SNOW!

We finally were in town for a snow dump!  We have missed all of them so far.  It was the most beautiful storm too. Soft, big, sparkly flakes that just fell for hours.  We were so excited to get Say out in it to play.  She LOVED it!  below is the evidence...

 

 How cute is this little girl? Oh she kills me! 

She totally knew how to do this without us showing her. It was so cute. Her little angel was much cuter than mine.  Mine generally had another imprint next to it where I had to roll to the side, so get to my knees, to be able to stand.  I barely fit into Chris' pants.  Maternity snow clothes are not in my wardrobe!  And let me just tell you....seven months pregnant sledding is a show. I could barely get my feet up on the sled and then there was no room for Say to sit on my lap.  I was a spectator for the sledding adventures.

 Seriously, how cute? I love her! and sorry this is sideways....

 

this seemed to be her favorite activity.  She had a blast and when it was time to go in she declared, "I am NOT going inside. NEVER EVER!" hahha well eventually we negotiated that after one more sled run and some hot chocolate she would relent.  It was such a perfect morning with my favorite people!

Flashback

These pictures are too good not to post--which means I obviously didn't take them.  These are courtesy of Cerina J Photography.

Back in September, we had a visit from Ceri, Grandma, and Gia.  It was so fun. Say always loves having more friends around and those three are three of her absolute favorites!! These capture a few of the adventures we had watching movies, playing in the rain, and hanging out in the backyard. Love these two girls!!

 we introduced Miss G to Sandy. Love that 1 cent pony!!

 Say was pretty bummed that she could only get one treat (seen on the right) so she told me she was going to sit and think about it. (that is usually what I say for a time out. works for me....)

 Typical Saylie in her awesomeness. 

 She has been trained. This special little pose wasn't even coached. Aunt C is rubbing off on her!

I just loved this because it was so candid. She laid like this so much while in my belly. I have ultrasound pics of her in this same position.

 LOVE THIS GIRL!!

 Always having a good time!

 She really loved these. Not sure why, clearly her vision was impaired. hahaha

 G G playing on the swing set.

Look at these sweet faces!

Say's expression is so funny. probably rolling her eyes at me. Can't wait for her attitude to develop....SYKE!

 Some quality bonding over Lion King. Oh I love these two together!!

  These are the two most unfortunate smiles, but I laughed so hard because it looks like they are both trying so hard to get it right. hahaha

 Again, uncoached, just pure LOVE!

 Just holdin hands and exploring

Tour Finale - The Basement

so- remember LAST YEAR when we moved in and I started a tour. hahahhahahahaha. oh billy!

This is the last "room". It is one big open space, but we have tried to partition it off into some various uses.  We have Chris' movie area set up. Let me tell you, he put so much time into researching different options, and he was like a kid at Christmas tracking packages and installing everything. Totally worth it. It is a GREAT picture and we have used it tons!! Nothing like watching the Olympics or General Conference on a huge wall.(chris totally watches his classes on their too. I even caught him making popcorn once for "school" hahahah)

This is a lame play area that needs a rug, some shelving, and some fun decor. I have grand plans, but for now, it is not at the top of the priority list. Saylie doesn't object to jumping and playing against plain walls, thankfully!  she LOVES it down here. The train table was an awesome addition this Christmas (thanks Grandma and Papa Chappell!) She is the envy of all her little guy friends!

This is a funny thing. I think it was just a whim project because there is no counter and it isn't plumbed. It looks like a kitchen, but is missing the key components. we aren't sure what to do with this....we may try and get a compact fridge and some kind of sink, but i don't know. For now it is just an area to paint on the easel that I can clean if anything happens. YAY! I love spaces like that!

This is my favorite part of downstairs. MY CRAFT SPACE!! (please forgive, it is always going to be dirty, so just don't get your hopes up.)  I thought long and hard about using a different room, but I am not going to get anything done if I have to wait until Saylie is sleeping and then I lock myself up in a room. This way I can work and Say can play. It is perfect! thanks to the super long delay, I just upgraded my storage to coordinate and it looks so much better. before it was a bunch of hodge podge boxes and totes and stuff just piled everywhere! I can craft my little heart out without ruining and monopolizing our kitchen table! I think everyone is excited about that!

and lastly, this was a super fun project that I did from pinterest. I nailed the silhouette of the states we have lived in (only since we were married) Chris was awesome and built these shaddow box-like frames to custom fix the boards i used and give a flush back for mounting. he is super handy and i LURVE him!






Ok, congrats, you MADE IT!  Stay tuned for shorter, more interesting updates as we fix stuff and get prepped for number two!

That's Pretty Accurate

We went up to Frankenmuth this weekend. I know. We are CRAZY!  It is this great little bavarian town in central Michigan and it is home to Bronner's Christmas store. It is a massive Christmas wonderland. We thought, what better festive activity? Only problem is that busy season begins in Sept. so we were late to the show and it was soooo packed!  It was pretty insane.

Chris' family has a great tradition of annual ornaments for each kid so every year we have been picking out an ornament for Saylie that kinda represents something special about that year.  This way, when she is older and moves out she has a great little starter collection for her own tree.  Well there were probably a billion ornaments to choose from and a billion other people trying to shop so i decided we would just let Say pick something she liked and get going.  It was perfect because just as i was giving up, we passed a section of princesses and ballerinas. Say loved them so i let her choose one and she picked this cute little ballerina girl that semi looked like her. I was so pleased. The ornament seemed less fragile than the glass ones nearby and so we hurried to meet Chris in the checkout.  We bought the ornament and she was on cloud nine. She would not let go of that thing.  She was sitting on Chris' shoulders and so we walked to the exit of the store and stopped to get bundled up and Say started melting down. There were too many people, too many things to see and touch and she did not want to go back in the car. She threw a tantrum right up on Chris' shoulders. With ballerina in hand, she stomped with her whole body and what do you know. Her poor little ballerina broke it's arm off on poor Chris' head, oh i was soooooo frustrated!  We didn't even make it out of the store. I was so bugged...  We looked and looked for the broken piece, but with all the traffic, it was pretty pointless.  We headed to the car. Had a serious talk about not pouting and throwing things and Say could not contain her tears. Between gasps she kept saying, "my poor ballerina". It was pretty dramatic!  I just had to take a bunch of deep breaths, but then when i got to thinking about it i decided what better ornament could we have for the "terrible two's"?  So we brought it home, hung it on the tree, and I wrote a little note on the ornament box to remember why it had one arm.  PERFECT!  I actually now kinda love it and am excited to always remind her of what life was like when she was a stubborn and very free spirited kid! No matter what, we are just smitten with her. She is so nuts sometimes, but so sweet and is just my best little buddy.
Merry Christmas Suzie Bean!

The Most Wonderful Time of the Year

  We had maybe our best Thanksgiving ever this year. We were a little bummed because it was the first time we were going to be all alone, but it turned out so great!

We kicked festivities off early in the week by making and delivering some pumpkin pies. Chris, saylie and I had a whole factory line going and it was so fun. I snapped this picture and it has made my whole year! I love those two faces!

Then we started our baking on wednesday.  We made garlic mashed potatoes, green beans and bacon, waldorf jello salad, sweet potato rolls, apple sausage stuffing, a turkey breast, gravy and two pies.  We also followed tradition and Chris made these little cornucopias for each place setting.  You fill them with corn nuts, m&m's and we put in rolos. Each person empties theirs and must name one item they're grateful for for each rolo they had.

We started our turkey day with a chilly, muddy Turkey Bowl game. It was about 45 degrees, which is really warm for this time of year, but still cold when you are just sitting and waching for two hours. Chris and his team beat out the other three teams.  Chris scored a nice TD too. Say yelled, "go, go, go," while he was running.  She was in HEAVEN to just be outside roaming a field full of dirt for so long.

We got home, cleaned up, got cooking and celebrated with a friend. He immigrated here from Africa eleven years ago, but this was his very first Thanksgiving!

 The night was capped with a movie and sleep! Chris got up at 4am for his very first Black Friday experience! It was a total success!!! He went to Home Depot and nabbed a 22' ladder so he could get on our roof and check the flashing. He's been talking about that for so long! He also got lights and garland so we could get decorating!

It has been so fun to decorate our house for Christmas.  I realized that with more space, you need more decorations so we will just have to get working on that over the next few years. Much in part to Chris' sacrifice, we got lights for the outside, garland, and our tree. It feels so magical to decorate our house for the first time.  We nabbed these prelit garlands for a steal and then i added bows and chris helped put these pinecones on. I am so thrilled with how it turned out!  We decorated the tree today and Say totally loved helping! Every morning she will walk down the stairs and jump up and down when she sees it, as if she had totally forgotten.  She'll yell, "My Christmas tree! My Christmas tree! It's so beautiful!"  We let her put some of our more hardy decorations on the bottom of the tree. She was so proud of the ornaments she hung all by herself!  Now if i can just figure out how to keep her from playing with all the ornaments...

We are making a few other things this year too. I saw a great idea (on pinterest of course) to make an ornament out if a piece of the tree stem.  We are also working on some stuff to fill the space on our mantel. I can never figure out what to do up there. It always ends up looking sad.  When those projects are done, I'll post some pics.  We are 5 years into married life and sadly we still do not have stockings!! That should change this year. I have my sights set on some.  I am totally already caught up in the season and i just love everything about Christmas! I don't even mind tthe bitterly cold winds that blew in today because they brought along flurries!  Hope you guys are catching the bug too!!

3:1

It looks like Chris will be the sole source of Manhood in our home for a while longer! 

We were pretty divided on this subject as the time came to find out.  I felt like a girl would really be convenient and it would be so sweet for Say to have a little sister.  The could share a room and the clothes for Saylie would be the correct season for this little peanut. I definitely want a boy some day, but I just felt really excited about this one possibly being a "she".  The dad on the other hand, is just itching for a little guy.

Truth be told, we are thrilled with either, but we each were just leaning in different directions. Even Saylie was in on the action.  She would always say she wanted a little brother if we asked her.  And with one little boy coming into my side of the family there was a definite pull on team boy.

Alas, it is settled. now we can move on to bickering about names! Welcome to the family little missy, can't wait to meet you!

Trick or Treasure (Picture Overload)

October ended just as chaotic as it began.  We prepped for Super Saturday at our church (a crafting workshop for women) by cutting hundreds of pieces of wood to assemble a nativity set for each woman to paint and decorate, I had a severe hypoglycemic episode complete with convulsions and everything! Chris got to stab my leg with the Glucagon and everything.  We kid now, but it was pretty intense and we are making it our goal to NEVER have that happen again!

Then we celebrated 6 family birthdays, including the Mr. We capped his birthday weekend off with the Detroit Marathon and the next day we hopped on separate planes for separate trips.  Chris was going on a business trip and in light of my seizing, we felt like I shouldn't be home alone all week.  So Saylie and I headed to Virginia to hangout with family.

While in Virginia we went to Frying Pan Park, saw 2 week old baby piglets, petted sheep, horses, goats, rode a carousel and bought fresh fruit at the farmer's market.









































We went to the Trunk or Treat at my parents ward building and Say was able to dress up as Minnie Mouse with her cousin Gia.  They were so excited to put on a "princess dress" and ears.  Say loved the trick or treating.  She would go up to cars and say "Trick or Treasure" (i think she picked it up from Jake and the Neverland Pirates.  She was always sure to say thank you! It was so fun to watch her be so old and really GET it.

 We went to Cox Farms on Saturday and it was insane! I was pretty skeptical about the whole thing because I thought it was kinda hefty for $14 admission for a 2 year old, but wow!!! There were so many children play areas, corn pit, hay bails to climb on, wooden structures, slides, more horses, cows, goats, treats, and a pumpkin patch.

 

 

The trip wasn't even over yet.  We celebrated Gia's birthday on Sunday and then got an extension on our trip as we rode out Hurricane Sandy.  We were very lucky, in our area it was mostly just rain, and wind.  We never lost power and watching coverage of what other areas went through, It was just very mild in comparison.  The airports did close for 2 1/2 days so we didn't get home until Halloween night.  Say missed out on trick or treating in our neighborhood, but it worked out fine because she was the cutest Minnie Mouse on our whole flight.  She stood up on her seat after landing and yelled, "Happy Halloween everybody, follow me!" and we headed up the aisle of the plane. She is so stinking fun, i can't stand it.


 We were soooooo glad to get home to Chris, but we had a great time.  We got to see Grams, Papa, aunties, uncles, friends and puppies! Say needed it so much, she had such a blast and was thoroughly entertained