Dear Thanksgiving....

.....I want to apologize. For all the years of my youth that you went as an under appreciated holiday. When you were merely a pit stop to be endured on the way to Christmas. When I didn't realize how wonderful you were. How could I have overlooked all you great attributes? Turkey and dressing, sweet potatoes, all the many casseroles, and let's not forget the most important, pumpkin pie! I humbly apologize and promise to fully appreciate you from now on!

Okay, maybe I enjoyed it so much this year because I am a hungry pregnant women or something, I don't know, but our Thanksgiving meal was fantastic! The Shealy family came to our house this year and we enjoyed a smorgasbord of yummy dishes. I cooked all afternoon which, despite my dislike of cooking in general, was kind of fun, maybe because it's a once a year thing! Noah spent the whole day enjoying himself and talking excitedly about how he loved watching the circus. (To be clear: he means the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade. No matter how many times I told him otherwise he insisted it was a circus. He kept saying, "I wish I could be in the circus!") He was very excited to have everyone at his house and he even stopped running around long enough to pose for a few family pics....



...well, by "posed" I mean was man-handled by his parents for the 12 seconds it took to take the pictures. See...



Hope everyone enjoyed their Thanksgivings....and as Noah is now saying, "It's time for Christmas!"

What We Have Been Up To

Once again time seems to be flying by and I look at the calendar and realize that next week is Thanksgiving. Wow! Wes and I spent last week at an optometry conference in Orlando (yes, they are actually good for something!). We left Noah with Nana and Pops and headed down to sunny Florida to stay at the world's largest Marriott. Seriously, that is their technical status, not just me exaggerating. It was great, huge with many restaurants and several pools. While Wes went to lectures I slept in, read by the pool, worked out at the fitness center and enjoyed yummy food. It was very relaxing. Plus, Wes and I got to spend lots of fun time just the two of us which, lets face it, will be very rare from now on!

Because we knew we were going out of town, we had spent the whole weekend before doing fun things with Noah. The weekend before last we took him to the aquarium and he had the best time. Seeing the fish was great, yes, but his favorite part was seeing the giant barge that was parked in the harbor right in front of the aquarium.

We sat outside on the steps for 30 minutes just watching them dredge up gunk from the bottom and dump it onto the barge. Noah was amazed and got excited every single time the brought dirt up from the bottom. It was really cute! We had a great time. Noah is really fun to hang out with these days. He is interested in everything and always has funny little insights into every situation to share with us. I used to worry about having 2 kids and if I could handle it, but I know that we made the right decision by waiting a while to have number 2. We are in a great place with Noah and I am excited (rather than scared) to add another one to the mix.

Speaking of baby number 2, we find out on December 9th if it is a boy or a girl. Wes and I are really fine either way but poor Noah has his heart seriously set on a "girl baby". He even told me that if they do the ultrasound and say that it is a boy that he "will check instead and find a girl!" I have this vision of him leaping across the table and grabbing the thing from the ultrasound tech and saying, "No! That is NOT right. Let me show that it is a GIRL!" I wouldn't put it past him!

Halloween Fun

For Halloween this year Noah spent 3 weeks insisting that he be a ghost. Fine by me I thought. That is a simple costume to attain. Cut some eye holes in a white sheet and, voila, instant ghost. Except that with Noah things are never that easy. Two days before Halloween he declared that the sheet was "too stinky" and that he would not wear it over his head. So off to Party City where he picked, (insert eye rolling here) a Nascar driver costume. But being the good mother that I am I rolled with it. And good thing too because the minute he put on the costume he was in love!

On Saturday he was very excited to put on his costume, grab his ghost bag, and head out the door to join his friends from some trick-or-treat fun. We tried to get his picture with Bebe before we headed out but he was a little too crazy to cooperate. See.....

Anyway, we meant all the neighborhood kids on the corner for a photo op.....

...and then we were off! Perhaps in keeping with the theme of his costume, Noah adopted Ricky Bobby's motto of "If you're not first, you're last" and set out at breakneck speed at the front of the pack. Pretty soon he and his buddy Nicholas had left everyone in the dust in their effort to see who could collect candy the fastest. Of course, I should have expected no less from my little speedy Gonzales!

After going around to many houses - and getting extremely hot and sweaty in our polyester costume - it was time to call it a night. Noah finally headed home to enjoy the spoils of the hunt.

Hope everybody had a fun Halloween!