Thanksgiving and more Randoms

My sister Catherine and her cute family came to visit us for Thanksgiving.  It was so fun having them here.  We had a great time watching movies, baking and cooking, crafting, playing games, and just chatting.

 I made my first apple pie the day before Thanksgiving, and if I do say so myself, it was delicious!

 We set up the tea table just for the little girls-Jane and Catherine's two girls-Claire and Cora.

 Talk about cute!

 There was no shortage of food!  The green salad was untouched because everyone got too full off rolls, turkey, steak, sparkling juice, potatoes and gravy, and stuffing. We gave ourselves a few hours to let the food digest, then we dug into the apple pie with vanilla ice cream and a homemade chocolate pie!

 This was my first year cooking a turkey and it turned out to be divine! I brined it the night before and it was so tender and flavorful! There's nothing worse than a piece of dry turkey.

 Lincoln had a great day too, even though he didn't get any pie.  :)

 Rob made our first fire and Lincoln took a nap by the fireplace.  So warm and cozy!  I wanted to snuggle up next to him.  This was a cold week!

 The next day-Black Friday-we all stayed in, because it's my motto never to go out on that crazy day. Catherine and I made some yummies and some adorable wooden Christmas trees.  I wish she lived closer, but we were so glad they made the trip out.

On Saturday we took the kids to the park, even though it was freezing!  They seemed unphased by the cold, so we stayed for two hours!

 I love that these kids want to hold their baby brother all the time.  Lincoln just adores them.

 Big yawn!

 Lincoln is such a happy boy and a total joy to have in our family.  He's sleeping pretty well too! Most nights he wakes up once or twice.  I can handle that!

 Rob went out of town the Monday after Thanksgiving, but the kids wanted to decorate their Gingerbread house that evening, so we did.  Then we watched How the Grinch Stole Christmas.

 I can't believe how far he can push up already!  I'll blink and he's going to be rolling over!  Time stand still, please!

 The other day the kids wanted me to go outside with them and watch them climb our tree.  It was such a nice day that we also played tennis together...in December in the mountains, that's crazy!

Rob took Natalie to The Nutcracker Ballet this day and Lincoln was napping, so we took advantage of our time together.

Randoms

 Crazy hair!  This girl has a bad habit of sucking on all her shirts and she's literally ruining them. I can't figure out how to break her of it.

 Jane just loves to hold her brother.  She's so sweet with him.

 First bath in the "big" bath.  It's always sad when the babies outgrow the sink. :(

 These kiddos decorated gingerbread cookies and wanted to show them off.

 Just chilling with his daddy.  I have to put socks on his hands or he claws his face.

 It's the cutest thing ever to see all four of my kids together in the bath.  I know it won't last long.

 He just looked too handsome before church...I had to snap a pic.

 We had our first snow the week before Thanksgiving! The kids and Rob took full advantage of it by slumming it up in the hot tub.

 I was downstairs one day and heard the kids upstairs say, "Mom, Jane's bleeding!", something a mother hates to hear.  I ran up and she was holding her hand over her eye and there was blood everywhere.  Needless to say, I freaked out inside but tried to remain calm for her.  Then I took a look at it and called Rob at work to have him come home and see if he thought we should take her in for stitches. She cried herself to sleep before he got home, poor girl.  She had tripped and bonked on the corner of a chair.  In the end, we decided not to take her in, and it's healed up nicely.

 I can't help but take a million photos of my sweet baby Lincoln.  I always laughed, growing up, how the camera was always on the baby and no one else, but now I know why! :)

 We set up Christmas before Thanksgiving this year, and I think I'm going to do it that way every year now.  It's just nice to be able to enjoy it for longer!

 We took a little day trip to Madrid on Rob's Friday off.  It's the place where the movie Wild Hogs was filmed, and we've been wanting to check it out.  It's less than an hour away from us.  It's a really cute small town with lots of shops, mainly artsy things.

 That fun white house is their mercantile shop.

 This was the town's main street where all the shops, and a few homes were located. We ate at the yummiest cafe for lunch (seriously one of our favorite places now). The green chile was bomb!

 Little Lincoln on his three month birthday!  Time is going too fast!

 Blake and Jane dressed up the other day in some great combos that I had to record for the generations.

Jane and I made a fun little turkey gratitude craft before Thanksgiving.  She told me while we made it, "Mom, I love making crafts with you."  Melted my heart.

Lincoln's Blessing Day

Lincoln looked so darn handsome for his blessing day.  He was so happy that day.  He fell asleep on the way to church, but then right when the bishop got up and announced his blessing, he woke right up and stayed up for it.  It was like he knew and wanted to be awake for it.  :)  Rob gave him a beautiful blessing.  Then, after sacrament meeting we went home for a luncheon with our friends and Rob's family.  It was such a happy day.  We love our sweet Lincoln so very much and can't imagine life without him.

 It was so nice that Rob's parents could make it.  What a joyous day.  I love my family and feel so blessed to have four beautiful, healthy children.

Halloween 2015

 The kids' school had a little Halloween costume parade the Friday before Halloween, so I took Jane and the baby.  It was adorable.  I love how proud Blake was in his Harry Potter costume.

 Natalie wouldn't pause for a picture because she was worried about holding everyone up.  :)  Typical Natalie.

Rob's parents were here for Halloween because Lincoln's blessing was the day after.  So they got to go trick-or-treating with their grandbabies.  It was so fun!  The perfect evening...a little cool, but not bad at all.  We of course came home with way too much candy.

 

I love that Rob's always such a good sport and dresses up too.  Lincoln was just a baby this year.  :)  I wanted to make sure he was nice and warm.  We had Harry Potter, Anna from Frozen, and a dragon girl.

 Lincoln was mesmerized by Grandma Bell.  She had him laughing pretty hard.  :)

 We carved pumpkins the night before Halloween.  I was so pleased with the kiddos...Natalie carved hers all by herself and Blake cleaned his out and selected his design.

 Having a great time with the pumpkin guts.  Ewe!

 I carved Jane's mermaid pumpkin and Rob helped Blake with his skeleton face.

We trick-or-treated our old neighborhood since the houses are so spread out in our new area.  And because it's fun to have an excuse to go back and see friends there.  Rob got to come too, since we don't get trick-or-treaters at our house.  This is always our favorite house to go to because they really go all out with the decorations.  To the side of them they had a bunch of blow-ups like Jack Skellington.  They also went to a spook alley that some people had set up in their garage.  I took one for the team and stayed back with the baby.  :)  I could hear the screams and see kids running out in a hurry.  The creepy clowns were enough to keep me away.  Jane came out with a smile on her face and the other kids couldn't stop talking about how cool it was in there.  Ha!