Friday, November 28, 2008

Happy Thanksgiving!

Of all of the things that I'm thankful for, my family is at the top of the list. We had our traditional thanksgiving meal at my parents yesterday with our family, natural and adopted:) We even had my brother and his little family. We had a wonderful time eating, visiting, playing games, and enjoying each other's company.


If you look hard you'll see; me, my brother, Kyla, Gavin and my dad:)

The kids enjoyed getting to know their cousin, Gabe and Chad and I really enjoyed cuddling with him. We don't get to see him often, he changes so much between visits! The kids got their monthly quota of wrestling with Uncle Josh and Grandpa and I got some much needed time with my brother and Randi.


Gavin laid on the floor with Gabe and just let Gabe poke, pinch, and investigate with out so much as flinching. He was so gentle with him!



The cousins, Gavin, Gabe, and Kyla

Tuesday, November 25, 2008

Cavity Free Kid!

Kyla had her first dentist appointment yesterday. The time has gotten away from me and I realized that we are pretty late starting, but thankfully, she is cavity free! She was quite worried as the visit started, but did okay as it progressed. She ended up laying on me for her checkup and cleaning, I had to fight not to open my mouth and let him check me:) Gavin enjoyed watching the show and was ready to jump up on the chair and let the dentist check him out. We were able to look at the x-rays and saw her permanent teeth ready to come through. The Dr. says she'll be losing her bottom teeth anytime. Crazy looking pictures, here we come, the gawky stage is about to start:) She got to choose a prize for doing so well so we came home with a purple dog named, "Purple Dog."

Cavity Free and proud:)
Since her appointment, the kids have been playing dentist. Poor Gavin, always seems to be the patient and he always has too many cavities:)

The Bride and Groom...

We recently traveled to IN to visit my extended family. Our trip coincided with my cousin's wedding, not by accident of course:) My cousin Abby married Joe on November 8th in a beautiful ceremony in northern IN. They asked me to do the photographs, I was honored and really excited to do so.


Gavin buddied up to my cousin, Adam, and hung out with him for most of the reception. I still cringe when I think of all the candy, food, and who knows what he was given:) He would just go up to people and say please and they would hand him whatever they had:) It's that cute smile of his, it gets people every time:)


Kyla played with my cousin's little girl, Elaina. You can see the girls in our family picture. If you look closely, you'll see that Gavin isn't with Chad or I, nope, he's with Adam:)


I was able to chat with my cousins and aunts and uncles that I haven't seen for over 2 years. The Bride and Groom were happy and gracious, my family was all there (minus a couple of cousins and my brother), the kids did well, and the pictures turned out nicely. All in all, we had a great time!

Friday, November 21, 2008

Snow, Glorious Snow!

Our last morning in IN, we woke up to about 3/4" of snow. By the time we got the kids out to play in it, it was considerably less:) Being unprepared as I was for cold weather, we went old school as we bundled them up to play outside. Plastic bags over their socks and shoes, socks for mittens, borrowed gloves and pajamas under clothes for added warmth. They sure looked fashionable:) My mom and the kids stayed out for about 45 minutes and came back in with cold fingers and red noses, but they had a great time!

Thursday, November 20, 2008

Tractor Rides!

Knowing that Gavin loves tractors, my grandpa invited us out to the farm that was has been in our family for generations and got out my great-grandfather's tractor for the kids to ride on.

The actual farm house is owned by one of my mom's cousins now, but most of the property is my grandparents. It's a beautiful area. My grandmother and her mother were both born in the house. I love family history:)

While Kyla and I were waiting, we walked around the farm. Kyla was even able to help my cousin collect eggs from the 20+ chickens.

Leaves!

While staying at my grandparents house, we spied their neighbor's leaves and decided that it was the perfect time to go and play in them. My grandpa got out his riding lawn mower and hooked his trailer too it and we headed down the road to the neighbors. As a kid, I have great memories of sitting in the trailer with my brother and cousins being pulled by my grandpa. I was so excited for my kiddos to get the same experience. My grandpa is pretty creative in his trailers:) Gavin got to "drive" with grandpa. He was very reluctant to get off to play in the leaves:) Indiana is truly the place to be for a boy who loves tractors!

My grandpa with the kids
my Mom and Gavin
my Mom and Kyla

Visit with Miniature Ponies

At the beginning of our trip, we stayed the night at my Aunt and Uncle's house in Goshen (Northern IN). My Aunt has two dogs, Fred and Daisy, that the kids absolutely love. Gavin found this stool in the kitchen and proceeded to drag is around the house, climbing up it, and saying, "Ta Da!"


Their neighbor has 15 horses/miniature ponies, so of course we had to go over and visit them. We brought carrots and apples and fed all fifteen of the ponies and petted the marauding barn cats and kittens. We even got to meet Gus, a baby pony. Thanks Betsy for letting us visit your barnyard friends!

Wednesday, November 5, 2008

Away We Go!

We are off to Indiana early tomorrow morning. As I deal with all the crazy last minute stuff before a trip, I decided to take a minute, take some deep breaths, and ask for prayers as we are off on our journey. I'm a little anxious as to how Gavin will do on his first plane ride...We will surely see tomorrow:)

Here are a couple of shots of the kids to tide everyone over until we get back:)

Sunday, November 2, 2008

Pumpkin Time!

We don't celebrate Halloween, therefor we didn't get our pumpkins carved until today. That's our excuse anyway:) My mom gave us these gigantic pumpkins right from her garden. We stripped Gavin down to some play pants and Kyla picked out the perfect pumpkin carving outfit. Hmmm.

Gavin could barely clean out the bottom of his it was so tall:) He wasn't so sure about touching all the goop inside the pumpkin but got into the spirit of it when we gave him his very own spoon.Chad drew the face on Gavin's and Gavin "helped" me carve it.

Kyla cleaned out, drew a face and carved her very own pumpkin this year! What a big girl she is!


Here they are.


Happy Harvest Everyone!