Jumping on Beds..........

Happy Day!

 How is your day?

I am good. 

We have done nothing all weekend.  I am still battling this thing...one day I feel fine, the next day, wiped out! We hung out in our pj's all day yesterday. It rained here. 

Today, we hung out again and watched the Olympic hockey game....US vs Canada.  Mannie left the house to get us Subway sandwiches for lunch.  It looks like a fairly nice day but like I said, I just don't feel 100%.  

I am feeling excited though....we officially are going home (to NY) for spring break! I can't wait to see everyone.  My kids will see all their cousins and my parents, sisters, brother in laws.....my uncles and aunts!!! I can't wait! I am going to take them to my favorite spots!!!!  OMG!! I can't wait!!!!  We are going to be there for my nephew's first birthday party!! And our Easter plans are already set!  I am hoping to take the kids to my old church for Easter Sunday! It will feel so good to be back there.  Mikey is going to have an Easter party for kids on Friday....egg hunt and crafts!! It will be a fun filled EAsterfest!!

The last time all 5 of us were home was 4 years ago...Cami of course doesn't  remember a thing.  Charlie remembers that my parents house has yellow walls.  Cara remembers the most and I am sure it will all come back to her once we are there.  

We are going to hit the city too!!  I can't wait to be in the city again!! The smells, sounds and feeling!!!  We are going to see the  Statue of Liberty, central park....the village.....hoping for a show but we are going to wait on that for now.  I have never seen the Statue of Liberty....can you believe growing up in NY and never going to see the statue?? Seems odd to me.  

I am just dreaming away over here!!  

I have been scrapping alot....since I have been cooped up for a majority of the past 2 weeks....this is some of what I have done with my time.  

Here is one about Man and I....
 A Charlie at the beach....
Charlie at school....
a Puerto Rico...
another Puerto Rico....
Suzy, Laura and I got together and scrapped on Friday day.....thanks for sharing your supplies with me!!!  And I had lots of fun with you guys as always!!!  Sorry I spoiled your appetite Suzy!!    

That is all.....hope you had a WONDERFUL weekend!!!    

End of the month

 How crazy that it is the end of the month??

This was by far the fastest month of my life.

I don't have alot to "wrap up" for the month.

Basically, the month started....I packed and got ready for Puerto Rico.

We went to Puerto Rico.

We got home and were sick. 

End of the month.

We did have a fun, quick month.  A few things to mention: 

I had dinner with Tricia at the beginning of the month....long over due night out with my bud.

We also had dinner with the Roth's.....another long over due night out with great, fun friends!

Suzy, Laura and Suzy's sister, Liz, came over for a day of scrapping in honor of Suzy's birthday.

Packed for Puerto Rico.....I made it through 4 plane flights!!! 

The kids were amazing little travelers!!!!!

Both travel days were LLLLLLLOOOOOOOONNNNNNNGGGG and they did a wonderful job.  

I think they actually love to travel....probably because we stuff their backpacks with new toys and activities to work on and that is very exciting for them!!  They also wheeled their own suitcases on this trip.  Gia bought each kid their own suitcase with wheels.  So, I packed them with all their own stuff and they were in charge.  We checked them in as carry on so they did well with the layovers.  I never took a picture of it but they looked so cute parading through the airport with their backpacks on and their suitcases pulling behind them.  

Mannie played well.  I only made it to 2 out of 6 games so I only got to see a little bit but what I saw impressed me as always.  He is a great athlete.  

It was fun for the kids to travel with their cousins.  They played in the pool and at the beach and explored a fort and a dirty mangrove together!  Could it be any better for a kid?  

Me....I am just happiest when I can spend time with the family away from the everyday stuff....no computers, no phones....well, we had our cells but for the most part, no phones......no t.v.....I only caught glimpses of news bits while we were away......felt so good to not hear any of the negative crap that is on air 24/7.......no laundry/cooking......no school!!!!!   Moving to a secluded tropical island always sounds so tempting.

I always feel sort of sad to come home....it is not that I don't love my home and our life....but I like NOT sharing my family ALOT!!!  so.....then I came home and I was sick!!!! blah!  

** Almost forgot....Cami lost her first tooth!!

March will bring some exciting things.....like Cara's 8th birthday!!! I can hardly believe it!!  I have to get moving on planning that one!!  We chatted about it and I got that she wants horses, hula hoops and hand ball.....it is an H party!!! So, I think this year with be a non themed, completely random party and if she is happy with that......then that is what we will do!!!

That is all for now.

Bye Feb. 2010....you were a fun filled month!! 

Oh, and......HAPPY BIRTHDAY ERIN!!!!!!!!! I LOVE YOU and I will give you a birthday present IN PERSON this year!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! YAY!!

Hola #2.

I am back with some more pics to share.

I made it out of the house.....I went to Target, got some breakfast out and sat in the Book Store reading!!  Now, I am about to leave on more errands.  It feels so good to get out and about!!

Back to the trip....On Valentine's Day, I took the kids to a botanical garden and a museum.....Museo de Arte.

 Mannie had a game....this was their last game when our friend Mike got injured....who, btw, is resting from surgery. I think it all went well, just having a little bit of pain.  

Gia had told me about this museum and so I thought I would run the kids over there to check it out and then head back to the beach for the rest of the day.

They had a great area for kids.  
 They had little projects set up for the kids and some hands on stuff for the kids to do.  Cara worked on a self portrait.....

We saw the Santos and saw how they carve them....
 

We saw the Vejigante masks too....
OPPPs....wrong picture

  ..great cultural art experience for the kids.  

We went upstairs to the adult area to view some of the Puerto Rican art displayed.....beautiful, gorgeous museum but the kids were ssooooooooo not into walking around this part, I was a little bummed b/c I was very interested in checking it all out.

So, we hopped back into a cab and headed back to the hotel to relax at the beach.  This is when we heard the bad news about Mike getting hurt and UCLA losing the game.....but we were having a party for our friend Jen at the beach so that was something to look forward to.  We had the party at my favorite little Cafe on the beach....

Jen and Dan....gorgeous couple!
Our last day.....we drove to the south of the island to check out the city of Ponce....really cute town....it is a city but felt like a town to me.

Look at the lavendar church!!!! I thought it was gorgeous!!
A pineapple drink.....
 

Some tortillas....  
Are you hungry??

The kids and I outside of a famous firehouse museum.....
Mannie and the kids at the museum...
After touring around Ponce....we met up with Shawn and Miro at a beach in the south...it was a shallow beach in mangroves...
 the kids loved swimming in it.....I was sort of grossed out though because there was considerable amounts of trash....so we stayed about an hour and then I wanted to call it quits shortly after I got bit on the behind by some ants and it stung and I was "over it" by then....so we head back to the hotel since it was our last day.....we had dinner at my favorite spot on the beach and the kids got in one last swim in the ocean and then one last "night swim" at the pool. 
  

Adios Puerto Rico!!
Thanks for following along.....now, I can officially mentally get back to reality...well, sort of!     

Hola!

Tuesday, finally dressed and actually going to venture out of the house today!! I ended up getting something, no fever but achy and miserable on Saturday and Sunday and then yesterday, I slept half the day.

But today, I am going out into the world!!! I AM!! I AM!!! Yay!!!!!!! 

Suzy helped me temporarily fix my computer so I could load the rest of the pictures via the phone yesterday!!!!! Thanks again Suzy!!! I was so happy to have everything on here...now I can print them out!!! 

Here are some more pictures...

Cami taking a break to draw at a fort...San Cristobal....I made it seipa(sp?)

 .

The kids eating with their cousins....I post this because I wanted to show you where I ate practically all my meals...I am not a very adventurous eater so once I found something I liked, I stuck to it....plus I loved eating on the beach!! Heaven!!  
Here is another one from San Cristobal ....
  And here is one of the ocean....Atlantic.....warm and the prettiest blue......I would love to go for a dip right about now!
 I need to go....I have more to share if you care!!  (I am a poet and didn't even know it!!! I know, old and corny joke!! I am a geek, what can I say?) Catch you later!!  I won't say it.
Here is the bouquet Mannie sent to our room....he had a game that morning so these arrived as a surprise and I was laughing because it said, "I love you Annie" Adam....I think they had a language issue....either that or I have a secret admirer named Adam.  The kids and I made Valentine's at the hotel the night before with Gia and Aunt Joan.....the guys had a game that night, shocker!  We all made Valentine's and then on the actual day the kids and I realized that we didn't make Valentine's for each other.  Can you believe that I didn't make my own kids Valentine's???? Yes, I felt bad but I did give them chocolates and lollies so that was my gesture of love!! We made them for Mannie, the team and the family.

See ya.  

Saturday and Home

Hi there....Saturday morning.  Cara is still battling the virus with low grade fevers each day.  She is stuffy and coughy and occasionally has the chills but other than that she is just her normal self.  

Mannie has another alumni game today....his high school in Newport.  I wish we could go to cheer him on but with kids sick no can do.  I am getting tired of being cooped up at home.  I wouldn't mind it except for the fact that I don't feel 100% either so I am not thinking of ways to have fun just sort of being a slug. 

I thought I would look thru and post a couple more photos and then I might actually scrapbook today just to do something.  

Kids are cozy in the family room right now watching Clifford.

I managed to get a few more pictures on my computer....not much but a few more.  I am hoping to go into the Mac store and figure out what I can do to clear up my problem.  I guess I just take too many pictures.  

I am starving right now....I wish I could magically transport myself back to NY to get a slice of "Sal's Pizza".....seriously THE BEST pizza in the world!!!!  

Random information I know but that is what is on my mind right now.  I was watching a show earlier about yummy places to eat on the Travel Channel and Sal's came to mind and hasn't left.  

I also have found myself watching Celebrity Rehab with Dr. Drew....have you ever seen it?  I want all those people to get better.....how terrible, what a horrible life.  I hope they can stop using drugs/alcohol.  I want to keep watching to make sure they seem to get better now.  

Oh, Yvette....my camera is the Canon Rebel.....T1i.....it is good, I like it.  It took some getting used to....but I think I have the hang of it for the most part.  

So, here is a picture from Mannie's first game in PR.....
 

I think he always looks so cute in his baseball pants!! :)   tmi??? :)  Although much better when his shirt is tucked in.
 Another picture from the game...
Charlie looks like a reporter in this one....
A step back to earlier in the day.....Gramps and his grandkids at the El Morro fort......GO Team Adams!!!
The next day I took the kids back to the forts with Gia and Aunt Joan...UCLA had a game but it was early in the morning so we decided to skip it and go to the afternoon game (2 games that day)......so we went to Castillo de San Cristobal.   Forts built by the Spanish to protect San Juan from invaders.

They had cool tunnels and a dungeon....great views of the city and ocean. It was a rainy/misty day. 
Cara and some cannonballs...
 a view of a street in Old San Juan....
Here is a model of the Santa Maria which I think I read that day it had sunk somewhere in the Caribbean.....sort of interesting.
Finally, here is some loot on a window ledge....I just thought it looked cool.
 

That is all for today....have a good one. Hope you are doing something exciting!!!    

Gloomy Friday

OMG...what a day.  I have been suffering big time from jet lag and having 2 kids sick doesn't help.  The girls have been waking up so early although today I think they made it to 5am......but I am just dragging.  Very hard to motivate to do anything when I am  exhausted.  

I think it is supposed to rain for the next week....normally I would be happy about that but right now it just adds to my tiredness.  

I have a few more pictures to share from the trip.

We took the kids to these caverns and saw the stalactites and stalagmites in person.  I was in complete awe....the caves were just so huge...more than I had imagined they would be.  I felt like I was in a beautiful cathedral......natures cathedral.   It was quiet and echoey like a cathedral and just so massively grand and beautiful....I think they were one of the highlights for me.  I am putting the caverns in New Mexico on my list of places to visit.

Pictures really do not do the caves justice......the lighting is hard and then there is no lens that I had to convey the enormity of the caves.  But I took a couple of pictures and they will remind me of how I felt.  I love cathedrals....growing up in NY, I had access to many beautiful churches/cathedrals...one of the things that I love about them is that they have a certain consistency or feel to them so that no matter where you are, you feel at home.  I was in Europe touring with my friend for 3 weeks(many moons ago) and I started to get a little homesick but every time I walked into one of the cathedrals I always felt peace and familiarity.  That is how I felt in the caverns. 
 more on caves.....
We got to wear cool green hats and feel all official like real explorers...
  On our drive back to the hotel, we stopped at a quiet beach and let the kids go for a swim...it was just the perfect spot.....not too deep and no big waves....so Man and I could just sit and relax and let them have all the fun they wanted.
Here is Man relaxing..
Here are the little fishies....
Here is a cow.....I heard the steaks in PR are really good...didn't order one but that was the word. 

The next day we went to a fort with the whole fam.....called El Morro. It was really hot this day. I wish I had more time to explore the forts.....there are 2 of them close by to one another.....they were really cool but on this specific day we didn't have a lot of time and it was so hot anyway, the kids wouldn't have lasted much longer.
We were headed to a baseball game this day.....can you tell?

I love this one of Man and Charlie....
Here are Gia and Gramps...
 

Here is some architecture. 
  

Well....I think I will go now....hope you have a nice day!     

Hi Guys!

Thanks for the warm welcome back.

This trip is hard to get over.....Cara is sick....fever and cough/stuffy nose.....she actually got sick around the last hour of our plane ride home....she had a fever and the chills.....and now Cam has the stuffy nasal thing going.....the kids have been waking up at 4 in the morning for the day!!!  That is 7 am Puerto Rico time......my computer is full so I can't finish uploading pics.  I only did 2 loads of laundry yesterday.  

I am just in slow motion. 

I am taking Cara to the doc in a little bit.

Anyway, I wanted to share a few pics from the trip.

The trip was good but we had a couple of things that weren't so good....one biggie was that our friend, Mike...a player on the team, got badly injured in the last game.....really bad knee injury.  It really put a major damper on the trip knowing that someone got hurt so bad.  I wasn't at the last game so the kids and I were not there for the ambulance going on the field.  Poor Mike has to have surgery, he flew out a day earlier than the team.  Mannie and I were really bummed out about it.  The other bad thing was that UCLA got jipped and that last game was called on time with UCLA down by one run......if they had won, they would have played in the championship game.  So, it was a major bummer to know that a guy got hurt and then the team didn't win the whole thing.  

Okay.....so those things were bummers.....Charlie also got a fever on the trip but seemed to bounce back, no cough like Cara.  But I could tell that Charlie and Cara were not themselves by the end of the trip....they were definitely not into doing anything other than hanging in the room by the end of the trip and now I understand why.  

So, all that bad stuff aside, we did have some really fun times.  

Mannie's whole family was on this trip....well, almost whole fam.....his uncle (who is the coach)......his mom and dad......his other aunt and uncle (Gia's sister and her hubby who is the team photographer).....his sister, Shawn and her hubby Miro and their 2 kids.....

A little background info.....Gia and Gramps met in Puerto Rico 40 something years ago ..... Gramps was an instructor for the Peace Corps....Gia was one of the trainees......she was scaling a wall/rope thing and fell and hurt her leg.....Gramps carried her to the infirmary....and the rest is history as they say.  So, it was fun to have everyone there in the spot where it all started.  They went back to the site where they met and it is no longer a training facility but everything was still there.  That was cool for them.

Some pictures from the trip....
This iguana greeted us on our first full day.....he made the coolest noise as he climbed the tree....you could hear his claws grabbing on to the tree.  
Gotta love the tropics....and coconut palm trees!!  

Old San Juan at night...
Christopher Columbus got around.....
Medalla...the local brew....
 

Me.... shopping for souveniers...I miss being warm in a tank top :(
 

El Yunque...we walked 2 miles in the rainforest.....we hiked to a waterfall called La Mina.....the hike was nice but tiring....minimal whinning and complaining...(from me :).....the waterfall was  crowded with people....yuck. 
   Rainforest stuff....
The waterfall....
A pretty beach....
We collected coconuts....I am crazy for coconuts!!!  To me, they symbolize a tropical paradise!!
The kids and Mannie threw coconuts into the water and then collected them when they got washed back ashore.....
We splashed around and got all wet....no suits with us....
 

Man and I on the beach.....
 

A fruit stand....you drive up....a lady from behind bars hands you a knife and you cut off how ever many bananas or plantains you want.....
More of the stand....
  

I guess that is enough for today....more tomorrow if you are interested....I took 900 photos.....and only 400 of them are available right now.....caves and fort pictures to come.
     

I was here.....

I was here........
 

Now I am here.....
 

Back to Reality!!! 

I am actually loving being back in my own bed and eating the foods that I have missed!!

But I can say I will miss eating at a table on the beach with my toes in the sand watching the kids play and listening to the (crystal/turquoise blue) ocean waves crashing on the shore......and being in a tank top at night!! Nights in Puerto Rico are warm and balmy.  Ahhhhh......but I have a lot of this laundry stuff to do now....sand actually feel out of the suitcases!! 

It is good to be home safe and sound.

:)

  

Off Exploring......

Be back in 2 weeks!!! 

MIA....in Valentine Hell

 Hi all....hope you are having a wonderful week!!

I have been buried under a pile of stickers, paper, glue and ribbon this week.

The kids decided to make their own Valentine's....which is great except that it meant making 80 Valentine's between the 3 kids.

I helped cut out hearts.

We have been studying the earth, rocks, stalactites, stalagmites...ect....

The science table has some rocks, a volcano and Thomas and a kitty of course....when I think rocks, I think Thomas the Tank Engine!

Anyway, we had to get all the projects done this week since I have to send them off today and tomorrow!!! 

We leave in a few days....enjoying getting all prepared.  Not stressed though.

Looking forward to hanging with Tricia tonight!

And celebrating Ms. P's birthday tomorrow!!! 

Must get Cam to school!

Hope your day ROCKS!!!!! (yes, I am totally corny....I love it! :)