Joey's checkup!

Today we went in for Joey's 3 year old checkup. He did much better than I thought he would since he HATES going into the doctors office and usually cries the whole time. He did great getting on the scale and getting his height measured and actually let the nurse take his blood pressure. Then into the office we went and when the doctor came in I thought we might actually have an appointment without a fight! He let her look in his eyes, ears, and nose without any problems but then came the mouth. I think he was remembering last time we were in the doctors and had a strep test done and he threw up because his mouth was glued shut. But we managed without too many kicks at the doctor.
He looked like a very healthy 3 year old with only one minor problem. He snores really, really bad at night and still does not sleep through the night very well. So after seeing his ginormous tonsils, the doctor decided it was time to be referred to the sleep clinic. So we will be having a new adventure which with this child I'm not too excited about! He only got to have one shot this time and only one nurse came in to give it to her. I warned her about his hitting and kicking and she said she was used to it. So I held his hands and kissed on his poor face while the nurse got the worse end of the deal. All I heard was her repeatedly saying "wow, you are strong for such a little guy!" She was finally able to give him his shot but without him screaming "I don't like you" at her and telling me that shots aren't his favorite along with how he didn't like that bed! Wow, does he give me a workout!
So as far as stats going......he is 41" tall which is of course off the charts and weighs in at 34 lbs which is in the 75%. I asked her if he was overweight because all he does is eat all day and he is heavy to carry, but she said no he was perfect. I guess he is still 25% taller than what he weighs, but man is he heavy to carry! So I guess we are good for another year and will update later with how the sleep clinic goes!

The boys!

I'm so glad my boys get along so well together! They really do love each other, and love playing together! Yes, of course they have their moments......ok a LOT of moments but they are usually quick to make up and are back to best buds quickly! These two will grow up being best friends and I'm sure they will quickly turn their parent's hair gray because of that!

Christmas day!

On Christmas day we head over to MeMaw and PePaw's house. This year I didn't get near as many pictures as I normally do, I guess I was wore out from so many pictures the night before!
Adriana and her little cousin Angeline!

All the cousins lined up.......Gabe (5), Angeline (3), Joey (3), Adriana (7), Mikey (4), and Andrew (5). We also have two new cousins on the way.....one boy and the other is yet to be known!

MeMaw with all the grandkids getting ready to open the gifts!

Opening the gifts......


I love this picture of Joey and Angeline. It almost looks like Joey is proposing and putting a ring on Angeline's finger and she has her hand up over her mouth in surprise. So cute!

As always, we had a great time and loved getting to see everyone! I can't wait to see all the new babies added in next Christmas!
I think we will have to add an extra room onto the extra room for all the toys we gained at MeMaw and PePaws!!!!!!

Getting ready for Santa!

Every year while we are at MawMaw and PawPaw's house, Santa stops by and drops off some Christmas pajamas for the kids.
Here is the kids in their new pajamas!

Then we set out milk and cookies and head outside to sprinkle out the reindeer food! The kids are always so excited about Santa coming that we have never had them stay up past 9pm, thats great for Santa!

Look, Santa came! Can't wait for the kids to wake up and see!

Merry Christmas everyone and take a minute to remember the reason for the season.......Happy birthday, Jesus!

Christmas Eve!

We always spend Christmas Eve night at my parent's house, it makes it so nice so we don't have so many places to go to on Christmas. I'm just going to warn you that this year I went a little crazy on pictures and we did a lot of family pictures.
Getting ready to head over to MawMaw and PawPaw's house......

It is always so crazy when it comes time to open up gifts so I don't get too many pictures of the opening part but here is the boys with a few of the gifts they got.....


Here is my little niece, Jessica, whom I also found out this weekend that I will be her Godmother!!!!! I'm so excited about that!!!!!

So here come all the family pictures....you've been warned! We don't get to see each other very often and we usually forget to take any pictures together so we made sure we did this year!
First off is the girl cousins.......Kaitlyn (15), Adriana (7), and Jessica (6 months).

The boy cousins........Jacob (11), Andrew (5), and Joey (3).

For some reason this is the best picture I have of our family. Thats what I get for trusting my family to take a good picture with my camera :) just kidding!

All six of the cousins.....

Mom and dad with us four kids.....

MawMaw and PawPaw with their six grandkids.....

My sister's family......

My little brothers family.....

Me with my brothers and sister......do you see the only normal one in this picture!!!!! just kidding guys, you know I love you all!!!!!!

And finally proof that my older brother likes kids!!!! We secretly know that he will one day settle down, get married, and have lots of kids even though he will deny ever wanting to settle down and have kids!

So this concludes the Howell family Christmas party! We had so much fun and seriously my parents have to slow down on the truckload of toys they buy for my kids every year! We are going to have to add on a room to our house just to put all these toys!!!!!!

Christmas parade on Mainstreet!

On Sunday, Chris went to the Rams football game with some customers from work so I wanted to figure out something fun for me and the kiddos to do. I decided to take them down to St. Charles Mainstreet for the annual Christmas parade. I figured it was the last weekend they would be down there so I better do if before it was done. So the kids and I loaded up and headed down for some Christmas festivities! This is what else I love about this city is that there is so much free things to do with the kids that is so much fun. Although we didn't escape without spending anything because we had to make a stop off at Grandma's cookies! These are the best cookies ever and I'm not just saying that because the owner is a fellow parishioner and a friend, but they really are yummy!!!!
While walking down Mainstreet we ran across several of the characters and Adriana was very excited about trying to collect all their cards this year.


My crazy kiddos waiting for the parade to begin!

Many of the parade characters.....





Even though I warned Joey over and over that this isn't the kind of parade that they throw candy, he was still disappointed when he found out momma was right :)
The kids had a lot of fun and we got to see many of our friends down there which is always a lot of fun. Adriana collected over half of the 30 cards so she was happy and the boys got some of Grandma's cookies so they were happy! The kids really wanted to go ice skating while we were down there but I had promised Chris that we would wait for him so stayed tuned for a post on that this week!
Have I mentioned enough how much I LOVE this time of year with my kiddos!!!!!

Last day of skating!

On Saturday morning, Andrew had his last day of skating lessons. He has come so far since he first started and we are soooo proud of him! He has been working so hard so that he can start playing hockey!

On the last day he was also able to bring a friend, which he immediately picked Adriana! I love that these kids are all so close friends!

Well my little social butterfly can't go anywhere without making friends, so here she is with her new friend Holly.

Andrew may not be super graceful, but he has definitely got the speed down! He would also be the first one done skating whenever they went back and forth!

The last part of class was a little free time so they let the kids do limbo. Adriana was helping Andrew over to the line, sooooo stinking sweet together!

And here they are doing limbo, there were no winners or looser just a fun time!


Andrew passed his class with flying colors and is now ready to play hockey for St. Peters Spirit starting in January......stay tuned for lots more pictures to come!

An incredibly good time!

On Saturday the kids were invited to their friend, Dylan's birthday party at Incredible Pizza Place. I have been avoiding that place because I had heard it was so expensive but it looked like my streak had ended and all was over now. But it wasn't nearly as expensive as I thought it would be. But it helped that my friend Karen went all out for Dylan's birthday party and each child was given a card with $10 and 5 attractions which ended up being $30 and 15 attractions for all my kiddos.
Here is my three monkey's getting ready to eat.

The birthday boy Dylan!

Adriana doing the jumprope game.

Joey riding one of the rides.

We even did a family ride on the go carts, its a good thing Adriana is extra tall and was able to ride by herself!



We had a great time and still have $25 left on the cards plus 12 attractions left. I think we will be taking another trip there over the winter break, we'll just make sure to use the coupons to help pay for the overpriced buffet!
Thanks again Karen, we had a GREAT time! And a very happy birthday to Dylan! We love you both!

Christmas lights!

Last night we did our annual Weber family night out looking at Christmas lights. Every year we take a night, grab some hot chocolate from Starbucks, and head out to see the Christmas lights around town. This year we only made it to Grace Church on Mexico Rd. and Zumwalt Park in O'Fallon. The kids have so much fun and all we hear is laughter coming from the back of the car!
Here is my three little goobers and their drinks they like to refer to as "coffee"....

Well it didn't turn out so well trying to get a picture of the three of them together so here is Adriana and Joey.....

And Andrew......

While driving through Zumwalt Park, Joey insisted on sitting on Chris' lap and pointing to everything out the window. All three of the kids didn't let one display pass by without talking about each one of them.

I really love this time of year and especially the magic I see in all the kids! I'm really going to be sad as they grow up and loose the "magic" of Christmas but for now I'm going to enjoy every minute of it!