I took a rather long break from posting mostly to get ready for and enjoy Thanksgiving. We drove up to Driggs, Idaho (near the Tetons) where my family had rented a cabin. I have not had Thanksgiving with my family since my freshman year of college! So, it was wonderful for all of us to have Thanksgiving together, especially since Jess and Ricky will not be there for Christmas.
We drove up to Driggs on Thanksgiving Day because my sister and her husband flew into SLC and drove up with us. We made it in plenty of time and were even able to help with some of the dinner preparations. I also brought up two pies and forgot quite a bit of stuff as well... I was supposed to bring sweet potatoes and they were made and ready to go but I spaced it and did not get them out of the fridge! What is wrong with me?
It was a delicious and wonderful meal. I did not take a single picture because I was enjoying my turkey far too much. Sorry about that, but I am sure you can imagine what it looked like with nine of us crowded around a wood table covered in a leafy tablecloth in a cozy cabin, with the table groaning under the weight of the roasted turkey, mashed potatoes, brussels sprouts, rolls, gravy, stuffing, sparkling cider (yes...I forgot to bring the sweet potatoes....grrrr). A pleasant picture, yes?
However, here are some pictures from every other time, but Thanksgiving dinner:
The Cabin
The view of Teton peak from the cabin.
From the outside
Elanor with her Uncle Erik
We went skiing on the Friday after Thanksgiving at Grand Targhee. It was a beautiful day!
Elanor came up at lunch and we took her skiing! My parents got her a pair of toddler skis for her birthday and she absolutely loved skiing. She really enjoyed going fast and did not want to stop.
Here is the video of Elanor skiing down the bunny hill with her Uncle Ian:
Going up on the little kids moving ramp thing with Grandpa.
Elanor with her Nan.
Hot tubbing after skiing!
We celebrated Elanor's birthday on Saturday with my family, since they will not be able to be there for her birthday on the 10th.
She loved blowing out the candles!
Elanor also opened up some presents (she had already opened up the skis) including two "pretty dresses", a Pride and Prejudice board book, an apron and her favorite: a Merida doll from Disney Pixar's new movie Brave.She carries this doll around with her everywhere. Merida has already been very useful in many ways such as, "You can't play with Merida until you go potty" or "Merida wants you to sit in your carseat" or "Merida is so sleepy right now, so let's get ready for bed".
Elanor was so excited about her Merida doll!
We tried to take some family pictures and these are my favorites:
Elanor face is hilarious in this one!
It was a lovely trip. We played many games, laughed a lot, talked about everything, ate good food and overall enjoyed being a family. I sure love them.
Snow makes me all giddy, just the same way it did when I was a little girl. I love it! It means sledding, snowball fights, forts, rosy cheeks, hot chocolate, long johns, beautiful snow covered trees and skiing, if we are lucky enough to get to go. I have not outgrown my love of snow and I am so glad! So many adults complain about the snow and what a pain it is. I think snow makes everything so much more beautiful and fun. I especially love waking up to snow. It just seems so magical. I used to pray for snow all the time when I was little, especially on Christmas Eve. We woke up to softly falling snow on Friday morning and the snow did not stop until Sunday afternoon. We got so much snow (about a foot and a half)! We had so much fun in it!
We went outside as soon as we could on Friday to enjoy the snow.
To end my Harry Potter Month, I threw a Halloween Harry Potter Party. In the books, it always talks about how the Great Hall has live bats fluttering around the floating candles and huge pumpkins for the Halloween feast decorations. I wanted to sort of do that, but of course I am not a witch and could not actually procure live bats. Instead, this is what I did:
My friend, Becky, had made a ton of felt bats and a felt garland for Halloween and she let me borrow them to decorate. We just used Christmas lights for the floating candles and they worked.
We had quite a few people come to out party! Everyone came dressed up and everyone had great costumes.
Elanor did not take a nap on the worst possible day to not take a nap.... However, it was not a failure. She fell asleep on the way over to my aunt's house, which saved us a bit. We had such a fun time trick-or-treating! Elanor loved it and was so funny! She said "trick-or-treat" most of the time and she also always grabbed a piece of candy to put in everyone else's buckets. She likes taking care of people. We were also lucky because it was so warm out (60 degrees or something like that). Halloween and pretty much every holiday are so much more fun with kids!
Getting ready to go:
Sparkly nails to go with a sparkly dress.
Her Rapunzel shoes
Elanor's hair all done up.
Cheese!
These outside pictures were a bit more difficult. Elanor was is a good mood as I got her ready, but when went outside the sleepiness and crankiness hit her.
"No picture, no picture"
Sleepy....
Walking in the leaves.
Our maple is pretty gorgeous right now.
I told Elanor, "Please, please let me get one picture of your face and then we can go inside." She said she wanted to "go to Halloween". I told her she could if she looked at me and took her thumb out of her mouth. So, I got this one, no smile, but at least she is not crying...
We went over to my aunt's house for a neighborhood dinner, which was a lot of fun! There was a lady dressed up as Mary Poppins and Elanor got really excited because she thought she was the real Mary Poppins.
Then, we headed back to our neighborhood and went trick-or-treating with our friends. I did not get many pictures, mostly because they were all moving so fast and it got dark pretty quick.
Both of these pictures are pretty blurry, but they are the best that I could get.
We had such a fun Halloween! I hope you did as well!
We carved our pumpkins this past weekend and they turned out really pretty cool. They were all Harry Potter themed (obviously, with this HP month thing going on). Tyler did the Hogwarts Crest, I did Fawkes (Dumbledore's phoenix), and Elanor's was a regular jack-o-lantern, but with HP glasses and a scar.
Elanor loved getting all the pumpkin guts out.
Elanor showing me the pumpkin guts.
Elanor watching Tyler carve her pumpkin.
Watching from the other side.
While Tyler was carving Elanor's pumpkin, Elanor and I made some movies to entertain ourselves. Here is one of them:
The pumpkins all lit up:
(they are right outside our living room window, since we don't really have a porch and that way we can see them!)
Elanor's Harry Potter Jack-O-Lantern
Tyler's Hogwarts Crest
My Fawkes pumpkin
All three pumpkins right outside our window!
It should be a fun Halloween this year because we are actually going trick-or-treating! Hopefully, trick-or-treaing will be fun because Elanor did not nap (she always does) and will most likely be quite cranky. I really hope she will be in a good mood....
This is what she does for fun (for quite a long time).
She lays out her blankets (rather obsessively--they have to be perfectly straight).
She then puts one stuffed animal/doll on each blanket, leaves one blanket empty for herself, and then lays there on her blanket contentedly.
I love her and her funny quirks. She also really likes to straighten people's clothes and beds (she enjoys making my bed and her own). She can do one task for a really long time and sometimes over and over.
We sure love our little straightening perfectionist.
Elanor and I out in the snow...yes, we do need to get her some snow clothes. This snow only lasted the day and part way through the next and then warmed up.
Last Friday, we went on a walk to Mt. Olivet Cemetery with our neighbors. So beautiful!
I love this one.
Dancing in the leaves (in between melt-downs).
She looks so happy here, hmmmm..... I seem to remember her crying an awful lot on this walk, but she seems to be enjoying herself.
Throwing leaves and jumping!
....and then we had to leave because everyone had had enough and cried the whole way home.
