New Traditions:

We are spent the last 10+ years of our relationship traveling to the great white north for the winter holidays (and once or twice to somewhere warm). This was our FIRST year staying put, having a tree of our own, and forging some new traditions. I really and truly love all the holidays we have had, but it was wonderful to do somethings different (and yet the same).

On Christmas Eve morning we met some of our good friends for a serious track workout at the local track....now some of you might find that strange, BUT it's just our style. Then all the families and kids headed to our local breakfast joint for some "good country cooking at the right price," and filled our bellies while the kids run like wild animals and just had fun together.

We then blended an Italian tradition of "seven fishes" on Christmas eve with a classic "becky" twist: grouper, tuna, cobia, shrimp, Swedish fish, gummy fish, and fish food ice cream. Which will bring us luck into the new year!

We then got all pretty-ed up and heading to church for the children's service and let the kids join in the singing of come classic christmas carols. Lilly of course was more involved, until we ended up next to this wonderful older lady singing her heart out but a little off key. And poor Lilly kept looking over at her with a VERY perplexed look on her face :)

Home again and time to build gingerbread houses: this activity can take upwards of two hours in past years (the planning, building, decorating, fixing falling buildings, and such). We managed for nearly 35minutes to keep the kids attention. But most of that was MJ eating any candy handed to him for decorating and Lilly being the one handing candy to everyone. Priceless!

Time for an Internet check of where Santa is. This one is so cool to me......you can see where he is going and video of some of the big cities he's been in. Lilly LOVED watching this. And as we watched Santa flying over the Atlantic....we saw a flashing red light in our back yard. Lilly shrieked and ran straight to be and covered her head proclaiming that Rudolph was in our backyard.

Time to Christmas to begin......Lilly slept until 7am and eagerly woke everyone in the house and started tearing through her gifts. She was wide eyed and ready to play. MJ was more reserved as he still has two or so gifts to open (and it's nearly 1:30pm). He would open one and play with it. Then move on to the next one, and play!

Our house is now full of so much more.....Lilly and her matching American Girl Doll-in matching pajama's, books, bike seat for said doll, dresses, makeup, and more. MJ with all things boy-trucks, trains, scooter, roller blades. Fitz will be trying out his new grind rail, and down jacket. And I will be happily sporting my new boots, and rain jacket!

There are still a few more hours of Christmas Day, and we are currently heating up the oil to fry a turkey, and then in the nearly 60 degree weather we will head to the beach to visit with great friends! Hope your christmas was FULL of traditions new and old and more then anything LOVE. Hoping to post some photos and videos before the day is done!

Phew, is it really NO-vember?

It seems like just yesterday we celebrated the kids 1st and 3rd birthday and now it's been over 6 months. Quick update: Becky went on a trip to Australia and met Bobby for a 10+ day trip during his mid-deployment R&R, Becky turned 30 and fished in the women's big rock fishing tourney (and caught the only fish), kids keep growing, Fitz and Becky celebrated their 8th wedding anniversary (8-8-11), Lilly started preschool and dance, kids had their 1/2 birthdays, MJ started school and kindermusik, and now it's November. Phew! See photos for what's been the happenings!

What happens when you combine an egg hunt, two bounce houses, and a whole mess of kids?

A Fitzula birthday party of course!

We got to celebrate Lilly turning 3 and MJ turning 1 with only the best of parties. There were two bounce houses for the kids (and adults) to play in along with a candy filled egg hunt!

Lilly filled her basket quickly with some of the 500 eggs that were hidden, and left them at my feet to gather up more!

Then it was time to sing "happy birthday" first around Lilly's purple princess cake.

Then around MJ's #1 car cake.

Although, I would love to take credit for their beautiful cakes, they were bought from a local baker....Christy Harrell owner of Beach Bakery here in MHC....look her up if you need a cake.

Then we opened some gifts, of which we slyly packed some away so we can pull them out on a rainy day. Lilly's current favorites are her Logan Dress, princess sing along, and DVD of Snow white. I'm sure others will quickly make her list when we allow her to have them.

Then it was time for more jumping, sliding, and having a grand ole' time. We managed to have NO injuries, and the kids LOVED every minute of it! Hurray for birthday parties!

Happy Birthday to my babies!!

We have the joy of celebrating our kids birthday on the same day...what a great thing...Fitz loves it since he only has to remember one day! The day started with gifts for the kids; Lilly got her princess dress for us, and a set of magnetic building things (magnaforms) from MJ. MJ got a a lifetime fishing liscence from us, and a toy telephone from Lilly. Since their party is not for a few weeks, the only other gifts they got to open were for close friends who came by for some cupcakes.

The weather was BEAUTIFUL, so we started with breakfast outside. Lilly was on to outfit #2 by this time, and she just HAD to weather her Cinderella Dress! MJ loved eating outside and watching all of the birds in the sky.

After we made our birthday shirts (3 for Lilly and 1 for MJ). It was time to do some swinging. And if you know my kids at all, it was not a surprise that they ended up nudie! It was so nice to be able to enjoy the outside! During this time, Dada was tilling the would be garden so we could plant. Lilly wanted to plant flowers for her birthday, so our next stop was to pick up some flowers, veggies at the Newport Garden Center.

Later on in the day, we had some of Lilly's good buddies over for a cookout. The girls gathered around the table for some burgers and dogs. They had to finish before we could move on to cake!

YAY for cake!!!

The night ended with some baths, hats and hugs! We are looking forward to the big party with weekend, and having all of Lilly and MJ's friends over for food, fun, and an egg hunt! It's so nice to have a "theme" already build in to birthday parties! If only it was not such a pain to fill the eggs...at least they are already done....all 500 of them!

April Fool's Day

It's 8:45am and our family has already been going strong for 2 or more hours. We have slipped back into cooler then normal weather for this time of year and I think it is putting everyone in less then happy moods. I think we are in desperate need of some warm weather and time outside. In the mean time, we have been staying busy....Lilly has become quite the actress and LOVES to dress up and play the "watch me" game. You know..."hey (blank), watch me do this"..then said adult had to "ohh and ahhh" over whatever it is that she did. We are really looking forward to her birthday since she will get yet another dress up dress. MJ is practcing walking but has not taken his first steps yet. maybe soon?!

Tomorrow Lilly will "run" her first road race. It's a mile fun run....I will hopefully, be able to take lots of photos!

Finally some nice weather!

We have finally had a change of the seasons, and we are enjoying every minute of it! We have been spending as much time at the park and beach as possible.

MJ enjoying the beautiful day at the sound, he loves the sand and being able to stand with a bit more help.

Lilly has become a master of the "spider web" She is now tall enough to do some climbing on her own, and loves being independent!

MJ is, of course, too small to do any climbing, but he loves to stand at the bottom and cheer on his big sis as she does her climbing!

This is what is looks like when Lilly reaches the top (with Dada's help of course). She only gets to attempt the climb to the top when there are two of us at the park.

Actually, playing nicely together....it's a rare thing so I had to get it on film. Lilly found this to be great fun, and MJ was a good sport so we let the game continue!

NYC-you soon

So after not being away from the kids since Lilly was born in 2008, my parents kindly offered to take them for a weekend so we could get away. With Fitz's points (both hotel and airline) about to expire we decided to go big.....fly to NYC and stay in the Waldorf Astoria! What a time we had....I don't think we could have packed anymore into a weekend had we tried!

We left MHC 9am on Friday and caught a direct flight from Wilmington to Laguardia, then cabbed it to the hotel...what a location!! Then we changed and headed out to one of the many adventure we had planned (needed to check things off the list). First up, Millrose games (104th running)! We saw it all: 60M dash, shot up, pole vault, collegic 4X800 (Congrats to Virginia and Vig), then the event of the night Wannmaker mile! We managed to meet up with a buddy Fitz ran with at State.....then it was out for drinks with said friend, Chris Lear, Vig and other running nerds :)!

Inside Madison Square Gardens at Millrose Games!

Can't be in NYC without running through Central Park (we ran both days), but this was Sunday with our NC buddies Heidi and DT.

Another Must Do: was the museum of sex. Need I say more....somethings were interesting, and others were down right disturbing!

We used Sunday as our day to sight see.....Where else can you see a guy totally rocking on a piano in the middle of Washington square park. Look closely and you will see the straps he must have used to drag the piano to the park! What an amazing thing to see!

On our last day we hit the Museum of Natural History.....needed a full day in there, but we only had a few hours. One of the must see's for Fitz was the dino room.....I just hope to take Lilly and MJ someday. It was an amazing place!

All in all we had a great trip; Millrose games, running in Central Park, took in a show, celebrated the Chinese New Year in Chinatown (talk about feeling out of place), drank too much at the hotel bar for free (gotta love the perks), and then came home to the most amazing kids and parents a gal could ask for!

Icing a cake for Dada....look closely and most of the icing is on her face!

Four wheeling in the snow:)

Lilly and her good buddy Macy watching some curious George!

Lilly, Macy and Huddy enjoying a tea party :)

Pinkey's out Hud!

Kiddos at the 10M and 34M photo shoot!!

The weather has been cold and there for we have been spending more time inside...not fun! But we have been tryin to make the best of it with other activities (baking, tea parties, puzzles, and of course jumping on the bed)! Hopefully soon we can enjoy the great outdoors!

January started with Uncle Bobby heading back to Hawaii and then he will deploy for 12 months to the desert, but we hope to Skype him with while he is gone. The kids loved the time they got to spend with him and hope he we will see him sooner then later!

January 10th we had snow and Lilly got to play with her friend Gray and Gray's barbie jeep. The girls were crusin' around listening to tunes in the snow!

Intermeditly we have had some warmer days so we took advantage of them and got outside on the swing set. MJ loves to swing just like his big sister and it works out perfectly since we have two swings. Lilly is now a big help since she loves to push the swing and MJ is not as floppy!

One weekend Lilly asked for a big girl bed and we made it happen. She loves her new bed (mostly for jumping on), but has had no trouble at all sleeping. It's nice not to have to lower her down into the crib, but interesting to hear the pitter patter of little feet in the morning. Now on to the next task of getting her potty trained through the night!

Enter January 22, 2011....we got 7-8 inches of snow and Lilly was not a fan of the blowing snow, but the next day she loved riding her four wheeler on the iced over roads. We built a small hill in the front yard and did some snow tubing down it. All in all a great day!