Days with the Dorans

It's that time of year again... HEART ATTACK! Here are what those hearts said. Sean gave me a heart attack too!  Jeff~ 1. I love that we have time for date nights 2. You are the best baby-daddy. 3. You are a great cook. 4. I love that you do little things for me that make a big difference (these hearts) 5. I'm glad we're in this crazy together 6. I love listening to you play and sing 7. You have the greatest laugh 8. I love that your job makes you happy now! 9. Thanks for folding clothes 10. I love that you pump gas (not PASS gas) Joe- 1. I love love love watching you run! 2. I love watching and listening to you play/sing 3. I love how cool you are with your sibs. 4. I love how you are the click-list picker-upper 5. I love how you can make art like it's no big deal 6. I love your smile (it was money well spent). 7. I love when you send me funny insta things 8. I love when you hug me unexpectedly 9. I love that you clean the kitchen (sometimes) 10. I am going to miss you...

I love that Grandma always sends the kids' a package of love for the holidays! This brought some normalcy to this strange year too! She gave them a fun scavenger hunt letter with candies! They loved it! We love her!!

  Even a pandemic can't keep Grandma from getting gifts to her grandkids! This seriously is such a special thing she does! I can't wait to do this for my grandkids one day! HERE is a video.

When we were visiting Grandma, she gave the kiddos passes to SkyZone which is a place with trampolines and other fun things. I made a video of all our fun HERE . We had so much fun! Since their computers were down and we had the place to ourselves pretty much they let us stay as long as we wanted. Sean got a cramp in his chest but we were all a bit tired and ready to leave after a few hours. We headed back home but first enjoyed a yummy dinner together. I love these people. Great Stay-Cation! I love mid-winter break.

 The Doran kids love their traditions~ especially Grandma's! Each year (for each holiday) she sends them a box of goodies and they always look forward to opening it. Dad said that they should wait until it was closer to Valentine's Day to open this box, but someone had other plans... The night we got the package, we headed over to the Gearys to play cards and just hang out together with friends. It was a fun night and Sean and I actually walked home around midnight because we were tired but realized we were locked out so waited (a few minutes) until the rest of the family got home. When we got inside, we all stopped. The floor was a mess!! MARTY HAD OPENED THE BOX!!! Now panic set in a bit for me because Grandma always sends her homemade goodies which includes CHOCOLATE!!! Shockingly, many of the chocolate treats were still in the box as were some no-bake cookies! Something was clearly missing but since the bag was empty- we had no way of knowing what it might be...

Although the kids are getting older, they still get so excited when that box shows up on the porch from Grandma! She sent some of her homemade goodness (which was gone MUCH to quickly), McDonald's gift cards and the movie, "Trolls" which I was told was super cute though I slept through most of. I'm going to blame it on my exhaustion and not the movie... I'm sure I'll be able to watch it again! How lucky these kiddos are to have such awesome Grandmas!

One of my favorite traditions (even better than the neighborhood "boo") is when the doorbell rings and that brown box package is outside of our door! Grandma always sends sweet packages around the holidays and I love seeing the four gather around the box to see what surprises are inside! She is such a blessing and I can't wait to continue this tradition (one day) for MY Doran grandkids! 

 With Valentines Day around the corner, there was a ring at the door and the kids knew that could only mean one thing... GRANDMA'S PACKAGE!  There is so much excitement in the house when Grandma's packages arrive! I was amazed that it arrived on a day where Al comes home for a bit between dance classes so they didn't have to wait to open it! It was filled with all sorts of goodies and of course Jeff got in there too!  Not only does Grandma send sweet trinkets, but she sends some of her own homemade creations!  She is SUCH a good cook and baker and what she sends doesn't last long in this house! The kids also needed to work on Valentines! Z basically said, "Mom just find me anything... maybe a super hero or something." This makes Valentine buying easy for him. Thankfully I talked Al into NOT doing a homemade creation for this year's cards (since we were in the 11th hour and had no time for creativity with her schedule). They were yummy and cut...

 It's always a treat around holiday time!  The Doran kids get a big box and they know exactly who it's from... GRANDMA!  Grandma fills it with lots of fun Halloween goodies and toys and of course lots of her homemade goodness (which I think were gone within three days). Opening the box is always a lot of fun.  Jeff and I sat back and just watched the fun and this year, so did Marty.  One of the things the kids got was a Goosebumps movie.  We enjoyed watching it except that Joe had read the books and told us all what was going to happen next. These kids are so lucky (but then so are we...).

So our school districts went to having our Spring Break the first full week in April.  It used to be that (years ago) it always backed up to Easter, which (while nice for Christians) didn't seem fair to everyone (we are quite a diverse population now) so I'm kind of glad they went to a more uniform type break.  I also like when we aren't backed up to Easter because then we get to go away for Spring Break but are also able to spend Easter with Grandma and the Dorans. This year, the first week of April happened to be that Easter week so sadly we weren't going to be able to spend it with Grandma.  We also didn't color eggs this year (I know... bad mom!  I promise to do it next year)!  The last time our vacation fell like this was when we drove to Orlando (the vacation where Jeff vowed NEVER to drive to florida with the kids again).  This year he said... "Maybe one day..." so who knows~ perhaps our next Spring Break that backs up to Easter we'll be ...

The kiddos always look forward to Grandma's packages!  They have become a tradition that they look forward to and can't wait to open!  I seriously love that she does this and no matter what the holiday (because she sends them for all of them) the package is always full of such love! In addition to candy and trinkets, she always sends some of her homemade goodness which doesn't last long in this house since Grandma makes the BEST goodies!!!!  She recently got an iPhone so we tried to facetime to thank her but it didn't work, so we sent a video to her (so she could SEE the kids).  Love technolgy- but not as much as I love traditions!  Thanks Grandma for always being AMAZING!!!  We love you so much!

I can't believe I forgot to post about this!!!  I was thinking I needed to update some things and found these pictures on my phone.  These were actually taken before Halloween.  Grandma Doran always sends these wonderful packages in the mail!  Whenever we get a box, the kids know exactly who it's from and what is inside!! Well... we know it from Grandma and that it is bound to contain some of her homemade pieces of heaven and also some super fun things for the kids.  They love everything but the anticipation and the surprise of what is in the box is always the best! Thanks Grandma, for always being wonderful and amazing and creating these special moments for us! See you soon!!!

 Jeff's mom has made it a tradition to send the kids holiday packages throughout the year.  When a box showed up on our porch a few days before Valentine's Day, they knew who it was from!  They could hardly wait to open it because they knew that it held treasure from Grandma!  They each got their own bags of treats (Ali's of course had things specially chosen for a princess) and they were thrilled (and their volume showed it)! In addition to treats for the kids, Grandma sent a lot of her homemade goodness!  Grandma is a great cook and baker and we were all excited to see some of her yummy creations too!