November notes

-This month we FINALLY took Gwen to get her first haircut: Bangs! You see, the problem is, she has hair that just always is IN her face. No matter how much we brush it to the side, or to the back, it just ends up in her face. Whenever she eats it gets her hair so matted. She tends to drool and is a bit snotty so that also gets it all gross. I finally had the realization that if this hair is going to go forward, it needs to be short so we need to cut it. I took her to Sharkey's and it ended up SO cute! I really hope she loves them because she looks like such a freaking doll with them and I just love them on her. The other girls decided they needed bangs as well so we took them to get theirs done. They don't seem to love their so that probably won't be a common thing for them.

-The kids are obsessed with Charlie! I mean, how can you not be? He's a cutie (yes, he's a he for sure...hasn't been confirmed, but we can definitely tell) and he loves to snuggle. He does get a bit rowdy and sometimes that makes the kids nervous, but when he wants to relax he'll do it anywhere and he doesn't mind the kids coming up to him and petting or pulling on him haha. He's been a good new addition.

-Speaking of Charlie, him and Otto seem to be bffs. They love to play around with each other and I think it's nice for Otto to finally have that. He always gave Minnie such a hard time that he needed an active outlet and Charlie definitely steps up to the plate! I just hope Otto can keep up with him at this point haha.

-I got to hit up the Christmas show with Mom and Rachel. We all found a few good items for our Christmas shopping. I think I might have found more food than anything, but I did find some good items for the kids there so I'm pretty happy with how my shopping is going.

-We had our time change this month. Honestly, the kids adjusted perfectly, but for me it took about a week (maybe a day or two longer) to really feel adjusted. I was fine in the mornings, but having the energy to stay up after putting the kids down has kicked my butt. I guess I'm just getting too old for that now haha.

-We had moments of Cara wearing my shoes this month and my heart just swells! I remember very vividly wearing my mom's heels growing up and thinking I couldn't wait to be big enough to fit into them and wear them all the time. I thought heels were the ultimate feminine shoe and I couldn't imagine wearing anything else. I hardly wear heels at all now (funny how that works out, huh?), but it's still fun to see Cara getting into mine. I wonder what goes through her mind when she does it.

-Pierce LOVES jumping. Oh boy will this boy jump anytime, anywhere. He doesn't do a full jump, yet, but he practices MULTIPLE times a day. He's so freaking cute, I just don't know how I handle it haha.

-Cara is the sweetest little girl, she loves to leave little messages for people. I constantly find little messages in her backpack that are clearly ones that went back and forth between her and one other girl in her class (it changes, but the messages always say "I love you" either from her to the girl or from the girl to Cara). I was doing laundry and found this sweet one from her in the dust:

-Oh boy has the flu hit us HARD! I got it SO bad after Gwen's birthday. Larry got it a bit for a few days and was down. Gwen just had a headache so I'm nervous she's going to get it. It's so unfortunate to get sick around the holidays, but I'm hoping it's at the end for us now (fingers crossed).

Christmas Starts Early

Oh man am I just so pumped for Christmas this year! I did my absolute best to not do a single Christmas thing until Thanksgiving had it's time. That is now! I have already started shopping (and got most of it done, even!), Christmas music is already on the radio (sweet! Sure made shopping that much more fun) and we are planning on putting our décor up today.

Really quick, I have to say how happy I am with my shopping already. I just went to the strip mall place near us and crossed off SO many items! I am making sure to go lighter with our family (I always overdo it and forget about how others ALSO have gifts for the kids and so it just gets so overwhelming) and I feel I got a good chunk for the kids crossed off. I think I just have a few more things to get others (as in, those not living in my house) and then just stockings and maybe some online stuff and I'm done! Like, really done! I think I might even be able to start wrapping this week and I'm just feeling so head of the game.

So I hope you all were able to enjoy your Thanksgiving and got a good head start on Christmas. It'll be here before we know it, it always is!

Thanksgiving 2023

Thanksgiving this year was definitely one of the top ones for me. The only bad part was I was still feeling a little iffy. Not enough that we had to stay home, but enough that I wasn't going to get dressed until the very last moment haha (mostly just a stupid little cough at this point)

We started the day with relaxing and watching the parade. Luckily, we only needed to bring cheesecake and carrots to dinner. Larry is the king of making cheesecakes and we grabbed carrots at the store on Sunday so I got to sit and relax while Larry did all of the cooking. The kids all came to snuggle with me at some point during the parade so that was nice. We also watched the Packers DOMINATE and just kill it. It was definitely the first win that I was very proud of this season. 

It finally got to be time to get ready, so I did real quick and we quickly got the kids ready as well. We headed over to Marie's (our year with them this year) while "watching" the Cowboys on my phone (they also killed it). Dinner was so yummy and I just love holidays where you visit with family and just eat so much amazing food haha.

Marie decided to do a Bingo game for some treat bags for the kids (she's seriously the best mother-in-law!) and the kids all had so much fun with that. Gwen also got more birthday gifts from that side (she seriously got spoiled this week...not sure how she's going to go back to normal haha).

Once we were done, it was early enough that I decided we should stop by my mom's (I wasn't sure if anyone was able to make it to hers and I knew she shouldn't be alone for Thanksgiving...it is about being with family after all). We got there and it turns out Andy and Rachel were able to go so it was all of us on that side there and it was actually really nice. We had some dessert, visited with each other, the kids got to play with the dogs. I think my mom really enjoyed having us there.

We did decide we're going to do our own Thanksgiving today. We decided to make it small so that we don't have leftovers for a couple weeks (like normal) so we didn't load up on too much. I did have to do the homemade mashed potatoes (my favorite), but I forgot to get the right gravy so that was a bummer. Other than that it was all delicious. I am thinking this might be our last year doing our own though. It's so much work and I don't actually enjoy too many of the leftovers like I used to. I love the smells of the dinner, but it's just SO much. We'll see how I'm feeling next year though.

Anyways, a very successful Thanksgiving in the books and now onto Christmas. Happy Holidays and Thanksgiving to anyone reading this.

Gwen is 5

Gwen-Gwen is officially 5 now! Five is such a crazy age, it's the age I saw up to when we started talking about having kids. I didn't know what to expect after that point and thought that's when they are like little people. So to have two kids at this age (or older) is so surreal for me. We had a great time celebrating our sweet little crazy girl. We did her "party" on Saturday. We went to Airborne in Lindon because she decided she wanted to go to a trampoline place. We stayed there for about an hour and a half and had SO much fun doing ALL the things. We came back and did cake, ice cream, and presents at our house. She got a lot of good things and even though she clearly hates being center of attention, you could tell she was happy it was her day. We didn't have a lot of people come, but I don't mind. I just care that we had fun as a family and maybe next year we can do a friend party.

Sunday, she said she wanted donuts and watermelon for breakfast, so that's what she got. We also had her birthday table set up for her with some more presents and some treats. I unfortunately, started feeling a little iffy that morning so it was a low-key day.

Monday, we had to do her birthday dinner because she wanted Leatherby's and it's closed on Sundays. By this point I was feeling dead to the world. I started my work day, but about halfway through I stopped and just went upstairs to sleep for as long as I could. I mentioned to Larry that I wasn't sure I'd be able to make it to dinner and he'd have to take the kids by himself. He said he was okay with that, but after sleeping a good portion of the day I knew I couldn't miss out on her birthday inner (I didn't care that we spent the whole weekend celebrating her, this was important too). I dragged myself to dinner and, even though I was extremely miserable and didn't eat much of my food and definitely didn't order ice cream (which is a sure sign I'm not doing great), it was good I was there as the girls needed to go to the bathroom multiple times and I'm not sure how Larry would've done that with Pierce and all them. 

On Tuesday she got to do her classroom treat at school since that was her first day back at school after her birthday. I also had another present show up so she got another present.

So while she didn't have a HUGE party, she got a whole week where she was celebrated and she seemed to enjoy every bit of it. I'm so glad it was good. I'm still a little under the weather, but getting better so I'm glad I survived all of it as well haha.

Gwen is so silly! She loves being a goofball, she always has to be right (she's SO stubborn!), she loves to draw stick figures with shirts with hearts on them, and she loves being active or messy. She can't sit still for anything. She still loves being naked as much as she can be and groans when we tell her to put clothes on (and she loves saying "hey! I'm in my birthday suit!"). She likes to do things that Cara likes to do, so I've been trying to push her to be her own person. She's extremely shy and hates to ask for help, even her teacher says she doesn't talk much to her.

She loves Charlie and giving cuddles and protecting him from Pierce. She is a gentle giant for sure, she's strong, but she'll be cautious with him. She loves being loud and fast (running is her favorite thing). She loves laughing and doing goofy stuff to make us laugh. She also still loves Spiderman, but is also starting to get into her unicorn phase.

Our lives are definitely better with her in them and she makes us laugh on a daily basis with either silly questions or thoughts or random things she's figured out how to do. I am so excited to see the kind of person she grows up to be and I hope she's always as happy as she is now (just a little more vocal when she needs help and a little less stubborn when she thinks she's right even though we've shown her the truth). Gwen, please always know we love you so very much and we hope you continue to be as great as you are!