Is This Normal?
The chaos that is the KerbersArchive for family fun
Our Cinco de Mayo themed Kentucky Derby party
Tonight we had the second annual Kentucky Derby party at Myrvold’s. However, since it was Cinco de Mayo, too, we decided that we’d have Mexican food to celebrate both. This year I wasn’t as lucky in my Derby pick. Last year I drew the winner, but this year my horse came in like 13th. Bummer. But the party was big fun and we had a Mexican feast. The weather was perfect, so the kids had a ton of fun running around with their friends. As the sun went down the deck became the perfect spot for good music, good cocktails, good friends, and a lot of laughter. It was a perfect night.
Karnival Knight
I had been dreading the Northpoint carnival, affectionately called ‘Karnival Knight’ (because the Northpoint mascot is the Knights), because I knew it would be a crowded, crazy madhouse full of screaming kids and frustrated parents. This isn’t my first rodeo…I remember going to far too many school carnivals with my nephews. Why on Earth I would have subjected myself to that is beyond me. But anyway, I digress. Dave really had no reference points for school carnivals, and I think he may have even been looking forward to it a bit. Then we got there.
We headed for the balloon animals first, but saw there was a LONG line for them. Dave almost had Ben talked out of waiting until he saw his friend Griffin in line. Then there was no talking him out of that line. Emma desperately wanted to head for the bouncy houses, so we headed back to the gym. About 35 minutes later, while still in line for a bounce house, I got a text from Dave that contained two words, “This SUCKS.” I cracked up…that didn’t take long.
About a half hour later Emma had her 30 seconds of bounce house fun (after about a 45 minute wait) and Ben and Dave met up with us in the gym. The kids waited in line for a few more bouncy things, and then we headed to put our tickets into the raffle baskets. They had about 50 different baskets with all kinds of fun prizes and toys. The kids both found things they desperately wanted, and while Ben spread out his tickets among 5 or 6 different baskets, Emma put all of hers in one…the American Girl doll. She loved that thing. She didn’t even want to leave that gym because she just wanted to stand in front of it and wait to win it. I tried to explain to her that her tickets were just a chance for her to win and that we didn’t know if she would win just because she put a tickets in there. Reluctantly, she agreed to go do some more games.
The only thing we really had time to do after that was the book walk. It was pretty successful; Emma won legitimately, and we were there when it ended so everyone still in there got to pick a book, which meant Ben got one, too. Then it was time to head for the gym to hear the names of the basket winners. When they started drawing, and would get to a basket Ben wanted, we’d make a big deal about crossing our fingers and hoping. When his name wasn’t read, we’d snap our fingers across our body in the “darn it!” motion. He totally understood the raffle concept. Not so much for Ems. When the American Girl doll was given away, and it wasn’t to her, she burst into tears. The poor thing really thought she was going home with that baby.
Thankfully, this was the end of the carnival and we headed home. I cannot say it was a fun night, but I think the kids kind of had fun. Kind of. I know Ben was just excited to be at school at night and to see a bunch of his friends there. So I guess even if it wasn’t that fun, it was a success. We have 364 days until the next one. Let’s hope we can think of some plans that we can’t get out of that night next year. :)
And we’re off…
…to Florida! We all can’t wait to spend time with Grandma Judy and Grandpa Scott while enjoying the sun, the beach, and a whole bunch of family who will also be down there. It’s going to be a great week.
We’re leaving at 4:00 this afternoon, and as always we’re hoping that the trip is a smooth one. Hopefully I’ll have lots of pictures to share when we get back!
Happy Spring Break everyone!
An awesome get-away
We had a wonderful get-away to Key Lime Cove over the weekend. The kids had been looking forward to it for weeks, and even Dave and I were super excited to have some quality family time together.
We did everything in the water park…the wave pool, the slide and climbing area, the kiddie area, and Ben even went on the big slides. We spend some time in the craft area, and even got balloon animals! Then we went to Rain Forest Cafe for dinner before coming back to the water park for more fun. The kids had such a great time playing together, and since they were pretty contained in the “pineapple” area, Dave and I actually had time to sit and talk to each other without much interruption at all, which was heaven for us.
The next day we met up with our friends the Madzinskis for lunch in Naperville. It was a short, but very nice visit with them. Then we headed to the DuPage Children’s Museum and played there for a couple of hours. When we finally headed for home, we were all tired, but incredibly relaxed and happy. The weekend really was a perfect retreat from the winter blahs and winter weather.
This short trip made all of us so excited for Spring Break. Let’s hope we can make it through the next 5 weeks!
Valentine’s Day
Anyone who knows me well knows that I’m not a big fan of Valentine’s Day. However, I do appreciate that it’s special to the kids, so I tried to create a little bit of festivity for them. 
Before dinner, I arranged a heart of kisses around a Kit Kat bar for each of them just above their placemats. You would think that I had made them something of pure gold as excited as they were when they saw those. I surprised them again by making their favorite dinner, buttered noodles. 
But they weren’t regular buttered noodles…oh no. I had put some food coloring in the water to tint the noodles pink! I know if my mom is reading this she is gagging right now, but the kids loved it. I gave them red grapes with their pink noodles, and the Valentine’s Day dinner was complete. I just wish I would have tinted the milk pink, too. It was all very gourmet.
After dinner Ben was inspired by my Valentine’s actions. As soon as he was done eating he grabbed some paper and made Valentines for Dave, Emma, and me. 
He proudly cut them out, drew a picture of our family on the front, and wrote our name on the back. Then he hand delivered them with a huge smile on his face. It was the best Valentine I could get.
So, as I continue to believe that Valentine’s Day is nothing more than a Hallmark holiday, I will always make sure that my kids feel the love from me…year round.
Baby Emma
Earlier tonight Dave was trying to help me with some video transferring. We had let way too many videos stack up on our video camera, so I was trying to get them onto my computer. It was not going well, and I was frustrated. It kept appearing to transfer, but I had no idea where it was being stored on my computer. So Dave was working on his computer searching for the path when he started watching some of our older videos that were stored there. The first one he watched was of Emma when she was very little. She couldn’t have been much more than 18 months old, and I was trying to get her to count on camera. As soon as they heard the audio, both kids were over at Dave’s side watching. I was, too. Emma was mesmerized at the sight of herself, and Ben got the giggles every time he came onto the screen. I don’t think they could believe that it was actually them. One of our favorites was of them playing in the basement together. Emma was just in a diaper and she thought that was so funny. ”Why am I like a baby?” she kept asking. Ben looked so little in the video, too. He kept saying, “Look, there’s the basement…do you remember that part?” It was nostalgia overload.
We watched all of the videos that were on Dave’s laptop together, and we all loved it. I think we could have huddled around that thing for hours. It made me realize how important it is for us to get all of our old tapes onto DVDs so we can watch them together, too. I can’t believe how quickly the time has gone. When I was watching those clips it seemed like they were filmed yesterday but yet they were filmed a hundred years ago, too. I know that doesn’t make much sense, but it does to me.
It was such a sweet time together watching our past. Just writing about it makes me smile and feel kinda warm inside.
Snow…finally!
Everyone in the Kerber household is so excited…it finally snowed! Even though we were just playing outside in mild weather after school yesterday, today marked the first real snowfall we’ve had this winter. After school it was cold and windy and snowing hard, so although the kids were begging me to go outside and play when we got home, I put the veto to that one. Of course the minute Dave walked in the door he said, “I hope the kids will want to go out with me after dinner!” Ha.
So we got everyone bundled up and they had some snow time in the dark.
Dave was so anxious to try sledding down our driveway like we did at the old house. I kept telling him that I didn’t think it would work as well because our new driveway isn’t as steep. He proved me wrong…the kids were having a blast sliding down the driveway and were stopping at the bottom just before they went into the street. It was actually about perfect.
They were only out for about a half hour, but it was so much fun for them. We’re all hoping it sticks around for a while so we can play more!
A Christmas Eve movie
We still had a lot to do today to get ready for tomorrow and Monday’s Christmas parties, but we wanted to make sure that we had some family time, too. Dave took the kids shopping in the morning, which gave me some great time to focus and finish up the chores. We had told the kids that if they were good we could go to see “Chipwrecked” the latest in the Alvin and the Chipmunks series. They were both motivated big time because they’ve looked forward to its release for months. Dave said that a couple of times while they were shopping Ben reminded Emma, “Make sure you’re good so we can go see Chipwrecked!!”
Of course they were angels, so we got to go. Seeing a movie on Christmas Eve is certainly not a traditional activity, but we had no family obligations, so for us it was the perfect thing. The movie, however, was not. Everything started fine…it was silly and fun and the kids were totally into it. Then of course it had to become an action-adventure movie where the Chipmunks and Chipettes were in danger of death because of a volcano that was going to erupt on the island the were stranded on. It was a little too much for both kids. At one point Ben had a horrified look on his face and frantically said, “I have to go to the bathroom!” Dave obliged, even though we both knew that he was just scared. Meanwhile, Emma was basically whimpering and saying, “I don’t like this…” It would have been comical if they weren’t completely panicking.
Thankfully everything worked out ok and everyone escaped the island. Shew. I guess overall the kids liked it, but there was definitely a time during the climax that they truly wanted to leave. Not really the fun family event we thought it would be, but hopefully no one was scarred. At least it was a nice time together.
The Polar Express Party
Our friends the Inces have the best ideas for parties. You may remember me writing about their drive-in movie party last year. Every kid made his or her own “car” out of a box and they all watched Toy Story 3. It was big fun. This fall, their family went to ride on the Polar Express over Thanksgiving weekend, and that spawned another brilliant idea in Addie’s head. This time we could have a Polar Express party, and the kids could come in their jammies and watch that movie! It was brilliant timing, because the Bears were playing tonight, too, so the grownups had their own entertainment. Well, the way that game turned out I’m not sure we could call it entertainment, but it was good in theory. We ordered pizza and the kids ran around
The kids, however, had a blast. Addie borrowed a projector and showed the movie on their wall. Everyone brought sleds or saucers to sit in while they were watching, and most of the kids brought blankets and/or pillows to snuggle up with, too.
The lights were out for the movie so the kids could get the full movie theater experience. During the scene when the kids on the train were served hot chocolate, we served hot chocolate to our kids. Addie had thought of everything.
It was such an awesome evening…until it was time to go home. As always, we waited just about 10 minutes too long to leave. Emma was tired beyond belief and she absolutely melted down. You see, Ali just got a new kitten (named Pepper) and Emma just wanted to see her once more before we left. Pepper had been man-handled enough for the night, so we told her no. That was it, she was gone. She cried the entire way home, sobbing that she “just missed Peppa so much” and that she “just wished Daddy wasn’t awuhgic!” (Dave’s allergic to cats so there’s no chance we’ll ever have one). Thankfully they were already in their jammies, so as soon as we got home we did our best to calm her down and just threw her into bed.
It was a really fun party, and a great night with our friends. Hopefully soon nights like this won’t always end the same way…with complete meltdowns.
A super busy week
It’s Friday night and I’m pooped. We’ve had so much going on this week that it simply flew by. Some of it was professional; I had a curriculum chair meeting on Monday and class on Tuesday. Some of it was for the kids; Ben had basketball on Monday and Wednesday and Emma had choir on Wednesday. Some of it was social; I had a girls night out on Thursday. If you add that all up it equals some committment every night and some nights two commitments. Ugh.
We were supposed to get together with our friends the Mathiases tonight, but half of their family is sick, so that got canceled. I have to admit that although I’m bummed we’re not going to see them, I’m relieved to have a nice relaxing evening with the entire family home.
Tomorrow the craziness continues as Grandma, Grandpa, Aunt Nancy and Brett are coming down to watch Ben’s basketball game. After that the ladies are going shopping, which is good, since I haven’t even started mine yet. I do love this time of year, but sometimes it can just get too busy!
