Christmas Time...Here we come!!

We are crazy for Christmas in our house...we'll I guess its mostly me. The day after Thanksgiving is always "Christmas decorating day" in our house. Yep...I break out the Christmas music, hot cocoa and apple cider and decorate all day.
This year, however, I was a slacker. It took me all weekend to get in my Christmas groove. We put the tree up Friday, decorated a little more Saturday, and decorated the tree today. We are officially in Christmas gear now. We even snuggled in to watch Rudolf the Red-Nosed Reindeer with Kate tonight. I just love this time of year!

Christmas Wonder

Kate woke up from her nap just as we set up the tree. The Christmas lights were on, twinkling away. As Eric carried Kate down the stairs her eyes got big and a long ooooohhhhh escaped from her lips. Our tree at this point had no decorations, just lights. Simple, but truely beautiful. She walked over to the tree, eyes sparkling with joy, and just stared at it in absolute wonder. She cupped one of her little hands under a branch to get a closer look at the lights and her eyes just lit up. We told her it was our Christmas tree...and she repeated it over and over...with a few ohhhhs and aaahhs in between. She curled into my arms and just wanted to sit and look at the pretty tree. It was such a tender moment and it made me slow down and realize the beauty in the small moments we have with our children. The holiday season can get so busy and the little moments like these can be lost if we don't take time to enjoy them. All to fast they will be grown and the childhood wonder in which they once looked at things will be faded. May you all have a wonderful Christmas season and take time to enjoy the little moments with your children. How wonderful it would be to see life through their wonder filled eyes again.

A Day for Thanks

We have so many blessings to be thankful for. Too many to count!

Thank you to all our family and friends. Your love and support have made an incredible difference on our lives. We love you all so much!

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving! Our morning activities included:

Watching the Thanksgiving parade

Making pumpkin pancakes

and

Decorating our "thankful tree"

Kate loved hanging the leaves....she thought they all needed to go in the same spot.

Then we enjoyed a lovely day with family and yummy food. What a wonderful way to spend a day : )

Kate playing with her favorite toy at Nannys

Couldn't resist making a new bow to match her skirt : )

Gobble Gobble


My mum (The best cook EVER!!)


Eric carving his first Turkey

Happy Thanksgiving from our family to yours!

We owe all our blessings to our gracious and loving God from whom all good things flow.

"T" is for "Turkey"

The night before Thanksgiving called for a little turkey crafting to get us ready for tomorrow!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Apple Cranberry Pocket Pies

I've been in the baking mood. Fall does that to me. I've made 3 batches of cookies in the last week..and now Im on to pies : )

My mom surprised me with some pocket pie molds from Williams-Sonoma last month. Thanks Mom, I love them! Here is the apple mold in action....

I put a little too much filling in...so the decorative cutout...turned into a big hole....hehe...oh well, guess I'll have to make another batch : )

My Favorite FALL Scent

Bella's Birthday Bash

For the New Moon opening night, my friend Sadie planned a whole event leading up to the midnight showing of the movie. Her and her sisters planned a semi-formal birthday party at the Olive Garden. Who was the guest of honor you may ask?? Bella of coarse...well her cut out at least :)

In the first chapters of New Moon...it is Bellas birthday...so that was the theme for the night. They had all the details down to party hats and cuprcakes! They also handed out treat bags that held a box of candy for the movie, vampire fangs, Edward/Jacob sugar cookies (the most amazing sugar cookies I've ever tasted!), and Edward/Jacob buttons. The cupcakes were from a favorite local bakery and were divine! Everyone at the restaurant was coveting the cutout.....we had probably 6 groups of people interrupt our party to ask if they could take their picture with the cutout. It was hilarious!

Then it was over to the theater for the big event! The movie was fun....I didn't love it..or hate it....but it was just fun to have a night out with my ladies! I didn't get home until almost 3:30 am!

Thanks Sadie (and your sisters) for planning such a fun event. You really outdid yourselves! I am so glad I have such crazy, fun friends!

CRAZY LADIES (Im so sad I didn't get a pic with Sadie in it! I wish I would have gotten one with the whole group too...there was about 15 of us!)

Our wonderful Hostess!

The Cutout

My cupcake....YUMMO!

Twilight Movie Night!

Tonight I am going to the midnight showing of NEW MOON with my girlfriends. Sadie has planned an awesome evening with a semi-formal black dress party before the movie! I am soo excited!

In preparation for our big New Moon night, I planned a Twilight movie night at my house last night. It was fun to watch the movie again....it grows on me every time I see it. The first time I saw it.....I HATED it!! Big Time! But now...I actually really like it (even though parts of it are fairly cheesy)....and even Robert Pattinson has grown on me as Edward. We had a great night and of coarse....I had to make some vampire themed treats (Vampite bite cookies) for the party! Tara even brought some "Bloody Bites" as I call them (red velvet cake chocolate balls). They were delicious and blood red when you bit into them! It got us all really excited to watch New

Moon tonight!

Vampires Bites

Tara's yummy..and bloody.. treats

The ULTIMATE slide!

After Kate had so much fun sliding down the box on her birthday....we decided to take the box slide to the next level. We had some big boxes from shelving we had bought for our storage room.....so of coarse we couldn't pass up the opportunity to utilize them to their full potential.....

First....


And....then...the DOUBLE SLIDE

WHEEEE! So much fun!

Kate was in heaven!

Im such a safety freak..I still can't believe I let her do it....but we had plenty of pillows at the bottom of the slides and Eric and I were right there to catch her. All in all...alot of fun ....and no owies! YEAH!

Elephant Face Off

Kate loves to play with playdough. Well...actually, she likes to tell you what to make and watch you mold it. Without fail...she will ask me to make a cat and an elephant (her two favorite animals).

Tonight...Eric and I had a contest....who could make the best elephant?? And Kate would be the judge. Of coarse when it came time for her to judge...she didn't care and just wanted to play with her elephants.

So what do you think??? Who's the winner??

Green or Pink? And Who made which one???

Latest Stats

At her 2 yr apnt, Kate weighed in at:

21.2 pounds (2-3%)

And measured

32 3/4 inches (not sure the percentage)



Yep.....still my little bean!

I love her soooo very much!

Birthday Adventures

Kates birthday fun included...

Lunch with Nanny

Helping mommy pick out decorations for her cake. This year I made a....

I have so much fun making Kate her cakes!!

Some mommy daughter time at the aquarium

Pizza, cake and presents with mommy and daddy.

And her favorite part of the day was turning the box from her present into a slide. Haha, She seriously could have cared less about what was in the box.....note to self for next year...just buy a big box (much cheaper...haha)!

Happy Birthday My Sweet Baby Kate

How has another year come and gone?? My baby is 2 already. I guess I can't call her a baby anymore. She is becoming more of a "big" girl everyday. Its hard to believe she has grown into this little person...from the tiny 6lb 3oz baby she started as.

From the moment (6:14 am, 2 years ago) she came into this world....she has been bringing so much joy into our life everyday.

Some things I want to remember as Kate moves out of her 2nd year...

Her favorite thing: "B" (her blanket)

in close 2nd..."Dante" (her stuffed cat...she loves the real Dante..our cat.. too), "Dumbo", and "Mamo" (her monkey).

Her favorite foods: Bananas, Cheese, Strawberries, Mac'n'cheese and spagetti.

Her favorite show: Dora the Explorer

Favorite article of clothing: Her boots!

Favorite activity: Going to the park (especially the slide and swings) and coloring.

Other tid bits: She is talking so much now. She repeats just about any word and has started saying small 2-3 word sentances. She loves animals...especially elephants and cats. She is still my little bean....probably only weighing about 21-22 lbs. She is wearing 18 month clothes and still fits in many of her 12 month clothes from last year. As her pediatricain said...she is just going to be petite. She is my little firecracker! She has so much spunk in her. But she has such a tender heart. She loves to give hugs and kisses and also shows affection with little love pats and rubbing her nose on you like a cat (best I can describe it) It is sooo sweet.

My sweet little Kate, You are the absolute joy of our life. You are such a blessing to us. We love you to the moon and back.....and then some!

Happy Birthday!

Love Mom and Dad

Super Daddy

We survived Kate's first time with the stomach flu.
It started while I was at work.....and Eric was at the car wash with Kate.
Out of the blue.....throw up all over the car.
If that wasn't bad enough for Eric to deal with...
Kate threw up on the floor once
and on on him twice.
Poor Kate....Poor Eric
When I got home...he had cleaned the car....himself...Kate and the floor
and was cuddling his sweet little girl.
What a guy!
I was so sad for my little one. I hate seeing her miserable. But I love comforting and rocking her.
Needless to say...it was a long night with very little sleep... but we survived and she is back to her spunky self today!
FYI... unflavored pedialyte is GROSS! I thought the clear one would be less messy coming back up...but...definately go with the flavored ones if you actually want them to drink it!

An October Recap

Here is our October....in a nutshell.

Erics B-day! We love you sweetie.

Day at the zoo to see the new baby elephant

The Great Pumpkin Festival (Hay rides, fresh apple cider and carmel apples....and The Charlie Brown Great Pumkin show outside at dusk!!)

Hiking

Raking leaves.


Lounging


Costume pics

Back to the 80s...Murder Mystery Party (Thanks Dan and Mishay!...It was like totally a blast...haha)

Playing the roles of Molly Holiday (80's valley girl) and Biff Bushnill (80's preppy)

I made my first Pumkin Pie.....actually....my first pie ever!

Halloween Party#2

Halloween Day...trick-or-treating on Main Street

Carving Pumpkins

GNO(with kiddies of coarse)

That about sums it up. Maybe one of these days I will get back to more frequent posts..instead of the month long.."in a nutshell"..type of posts.....