Dance Recital

The girls had their dance recital last week. This is their 3rd recital! They were so cute, and did so well on stage. They seem to have no stage fright! I know when I was their age....I would have died to go on stage dancing, but they seem to love it.

Both Kateri and Luanna are very fancy and girly-girls....and again...unlike me as a child! I was pretty much a tom-boy, who hated getting dressed up. Baseball was more my thing.

Van for sale!

We are selling our 8 passenger Chevy Astro van. We bought it new a few years ago and it has served us well. With the new baby coming, we will be a family of 9 now, so need a bigger vehicle.

It is a burgundy 2005 Chevrolet Astro van with 50,000 miles on it. It has been a wonderful vehicle for us and we’ve had no problems with it. We bought it new in 2006. It has 8 passenger seating, air conditioning, power steering, power windows, power door locks, tilt wheel, cruise control, A/FM radio, CD player and a DVD system in the car (great for long trips with the kids!). It also has duel air bags, ABS (4 wheel drive), roof rack, privacy/tinted windows, running boards and Dutch doors in the back.

We are selling the van for $9,900. If interested, please contact us, come take a test drive and make us an offer. We are near Cleveland, Ohio.

Here are some photos of our van:

Week 31

Traben family at the Indians game a couple weeks ago.

I am starting Week 31 with Baby # 7! I can't believe how fast the pregnancy is going. We have a ton of things going on this summer with our family: baseball almost every night, swim lessons every day, Metroparks camps and 2 weddings coming up in July and August.
Ken's sister, Diana, is getting married on July 3rd and my sister, Mandy, is getting married on August 7th. Baby is due August 21st, so hopefully, we'll make it through everything and then baby will decide to come.

Here we are (me, Kateri and Luanna) at Diana's wedding shower on May 24th. Doesn't Kateri look just lovely with her chocolate sucker face!

The kids are rooting for a baby girl, to even things out a bit with the 4 boys and 2 girls. I just want a healthy baby...really does not matter to me. With all the nice weather, I've been walking the dogs a lot every day. Good for me and good for them too.

Week 23

I am in the 23rd week of pregnancy with baby # 7!! Everything is going well and this pregnancy is flying by. I am starting to get big I think...although I had someone today tell me they did not even know I was pregnant. ?? Guess they just thought I was fat!

The 3 boys all just had their birthdays. Jeremy turned 11 on Feb 17th, Oliver turned 9 on March 11th and Isaiah turned 13 on March 31st!! Kateri's 7th birthday is this friday (April 30th), and then Elliot's 2nd bday is the next day (May 1st). Lots of birthdays! Both Luanna and the new baby (and me!) will all have the August birthdays.

This is an ultrasound photo of baby Traben from April 2, 2010. He/She looks great and is healthy and vibrant...such a cute profile. We did not find out the sex, so we are all left in suspense here.

I'm Back!!

(Traben family- November 2009)

Wow....sorry to be gone for tooooo long.

I've been so busy with the kids, dogs, work, homeschooling and posting on Facebook that I honestly forgot about my blog. I just thought about it again and checked it out and I miss posting here with longer posts and lots of stories and photos. I will attempt to keep up with it again.

Our big news now is that I am again expecting a baby....baby # 7 for the Traben clan. I am due in August and we are all thrilled and excited. Baby Elliot may not be thrilled though when baby comes, as he has become my spoiled little love.

I need to post some updated photos.

Summer winding down...

As you can see, with my lack of posting this summer...I've been VERY busy. The kids have been all involved in baseball, swim lessons and tennis. We are usually not home pretty much every night. However, things are winding down, and getting calmer. Both Jeremy and Oliver won the Championships for their baseball teams. So, we have 2 winning teams!!

Oliver's team- the Mets! They had the best record this year, with only one loss all year. They were, by FAR, the BEST team in the league!


Jeremy's team- the Timber Rattlers! His team were the under-dogs. They did not have a great record...probably middle of the road, so it was a total upset that they made it through the playoffs into the Championship game. And, then winning it was a total shocker! It was an exciting playoff season. Go Rattlers!!


Isaiah did not have a winning team, but he really enjoyed his season so much this year, and he improved so much. And, of all the boys, he probably loves baseball the most!


This week, Isaiah and Jeremy are in California! They went with my youngest brother, Brian (age 20), and they are visiting my other brother, their uncle Vince, who is a Norbertine monk in California. They are all staying at the abbey and participating in the summer boys camp there. Last update I had, they were all having a blast catching tarantulas and snakes, swimming and playing lots of sports. Of course, they are also doing lots of church activities there too, like daily mass, rosary and Catechism lessons...which are probably my boys least favorite things to do at the camp. But, it sounds like they are very happy and having a great time. They come home tomorrow night! I am soooo excited to see them both and give them big hugs. We've missed them both so much.

Also, this summer, both my youngest sister Mandy (age 22) and Ken's youngest sister, Diana (age 22) BOTH got engaged!! Actually, Mandy got engaged in May, and Diana just called us tonight...guess they got engaged TODAY! Looks like we will have 2 family weddings next year. Mandy will be having her wedding next summer on my bday (August 7th!!) I am honored!
Mandy with her fiance, Jeff.


Elliot starting walking on Independence Day- July 4th, which is pretty ironic, since now he is so independent! Well, he does still like to cling to Momma sometimes, but this walking thing is pretty great.

Elliot walking in the Lakeview Cemetary...the boys are taking an art class there. It's actually a very cool place to visit.


Have you ever been this tired?


Here's my little walker...ain't he cute!!

Summer time!

Summer is my most favorite season! To me, it seems like a long, long party where there is just a ton of fun stuff going on every day, like baseball, swimming, camps, parties, cookouts, bike-riding, walks/hikes, playground dates, dog-parks...ect ect. And, we usually do not do a whole lot of "schooling" in the summer, although this summer I would like to do some. I bought the "Math U See" program for the oldest 4 kids to keep working on their math this summer. I just noticed that 3-4 months of doing no math school work made them forget so much by September. I am also hoping to keep up with their reading this summer with some fun books. I usually have a big box of books labeled "Summer Reading", fill it with all sorts of books that we did not have time to read during the school year and whenever the kids complain they have nothing to do, we go and find a book from that box.

Most nights already we are at the ball-fields. All 5 kids are playing baseball and or t-ball this year, so we have a number of teams we need to follow, and keep track of. It's really insane. But, Ken and I really enjoy watching them all play, and they look so cute out there on the fields. This weekend, Oliver, who is also on our city's travel baseball team, had his first tournament. They won 2 out of 3 games today, so he is playing again tomorrow morning for the semi-finals. Oliver's batting average was .429 today in the tournament, and he played left-field. Good luck tomorrow Oliver!


Here are the boys' before and after photos with their "summer haircuts"!
Before.....

...and after!