Romios Family

Two Cats & a Dog

2012-01-25T23:02:00.001-08:00

In mid-December I picked up these two cats from preschool - so cute!

SWING!

2012-01-25T22:42:00.000-08:00

We've started tball again, this time in Alameda and Marco is in the class!

How cute are my kids?? (note Scabie Baby. Ha. Can't ditch that chic if you try.)

+Marco

Post-Thanksgiving

2012-01-25T22:12:00.000-08:00

And we're back from Thanksgiving (omg I am behind on blogging) and hanging out on the lovely 4th Street. Love this place at Christmas time!

Nikos and Tyke

Olive (her father's daughter)

Nikos takes the camera.

(Side note - since I am blogging so late - when they took the lights down in mid-Jan Olive said to me "it's berry berry sad, isn't it mommy?")

We picked up our Christmas tree at our local Christmas Tree farm (Home Depot.)

The annual car/tree photo.

Wow - sorry, just realized this is kinda the most boring post ever. I'll try to step it up with my next one.

We Are Thankful (part 2)

2012-01-13T06:15:00.000-08:00

Back to Thanksgiving...

Since everyone had to check out of their timeshares on Friday we decided to celebrate Thanksgiving a day early. With our assignments in hand we set to work. After a some serious deliberations about who had the most room we decided that our timeshare had the best layout and we would host.

We had a delicious spread and even better company.

Christian and Lucy toast.

I didn't get a group pic of all of us - but here is part of the crew. L-R: Frank, Christian, Lucy, Vernie, Robyn (Austin's girlfriend), Austin, Callan (Austin's friend that just moved from PA.)

Christian and Vernie

Me + kids
The spread.
Kids' table (minus Kira.)

The girls after dinner.

The day after fake Thanksgiving -- uh, so basically real Thanksgiving, we celebrated with a good old fashioned 3 mile Turkey Trot. While my Dad, Mel and Maile "trotted" and finished at a reasonable time, my mom and I were stuck with the Kira and Nikos, the scenic crew.

Here's the our walk in pictures.

After our walk and some naps the kids went to the Kids Club for the Thanksgiving Day crafts.

Turkey hats!

The cousins by the lobby tree.

On the back of the turkey feathers they kids were asked to write what they were thankful for. Here are their lists - Nikos': Kira, Maile, Mason, Olive, Marco and Dada. Olive's: a fox, a birdie, a turkey, Baby, Mommy, an eyeball.

Ha.

Thanksgiving night the kids modeled their pjs.

And..roadtrip home.

Until next year!

We Are Thankful (part 1)

2012-01-05T00:32:00.000-08:00

I've decided that Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday of the year. I love getting together and spending the week with family. This year we spent the week in Tahoe and had a fabulous time.

Roadtrip on the way up.

We stopped at Islands (shocker) and devoured some cheese fries.

The kids pose in their Thanksgiving pjs on the balcony - they were super excited because it snowed the day after we got there and we woke up to a light snowfall.

We bundle up to go play in the snow

Olive isn't sure how she feels about the snow so she chills with Grammy.

Nikos gathers snow for snowballs.

Other fun activities included:

Hide-n-seek

Cheering for the Eags

Ice skating (despite the pic he had a great time.)

A few visits to Starbucks...

I caved and bought the kids snowball makers that they spotted - they were super excited.

The fruits of our labor - 1.5 Scabie Babies!

To be continued.

Christmas Morning

2011-12-31T10:30:00.000-08:00

Frantically trying to wrap up all of my 2011 posts by today (it's not looking so good since I really only have a three hour nap window to work with later on today.)

In the meantime - here is a fun video shot of the action in our house on Christmas morning. Enjoy!

Merry Halloween! (Yes, Halloween!)

2011-12-25T23:00:00.000-08:00

The week before Halloween the Kienzle cousins met up for our annual trip to Smith Family Farm in Brentwood.

I am loving it that my kids are still at the age where I can manipulate them into wearing costumes in the same theme (and usually what Mel's kids have worn two years prior). I am feeling like my days are really numbered on this. I was planning on Popeye and Olive Oyl (Ha!) for this year, but already having Kira's Tinkerbell costume & Mason's Peter Pan costume swayed my decision.

Tinkerbell enjoys the farm animals (much like her costume predecessor.)

Grammy shares some interesting farm facts.

Serious Peter Pan.

Two ninjas (Maile and Mason) and Peter Pan check out the chickens.

+ Rapunzel (Kira) and Tink.

Exploring a...okay, I wasn't paying attention. But it does remind me of those little structures that Mel and I visited when we were in Ireland. (If I wasn't so behind on blogging I would dig up a pic.)

Inside the "structure."

The two little Kienzle princesses - they play so well together!

Playing on haystacks.

Group Cousin Pic.

Add 1 Pop-Pop (+ Tinkerbell's wings)

We jump on the hayride and head out to the pumpkin patch to pick our pumpkins.

Olive took awhile to pick her pumpkin, surveying the rows for the perfect one.

The perfect pumpkin!

Nikos found his winner fairly quickly.

Olive chatting Tyke's ear off on the way back to the car.

Niko wants to pose one more time with his pumpkin (how cute is this kid!) (Ps - this may be the debut of his new smile...)

Back at home we carved the pumpkins - left to right - Olive's pumpkin (from school), Heather's, Taki's (stalk as nose), Nikos', Olive's and Nikos' (from school.) And how cute (and big!) do the kids look in this pic.

And love this one of Olive adoring her big bro.

Flash forward to Halloween morning and the preschool Halloween parade. We all gather at the school and basically walk around the block in the neighborhood and then back to the school. As I'm getting the kids ready I realize Olive is a little bit warm (okay borderline on fire) and like any respectable parent...I drag her to preschool for the parade.

Papouli and Grandma met us at the school. Olive charms Papouli in her classroom (this may have been the last time she smiled all day.)

Preschool parade. Olive (obviously at this point not feeling well), cried inconsolably until Nikos held her hand. (You can see both that she is looking a little peaked and he is looking a little un-thrilled.)

After the parade was over I took my little mini-sauna home with me and she promptly laid in our bed and then fell asleep about 10 minutes into tangled (with a fever of 103.)

Later that night for Halloween Taki took one for the team and stayed home with Olive while Nikos & I met up with Cecchins & the D'Angelos for trick-or-treating.

Not sure how I didn't get any good pics of all of the kids, but here are two.

Peter Pan and SuperGirl (Brookie.)

+Hulk (Marco.)
We had a great Halloween, adults with their roadies, kids collecting lots of candy. Nikos even asked one house for a glow bracelet for his sister since she was home sick (so cute!) Of interesting note, I'm convinced that Olive's fever, which lasted 2 days, was the starter for my lower left lung pneumonia (to debut - and last - most of November.)

September Rain

2011-12-21T06:09:00.000-08:00

In late September we headed over to Dreamland at Aquatic Park to burn off a little pent up energy.

We fed the ducks.

And played on the sliding boards.

And played on...what is this thing called??

And then a little puddle jumping on the way home. (I tried my best but couldn't land the double jump shot.)

We are so fortunate to live in walking distances to so many cool places!

End of Summer (yes...Summer) Hurrah

2011-12-20T21:00:00.000-08:00

One of our favorite annual summer trips is up to Sarah's cabin near Silverlake. This year the boys (big boys) couldn't make it, so Sarah and I once again crammed three carseats into the back of a car and headed up for some fun.

We had a great time exploring the resort and checking out the "horses" - always a fan favorite.

Turns out we were up there so late in the season that the general store and restaraunt/bar was closed and the game room was in the midst of being dismantled.

Olive enjoyed some time on the motorcycle, one of the few holdouts in the gameroom.

After playing in the dirt the boys took - what I think will be their final - joint bath in the sink.

The next morning we headed to the beach and spent a fabulous morning and afternoon at the water.

Nikos shows off some hula (remember we were fresh off our trip to Hawaii - despite my late blogging...ha.)

Ollie blows bubbles.

The kids entertainment...a downed ladybug.

Our entertainment...highly recommended summer beer.

We headed out for a batwalk and the obligatory photo opp on the bridge that Sarah's grandpa built.
And although I didn't get any pics of the elusive bats, I did capture what I think may be another yearly pic.

Thanks for including us on one of your cabin weekends Marco and Sarah!

Flashback...September Candids

2011-12-12T21:25:00.000-08:00

Trying to get caught up on my posts before Christmas is upon us.

Nikos and Olive started preschool the morning after we arrived home from Hawaii (at like 11pm or something.) Obviously a genius parenting move.

Here we are leaving the house to go to preschool. Olive was not happy in this pic but she perked up as soon as we arrived at the school.

Here's Olive's lunch cubby (not to be confused with her nap cubby and her extra clothes cubby.)

I was curious as to how Olive would transition but not really worried. She had already been in daycare and every time we picked Nikos up/dropped him off she would try to stay at his preschool. However, I didn't plan on her being so nonchalant about the drop off. We walked into the class, put items in all of her assorted cubbys and then she spotted the painting area.

She didn't even wave goodbye!

And you know how everyone says that the second child gets the short end of the sick? I mixed it up a little bit. I didn't even take any pics of Nikos in his new class. Whoops. I'll also state for the record that I wasn't at all worried about Nikos since he was just moving into the classroom directly next to his, with all of the same kids and four new ones. Turns out, I was right (he was fine.)

...

Not sure if everyone remembers, but Scabie Baby was accidentally left in Kauai with my parents - for more on her adventures without us click here.

While she was gone I started thinking Olive might actually be able to live without her. When we got home she asked where Scabie Baby was (and when I told her she was in Hawaii with Grammy and Pop-Pop she simply asked me to go get her.) Throughout the time I would have her check out Baby on my parents website and she seemed okay. I was all ready to tell my parents they didn't need to drop her off the second they got home when - this magazine arrived in the mail.

Yes, an American Girl catalog with a picture of a baby on it that bore a strong resemblance to Scabie. She shrieked, hugged the magazine and carried it around with her for a few weeks. Poor kid.

...

Another new item in the Romios household, bunkbeds! I lucked out and scored our neighbors' bunks when they were giving them away. (I took these pics in the middle of the night but turned the lights on.)

(Note - we let Olive use her pacifier until Baby came back but we took it away afterwards & she didn't even react!)

The kids have done really well in the bunk beds - Olive doesn't get up at the middle of the night or during naptime like we were afraid might happen. We put a guard on the side of the bed for awhile because Olive fell out (we just took it off last night) and we also stuffed pillows between the bed and the wall (she actually fell in that crack twice!) and another pillow under the bottom ladder wrong because she got her head stuck in their one time. (Can you tell she moves a lot in her sleep?)

...

Next up - the Komen Walk for Breast Cancer. One weekend morning in mid September my neighbor knocked on our door to let me know that the route for the walk was a block away from our house. I grabbed the kids and a Costco box of granola bars and chocolates and we headed to the corner to give out treats. It was so much fun! When I've done the walks one of my favorite things is when little kids are cheering for you and handing out treats in their neighborhood and I was really excited to have my kids take part in it.

And finally - just a cute pic of the kids.

Kauai - the finale

2011-11-29T22:06:00.000-08:00

Is this depressing you guys as much as it is me? I need to finish off these Hawaii blogs lest you think we are still in the islands.

Did someone say dollar maitais and free pupus? The kids take off for the partay.

I didn't want them to go to the party alone...

When we started planning our trip to Kauai I figured out that Olive would be around the same age (well - about 6 months older but same clothing size) as Maile so I was super excited to put Olive in the outfit that Maile wore to our rehearsal bbq. I'm a dork, I know.

Maile in 2005

Olive in 2011.

Doing the hula.

Olive and Grammy check out the flowers.

Family pics:

The boys

The girls

The four

The whole fam

Love these happy faces!

More time at Poipu Beach.

Gettin ready to chill in the pool.

My parents and I ran the Kauai marathon (or posed by the sign) on our way back from Starbucks.

Enjoyed (well semi-enjoyed but weren't really thrilled by) some shave ice.

And more ice cream.

Went on a hike.

Checked out some koi.

And finally - we enjoyed some coffee before our flight back to the mainland.

Okay - I think that's it! I may throw some videos up later once I catch up on the rest of our lives.

Kauai - continued

2011-11-19T20:17:00.000-08:00

A few more Kauai blogs before I get it out of my system.

Nikos tries his first puka dog.

Pop-pop talked us into another trip to Lapperts.

Funny faces in Starbucks.

The timeshare had a new kids program and the kids had a lot of fun with the facepainting. Nikos picked a turtle.

Olive picked a flower but then was apparently too shy to show it off.

We enjoyed some pizza at Brick Oven.

No shirt, no service? Not in Hawaii. Don't worry, I convinced Taki to wear a shirt.

Taki and I enjoyed a date night at the Beach House and my friend Jeannine from high school (who is now the HR manager there) hooked us up with an amazing table and champagne. so fun!

Olive coloring in the timeshare.

and showing off her new right hand ring at Keoki's.

The kids were thrilled by all the geckos (mo'o) we kept spotting.

The kids playing in the pool.

and watching the ocean.

Kauai!

2011-11-18T21:24:00.000-08:00

We showed up in Kauai to high surf - it was the biggest that we have ever seen it!

Olive got in some cuddles by the pool with Grammy.

The kids check out the view from the lanai.

Olive models a few swimsuits.

The kids fish for...tilapia?? Some tiny fish that they caught with little balls of bread and threw back.

Here's how Nikos spent most of his time in the pool.

Coincidentally the pool had to be shut down for puke one day during our stay. I mean, purely coincidental. I would also like to state that during the time of the alleged incident I was watching Olive while she was napping and Taki, Grammy and Pop-Pop were in charge of the tossing of Nikos back and forth in the pool.

Checking out the surf again and looking for turtles.

Maui Revisited

2011-11-06T20:05:00.000-08:00

Found a few more cute pics from Maui.

Nikos and Brookie taking an early mornng dip in the hot tub.

Lava flow!

Bloody Mary!

Aloha Heather!

I see the resemblance...
Lovin the pirate ship pool.

And the flight to Kauai...

Mahalo Maui!

2011-10-20T21:26:00.000-07:00

Ahh - our last full day in Maui. The D'Angelos hosted some fabulous shrimp tacos on the bbq.

The boys and the kids working on the tacos.

So good! The guys did most of the work (but Katie and I did the shopping so we will take half the credit!)

And now for photo shoot part 2.

Group pic!

Love this pic Jack took of me and Olive.

Taki, once again, attempts to get artsy.

It was our turn for a date night so Tyke and I headed to a little restaurant that was suggested by the concierge - Mala Ocean Tavern. WOW. It was fabulous. It's in my top two for restaurants that we have ever been to. We had reservations and when we arrived we sat in the bar for a little while and the hostess promised us the best table in the house.

Hibiscus martini for me - mojito for Tyke.

Well, she wasn't exaggerating! We sat outside right on the water - it was awesome. (We are the corner table in the pic below.)

The food was delicious - I took pics of it all but I won't bore you - I did want to include this pic of the dessert though - love all of the hawaiian fruits that were included!

The food was so good (and I am such a dork) that I took my leftovers on the plane with me and had my mom try them in Kauai the next day.

Obviously one of the reasons that we had such a good time was that we were secure in the knowledge that our babysitter was alert and responding to ever need of our children.

Uh huh.

Hawaii Photo Shoot (Day 5?)

2011-10-17T21:32:00.000-07:00

My grand plan (when I had to admit I couldn't fly my photographer Jackie out to Hawaii) was to have our wedding photographer take our family pictures. Until he told us he charged $450 (an hour/2 families) for his assistant. What? We decided to try a little photo shoot on our own...not great but with that setting you can't go too wrong. Next time I'll budget for Jackie to come with us.

Brookie was playing hard to get. Of course with those eyes, she doesn't need to smile.

Romios kids being cute.

Possibly the cutest pic of my kids ever. Damn that guy in the background. Sarah - photoshop?

Excited to be done with pictures.

The girls.

The D'Angelo's

Me & O

Tyke and the Kids

And finally - because you know I have a problem with comparison photos...

Olive in Maui - 2.5 years old

Nikos in Aruba - 1 year old

Maui Day 4

2011-10-08T20:25:00.001-07:00

Again, suffering from rental car guilt (because quite honestly we really could have just lounged around all of the resort pools all day long) we drove over to the Maui Ocean Center to enjoy some time at the outdoor aquarium.

The kids checking out the colorful fish.

Nikos was in a loving mood.

More fish watching.

Playing with the interactive displays.

Olive got a little impatient with the scuba diver shark exhibit so we went outside to burn off some energy.

We loved spotting my favorite flowers!

After our morning at the aquarium we enjoyed a nice lunch with the D'Angelo's right by the water and then the Romios kids played on the playground.

Back at the timeshare we hit the beach.

Sand castles!

I can neither confirm or deny that I yelled "SUCK IT IN!" before this picture was taken.

Please realize that the entertaining part of these next pics is not the foreground.

Had to go closeup to cut out that crazy fool.

Since this post is a little bit of photo overload I'll continue the day it in the next one...

ALOHA! Hawaii - Day 3

2011-10-05T22:20:00.000-07:00

We decided to leave the resort (partly to prove we rented these cars for a reason, dang it!) so we headed over to Baby Beach in Lahaina. After a little tour of the neighborhood (to read: Heather got a little lost) we found the beach.

The water was beautiful and calm. We spent time in the water and on the beach - fabulous!

Time for some "boogie boarding".

Warning! This might be the cutest video of Olive that you have ever seen.

After a few hours at the beach we headed back to the pool.

Love the look on Baby Jack's face here!

Baby's Inaugural Pool Dip

Olive decided it was time that Scabie be baptized. We agreed.

Nikos and Brookie were doing the cutest thing. They would run around the pirate ship, run up to the top of the slide and hug and then slide down. So cute!

And a little stop in the action for some more koi feeding.

And the day ended with Mom's Night Out. Not a bad day.