Anniversary fun

Aaron and I got married on December 1st, 2004 and we had our party in the summer of 2005 for family and friends.   We have always considered the December 1st wedding the offical one since it is the date on our marriage certificate.  This year we are celebrating our 8th. anniversary.  We usually just go out to dinner, but this year we decided to get a hotel in downtown and enjoyed some extra sleep!

We had dinner reservations at 7 PM at the Brasserie by Niche.   It is a french restaurant at the Central West End.   Aaron loves french culture since we have been to Montreal.   He is actually taking french lessons next month!  We hope to make it to Paris someday, but for now, we will just enjoy it here.  The atmosphere was very French, very cozy and super cute.  I ordered an endive salad, steak frites, a Parisien drink and for desert crème buleet.  Aaron had a frisee salad with poached egg and lardon, causoulet (he was very excited they had it that night!), wine and for desert a floating island.

Brassserie by Niche



Frisee Salad

Steak Frites



Frisee Salad with poached eg and lardon

Cassoule





After dinner we stopped by at my friend Masina's Christmas party for a little bit and we headed to the hotel.  We stayed the Westin downtown, literally across the street from the stadium.  Awesome hotel, very modern inside and they had great breakfast!  Tin Tin!

Christmas Tree 2012 and etc...

We finally got around to getting our Christams Tree.   We went to a place called Sullivan Farms in St. Charles, MO.   We went there last year and we really liked it.   The weather was only in the 50s, so it wasn't that cold at all.  The boys went running around to pick our tree.  Noah right away found our tree.   We got a Frasier Fir type of tree.





This one!



Everyone liked it!



 

The boys enjoyed watching the process



Sam by our tree



Pretty cool tree



After we got home, had lunch, naps, and then we started to decorate our tree.   The boys were really into helping papai and they did a very good job. 

Our Christmas Tree 2012

The next day we went to the mall to take picture with Santa (or Papai Noel).   We went to Chesterfiled Mall as we did last year as well.  The wait was about an hour, and we got there right at 11 AM.  The picture is hilarious, Noah was screaming and Sam was super serious!   We thought maybe Noah would be ok since he gave Santa a high 5, but as soon as I lay him on his lap, he was screaming/crying.  Awesome!   Since they were all dressed up we decided to get home and get some pictures taken for Chritmas cards.  After  a few tries...we were able to get a good one:

Noah Cryes, Sam smiles



Noah smiles, Sam gets serious



Yeah, a good one!





Vovó is back!

I finally got some time to update the blog, after a couple of crazy weeks of everyone under the weather.   Vovó is back!   Sam recognized vovó right away and gave her a big hug.   Noah took a little time to get used to vovó again, but now they are very close.  Lola was very excited to see vovó too.

Sam is now very excited to learn portuguese, his portuguese already improved tremendously in only a few days of Vovó being here.  She will be here with us for awhile! 

Boy's hair

Our boys have completely different hair styles.   Sam has thick curly hair, and Noah has straight, smooth hair.  For their first hair cut we took them to the Hairy Elephant, which is a hair cut place just for kids.    Both boys did very good.   After a few times,  we decided to do the trimming ourselves adn save some money.  I started just doing their bangs, and the last time I went a little over board.  Disaster.   We decided to just let their hair to grow out for a while so they can get a decent hair cut.  We do like little boys with long hair and are not too big fan of the "buzz" hair cut.

Here is Sam and Noah Hair style:



Sam has wavy, curly hair



Noah has straight hair -we are trying to do his bangs to the side



 





Do they look like they need hair cuts?

After Thanksgiving we decided to take Noah to get his hair cut, it was about time.  We made sure to tell the hairstlyst that we like to keep a little bit long.   Noah did so good and just sat there watching Mickey on TV.  He even got his hair washed and dried.  I am going to just trim Sam's bangs over the weekend, his hair is not ready for a real hair cut yet.  Here is Noah at his hair appointment.

Focus

Getting rid of the mullet hair!

 

Noah has short hair!





Thanksgiving 2012



The family went to Columbia for Thanksgiving this year.  We got up early and got there for breakfast.  The boys were very excited for "Thanksgiving". Aaron's mom made an amazing Pecan cake/Christmas roll and a potato cheese casserole for breakfast.



Christmas Roll - Pecan cake made by Aaron's mom

Boy's place setting for breakfast

 The boys did a lot of crafting with aunt Meghan, they had such a good time.  It was a relaxing day  as it can be, and Aaron and I even grabbed a movie (Argo-Awesome!).  We also scored a deal on a vacuum cleaner on black Friday!



Final product!

Aaron's mom does a very good job setting up the table for thanksgiving, the table was beautiful:

Kid's place setting

Adult's place setting

The meal was delicious.  Sam did not try the turkey this year, maybe next year.  Noah really enjoyed the meal. We had turkey, lobster, stuffing, noodles, sweet potatoes, potato casserole, cranberries, and pies.

Happy Thanksgiving 2012!

I saw a beatle!

Last Sunday night, Aaron and I had a date night and we went to Paul McCartney’s Concert.    Aaron’s mom and sister came along and Aaron’s dad babysat the boys for us.    It took us 2 hours to arrive (a lot of traffic + rain) but we made it just in time.    Paul was amazing, what a concert!    

“Good evening, St. Louie. It’s good to be back” Paul said as soon as he came out.  Paul played the piano, ukulele, the guitar and the mandolin, he can do it all!  When he sang “Live and Let Die”, there were huge fireworks in the stage.   I cried when he played “Golden Slumbers” in disbelief that I was there.   At one point, everyone in the crowd was singing “nanananana” when he played “Hey Jude”.  

It was one of those concerts that you feel so many emotions, because obviously Paul is still playing/singing because he wants to be there.  Plus the fact that he is just awesome.  He also honored John Lennon and George Harrison playing songs for them.  My favorite song was “Yesterday”.  I remembered when he played in Rio many years ago, and they were showing him on TV playing “Yesterday” on the piano, and I thought it was so great.  He sang for almost 3 hours.  I danced and sang along almost the whole time.   I can’t believe I saw a Beatle!    Insane!!!

Paul playing "Hey Jude"

Thank you Paul!

Paul holding the Missouri Flag

Spaguetti Fridays

We started this new tradition on having spaghetti on Fridays.   Aaron is always cooking awesome dishes and one day I just requested spaghetti.  Of course, since he is a chef by heart, he made Spaghetti alla puttanesca. It is amazing and we are trying to have it on every Friday.

  Ingredients:    

·         1 package of spaghetti

·         1 tablespoon capers

·         1 can of anchovies

·         Garlic

·         1 Large can crushed Italian Tomatoes

 

      




Sauté garlic and anchovies in olive oil, add crushed tomatoes and simmer until broken down, add salt,pepper, red pepper flakes, and capers……put over the spaghetti and will be ready to serve.

        

We added salad and fresh bread:

Look who loves Spaghetti Fridays!

Noah -22 months

Halloween, Madonna and a cold

We had a party for Halloween and it was so much for the kids.   We had friends to come over with their kids, made chilli, had a fire going.   Noah and Sam were very hyper thru the evening.   The guys took the kids out for trick or treat and I followed them a little bit for pictures.  Noah was all over the place as expected and Sam enjoyed himself as always.   Sam was a knight and Noah a pirate socket monkey. Here are a few pics that describes the night:

The next day I got up sick (a very bad cold) and had to be all better for the evening to see MADONNA. I worked from home and tried to rest up for the concert.   The concert was awesome, she is great.  I went to see Madonna 20 years ago at age 13 with my older sisters and that concert was so especial to me.  I even won a DVD player from a contest.   Good times. 

MADONNA

2012