Thanksgiving 2011

We had a wonderful holiday weekend. We celebrated Thanksgiving on Thursday with both Will's parents and my mother, siblings and their families. We headed up to Colo in the morning and spent a few hours with Will's family. The food there is always good and there is plenty of it. The weather was beautiful and the guys played football outside for a bit.
In the afternoon we headed back home and spent the evening at my mothers house. My siblings and their families showed up and we ate yet again! We celebrated the November birthdays that evening as well. The cousins all had a good time playing and hanging out.

It was a great day filled with wonderful food, warm homes and loving families. I am truly thankful for my life.

Drew's Birthday Cake

Drew sat with me at the computer a couple weeks before his birthday and we googled images of super hero cakes. He found one he really liked so I had an idea to go off of. The weekend of his birthday party I spent a couple hours one evening coloring and making the fondant decorations for his cake.
Batman, Spiderman and Captain America were the heros that he wanted on his cake.

The morning of his party I finished up the decorating. Here is how the cake turned out. He was so excited when he saw it. He said "ahhh mom, that is AWESOME!" He must have thanked me half a dozen times. This was definitely one of my favorite cakes I have made.

Happy Birthday Drew!

We celebrated Mr. Drewbugs birthday yesterday. He turned 5 years old! I love this kid so much. He is one of the moodiest kids of all the children but he is also one of the most lovable. He is always giving me random hugs and kisses on the forehead when I am sitting in my chair. He is just such a good boy and I can't believe he is FIVE!!! Ahh my baby boy.

He loves all things super hero. Remember the costume post? Well he still loves to dress as a super hero and play super hero. So of course all he really wanted for his birthday was super hero stuff. So here he is opening his Captain America shield.
And here he is opening his Batman house.
So excited! He wanted me to wait and make his cake for his birthday with his grandparents, which turned out to be a really good thing since I was sick and wouldn't of been able to have the cake ready for his actual birth date.

He got to choose dinner which consisted of bacon wrapped sirloins, popcorn shrimp, blueberry muffins and strawberries. Definitely my son. Those are all my favorites too! We spent the evening eating popcorn and watching a movie in the basement for a change.

Goodbye beard, you won't be missed.

Well, he did it. The grizzly, Neanderthal, homeless looking husband that I had is now this well groomed, clean kept man! Amazing what shaving can do for a person.It started out as a no-shave contest at work. The only problem was, Will was the only one left particiapating. He has done it before a few years ago. It's kinda fun to watch and see just how long and curly it will get. The top picture was just a little over 3 1/2 months of not shaving. The goal was January first and then he would buzz it all off. Once he started double taking because he thought he kept seeing people sneak up on him, only to realize it was just his own beard, then he realized it was time to shave. (sorry hon, had to share that!)

And since Dad always uses the clippers to cut the boys hair, it was only fair that they get to cut his hair. Brodie wasn't at all interested, but Drew loved every minute of it. He was very serious and would periodically stop and look at Will and say "you look so weird".

Yes, this all came from his head.The house was pretty split about the decision to shave. Jake and Tony liked the beard and were a bit bummed to see its demise. Brodie and Drew liked it cut. I, of course liked the new look. Emily on the other hand, not so much. I had a feeling she would be a bit reserved if he looked different. We even had her watch so she could see the transformation. She giggled and totted around the kitchen while Drew cut. Once Will was done and actually looked at her, she shreaked in fear. I couldn't believe how terrified she was of him. I didn't know who to feel more sorry for Emily or Will.

She got over it eventually but was still a little unsure of it the next day. Everything is all good now and she is back to being a daddy's girl.

Emily's First Bithday Party

We held Emily's first birthday this past weekend. We had lots of friends and family show up to help us celebrate. I thought she might be a little shy since there was so many people in our house but she did great.

Here are some pictures of her opening her gifts. She got lots of good stuff. I am realizing now that when you have a girl, her birthday gifts are kinda like your own. I loved seeing all the new clothes and fun girlie things she got. She immediatly had to love on her babies when she opened them. Funny how girls just do that. Its like boys automatically play guns and making car noises.
Here was the birthday cake I made for her. I made Emily her own special cake. She poked at it a few times and then just leaned forward to take a bite.
She thought she was pretty funny. And she was. Before the party we took a couple pictures of Emmy and her mommy and daddy. Awww, she loves her daddy.
It's still hard for me to believe that we finally have a girl. We all love her so much.

Halloween 2011

Here are my boys all dressed up for Trick 0r Treating. Begger's night was chilly and windy but at least there was no rain or snow like there has been in previous years. The kids went out with Will, our good friend and his little boy and my step sister and her son. The girls stayed back at the house and helped hand out candy and listen to funny jokes all night.

Here are the 4 younger kids all ready to head out and fill their buckets. They stayed out for about an hour and that was long enough to get a good variety of candy.

Emily's First Birthday

I can not hardly believe our little Emily is 1 year old today. Boy does the time go fast. I am still fascinated that we have a girl! I think I might have found my feminine side again after living so long with only males in the household.

Unfortunately she has been sick all week with an ear infection so she wasn't her perkiest today. We decorated the dining room like we always do when it is someones birthday. Daddy decorated her chair. The balloons provided lots of entertainment and she was quite content for awhile just sitting there playing.Once daddy got home from work and all her brothers came home from school it was present time! We had the radio on and she loves music. So instead of tearing open her presents she just sat there and danced. And danced. And danced. The boys were starting to get really impatient so they started to open her presents for her. Finally Dad turned off the radio so she could concentrate on ripping paper!She got a new pair of black pants and had fun playing peek-a-boo with them. She giggles so much when you play that with her.
Where's Emmy?There she is!

And I had to share this picture of her playing with Drew. Notice her hair is starting to get thicker? And dark too. Some day we will be able to do bows and pony tails.
This little girl has brought so much joy and happiness to our lives. We love you Emily Joy!

Pumpkin Carving

This year was a little different than most years. We typically always go to the same pumpkin patch to pick our pumpkins. They have a hay bale maze, a corn pile to play in, animals to pet and other games to play. However since I had my foot surgery a couple weeks ago I am still not very mobile and we waited till the last minute to get our pumpkins. On top of that we found out our favorite pumpkin patch wasn't open this year. What to do??

After doing some research I found a couple other pumpkin patches in our area but unfortunately they charged big bucks to get in. I couldn't justify spending that kind of money so we decided to just pick some pumpkins from a stand I found at the side of the road. It worked out fine and the kids still had fun trying to find that perfect pumpkin.All the boys had fun helping Emily pick out one that was just her size.She really liked her pumpkin. She held onto it the entire time we were there. Even while Daddy tried to find his pumpkin.She even fell asleep holding it on the way home.When we got home it was carving time! Tony had a friend over so we got him a small pumpkin and he joined in too. As you can see, Drew of course picked out the biggest pumpkin. He does that every year.

Here is how they look on the deck after we were done carving.
Brodie's is on the top right, below that is Dad's, then Jakes. On the left side there is Tony's, then Drew's and then Tony's friend Alex.

While we carved Emily had fun walking around picking up pumpkin seeds off the floor. When she wasn't picking up seeds she was on the floor giggling and playing with her little pumpkin.