Pics from the in-laws

I love getting pics of the boys when I'm at work and they're playing at their Lola's house. Technically they send it to Lisa and she photostreams them to me...here are a few of my favorites...

Our First Thanksgiving

This is the first year since my pop passed away that I'm once again happy about the upcoming holidays and of course my birthday. When I was a kid, I used to LOVE Thanksgiving because it was the one day when we all sat at the same table to eat. Mommy and Daddy would season the turkey the night before and would wake up crazy early in the morning to pop it in the oven. By the time it was around 2pm, it would be all ready to get gobbled up (pun intended). We always ate early back then and also used break out the fine china that was in our cabinet. I used to just eat breakfast Thanksgiving mornings so by the time lunch came, and we were ready to eat, I would be able to stuff my face with all the yummy foods. We always made straight up traditional American foods like freshly mashed potatoes, stuffing, blueberry muffins, corn muffins and of course Tom the Turkey. We were sometimes joined by our neighbor from around the corner Nancy, an old Italian lady who would talk non-stop even with her mouth full. It was hilarious. She lived by herself and my parents met her when we bought another house on Garfield Ave. She lived next door with her brother John. Hmmm now I'm wondering if they're still alive? As the years went on when I was in HS, Meera met a guy at work named Sourika and he came over for Thanksgiving one year...and then eventually Justin was born and Reek never left hahahaha. He celebrated Thanksgiving with us for many years after that. One year we had both Reek and Nancy there...and it was hilarious. With Nancy talking as fast as she was eating and Reek's contagious laugh, it was really entertaining.

This year, we're celebrating Thanksgiving at my mom's house, our first time having it there since daddy passed away in Dec 2007. Now with the change in venue, I am really looking forward to celebrating our first thanksgiving with our boys at the house where I grew up. 

So how are we celebrating our first Thanksgiving morning? I whipped up some pancakes and sausage for us and we are in bed right now eating and watching the parade, like we have been doing each year since we moved in together. This will be our tradition every year....

Have a great Thanksgiving everyone!

Halloween!

Despite the hurricane, the boys did get to dress up for Halloween for a friends' son's birthday/costume party. I wanted them to be 2 different superheroes but couldn't find costumes in their size. So we settled on Hot Dogs! The party was great, really great filipino food and cake pops! It was so great to see their cousins all dressed up too. Sofie and Sam were princesses, "Baby" Ryann was Snow White and little Jeter was Superman. At first, Gray and Jericho hated being in the costume but as soon as we rolled in there with our new double stroller (that was our first time using it), they both took it all in and was mesmerized by all the different kiddies in their costumes. I forgot my camera so I had to use my phone for all our pics. Take a look below...

The Hurricane

I've been meaning to write this post since we got power back last Tuesday. After the power went out Monday night, it was like we were living in the primitive era...no electricity, no heat and no cell phone service. All we had was a hand-crank radio that thankfully my buddy Rich bought for us off our wedding registry. We roughed it with the babies in the house for 2 nights and it was a little scary because they are only 4 months and every few hours, we would wake up to make sure they were warm and snuggly. And then on Wednesday night at like 7pm, that same friend who bought us the handcrank radio we've been using, came knocking on the door to pick us up and take us to their house in South Plainfield where power was restored earlier that day. We're so blessed to have great friends who would drive an hour in crazy traffic for us. We packed up the car and as I looked down the street as the sun was going down, it really looked like a scene from Walking Dead...without the zombies. Crazy seeing absolutely no one outside and all the houses dark. We spent the entire week there with some of our other friends and had a blast. Peep the pics below...

A huge thank you to Rich and Kat for taking us in. My mom was really grateful we were able to find shelter with you guys and said "that's when you know your friends are family." The boys had a great time playing with Nicolai and Noah. Every night we would stay up after putting the kids to sleep and chit chat and laugh till our stomachs hurt. Great times even under those circumstances. Also thank you to Kat's Mom and Carmela and Ray for helping with the boys.