the latest wells family antics

Angela was so good at ice skating the last two times we took her that we thought she was ready for lessons.  She is technically too young to start, but close enough, right?  She loves ice skating, but from the second we told her about lessons she said, "NO".  Utoh.....not a good start.  We actually almost canned the whole idea and then this morning she said she was a big girl and wanted to skate.  We know the little kid's instructor Kate because she taught Rich for his first two years so I knew she would be in good hands.  AND Angela just wants to do what Richie does so she got out on the ice pretty easy.  Once out there she did amazing!  I remember Rich's first lesson and how shocked I was.  Today was no different.  You can see her all by herself with the other kids all over the ground.  At the same time, she didn't really do much of what Kate told her.  She mostly skated around by herself.  She would come over to me and ...

My Wednesdays are the hardest day of the week because I work from home and I have Angela.  Today I looked over from my computer to see Angela quietly playing Richie's new Leappad snuggling with Regina.  She loves her puppy dog!

We finally got to celebrate Christmas with Aunt Erin and Uncle Matt!  The kids were so excited to go down to their apartment and to open more presents of course.  I had saved Aunt Donna Jo's, Aunt Kim's, Grandpa and Nana Sheila's gifts so they had another boat load of loot.  After an awesome ham dinner (complete with Matt's special ham gravy!) we got to playing with all of their new toys.  Erin and Matt helped put together their new crazy tent and played at least forty games of Connect Four Launchers.   We finished the night with birthday cupcakes for Aunt Erin and some torture time for poor Maggie dog. Thank you everyone for all of the gifts.  My house looks like a bomb hit it, but the kids are having fun!

We got the opportunity to do one of the most exciting things (at least I think!)......to skate at Fenway park!  Frozen Fenway had a day where Boston residents could skate for free and we had scored tickets.  I guess it was just like any other ice rink, but the green monster back drop made it special.  This was only Angela's second time on skates this year but we started to realize she is already pretty good.  She didn't let us hold on to her and had no fear of falling. Richie skated around with such a serious look on his face in his new hockey dress....I mean new hockey jersey (#30 Tim Thomas that he got for Christmas).  It is big because it is supposed to fit over his pads, but he was NOT going to wear anything else.  Wally the Green Monster came out with his hat and scarf to skate for a bit as well.  Angela is still talking about how, "I skated with the Red Sox".

We started today with plans to take the kids swimming, but that fell through because the gym closed family swim for the holiday weekend.  Then since the kids were so disappointed we quickly rallied and said let's go bowling instead.  When the bowling alley wasn't open yet we were in a bind with two really sad kids.  Since it was such a nice day we decided just to head to Castle Island  and play outside.  Luckily this was a great idea to the kids and they had a blast.  Not often you can head to the beach without a coat in January in Boston!  In the evening we went to the Common to check out the ice sculptures and the Frog Pond.  Look at the pic of Angela SCREAMING because she can't on the frog.  I love that picture because it is so often the scene with her trying to do everything her brother does.

New Year's Eve just isn't the same with kids.  Now we just do our best to stay up until midnight!  This year we wanted to make it  little bit of a bigger deal so we invited some friends and made some fancy drinks.  You can see Richie helped mix up some special concoctions and Regina stayed up late as well (under the plate of beef skewers!).  Thanks to Zido, Doug, Lisa, Shumway and Joanna (and baby Carly) for coming over to celebrate the new year with us.  It wasn't a wild party, but we got to spend some time with good friends (and some fireworks from the roof).

Chris and Rich got their first day out on the slopes this year during the Christmas break.  I wanted no part because it was going to be so cold and crowded, but as soon as they left I felt so jealous.  A bad day of skiing is still better than a good day at work, right?  You can see the pics I received while I was sitting in my office.  A big boy lunch at the top of the mountain and riding the gondola all the way to the top.  I guess Chris had to talk Rich out of one more run because he was absolutely exhausted.  We are so happy he likes skiing and he is more and more like his Dad every day!