Vincent being the little gassy guy he is, went as a Whoopie Cushion.

We had a late start to the evening due to Vince’s projectile presents (vomit) moments before we were to leave, which prompted a bath.  After a stop to show off the costumes to Grandma, we ended up at a friend’s house in Los Alamitos for a neighborhood Bug-A-Boo mini carnival.

There Dominic was able to walk the neighborhood and entertain all the adults who LOVED his costume.  He was enjoying it and would dance, especially when I’d play Elvis music on my phone for him.

Having two kids to manage on Halloween is pretty tiring and one of them isn’t MOBILE yet!  I can’t wait until next year when Vince is walking around (with Dominic running away) and then the subsequent years when they’re both running away from us while we go trick or treating.

Hopefully next year we’ll get some coordination with their costumes and maybe a return for Lori and I to dress up again though it’ll be hard to top Dog and Beth!

Halloween is ok but I’m REALLY excited for Christmas!

More photos here

This time however we had TWO kids to wrangle (well Vincent’s not mobile yet) and with Dominic being 2+ now, he’s VERY interested in the rides and not so much the photos.

Unlike the previous two years (photos: 2009 and 2008) we made the trip on a Saturday and quickly found out they are BUSY!  So next year we’ll return back to the empty patch that weekdays bring.

We met up with David, Gina and Emma so we had some fun shots of the kids.

It’s fun having this annual tradition and it gives quite a perspective on just how much Dominic has grown up when I look at the old photos.

Check out the full set on our Flickr.  However, I must warn you (and I know I’m biased) there are some images here that may just completely melt your heart!

RAGE!!!

If you didn’t get this in the mail please accept our apologies and send me your address so we can build our list back up.

To say we have been blessed this year would be an understatement.  We would like to wish everyone a Merry Christmas and hope you all are with the ones you love and if you can’t be we hope you are remembering the good times.  We wish many blessings and much rest to you all!

I don’t really know how to process that thought/fact and I’m not sure why it (or what about it that) bothers me so much. I don’t really feel any older so I guess it’s just that I’m aging and inching towards the end that is the hardest thing to wrap my mind around.

Enough of that stuff… So I’m now 30 and life is pretty darn good.

I am blessed with an awesome wife and son who I adore and help to make life fun. I have a caring, supportive family I know that I can turn to for whatever. I have some great friends. I am part of a great church filled with good fun loving folks. I am also blessed to be in a thriving business I enjoy along with two great friends who help make the monotony of work tolerable.

Life IS good! So I guess I am achieving (or working towards) all that I have set out to do and can’t ask for much more.

Ok here’s a little more I can ask for… I love this little man, he makes me smile!

The reason why I bring this up is to record this memory/story. So with the passing of my grandfather comes the cleaning of the house. While I’m not ready to partake in this, my mother has done a little. She came over the other day and gave me an envelope. I asked her what it was all about and she told me to open it up.

I opened the envelope and in there was a stack of $2 bills clipped to a little yellow note. The note read “Angelo”, the value, and “From Nonna” all written in my grandmother’s handwriting. I immediately felt numb. Not due to the value, which was generous, but from the flood of memories of times in my life that my grandparent’s were generous to me.

It blows me away, my grandmother passed away nearly two years ago and just before Easter. I would assume that my grandmother was preparing little *boosts* for all of her grandchildren which she would’ve probably given to us come that following Easter along with a card where she would write a loving message.

Almost TWO years later my grandmother is STILL GIVING from her heart! She enjoyed collecting $2 bills and since she owned a Pizza Store she often came across them and would save them for her grandchildren.

I’ve never received a posthumous gift before and I’m not sure what to do or even HOW I could possibly thank her. So now, I have these bills, a paper clip and a note and I will save this *gift* for as long as I can.