Year in Review [Summary: A Good One!]

This is my year-in-review post to close out 2011. All in all, a good year here in Kansas. It started off snowy. When I think of January 2011, I think cold. And snow. And not being able to go anywhere because it was so. darn. cold. Why does January have 31 days again? February started out GREAT. It was my birthday! I had a party! My awesome husband set up a LIVE trivia game for the grownups upstairs, and the kiddos watched Toy Story 3 in the basement. My team (fueled by three babies) won!

March was OK. My dear friend had medical issues and a very premature baby (who is doing great now), and my other dear friend lost her mom. So maybe it wasn't really OK; it was a worse month than most. But we pressed on. In April, we celebrated Trucko's big #1! I took the day off with him on his actual birthday and the two of us had a great day. We went to Wonderscope, followed by lunch at Fritz's, where your food is delivered by train:

Happy boy, happy mom. In June, we spent a week at the beach and in July, we flew to California for a long weekend for my grandmother's memorial. Lots of time with the extended family. It was fun. Truck did set a new family record of length of time crying on a flight (55 minutes straight; from here to Chicago). He got more and more teeth. My big boy celebrated #8 in July. He had a joint birthday party with a friend and we took 20-some boys to a minor-league baseball game. We had bought the suite at the elementary school auction. It was approximately 110 degrees. Thank goodness we had air conditioning in the suite!

August is back to school time here in Kansas. TOO EARLY if you ask me. But back to school we went. It's been a great year. Third grade is absolutely transformative, and the big guy has perhaps the world's greatest teacher (second only to MY third grade teacher) (and maybe his grandmother!). Noodle started kindergarten at 4 1/2 (private). She'll repeat kindergarten next year at the public school. She loves it, which is making the year magical. She's gone from knowing her letters to reading chapter books in a few short months. It's so fun to watch her think. She and I took a girls trip to San Diego for our cousin's wedding and had a blast. A definite highlight was getting room service and eating pancakes in bed!

September and October were blurs of soccer and baseball games. Halloween came quickly, our house filled with candy, and my dream of having all three kids wear the same bear costume faded away when our Truck was (AHEM) too large for the costume (at 18 months) that his sister wore at almost-3. We had a full house (all four grandparents, and one great-grandmother) for Thanksgiving, and then it was Christmas! Both of the big kids performed in Christmas programs at school, and it was great fun to go and watch them sing and dance. And now we're knocking on 2012. The year flew by impossibly fast - it's true what they say: the days are long but the years are short!