Risky Business

Merry Christmas!! Riley and Kyle had a wonderful Christmas and send holiday greetings to all! It has been an exciting week beginning with holiday parties at school for both kids. Tracy attended Kyles and then Tracy and Kyle joined in on the fun with Riley's party. Christmas Eve was spent at the Umsteads with Grandma and Papa and the Rodrigues tradition of Chinese food! The kids had a blast exchanging and opening presents and the following morning was even more fun! We were lucky enough to have the entire clan (both Tracy and Erics sides of the family) over for more fun on Christmas day! Thank you everyone for all the wonderful and thoughtful gifts! The kids, and Tracy and Eric, are still in amazement and are not sure where to begin playing!


The day after Christmas, Darcy had us all over to spend time with Cousins Courtney, Greg, Ian, Betsy, and Bob. Tracy and Eric had to head out early to attend a mystery dinner party! The kids spent the night with Aunt Darcy and Tracy and Eric had a great time with friends for the evening!! On Sunday, aside from a killer win for the Steelers, we got to spend the day with Uncle Jim and Aunt Mary Ann from Rhode Island! We really hope another Rodrigues Reunion can happen again this summer!!

Kyle at his school holiday party

Kyle LOVES his new roller skates! This pix was from xmas eve, but he wore them all of xmas morning as well! Thank you Aunt Darcy, Uncle Mike, and Lexa!

Christmas Eve at the Umsteads

Christmas Eve

Kyle and Papa having a sword fight on Christmas day. They were hysterical!

Grandma and Kyle going for a ride on the new scooter

Riley with her new bears

Riley opening the twins from Santa. Riley had drawn pictures of these twins for Santa and asked every Santa she saw for these dolls.
Lots of xmas love!

Kyle playing with the new train table!

Tracy, Darcy, and Courtney

Kyle playing Tom Cruise in Risky Business

Christmas Spectacular

This week was full of holiday fun again! Riley performed in her preschools Holiday Spectacular and was Great! She did all the moves and sang each song - she even knew the words to Jingle Bell Rock, but the music teacher decided to forgo singing Jingle Bell Rock at the last minute and the kids just did the dance that went with it. Kyle loved watching Riley and the other kids, but especially loved sitting in chairs that were just his size... too bad Tracy and Eric had to sit in the same sized seats!

Kyle had a follow up appointment for this ears this week and his tubes look great! Unfortunately, his tonsils are HUGE and need to come out - I'm sure we'll have a lot more to write about concerning that but for now the surgery is scheduled for January 15th.

We also got to visit with 2 separate sets of friends this past weekend. The Berniers brought their new, perfect baby over! Riley couldn't get enough of Hannah and Hannah was a doll for our entire visit. We also got to visit with the Faria's from Atlanta! Christmas is so much fun!
Enjoy the pix/videos!

Riley and Tracy made 4 types of cookies this year - below are our ginger snaps

Riley holding baby Hannah!

Kyle and Riley cuddling after naps!

Riley and her best bud Brianna after their holiday show. They are dressed like reindeer and their teacher french braided their hair!

During the show!

Riley and Kyle singing a duet of "Elmo's World" (watch the volume... they are a...bit... off key!)

Riley singing Jingle Bell Rock since she didn't get to in her show!

A Christmas Story

Riley and Kyle had another great and exhausting week! Both still love school and Riley was not happy with Tracy for picking her up early one day this week. Riley is still loving gymnastics and we are ready to enroll Kyle into his own activity which will hopefully help tire him out! Riley saw the dentist today and did a great job!! Unfortunately, she is going to have to go back in for a very small cavity - we are not mentioning anything about a shot to her!

On Friday, we hosted a holiday party for our playgroup. Lots of kids, crafts, food, and fun! Saturday the kids went to Duffy's 4th Pirate Birthday party and later that evening we celebrated our friend Tony's birthday at the Harlows new and beautiful house! It has been a while since we have seen the Fosteks and it was great to catch up! Riley and Layla were two peas in a pod and we didn't see much of them all night! On Sunday we enjoyed a close win for the Steelers with the Britts at our house. E made his famous chili and we served it this time with a side of tums - we had a good batch of jalapenos this time! Riley and Kyle loved having Jacqueline, Morgan, and Sam to play with all afternoon - I'm sure the big kids were ready to go home!! Riley was in heavy show off mode (aka: talk like a baby and annoy mom mode) all afternoon.
Enjoy the pix!

Riley, Caroline, and Duffy at our playgroup holiday party

John, Duffy, and Kyle dressed as pirates at Duffy's bday party

Eric being dragged around by the birthday buddies, Kyle and Hunter. Kyle wouldn't let the football go all night!
Kyle, Layla, and Riley getting into some sort of mischief!

Our own little xmas bunny!! Both kids are really getting into dressing up lately!

Sunday victory picture! Sam, Kyle, Morgan, Riley, and Jacqueline.

No More Santa

Over all, everyone is healthy (aside from runny noses and fluctuating temps!) and great! Kyle's vocabulary is growing everyday. According to his doctor, he has many more words than he is supposed to at this age, however, we still consider him a man of few words. He understands everything you ask of him, however he pretends not to understand most of the time:-) Kyle loves to run and jump and his legs move faster than his body most of the time!!

Riley continues to be a sweet, (very) sensitive, and smart little girl! She hears and understands more than we want her to and makes us laugh constantly! Riley currently is obsessed with hand me down black patten leather shoes that have a little heal. She puts them on as soon as she wakes up and tries to wear them everywhere! Since they are an entire size too big and not so good for playing, Riley has only worn them out to church. However as soon as we get back into the house, she changes her shoes back to the "heals".

During this fun, exciting, overwhelming holiday season, we are so thankful to have such wonderful children, families, and friends!

This is a bad time of year to skip a week of blogging... hopefully our many fun activities can be discussed easier through pix! Enjoy!

Riley's new look - This was at Bebe's house for a delicious and fun Thanksgiving dinner!

Kyle, Riley & Bebe on Thanksgiving dayRiley and Kyle back home after a long fun Thanksgiving day
We decorated the tree the weekend after thanksgiving. Riley LOVED every moment, including all of the stories that went along with nearly every moment.

Kyle, on the other hand, had no interest decorating the tree, but he did enjoy the wedgits while we decorated! We had a great dinner at Aunt Darcy and Uncle Mikes that weekend as well. The kids got to spend more time with Grandma and Papa and enjoyed playing dress up (even Kyle!)

We visited Santa at Bass Pro. Riley was all about telling Santa that she had been such a good girl and really wanted (more) twin baby dolls. Kyle enjoyed Santa as long as Tracy was holding him. Once sitting in Santa's lap he just screamed!

Tracy attempted to get a holiday photo card pix, without success. Ri was a cute little ham, but Kyle would not cooperate!

The Jingle Bell Jamboree was this past week and Riley got to sit on Santa's lap again!

Kyle and Ruthie at the Jingle Bell Jamboree - don't they look so grown up!!??

Our good friends, Lindsey and Drew, came for a visit as well! Kyle is back into his "camera smile", as seen below.

Riley, Tracy, Lexa and Aunt Darcy also had lunch with Santa...

Where Riley got to sit on Santa's lap AGAIN!!

We also toured some of the tacky lights in our area and just about finished our Christmas shopping!

Kyle's new word on Thanksgiving was "pack back" and for what ever reason, it cracked us all up!

Lexa has been learning tons of new songs and sang many of them for us during Thanksgiving dinner - she is so cute!

Checking out

Riley and Kyle had a great week of being spoiled rotten by Grandma and Papa! Tracy had surgery on her foot last week, so Grandma and Papa came to town to help out and play with the kids and they were ALL worn out! Riley was a wonderful nurse to her mama and helped out whenever possible, including holding Tracy's arm as she bumped from stair to stair on her bottom on her few ventures down stairs! Kyle wasn't sure what to do with mom laying down all day. At first he cuddled with her and then he tried making her get up by pulling her head upward. Eventually, he gave up and just enjoyed all the attention of his grandparents.

It was a cold weekend, so Grandma and Papa played inside a lot and took the kids to the mall to play. Riley got to see Madagascar and Papa even took Kyle out on his own for some quality guy time. Aunt Darcy was planning on taking Lexa and Riley to cousin Ians 2nd birthday party Sunday night, but Cosmo ended up at the emergency vet and of course Tracy was still in no shape to move, so the girls had to miss all the fun. Good news though, we found out today that Cosmo is doing MUCH better and the Umsteads hope to bring Cosmo home on Thanksgiving!! We are thinking about you Cosie!

A big and special thank you to Grandma and Papa for all their wonderful help! And also to Eric for taking on all the Tracy duties for the last week and for being such a great nurse:-) And to Bebe for all the wonderful food! And to all of Tracy's friends for their warm wishes, goodies, thoughts, and prayers! On the cusp of Thanksgiving, the Surratt Pack is so thankful to be surrounded by such wonderful family and friends!

And on to the few pix that were taken this week:

Riley & Kyle being silly!

Papa relaxing after the kids were asleep - with Taz -

Taz always finds the one person who can't stand cats!

The kids attacking Papa.

Riley and Kyle playing Honey Bee Hop!

Kyle playing independently (with Riley laughing in the background)

Disney Days

This weekend Riley and Tracy joined Darcy and Lexa for Disney on Ice, Worlds of Fantasy! The show was wonderful and our seats were amazing (Thanks to Darcy!)! The girls, young and old, had a blast!

Preshow - that is the REAL Cinderella!


This is a typical Kyle dinner now a days - straight to the bath after dinner!

Riley also had a birthday party this past weekend at a dance studio! She is now ok with wearing her leotard and had lots of fun with her friends from school.

Although she now likes her leotard, she still isn't much on dressing up. So when the other kids dressed up in old costumes, Riley wore her friends fun pink dress!!

The Zone

Happy Birthday Bebe!! Last Saturday we had a wonderful birthday celebration with Bebe and Mamo - out to dinner and cake back at Bebe's! The kids had a great time and enjoyed getting covered with chocolate. Happy Birthday!!

Tracy, Riley, and Kyle spent Sunday afternoon at Aunt Darcy's house playing with Lexa and Monday was full of errands and play. Tonight, the entire family went jumping at the Jump Zone - one last hooray for Tracy before foot surgery. Riley didn't hesitate and was on the equipment in a flash. Kyle was a little hesitant at first but after a few minutes he was invincible as well. The camera didn't come out much this week... we'll try to be better next week!

Happy Birthday Bebe

Kyle and Riley decorated Mamo with stickers. Mamo was a great sport as always!

Kyle covered in chocolate
Sleeping baby

One last birthday picture of Riley in the Birthday hat!

Fairy Lifeguards

Riley and Kyle have had an exciting couple of weeks! Due to technical difficulties, we were not able to post last week, so there is a lot to say!!

The 2 week period started with Riley's 4th birthday which we seemed to celebrate all month long! On Monday, her actual birthday, we a great play date in the morning and the kids made their own pizzas for lunch and that afternoon we had other friends over and the kids decorated Halloween cookies (needless to say, we couldn't see the floor of the playroom by Monday evening!) After Rileys pick of a taco dinner, we went to cold stone for an ice cream birthday treat! Cotton Candy ice cream with sprinkles as always!

Both kids had a great 2 days of school and Ri got to share cupcakes with her classmates on Tuesday. Thursday brought a few tears due to 4 shots for Riley and 2 for Kyle! They tried to be brave but in the end, the entire doctors office will agree that Riley should get involved in horror flicks! Stats are as follows...
Kyle at 18 months: 32.5 inches and 23.5lbs
Riley at 4 years old: 40.25 height and weight - a perfect square!
Kyle is still on the small side compared to Ri at the same age, but the doc says they are both doing great and a head of the curve as far as learning. We are confident Kyle will shoot up some day!

But all the excitement of the week lead up to... you guessed it, Halloween!! We spent Halloween morning at the Library for a special story time and activities just for our playgroup. Our friends Julie and Brad had their perfect baby Ben, so big brother John and big sis Ruthie came with us to the Halloween activities (ages 1.5, 2, 3.5, & 4). If ever there was doubt (which there hasn't been!), Tracy and Eric are very happy with just 2 children and bow before anyone with more than 2!! (in all honesty, it wasn't too tough but but only because all 4 kids are really good kids and it was only for 4 hours!)

Riley, Kyle, and Lexa had a blast trick-or-treating that night! The girls are braver than any prior year and nearly skipped from house to house. Kyle has a hoot! He'd push the girls out of the way and grab handfuls of candy!! Tracy found herself giving candy back when he wasn't looking! But even with his pushiness, he always remembered "thank you" and "bye-bye"! However, later that night while the kids were checking out their loot, Kyle would grab handfuls of Rileys candy every time she wasn't looking. It was hilarious! Luckily, Ri never caught on! The night ended with a 102.9 temp for Riley!! Luckily, when she woke up Saturday morning, she was back to normal - we are chalking the temp up to the shots.

But not only was last week Halloween, we also had Riley's birthday party with her friends! It was a princess and pirate theme and the kids decorated hats, wands/swords, and their own cookies on a stick. Riley had a great time (and Tracy and Eric were exhausted!) Thank you Aunt Darcy for all your help and Bebe for watching the little man, so we could focus on all the "big kids"!

After all that, the following week was pretty low key... however tomorrow is Bebe's birthday, so we get to do some more celebrating!


Update: With all the craziness in the last week of October, we forgot to mention the excitement in the 1st week of November! Not only did the Steelers have an awesome win on Monday night, we also get to celebrate an amazing moment in history - Virginia turned Blue and the election of Barack Obama as our new President of the United States of America!! We hope that everyone is proud of our country and looking forward to the years to come as much as we are! (no matter who you voted for!)
Have a great week!

Lexa, Kyle, and Riley getting ready for the party

Kyle as a pirate - I believe that he is soaked in drool as well as juiceRiley showing off her favorite dress and new party hat

Riley and Kyle eating the cookies they decorated at the party

Halloween night
Door number one...

Post trick-or-treating