Thursday, November 22, 2012

Many Thanks!


A few weeks ago Andy presented this tree (minus the leaves) to us for Family Home Evening.
Each night since then we have all tried to write something we were thankful for that day on a leaf and tape it up...some were more liberal with their tape than others (see leaves in the middle of the trunk).
It was a fun activity.
I thought it would be fun to show you some of my favorites...





I ordered a seizure monitor for Ben's bed (thanks to my Grandma) and I found that it was on sale due to November being Epilepsy awareness month...this saved us over a hundred dollars.





A sure sign that Christmas is here...driving down Main street and seeing this happening was one of those moments where you realize just how close Christmas is and panic just a bit because you don't feel prepared.

My Thanksgiving Day started off with a 5K to benefit the victims of the Hurricane.
I was so surprised to see a gaggle of my cousins there as well.  (So I know a gaggle refers to geese but a group of turkeys is called a rafter and it just didn't sound as fun...not that my cousins are turkeys, I just wanted to stay in keeping with the holiday.)




 
My cousin Clay and his adorable first born, Navy.

Then, for our Thanksgiving meal we drove down to Farmington to my aunt's house.






My cousin Zane played his sax for us.



Ben borrowed a little sweater from my aunt since his mom wasn't smart enough to bring one :)  The kids played outside for quite a while and Ben didn't want to come in.  Love the belly bud!















Looks like apple pie doesn't it?  Guess again.  It's my mom's famous pear pie.  YUM!

My Grandpa Olsen's sax that he played in high school.  Grandpa passed away in 2007.

It's impossible to see this and not touch it :)  Isn't it nifty?





Zane also plays the drums (and the clarinet) and he was kind enough to let my family try their hands at his set.

My husband impressed us all with a hidden talent!


Jo and his hidden talent :)





We had a lovely time.

Once we got home it wasn't long before we started taking down Thanksgiving decor and putting up Christmas.  We arranged the village that my friend gave me on top of the piano.  Then after the kids went to bed I pulled out all the tubs full of stuff and they are sitting downstairs ready for the morning. 

I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving.
(I have been sitting here for probably 15 minutes now trying to think of a good closing sentence and falling asleep at the same time...so I'm just going to sign off...without a good closing sentence.)

Saturday, November 17, 2012

Lots of fun Little things Part 2


My mom gave me this fun little thing....I love the scrappiness of it!  Didn't she do a beautiful job?



Speaking of my mom...she has a birthday coming up so a friend and I took her out to lunch to the local Crepery.


It's a fun eclectic place.  I thought this picture was fun because Mom loves matryoshka dolls and there was one right on the wall next to her. They also had tons of  nifty birds hanging from the ceiling.


When they took our orders {I had a cheesecake, strawberry, chocolate drizzled crepe} they made sure they got the correct spelling of our names.  I thought it was kind of funny that they were so exact about it... but when our drinks came out {I had nutella hot chocolate} I saw why...

 So cute!


Just in the last few days we have seen some exciting progress with Ben's language. 

I tell you, his little head is full of understanding and every now and then we catch a glimpse of it.  He's said "knee" and pointed to his own.  He surprised me the other day by pointing to a toy castle and saying "hou".  Today we were building a cabin with lincoln logs and he kept saying the same thing!  Tonight Andy was taking him into the bathroom to brush his teeth {dada has been the only one allowed to complete the bed time routine lately} but josh had gone in and locked the door.   Ben pointed to the thermostat on top of which we keep the straight.  and he said "ey".  Now we don't use that key very often so the fact that he knew where it was, what it did and what it was called was pretty amazing.  I can't wait to hear what he says next.


He had a pretty hard fall the other day and got a black eye.  He scrunches up his eyes so much when he smiles for pictures so I asked him to close his eyes to show it off.


Andy replaced 18 lightbulbs in our home the other night...with that many out you'd think we had been living in the dark...close but not quite.  I had to smile at the irony of the moment when Andy finished the lights and went to bed and I walked into the kitchen and saw one of the flood lights high up in the ceiling go dim...and then out.

I snapped some pics of the kids drawing hand turkeys a couple of nights ago...



I was also having fun playing with some of the filters on the camera :)
 I can't believe Thanksgiving is less than a week away!


A few weeks ago I found this darling flannel and had to buy some. 


Isn't it adorable?
I was excited to finally have an excuse to use it for a friend who had a baby last week.


There's that awesome mitered corner technique again...and of course I had to make some burp cloths to go with it.


And lastly, I have a friend...an older woman in our neighborhood...who recently offered me her Charles Dickens Christmas village.  Ummmm...yes please!


I took Abby with me to her house last night to pick it up.  I hoped it would be a memorable experience for her...looking back years down the road to the night that we received our well loved Christmas village.


  My friend is such a sweet woman.  She said she hadn't gotten it out for years and wanted it to go to a good home where it would be used and enjoyed.  She had it all set up the same way she had always set it up for her family when her children were young.


  She lovingly showed us the individual pieces and explained the part they played in the tiny town.  We carefully packed them all up, thanked her and said goodbye.  Abby can't wait to put it up...I'm kind of excited too :)


We are honored to be the new owners...thanks Barbara!
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