The Parrillo Family

There's a little bit of a 'bro-mance' happening between Frankie and his Uncle Shaun.  Everytime we get together, Frankie is drawn to Uncle Shaun and thinks he is just the absolute coolest.  Shaun, for his part, *is* pretty cool.  But he also spends time with Frankie that has made an mark on him.  When we ask Frankie who is 'Best Friend' is, you know what his answer is?  "Uncle Shaun". They play with cars and also balls and buckets - as evidenced in this photo.  I know it won't always stay this way, but I thought that this 'special relationship' that they have was worth noting here on the blog, so Frankie can look back when he's older. 

For the third (I think?) year in a row, we brought the kids and met their cousin, Aunt Sisi and Uncle Bill along with Grammy and Granddad at an early Holiday Open House in the Western Suburbs to meet Santa and his reindeer. Here's the post showing photos from the same event last year. Like in year's past, we first were able to meet some of the reindeer.  Sadie loved petting them and learning all about them from the elves. The line was long, but the team at Wannamakers has set up some cute photo ops including this one in the little red car with a Christmas Tree attached to the roof. And then it was 'showtime'!  Let's meet Santa and tell him what we want for Christmas. As you can see, Frank couldn't get out of there fast enough!   *Feets don't fail me now!* But the girls?  They hung right in there. And were able to spend some time with Santa to tell him what was on their list.  SD said she wanted the American Girl Camping set. ...

Over the weekend, we packed up the van and went with the kids cousins and Aunt Sharon, Aunt Linda and Uncle Shaun down to Champaign to take in the Fighting Illini football game against the Michigan State Spartans.   We've been down there for football before.   Here's a post from 2013 when we all went down to enjoy the game .   Here's the time in 2012 when we drove down for the Spring game .  And even took Eloise to Homecoming back in 2010 before she turned one. But, this was the first time for Frankie.  And that made this trip special and a lot of fun.   Above at the top, you'll see Frank dressed in his best orange and blue jumper meeting Red Grange.  The University has a student dressed up in an old-timey football outfit standing in the "Grange Grove" to pose for photos.   Kinda neat!  Frankie liked him, but was shy.  After getting into the stadium, we went to a little pre-game party in what they call the "Legacy Loung...

This weekend, we brought most of the family together at our temporary* house (Thanks, Marini's for the house!  We missed them, though!) to celebrate Frankie's second birthday.  The Beef, as I call him, turned two.  And since he's born so close to Halloween, Nat threw a "Monster Mash".  Complete with a huge inflatable Frankenstein out front. Decked out in their Halloween costumes, Frankie was Marshall From Paw Patrol, his sister SD was Ariel from the Little Mermaid and their cousin won the costume contest with the incredibly detailed and imaginative bespoke Dump Truck outfit that Uncle Bill created in his workshop. Everybody liked posing in front of "Frank" with Frank. What a happy boy on the day of his birthday party! The Monster theme extended to the birthday cake.  And some incredible Frankenstein cookies made by Grammy. And we all gathered around and sang the Happy Birthday song to the big guy.  He was so happy with all of hi...

As I posted yesterday, we celebrated Mother's Day with *most* of our family over the weekend .  It was great and I'm glad we got to pamper Nat and the other Mom's with a day of activities. But as I mentioned, the girls' cousins, who are living in Switzerland, weren't there.  Aunt Kiki is SD's Godmother and to mark the occasion and as a very.small.token of our thanks for having us stay in their house, Nat thought it would be a good idea to plant a perennial in their yard. And that's what Sadie did!  Here she is digging up the hole (with an assist from her brother Frankie!), pushing the dirt aside and then putting the plant in the ground.   Sadie was so proud of herself!  She's promised to tend to it all summer and keep it watered so it will survive this first year. We put it in a pretty prime spot, so it should get some good sun. Hopefully, it will come back year after year and Aunt Kiki will remember the time that her Goddaughter Sadie lived...

Over the weekend, we gathered at Aunt Sharon's house and our 'own' house (Thanks, Marinis!) to celebrate the Moms that we love.   I've posted photos from Mother's Day celebration here on the blog that was all the way back in 201 1 when Eloise was not quite two years old.  Sadie wasn't quite in the world yet!  I also posted some photos in 2012 when SD was, indeed, in the world.   There's also this post of Eloise's first-ever Mother's Day card .   This year, we started the day with breakfast at our own house and some home-made gifts from the girls to Nat.  After a nice walk to-and-from Church, we went over to Aunt Sharon's house for brunch to celebrate with Noonie and the Coyles and Dyers as well as Grandma and Grandpa Marini and Aunt Lisa.  The Swiss Family Marinis were missed!  But...we *did* do something on Mother's Day for Sadie's Godmother Vic, so I'll post about that another day. I posted about Natalie and Mo...

Earlier this year, we posted some photos of the wedding shower that the Morans' hosted out in Naperville for Aunt Sasha and Uncle Charlie ahead of their wedding this year.  And then in February, I posted some photos of a stop at Disneyland in Anaheim and mentioned that we were in California to celebrate Charlie and Sasha's wedding .   But, now Charlie and Sasha have shared some of the photos their their photographer took of the day and there's a bunch with the kids that turned out really awesome.   Here's little Sadie playing Uncle Charlie's Nintendo.  #GamerGirl, right?    This was in the "Groom's room" as everyone was getting ready.  Nat had the morning to her self and I took the kids down there to hang out for a bit. Ellie and Sadie were both lucky enough to be asked to be flower girls.  Here they are in the dresses that Grammy made herself! Along with the beautiful bride! This is wedding #3 for the Moran original four. ...