Thanksgiving

We had a great Thanksgiving Holiday with my family up in Cambridge! My cousin son, John, came up from Wheaton to spend his break with my family and my Uncle Kevin flew in from Maryland. Of course my parents, Brooke, Alisha, Scott, Macey, were there as well as my grandma and her caregiver, Cheryl. Everyone arrived throughout the week - we arrived on Wednesday, but everyone was there by Thursday morning. My mom made an amazing Thanksgiving meal, just like always! Ahhh, seriously I already want o eat it again! Case couldn't quite wait until the big meal, so he started his Thanksgiving feast a little early on the couch...

He was more than happy to join the rest of us for the real meal as well...At Thanksgiving, instead of doing the usual going around and saying what we are thankful for my parents had looked up scripture that proclaims our thankfulness for our Savior. We took turns reading aloud the scriptures, it was a great way to worship together as a family!

Throughout the rest of the weekend we relaxed, watched football, played games, ate a lot more food, and so much more! On Friday some of us went to the movie, The Blind Side. It was really good! Case loved playing with Macey and the two of them wanted to play outside as much as possible.

They both loved the blue car, it was good they're both so tiny and could fit in it together.

Case spent hours walking around the yard kicking his ball. That's probably currently his favorite thing to do - that's why I wish it wasn't getting cold outside right now. Hopefully when the snow comes, he'll love that too! He also enjoyed getting his first wheelbarrow ride from Daddy!

It was a great holiday! And I am once again so thankful for this season to be in MN and celebrate the holidays with family. Up next - Case's first Christmas in Iowa!

Big News

Well, I haven't been exactly keeping up with my blog lately. Maybe that's because I am sleeping in as long as Case sleeps, taking a nap during his morning nap and lying on the couch pretty much as soon as he goes to sleep at night. Maybe it's because I am constantly shoving animal crackers in my mouth or Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip granola bars, anything to keep me from throwing up. This might all sound a bit strange to you, BUT not if you've ever been pregnant!! Yep, that's right, in case you haven't figured it out yet, I am - as Matt likes to say - "with child". Ahhhh, so fun!

We found out on October 8th. Saying that now, I can't believe how long ago that sounds. I am 12 weeks along and due on June 9th. Case will be a little over 20 months old. I look at him everyday and just can't believe he is going to be a big brother! We've already had an ultrasound - at 6 weeks so all we saw was a little blob with a super tiny fast heartbeat - it was great! I had my second doctor appointment today, got to hear the heartbeat and then got my H1N1 vaccination. In case you were wondering, we will not find out what we are having by ultrasound. Just like with Case, we'll wait until the baby is born! A LOT of people have already weighed in with their guesses, come to think of it, I'm not sure if a single person has guessed boy, funny! So feel free to let me know your "instinct" - it's always fun to hear!

As far as pregnancy, it's going pretty fast. As I mentioned before, I am feeling pretty sick but it's not unexpected. And the question everyone asks... any cravings? Well as mentioned earlier, PB chocolate chip granola bars and animal crackers get me through the day. But for actual cravings... chocolate chip pancakes, fruit, lemonade, doritos, mashed potatoes, and McDonalds breakfast sandwiches. Just mentioning them makes me want all of them. I have given in on the first three cravings but have tried to be normal with the last three. I think for the last three I've had each of them only once since finding out I was pregnant. But seriously, I could do McDonalds breakfast everyday.... yummmm. It's probably a good thing it's only an option in the morning. I've also tried to keep going to the gym on the days I'm not actually physically sick. So hopefully I won't get as huge as I did with Case - we'll see... chasing him around sure should help. He is as busy as ever, into EVERYTHING, climbing on furniture. It's great! It's a bummer it's getting cold outside because he would love to just run around outside. So we try to be creative and do some fun things. I'll try to be better about blogging :) Hopefully I'll get caught up a little over Thanksgiving break... but no promises!

In other big news, Matt and I will be gaining a sister-in-law in July! Matt's brother Ryan proposed to his girlfriend, Kari, in October and they will be getting married July 9th. We LOVE Kari and we couldn't be more excited for them!

Fall Fun

I'd have to say that here in MN, we have not had the best fall. It's been rainy, cold, and we've even had a real snowfall or two. There have been a few of the fabulous fall days that are more typical for this time of year so we've tried to make the best of those! We've been busy and have had a lot of fun. I mentioned we had our five year college reunion about a month ago. It was so fun seeing "old" friends and just remembering the way God blessed us during our college years with just some of the greatest friends/roommates imaginable. I am so grateful for our time at Bethel and what the Lord taught us and continues to teach us through those friendships. Unfortunately, I only managed to take a couple of pictures over the weekend.

Here's Hannah B with the boys, Case and Coleman at the Homecoming football game

A group of us went to the Darr's on Saturday evening to hang out, eat food (they always have the best food), play ladder golf (again, Sarah and I were amazing!), sit around a campfire and just catch up. It was great. We took a baby picture early in the evening - always an event!

Here's Owen, Turner, Abby, Case and Meghan. They are such sweet kids!

Here's the group that was left at the end of the evening - more people were there but here's the one group shot we got. Thanks Steve and Sarah for always hosting such great parties!

Last weekend we attended the annual Fall Fest hosted by the Darlings. The theme this year was Disney and since Case was already Tigger, I went as Pooh and Matty went as Christopher Robin -sorry, no pictures of him :(
The party was great as always! We always have chili and this year I tried Anna Lindquists white chicken chili. I can't even begin to describe it... it was AWESOME!! I seriously loved it so much, I couldn't stop talking about it. There were some great costumes, a ratatouille family, a narnia theme, wizard of oz, peter pan... it was really fun to see what everyone came up with.

Here's Bethany as Glenda the good witch

Here's Nachelle (in my opinion the best costume), The Magic Carpet from Aladdin

On Monday, Matt and I took advantage of a nice day and took Case to the apple orchard. We had so much fun picking apples, visiting their petting zoo, pumpkin patch and play ground. Case thought it was great because there were so many apples on the ground that he got to pick up and throw. He could have done that for hours!
Here's a lot of pictures from the apple orchard - it was so hard to even narrow it down to this!

On Saturday night (actual Halloweeen) Matt, Case and I joined Macey, Alisha and Scott at their church's pumpkin patch. We had fun and Case LOVED it! He had no fear of the animals and would have jumped right in the cages if we let him. There were goats, rabbits, donkeys, chickens and a camel! We also played some games...
where Case won some little prizes (a plastic snake, a matchbox car - both big hits), "trick or treated" along a hallway, and ate some carnival food. Case had his first taste of cotton candy - big shocker, he loved it!

Here's the best picture of Tigger and the Koala Bear (Macey) that I got...
Case and the Scarecrow...Happy Fall!

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