Weekend Recap

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We had one of the best weekends on record at the Heffs House- doing almost nothing!! We had not a single thing planned and anything we ended up doing was spur of the moment and very relaxing. We ended up going on an awesome date night thanks to Emmy, having lunch with our old buddies the Keeps (Francie was ecstatic!), cleaning out the garage and getting rid of some baby gear, putting Christmas officially away, having Friday night dinner with friends, Sunday night Sushi with Maddie and Emmy to check out their cute apartment and taking a 2 hour whiole family nap Sunday afternoon - might have been the highlight!

Weekend in photos...

Friday night dinner with friends

Saturday clean the garage and hang out at home day - take down Christmas, tune up the Troopy, start the 4-wheeler and clean up the crap

waiting for the mail, now that IS exciting! (especially when you are still in your nightgowns at 1pm)

Little Beezer saying "I wide the moto-cycle!!!"

and Francie decided to have a "yard sale" of toys so she collected all the stuff in the house she was willing to part with (aka "Oh Maisie don't you want to give your new Tinkerbell to kids who REALLY need it?!") Charity and Yard Sale-ing might be confused here.

Yard Sale Toys - if you ran by our house Saturday afternoon sorry you were accosted by a four year old

"Mom wanna buy this Thomas? It still works!"

Maisie was busy with her dolls

Friday a new BOB Double showed up in a box on the doorstep (weird Heff I don't know HOW that happened?!) Emmy had been using the Joovy Caboose with two seats and a stand on but with crappy wheels it was impossible to push and the BOB has an awesome footwell for Francie to ride while the little ones are strapped in. Emmy and I are in love with it :)

Janie says "it's just another stroller mom."

Mersa and Mercy got to ride too

So to make room for the new BOB I promised Heff I would finally clear out my collection and sell a few of the strollers that are out of circulation. (I know I have a problem with my love of baby mover with wheels but I use them all!) I set up a blog to sell all my crap (Craigslist doens't work anymore!) so Francie helped be my tester for our sale photos backdrop

and then....

The only photo I managed from our Saturday Night date night - we went to Dio Deka in Los Gatos where my friend Marty Cattaneo is the Executive Chef. Incredible food and what a sweet date! :)

Sunday morning brunch with the Keeps at Bumble!

and Sunday Night we went down to San Carlos to see Emmy and Maddie's ADORABLE aprtment and thake them out for a fun Sushi dinner!

The girls demanded a sleepover asap

How cute is their place?!


Sushi dinner - what fun with these girls!

Can't have dinner without a show! Talent by Francie and Maisie (soon after followed by Emmy and Mary singing the entire rendition of "Show and Tell" - a Mary's SUmmer Fun Camp old favorite. How do we remember it Em?!

thanks Maddie and Emmy!

Francie says "my face was like that because I didn't want all those people sitting on their laps too"

Oh Emmy what would we do without you!? :)

Randoms and Build-A-Bear

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nothing very exciting to blog but random, blurry instagram pictures! This week the highlight was when Emmy and I were hanging out with the girls after a PJ morning and I didn't have too much to do at work so we jumped in the car and headed to Valley Fair (our old favorite stomping grounds!) for pretzels, play place, Build and Bear and a few quarter eating rides.

Valley Fair's new playplace! (only slightly less germy than the old one :)

and Build-A-Bear… of course they had Ariel outfits

Bathtime for the new Playroom friends - this is "Hug Bug"

Maisie got a fuzzy blue bear (her favorite color) but decided she needed Ariel outfit too (over Buzz or Woody surprisingly!) but picked an extra Cars shirt and Cars slippers for her bear "Hug Bug" she can be a little tom-boy with her taste!

and a random cute picture of Dad and Janie in her first bow and Princess ballet outfit her sister's gave her for Christmas (they were sooo excited about this little outfit)

Cousins in Red Bluff for Christmas

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What a week we had in Red Bluff! It's always a treat to get to continue Christmas on the 26th… 27th… 28th… and on and on :) Makes post Christmas let down a lot easier. Red Bluff was awesome. We celebrated family Christmas, went on a hayride to a campfire excursion, did a little playroom makeover, tore up the barn and swings, played with the animal menagerie, celebrated Oma and Nana's 64th birthday, threw a little "sprinkle" celebration for Maureen's surprise baby on the way and made the most of RV life in the driveway (with bathroom/showers/meals in the house - cheaters! :) Thanks for another fun week Oma and Opa!

some of my favorite photos from the week…








Oma and her brood of grandkids

What she is REALLY thinking… HA :)

Santa's Elves

I wish I could remember what Francie was so mad about!

We tried ;)

more craziness...




Oma made ALL FIVE FAMILIES these awesome quilts for Christmas - so warm and cozy!!

The little buddies got Camelbaks from Oma- they were OBSESSED

the line up

board game time with patient Aunt Maureen

Thursday trip out to a ranch for some down in the dirt fun (don't worry JJ is usually facing backwards- we threw carseats in Oma's truck)

Unloading

On the hay truck bed and "cheers"-ing with the hot chocolate in new thermoses from Oma

Let's go!

Sweet Caroline

My cute godson Thomas flashing a smile

What you mad about Baby J?

the BFF's

Stop taking pictures Mom- let's go.

ready to roast hot dogs and marshmallows

Two of Uncle Ducky's biggest fans

Look who's standing!

Bow practice with Uncle Brian

Gathered round the campfire

Thanks to Doug and his family for donating the fun afternoon to a charity auction and to Oma for buying it!

heading home for NAPS

Ladies only Baby "Sprinkle" (aka little shower) at Kat's house for Maureen- due with surprise baby number 4 on April 9!

Happy Birthday to the twins!

Kids table in the new Family Room

and the big table

Love this Oliver

Friday we took a trip out to Maureen and Dougs house in Chico for some running around and lunch


lunch for 20 at the Indian restaurant in town - kids managed to not even spill 1 glass by some miracle

bedtime in the RV - Janie slept in a pack and play in the back bathroom (turns out 39 foot RV's have TWO bathrooms?! more than our old house!), Francie took the table turned bed and Maisie got a couch. Not a bad set up for a house on wheels!

Janie attacking Maisie and Francie getting her "Mole-e" fix on dad's arm (don't ask - we have weird children)

packing up "home sweet RV home" to head HOME on New Years Day

Rest stop PB&J sandwich making on the ride home

Fueling up with the truckers (my favorite part of the whole trip was leaving here when Heff passed the line of trucks parked for breaks/sleeping and Heff said "watch out for Lot Lizards" so Francie asked 40 times over the next hour what Lot Lizards were

My driver - 10 and 2!

and that's a wrap on Christmas 2011!

Oma's Playroom Makeover

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Claire added on to her house to make it a little more comfortable when we all get together up in Red Bluff - 13 adults and 11 kids under 8 make for a FULL house. She added a big family room off the kitchen and a bunk room underneath it for the older kids to start camping out. It makes for an awesome playroom where we can "kinda hear but not see" the band of holligans too!

It was just finished and empty - I knew Oma wanted some sleeping space without bunk beds (as you saw in my last post we've got some accident prone kids ;), a reading nook, a dress up area and stage for shows, art area and bright colors. Thursday we didn't have much planned so I jumped in the car to hit up the IKEA in West Sacramento to outfit the playroom- my favorite task!

Before:

4 hours of driving, 3 hours in IKEA, 5 carts full of stuff and 3 check-outs later… I came home just in time for dinner and to lots of willing helpers to unload and start building those IKEA brown boxes - it was a family team effort but we made Oma stay away until the big reveal :)

Lots of helpers!


and… it's DONE!

The kids were SO excited to show Oma

party in the new playroom

Reading Nook

Floor cushions and a basket for extra books

Big Kid art supplies out of reach from the little sticky fingers (Ellie is the keeper of the Playroom and already doing a very good job keeping the kids in line and this place organized!)

Art or train table with lots of paper for creations

Oh and one trip to Wal-Mart for some finishing touches like canvases for the girls to paint

We're still working on an official "stage" but we made these little dividers for a temporary curtain area for all the talent shows

Dress up all hung up on the walls in the utility closet

I love this map! I wanted two beds end to end for one long sleeping space and two trundles underneath but of course IKEA only had one left so we'll add the second bed for more sleepers soon.

Finishing touches before we revealed to Claire!

some shots from my wide angle iPhone lens I got for Christmas!

<

Now time to break it in!

Bruising Up the New Year

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We had a very exciting NYE sitting home by the fire checking out our new AppleTV (thanks Jannie and Grampa! the girls are obsessed with "Wonders of the World" documentaries and our DVD collection was getting old) and doing NOTHING. Brian and I made dinner and had a bottle (or 2?) of good wine. He was asleep by 10pm with the girls and I stayed up indulging in Big Love Season 5 until 2am.

New Years Day we decided to clean and organize the house/garage and put Christmas away while the girls played with their new toys. I was half way through pulling every item out of the kitchen cupboards when Maisie fell running in her sister's too-big Princess Aurora dress and stood up with a gapping gash about an inch wide on her chin.

We called Dr. Cisco and met him at the pediatrician's office - apologizing for ruining his football watching New Years morning! It was a pretty clean gash so he was able to glue and steri-strip it up. No "real" stitches! Maisie was a champ and didn't even cry

All better! Jannie and Grampa met us at the Dr's office and took the other girls across the street to the park while Maisie was fixed up so we all went to the Oasis for burgers and pin ball afterwards. Thanks to Maisie we had a fun lunch and put off cleaning the house :)

and speaking of stitchable gashes - when we were in Red Bluff little Oliver dove headfirst into a trailer and cut his eyebrow pretty good! We were out on a ranch in the middle of nowhere so we bandaged it up and called Dr Doug (Brian's sister Maureen's husband who is a CR Surgeon) to bring his stiching kit.

handy having a doctor in the house and avoiding the Red Bluff ER for at home stitches

smiling and stitched up with a popsicle!

Christmas!

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Christmas morning was so much fun with three little girls! Maisie woke up first and went and found Heff and curled up on his lap. He said "I wonder if Santa came?" and she said "Prob-we not. Or maybe he prob-we brought me wain-deer poop. GaGa said he being me wain-deer poop." Poor second child :) But Santa did come and brought both girls shiny new pink bikes. Maisie is still a little tall for hers (Heff had the bike store guy take off the pedals and gears so it's a scoot bike for now but will grow into a real pedal bike when she is ready) and Janie got a little white puppy dog who barks and walks. Stockings had art supplies and there were a few princess items under the tree too (the biggest hits of the morning were the gifts they gave each other - a princess tent from Maisie to Francie and a princess night light/singing music box from Francie to Maisie. I didn't take any pictures all morning- it was too much fun to just sit back and soak it up.

Then we hosted Christmas Day at our house with my parents, siblings and Big Uncle Jerry. A small affair for our family!

random assortment of snacks -ready for company

Heff got a big Prime Rib for dinner and cooked it on the spit on the BBQ for 4 hours. It turned out great.

Presents with my family. I got Pat in the draw and gave him an Auburn garden gnome and as a gift for HIM and to get back at my sister for selling out and piercing her ears at 25 - a beautiful pair of lapis shell big ole Auburn earrings! You better wear those ABA!

Francie wearing a Dorthy costume, Maisie trying out her new doctor set in her Elmo PJs and Janie still in her pajamas from last night at 4pm- pretty good day!

the aftermath - and reminds me we need to hang those pictures on the wall (they've been sitting there for at least a month- shocking they haven't been stepped on and broken yet!0

guys watching football in the back-to-red kitchen! (and playing with James' new wide angle lens)

Prime Rib a cookin!

Big girls playing with toys in their room (with new twin beds)

Arte Italica table set - our favorite Christmas cards all over the wall to admire - ready… set…

DINNER!

Christmas Eve 2011

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Janie's first Christmas! We were at Grampa and Jannie's house for Christmas Eve - which is usually our big night of gifts, Cracked Crab dinner, Santa, swaps and the ever-growing Mr/Mrs Christmas contest. It;s a full night - next year we decided we may need to start earlier since we had to take the girls home at midnight and we hadn't even gotten to one of the swaps yet! It was a great night- I love Christmas at my parents house and it's 100 times more fun watching the girls getting into the spirit too.

The pretty tree and lots of presents ready for swaps and swapping

Mr Jerry Christmas - another good showing this year! Jerry started the contest three years ago when he thought people were showing up for Christmas Eve too casual...

the plaque - he was going for a three-peat

James and Em - I'm not even sure what to say about this outfit on my brother

Emmy, Em and I trying to add some sparkle

Aunt Mimi making delicious cheesy puffs - I think I had 12

Jannie and her niece and nephews (aka contestants)

The "kids table" (ha)

and the KIDS table

Jannie and Grampa - the chefs and host/hostess extraordinaire!

Ann and Pat making their Brother-in-law John Galassini's famous tortellinis

after dinner waiting for Santa upstairs! Always an energy charged 5 minutes

Santa left Francie her much anticipated Princess roller-skates, JJ got an alphabet music toy thing and Maisie- well Maisie wanted tinkerbell roller-skates but turns out they don't make specific tinkerbell ones but Santa found a Tinkerbell helmet which seemed perfect since the morning "big" Santa gifts were shiny new pink bikes. She was pretty happy with the purple Tinkerbell helmet but my brother Jerry was like "Mary - a HELMET from Santa?!" I guess it was a little weird

still a happy kid

and a SERIOUSLY happy kid

roller skating fool

Let the chaos begin

first up after Santa was the "Hilarious" swap

my favorite swap gift was my sister's but she made me promise not to blog it or she'd get in trouble for re-gifting. but it was GOOD!

and it's time to get serious - The "talent show" portion of the Mr/Mrs Christmas contest. A score card with 11 categories and a total of 75 points possible was assembled by Jerry and even emailed to everyone a week before the big day. Intense

James was very serious about his big surprise this year. And adamant the show had to be outside as usual even though it was FREEZING

the first act…

not even sure what they did I was busy getting ready ;) but I'm sure they were fabulous

The Heffs + Emmy's entry - the creche/nativity scene live and in person. This may seem slightly irreverent but we were just there to remind these competitive family members…

the true meaning of Christmas is not glitz, glamour and sequins… it's the Baby Jesus! (and if you can't tell - Emmy is the Angel Gabriel, I am Mary, Heff is Joseph, Francie is a "wise-woman" riding a donkey Maisie is a sheep and Janie is Baby Jesus of course)

A squirmy Baby Jesus!

We thought we were a shoe-in… didn't even make the top 5!

Then we were so proud of the girls- they both got up and sang songs for their own entries. Francie appropriately sang "I am a C-H-R-I-S-T-I-A-N"

and Maisie sang Twinkle Twinkle Little Star - the lamb costume kills me!

Gerald up next - looking for another win

JJ thinks we are all crazy

and then came this… WOW is all I can say. Emily appeared first in an impressive homemade corset/tutu and did a little Nutcracker ballet for us

then Darth Vadar (or so we thought) appeared from the darkness floating along (or riding a Segway- yes my brother James rented a Segway for the contest)

then he and Emily had a choreographed dance routine

and their COSTUMES LIT UP (all homemade- my brother bought some LED light up stuff off some guy in Oakland!)

and then we realized this was actually DARTH XMAS performing for us

and Rabbi Lowenstein showed up again this year (James' finale last year - and yes he also rented a rabbi costume) but HE was actually Rabbi GLOW-enstein (or maybe Pat)

and they light-saber fought

this went on for awhile…

until Darth XMAS announced he had bad news for Glowenstein…. "I am your FATHER"

the judges… not an easy job anymore

but the most impressive gift/show/thing all night was this charcoal painting Claire did in Art Class at BC as a gift for Emmy - it looks EXACTLY like one of Emmy's favorite photos of her and her mom - AMAZING!!!

more presents - Maisie got a Tinkerbell doll from James and Em. Made up for the whole helmet thing

big girl camera from Jannie

Em had Luke in the swap and gave him a huge box of candy. nice call. Uncle John said "take his picture now while he still has teeth"

the Top 5 after judges deliberated for an hour (I'm not even joking)

Uncle Jerry the Emmcee has it down to the final two…

yeah James won. Jerry had to give up the title graciously

oh this family is crazy!! But we had a fun Christmas Eve being a part of the craziness :)

SF Night

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We were in San Francisco December 23 for my family's Christmas tradition - drinks at the St Francis and dinner at Sam's - a table for 29! We usually stay overnight but this year it's a little tricky with two little girls and a baby who likes her own crib so we just drove up and back that night. It was a loud, wild, crazy evening with my relatives, as usual!



before the carnage






walking back to the St Francis after dinner

Grampa loves his JJ time!

Union Square

trying to "recreate" a picture of James, Jerry and I hanging on this banister when we were little - didn't work so much ;)

checking out the gingerbread houses while dad gets the car. It's only midnight!

Carter-Simo Christmas

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Thursday night we celebrated the Annual Carter-Simo Christmas dinner at the Carter's house. We grew up next to Ryan, Beth and Jill who were in the grades right in between me, James and Jerry (Baby Ann is infamous for scratching Bethy from her carseat in carpool:) Ryan and his wife Kim are here from Philly with their triplet boys Danny, Drew and Dylan. We took the girls home before the Left-Right-Center competiton got too heated - it was a fun night!

ABA (who just flew in this afternoon with Pat!) and her god-daughter JJ!

Three Heff Girls and Three Carter Boys!

Georgia is on it- all the gifts are wrapped! (as I sit here procrastinating wrapping mine)

Jer always thinking- dressed up for the occasion in the EXACT outfit he wore everyday for two years in 4th-5th grade. A Pearl Jam shirt that says "9 out of 10 kids prefer crayons to guns" - plaid board shorts and high top sneakers. We teased him endlessly about that shirt - he found the replica on eBay :)

Jannie and the big girls

Jerry (in his dinner attire), Jill, Ann and Pat laughing at the old junior high photos of us - the spouses all got good laughs at our awkwardness!

Ready for dinner - pretty table Carter girls!

Dinner shots - can you tell we all had a little wine? :)



The Carpool - since 1989

and with spouses! (Jer and Jill being good sports and looking like a cute couple :)

all the girls

Beth and Greg's Rehearsal Dinner posted that made it through DTPA bar scene and the wedding day golf course - and who knows where else!

Cheers!

Mariani Christmas Tea!

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We had such a fun afternoon with all the Mariani girls and a few other friends for our Annual Mariani-Simonson Christmas Tea. Arlene hosted at their house in Saratoga this year and there were kids running around everywhere - it gets more and more fun every year as the kids get older and the moms get to sit around and catch up! We were there for six hours- a great way to kick off the holiday season!

My little stinkers

Tracy and Julie

Molly and JJ

Janna and two babies

and of course SANTA made an appearance!! Here are the kids getting there last minute requests in…

The Wallace Crew - Joe, Whitney and Maddie

but my favorite Wallace photo :)

The Passanisi Clan - Emilia, Sofia and Nico

The Heff Girls - Francie, Maisie, Janie

(The closest Maise got - nice faces on the girls!!)

The Stonebargers - James, Wil, Stella and Emerie

The Cassles - Nellie and Beau

The Farwells - Stella, Giacomo and Dominic

What a fun day - can we do a Mariani Christmas Tea every month instead of every year?!?! Love you girls and all your cute kids!

Back Track

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I wish we were really back at the beach but only in photos! We just got a few more pictures from our fun trip to the Bahamas- makes me miss that sun long after anything resembling a suntan is gone!! Guess we'll just have to go back someday :) The sunglasses picture above might be one of my favorites ever so I had to revisit a repost.

I was obsessed with the colors in this cool kite the kids helped fly on the beach - I want one for the park

Jet ski maniacs - look at the Beezer driving!

We were there to celebrate 11-11-11 at 11:11am! (and pm but that involved champagne over seashells)

I'm thinking that pixie haircut was a really GOOD thing Jannie

Little scraggly Maisie - but still cute :)

big smile from my JJ

A picture Heff with a baby taking a picture of me paddle boarding - I would think "what a smart/adept husband!" but I know he was laughing at me trying to be sporty on the paddleboard and was secretly hoping I would fall hard so he could capture the shot :)

family in stripes - Janie was sleeping!

Even big girls (Francie) need snuggles

beach baby with a conch shell

Maisie looking like a big girl

Little Miss Thang (she was singing "I wear an itsy bitsy teeny weeny stars and blue striped bikini")

Night time with my JJ (don't worry Dad - it's over 4 feet of water)

wish we were there again!!!