The Parrillo Family

Another year together as a family and a lot more milestones and news.  As we've done the past few years, here's our look back at all the activities we took on as a family in 2017.  2017 was a big year for all of us - in many ways.  We moved!  Yeah!!!  After spending more than two years in limbo including 9 months of building our home in Downers Grove, this summer, we finally moved in.  Nat managed the project and our family and did it with incredible grace.   Eloise continued to be an amazing human being (she's now 8!), SD started 'big girl school' with Kindergarten at St. Mary's and the Big Beef grew up a lot, too.  Lizzie?  Well....she grew too.  She mellowed out *just.a.little* but she still is a steady balance of annoying and adorable. Most importantly, 2017 brought us together as a family.  Mostly with laughter and learning from each other.  I learn something everyday from them.  From Nat, I learn patience a...

Wow. Eight sounds so old, doesn't it? Our little Eloise is 8.  And she's just an incredible human being. We celebrated her with a weekend of activities including a kid party on Friday night, a family party on Sunday, a field trip with her classmates on the actual day and a 'fancy' dinner with her crew. She's growing up so fast.  Check out this video of all the moment's of Eloise's life up until now.  (If you are reading this in your email and can't see the video below, click here !)

Dead ringer, no? Credit to Nat for pulling this comparison off. And for the record:  no...Frankie doesn't need glasses.  He was just trying on some of Nat's sample frames. 

In what has quickly become a fun family tradition, we took the kids along with both Grammy and Granddad as well as Noonie and Papa to meet Santa and his reindeer at Wannamaker's in Downers Grove.   Here's the photos of the same event last year.   And here's the kids in 2015 meeting Santa .  If you look back through those, you can see how much each of them has grown! The program starts with a stop to meet the reindeer.  You can see all the kids above petting Peppermint who is just six months old.   Below, you can see Sadie - the animal lover - petting the six-year-old Glitter.  Then it was time to meet the big guy.  Sadie, of course got up there right away.  The other two were a bit more hesitant.  Eloise made sure to keep her distance.  Frankie?  He decided to put on his 'Batman mask' with his hands to protect himself from Santa! Check it out in action below: But...what happens when Sa...

Welp...we finally did it.  Nat and I went on a vacation to Walt Disney World (gasp!) without our kids!  Yep.  And...we had an amazing time.  We were there to run the 2017 Wine and Dine Half Marathon which was a makeup for the canceled Half Marathon in January of this year.  You can see how Nat ran a 'bandit' half to make up for it at the Polynesian here in a post from earlier this year .  Nat ran a half marathon in Oak Brook back in 2013 that you can read about here . This race, however, was something that we decided to do together.  That meant training together (when we could) and running together, despite my speed being a lot slower than Natalie's!  Even though she was literally running circles around me during the race, she stuck with me and we finished together.  Our time wasn't record-setting, but that wasn't because we were just slow.  We also spent some time enjoying the festivities.  Here we are on the Tower of Te...

Having a birthday that takes place close to Halloween and having the name "Frank" seem to indicate that A LOT of your childhood birthdays are going to be centered around the holiday and various monsters.  So, it should come as no surprise that just like last year , Frankie had a 'monster' birthday.   On his actual birthday, Frankie got a little bit of help from his sisters to blow out the candle on his monster ice cream cake. Here's the photos from his 2nd birthday party .  And here's the photos from his 1st birthday party .   Then a few days later, we had a party where the whole family came over to celebrate Frank.  Here's Great Grampy Ray and Great Uncle Frank settled in on the couch watching Frankie's bestie cousin play with some toys in our family room. Nat made a monster cake.  It was awesome! And while there were LOTS of awesome presents that Frankie was so happy to receive, one of them got a littl...

Just like we've done in years past, we had some family photos taken this fall.  Here's the ones from last year.   Here's the ones from 2015 .  This year, we had a new house and a new neighborhood.  And kids that are growing like weeds.  Nat found someone who could help us capture this moment in time.  I'm so glad we did. Eloise is 7. Sadie is 5. Frank just turned 3. And they're just awesome human beings.  Hope you get a kick out of these photos as much as Nat and I both do!

First year trick-or-treating in our new neighborhood!  The kids dressed up in their costumes and were willing to pose for a quick photo.  Then, two of the girls from next door came by and joined in! This was the first year that Frankie was really (I mean...really!) participate in trick-or-treating.  Check him out, as Buzz Lightyear, going up to the door below.  

Well, she's still here.  And that says something, I guess?!?!  Our little Lizzie is now more than a year old and she's grown quite a bit.  She was just recently skunk'd but that hasn't stopped her from chasing wildlife in our backyard.  She's still the worst dog ever.  But we love her.  And the kids lover her so much!

Like everyone else, we give the whole pumpkin carving thing a try every Halloween season.  This year, we got to them just a few days before Halloween.  Each of the kids is now getting to the age where they're actually able to do some of the work themselves.  Sadie and Frankie can scoop out the 'guts' themselves.  While Eloise can give some of the carving of the face a go.   Check out the Beef scooping out the guts: SD had a lot of fun gutting her own pumpkin. Eloise was her usual, reserved self.  She took her time and was deliberate in separating all the seeds from the slimey stuff.  You can check out some of the past adventures in pumpkins here on the blog .  

Just like her big sister Eloise who played indoor basketball for the first time last winter , Sadie has joined a basketball team this season.  Check her out above with some of her teammates in her white jersey and sport shorts.   She's on a coed team of Kindergarteners from her school St Mary's of Gostyn and because she's a young kindergartener, she's not quite advanced in her skill level as some of the other kids.  She doesn't quite have the strength to get the ball up to the rim.  But that isn't stopping her from being a superb defender.  She sticks to her guy like "stink on a monkey"!   I love seeing her play hoops and I love seeing her being part of a team.  Despite her not being able to score just yet, she isn't discouraged.  I hope she falls in love with team sports like I did!  And there's aways room on the court for someone who plays great defense, right?  

One of the casualties of moving out of Elmhurst is that we're switching up some of our traditions.  One of those is our annual visit to pick out our pumpkins at Sonny Acres . But, we did get to go out to Heap's in Minooka.  Heap's is just flat out awesome.  We brought along one of the cousins and had a good-ole-country time!