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!