Holiday Happenings!

It's time for another recap of what we've been up to for the past little while...

Preston got his Kindergarten school pictures back and they are soooooooooo cute!! Awwe, seriously, proud mama here!  Look at this handsome kid.

It's so fun to look at how much he has grown in 4.5 years.  The picture on the left was his 6 month pictures, and then Kindergarten on the right (5 yrs old).

Living Room Camping - Nov 15, 2013

The boys were excited all week long to go camping with Will on this particular Friday night, but there ended up being a HUGE winter storm with rain, sleet, cold temperatures and more.  So instead, Will set up the tent in our family room and the boys camped out inside!

Will even made a nice roaring fire in the fireplace to add to the atmosphere. The boys loved it.

Playing in the Snow - Nov 16, 2013

And of course, in lieu of the winter storm we had that weekend, the next day we drove up to Snoqualmie Pass and played in the snow a bit while looking for future spots to come back and chop down a Christmas tree.

It...was...FREEEEEZING.

I will say though, I was just ecstatic to still be able to zip up my ski jacket at 5.5 months pregnant - ha!

Relief Society Holiday Dinner - Nov 18, 2013

Our ward Relief Society had a holiday dinner in which we could sign up to decorate our own table. My mom is like the total connoisseur of dinnerware and decor, and so not only did I invite her to come join me for the dinner, but to help me decorate my table. 

Here was our table...

And here were the other gorgeous tables as well...

THANKSGIVING - Nov 28, 2013

It has actually been a few years since we travelled to Idaho for Thanksgiving or Christmas, and we wanted to make the trip to Will's parents house for Thanksgiving this year. So we drove to Idaho Falls and spent it with them.

Taylor was definitely a ball of entertainment for everyone during Thanksgiving...

These boys LOVED this smiley face pillow - which I hear has quite the funny story behind it. Will's grandma made one for EVERY family member several years ago, all because she loved Walmart. LOL Woohoo go grandma.

After dinner, of course the Thomas siblings have to play some sort of game.  This was their 3 HOUR game of "Phase 10"...which is why I don't like to participate. :p

Seth and Will looking at landscape photography.

On the way TO and FROM Idaho, we stopped at Grandma Lindsay's house in Pendleton, Oregon.  It's always nice to visit her!

Oops..one more from Thanksgiving.

New Car - Nov 25, 2013

So the week before Thanksgiving, our Jetta finally decided to committ suicide. Granted it was 10 years old, and the transmission had slowly been going out for a month (it only drove in 3rd gear).  

It was time to buy a new car. And if there is one thing that Will and I have never really agreed upon, it is car shopping and car buying.  I hate to admit though, Will IS the smart one in all of this even though I would prefer a newer nicer car. He at least has enough smarts about him to buy quality older vehicles and pay cash for them.

We did compromise and buy an SUV (Will didn't one one, I thought we needed one since we are having a 3rd kid and driving a Sedan around was no longer roomy enough).  So we spent a weekend researching SUV's and ended up finding this Kia Sorento on Craigslist.

It was still with the original owner who only really drove it around town, it had low miles, and all the extra's like leather heated seats and more.  We got it for a really great deal too. The owner even had dealerships calling him offering to buy it for twice what he was asking, but he didn't want a bidding war and just wanted to sell it some good people.

Some random photos....

My fingers have finally gotten too pudgy for my wedding ring. So sad. 

Primary Program....

We were so proud of Preston who for the first time in 2 years, finally got the courage to stand in front of the congregation and say his part in the primary program.  What a stud!  And yes he does look like he wants to throw up in this picture.  He told us before getting up there "Papa I have to go poopy!" LOL We told he him he would have to hold it until after.

And the rest was documented by Taylor on my phone....

At home, relaxing after Primary Program Sunday...

Made my mom's famous apple pie recipe...yummmmm

After years of drooling over all of the super cute girl holiday dresses that Costco carries every year, I was excited to see that this year they FINALLY wised up and started carrying little BOY holiday suits.  I bought 3 of them.

After laughing hilariously for 15 minutes watching a movie upside down, I wondered if their vision would eventually flip...

The boys had a blast helping me get all of the Christmas decorations out of boxes and putting them around the house.  I don't know the last time I saw them so excited!

I should also add that our little charlie brown Christmas tree was cut down in the wild ourselves!

Relaxing at home and having a movie day...

Doing the awful task of shopping at Costco with 2 kids while pregnant and trying to keep them quiet whilst they are laughing hysterically from bending their heads back and pretending to walk on the ceiling.

Taylor's goose-egg on his forehead from getting clobbered by another 3 year old in the play center at the gym.

Date Night - "White Christmas" - Dec 6, 2013

Will left on the 7th for a weeklong business trip to first Denver, and then San Francisco (where he still is while I type this!). And so before he left, we did a quick short date night to go see the Issaquah High School's "White Christmas". Unfortunately, we had to leave during intermission because we promised our babysitter we would be back by 9pm.

24 weeks along...

Weekend at Grandma and Grandpa's - Dec 8, 2013

Since Will was gone, the boys and I decided to spend the weekend with my parents on the island. The boys loved seeing all of Grandma's Christmas decorations up everywhere. I especially love her Victorian village.

The boys all snazzied up in their new suits before Church...

We stopped at the beach for some photos before church. Brrrrrrr.....

The boys LOVE story time with Grandma....

And snuggles with Grandpa...

The Elf on the Shelf

Last year, we received the "Elf on the Shelf" as a gift from Luke & Jenn, and so this year we tried it for the first time.  The elf is supposed to keep an eye on the boys and then report to Santa every evening whether or not they have been good or bad, and then comes back and hides in a new place every morning when they wake up. 

The boys have been having a LOT of fun discovering "Jack" (what they named him) in new places...

Snoqualmie Falls Ice - Dec 10, 2013

A really beautiful rare thing has happened - in being that it has been so cold here lately. Snoqualmie Falls has almost frozen over, creating this natural ice castle effect.  It was really cool to see!

Pregnancy Update

Yep, I'm still here and still obviously pregnant. (That is a good thing considering I'm not due until March).

I've still been keeping up with 4 days of workouts per week, which for this stage in my pregnancy is really an accomplishment for me - considering I stopped working out when I hit 6 months during my last two.

I've definitely popped out a lot in the past 2 weeks and am feeling very huge. But having done this before, I know that this "huge" is NOTHING compared to the last 6 weeks.  I am currently 25 and 1/2 weeks along, so in other words 6.5 months pregnant.

I don't usually talk about this much, but I do struggle with depression during pregnancy. Normally, as a non-pregnant person, I'm quite driven and motivated and happy.  But when I am pregnant, I feel very caged, broken, unhappy, unable, crappy, unspecial, and more.  Blah. I hate even talking about it.  I suppose you could say I have the "baby blues" but WHILE I'm pregnant.  Because once that baby is out of me, I'm SOOOOOOOOOOO HAPPPPPPPPPY.

I got a blessing last Sunday from my Dad, and he said some words in it that I specifically needed to hear and it helped me a lot to know God is aware of me and my needs during this time.  I have also received emails and phonecalls from sisters in my ward, out of the blue, asking if I needed help with anything because they felt inspired to call me. I can't help but think of some of the words my dad said that "Angels would be around to assist me", and it has been so true.  It's really amazing to see certain things and then make the connection "Ahhh this is because Heavenly Father is watching out for me!".  It's kind of neat.

Anyway enough of that.

Other than that, I'm doing all right. Baby is kicking the heck out of me, I'm gaining weight like I always do DESPITE my gym efforts (I've come to accept the fact that it is just something my body does when pregnant). So I am looking foward to having this little boy in another 13 weeks and feeling somewhat normal again and having a new addition to our family. :)