Thanksgiving Day - Part 1

We are celebrating our first official holiday in the new house--I wish all of the "kids" could be here.    Over the years, Tony has cooked our Thanksgiving meal and I think the food gets better every year.  This year, David helped out in the kitchen and Joanna and I did our "watch the men cook from our seats at the bar" routine.  We are real Swegle women--we don't cook, we enhance!!

We're going to drive David and Joanna around the development while the turkey is cooking, so stay tuned for Thanksgiving Day - Part 2 coming soon!

Preparing the bird

Two great chef's.....one single bird

Putting in the stuffing

Getting ready for the "bird massage"

Tony, enjoying the bird massage, way, way too much!!  Notice that David has bailed at this point; it was just getting too wierd!

From A to Z

We had the kids while Jenna and Jon were at the hospital with the "new" baby. I heard quite a few gems from Ben as I always do. Let's see, there was, "another brother, oh no!" And then there was, "Sam you have to share with our brother," as Ben was taking an airplane out of Sam's hands. But the gem of the day happened when we got to the hospital. Ben and Sam saw the baby for the first time and Ben was pondering about the event.

He finally said, "when do we go to that place where the judge tells us that he is ours?" Everyone laughed and Jon explained that since this baby grew in Mommy's stomach, we didn't have to have a judge tell us that he was ours. Jon went on to say that Ellie was special.

Ben, always the planner and not one to be easily diverted said, "well, will we have to go back there when we have our next baby?"

Jenna, full of pain killers and cold medicine stated firmly, "Ben, we're not going to have anymore babies, this is it." I think Ben still wants to go to court and talk to the judge!

Speaking of gems, please see our beautiful and ever expanding family.




The best Mom I know

The end, sad but sweet

Ellie saying, "what do you mean you're the new baby?"

New baby saying to Ben, "we bounce rubber balls of his head for fun? Do you think I was born yesterday?"

New baby saying to me, "So I hear you're going to buy me lots of clothes and toys. How do you feel about motorcycles?"

Of all of their babies, this one looks like Jenna when she was born. It took me back 35 years.

Even though Jenna and Jon like to keep the name of their babies a secret until he or she is born; I've always thought I had a knack for figuring it out. I knew Sam was Sam from the minute I found out about him. And, with Ellie, well, Elizabeth has always been my favorite girl's name (second only to Jenna, of course!!) so I hoped very hard that Ellie would indeed be Elizabeth. But with this one, I was way off. Alexander kept ringing in my head. "It sounds like it should be in the bible," they said as a clue, "but it isn't." Hmmm....that got me thinking. All of their children have a three syllable name, so Alexander fit the bill. Not in the bible, 3 syllables, a good strong name like Ben, Sam and Elizabeth. Yep, I was convinced it was Alexander.

Well, today we met Zachary William Purdum for the first time. I was way at the other end of the alphabet. Zachary.....it never occurred to me. Guess my knack is gone...good thing, too, since Zach will be their last baby!

And what a baby he is. Bright eyed, alert, big....8 pounds, 12 ounces and 21 inches long. Through all of the noise of his brothers and sisters and grandparents, he just watched us all, taking us all in for the first time...maybe wondering, "what did I get myself into?" But beautiful with every look.

What a wonderful family Tony and I have. It keeps growing with beautiful people. We hope we have more grandchildren in the future, but until then....

Benjamin Scott, Samuel John, Elizabeth Rae and Zachary William, Moe Moe and Papa love you so much.

Chill, Jenna, I meant grandchildren from David/Joanna and Tony/Marie!!

Happy Birthday, Dear Sammy, Happy Birthday To You

Wow....Sammy is 3. No way....I have a picture of Ben, Sam and me on my desk. Ben has long hair, I'm laying down on the floor and next to me is this little baby boy with wild hair. And now, he's playing video games at a higher level than Tony and I, he's riding a bike and pretty soon, he'll be out of diapers. Where did the time go?

Jenna and Jon had a nice birthday party for Sam today. It was too cold to be in the park, so we all went to their house. What a great job they have done in re-tooling the bedrooms to get ready for Baby #4--or, as I call him, Alex.

I think Sam had a really good time and was surrounded by people who love him.

Happy Birthday, Dear Sammy, Happy Birthday to You.

Next Up.....Miss Ellie at 1 year old. Wow.....time flies.

Count Down to So Much

It was a busy weekend. Donna and Bob's 40th wedding anniversary and their party. Slipping away to our favorite vinyards for the last time, celebrating with Marie over cake tasting and a cake cutting set that says "Moving On...." a tribute to their journey. Two weeks to the wedding, 3 weeks till the baby. 4 weeks till the move....wow....this is a count down to so much!!!

Enjoy our weekend....

Enjoy!!

The Things I Learned Today

We had the kids last night and part of today and as always, I learn much from them when they are here.

Here are a few lessons I learned:

1. Ellie likes to play train with the boys, as evidenced by her laying across the tracks so no trains could move. The boys tried to move the coal car above her, but that didn't work either, she took the coal car and started to suck on it.

2. All of the kids still like Papa best. All night and today it was "Papa, papa, papa...." that pleases me.

3. Sam likes to go without pants. When I changed his diaper, he ran around the room and said, "no pants, Moe Moe." He enjoyed being naked.

4. I slept in the wrong bed. Ben asked me to sleep with them last night, but when I checked on them, they were fine, so I went to our real bed. Ben came into the bedroom around 6:45 and jumped, bringing his arms down on my arm...he spoke directly into my ear so he didn't wake Papa and said, "Moe Moe, you sleepted in the wrong bed."

5. Ben and Sam can wear each other's pants. Ben put Sam's on today and Sam put on Ben's...they didn't' care.

6. Don't think that just because Sam has a flashlight and opens up the toilet that he is going to throw the flashlight in. As I was washing up Ben, Sam came into the bathroom and lifted the toilet lid, flashlight in hand. Fearing that he would throw it in, I said sharply..."Sammy. no." Just as sharply, he replied, "have to pee," and proceeded to pull his diaper off and hand it to me.

7. Butt is still a funny word. They bounced the ball off of my butt today and laughed with glee as I said, "oh no, you hit my butt."

8. Sammy is kind. Every time Ellie was on the floor, he made sure she had a toy and was not swallowing it. He said, "Yellie tune," which I took to mean Ellie's turn.

9. Ben knows his directions. He told us to turn left and right to get us to his house because "Mommy goes this way to go home." He remembered the turns very well.

10. We still have two living rooms. When we tell Ben to play in the other room, he wants to know which living room he should be in--the living room or the family room.

11. Ben knows that the kangaroo is the symbol painted an Australian airplane. Sam knows that when he points the flashlight on the ceiling, he makes stars.

12. Both boys know that when they hear noise in the sky it's tunder.

What fun it was to see the world from their perspective. And combing Ellie's hair....well, let's just say that I understand why Jenna puts it in a bow. It just kept getting wider and more curly.

We love our babies.

That's A Wrap

Well, today I am 59....a wrap on my 58th year. Not sure how I feel about this....Tony says it's just a number, but for me, it's a passing. A passing from the 50's that went too fast, a passing into the unknown. I feel 59, and that makes me sad. I feel old and used up and I wish I didn't But I am. ARG..life goes too fast.

But, at least this was a good passing. I had a wonderful birthday with lots of cards and gifts and good wishes from alot of people and a phone message from Jenna, Jon and the kids. How cool is that!!

Tony and I used the gift card that we got from the kids to go to Pickwick and Frolic for dinner. It was a great gift. We saw Dina Costas, the owner of Pickwick's daughter. She used to work at our favorite wine bar and it was from Dina that we learned so much about wine. She is a wonderful person and made our night even more special by taking us to the comedy show after dinner and treating us with not only the show, but dessert and more wine. We laughed until we cried and had a wonderful evening.

Before dinner we walked around downtown and saw the film crew from the Avenger's movie. That was fun. We saw our favorite downtown buildings "reduced to rubble" that was really just plywood and plaster board. We took pictures of cars that were destroyed in the movie and stood by and watched huge craines with lights set up for scenes.

It was a good day to be in Cleveland. And after dinner and the comedy club, we just walked. There was a breeze and in our own way we said our first goodbye to Cleveland. We will be back. We will see Dina again. We will walk around East 4th and pass by the places we have been. But really, for us, this is a wrap....we are Wilmington bound now and Cleveland will be where we were from, not where we live.

I will miss it.

More Firsts!!

Not to worry future visitors, the house does have bathrooms, the porta potty in the front yard is only temporary!!

The bath tub in the master bath

The fire place in the living room...view from the kitchen

The "back" window is the guest bedroom. The windows near the back patio will be the office.

Tony's future domain....the kitchen. On the right is the start of the bar. You are looking at where the stove will be.

View from across the street. We are on the left. Our neighbor, Bill and his wife live in the house on the right. To the left of us will be the Ferrows and to the right, the Zeno family.

The garage is sticking out. The area in the back is the front door and front porch.

This is the back patio, you can see where the fireplace will be (on the right.)

Our house will be framed with trees in the back.

So much is going on in our lives. I joined Weight Watchers and went to my first meeting last night. For the first time in a long time I felt like I could do this program and achieve the results I want. And so I am committed to it. This is indeed a life style change and that is exactly what I need.

Tony went to see our house in Wilmington as you can see from the photos. I didn't realize that they were so far along in the building of it. I think it's going to turn out well. Look at the picture where all you can see behind our property are trees. WOW. Talk about the view from our window.

It's interesting to see a house "being born." We walked through the model of this home many times, but this is ours. The beems will keep us safe. The windows are where we will watch the world go by. This is like watching an ultra sound of a new life.

So, enjoy our new home and we hope you all visit very soon.