizza Putt. The resounding screams made it clear this was a hit. (Although my kids do scream incessantly....)

We headed to Pizza putt. Connor had two meals for lunch. ("Yes day")

Connor, Aisling and I then went off to play Laser Tag, (to work off those meals...) while Siobhan rode some rides and played some games with Al.

We had a good time with Laser tag. Connor is a perfectionist who is highly competitive. This can make it a challenge to join in with games like this. Today, though, he was great! We joined in with a larger group who was there, and Connor got to hang with some bigger kids. Unfortunately, Aisling's vest wasn't working. Thankfully, they gave us a free game, so we got to go back in. That was nice!

Siobhan had a blast riding the horses!

She was also able to do some bowling. She couldn't wait to show us all the bowling game!

The kids then spent some time in the ball put/climbing toys.

After several attempts, Siobhan was finally brave enough to go down the big slide:

(Only after her sister, of course)

Then there was a little time for bumper cars:

When we got home it was time to have dinner. "Yes day" dinner is apparently fondue and a movie.

The funny thing is that the kids didn't like the cheese fondue! (although they swore up and down it's what they wanted!) They were content to chow on bread, chicken, and grapes, since they knew dessert fondue wasn't far behind!

Nothing like chocolate covered fruit and pound cake to end out a great "yes day".

Our days are so busy. That's just the nature of our life. Our children are busy, and our jobs and lives are busy. Our children are also extremely well behaved, and are a joy to be around! Generally, when we participate in things like this it's for a special occasion; holiday or birthday. Today was so much fun. It was so beyond ordinary. The kids' bedtimes were late; chores were late; food was utterly unhealthy....! And yet it was so special just to enjoy letting the children take the lead. They were just so much fun to be around. Today was such a nice reminder of what special little people we have living in our home. One of the things I think was most wonderful was how simple their requests were. They were so happy! They were just genuinely excited about the whole thing! I wholeheartedly recommend that every family try a "yes day".

(A few guidelines: anything that gets done on a yes day has to be completed/consumed on that day. (i.e. no spending hundreds of dollars on new toys; no promises of things to come for tomorrow). If you have siblings, you may need to make compromises about your yes day requests; and yes days do have to end.)

At the end of the night, Aisling asked if we could do a "yes day" every weekend.While that will definitely not happen, I do look forward to another one happening at some point soon.

Feeling the love!

We had an amazing weekend this past weekend. We were able to head back to Massachusetts for the weekend for the O'Connor annual Christmas party. That was on Saturday. On Friday we were able to (finally!) reconnect with close friends of ours from our graduate school days. We had not seen Shel and Dave since, as they remembered, Connor was running around in a diaper while we were camping a few summers ago! (just a few...!) Reconnecting with them was wonderful, and felt like we were picking up right where we left off! I am thrilled to know our children have finally met, and cannot wait to get together again! (Perhaps in Vermont this time?!)

While I have not had time to take pictures off of my camera (these classes are getting so hard!) Shel wrote a wonderful blog post and shared some great pictures. I will share it here.

http://ouronesweetfamily.blogspot.com/2011/12/like-peas-and-carrots.html

In addition, we had an amazing time with my family. Although my childhood was full of ups and downs, my children are certainly experiencing some wonderful family times, and for that I am very thankful!

Getting the Christmas Tree!

Each year we get our Christmas tree from White's Tree Farm. It's a family run business, and we've been going there for at least seven years! This year it was extremely warm, which felt unseasonable, but was nice for tree gathering! This year we also brought Wyatt with us for the first time ever. He seemed to have a good time, although he had to walk quite a bit!

The farm where we get the tree has a beautiful view of Mt. Mansfield.

We found the one we like!
It's shocking that Connor is sticking out his tongue...



Siobhan really has that pose down!




Connor helped cut it down; although it was pretty challenging.
Aisling tried to help:

Connor helped carry it to the car.

We brought the trailer this year; there was no snow so that was an easy choice!
Wyatt got in on the posing action:




Getting the right tree calls for cartwheels:


And somersaults:


Joyful running:


And celebratory dancing!

Feel the love!

My dear friend Shel has given me a blog award! Shel and I met in graduate school. And while we lost touch for far too long a time, she is back in my life and I am thrilled! We have only reconnected via Facebook thus far, but I so look forward to the day when we can reconnect in person and I can meet her darling baby girls! Her blog is One Sweet World.

She selected me to receive a:

The Liebster Blog Award started (sometime in the recent past) in Germany to encourage traffic to hidden gems of blogs with 300 followers or less. So it is an award you receive, but also an award you give (share the love kinda thing). If you receive a Liebster Blog Award you are asked to choose 3-5 other bloggers and link back to the blogger that gave you the award. Thank you, Shel for viewing my blog as a hidden gem!

Unfortunately, given the fact that I rarely have enough time to write in my blog, I most definitely don't have time to read other blogs! (Except for Shel's that is!) So, I have no one to pass this award along to. But, thank you so much Shel, for thinking of me!

American Girl!

Today I was lucky enough to have some special time with just Aisling. We participated in an American Girl tea party at the library. There were some crafts to do, games to play, and food to eat. It was a blast! The theme of the day was from Molly's era (1944) and Addy's era (1864). With both of these there was a patriotic theme. From the Molly era we played "Statues" (freeze dance) and red light green light. From Addy's era we played Bean Bag bucket brigade. the girls made patriotic painted teapots, and they sewed their own pillows for their dolls. We then had a yummy tea party with other era based snacks. There was Shirley Temple punch (Molly) and Lemonade (Addy). There was Jelly roll ups, Pigs in a blanket, and patriotic cupcakes, all from Molly's era. There was also gingerbread, Applesauce cookies, shortbread cookies,and corn muffins, all from Addy's era. We had such a good time.

When we got there they took pictures of the girls with their dolls. They then turned these into favors by gluing the pictures onto the schedule of events!

Painting her teapot:

(Thankfully the library provided art shirts!)

Sewing her pillow:

(This was hard work.
Aisling was able to thread the needle a few times!)

She worked on a word search between activities:
Red light green light:

Then we had our tea party.
Great menu!

Someone had lent the library nice, proper tea cups and saucers!
There were even tea cups for the dolls:
Yummy food!

Aisling and I had such a good time. I tried convincing her to do something like this for her next birthday party; I think that would be a wonderful time! I love spending time with the kids like this, and definitely don't get to do it nearly enough.

Halloween!

We had a great Halloween this year. Full of excited sugary children who stayed up far too late and ate much much too much candy!

We carved pumpkins on Sunday...

Aisling chose her own design, stenciled it and carved it nearly all by herself!

Siobhan obviously needed a little more help.
She chose a stencil of a cat; about which she was very excited!
Connor also carved his own pumpkin, with his own design....

As you can see, it was very, uh.... creative:

The kids headed out for trick or treating:
We had a princess:

She wore these shoes halfway around the neighborhood!
I swear she's better at walking in heels than I am!And a "hippie peace sign girl"

we also had a ninja, but you may not be able to see him...
Ready for some trick or treating!
Next it was time for stuffing their faces full of candy!
And also scary vampire teeth:

All in all they had fun. Full of the typical exhaustion and squabbles that go along with that.Eventually they decided to sell their candy to the orthodontist. They scored four dollars for their candy!