Movin' on out...

I am so excited!  The movers will be coming 3 months from today to pack up all of our stuff to ship it off to Salt Lake City, Utah.  I can't believe the time is finally here.  It was about 3 years ago that I sprung this big move on Vinnie.  I was pregnant with Sebastian, emotional, and feeling like I wished we had more family near us.  Vinnie came home from work one day and sat down next to me on the couch.  After sitting there for a few min trying to get up enough nerve to tell him what I was thinking, I finally spit it out;  "Honey, I don't want to live here anymore."  He looked at me and said, "In this house?"  I said "No, in this state."  His jaw dropped in a bit of a panic.  I explained to him about how far away our family was and that our kids were going to grow up not knowing their grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, and so on.  I told him that I wanted to move to Utah.  After discussing it for a little bit and exploring all options, he was  on board.  We decided that we need to come up with a plan of action and set some dates and goals to make the big move.  Our original plan was to move the summer of 2009.  Well financially this just didn't work, so we pushed it back 1 more year and realized that we needed to get serious about this so we wouldn't have to push it back again.  We have been planning and saving and the time has finally come.  I can't believe that we are actually moving in 3 months.  These past 3 years we have been talking about this move and it seemed as though it was never going to get here and now it is just days away, really.  This is a busy household so our days seem to go pretty quick. 
The plan is to fly the little kiddos to New Mexico to stay with Vinnie's parents while we get everything done.  Austin will fly to Utah.  Vinnie and I are going to be driving the Alcan Highway  :) and heading on down to Utah.  There we will wait for our stuff to arrive at our house (from moving company shipping it).  The moving company said that it will take a minimum of about 10 days for our stuff to get there.  Once that is there, Vinnie, Austin, & I will drive down to New Mexico to get our other little ones.  We will stay there for a week or two and then drive back to Utah and get settled in.  While settling in to the house, we will also be getting the tattoo shop up and going.  We are leaving Rebirth Tattoo by Vinnie open here in Alaska.  There are 3 others artists working in there.  Vinnie will be doing some traveling back and fourth between Utah and Alaska to continue working on his clients that need their pieces finished, or even new projects that may want to get started.
Remodeling of the basement in our house in Utah will begin March 8th.  We are having it finished and that will be Austin's area.  He is pretty excited, he is already talking about what color of paint he wants and how he wants his room arranged.   
It is all coming together and I am praying that things go smoothly!  They have to, I have 3 months to make sure it does.  :)

Tranquility...

They all slept for the flight home....awwwwwwwwwww...Vinnie and Sebastian shared a row, so Sebastian was able to lay down comfortably.  Abby, Gabe, & I shared a row, I was able to lay Abby down in the seat next to me, Gabe leaned up against the window, and Austin had an entire row to himself right in front of us.

This meant that we got to sleep too....YAY!!!

Family...

We love love love our trips to Utah!  It is so nice to see everyone, especially since we only get to see them once a year.  Thank goodness we are moving back to Utah in just 3 short months and we will get to see family whenever we want.

Here are a few pictures with family, wish I had more to post but this will do for now...

These are my grandparents, Jim & Elaine. This is the first time that they have ever met Abigail Elaine .

Elaine & Abigail Elaine

Grandpa Shane (my Dad) & Mimi (my grandma)

My cousin Jill at her wedding, February 18th

This is Austin and MY cousin (he he), Austin's 2nd cousin, Noah.

Gabe's 4th Birthday

Every year we go to Utah for the tattoo convention in February.  Lucky for Gabe, it just so happens that we are there for his birthday.  We have a big party for him and get to see family.  This year we had his birthday party at Classic Fun Center.

I can't believe that my little guy is already 4 years old!  I took him to the party store and let him pick out his plates, he chose this crown as well, he also picked out some balloons that he wanted blown up.  It was fun, he is growing up so fast!

Presents are always fun!!  He is understanding the concept more and more!

He had so much fun playing, he loved this jungle gym and could have stayed in there all night!  When it was time to go, I put his jacket and shoes on and turned around for just a min and poof Gabe was gone, he ran back into the jungle gym to play some more.

 Poor little Sebastian was sick sick sick!  He didn't want anything to do with anybody or the party.  He was burning up and just crying and crying.  Daddy had to sit with him the the Sponge Bob party room and hold him for a couple of hours after he finally fell asleep.  We took him to the Doctor the next morning along with Gabe & Abby.  All 3 of them had ear infections.  Sebastian had them pretty significantly in both ears, Abby had them in both ears, and Gabe was starting to get an infection in his left ear.  They all ended up on amoxicillin.  All are doing much better now.

My Beautiful Step Daughter

This is my step daughter, Andrea.  She flew from Phoenix to SLC to visit us.  It has been about 7 years since Vinnie last saw her.  I have been chatting with her on Facebook quite a bit and have gotten to know her a little.  I mentioned that we were going to Utah for the tattoo convention and she had commented that it would be nice to see us while we were down in the lower 48.  I commented back to her and before we knew it, I was booking a flight for her to come to SLC.  She flew in Tuesday night Feb 9th and left Thursday morning the 11th. I thought her flight came tuesday night at 9:00 pm, well about 7:00 Vinnie asked me to check Andrea's flight information.  I opened up my email and her flight info said the arrival time was 7:05.  YIKES!!!  How did I mess that up??  Vinnie and I ran out the door and raced to the airport.  I was stressing out the entire drive there, I can't believe that I did that.  Fortunately we were able to page her thru the airport and tell her that we were just a few minutes away.  She was fine and wasn't worrying at all.  Phewww, what a relief!  We got back home, Gabe & Sebastian seemed very interested in their big sister.  They didn't need any time to warm up to her.  We had a great time while she was here.  Austin was super excited to have a big sister.  Andrea enjoyed meeting her new little siblings.  Vinnie was so excited to see his daughter again after so many years. 

Date with Gabe...

Gabe and I went on a Mommy/Son date yesterday and had a blast!  I had a babysitter come over while Sebastian and Abby were napping and Austin was at school.  I didn't know exactly what Gabe and I were going to go do, I just knew that I wanted to have some one on one time with my little guy.  He seemed excited and ready to go.  We went to the Dimond mall where they have ice skating, bowling, an arcade with kiddy stuff.  Right when we walked in he saw the ice skating rink and immediately started saying "ice skating, ice skating".  He has never gone before but he knows what it is from Sesame Street and maybe from Austin playing hockey.  We rented some skates and went out on the ice. He did pretty good, I skated behind him with my hands under is arms to help hold him up, then I would have him hold on to the wall, then I tried skating backwards but in front of him holding his hands.  He never even fell.  We only did that for about 20-25 min and then he said "skates off, boots on".  Thank goodness becasue I was exhausted after skating around holding him up. font-size: large;">

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When we first arrived at the mall I saw "Color Me Mine", which is a place that you can go and pick out any sort of ceramics that they have there (figurines, plates, bowls, mugs, tiles, etc..) and paint it.  When you are finished they keep it and do all of the glazing and firing and then they call you to come pick it up a week later or so.  So, once we were done skating I asked Gabe if he wanted to paint and he got all excited.  He picked out a coffee mug (a cup, if you ask him), the lady asked him what colors and he chose red, blue, & green.  Before you start painting they give you a mug full of water to dip a sponge into and then you wipe down the item that you are going to paint to get all the dust off.  I think this may have been Gabe's favorite part, he kept saying "squeeze".  He wanted to dip the sponge and squeeze the water out.  So the lady gave him little sponges to paint with, he really liked that.

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And 23 inches are gone.....

After growing his hair out for about 12 years, my husband cut it all off.  Vinnie's hair was all the way down to his waist.  He has beautiful hair, thick, shiny, healthy long hair.  He use to wear it back in a ponytail everyday.  One day about 5 years ago I asked him if he ever thought about braiding his hair.  Well, since then I have braided his hair nearly EVERYDAY for the past five years.  Yesterday he decided it was time to cut it.  It can be so hectic in this house with our growing family to get everyone ready and out the door he thought this would help.  He called the lady that does my hair (a client of his) and she said that she didn't want to cut his hair, she would be too nervous.  So another lady that works in the same salon cut it for him.  He was ready to get it cut, I on the other hand was excited yet very nervous! 

She wasn't able just to cut his braid off in one swoop, she really had to work at it from all sides because his hair is so thick!  Once she cut it off, she handed it to Vinnie and it made him sick, almost like he just lost a limb or something.  So I took it and I got all teary eyed.  His braid was gone!  We will be donating it to Locks of Love.

I LOVE IT!!!