Thanksgiving

I have always celebrated Thanksgiving at either my parent's house or Gus's parent's house. So, I was a little nervous about Thanksgiving this year. I honestly thought I would have a couple nervous breakdowns without my family nearby, but it turned out just fine.

We drove down to Richmond and spent the day with Gus's Aunt Patty, Uncle Glen, and cousin Amy. Also in attendance was KA, MJ, Jake, and their friend Laura. We had a great time with everyone. We talked, chased Lilly around the house, ate delicious food, chased Lilly around the house more, played the player piano, tried to keep Lilly's hands off the gingerbread house, and played cards while Aunt Patty played with Lilly (thank you so much Aunt Patty!). Gus's Grandpa "Pop Pop" and his wife Betty Sue even came over later for a little pie. It was wonderful.

Amy, KA, and MJ

Playing the player piano with Uncle Glen

Making necklaces with Dad'n

Being snugly with Jake

All day MJ tried to make Lilly say her name. When we ask her to say MJ she says, "KA".

Lilly LOVED Pop Pop. When he got there Lilly followed him around the house yelling, "Pop Pop", and wanted to show him everything.

Preschool Time

Lilly is a little too young for me to be sending her off to a preschool but I wanted to start teaching her the alphabet and other school things just to get her excited about learning. So we have been having "Preschool Time" every morning. My preschool and daycare experience have definitely come in handy over the last couple of weeks. We sing songs and do a craft.

Craft time is definitely Lilly's favorite thing. She loves to squeeze glue everywhere and cut paper with her little scissors. She can make a HUGE mess in no time.

She can also sing the ABC song. Well, kind of. She sings, "A B C B E F J" and then stops because she cant remember the rest. Its very cute and amazing to me that she learned it so fast.

So we have been working on our alphabet and hadn't quite made it to numbers when I found out that we may not need to. On our way to the grocery store on Saturday Lilly started counting and made it all the way to 10. She didn't even make any mistakes. I have no clue where she learned it.

Cookie Making

Last weekend Lilly and I made sugar cookies. She loved to help measure the ingredients, roll out the dough, and use the cookie cutters. But her favorite part was frosting her cookie and shaking on the sprinkles. She sat on the kitchen floor for about an hour playing in the frosting, tasting her cookie, and pouring sprinkles EVERYWHERE.

From Fall to Winter

I love winter. The cold air, puffy coats with fur, beanies, boots, snow, snowboarding, snowmobiling, I love it all. I guess that's what happens when you grow up in Idaho and winter lasts forever. Me and Lilly are thoroughly enjoying the colder weather.

Baltimore Harbor and Children's Museum

On Friday Gus had the day off, so we decided to drive up to Baltimore. First, we went to the Port Discovery Children's Museum. There was no one there and Lilly had a great time going through all the fun exhibits. They had a huge maze that was 3 stories tall, a scary Indiana Jones exhibit, and tons of other amazing things for kids to do.

In this room Lilly picked out fruit and had a picnic with her Dad'n. She of course tried to eat the fake fruit.

Lilly could have stayed in this room all day. She loved running through the water, pouring water everywhere, and washing windows.

My favorite exhibit was the Diner. Gus and I sat in a booth while Lilly made us dinner and served us on trays. It was so cute!

Lilly loved the room with all the ball pits

After the museum we went across the street to the Harbor. Lilly had fun feeding the seagulls and trying to jump into the water.

Halloween

For Lilly's very first Halloween she slept on the couch while Gus and I handed out candy. She was only two weeks old and had just come home from the hospital the day before. We didn't get a costume for her that year because I was still a complete wreck.

The next year, for her second Halloween, she was a skunk. She couldn't say "trick-or-treat", or even walk for that matter. Her Aunt KA was nice enough to carry her around to the neighbors and do all the work for her so that she could have some candy.

This year for Halloween Lilly was a witch. Except her costume wasn't black, it was colorful. So she became a "good" witch, or a fairy as some people thought.

She had a great time walking up to all the doors, listening to the kids yell "trick-or-treat", grabbing HANDFULS of candy, and running off to the next door. She was a bit shy at first but caught onto the game real quick. It was fun to see how big she has gotten.

At one house Lilly noticed a little dog inside. When the woman opened the screen glass door, Lilly attempted to dash into her living room to pet the dog. The woman wasn't too amused, and it was a little awkward. Since Lilly couldn't pet the dog she simply stood on the other side of the glass yelling and pointing until the woman finally shut the door. We really need to get her a dog, or maybe just a sibling.

We had a great time and came home with way too much candy.

Halloween day Lilly wore her cute cat shirt from Grandma

BIG Girl

Yesterday I took Lilly to the doctor for her two year check up. You know, it's really hard to find that perfect pediatrician. We loved Dr. Wilcox in Utah, and I guess this doctor was okay. I think we'll keep shopping around though.

Anyway, Lilly was her typical charming self at the doctor's office. We didn't have to spend long in the waiting room (always a plus). When they took us back to our patient room I stripped her down naked as instructed by the nurse, and before I knew it Lilly was out the door and down the hallway to the reception desk and back to the waiting room again. Everyone laughed when they heard the "pitter patter" of her tiny feet carrying her nude body from me. Those in the waiting room quickly covered the eyes of their innocent. Thanks for that awkward moment Lilly! Sure, I was a little red-faced but I got a good laugh out of it too.

When the doctor finally came in, Lilly thought it would be fun to throw her sippy at her. She threw it three times. I think Lilly was letting out some bitterness toward doctors in general. You see, Gus tells her the same story every night about how the doctor gave him a shot and hurt his arm. Nobody hurts Lilly's Dad'n and gets away with it. The doctor was a little annoyed, but fair enough. Gus - please find a new bedtime story for Lilly.

Then the wonderful old nurse came back in to give us our shots. I went first. She gave me my flu shot, and I seriously didn't feel a thing. I was impressed. Then it was Lilly's turn. She got two shots in the right arm and one in the left. Lilly watched in awe for the first two and didn't even flinch. On the third she screamed. It must have burned because Lilly let everyone know about it.

I also found out that Lilly's rather big for her age, which I kind of already figured.

Here are her stats:

Height: 36 1/4 (95th percentile)

Weight: 29 lbs (70th percentile)