Getting Ready For Thanksgiving (And Christmas!)

I have a hard time focusing on Thanksgiving. As long as Steve and I have been married, Thanksgiving has also included an "early Christmas" with one side of the family, so it's never just been about getting together and giving thanks. In my mind, I'm already halfway to Christmas and presents and decorations.

Because of Steve's work schedule at his new company, we had to tell our families that we were staying in Georgia for Thanksgiving and Christmas. That decision made me a little excited and very nervous at the same time. I am so excited for Bella to experience the anticipation and joy of Christmas in our own home this year, but I was also a little nervous that celebrating wouldn't feel real without our families.

Here's the fun, unexpected part: since we aren't able to go anywhere for Christmas, both of our families are coming to us! We'll be hosting Steve's parents for about nine days at the beginning of December, and my family for about five days at the end of December. Stuff a few Christmas parties in-between for good measure and the month of December is going to be a very fun, special time for us! (I'm also imagining the spa day I'm going to need on January 1st!)  

Mel and I are cooking Thanksgiving dinner this year, and we'll be hosting some friends who don't have family around either. We've been spending the last few weeks poring over cookbooks and food magazines, looking for new recipes to try!

The first sign that Thanksgiving dinner is rapidly approaching - letting pieces of bread dry out on the counter! My favorite addition to the Thanksgiving recipes that I grew up with has been Steve's mom's stuffing recipe. It's so incredibly yummy!

I like to have all of my Christmas decorations up at the very beginning of December, but I didn't want to have to worry about doing anything while Steve's family is here, so I've been working on Christmas preparations for weeks and storing them away for easy access as soon as Thanksgiving is over. 

Hopefully, if the "busy work" is done, it will make it much easier to decorate and get ready the week after Thanksgiving. This year we're planning to read a book each night with Bella, so I have all of her Christmas-themed books wrapped and ready to go.

This is my favorite Christmas project and I will definitely be posting about it later on! I created an advent calendar for Bella out of Christmas socks. There are 24 socks, and each day has a different activity on it. There are some silly ones, like "paint your fingernails in Christmas colors" and some more important ones, like "decorate the Christmas tree". I even tried to make sure that some of the best activities would fall on the days that Steve's family is here! I've got to admit, I'm really proud of this project and I can't wait to do this with Bella!

The corner of my room is stuffed with gifts for the girls, friends, Steve's coworkers, and grandparents. A lot of my gifts are homemade this year, which can require a little more hands-on time, so I tried to do as much as possible ahead of time. I can't wait to post about the grandparent gifts that Steve and I worked on!

 

I'm looking forward to Thanksgiving and Christmas being an incredible time with our family this year, and I can't wait to experience it all in our own home!

Fun With New Textures And Food

Before Evelyn gets her first "official" food with a spoon, I've been letting her taste a few things to keep her little hands and mouth busy! With this baby, I'm not going to bother with rice cereal, but we're waiting for Steve to be home before we try pureed vegetables with a spoon (and a camera!). 

 

Munching on apple pieces in a little teether net. Best invention ever!

 

She's still learning how to hold it and what it does.

Looking back at Mama while she's scooting around the floor. She's definitely understanding more about how she can move herself around.

Tasting a frozen pea popsicle...another new experience for Evelyn! I found a small popsicle set at Wal-Mart, so I cooked up some peas, pureed them in the blender, and then filled the popsicle molds.

Yummy, silly pea face!

Our birth teacher (and friend), Lindsey, suggested I give Evelyn a carrot when she was teething, and it's worked out great! It's easy to hold, it's nice and hard so she can "chew" on it, and it's gives her a new texture to explore.

I just realized that all of these pictures are of Evelyn in her walker...just three different PJ's! She does not like to be put down and gets restless easily (don't we all), so "new food + the walker" is a great way to keep her happy!

We Need A Camera Crew Up In Here

I'm sure most parents wish they had a video camera going during all of the times their kids said something funny or cute! (Not during parenting fail moments; the camera would magically turn off anytime you lost your cool or let your kid eat Cheetos for breakfast.)

There are so many times throughout the day when I wish we had a camera going for Bella's "awesomeness". Sometimes it's a parenting bomb that I just feel the desperate need to document or something beautifully sweet that comes out of her mouth at the most unexpected moment.

Our MTV Real Life moments from this week:

•  I brushed my teeth while driving in the car, using my unsweet tea as toothpaste. (True story.) 

• On our way to preschool in a huge rainstorm, Bella insisted that the "tee tee was coming out", so I let her unbuckle and sit on the travel potty while we were driving down I-75. Then, she was being so sweet and talking to Evelyn while she sat there that I just let her stay there the entire way to school. So unsafe, but I didn't want to ruin the "sweet sibling" moment!

• Bella told me today, "Mama, I want wings. Then I could fly like Buzz and Woody."

• Last night, Steve and I laid in bed with Bella, in total darkness, and sang our final bedtime song, "There's Something Mighty Sweet About The Lord"...it was so sweet to hear her little voice join in and sing the words with us!

•  Evelyn is so close to sitting up on her own! She's also propped herself up on all 4's a few times, so maybe crawling will come soon, too! She is definitely doing things differently than Bella. Bella would just wait to even try something until all of a sudden, she did it. Then, she felt she had mastered it and took off! With Evelyn, you can see her try over and over, and watch her little face process what she's doing.

• While we were playing horses today, Bella put her horses' faces together and then said, "Mama, my horses can't play right now. They're talking about Jesus."

 

How do you make dinner preparations for enchiladas more interesting? Wear a baby on your chest! She still looks a little miserable from her cold; the ladies of the house are slowly, but surely improving! Oh, and I totally used the flash right in her face. Oops.

I'm sure there's more, but those are the ones that I can remember. Not too exciting, but it keeps a smile on our faces around here!

Evelyn's Baby Dedication

This morning was Evelyn's dedication in church. The poor squirt still has a nasty cold, so she was crusty and snotty and a little cranky. It was beautiful, though, and we feel so blessed to be a part of a church family that we love! 

I was able to do a "walk through" with Bella in the sanctuary (while it was empty) to give her an idea of what would be going on. Bella did a great job! She held my hand and even smiled at Pastor David when he said she had pretty hair. We couldn't believe it when she looked at him and giggled!

Evelyn never spits up anymore, but of course, she spit up like a dozen times today! We finally stopped worrying about a bib and just wiped it off her dress when it happened. 

The verses we chose for Evelyn were from I Samuel 1:27-28, "We prayed for this child, and the Lord has granted us what we asked of Him. So now we give her to the Lord. For her whole life she will be given over to the Lord.” 

We are learning the importance of showing Bella and Evelyn the attributes of God through our actions, and we pray daily for the wisdom, love, and patience (and humor!) to raise them to love Jesus with their whole hearts!

"Helping" Hands

Steve had to do some work on the car this morning, and he got an unexpected helper. Bella loves being outside and helping Daddy with things for the car or yard!

Using Daddy's wrench to "hammer" while Daddy works on the spark plugs.

Evelyn's legs are finally long enough to touch the ground, so she can scoot herself around! She runs into walls a lot and has no idea that she's the one who can fix it, but at least her legs touch the ground.

Showing Mama all of the cool parts! "Touch one, Mama!" was a common command.

The man. I love sitting outside and watching him work on the car.

Trying to play "horses" with the spark plug cords.Finally had to put a stop to that when she almost whipped Evelyn in the face!

Halloween 2012

Okay, I'll admit it: I was a little cranky about Halloween this year. The weather has not been great and both of the girls have colds, so I wasn't thrilled at the idea of taking them out in the cold while wearing costumes that didn't protect them.

Thankfully, the weather held up pretty well with not much wind, and we had a great time at the Sapps' house! All of the families met on one of their streets to let the kids have a fun parade and then we went trick-or-treating in their neighborhood. Bella did great and obeyed Steve really well! We tried to get her to say, "Trick or treat, please!", but instead she would walk up to the people and state, "I need candy."

Evelyn was originally going to keep the tradition going of Bella's first Halloween and be a little punk rocker, but we started to get a little nervous that her fake tattoos wouldn't wash off before she gets dedicated this Sunday. (Not the look we're going for when she's in front of the church being prayed over.) I looked online for some ideas and remembered my friend, Ashley, dressed her daughter as a 1980's workout instructor a few years ago, so I decided to go with that. She spent most of the night completely bundled up in her stroller, but it was still a cute, DIY costume!

 

Bella was supposed to go as Cinderella, but decided at the last minute that she didn't want to wear her princess dress. Steve and I have been working on being more laid back as parents (Who are we kidding? I'VE been working on being more laid back), and one of the things we've been working on is not pushing issues with Bella that aren't a big deal. We just smile and say, "Okay! It's up to you! Just let me know if you change your mind." P.S. She never changed her mind about dressing up. We just told people that Bella was dressing up as Bella this year!

Which brings us to Steve and I. We didn't originally plan on doing anything, but I have to confess that sometimes it's just fun to dress-up! Mel created a simple "tooth fairy" costume to wear to a party with some of her friends, so I was just going to steal her things and do that. She carried around a big, plastic tooth (she works at a dentist's office), and I knew I wouldn't be able to do that while watching the girls, so I figured I'd just go as a normal fairy and wear some fun eye shadow. 

When I started looking online for makeup ideas, I saw a lot of images for Day of the Dead costumes. [Dia de los Muertos is a Mexican holiday that celebrates loved ones who have died. Obviously, we don't celebrate this holiday or belief; I just thought the faces looked fun!] The pictures were really beautiful, and I found a tutorial that helped with step-by-step makeup instructions. (Are you sensing a "last-minute" theme to our costumes this year?) Once I got started, it was so much fun! I found big flowers to put in my hair, did my makeup while the girls were napping, and convinced Steve to let me do his face when he got home from work. I loved the finished product! Okay, so we scared a little girl while we were all out trick-or-treating, but otherwise, I loved it!

It made me a little sad that this was so last-minute because I think we could've done really fun things with our outfits! Hopefully, no one thought we were too evil-looking; I don't know if this is weird, but I felt really pretty! (My mom thought we were zombies, but oh well.) I'm seriously considering repeating this next year, and adding outfits to go with it. Maybe Bella would let us paint her face. And then promise not to smudge it...

Tennessee Aquarium In Chattanooga

I could have posted SO MANY MORE pictures of our aquarium trip on Sunday! We've been saving for months to make a family trip to Chattanooga for Steve's birthday. It was so much fun! We had been told many times that the Tennessee Aquarium was much better than the Georgia Aquarium, and everyone was right! I wish the one in TN would have had more large fish, but overall, the entire set-up was just better.

It ended up being a great idea to go on Sunday morning - the aquarium was deserted and it allowed us so much more freedom! Bella was able to run around and explore the exhibits without us worrying that she was bothering anyone else or going to get lost. That aspect alone made it a relaxing, fun trip for everyone! 

We started out in the Fresh Water building; this exhibit was incredible! Bella kept gasping and saying, "Oh my gooooooooodness."

Turtles, "big fish", sting rays...she loved it all!

The piranha exhibit had a periscope-type compartment that you could crawl up into and peek up-close. Here are Steve and Evelyn, snuggling while exploring.

In the rainforest habitat room. It was beautiful! Waterfalls, parrots, and small fish.

Touching the sturgeon. We encouraged Bella to remember the "two finger" rule, but when we looked up to talk to the aquarium employee, she picked up the entire fish! (She chooses unfortunate times to be brave!) Luckily, we were right there to help put the fish back.

Sadly, this is the only picture we got of all of us. (Well, minus Evelyn) Why does this always happen? Our one group shot always turns out fuzzy, washed out...something!

I love Bella's face here! She was so enthralled b the butterfly habitat! We were able to gently catch quite a few and let her see them up close. She was super-impressed that they would sit on our hands!

Mel's about to pick up a huge brown moth. Bella wasn't so sure about his size!

I just love this picture of Bella and Steve!

Pointing out little seahorses.

 

Evelyn playing with Mel. She loves sticking her little tongue out!

Great picture! I love Steve's iPhone.

Our little baby girl is so aware of what's going on around her! She loved the jellyfish because they moved slow enough for her to follow.

The jellyfish exhibit was stunning! 

I want this picture to say, "My family went to the aquarium and all I got were these silly earmuffs!"

About to go into the IMAX 3-D theater. We didn't actually make Evelyn wear those glasses, I promise.

So, the story about the sea creatures...I was really excited about letting Bella pick out a toy from the gift shop. I had images of her squealing in delight over a fluffy turtle or an adorable polar bear. Well, it didn't exactly go like that; Bella found a bag filled with plastic fish and fell madly in love! We let her choose and she went home so happy! She's been playing with them non-stop all week and even lined them up "holding hands" on the counter when we got home.

The aquarium was a great ending to our weekend! We had a wonderful time as a family and loved the aquarium!