Buona Volte, BonaVita

Spring Fever Take 2!

2009-03-08T19:02:00.003-04:00

Temperatures rising into the low 70's will give even the grumpiest snow meiser a case of Spring Fever and two consecutive days in a row of said temperatures are almost more than I can handle. Unfortunately we wasted most of the weekend indoors (mostly shopping for Spring/Summer clothes), but at least we got to shut off the heat and open up the windows in the house. We didn't spend all weekend shopping though, we did get to spend Sunday morning at the Smith Playhouse in Fairmont park with some of my other "Mom" friends. Here are a few pictures from our morning.

A task of epic proportions

2009-03-07T17:14:00.004-05:00

Okay, so maybe that is a slight exaggeration, but come on, getting 8 kids together for a family portrait is not an easy task. Think about it, 8 kids, aged 10 months though 13 years old, not an easy thing. And it's not even just the day of that is complicated, it's the simple task of 3 busy sets of parents with even busier kids finding the time to all get together. We did pretty good, it only took us 2 months to find a Sunday that we were all free. Then, after we found a date we had to decide on what the kids would wear. So, the day finally came, the kids looked great and all came prepared with their best smiles, with the exception of Alyssa that is; she wanted no parts of the picture and made this well known. I was fully expecting the two youngest to keep trying to crawl out of the picture, but instead, I had to sit next to Alyssa as she kept trying to skootch out of the picture I kept skootching her back in. Notice Alyssa's posture in the picture below, that was par for the day so we just went with it.

Spring Fever!

2009-03-03T13:12:00.004-05:00

When we woke up this morning it was a balmy 64 degrees in the Bonavita house (in spite of the thermostat being set at 72). Isn't it funny how after all the short winter days and long winter nights that 64 degrees outside calls for shorts and tank tops, but 64 degrees in your own living room calls for sweatshirts, sweatpants and two pairs of socks?

That's okay though, being chilly afforded me the opportunity to cuddle with Alyssa, which is something that she never lets me do. And after we were done cuddling I decided to look through a few old shots from last Spring when we were enjoying the great outdoors and then share them with you all. Enjoy!

Finally, the joy of having a girl!

2009-03-02T13:41:00.000-05:00

Within the last month or so, Alyssa has finally let me start to do some more girly things with her. First was when she finally let me paint her toenails. I'd being trying to do this for months but every time I got out the nailpolish she would run in the other direction screaming "NO!". Well, she finally let me do it and now I've created a montster. She has done a complete 180 and now wants me to paint her fingers and toes everyday. I actually had to hide the nailpolish in the hopes of breaking the habit that I created! Here are a few pictures of her showing off her pretty pink toes.

The second "girly" thing that Alyssa gave in to was letting me braid her hair. Her hair is super long and I've been wanting to do this for months but she would never let me. Finally the other night not only did she let me braid her hair, she let me put it in a French Braid. Woo hoo!

Let there be curls

2009-02-26T14:15:00.000-05:00

As you all know, Dave has pretty curly hair. We had hoped that the kids would get his curls, but well, you know how that goes. Alyssa definitely has some curls but they are mostly in the back and are more or less just nice waves. Up until now, it has seemed that Nate was also going to go the way of the non-curls, until his bath today. When I was drying his hair I noticed that there was some waviness where there was none before. A quick application of some of Daddy's hair gel and voila! We have curls! Not sure if they were brought out by the conditioning shampoo that I used or what, but who cares, I have photo documentation of curls.

The Naterator is hitting some milestones!

2009-02-24T17:34:00.002-05:00

Our little big man is getting, well, big! On his 10mth birthday he started walking full time and then today he started clapping! Yay! I've included a couple of links, so enjoy.

Nate can walk! @ Yahoo! Video

Nate claps! @ Yahoo! Video

And while we were trying to capture Nate clapping, we got this one. Don't worry, no babies were hurt in the making of this film.

Nate's new booboo @ Yahoo! Video

Looks like we're going to have some models in our midst!

2009-02-13T13:57:00.002-05:00

Sorry that I haven't posted in so long, I've been slacking. Stay tuned because I'm going to try to get in here and add some backdated posts :)

Anyway, on to our news. Alyssa had an appointment yesterday with a local modeling agency http://www.mainlinemodelagency.com/ . They loved her look and are very interested in working with her. Even better, I had Nate with us and they said that they are very interested in him as well! This is so exciting, I will keep you all up to date as more information becomes available.

Our very own scholar athlete.

2009-01-12T14:04:00.000-05:00

I don't brag nearly often enough about just what a great kid Jeremy is. He really, really is. Not only is he super smart, but he is super athletic as well. The kid not only plays Football, Baseball and is a Wrestler, but he excels at all three. Smart and athletic? Could I have ever asked for more?

Here are few pictures from his most recently wrestling season:

A special photo

2008-12-28T21:43:00.002-05:00

There is one thing about the holidays that makes them very special for me and that is the fact that they bring the whole family together. Granted, my family is very close and we do see each other quite often, but the holiday get togethers have a lot of meaning for me. This year I was able to snap a very special photo of my Gram with all 8 of her Great Grandchildren. This is the first and only time that this event has been captured on film and I'm so happy to have finally gotten to immortalize a family event with such a wonderful picture. Okay, maybe the picture isn't that great, but what it represents is very special to me and I will treasure this photo forever.

Respect the Turkey

2008-11-30T16:45:00.003-05:00

This was the 2nd year in a row that I hosted Thanksgiving Dinner at my house. I was thrilled to have hosting duties passed down to me by my Aunt L and this year my Mom passed down to me the official TDay turkey platter. I'm not sure of the exact origins of the platter, but know that I am at least the 3rd generation woman in my family to use this platter, so it was quite the honor when my Mom passed it down to me. Dinner went off with out a hitch and the meal was quite a success if I do say so myself. Here are a few pictures from the big day. Enjoy!

Happy 2nd Birthday my sweet baby girl Alyssa!

2008-11-25T20:51:00.004-05:00

November 24th, 2006 my sweet baby girl Alyssa entered the whole after a mere 1 hour and 34 minutes of labor. She was, of course, perfect! Over the last two years we have watched our sweet baby girl grow up before our eyes from first smiles, to first laughs onto first steps and first words and yet still the firsts keep coming. Alyssa Michelle truly is our sweet princess baby girl and we are truly blessed to have her in our lives.

What a difference 2 years makes!

We have a crawler!

2008-11-14T13:08:00.002-05:00

One day shy of turning 7mths, I think that it is safe to say that the little Naterator is on the move.

Happy Halloween!

2008-11-03T22:26:00.002-05:00

Phew! Thank goodness that is over! Me being the procrastonator as usual, I waited until um, Halloween Day, to get costumes for the kids. I mulled it over for weeks and weeks trying to figure out something that would be just to-die-for cute. The way I figure, I've only got maybe one more Halloween if I'm lucky that I'll be able to dress Nate and Alyssa in "coordinating" costumes and I wanted something super cute for the first year. Of course, I had big plans and failed to follow through on any of it. In the end though, the kids still looked super cute. Alyssa was dressed up as a Doo-Wop girl from the 50's and Nate was a Greaser. His look would have been much more complete if I had been able to find an itty bitty leather jacket, but it was kind of hard to find 6 hours before Trick or Treating. Here are a few shots of the little kiddos from Halloween night. Enjoy!

Phillies win the World Series!!!!!!

2008-10-29T22:52:00.007-04:00

Photo Courtesy of www.ComcastSportsNet.com

Woo hoo! I can't believe it! I never thought that I would get to see this again in my lifetime. I honestly think that I am still in shock. This is the first Philadelphia Championship in the life of Jeremy, Alyssa and Nate; at least Jeremy is old enough to remember it.

Of course, there was never any question in my mind that we would win tonight, so on the eve of the Phillies winning the World Championship (of the afternoon as the case may be) I got Nate and Alyssa together with their best-est Phillies gear. So, even though they may not remember this moment, the fact that they were here in the Philly area when history was made is forever captured in a photo will hopefully someday make the memory more real for them. Enjoy!

We've got the peanut, bring on the jelly.

2008-10-18T00:37:00.002-04:00

Happy 6 month birthday Nate! (a few days late, oops). Our little peanut is 6 months old already and I can't believe it. What I also can't believe is how much of a peanut he is. At 6 months old Nate weighs a mere 13lbs and 11oz, no wonder he's still wearing 0-3mth sized clothes! But, as small as he may be, he is 10 times as strong. He can sit up and he scoots across the room to get to a toy he spies, so I'm pretty sure that it is just a matter of weeks until he is crawling around chasing his big sister. Oh, if only they could stay little forever......

Who needs the Gap Casting Call?

2008-10-10T18:03:00.000-04:00

Well, I got the Nate and Alyssa (Jeremy was at school) all gussied up this morning and made the drive over to the Cherry Hill Mall for the Gap Casting Call that was supposed to be from 10am-4pm. We got there at 11am and it was CLOSED!!!! Apparantly, there were well over 1,000 people in line by 6am. Now, of course I think that my kids are gorgeous, but there is no way in hell that I'm going to get in line at 6am for anything :)

So, we turned around and came home and had our own little photoshoot at Glenolden Park. Here are a few of my favs.

Back to School and home from work!

2008-09-30T00:28:00.000-04:00

Well, it's offical! Jeremy is in the 7th Grade and I'm finally a SAHM for my kids! Nate and Alyssa are thrilled I'm sure ;)Thursday, September 25th marked my final day of working full time so now I am home full time with my kids.

Hopefully going forward I will have much more to share with you and plenty of pictures to share it with, but for now, here are a few recent ones of Nate, Alyssa and Jeremy.

.....and then there were 5

2008-09-11T22:06:00.000-04:00

Welcome to my Blog! This is my first time and I thought it might be a good way for me to share our lives with everyone!

We are Dave and Michelle and Jeremy, Alyssa and Nate. We bought our dream house in July of 2007 and can't wait to share our lives with you.