Thanksgiving Trip to Utah - Day 3 Thanksgiving!

Thanksgiving was filled with lots of family!  We started out the day at Aunt Tammy's and did an early dinner with my Blank family and then we went to have dinner with Peter's family.

We bundled up and went to the park so Maxwell could burn off some energy.

Maxwell and Maryn

All wrapped up - she was thrilled to be outside and in the stroller

Racing down the slide - it's still a big deal to see Maxwell willingly go down slides

Emmalyn loved playing with her second cousins and they were so sweet to play with her and Maxwell

Our early dinner - Grandma Grandpa, Tammy's family, Russell's family, and Paul

Ethan held the baby so I could eat

Maxwell played a little nerf wars with the big boys

We then headed south to have dinner with Peter's family.  They were meeting in a banquet room at a hotel because Alex's house was having plumbing issues.

The minute we walked in, Lola was all about Emmalyn.  :)

Payton

Korben and Morgan 

Payton pulling funny faces for Maxwell (I gave him my phone to take pictures with because he wasn't very entertained by hanging out in the banquet room).

Lola and Emmalyn

Emmalyn and Grandma

Aunt Aja and Emmalyn

Uncle Alex

Peter stayed late playing games and enjoying his family while I left to take the kids back to Tammy's so they could go to bed.  They were both exhausted and ready for bed after a long day.

I love this fruit salad!  Heck, I love all Thanksgiving food. (especially later that night or the next day...leftovers!)

Halloween Carnival and other fun festivities

 We enjoyed a Halloween Carnival, especially Maxwell.  He had a blast playing all the games and getting candy, of course.

Maxwell and I enjoying the Hayride.  He thought it was pretty cool.

So we were about done but we had bought some tickets to use and hadn't used them.  Maxwell had ZERO interest in riding rides (maybe he remembered when we made him do a ride last year?).   He had zero interest in doing a bounce house...the cotton candy machine was down...so the only thing we were left with was the cake walk.  

I had no idea what a cake walk was until we moved to Texas.  I think it's pretty silly but oh well.  For anyone who doesn't know, it's basically musical chairs but instead of taking a chair away, when the music stops the seats are all numbered and they pick a number.  The person sitting in that seat wins a cake or some type of dessert like brownies or a pie.

At first Maxwell wouldn't do it alone and I had to walk with him but after a couple times (and he wanted to keep going until we won) his confidence was up and he started doing it all alone.

Intently listening for who the winner was

Video - Maxwell doing the cake walk.  He's so little!!

He wasn't disturbed by the other costumes, he was so intent on winning.  Unfortunately we went through all 10 tickets and never won.  :(

At home the baby wasn't too happy that I was trying to give her avocados.  She does NOT like them.  She is so tiny in the high chair!

The 3 boys decorated their pumpkins.

Dad, Maxwell, and his pumpkin - - - a pirate for my little pirate.

Speaking of dressing up, can you find my cute husband in this pic?  

(from when he plays paintball)

Maxwell likes to pull my hair over my shoulder on one side and then say "you look like Elsa, Momma". :)  I sort of love it.

Maxwell has been struggling with staying dry during nap time at school the past 2 weeks and has had two accidents each week.  It's frustrating that they won't put a pull up on him and instead have to deal with completely changing his clothes and bagging up his wet clothes and nap mat (and then I have to wash everything so that it's clean for the next day).  Why not just let him use a pull up!?  ugh

At least he seems to be learning at school.  He is now writing some of his letters and as I've talked about, can write "MAX".  I think his experiences at school helped him do great at the carnival when we were standing in so many lines and he was so patient and well behaved each time.


Emmalyn is struggling with her naps during the day.  It's so frustrating and can take so much effort to keep trying to get her down.  The good news though is that she has no issues at night.  She is still up 2 - 3 times between 11 pm and 7 am to nurse.

She's solid in her ability to sit.  I'll let her just sit there and play for quite a long time.  She will move to her belly if she's done.  She also has the army crawl down.

Easter 2013

Happy Easter!

Easter breakfast

Max got a variety of things in his eggs - Pretzels, Swedish Fish jelly eggs, marshmallow bunnies

Max's Easter basket

The eggs were hidden during Max's morning nap

When he woke up, Max went on his egg hunt.  For the first few he stopped to open them up and see (eat) what was inside

Notice the opened eggs and candy strewn about?  They never made it to the basket.

Once we got him to carry the basket he did a better job of putting the eggs in the it.

Movie - Max got the hang of it.

That's a lot of eggs!

Nap time - we got him to sleep in his crib in his room!!!!!! (Bum in the air, head in the corner)

I made another batch of the robin's nests and Easter baskets. 

We gave this plate to our next door neighbors.  They were so sweet and brought Max an Easter basket filled with things appropriate for him.  We are so blessed to have such kind and great neighbors.

Movie - Max "riding" his bike

Family dinner

Ham with a brown sugar/mustard glaze, deviled eggs, rolls, asparagus, and funeral potatoes (which were a FAIL!  grrrr...they sounded so good)

Max LOVED the ham!

Family pic - Joe, Hayden, Landen, and Britt

Family pic

Daddy kisses

Hey dad - don't kiss me!

Happy family.  It is awesome to be a family!

We found a visitor in our yard - - A BUNNY!!!!

This is the first bunny we've seen in our yard.  I thought it must be a good lucky sign that we saw the bunny on Easter.

Bunny hanging out by the grill

Hayden tried to touch him and he ran off