Happy Thanksgiving!!

We had a super fun Thanksgiving week!!
Here's my sweet little lovie with his special preschool lunch "Charlie Brown Thanksgiving" turkey hat. He came home from school that day and said, "Daddy, look at my chicken hat!!"

We spent Thanksgiving with Aunt Jen & Uncle Dan at their house. They prepared THE BEST EVER turkey. It was yum yum yum!

Sweet little Allie Marie with mommy-to-be-very-soon Aunt Jen:

We went for a little walk before our big lunch and Allie was super cute. When you ask her to smile, this is the beautiful little face she makes...SOO darn cute!!:

Lotsa nice pics:

I think the most fun part of Thanksgiving day may have been this tiny centipede that crawled across the floor. The kids followed this thing for quite awhile. They were so funny:

Come on, Mom!

Zachary has a pretty neat little imagination. He's been making up games to play with me, Todd and/or Allie. This is really funny because sometimes he'll make up a game, insist that we play, yet doesn't really inform us (the participants) of the rules and regulations. Here's the most recent example:

Zachary: "Mommy! Let's play cowapeelur!" (he still says 'caterpillar' funny)
Mommy: "Ok, sounds fun."
Zachary: "I'll say 'cowapeelur cowapeelur cowapeelur' and you walk like a cowapeelur."
Mommy: "Ok, I'm ready."
Zachary: "cowapeelur cowapeelur cowapeelur"
Mommy wiggles across the floor in a fairly poor effort to look like a caterpillar.
Mommy: "Ok, your turn...caterpillar caterpillar caterpillar..."

Zachary does an even funnier impression of a caterpillar
Zachary: "Now do ladybug ladybug ladybug..."

We proceeded to repeat this same little routine for spider, and then Zachary decided he would do the imitations, if I yelled the creatures' names. I quickly agreed to this mid-game change, sacrificing my deep desire to wiggle, walk & squirm all over the place.

I yelled bumble bee, centipede, worm, snake, ant, beetle, and a few other creepy crawlies. At some point, I couldn't think of anymore and since I didn't know the official rules of the game, I just said, "Frog!"

Oops.

Zachary: "Mommy. No. That is not right. A frog is not an insect. BUGS are insects. Not frogs. Don't you know that? You have to say insects."

Weekend in Charlotte

Last weekend we headed to Charlotte to celebrate Aunt Jen & Uncle Dan's soon-to-be-here baby!! It was a nice weekend...minus the virus that traveled with us. Eck.
Me, Jenny, Grandma (Great Grammy Claire), My mom (Grammy) getting ready to go to the baby shower:

Allie playing in her carseat (apparently being strapped in it for almost 4 hours wasn't enough):

Grandpa & Allie (not sleeping...which was the trend for the weekend):

Zachary talking with his cousin:

...and pretending he had a baby in his tummy too:

While we were at the shower, all the boys put together the baby's crib. Zachary enjoyed the giant box that Grammy made into a slide. Up & down, over & over...So fun!:

Allie decided she wanted to wear some of the baby's clothes:

Uncle Dan made one of his awesome camp fires and we all enjoyed s'mores - yum!!:

Here's Zachary roasting his marshmallow & enjoying the fire (you can ask Grandpa what happened later, under HIS supervision, that changed the course of this enjoyment...):

Sleepy kids

Over the past 10 days, we have been so very crazy busy and I have been super lenient with the kids' usually-very-rigid schedule. Grammy Claire likes to take pictures of them sleeping, so I have some good ones I stole from her camera. Here are some pictures of them passed out after a few crazy days of non-routine. Love it!!

Grammy Claire

We have been SO busy! Over the past week, we've had Grammy Claire & Mr. Roy at our house with their doggies (which the kids loved!). We also visited Aunt Jen & Uncle Dan (pictures soon) in Charlotte to celebrate a baby shower for my first-ever niece (!!). Here are some pictures of the kids with Grammy Claire & the dogs.

No low self-esteem here

Zachary: "Mommy, I can help you...with my big muscles."

So pretty

I love my little Allie girl -

There was a little girl...

Allie has my hair. My thin, wispy, not-quite-curly-but-not-entirely-straight hair. She also (still) doesn't have very much of this so-called hair. Most of the time, people assume she is a boy and they're shocked when I correct them (because they would know better, right?).
Anyway, in an effort to help her out, I broke down and bought some of those tiny tiny ponytail holders. I mean, these things are super small. I can't even get my fingers in the smallest of the pack to twist them around her little hair. She doesn't have any hairs long enough to pull together, so this is the best I could manage.

Of course she's cute...

...but I'm pretty sure I agree with her response:

Whoa there...

Zachary has recently started using the words "girlfriend" and "boyfriend," but not in the right way. He just thinks that girls are "girlfriends" and boys are "boyfriends," regardless of the depth of the friendship.
Initially I thought this was cute because he'd talk about his friends at school. However, his use of the word has crossed over into referencing our (mine & Todd's) friends. And that, as you might imagine, does not transfer well. Especially when one of those friends is at our house working on the heat/air conditioning downstairs.

Zachary: "I can't find my panda."
Daddy: "Where were you playing with it earlier?"
Zachary: "In the basement."
Daddy: "You were in the basement?"
Zachary: "Yea, while Mommy & I were down there with her boyfriend."