General Summer and Fall Activities in the Ciszczon House...

We hung a basketball hoop in our garage this summer and the kids all had a great time playing ball with us. Makayla even took some turns with the ball!





Here is Jonathan on his first day of school. Jonathan is in first grade this year. He is doing great! I was a little worried about how he would do with full day school since he still took naps during the summer. He is doing really well during the week, but still takes naps on the weekends.



Here is Jonathan showing us how dirty his desk was after only 3 weeks of school. I was hoping that was a habit he did not get from me...

Makayla had a big step this summer and joined the family at the "big table"!

She also started pulling herself up and walking around furniture.

This day we had spent about 4 hours running in the sprinklers with our neighbors and apparently Jaden was a bit wiped out. I don't think I have ever seen Jaden not finish his dinner before this!

Now that I am home with the kids, I have been trying to find different projects to work on with Jaden. This day Jaden found the package with the gingerbread train we never had time to make last Christmas and decided he wanted to make it. I think it was wishful thinking!

With being home, I am also able to go on field trips with Jonathan and his class. Jonathan was so excited to have me come with his class, but I had to laugh when he didn't want to sit by me in the bus.

We were on a trip to the Fair Oaks Farms. We were able to see all about the 3,000 cows they have, how they are milked, fed, sleep, how ice cream and cheese is made, etc. This was Jonathan's favorite cow at the whole farm!

The coolest part of the whole trip was watching this little cow being born. It was really neat to experience this. When I asked Jonathan what he thought of seeing the cow born he told me, " I think the Mommy cow's bottom must really hurt." I still laugh when I think about it!

Jaden helped me make some applesauce this fall. He really liked helping stir the pot. Of course I think he enjoyed eating it more!

Jonathan recently had Spirit Week at school and got to dress in costumes instead of his uniform. He still really loves to dress up and even put his "Cowboy day" costume together all by himself.

Jonathan and Joe started Cub Scouts this fall too. It seems to be going very well and both of them are enjoying the time together without anyone else interrupting.

Makayla has started really showing her personality and making lots of funny faces. I love the fact that I was able to get a picture of this one. This face seems to be her current favorite to make!

Makayla Turns One!

Oh my goodness, can you believe it has been a year since we got Makayla?!?! We surely can't! Miss Makayla turned one year old earlier this month on October 6th.



We were having Makayla's party on the weekend after her birthday, so I decided to make cupcakes for her to enjoy on her actual birthday. She seemed pretty happy about the attention.

Then we put the cupcake on her tray and she just looked at us like she was saying, "And what do you expect me to do with this?"

The best part was when she got some of the icing on her hand. I thought she was going to melt!

I figured we were trying to celebrate her birth, so I should probably give her something she would consider celebrating about. I'm not sure what we would do without puffs in our pantry!

Here is the cake we ordered for Makayla's party. There are quite a few boys in the family, so it was really nice to be able to order pink and flowers!

We love being able to utilize our church of gatherings. It makes it so much easier to serve and celebrate with our family and friends!

Here is the birthday girl with our friend Beth.

Makayla received a few different dolls and she got excited every time. Man I love having a girl!

Here is Makayla with one of the dolls she received for her birthday. All in all she ended up with 6 different dolls that day. Joe was asking what she was going to do with 6 different dolls, wasn't that too many. All you have to do is look at her face here to see that Makayla feels like she can never have too many dolls!

Soccer Boy

Jonathan decided to try soccer this season. We chose for Jonathan to play in Upwards, like he did for basketball. They have 4 kids on the field at any point in time, so Jonathan had a lot of playing time with his team only having 8 boys total.



We are not sure if it was due to Jonathan being 9 months older, this being his second team sport experience, or just the fact that it was a different sport, but Jonathan seemed to be more aggressive in soccer than he was in basketball. He was actually not afraid to get in the middle of the group of kids and go for the ball! We are very proud of his progress!

Here are some picture of his games:

Jaden really seemed to enjoy the outdoor games where he could run and play in the open field while Jonathan had practices and games. During one of the games Jaden decided he was going to coach. It just cracked us up!

Makayla was the team's cheerleader!

Now that soccer is over, Jonathan is getting ready for 2010's basketball evaluations. I can't imagine what it is going to be like when Jaden and Makayla are into sports and other activities too!

Summer Update

This summer has been full of activity. One of the major updates from our family is that I have resigned from Press Ganey. Actually, I have resigned from working outside of the house. I have joined the ranks of the other stay at home moms of the world! While I miss the friends I made over the 7 1/2 years with Press Ganey, the clients I worked with, and the work that I did, this is the best decision I have made for our family.

There are quite a few things I have learned in the past 1 1/2 months at home. Jaden is the biggest cuddler you could ever want. Makayla can never get her fill of Mommy (even with me home all day!). Jonathan values me being home over going out to lunch (ask me and I will tell you the story sometime). The laundry will never be done and the floors will never stay cleaned. I think the biggest thing is the fact that we as a family are much less stressed and we have the ability to spend time together as a family now, instead of just trying to keep up with the household duties in the evenings and on the weekends.

Now that I have more time at home, I am going to try to keep up with this blog. I will get you caught up with this post and hopefully keep up from there!


Joe started the summer by taking a trip to Utah to race Mustangs. He really enjoyed himself.

Joe brought home racing shirts for all of the kids. I still think the little pink racing shirt on Makayla is just too cute!

At the end of June we drove to St. Louis to the Ciszczon family reunion. It was really nice to see some of the relatives we have not seen in a while. Some of them had never met any of our kids! They told me what the cake said while we were there, but I can't remember and I cannot read Polish...

The boys had a great time hanging out with their cousins. Jonathan and Jaden really love to "swim". I have a feeling I will be driving them to swimming lessons next year...

We went to The City Museum in St. Louis the second day we were there. It was this really huge strange place. It was made completely from recycled materials. It had all of these climbing structures, slides, ball cages, etc. It was really just a big playground for kids and adults. We were told that it is open to adults only from like 9pm -12am and that a lot of the 20 somethings in the city hang out there.

Joe got into playing too!

Here is a picture with Jonathan and Stacey in one of the outdoor ball cages. This was a huge step for Jonathan. He actually chose to go off with a group of the cousins (most of which he had never met), instead of staying with Joe, Jaden, Makayla, and me. We were really glad to see him stretch his comfort zone and go off with them. He was with them for about 4 hours and didn't have any attachment issues at all!

There were so many activities and heat (It was over 100 with the heat index that weekend) that the kids just crashed at the hotel!

In July Jonathan turned 6! He decided he wanted to have a group of his friends "come over to play in [his] backyard". Jonathan chose Star Wars as his theme, so we picked up the invites and all of the decorations. When we got to ordering his cake, he found out the only Star Wars cake they had just had a picture on the top, no toys. That would not work for him, so he decided that he would have a Finding Nemo cake with all of his Star Wars decorations. The Finding Nemo cake had little fish that squirt water. So that is what he got!

Here they are with the Darth Vader pinata. It was a beautiful day weather wise too!

It was a good thing we went with the large L couch. All of the kids would not have fit otherwise!

We played some games,

and ate a lot of food!

This summer Jaden has really gotten into dressing in costumes like his brother!

Now that we have more family time, we have more time for bike rides.

And camping!

I thought this was a really cute picture of Jonathan and Nathan during their visit. The way the blankets are makes them look like the shape of a heart.

Jonathan also started playing soccer this summer. He is doing really well. He is actually being aggressive and going for the ball. This is different than how he played basketball last winter.

Makayla has been enjoying the bike rides!

She also thinks her helmet is pretty neat. I just loved the fact that they had little helmets for her and it even has little flowers on it!

Now that I am home, I was able to hang all of Makayla's decorations. Her room actually looks like a little girl room. When Jaden saw the decal I adhered to the wall he said, "uh oh. Mommy we don't color on the wall. We color on paper." I had to try to explain to a 2 year old that decals Mommy puts on the walls is different than when he colors with crayons on the walls...