Thanksgiving

This year for Thanksgiving I had a lot of mixed emotions. For some reason I was feeling really nostalgic for the Thanksgivings I had growing up. Being at the "ranch," my grandparents house in Swan Valley, Idaho, playing in the snow with my cousins, and eating my aunt's delicious rolls. Have you ever had those days where you want to be the kid again? 

Thankfully my sister and her cute family were able to join us for Thanksgiving! My cousin also came for a few days. Our weekend was full of lots of cooking, eating, playing with the kids, catching up, and playing some wackie six (a card game). It was so awesome to have visitors! I am looking forward to the day when Claire will be able to play with her cousins. Daphne is just a year older than Claire. They will be great buddies in a few years. :) We tried to get some pictures of them in their matching outfits. 

 Daphne ready for a nap...

 Claire ready for a nap 

 This picture says it all with Daphne walking away. :) 

 Shaun was our head chef for Thanksgiving weekend. It was nice having our kitchen done so we could make some of the food ahead of time. We were reminiscing on how last year right before my sister and her family arrived shaun had just dumped his entire bag of tools on the floor to organize them. My sister arrived an hour sooner than planned. Shaun told me this year he could empty all of the kitchen drawers if I wanted... no thanks!

 I tried to wash the dishes as Shaun was cooking so there would be less clean up at the end. I don't think I was this smiley by the end of the day but the delicious food was worth it!

 the Dr. performing surgery. 

 We went on some great walks. Collin LOVED seeing the "digger."

 My sister and her family. She has lost over 50 pounds and is looking awesome! I am so proud of her!

 Daphne and her bear. She loves the stroller. 

 my cousin, Christy, making peanut butter balls. Delicious! 

 A little football doesn't hurt either. 

 Playing at the Rubbermaid store. 

The park was a hit too! 

Thank you for making our Thanksgiving so great! Seriously, we feel so blessed to live within driving distance of family. It makes it much easier to be away from "home." After Seleta's family got home Collin said, "get in daddy's car and go back to Auntie's house." SO cute! I'm so glad they had a great time with us! Can't wait for Christmas in Rochester!

p.s. a big thanks to Shaun for making some amazing food. He really went out of his way to make me a yummy pumpkin pie and coconut cream pie since last year the recipes we used weren't that great. This year the pies turned out amazing! Thanks honey! 

what's for dinner?

Shaun's garden is amazing! We only had about six weeks to grow our fall weather crops and it was a success! It doesn't look like much lettuce when you see it in the ground but...

Look at this yummy stuff!

I just want to say how grateful I am for Shaun! He is such a good husband and dad! He makes dinner almost every night. Can you believe that? Even though I am home all day he still enjoys coming home and cooking. Don't worry I am capable of cooking and a lot of times we cook together but Shaun is the chef of the house. He will whip up sauces and combine spices that I wouldn't think to use. I really enjoy seeing his creativity come out. Thanks honey! 

p.s. the fresh salad was delicious!! 

2 months old

I can't believe it but Claire is already 2 months old. She has "grown up" so much since she was born. She is still such a sweet baby and so content! Here are a few of our favorite things about her! 

2 month stats: 

weight: 9 lbs 13 oz (21 %)

length: 22 1/4 inches (42 %)

head: 37.75 

I love when she wakes up. Sometimes I have to wake her up during the day so she will sleep for me at night. But she always has to stretch and we love it! 

She loves music! We sing all the time with her and she is starting to coo along. 

(This video was taken before she started joining in.)

We love that she is so snugly! It is rare for us to let her fall asleep on daddy but when a bout of bad gas hits this is a good alternative.

With two months came the dreaded but oh so necessary shots. I really thought I could be brave. Shaun was able to come to the appointment with me. The minute she screamed and her face got all scrunched in a red ball I lost it and was crying. :( I have never heard her cry like that before. She seemed fine after but about two hours later we definitely needed the Tylenol! Thank goodness for that! It took her most of the night to recoup but by Sunday morning we had our smiley girl back! 

Sure love this girl! 

Claire's Smile

Claire has the cutest smile! We have been trying to capture it for a while now but all I would get were blurry shots. Well, while I was at the store tonight Shaun worked his magic! 

This was my attempt earlier... Notice with mom Claire has the bow. :)

New Born Pictures

Our good friend Allison took Claire's new born pictures for us. Claire was only about 10 days old. Thank you so much Allison! We love them!

We sure love this sweetheart of ours! 

Happy Halloween

We dressed Claire up for the ward Halloween party. They announced that everyone was supposed to dress up so Shaun and I assumed that the adults were going to be good sports. Guess again. I think it scarred Shaun because he totally went all out to look like the perfect Walmart shopper. If you ever come visit our town you will see that he is pretty accurate with his costume.

 Claire was a little ballerina 

Shaun slicked her hair down. It lasted about 2 minutes that way but we tried. 

 Ready for a trip to Walmart 

A friend in our ward has a big Halloween party every year. Last year all of the adults dressed up but this year only the host and her husband (besides us) were in costumes. Lame! Shaun toned it down after the ward party and decided to be a scientist. Claire was in her little cat outfit. Not such a good picture of her with us because she was so focused on all of the commotion going on around us. AKA lots of children in their costumes getting excited to trick or treat. :)  

Love this picture! Love this girl!