the latest wells family antics

We had another crazy world wind adventure when my best friend Juliane and I took our four kids to NYC ourselves for the day.  We knew it would be crazy, but it turned out insane.  We took so many buses, train, ferries, etc in one day my head is still spinning thinking about it.  BUT as crazy as it was, it was worth every minute.  We had so much fun, especially getting to spend a whole day with Juliane.  I will never forget it. I love the before and after pictures of the four kids in the two strollers.  That epitomizes our day. We hit the 9/11 Memorial, then Liberty Island and back uptown to Times Square and home to Monroe.  We left on the 9 am train and didn't get back until 9 pm.  So glad these kids had time to get to know each other.  They said their favorite part was getting to see Lady Liberty up close. 

Another new family that we know are the McDonald's.  Richie goes to school with Lukie and Angela is friends with Julia.  When Lukie had his tonsils out we took Julia for a few hours.  We lucked with one of those super warm days so we stayed out ALL DAY and Angela napped in the stroller on the waterfront.  I could get used to this!

We love our new tradition of watching the Southie St. Patrick's Day parade with the Ryans.  It has been two years now, but we hope they keep coming.  This was a special year because we got to meet the newest Ryan girl, Clare.  Maybe next time I will actually take a picture of that beautiful baby......and give her the present we bought her.  Fun day!

St. Patrick's Day on a Saturday meant I would finally have time to make corned beef and cabbage at home.  It came out great, but the real treat was the 2 loaves of homemade Irish Soda Bread.  Yum-o!  I hope to make this (somewhat) of a tradition for the kids.  Chris remembers his Mom doing it growing up.  In typical "my kids" fashion, their favorite part was the cabbage.  I agree, but never would have at 2 or 5. Earlier in the day we took the kids for a bike ride along the Esplanade.  Richie is really getting good on his bike now that he can reach the pedals.  Another plus to his growth this year.  Then we hit our favorite "big kid" playground.  Who needs slides and swings when you can have zip lines and rock walls to climb. Happy St. Patrick's Day friends and family!

With Richie in a new school has come new friends for all of us!  Here is Angela and her new friend Jojo being silly at the library.  Richie goes to school with his sister Natalia and I like to sip coffee at the park with their Mom Julie.  It is a win, win for all.

The Eliot has an assembly every couple of months to hand out awards to each of the kids.  We were all lucky enough to be home to attend and watch Richie get his award for strong ability to develop and write rhyming words.  We are very proud of him because this ability to rhyme words and learn his letter sounds has led him to be able to begin to read!  He also got an award for perfect attendance in January and February.  Kind of ironic since we just got back from a week vacation (not during school vacation).

Next up, a couple of days with some west coast cousins!!  Kathleen and Steve were nice enough to let us come visit their Tahoe City house.  You can see all the games, sledding, art projects and snuggling the kids did with their cousins Laura Ann and Sarah.  There was also a special fondue dinner and some time spent on the actual lake (we love when playgrounds are in gorgeous places!).  We are very grateful for this memorable family vacation.  They better watch out because we want to COME BACK to Tahoe! Highly recommended family vacation that we will never forget.  We consider ourselves so lucky to be able to take our family on these wonderful adventures.

Day 3 was another perfect ski day and this time Richie skied with us.  He had done so well in lessons this year and this mountain was set up perfectly for us to spend the day together.  It had been so warm we started the day with breakfast outside.  Actually we did everything this day OUTSIDE!  You can see pictures of our numerous Gatorade/beer breaks.  You need time to check the trail map!  You can see Angela had another great day at day care as well.  She got to see part of the mountain on a snow mobile ride.  Sorry about the very long video while skiing but I had to capture the view, Richie skiing AND the singing and dancing he does while heading down the mountain.  Hopefully your stomach can handle the bumpy video to see all of this. Before we left Heavenly we grabbed Angela and took the gondola to the top of the mountain.  More amazing views.  Nap time on the drive to Tahoe City to visit Kathleen and family.  Part 2 of our vacation.    

Day 2 started bright and early and busy!  We had to get both kids off to the mountain; Angela to day care and Richie to ski school.  As you can see they both parted with smiles.  This meant a very good adult vacation for a few hours for us.  Needless to say (I think you can tell from the pictures) we had an amazing time.  The skiing turned out to be great (Heavenly got 5 feet of snow before we got there) and the views were.....well you can actually tell how the views were too.  We finished the day checking out the area, ice skating and eating a nice sushi dinner.  It was such a long day that when we got back to the hotel Richie put himself straight to bed (in the living room we were in!).  Always a good sign of fun.