Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving! I hope everyone had a wonderful holiday with their family and friends, I know we did! Instead of traveling down to California to visit my in-laws, like we usually do, this Thanksgiving we stayed home and it was just the three of us. As much as I love visiting our families, especially around the holidays, there is definitely something to be said about being at home. No stresses about traveling or packing or cooking for mass amounts of people, and no trying to please everyone. We spent Thanksgiving exactly how we wanted to and it was fabulous.

After a quick breakfast of orange glazed cinnamon rolls and coffee we put on our winter coats (It was cold for Phoenix! Only 49 degrees!) and walked down to our park. We spent about an hour kicking the soccer ball around, going down slides, climbing on the jungle gym and through the tunnels  and rolling down the grassy hill before we were all worn out.

After we got down we all lay down for a nice mid-morning nap and then we put out some munchie foods, opened some beer and put on the the football game. In true Thanksgiving dinner fashion we pretty much spent most of the days munching and lazing around with beer and football.

and we went all out for dinner, even though it was just the three of us. We chopped and baked and stirred and boiled and had a Thanksgiving dinner with all the trimmings. There was ham (I'm not a huge fan of Turkey), mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, stuffing, rolls cranberry sauce and wine. L loved trying all the new food and we ate way to much and still ended up with a ton of leftovers.

I love that L is a little older this year and seemed to have a better understanding as to what was going on around him. Or, at least, he was more excited about what was going on around him. And now that Thanksgiving is over I am in full Christmas mode. I love, love, love Christmas, and that love has only grown now that I have my monkey to share it with. L and i braved the crowds out for Black Friday at our local Target and Kohl's, picking up Christmas Presents, decorations, wrapping paper and eggnog, and then we spent the afternoon listening to Christmas carols, watching Elf (favorite Christmas movie ever!) and decorating our house. The Christmas village is up, the stairs are wrapped in garland, the stocking are hung, and even the creep angel from my childhood glows from the corner of the room.

I hope everyone had as great a Thanksgiving as we did, and let the Christmas festivities begin!

Plaid Pajamas

Life has been busy lately (really, what else is new?), hence the lack of updates lately. And this is not going to be much of an update. With Thanksgiving just around the corner my focus right now is on the upcoming holidays. I am planning on cooking (gasp!) and am more than a little nervous about this. And as soon as soon as thanksgiving is over it's CHRISTMAS! Yes, I love love love Christmas time and am planning on going into full Christmas Music, Christmas Movies, Christmas Stories, and Christmas decoration mode as soon as Thanksgiving Day in done. I can't wait.

But, in the meantime, here is a little something to tide you over:

Seriously, is there anything cuter then a baby boy in his big boy plaid pajamas?

I think not.

Wedding Weekend

It has been a long week of catch up (even though it's only Wednesday) and after all the craziness I am finally getting around to writing again. After the excitement of Halloween and costumes and candy, we had a few days of rest before we boarded an airplane bound for Minnesota. My beautiful cousin Kellie was getting married an we were so honored to be there for the festivities. I have been looking forward to this wedding forever. It is not often the my crazy, kooky, wild and fun clan gets together. Really, the extended family of cousins and aunts and uncles only see each other for weddings or funerals, so we are all very grateful when it is a wedding that bring us together.

We were slightly nervous about how L would do on the plane ride. He has flown several times before, but when he was much younger and able to nurse and then sleep on takeoff and landing. He did wonderful on the flight there, but the return flight was a different story. He has been fighting a cold already, and between the plane ride, the change of weather and the complete abandonment's of schedule it grew progressively worse and seemed to spout horns and a tail on the return flight home. We became, in a few short house, that couple. The couple that, when you were younger and long before you ever had kids, you wonder why they would ever bring their child on an airplane. He screamed.... and screamed.... and screamed... for three hours. It was awful, and I went into full mama bear mode, staring daggers at anyone who dared give an irritated glance in our direction. But we survived, and the important part is the fun we had this weekend.

Have I mention I love my family? The are so fun and diverse and absolutely wonderful to be around, and I love seeing them. L got to be surrounded by his many cousins (and second cousins) and S was the most wonderful husband ever, watching the baby while I bonded and gossiped and laughed and talked with family it had been far to long since I have seen.

And really, I have no words to commemorate the weekend by. I think pictures would tell the story much better. But, needless to say, we laughed and we talked and we drank and we ate and we remembered and reminisced about how absolutely important family it. These people make me who I am and I am so happy my husband is getting to spend time with them at such a young age.

Congrats Kellie, you looked beautiful and we all had so much fun!

Happy Halloween (A few days late!)

Happy Halloween, even though it's a few days late! I blame that tardiness of this post purely on the sugar high it has taken me several days to come down from. Between snacking on the candy we bought for trick or treater's, the candy L got from going house to house, and all the treats the students and parents at my school brought round, it is pretty amazing I didn't go into a sugar coma and/or gain fifty pounds. That last point is still up for debate, since I haven't stepped on a scale yet.

But, oh my, did we have a wonderful Halloween. I know you have all been waiting in suspense (right? right?) so I won't keep you in the dark any longer: L dressed up as a lion. Correction: L dressed up as the world's cutest, most cuddly, most adorable lion ever. I know you may think I am being biased since he is my baby, but he was pretty darn squeezable in that costume.

Last year at Halloween L was only about 6 weeks old, and so while we reveled in carving pumpkins and taking pictures of him in his fuzzy Halloween sleeper and pumpkin hat, and handing out candy to trick or treater's and just the awe of it being his first Halloween, we were also still well entrenched in the feelings of "oh my God, we have a six week old baby and what the heck are we suppose to be doing and who decided that we were capable of this?". So last year truly is kind of a blur, a sleep deprived, over the moon happy and euphoric, not quite sure what we are doing, blur.

But this year? This year was all about making memories. This year Landon was by our side as we carved pumpkins, trying to eat the pieces that came out and running up and down the driveway. This year he was equally confused and excited by his lion costume. This year he is walking so we actually took up and down the street of our neighborhood, walking him to the front doors and helping him ring door bells. Mommy took care of saying "trick or treat" and "thank you" for him, but my boy gave every house his famous smile. He was never scared, just curious, and with mommy and daddy by his side he was totally ready for his adventure.

This year hit home for me. This is it. This is my wonderful and amazing life from now on. I have a baby who will one day become a child who I will make (buy?) costumes for every year so he can trick or treat. As he gets older he will get more and more excited about the prospect of candy. He will want to choose his own costumes, maybe a rockstar or an athlete, and the day will come where I will no longer get to choose his costume, and the one he chooses probably won't be a cute and cuddly animal. He will one day have siblings that he will take trick or treating, he may be the ones holding their hands instead of mom and dad. He will probably one day complain about having to take his siblings trick or treating. And one day, hopefully way down the line, trick or treating will no longer be "cool". And my baby will no longer be baby. And I will sob uncontrollably in bed for days. No, I'm kidding about that. (Sorta). But that day will come and then I will remember the things I did and S did when we were in high school and celebrated Halloween in a totally different way then the innocence of going door to door asking for candy. And I will worry, and probably be overprotective and will eventually have to let my little (big?) boy go out into the world and pray that while I know we all make mistakes we have done a good job with him and he will make good decisions.

Thank GOD those days are at least 15 years away. (Right? If the kids are starting getting into trouble younger these days, please don't tell me. I quite enjoy my bubble).

So for now, we relish in the present. We soak in the baby giggles that come with realizing hands are covered by mittens that look like paws, and the confusion of having something pulled over your head that seems to have a mane attached to it. We sit back and enjoy the fact that despite the strangeness of  walking the streets at night, surrounded by loud and sometimes rowdy strangers and having all the houses decorated with skeletons and tombstones and flashing light, it never even occurred to L to be scared, because we were with him. What an amazing feeling to know that you hold the key of someones very sense of well being.

We had a great second (how weird is that, it is already his second Halloween) Halloween with our boy, and it made me so excited for everything to come. I can't wait for Thanksgiving and Christmas this year, two more holidays that he was around for last year, but that he will really experience this year. and I am excited for all those Halloweens to come, even the ones where I will worry and fret and hope he is not getting into any trouble.

Happy Halloween everyone, hope yours was as wonderful as ours!