We're Off to go Skiing....

Well, I should say everyone else going with us is off to go skiing. I, being the pregnant one, cannot ski. :( We made plans for this trip with some friends WAY before surprise baby #5 decided to show up. So, no skiing for me this time. I plan to relax, read some magazines, and sip hot chocolate in the nice toasty warm lodge. Not too bad, right?

My parents will be toughing it out with the four little ones for a few days while we're gone. Everyone was excited to spend some time together, so all should be well.

We had a great Christmas and I will post pics and more when we return after the New Year. I MIGHT know a little something exciting about the baby too~but ya'll will have to wait a few days. Hmmmmmm... :)

If You're Watching TV Christmas Morning...

...think about putting on ABC and watching the Disney Christmas Parade. You JUST might see the smiling faces of Kris and Me. :) But, even if you don't see us, you'll still get to see...

...the charming Joey Fatone and all the Dancing With the Stars gang.

(He kept keeping an eye on the giant paparazzi lens. Maybe we made him feel special? ;) )

Miss Jessica Simpson. You probably WON'T get to see her with her "umbrella guy" who quickly appeared when Jess stopped the song to mumble "I'm getting wet." Such a diva. We're also guessing that through the wonders of Disney Magic, it won't look at all dreary and rainy like it really was during Jessica's taping. We shall see.

You'll also get to see the talented Regis (minus the sunglasses),

and his equally talented sidekick, Kelly Rippa. She's concentrating very hard here while all the Disney parade shenanigans are going on behind her. She truly was a very beautiful lady in person.

And don't forget those lovable curly haired Jonas Brothers. My girls are very excited to see their part on Christmas morning. :) He was also keeping a close eye on the big lens. I think I should have tried to sell my pics to US Weekly or something. Maybe I could have made a little pre-Christmas cash. ;)

I hope you all have an AMAZING Christmas! I can't wait for tomorrow morning! The girls are super-duper squirrely today with excitement. Merry Christmas everyone!!!

Greta Rocks!!!

My bestest friend from High School, aka Greta, always sends us and our kiddos the CUTEST Christmas presents every year. I was amazed that this years were even CUTER!!!

She completely amazes me! She's a very talented actress (and works now acting, teaching acting, and directing plays) and also a great seamstress! Look at how adorable these aprons are she made for the girls. Cute! They were obviously very excited and couldn't wait to show them off.

Katryna LOVED the fact they each had their names on them.

She said "now we can wear these when we help you bake and when we do art projects." Mommy is very happy about that too.

Sofia just HAD to strike a pose in hers. I love the colors on this one.

Very Sofia! ;)

Mia was THRILLED with her beautiful, girly-colored apron.

She wore it until I made her take it off for bed. :)

Sebastian got the CUTEST pillow that Greta made. It looks like a friendly stuffed animal-guy, but is the perfect size for a 2 year old to sleep on. He carries it around and will spontaneously lay down and make fake snoring noises throughout the day. Too cute!

Greta, you rock! I love you my friend and I miss our crazy acting days together. Thank you SO much from all of us!!!

Ugh!

Well, I truly had hoped to leave my new dentist with a sense of relief and maybe even a little happiness that it was over. Did this happen? Hmmmm...not so much! Maybe he's never encountered a TRULY nervous dentist-goer. Maybe it's because I've met him before in a dinner situation and now he was surprised by my change in demeanor (trembling, figgeting, trying not to cry and look completely crazy)...but it was NOT a good experience. Cue the sad music...

The anesthesia didn't completely work (OUCH!), he kept explaining to me what was happening ("Wow, you've got a lot of blood coming out!"), and then part way through he had to stop so I wouldn't pass out because the room was spinning and I started sweating like I was outside in 120 degrees. Sounds fun, right? WHY in the world would you tell a scared person a step by step account of the yuckiness. Especially the blood! The worst part was that my dentist in Omaha does root canals all at one time. It didn't hurt ANYTHING like this when I had the other one. I think that's why I completely panicked part way through because I was feeling WAY too much. When I got done finally, he said "so, we'll have to see you again in a few weeks to finish the root canal and then you'll be done." I was like "WHAT??? You're not done?? All of that craziness and now I have to come BACK???" I tried to not burst into tears and instead took my shaky self to the bathroom and tried to not throw up. UGH!

I'm trying to just be thankful that I'm home today. I might hurt, but I'm home and not at the dentist. :)

Cowboys are "Bad Guys" ?

Some how Sebastian has decided that Cowboys are "bad guys". Like a villain or something. Maybe it's from TV? I really have no idea. The problem with this theory is that Sebastian has decided to point out the "bad guys" whenever he sees someone that looks like a Cowboy. Where we live currently, this REALLY poses a problem. There are a lot of people that wear Cowboy hats in this town and Sebastian has decided they are ALL "bad guys." For example~ while waiting in line at the store, this very nice man dressed in cowboy boots and a cowboy hat, is waiting in front of us. I suddenly here "Mama! Look! Ba-guy! Cowboy! Ba-guy!" and I'm panicking and smiling and saying "Yes, Bazzy. He's wearing a Cowboy hat." Sebastian continues with "yeah Mami. Ba-guy!" and then makes some scary noise, that I'm assuming is to get rid of the "ba-guy". The nice man didn't seem to pay ANY attention to us thankfully. How do you convince a 2 year old that Cowboys aren't "bad guys"? When my tooth stops hurting, I think I'll be on a quest to find a very friendly looking Cowboy to give to my son. ;)

Ouch!

I have a toothache! Yes, I'm looking for sympathy. I am a big giant chicken when it comes to the dentist. Has a lot to do with my needle phobia. I don't like sharp objects coming at my teeth. Now I need a root canal. It's scheduled for 2PM on Thursday. I have to go to a new dentist here because my dentist in Omaha is booked for the next 3 weeks.
I'm off to feel sorry for myself. :(

(When my tooth stops throbbing...I have some great pictures of the girls in the presents my best friend from High School, Greta sent to share. SO adorable!)

Church Christmas Program

The girls had their Christmas Musical yesterday morning at our new church.

It was called The Mystery at the Manger~ and it was GREAT!

The kids did an awesome job!

Mia sauntered in when it was time...

enjoying all the smiling faces looking at her.

Then she RAN to her spot when everyone started singing. She LOVES to sing, and she didn't want to miss ONE moment up on the stage! ;)

You can see all three of the little munchkins here, with Mia on the bottom left and then Sofia above her and Katryna dressed like an Angel.

Poor Katryna has a miserable cold...but she put her best smile on
and was a BEAUTIFUL angel!

The end was hilarious. I could tell by Mia's face that something was "wrong". She started quietly tugging at the teacher next to her and that escalated to her trying to WHISPER loudly to get the directors attention and then when she realized noone was going to help her...she quickly crossed her little legs and tried to put a smile on her face and kept singing. I could tell she had to go potty BAD...but thankful she didn't make a scene. :) Well, not too much of a scene anyways. ;)

Who Needs Blocks....

....when you have Toilet Paper! :)

My creative little man was found doing THIS with the giant

package of TP we had just brought home.

He was really enjoying himself and concentrating hard on getting as many to stack on top of each other as possible.

Mia came over to check out the tower and Bazzy had to flash that wonderful Bazzy smile to show off his accomplishment. ;)

Active Baby

My OB really freaked me out today. It's nothing medical, just from a Mommy standpoint- she really freaked me out! I'm almost 17 weeks and she wanted to listen to the baby's heartbeat. She put the monitor on my belly and I felt a big jump and she said "WOW!" I was like, what? She said, "you have an EXTREMELY active baby! I usually don't ever feel that much movement at only 16 weeks!" Again, I was like, what??? All I was thinking is 'that's ALL I need is another extremely active kid!':)

I told Kris what the OB said and he wanted to know if we can start infusing Ritalin into my uterus before the little munchkin comes out. LOL! Might not be a bad idea! ;) I really do feel the baby move a lot! I thought it was just that this is my 4th pregnancy and I just new what to feel now. Yikes!

My OB also spoke with the high risk OB from Omaha about me and she suggested that I try these projesterone pills instead of doing the shots...since I HATE shots. I was pretty relieved to hear that. I obviously would have done the shots, but this will take a little extra stress off of me. She said again that they aren't really sure if the projesterone actually helps much, but it can't hurt so it's worth a try.

SO, we shall see what this "extremely active baby" does in the future. Look out world! :)

The Magic Kingdom and our Disney Hotel

This is a combo-gallery or our Magic Kingdom pics and the pics from our balcony at the Contemporary Resort. We actually started out at a hotel closer to Epcot called The Yacht Club. It was a beautiful hotel, but we've been a little spoiled in the past by being at one of the hotels closer to the Magic Kingdom that you can take the monorail to the different parks. It's SO much faster to get everywhere on the monorail and so we decided to see if the Contemporary had any rooms available when we went their our first evening for our anniversary dinner. They have a restaurant called The California Grill that's on the top floor of the hotel and overlooks the Magic Kingdom. We got there at the perfect time and were able to watch the fireworks at MK while we were eating. They even dim the lights and play the same music they play at the park while the fireworks are going on. It was an amazing anniversary dinner. ;)

I'm a CRAZY planner when it comes to trips, so if anyone ever has any Disney questions, please feel free to ask me. I've read all the books, studied their website and I usually have some sort of printed itinerary for everyone involved whenever we go. It's such a fun place and there's SOOOO much to do...so I feel it needs to be well planned out. But maybe that's just me. :)

It's beginning to look a lot....

...like Christmas at our house.

We finally got our tree up and put out a few decorations.

The kids were excited to see the Fisher Price Nativity Set again. Sebastian quickly figured out how to push the tab on the roof to make it play Away In A Manger. I think I'll be buying more batteries again soon. ;)

This was the great tree lighting. It's obviously very dark, but you can just see the outlines of Mia, Sebastian, and Katryna. They all said "Oooooo" and went running towards the tree when it was lit. We had to hang all the ornaments on the top half of the tree to keep our small boy from destroying them, but it's still a lovely tree. The girls did a great job helping with the decorating. :)

The Jonas Brothers Song

Ok, ignore the cheezy pictures (I realized that the Jonas Brothers are like what New Kids On the Block were when I was in Jr. High! The screaming when they were performing at Disney was piercing/deafening!), but this was the song they performed and since they did like 5 takes, I found myself starting to like it around the fourth time and couldn't stop singing it in my head for the rest of the day. So I thought I would share the love. ;)

Our Day of Celebrities

Maybe I was just in the right place at the right time...but I was feeling pretty lucky to have gotten such a great spot to watch a lot of the celebrities tape their performances for the Disney Special that will air on Christmas Morning. I think I felt lucky because most of the people there had been in line since 5 am to get a spot to see Dancing With the Stars tape at 9am...BUT Kris and I came sauntering into the Magic Kingdom around 9 and noticed that they were taping that day and that they had switched Patti Labelle with Dancing with the Stars because it was drizzling a bit and they didn't want any of the dancing people to slip and crack their pretty little heads open. So, for Patti (who I honestly thought was a country singer until I figured out otherwise...oops) we watched from far away because I wasn't that excited to see her (although she is BEAUTIFUL and a great singer!), and I ended up being very thankful we didn't wait in line because she was "on her way" to Disney for about an hour and a half before she actually showed up. All those lovely people who waited since 5 am and got a spot up close to watch the taping, ended up standing in one spot for almost 3 more hours until Patti finally showed up. Ugh! During that time, Kris and I went on some rides, ate a funnel cake, and took pics from far away with my big fun lens. MUCH better than standing and waiting for MANY hours I must say!

So here's the beautiful Patti Labelle. Maybe it took her that many hours to get so beautiful...but she really did a great job singing. I don't think the people who waited that long were very happy with her, but I guess when you're a big celebrity you can get away with such things. ;)

Now THIS was the fun part for me. I really wanted to see Sabrina, from the Cheetah Girls and Joey Fatone and Nick Lachey from Dancing With the Stars. I only watched a few episodes over the last couple years, but I was pretty excited to see these guys. Helio (who won this year) and Jon Secada (who, due to my intense celebrity knowlege, I thought was Neil Sedaka) were also a part of this little number. ANYWAYS...Kris didn't want to try to breach the little ropes that the Disney staff members were using to hold back the people that hasn't been their since 5 am. He thought there was NO way to get in. I, being the eternal optomist, thought "there's ALWAYS a way!". :) I had heard one of the lady's say that they might need some people to go over to the FRONT/side of the stage to fill in some gaps that would be caught on the camera. Kris didn't think there was a chance, so he said if I wanted to stick around and try that was fine, but he was going to walk around a bit. I decided I HAD to try (I mean, why not? Maybe I could get close and take some pictures. The worst that could happen is I'm still stuck behind the little rope.) So, Kris goes off walking and literally like a minute later I see the Disney lady dropping the rope and saying she'll let X number of people in. I make my move and sneak in with the little crowd of people excitedly heading right for the stage. I was now front row, on the side of the stage and could see SO good. I felt a bit guilty because I now had a much better spot than all those poors saps that had been in line for a million hours while I was happily eating my funnel cake! The guilt quickly passed though. :) I called Kris and told him to tell the lady that his wife was "in" and that he wanted to be in too. The lady looked for me and then waved Kris in. Yay!

They finished the Dancing with the stars part and then quickly went on to tape the "finale" which would feature Jessica Simpson and a HUGE choir, along with the Harlem Choir and a zillion other dancers and flag people, etc. We were a little worried they would kick us out before they taped this, because we didn't have the wrist bands on that all the people who had been in line since 5 am had on. Someone actually tried to escort us back to the other side of the ropes, but I noticed a woman who just slipped into the crowd and the Disney people didn't really care...so I grabbed Kris and once again headed for the front of the stage. We had a great spot for Jessica and shortly after a few people in the very front decided they had had enough standing and watching celebrities and they left. This left a gap in the very front and I quickly decided to fill that gap. :) Again, why not? The thing I didn't realize is that you're expected to sing and smile and look goofy while being in the front because they want to tape you. So, you very well may see Kris and I (well, probably mostly me) singing, smiling, and looking goofy on Christmas morning.

That night we headed over to Epcot because I wanted to see one of my long time favorite celebrities, Doogie Howser....uh, I mean, Neil Patrick Harris. NPH, as we like to call him. He was the celebrity that was reading the Christmas Story at the Candlelight Processional that night. This is such an interesting thing to me, because it is the actual Christmas Story from the Bible. It's not sugar coated or anything. They talk about Baby Jesus and sing Religious songs and it's a HUGE event with lots of celebrities that perform in it all month long. Pretty Amazing. NPH did a fine job! :)

Saturday was the day I probably wished the girls had been there the most. The Disney teen singing group sensation "The Jonas Brothers" were there to perform in the Disney Parade part of the taping and our girls would have lost their pretty little heads if they had seen them that close. Again, people had been waiting in lines for HOURS when we arrived. We got there right when the park opened and just happened to slip into a part of the parade route where we were pretty much right next to the Jonas Brothers. They truly were adorable and the song they sang was quite catchy. I'll try to find it and post it if I can.

I'll post a bit more in depth about a few of these celebrities...but I had to at least share our day with you as a whole. We also saw Katherine McPhee(from American Idol), Regis and Kelly, and the new Menudo band. I couldn't fit them all into this post, but I'll be sure to post a few pics later.

Is there something in the water?

So here's the deal. Shortly before finding out that I was pregnant...Kris made some joking comment about how he thought that they were putting something in the water at the hospital here to get people pregnant. Six of their Radiology techs were all pregnant at the same time. Maybe they're trying to add to the population here? I laughed it off and then soon found out we were expecting. A little crazy, right? THEN...about 2 weeks later, Kris finds out that one of his two partners at work also found out they were pregnant. They already have 5 kids and were definitely not trying, but SURPRISE. :) Crazy! THEN...a week later we find out that his other partner just found out that his wife is pregnant. She's in her 40's and had an extremely difficult pregnancy 7 years ago with their second daughter and they were definitely not planning on ever being pregnant again. CRAZY!!!! So now there are 9 employees/spouses of employees from one small department that are all expecting babies. Seems a LITTLE weird to me. Maybe their IS something in the water???

The Shooting In Omaha

I didn't get a chance to post more pictures today. I've been really shocked and saddened by the shootings at Von Maur in Omaha. I was thankful to be busy today with MOPS, going out to lunch with some other moms, and playing in the snow with the kids.

I've been in that Von Maur SO many times. I ALWAYS park at the entrance that they keep showing on the news. It made me think how easily it could have been a day that I decided to run to the mall and cut through Von Maur or went shopping up on the third floor to look at kids stuff. Ugh! :( I'm so thankful that our close friends and family are OK. I called my friends who don't work and could have possibly been there at that time and it was so good to hear their voices when they answered! I'm so sad for the families of the employees and costumers who were killed and for all the people that witnessed everything happen. Christmas will obviously never be the same.

Well, I'm done being depressing. I just didn't feel right about posting vacation pictures when people in Omaha are grieving and trying to go on with normal life. They are all in our prayers!

Animal Kingdom

For obvious reason...I love Animal Kingdom. It's like a giant zoo with rides and shows and great food. What could be better? They just started a new Nemo musical that was amazing. When disney does musicals, it truly is like a Broadway Production. The talent is unbelievable and Nemo was very well done. I wished Baz could have seen it. I think his little head would have exploded he loves Nemo so much. ;) There are lots of animal pictures, so I apologize to anyone who isn't a big fan of animals, but it is called Animal Kingdom....

Epcot

We have SO many pictures. I figured the best way to share them was to do these slide shows.

I love Epcot. Especially the World Showcase. If you haven't been there, they have several countries represented in one section of the park, and they actually have College age students from each country do year long internships and work in each of the countries. It's pretty cool to have Fish and Chips served to you by someone FROM England. They also have a great Aquarium area with lots of Nemo things and Manatees and dolphins. The Christmas decorations were great too. Here's a few of my million pictures....

Before Disney

Look at this baby! Isn't she the sweetest little thing you've ever seen??? We went to the visit our Kar-en Refugee friends the Saturday before we drove home after Thanksgiving. We hadn't seen them in a long time and they had other family and friends over too so it was a big party over there as usual. This is one of their cousin's babies and she's about 2 months old, but she was born almost 2 months early, so she was such a little peanut. I could have held her all day. What a pretty baby! :)

Mia of course felt the same way. She LOVES babies. I mean, she loves babies so much that she stalks them in Walmart and tries to "pet" them. I think she is going to be in her own little heaven when she has a baby sibling to hold whenever she wants. She would have held this little one all day too if she could have. ;)

I noticed another cultural difference while we were there this time. I am EXTREMELY careful with babies. I think most Americans are. The girls have only ever held babies while sitting down and usually with some sort of pillow or something to support the baby's head. Ser eh moo, who is the youngest daughter from the family, is 6. She's smaller than Mia...but the family let her carry this tiny baby around like she was a baby doll. I finally had to just stop watching because it was stressing me out so much. I thought for sure that poor baby was going to be dropped. Ugh! I had to just trust all was going to be OK and chalk this up to another cultural difference that's just well, different.

As uaual, when we arrived they give the girls the gift of soda. Almost always Coca-Cola. I think they think it's American and obviously we all must love it. ;) Actually, the girls DO love it because they never get caffiene soda at home, but they know we can't be rude with our Burmese friends so Mommy will let them drink Coke while we're there. Here they are all watching Jungle Book. We brought this as an early Christmas present for them. They LOVE movies and this is one of our favorites.

Kris was with this time, which was fun for him and for the family. They didn't get to see him as much as the rest of us because he was usually working. The brother decided to try to get some medical advice about why his Mom (who we lovingly call "Grandma Nah") always has a ringing in her ear. Kris did the best he could to explain the possibilities, which was a bit challenging since they are still learning English.

They also decided to feed us after this. I usually can stomach most of the Kar-en food they've given me...but I also haven't been pregnant since I've been there. They gave us some sort of fishy noodles with all these unexplainable things to put on top. I tried to put as little of the "stuff" on top as possible, but I still literally almost threw up on the table. It was TOUGH to make it through that bowl, but I did and quickly washed it down with, what else, Coca-Cola.

They were also very excited to find out about baby #5 in our family. They gave Kris a BIG thumbs up when we told them. It was really funny. :)

The 26th was Sofia's 7th birthday. Woah! I still can't believe she's 7! We left this afternoon for our trip, but we gave her her present the night before so we could all play the new Hannah Montana Wii game. The girls thought it was very fun and I mush admit, I did too. ;)

We're Back

We had SO much fun at Disney! What a great place. I will post tons of pics (surprise, surprise ;)...) in the next few days, but had to at least say "we're back!" In a nutshell~ we ate tons of yummy food, soaked up lots of sun, walked about a million miles, went on as many rides as your allowed to when one of you is pregnant (it was SO hard for me to pass by all those roller coasters! :( ), and we even got to see a bunch of celebrities. They were taping the stage shows and parade that will air Christmas Morning with Regis and Kelly on Friday and Saturday...but I'll post more about that later. Anyways, it was a blast. We both missed the kids terribly, but we had fun talking about all the fun things we will do with them the next time we ALL go to Disney.

This was what our hotel left in our room for our Anniversary. YUM!!! The strawberries were amazing and the dark chocolate fan thing had pretty little gold flecks all over it. Very nice! :)