giving thanks

This year, we are thankful for life, family, friends and for our daily bread.

Ellery learned this prayer at school this year. Our family has been blessed by two sweet prayers from the kids' preschool programs, and we are very thankful for this. Ellery has grown up so much in the last few months! I just love hearing her sweet voice and words.

Ready to eat a yummy lunch! Thanksgiving in our living room one more year! We moved the table back in here because we are about to finish the walls in our dining room. The fun thing is that our living room is full of fall colors, so it was a perfect place for our meal!

Jeff smoked an awesome turkey!

Spicy Smashed Sweet Potatoes - Something new and great!

Keeping family close even though distance means we usually spend Thanksgiving apart.

Now, a yummy Raspberry Apple Pie - thanks Cookie and Papa!

Thanksgiving morning hot chocolate

Sweet girl!

Yummy cranberry orange muffins for breakfast!

Taking time to smell the roses

A Thanksgiving afternoon at the movies - watching Tangled!

A Thanksgiving with short sleeves - 70 degrees outside!

Livvy is determined to get this doll!

Fun Late Fall Pictures!

Thanksgiving Lunch at school!

Happy 8 Months, Livvy!

What a fun couple of months this has been with Olivia! She is revealing her sweet, happy, serious, and super fun personality to us more and more every day!

Here she is peeking over her crib - time to move the mattress down!

There is no doubt about it - Livvy LOVES Rocky! She gets so excited when she hears him meowing and looks everywhere until she finds him. She pets him, and as you can see, he loves her, too.

Livvy is moving all around. She can get across the room - backwards! Not officially crawling, I guess she is scooting on her belly. She can also scoot on her bottom when sitting up. She is pulling her legs up, though, and is definitely working toward crawling! She is also trying to pull up.

She still loves peek-a-boo and will grab any piece of material she can get her hands on and hold it in front of her face until we realize what she is doing and ask, "Where's Livvy?" Then she giggles and giggles when we say "Peek-a-boo!"

Everybody loves Olivia's one long piece of blonde hair in the front that is perfect for bow wearing. But, without a bow, it provides for lots of fun hairdos! She usually has one big curl right on top! I can count at least four times that Livvy has been told she looks like a Cabbage Patch kid (in a good way)!

Olivia looks like she wishes she could just jump in and play with the big kids. She watches them like crazy! Kiran and Ellery really play well with her, and Livvy loves it!

Livvy gives Jeff the biggest smile each night as I'm walking out of the room to carry her to bed. They BOTH love that!

Olivia has a very serious look on when she is first getting to know someone. Once she gets to know you, she gives great big smiles. She is pretty quiet around strangers. She talks to me when I whisper to her. And, she talks most when she is chewing on her toys - sometimes, it seems like she is chatting about all that teething (you can see those bottom teeth under the gums) she is doing. She doesn't mind being held by others, though she certainly prefers Mom and Dad. However, I go at least once a week to the gym, and she has cried a lot the past 4 times. She just doesn't know what to think about it, but the childcare workers there are wonderful! I hear my name being called to come to the childcare center at about 50 minutes into the workout. Luckily, I have no interest in working out longer than an hour!

Livvy loves her telephone and will play with it for long periods of time.

With Rocky again!

On a fun family hike!

We took some pictures in the UT Gardens!

Go Purple! :) We decided to show support for Uncle Keri's team, and Livvy happily sported her accessories.

On a playgroup outing taking a little nap

Her latest favorite way of sleeping with Giraffy under her arm, fingers in her mouth, and on her belly! Too cute!

Here are some sweet videos!

Preschool is Fun!

Ellery is having so much fun at preschool! She has attended 4 days of class now. She is learning a lot, and has already completed a homework assignment! Ms. Melinda is one of Ellery's teachers from last year, so that helped make what seems to be an smooth transition into a new classroom even easier! Ellery walked right in the first day and never looked back, and she has been ready to go to school every day!

She is thrilled to grab her pink butterfly backpack and her butterfly garden lunchbox on the way out the door!

Ellery can identify many letters. She can say her numbers to 25 and can count objects to 12. She knows all of her colors (getting brown and black confused occasionally). She knows circle, triangle and square shapes.

She is so curious about nature right now. She loves to find squirrels and birds. She is great at spotting other things, too. She can see an airplane from so far away that it takes a minute to come into my view. She has always been the first to see a balloon, and on our trip to TX this summer, I don't think she missed any United States flags!

Ellery is awesome in her play! She can play very well with others and also by herself. I often hear her talking away upstairs either while reading books or while engaged in pretend play.

Ellery is very independent but also very grateful when she receives help if it is needed. She has excellent manners and almost always says "please" and "thank you." She can get dressed all by herself, and she and Kiran take turns feeding Rocky (then running around the house chasing him). :)

Ellery loves to sing songs and is great at picking up a tune and lyrics quickly to sing along. This is perfect for her music class! She always comes home from school telling about music and sign language and shows me the stamp she received in class.

This is Ellery's recent homework assignment. Pretty funny story actually . . .

This year, her teachers are assigning family homework to provide a chance for everyone to work with Ellery on her projects. The first assignment was to design and dress a "little person" (contact paper in the shape of a child) just like Ellery. We did great until it was time for the face. I tried drawing eyes, and Jeff attempted the nose. Let's just say it was so bad that I found another piece of paper that was as close as possible to the original and cut out a round face to paste over our first tries. We may have some talents in this house, but Mom and Dad are no artists! I then looked online for help with drawing children's faces, and it turned out much better. Thanks for being sweet about it Ellery! I think she was relieved to see the second attempt as the first one looked a little like a scary creature from a freaky movie!

Anyway, back to Ellery. Our sweet girl is so calm and confident about school each day! What a blessing!

With Daddy and Livvy on the first day of preschool

With Mommy (who obviously was making lunches and a mess!)

I have missed both of my kids while they are at school, but I absolutely LOVE picking them up and hearing about their adventures! Then, Daddy can't wait to hear when he gets home! Life with kids is simply amazing!

Okay, now THIS is the way to celebrate the end of a wonderful first day of school for all these kiddos! (Malon, Kiran, Fern, Baylan, Ellery, and Livvy)

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Kiran (with vanilla - his favorite right now!), Baylan, Foust

Fern and Ellery (with cookie dough)

I Love Kindergarten!

My name is Kiran. I just finished my first two days of Kindergarten! I really like my teacher, Ms. R. She is very kind, and I know she is cool because she told me that one of her favorite movies of all time is "Star Wars!!!"

This is me on my first day of school. My R2-D2 shirt and my new Millennium Falcon shoes were perfect for the first day!

These are some of my school supplies.

This is my dad and me.

My mom and me

My whole family outside my new school

This is my dad, my sister and me the night before my first day reading "Miss Bindergarten Gets Ready for Kindergarten." This is my favorite book about Kindergarten!

In class, I sit at the yellow table. I have a green chair, and green is my favorite color! My favorite things to do so far in class are play with blocks and Legos.

One of my best friends is in my class, and I have already met lots of other great friends.

I think I am ready for school because I know . . .

all of my uppercase and lowercase letters.

how to write my name.

how to count to 100.

how to do easy addition.

how to sound out letters.

how to read simple words.

how to write simple sentences with help.

how to follow instructions.

how to be polite and respectful.

how to have fun!

I also think I'm ready because . . .

I am adventurous and curious.

I love books!

lately, I have liked drawing and coloring and all things art.

I love to meet new people!

I love to try new things and learn new things!

My first two days, I ate all of my lunch and was starving when Mom picked me up!

One day, we walked with bubbles (to help us be quiet) and ducktails (to help us keep our hands to ourselves) around the school on a tour.

I found out that I will get to go to some extra fun classes on different days of the week: Music, Technology, P.E., Art, and Library and Yoga. I am excited about recess every day, and our playground is really awesome!

My first day, I had a little trouble saying "goodbye." But, that night at bedtime, I asked Mom if I could go to school again the next day because I liked it so much! And, now, I want to go to school every day!

Kindergarten, Here I Come!