Christmas Eve Eve.....

We were in NJ to visit Grandmom on the 23rd. The babies did awesome on the car ride there and back, actually I think that it is the best that they have traveled so far :). Unfortunately they got tired and we ended up leaving Grandmom's about 15 minutes earlier than we planned... there is not much you can do to comfort tired babies.
Grandmom made Bella and Jack babies:

But Bella just loves babies so she has decided that they are both hers

We opened presents from Aunt Pat, Aunt Jil and Uncle Don (we missed you Aunt Jil and Don and hope to see you soon :) )
They got an Elmo train/construction set, which they share pretty well.... Jack wears the "hard hat"

Of course we played the organ:

I love this picture!!

Then Bella realized that she could sit on the foot pedals and still make beautiful music! Grandmom and Bella look they are having a serious talk here....

When I was looking through old pictures the other day I found this one.... I love this, there are so many memories around Grandmom and the organ and I love that I have a picture with my brother and I with Grandmom similar to ones that I have of my own children

Isn't that such an awesome picture???
All in all it was a wonderful Christmas Eve Eve :)

Christmas Eve....

Christmas Eve will always mean one thing to me: Grandmom Newman's. For as long as I can remember we have always went over to my Grandparents on Christmas Eve. This was the tradition up until last year when I has kids and more of my family moved out here to PA. Regardless of what I do though, Christmas Eve will always bring memories of Grandmom and Grandpop's....
Apparently this year my brother got a ski mask and I got a bunch of jewelry to coordinate with my stylish flower shirt and pant suit

that year I also asked for a clown wig.... don't know why I wanted it, but I did...

Not only did the wig look awesome on my, my Grandfather looked quite dapper

Remember those Magic Eye Puzzles where if you stared at a picture just the right way it would become 3-D... well here is Grandmom trying to figure it out

This has got to be my most favorite Christmas memory....
My mother, brother, and I get to Grandmom and Grandpop's and of course we check out the presents. There is the HUGE package.... I mean it was huge, it was long and thin and it almost reached the ceiling. So there we were eating dinner and it was all I could think of is if that present was for me... It was!!! My Grandmother MADE me two care bears and Dorothy and Toto dolls. I can remember so much about that... I still have the care bears

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Christmas Eve went a little something like this:
We would get there and Shawn and I would look at all the presents, and there were always tons, so we had to sneakily see what was for who....
We would eat dinner and I think when I was young dinner lasted about 50 hours, or that is what it felt like.
Then depending on the time we would either go to church or open presents. As I got older I really enjoyed going to church, they had a candlelight service and it is beautiful.
At some point the guys would end up in the living room:

Grandmom had made dinner

And we would take a family picture at some point as well:


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I know this post is a little all over the place but I wanted to get it done while the babies are still sleeping :)
No matter what I do on Christmas Eve NOTHING can ever be better than Grandmom's

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We Love Santa....

We got this picture taken a little while ago but just got around to scanning it in to the computer. Yeah.... this year with Santa was not a happy experience. Poor kids!

What a week......

Ugh.... I really think that it is time for some health to come back to the Druck home. Now while I realize how lucky we are this cough and cold crap has been here long enough thank you very much! Luckily Mom has been able to help out during the days because there is only so much you can do when there are two little ones who want to be in your lap.
For some reason today they have loved the laundry basket and would sit in it while they watched tv .... anything for a moment of peace :)

notice how Jack is sitting on her? Bella is that engrossed in "Yo Gabba Gabba" to care


and a big old Pampers box works just as good:

The thing is though that poor Bella just likes to play by herself for the most part and well Jack, he just likes to do whatever Bella is doing so we have a lot of moments like these

But since Bella is out of the box, Jack wants out too..... For some reason though he is stuck, and me being the wonderful mother that I am, I took a picture before I got him out :)

It was the nap time so we went to bed....
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Bella has this thing where she likes to back her butt up into things, she does this a lot when she wants to sit in your lap, it is actually quite cute, probably one of those things you have to see to appreciate. Anyway she was in my lap and I tried to take a picture of both of us and I told her to smile and this is what I got:

(please don't mind the runny nose!)
Anyway.... the babies are asleep (YAY!) and I need to do somethings around the house :)
Love you!

Merry Christmas from Jack and Bella....

We went and got some Christmas Pictures done. They came out pretty good... well as good as you are going to get for two 1 year olds who really do not want to be there. I brought presents for them to unwrap to get them involved in something if needed and brought some cookies for thier pajamas pictures because I figured if all else failed it would be cuter to see them eating a cookie than tears streaming down their face.
Here is Bella after she opened her present ( A "Little People" tractor and girl.... my goodness how these two LOVE Little People)

I was shocked that Jack not only left his hat on but that he could have cared less that he was wearing a tie

Getting pictures of them are not so easy.... BUT I really kind of liked this one... This is how Jack looks a lot of the time (happy/proud and like he has something really really important to tell me) and Bella... well Bella loves boxes. She loves to put things in boxes, likes to throw boxes, likes to chew on boxes... boxes really are an all around perfect toy

The way the pictures were going we just whipped out the cookies right away for the pajama pictures because they were DONE! But I think they also turned out cute and were my favorite pictures of the day. They had never had a whole cookie before so they were very happy to eat them!


All in all it was a success!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving everyone! I can not even explain all that I am thankful for.... to sun it up in one word it is "family". I have such a wonderful family and I can believe how fortunate I am. Here is a big part of why I am thankful:
Jack and Bella in holiday attire (I made them :) )

Mischief....

First off sorry for not posting more but I have been sick for the past three weeks now. Two trips to the doctor later I still have this hacking cough and dizziness... boo to that! I just started some steroids so I hope to start feeling better soon!
So just one pic today so I can rest while the babies are sleeping....
This is what happens when you leave them alone with a box of wipes while you go pick out their clothes and are gone for 2 minutes...



It was hard to be mad and I wasn't actually because they were so proud of themselves and having so much fun!

National Prematurity Awareness Day

Today is National Prematurity Awareness Day.... did you know that 1 in 8 babies in this country will be born premature? ugh, that is just too many!
I have thought about this many times throughout the day and it is just amazing to me to see my little preemies and where they are today.

I did everything I could in my pregnancy to take care of these two and still they came 6 weeks early. I will never forget that night.... good and bad, I can remember it all.

Tiny Bella as she was getting "sun" for her jaundice

Jack in his "box".... ha ha, I remember the Doctor joking with me with my "Jack in the Box"... I laughed but it was sad at the same time.

But I am very,very fortunate to have two NICU graduates...

This was them last December with Jack in all his chunkiness


tee hee hee

here they are over the summer....
And this is myBella, the ballerina on Sunday night


The whole point of this post was just to remind me how wonderfully fortunate and lucky I am to have had such a success with our preemies. I am truly blessed!

Don't mess with Jack and his puffs....

Jack is such a cute boy. For the most part he is easy going and he loves to laugh. He has the best laugh and his smile lights up a room. But fair warning: DO NOT mess with Jack and his puffs! He takes them very seriously and is a piggy if they go on his plate... he will literally try to scoop up as many as possible and hoard them.


See that face?? I don't think he can possibly fit more in his mouth let alone trying to hold any more.
He just really, really, really, really loves his puffs.... almost as much as he loves his Daddy


That smile... what I wouldn't do for that boy when he smiles!

There are days when I just love being a Mom of Twins!

This morning was just great.... Jack and Bella were playing with this one toy and one would bend down and "hide" and pop up and make the other one laugh... they played peek-a-boo for awhile and times like those make up for all the other not so fun times!
This afternoon though it seemed like both the babies and I were just "blah" and we all needed something to do.... Well I decided that it would be fun that if they not only had pudding but if that ate it themselves. So I whipped up some vanilla pudding and got them mostly naked....


Yeah... I think they had fun

Seriously.... how can you not smile when you see these faces???

Bella enjoyed herself:

Jack, on the other hand LOVED this and when he could not get any more up with his hands the smart boy bent over and sucked on the tray....

Bella wanted to make sure that she got every last drop before I gave her a bath:


So all in all it was a success! It totally changed my mood around, I was able to sweep the floor, the babies got a bath, and the high chairs got a good cleaning... winners all around!

(oh... how could I forget this JACK IS WALKING!!!!! So I now how two walkers on my hands! He is just so proud of himself... he will walk to you and he has this crazy smile on his face... it makes me so proud!)
Here is a picture of Jack walking while he is modeling his new slippers:
dang, he is skinny... he kinda looks like he is going to get me like Godzilla or something....

Jack giving us a pouty look



Bella modeling her slippers:


Now here is where she looks like Momma... curled up in her chair enjoying a cup of coffee.... (ha, ha, ha, ha, ha... okay I will keep laughing, I don't actually get to sit and enjoy a cup of coffee but it is a good thought right??)


hmmmmm..... not much else is going on with the babies. I will ask for any extra thoughts and prayers though... my Grandmother, who this blog is for, is in the hospital with extreme pain in her stomach again and we are still not sure what is going on. So if you can spare a prayer for Grandmom Newman I would greatly appreciate it!