And So It Goes

Peer Pressure got to me....

2008-12-29T22:19:00.002-05:00

"Ya gotta get on Facebook". "Everyone is one Facebook". "Why aren't you on Facebook"?
I got tired of hearing it, so now, I am on Facebook! I look pretty pathetic with a measly 23 friends, so if you are reading this and are on facebook I wanna be your friend!

The Elf on the Shelf

2008-12-12T23:17:00.007-05:00

We started a new tradition with the kids this year - "The Elf on the Shelf". Our elf, "Alfie" came to us on November 29th. He is a small red elf and came with a story book. The story tells about how the elf will keep watch over the kids during the day (he even sees what goes on at school!) and by elf magic he goes back to the North Pole each night to visit with his elf friends and report to Santa. In the morning, he is sitting in a new spot to keep watch!

The kids are LOVING this! They love searching for Alfie each morning, and they love reminding each other that he is watching - he watches both the naughty and the nice! Alfie has been spotted in many different hiding palces in the last 13 days. We'll miss Alfie when he goes back to the North Pole on Christmas Eve, and we'll anxiously await his return next year!

Perched in a wreath

Riding with Santa!

Hangin' with the Nutcrackers!

Swingin' like a monkey!

Name Change!!!

2008-12-12T23:12:00.002-05:00

I never really liked the original name of my blog. So....time to change it! This title is very fitting of most of the content that I blog about and, it's also a nod to my favorite singer of all time - Billy Joel! "And So It Goes" is a song on Billy Joel's Stormfront (1989) album. So, there is the new name for now, we'll see how long it lasts :)

'Bye Mags.... :(

2008-11-10T23:32:00.002-05:00

It was such a sad day in our house today. Our little dog Maggie passed away. She started acting funny yesterday, but she was still eating and moving around. We called the vet first thing this morning and got an appointment for 3:00. She passed away at home about 12:30. It was so hard when her sister Molly died 1 1/2 years ago, but we still had Mags then. Now, we are dogless for the first time in 14 years. It feels so empty. Maggie, all 2.1 pounds of her, will be very, very missed.

All I want for Christmas....

2008-11-06T17:49:00.003-05:00

Is my two front teeth!!! Adam's tooth was hanging by a thread, and driving us all nuts! So, he got brave, went down to see his principal Sr. Jerilyn (she LOVES pulling the kids teeth!) and here is the result - TOOTHLESS!!!

Crud.

2008-11-05T10:02:00.002-05:00

I don't usually get political here, but I do have to say I am very dissappointed in the outcome of the election last night. I knew BO was going to win, but seeing it happen stunk. Well, hopefully in 1,461 days we will be putting someone new in the White House.

Trick or Treat!!!

2008-10-31T19:51:00.007-04:00

What a fun Halloween! At school this year, we decided to try something new. We did a "Trunk or Treat" - the parents parked at the school, decorated their trunks and handed out treats to the kids as they were parading by. It was so much fun! One family even had a generator with a huge blow up pumpkin! Here is my trunk and some various pics from the day!

Costumes were a quick decision this year. Both kids were Indiana Jones for the Disney Halloween party when we were in Florida earlier this month, and Andrew wanted to be that for home too. Adam wanted to be Mutt. Who is Mutt you ask??? It's Indiana Jones' sidekick (and later Indy finds out it's his son!). No one knew who he was, but Adam though he was soooooo cool!

Between the Trunk or Treat and regular trick or treating, we have TONS of candy - Doug will be taking lots of it to work with him on Monday!

PHINALLY!!!

2008-10-31T17:10:00.003-04:00

I remember 1980 - barely! I was in 7th grade. I do remember 1993 - ugh, Joe Carter. It's been a LOOOOOONNNNNNNNNNNNGGGGGGGG time coming, but WOOHOO!!!!

WORLD CHAMPIONS!!!! I told the boys to enjoy every minute of it, because we cheer for Philly teams, who knows when we will see it again!

Birthdays, Babies and a Shark Attack!

2008-09-06T23:27:00.010-04:00

Birthdays....

Yesterday 9/5 was Poppie Stetser's birthday - HAPPY BIRTHDAY POPPIE!!!!! Wish you were here in NJ!
Thursday 9/4 was Kyle's 18th birthday - he is coming home this weekend to celebrate! Happy 18th Kyle!

BABIES...

Congratulations to Susan and Matt on the birth of Madison Joy! She was 6 lb, 1 oz - what a peanut! We can't wait to meet her! Poppie must be so happy - his first Great-Grandchild born on his birthday!

SHARK ATTACK....Rivershark that is....

We have 8 free tickets for the Camden Riversharks, and since the season is almost over, we figure we better use some! We wanted to go on a Friday night, because after the game they have fireworks. Our seats were GREAT! We were in the row right behind the dugout - the kids were so excited!

We had a beautiful view of the bridge/skyline!

Andrew was very excited when one of the Riversharks players coming in from the field tossed him a ball - you would have thought he was given a bag of gold! The game ended with a bit of rain coming down, and the Riversharks losing to the Newark Bears 5-2. The fireworks after were wonderful!

School Time!!

2008-09-03T16:38:00.003-04:00

WOOHOO!!! The first day of school! Now, usually I am very sad about the first day of school. I am one of those strange Moms that actually like having my kids around all summer. They are a lot of fun to hang out with and I really enjoy their company. But...you knew that was coming....the last 3 weeks, they have been getting on each other's (and consequently MY) nerves. They are fighting over every little thing - "he's in my seat", "he is using my cup", "he is breathing"...and so on and so on. Both kids were ready to go back to school, and I think I was ready to send them. So, off to 3rd and 1st grade at 8:00 this morning. This week is three 1/2 days and on Monday starts the "real deal". I joked with them today that Mom has all the homework the first few days of school - so many forms to fill out, checks to write and workbooks to cover with clear contact paper (it's a Catholic School thing, the clear contact).

So, here are my angels on their first day!

What's in a name??

2008-09-02T16:18:00.002-04:00

Mom. Mommy. Mama. Ma. Mother. All of a sudden, Adam has taken to calling me "Mother". I don't know why. It sounds like something you would call June Cleaver. Or an old lady. It makes me feel like a mean old woman, not a fun, cuddly Mommy or Mom. But, he does it consistently, so it looks like it's going to stay for awhile. When he yells "MOTHER", I yell, "YES, SON". Maybe that will get on his nerves and he will go back to "Mom".

Ocean City, NJ

2008-08-28T07:53:00.008-04:00

I had a craving for Mac and Manco pizza. So, if you want pizza what do you do? Drive 1 hour and 20 minutes to get some! We headed down Ocean City to walk the boardwalk, get some pizza and for the boys to ride some rides. The weather was perfect - shorts and hoodie kind of weather. When we got there, we met up with some friends for a minute, said our hellos and then went off to Mac and Manco on 8th street. Andrew and Adam said it was the best pizza they have ever had. I knew my kids were smart :)

After that, we strolled down the boardwalk towards the rides, looking in a few shops to let dinner digest. Grandmom had given to boys spending money and told them "use it on whatever you want". Key word, "whatever". So, they starting formulating ideas and plans. More on that later. We stopped in Ocean City Coffee Company (I know the owner) and said "Hi" and promised we would be back for a cup after all the rides. On our way to the rides, we ran into this fella

On to the rides. We had tickets left from years ago for Castaway Cove, and the tickets never expire, so we went there. The kids had a great time! They rode the roller coaster, Dizzy Dragons, RipTide, Tidal Wave and more! They loved the "Surf Shack" funhouse. Here is video of them at the end. Of course, still have not figured out how to turn them :(

Random pictures of the night

Remember that spending money that was burning a hole in the kid's pockets? Well, Andrew got a mood ring, Adam got a sword (surprise, surprise) and then they combined the rest of the money to get:

Yup. A hermit crab. Remember, Grandmom said "whatever" they wanted to spend the money on. So, we have "Hermie" (my kids are so original!).

We had a great night on the boardwalk!

Summer Recap!

2008-08-24T21:38:00.034-04:00

Since I didn't blog all summer, I figured I would do a "recap" of our summer adventures. We stayed close to home most of the summer, but took a "field trip" or two. With the Disney trip looming, we are saving all our $$$ for that and with the price of gas, we didn't go too far from home!

So, lets start with June.

Baseball was coming to an end - both boys had a lot of fun this year! It was tough, since they were at different levels, and most of their games were on the same night! But, we did what good parents do - divide and conquer! Doug coached Adam's team, so he spent most of the first half of Andrew's games with Adam, then came over to the other field to watch Andrew.

As soon as school got out, it was time for the kids annual swim lessons. This is the 3rd year the boys have taken swim lessons from Donna O'Leary, a lady in town. She does a great job with the kids! One of the things they do is swim with their clothes on. This is a life saving exercise they are taught.

Andrew:

Adam:

Also in June was the Fish Family picnic at Matt and Nancy's house....hmmmm...no pictures of that - I'm not sure why! It was a great day and lots of fun - just no pictures to prove it!

Moving on to July....

We attended the Paulsboro 4th of July parade, as always. But hey - no pictures again! The next day was the Stetser Family Picnic. It is a lot of fun, but it's a ton of work. I spend about 5 or 6 hours preparing for it. It's held about 70 minutes away at Delanco Camp in Vincentown NJ. It's an all day affair, so lots of food to pack, games, swim equipment, fishing equipment and so on. But, it's so nice seeing all the relatives we only get to see once a year. And, the kids have a great time fishing with Poppie and their Uncles

There were sooooo many turtles in the lake this year. It made it very hard to fish. Some of the turtles were HUGE. The kids thought it was great! Poppie, Uncle Wayne and Doug didn't think it was so great getting the turtles off the line when they were caught!

All the "Stetser Guys" wore the shirts that John bought for them. The shirts have the image of John Stetser, Sr.'s fishing boat embroidered on them and the name of the boat, the Capt. Stetser

Another highlight of July was a trip to Northlandz in Flemington, NJ with Grandmom and Poppie Stetser. Northlandz is a HUGE model train display museum. When you are doing walking through, you have walked 1 mile! The displays are unbelievable - so much detail. I can't even begin to describe it!

We all had a great time - what a neat place! Thank you Grandmom and Poppie!

Another highlight of July was the Lee Graduation Party. If anyone can throw a party, it's the Lee's! The party was to celebrate Russell's 8th graduation from St. Margaret's and Kyle's graduation from Gloucester Catholic. They rented a HUGE gladiator pit and it was the hit of the party! Doug and I even gave it a shot! I won :). Adam was using it as a trampoline. The boy loves to flip! Sorry for the sideways video - I don't think there is a way for me to rotate a .avi file!

Katie and Annie doing battle on the gladiator!

Moving on to August.....

August 3rd was Mom's birthday, so we had a cookout at Jean and Sean's. While dinner was grilling, there was a card game going on! Surprise, surprise....

And yes, that is a mohawk on Kyle's head. It was something he wanted to do, so he did it. It lasted about a week and a half before he shaved it off

Opening presents and hanging out

And like I said earlier, we hung out at the library - a lot! Our children's librarian, Miss Heather is amazing! She comes up with great programs, great crafts, great fun for the kids! This years summer reading program theme was "Catch the Reading Bug". Here are a few highlights from some programs:

Mr. Malcom - we love him! We are groupies! He know my kids and Kevin and Annie by name!

A play the kids were in

And the end of the reading program party and a day of water fun!

All in all, it was a great summer! We hung out at the Gibbstown swim club a lot with the MacKenzies, had play dates, hung out, went to the park and really enjoyed ourselves! One week left to have more fun!

Moving In!

2008-08-23T22:07:00.007-04:00

Well, it will be about 10 more years until we have to move our child into college, but we had practice today with our "honorary son", our nephew Kyle. We took a trip up to The University of Scranton to help Jean and Sean cart all of Kyle's belongings to school! It's about a 2 1/2 hour drive, not so bad. We got there a little late since we hit traffic. Scranton has a tradition that when freshman move in, the upperclassmen carry all their stuff to their room - how nice is that! So, we pulled up, a group converged on our vans and up to the 2nd floor went all of Kyle's things! His roommate was already moved in, so we had to work with what we had. We were done in about 1 1/2 hours, and the room looks good! Jean got a GREAT list from Monica about what to take. There was nothing that didn't fit, that had to come home. We saw many people carrying out "extras" when it was time to go!

Here is Kyle's 1/2 of the room:

After we got everything settled, it was time to go down for Freshman Convocation. It was a very, very nice ceremony. The Class of 2012 (970 strong!) processed in in their new Class of 2012 t-shirts and were welcomed by alumni, faculty and staff. The president of the college had very nice things to say, the class banner was presented, their pins were given to them and they donned robes, like graduation robes, signifying "education". The class recited the school pledge and sang the alma mater. It was a beautiful ceremony!

Good luck, Kyle - we know you will be successful!!

Called To Serve....

2008-08-18T11:29:00.004-04:00

Andrew has been counting the days until he can be like his big cousin Russell and before him, Kyle and be an alter server. To be an alter server, you must have made your 1st Communion. Andrew made his in May. Of course, I didn't post it because I am bad about blogging. Here he is on his First Holy Communion Day

Usually, you need to be in 4th grade to alter serve. Well, things at St. John's are a little less strict and, my brother in law Sean is in charge of the servers. So, this summer Andrew was trained to alter serve. We were thrilled, because with all the church closings and mergers, we wanted him to be able to serve at St. John's before our doors are closed. He did a great job on his first time out. Honestly, I don't think I paid one bit of attention to Mass that day, I just watched Andrew. And Andrew watched his partner Russell. Whatever Russell did, Andrew did. And I mean WHATEVER - Russell scratched his nose, Andrew scratched his nose. Russell folded his hands, Andrew folded his hand - you get the picture. Andrew has served every week at 10:30 Mass since. Russell was sick one week, so he did it all on his own! He was NOT happy, but did a great job. We are very, very proud of him. We are glad that he wants to take an active part in the church and the Mass that we all love so much!

Updates....

2008-08-18T11:24:00.003-04:00

I keep swearing I will update more and more and then....life gets in the way. So..ahem...

I, Joanie, do solemly swear to UPDATE this blog more frequently. There. It's official.

Really, though, I should update more. We have family all over the place (shout out to the IL's in FL!), many, many FFF's (Far Flung Friends) (shout out to Anth and Erik, the Czerewko's, et, al.)
So, I am going to try and keep you filled in more frequently on our ever so exciting life. Do me a favor and leave a comment once in a while, so I know you are out there :)

STAR WARS!!!

2008-03-14T19:45:00.003-04:00

How stinkin' cool! We went to the Franklin Institue Science Museum to see the special "Star Wars - Where Imagination Meets Science" exhibit. Adam was in awe. The child has been OBSESSED with Star Wars since age 3. They had original costumes, R2, C3PO, Luke's landspeeder and so much more! Adam went decked out in his Anakin costume.

We were in the exhibit for a loooooooooooooong time, then went and saw the movie "Far, Far Away: The Worlds of Star Wars" in the Fels Planetarium and then went to see the IMAX movie "Dinosaurs Alive". Finally, we toured the rest of the museum! We are members, so we go all time and did'nt mind missing a thing or two! We were there from opening to closing - and we are beat!

Andrew took a friend and Wayne joined us. I think we wore him out - good practice for Disney World (only 203 more days, not that I'm counting or anything!!!)

I would highly recommend this exhibit if you are a Star Wars fan!

SNOW DAY!!!!!!

2008-02-24T12:17:00.002-05:00

Well, only 3 inches. But hey, it's better than nothing. And, we got a snow day out of it! What was supposed to be a full week of school turned into a very short one! We were supposed to have school on Monday (President's Day), but the week before, there were so many kids out sick that they decided to close on Monday and disinfect the whole school! Then, the snow on Friday caused another closure! The kids enjoyed the snow, even though there was not that much - and I enjoyed staying in all day, since I was sick.

Too long since I posted....again.....

2008-02-11T21:06:00.000-05:00

I have been so bad about updating my blog! Things have been busy as usual. Shouldn't that be normal now? I spend WAY too much time volunteering at the boys school. Way too much time. But, it is something that I love, and right now, I am able to do it. With tuition and everything else costing more and more, who knows how long that will last, so I might as well enjoy it while I can!

So much has been going on the last few weeks:

1. We bought a new (well, new to us) van. Our good old "Silver Bullet" was starting to nickle and dime us to death. It had almost 100,000 miles on it, and was starting to need lots of work. So, we bought a 2007 "pre-owned" (don't ya love that "pre-owned"-call it what it is USED!) Chrysler Town and Country Touring Edition. I LOVE the Stow and Go Seating and the Sirius Radio. The boys love the DVD player - even though they have not used it yet!

2. We added a new member of the family. On January 16, we got Max. Max was (yes, WAS) a cute "Winter White" hamster. Max died 1 week after we got him. We were very upset. So, what else is there to do but put the body in a bag and cash in on the 14 day guarantee. Yup, ya gotta take the body back to the store. So, off the PetSmart we went. We came home with Sam. Sam is a "Blueberry Dwarf" hamster. He is so much fun! We are all really enjoying him (Grandmom and I are enjoying him the most, believe it or not!). I will post a pic very soon!

3. The kids got their report cards - both did excellent! I was very proud of them! We are looking forward to Easter break in March - 11 days off - WOOHOO!!! We are going to go to the Franklin Institute to see the Star Wars exhibit. We can't wait for that!

4. I am still obsessivly planning our Disney trip - only 240 days to go! I know I am driving Doug and Wayne crazy, but I am really looking forward to going! We are really going to try and surprise the boys - really surprise them. Wake them up in the morning and say "come on, we are going to the airport and going to Disney NOW" type of surprise! We'll see if it happens!

So, that's our life in a nutshell for right now. I will post some pictures of the new wheels and the new hamster very, very soon!

I can't believe it's been so long....

2008-01-15T20:27:00.001-05:00

Where did the time go? I can't believe my last entry was HALLOWEEN! I gotta get on the ball! So much cool stuff has gone on since then! Thanksgiving was great - we all ate at our house and had so much fun. Christmas was a blast - we did a lot of fun things with the kids and really enjoyed the holidays. The boys Uncle Wayne got them (and us!) a Wii for Christmas-we are having a blast with it :)

For New Years, we went with friends to Lancaster, PA, to a hotel (Howard Johnson's) with a great indoor water park. The kids had a blast staying up until midnight and "partying" in the room!

Then, back to reality - school for the kids, work for Doug and the usual craziness for me!

We hope to have a great year ahead with a lot of things planned. The biggest plan is Disney! We are heading to see the Mouse on October 3rd! We have been saving for this trip for a year, and can't believe we are only 262 days away - LOL!

So, my New Years resolution is to keep my blog updated--think it'll happen????

Happy Halloween!!

2007-10-31T18:53:00.000-04:00

Ahhhh...Halloween. My least favorite holiday, and the one the boys live for! As you all know, every day is Halloween in Adam's world! I tried sooooo hard to convince Adam to be Capt. Jack Sparrow, since, for his birthday, Grandmom bought him the costume from the Disney store and Aunt Jean bought him the hat and wig. But no way. He wanted to be Anakin Skywalker and there was no talking him out of it. So, Anakin he was. Andrew was easy. He couldn't wait to be the "kid abducted by the alien" that was Russell's from a few years ago!

Speaking of Russell....since he is the cool 8th grader, he is way too cool for "costumes". But, St. Margaret's really does it big on Halloween. So, Jean came up with the idea for him and his friends: The Verizon Network. It really was a cool idea!

He's Got the Whole World in His Hands!

2007-10-29T14:19:00.000-04:00

Andrew's 2nd grade class recently read Ready Freddy and the Pumpkin Elf. In the story, the class has a pumpkin decorating contest. So, Andrew's class thought that would be a great idea.

We talked about what he wanted to do and some of the ideas he kicked around were: a soccer ball, a baseball, a monster and a globe. He decided on the globe. We spray painted it blue, Doug drew all the continents on it and Andrew painted them and labeled them. We think it came out great! The class will vote for their favorites on Wednesday. There were a lot of very clever ideas!

CRASH!!!

2007-09-21T14:28:00.000-04:00

Yup, crash. Our laptop crashed Wednesday night. Are we smart enough to back up? Nope. You know, it will never happen to us. Yeah. So, we lost 7 years of our checkbook (I didn't know Doug was not backing at least that up!), I lost all my word docs, excel files, email addresses - EVERYTHING. Our resident computer guru, aka my BIL Wayne came over with his magic tool kit and after about an hour, decided that nope, there was nothing to be recoved, it was all gone. I think I'm most upset about all the email addys that I am now without. I am soooo glad all our pics are on the desktop and that they are backed up to cds! So, looks like we are starting over again and going computer shopping tomorrow. Ahhhhh...gotta love technology!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME!

2007-09-09T19:48:00.000-04:00

I can't believe I'm 39. When did I get old?? LOL. Well, I used to think it was old, not anymore! I got a wonderful surprise from Doug and the boys - a ring from Nelle and Lizzy! It is two intertwined silver rings with the boys names on them! I tried taking a pic of mine, but it's not coming out right! Here is an example of it. A friend of mine had received one over a year ago and I loved it. I was quite shocked (and impressed) that Doug remembered it, and actually emailed my friend to get the details! He gets major props for this one...it almost erases the dreaded "Mother's Day 2006", but not quite :)

Orange Crush!!

2007-09-08T23:34:00.000-04:00

Our first soccer game of the fall season was today! Truth be told, I really expected to get steamrolled. We were playing one of the best teams, and I have quite a few new kids on my team. Well, surprise, surprise! My team did GREAT! Andrew stepped it up in the goal in the first half with 7 saves and scored a goal playing offense in the second half. Adam ran his little tail off and did great with ball handling. The whole team did awesome, despite the 93 degree weather at 10 this morning! We won, 3-2! I am so proud of my team, ORANGE CRUSH!

School Days!

2007-09-05T13:22:00.000-04:00

I can't believe the first day of school is here! I didn't want summer to end! We had so much fun and did so many cool things the last few months!

But, September is here and that means back to school! I was so worried about Adam. He is a bit of a Momma's boy and I was expecting tears. He made me so proud this morning - not one tear! I was so glad! When he came home he talked a little about school, but not much. I'm sure more and more will come out as the day goes on! WOW, my baby is in Kindergarten!

I knew Andrew would be fine, he was always my "don't let the door hit you in the butt on the way out, Mom" kind of kid. He has a very tough teacher this year, but I think he'll be fine. I can't believe he is in 2nd grade already!

Today felt like the longest 4 hours of my life! I can't imagine how Monday will be with them in school all day! We'll see how that goes!

My Blog....

2007-09-05T11:20:00.000-04:00

Well, I always said I would not "blog". But, since we have friends and family all over the country now, I figured it would be easier to have everything in one place. So, here it is, my blog.