Thanksgiving Prep 2013

We've had a lot of fun getting ready for Thanksgiving this year - here's what Lindy and I have been up to during November...

 For this turkey she painted the plates and feathers, I assembled the face, and she used her hand prints for turkey feet. When everything was dry I asked her what she was thankful for. The first thing she said was, "Jesus." Then she started looking around and said anything that was within sight. She only needed a little prompting to say Daddy and Mommy...

We've been coloring a lot of turkeys - she likes having her hands traced, it's one of the best parts! She's impressed me with her coloring abilities. This is the first time that she's really drawn in a space, trying to make it solid color and staying almost inside the lines. Then she started adding extra color to the sky to this one which I call, "Turkeys at Sunset" - if she becomes a famous artist, I think this is her first official piece... could be worth millions.

We've been spending a lot of time talking about gratitude and being thankful for FHE. One of our activities was to fill in this outlined person with things about our bodies that we are thankful for (doing sharing time has made my FHEs much easier to plan!). So we went through the 2nd verse of "My Heavenly Father Loves Me" and filled in the person. Then we added things from the first verse, and a bunch of other random things that Lindy is thankful for. She colored in some of it and has continued working on it on the floor over the last few weeks. It's even scarier looking now with crazy colored teeth, stickers, and scribbles all over. Prominently to the dude's right is a windmill - she loves the windmills that we see any time we head north on Redwood or out to Highland.

Our library does a story time, which we've only been to a couple times, but hope to go more often. This last time Miss Betsy gave the kids the makings for a "turkey hat" which we made when we got home. Lindy liked putting it together, but got a little nervous to see herself in the mirror when it was all finished. She only wore it for a couple pictures... apparently not being a hat person is genetic.

For our last FHE (actually with G&G Groneman - and Auntie Buffalo) she painted a cornucopia and all the fruits and veggies to go in to it. We each had to think of something we were thankful for, and how to show that we are thankful for it. Lindy wasn't so great at thinking of how to show her gratitude, but it was definitely cute when she said, "Thankful for Buff!" and gave her hugs - so I guess that counts as a way of showing it.

We changed the lyrics a bit from what I learned as a kid... but here's "There's a Great Big Turkey" Lindy style...

Lindy is really excited for Thanksgiving. For the last handful of days she has said, "Thanksgiving is ready!" or "Let's go to Thanksgiving!", and she's sad that she has to wait a few more days... hope she's not disappointed! We are sad Brett has to work this Thanksgiving, but are excited that he's off for Christmas.

Lindy's 2nd Birthday

My girl is 2 - craziness! She's still in a fun stage, minus the obstinate, stubborn parts. She still doesn't eat much of a variety and Gerber raviolis are still her favorite food. She loves to sing and dance and is really in to Winnie the Pooh these days. This morning it was raining and she burst in to "And the rain, rain, rain, came down, down, down, in rushing, rising rivulets. And the river crept out of it's bed and crept right in to Piglet's!" Of course, how she says it is, "Rain, rain, rain, dam, dam, dam, rushing, rushing, Piglets!" Once again, I have to explain that she's not swearing, she's just not saying things right...

We only had a few presents for her - I'm all about low expectations :)... but she loved them. I made her second year scrap book (photo book from Shutterfly), and she got a new puzzle. I've had these wrapped and on the table for a few weeks and she's been so good not to bother them. She knew they were presents and I told her she couldn't open them until her birthday. As it approached I would say, "It's almost  your birthday!" then she would point at the small pile and say, "Presents!" - so I know she knew they were for her birthday, but she was awesomely patient in not getting to open them. The morning of her birthday she was very happy to finally be able to get them down and rip them open.

It was morning, night perm for both of us going on in these photos. She actually really loves reading these books all about her, who wouldn't!

During the first session of conference on Sunday Brett set up the toddler bed we got for free from a friend (yay for free stuff). Lindy loved it! A little too much, I think. She played on that bed for almost the entire 2 hours of conference, or climbing on Brett while he set it up. She grabbed a bunch of her blankies from her crib and "snuggled" with them on the new bed and went to "sleep" complete with fake snoring. We tried to have her in it last night, she wanted to sleep in "little Lindy bed," but when push came to shove she kept climbing out, and back to the crib she went. But I'm glad she likes it, and definitely isn't afraid of it. The problem is going to be getting out and reading books all night...

My brother-in-law Justin made us these shirts for Christmas last year - mine was dirty, so I couldn't join in the multi-colored fun, but I think these two look cute when they match.

We spent Saturday's conference day with Brett's family and she got completely spoiled by her Grandma Marilyn. Lots of fun toys and a blow-up pool for the summer - we will really enjoy that, I'm sure! But of course, her favorite part of the gift was the huge bag it all came in, and she had to be in it. I think she's part cat - she likes to be in small boxes, bags, buckets, etc.

She wasn't super excited by the princess pumpkin wagon, but was pretty struck by the Tonka truck - that's my girl!

Fishies for the pool!

Someone, let the cat out of the bag!

On Sunday we went to my parent's for afternoon conference. I made a Pooh Bear carrot cake with cream cheese frosting. The frosting was a little melty... but it was more tasty than most frostings in my opinion. I'm not a fancy cake decorator (although I think it would be fun to learn), but this cake didn't take forever and I think Lindy liked it, although she didn't seem to recognize it as Winnie the Pooh, she thought it was a "smiley face" but that works too.

A little apprehensive about the candle situation

Instead of singing the birthday song she wanted us to sing the Winnie the Pooh song the whole time...

Yard Projects: One Year House Anniversary

We've lived here for almost a year - holy cow! While we've done a lot to improve the yard, there's still tons to do. I had some fun with "paint" to outline for you some of the projects and ideas that we have. Most of them are way cooler in my head, but this is a good starting point. Any ideas are welcome - though don't be offended if we don't choose yours :).

These are some shots of the house before we did very much. You'll notice less grass, lots of weeds, rocks in weird places, etc.

Gotta love those cheery yellow flowers.

Brett put in a lot of work into the sprinkler system.

Here you can see some of the progress we made last year, and some of our plans are documented. Wish we could win the lottery, and pay for everything we want to do...  (sorry the writing is kind of tiny and hard to read on some of the pictures, and there's typos... oh well).

 Despite the huge amount of work that the yard requires (if we want it to be awesome!), it's really been a lot of fun to work out there with Brett. We've planned out what we want to do, where we want to plant things, etc. It's nice to have a hobby we both enjoy. He does a lot of the grunt "Man" labor and I do a lot of the planting and watering. And we both enjoyed the harvest last year, and this year should be 10X better given the amount of manure and organic matter we've tilled into the garden - plus we've been able to get started on it even earlier since we're not dealing with moving into the house like we did last year.

Even Lindy has enjoyed getting out there this year "digging the dirt with a shovel" as she says it. She helped me plant my beets. And she loves rides in the wheel barrow ("wheel-barrah"... she has an accent sometimes), while Daddy pushes her. She likes taking rides in the bucket as well. Spoiled girl.

Already we've torn out that railroad tie wall and made grow boxes out of the planks - progress!

What you do today?

Lindy has really gotten in to playing and imagining lately. She needs a little help from us to get started, but once she gets going she's hard to stop. This is one of my favorite conversations I hear her saying almost every day. I think she got it from +Brett Groneman asking her these questions when he gets home from work and from when she wakes up in the morning. I don't know what anyone else thinks, but I think she's hilarious and cute.