These are a few of my favorite things....The CITY MUSEUM

We love going to the City Museum in St. Louis. These pictures do not do it justice. It is the # 1 coolest place to take your kids EVER!! There are holes and tubes to climb in everywhere, giant slinky's in the sky. There is a 3 story slide that is lightning fast and a 7 story slide in the enchanted caves that starts on the roof. AMAZING PLACE!!! Wear comfy old clothes for climbing on your knees, parents too! The entire place is recycled. You may need some hand sanitizer too! FUN FUN FUN!!!! Indoor caves, a running train, everyday circus...your kids will thank you. P. S. If you go when it is nice the outside is open too, you have to see it to believe it.

The Blasi zoo travels to the St. Louis Zoo

Our family loves going to the zoo in the winter. If you have ever gone in the winter you know why. All the animals are out and about and crowds are not an issue. One of our favorite places to hang out this year was the tiger cage, where there were 4 new cubs and 3 of them were nice enough to pose for a little pic. It was really fun watching them pounce on each other and play. The mom looked worn out which I could totally empathize with.

Christmas Day 2008

Just a few pics from Christmas morning and afternoon and grandma's house. We had a wonderful day and hope you did too!

More Karaoke

Christmas Karaoke

Merry Christmas everyone! I thought some of you might enjoy watching the boys do a little 8 am karaoke. It was great.

Tutu much fun!

Today is Christmas Eve and I have been frantically making these tutu's for my nieces. It was so fun to make something "girly". I wish I could post a picture of the tutu's on but the boys were not interested in posing.

Happy 12th Birthday Noway!

Tonight we celebrated Noway's birthday. We had taco soup and Green Velvet Cake. Noway got some ipod accesories, gum, sports magazines, and money to blow. He was most excited about the gum he got. Noway is sort of a gum expert. Everyone at schools come to him to get their gum, his backpack is always loaded. He also got Ironman which we watched tonight. It was a perfect night for a movie, the weather outside is nasty.

We also had fun with grandparents. The second picture is Mel trying to show Grandma and Grandpa how texting works. They were here when our niece Leslie texted me and it was funny to see their reaction to new technology.

They couldn't believe how fast she could send one back to Mel compared to Mel typing one to her. Thanks everyone for a nice evening. We love you Noway!!

The Weather Outside is Frightful

We had an ice storm last night and thankfully our power is still on.

Thanks Marcia

I loaned my friend my camera flash this weekend and she got me this for a thank you gift.

SWEET! Thanks Marcia!!! You can borrow my flash anytime. It's the little things people.

Let me catch some of you up...I am a lotionaholic and this "is my favorite brand of heroin." I put lotion on all day long, over and over again. So last week I was at Ace Hardware and the cute young lad working said "OMG do you smell that?" To which Kami and I were panicked like, is it a fire? " Do you smell that, It smells like cinnamon, and vanilla" Kami says "Oh that would be her" He looks at me like he might jump over the counter and says " you smell delicious!" FUNNY! I now love my delicious lotion even more. Yesturday I subbed at the school and all the kids had to come to me to staple their wreaths. Suddenly they were all surrounding me saying "you smell yummy, Mrs. Blasi" LOVE IT. I hope all of you smell deliciously, yummy this holiday season. I know I will! I bought myself 4 large bottles of love. That should last me til Spring....UHOH you can only buy it October thru December. Houston, we have a problem!

Video Trials- Pause music on bottom of Blog before playing.

We will see how this goes. I just got a new little flip video camera for Christmas. This is my first video post. I hope you will be able to hear it ok. Thanks so much for the camera. It is so tiny to tote around and should make it fun for everyone to catch up on the boys better. More video's to come soon!

Yoda is in top video, front and center. Noway is singing front and center of the second video. Our guys aren't too tall yet but it does come in handy sometimes.

Tree Time

The Tree is mostly up. I need to get a star for the top but I can't find one I like. The nice ones all seem to weigh a ton and pull the top of your tree down. I am looking forward to Santa's visit. The tree always looks better after he comes and and puts tinsel all over it.

Castro and Yoda put up our traditional tree in the downstairs family room. We love getting that one out and remembering all the ornaments we have collected over the years and hanging all the handmade school ones up. We hope all of you are having a great Holiday Season.

P.S. Mel picked out the tree, I think he did a great job!

Ballin'

Noway had a big game on Wednesday against Monmouth. We lost by 2 but the game was very exciting. Noway scored 3 points and his quick relfexes helped him get 6 steals.

My Obsession

I am sure most of you are expecting something to do with Twilight. While it is true that I am in love with a fictional vampire and ask that my family refer to me as Bella I do have another love.

This little bottle of deliciousness brings me joy everyday. My favorite hand lotion EVER, Vanilla Bean Noel from Bath and Body. It is so yummy! This flavor can only be found mid October - December so stock up people! It is a combo of Caramel and vanilla. I apply it easily 30 times a day so if you are still Christmas shopping for me....I'm just sayin' LOVE IT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

My First Gingerbread House

So I finally built my first gingerbread house. I just want to say that the Grand Champion Food Network Bobby Flay Throwdown Gingerbread Queen lives in our town and I suddenly have a whole new respect for what she does.

I was so stressed out. Where should this go, this is the wrong shape, it has a crack, there are too many candies to choose from and not enough.

I am recommending that if you have OCD you not try to build one of these houses of horror. FYI

At least the boys thought my house was cool. That being said I did have a great time laughing it up with all the sister at church. It's always a good night when I laugh till I ugly cry.

A Balancing Act

Uncle Jason taught Noway this really cool trick this weekend. You make a little pile of salt on the table and balance items on it. Waitresses love this salty little mess I am sure, since I have now swept my floor 50 times this weekend. Noway currently has a salt shaker balancing on it's side in the church kitchen. ( he is hoping it will be there next sunday) This is his latest balancing act. The can was nearly full, I was just waiting for it to fall but it didn't, lucky you Jason! I need to put salt on my grocery list as we are running out fast around here.

Christmas with the Martin's and the York's

Friday night was Christmas with some of my family. After attending the ward Christmas party we came home and had our Christmas party. The boys made us some yummy cookies and we opened gifts. The boys each got a nice Gander coat which they are super proud of. Castro commented that just today at school he noticed all the boys in his class had on a camo coat and he wondered if he would ever get one. ( who knew?) We all got spoiled with great gifts but the big winner was when the boys each opened a large box, which contained a smaller box of course, and then another. The last box held a shiny new Ipod Nano! The boys also got equipped with ipod cards and are now in download heaven. It was a really fun, fast weekend. Thanks so much for coming to see us and spoiling us all rotten! We love you!

A stop at the Hawton's

On our way to Thanksgiving in So. Illinois we made a pit stop in St. Louis to visit our friends the Hawtons. You guys are one of our most favorite families in the whole world, wish we could see you more.