Great Pumpkin Roll 2013

It's hard to believe, but it's true. This could be our favorite tradition.

Photos: JF2.com/131130/

#TeamJilly - Compound Style

Turns out, the Compound portion of the #TeamJilly #epilepsyawareness forces did not get to make the trip into LA for the mega event today (van issues). So off they go to church, all geared up and complete with #TeamJilly cookies, to cheer on the home team, from home.

When You Believe

Serafina nailed her performance of "When You Believe" (from Disney's "Prince of Egypt") at the CCS Celebration Gala last night. Robob wasn't up for attending, so he got a private performance earlier in the afternoon.

Check out some photos: click here.

Halloween at the Compound

Oh my... Bobbing for doughnuts, haunted hallway, yucky things to smell, even yuckier things to feel, cookies to decorate, trick or treating from door to door, and all this on a stomach full of mummy dogs.

Photos: http://JF2.com/131031

Triplets

With twins you get an array of question, from the general public, that just make you laugh. Add twins to a large family and they get better.  Then add adoption, mix races, and it just gets super exciting to go in public. The questions tend to make people look a little dumb and can feel a bit intrusive, but I realize that mostly people are just fascinated at the idea of multiples, and/or large families, and/or adoption.  To strike up conversation and stare at my adorable babies just a little longer, I assume people just say the first thing that comes to mind. 

I seriously thought that I had heard them all......including a time my Italian husband and I were holding our Chinese babies and a woman looks at me and asks, "is your husband Asian."  Or when a lady straight up shook her head at me and said "umm...two dads?!"  What?!  Who does that?   But noo...noooo I had not heard them all.

Until today.

Today I was dumbfounded by a lady in Target, right in the middle of the big aisle between books and kids toys.

I had one of them fancy big carts: AJ and David were sitting side by side and Jonathan was in the cart facing them.  I was pushing the kids mindlessly looking at this and that, when all of sudden I hear a lady say,

"Oh my goodness, mam' but you have triplets!!!"

I stopped dead in my tracks and started looking around for the lady with triplets, because she couldn't be talking to me?!?   

But I was they only other person in the aisle and she was staring dead straight at me.  

I can only imagine what my face looked like because this is what my brain was thinking;

Triplets?!?  Are you kidding me?  Minus the fact that one is twice the size of the other two did you miss the blue eyes, blonde hair vs brown eyes, black hair and oh wait....one is WHITE and the other two are ASIAN.

I was thinking...holy s***.  If these three were triplets there would be TV cameras following me because my life would be one of the those TLC reality TV shows - mom gives birth to mixed raced triplets -  I am thinking the tittle for the show would be "White and Brown Rice - A Wild Mix".    Then I was thought: man that would be awesome, I would be making bank...all my kids college would be paid for.  

Then snap back to reality the lady is still staring, smiling at my "triplets".

Then I am thinking how could this even happen?!?  

But of course in today's society it totally could happen.  

So maybe it was a legit question and I should be nice to this lady and not lay the smack down on what an dumb question that is and why in the world she would ask that, if she just wanted to stare at my adorable kids she could have asked are they twins and at least kept a little bit of her credibility.  

Finally after my head cleared,  I smiled and politely said "Oh no, these are twins and he is their older brother."  

She responded with "Well your hands are still full, and so is your heart."  

And we parted ways.

My head is still reeling. 

I will leave you with a picture of my triplets:

Handsome Dude

Look who made the cover of Central Coast Family magazine for October. Who better to represent the Central Coast Railroad Festival and all its family-friendly activities.

Help Fight Epilepsy

Do you know the totally amazing, rock star, awesome, Gibson family?   (All though I really am not allowed to call them rock stars because they are really just people, Jeannette said so in a blog, but it’s the way I talk so she has to deal.)

Do you know Jill and what an utterly cool 4 year old she is?

Do you know about epilepsy....and that ....well ......it ....sucks?

Do you know The Regusci family is going to walk to end epilepsy?

Do you want to know why? 

Years ago before kids Matt and I meet Andy and Jeannette.

When I first meet Jeannette I remember thinking she was "super cool" and "super smart".  She had a real career, you know like with a fancy job title, and she had work clothes.  She planned city's and things or something like that, and used big words.  

I was a nanny.  I could sing a mean nursery rhyme but that was about it.  

She also baked, scraped booked, spoke a second langue and had über crafty friends.

Serious coolness and totally out of my league because you know I got pregnant and had a baby and adopted all like within the same year...insta-family.  What "cool" person would want to be friends with a stay-at-home mom.  Who could barely take a shower or make a box of mac and cheese and her BA hung above the laundry machine because it never saw the light of an office.

But  those things didn't matter to Jeannette the "career" gal.  Jeannette just cared about your heart. She accepted everyone and welcomed you no matter what.  Soon we found ourselves in more and more situations together and not to long after she was toting around a one year old pregnant with twins.  And with that we had a lot in common and became even closer friends. (for the record she is still more cool than me and has uber crafty friends but she accepts me because like I said, she is a rockstar)

Now, we both have husbands that spend a lot of time traveling for work, we have more then a couple kids, we have twins, and we have kids with special needs.   We don't see each other everyday or talk everyday but in my opinion we get each other.   We can be real with each other. 

No sugar coating.  Just raw.  Love it.  That's us.  

Jeannette is also my friend I called when Jonathan was airlift from Tahoe to Reno.  

 It didn't matter it was late at night past her bedtime. She would wake up.  And she would get it.   She knew what it felt like to be driving in the car helplessly, why your baby fought for his life in a helicopter without you.  She knows the feeling of walking into and ER and not waiting.  Having ever doctor and nurse at your baby’s bedside.  She knows the lingo;  O2 sat, CBC counts, IV lines, ventilators, brady, rescue meds,  respiratory and cardiac distress.   She knows what it feels like to sit by your babies bedside in the PICU with monitors dinging and beeping.  She knows what not to say.  She knows to say...that sucks. 

Why because that is part of their normal lives because they have a daughter with epilepsy.  It shouldn't be that way for any family but it is.

Needless to say when Jill, one of their twin daughters, started to have seizures our hearts poured out for our dear friends.  I can remember each text like it was yesterday "Jill is seizing called 911".  Then we would wait for the all clear, sometimes hours waiting for the discharge text.  But then there was the time we got "Jill is still seizing" I cried.  I wanted nothing more then to drop everything and run to their side and hold their hands, but knew that was not practical for them or my family so we prayed.  We pray hard. 

Nothing seems liked enough at these times.

We only have glimpses into what life must be like for our dear friends and I want nothing more than to heal Jill, to tell my friend all is good she won’t seize again but I can’t.   Jill is strong, she is very strong and she has attitude and she will move mountains because epilepsy will not define her or stop her.  That girl brings so much life and love it is amazing.

So that is why we are so excited because we finally feel like we can stand up and support or friends in a very tangible way.   On Nov 17th our family will all be walking with #teamjilly in the 5k to benefit the Epilepsy Foundation of Greater Los Angles.   Please consider donating to our team by clicking here.  This would mean the world to us.   As I have learned more and more about epilepsy form my friend I am amazed at how little knowledge I really had, like 1 in 10 people will have a seizure in their lifetime (there are 11 of us living in our house).    It truly is a worthy cause to donate to, plus Jill is super cute. 

If you want you can also get #teamjillygear here, which is super cute and all proceeds go to the fundraiser. Also Jeannette is trying to get someone from every state wearing #teamjilly purple on Nov 17, be part of the social media fun -sport your purple and support us walkers that day!