Thanksgiving

This Thanksgiving we had a lot to be grateful for.  We, unlike a lot of unfortunate people out there, are able to pay our bills, live in a home, have two vehicles, have two beautiful and healthy girls, we both have jobs, and we both have very loving and supporting families.   We are grateful for our testimonies and for the many blessings we have witnessed this past year.  We are also very grateful for the knowledge we have of our Savior and his plan for us. 

The day before Thanksgiving Allie, Brookie, and I baked pies with Jaime and Craig.  Thanks for the baking fun ladies!!  I had never made a pie before and actually had a lot of fun making them. 

We made a pumpkin, pecan, and apple blackberry pies for each of us.  I made the pumpkin and apple blackberry pies gluten free for our family.  I guess I didn’t get a picture of the pecan pie.

Allie loves Craig!  And Craig is so sweet with Allie!  These two have tea parties together, watch Shrek together, and all sorts of other things.  Do you see Allie’s face in that second one?  What could she be telling Craig so seriously?  Look at that finger! 

 

Thanksgiving day we ate at my grandma’s house with all the family and then ate again with Nick’s family in the evening.   What could be better than good company and good food?  Oh my goodness I’m salivating just thinking about the spread we had…times two!

These two could be twins!  Some people will comment, when I’m holding Brooklynn, that she looks like me.  Then Allie will walk up and they say, “Holy cow!  Never mind, she (meaning Allie) looks exactly like you!  Brooklynn must look like Daddy.”  As you can clearly see…yes, she looks just like Daddy.

Thanksgiving night I participated in the midnight Black Friday madness at Superstition Springs mall.  I was not prepared for the chaos!  Sara invited me to go with her and her sister.  Thankgoodness I did not try to fight the crowds alone.  Sara and her sister are pros when it comes to Black Friday!  We all got the free $50 gift card for spending $100.  There were only 400 available and seriously…thousands of people fighting for them.  Thanks Sara and Marie!! 

 

Exhibit A: Waiting in line before the mad rush  Exhibit B: Waving our receipts in the air toward the mall employee handing out the vouchers for the free gift card  Exhibit C: I got a golden ticket!  (Sing the tune from Willy Wonka)  Don’t be afraid of my excited face.  It was $50 free dollars!  And no, that tendon you see bulging from my neck did not burst.  (If you click on the picture you will see how close it was though)

It was a good Thanksgiving!!

Jaime and Michael’s Wedding

Ok, here’s your warning.  This post is quite a long, detailed one.  But I knew I had to write it all down somewhere and I wanted to remember it.  So there…you have been warned.

Do you remember last December when I blogged about going to Zoo lights?  I was setting up one of my best friends in nursing school with one of my best friends from high school.  They met December 4th…and got married the 14th of this month!  As you might have guessed they hit it off from the first night and were engaged on Valentine’s Day.  No, they are not Mormon, but they both have said they can’t make fun of how quickly Mormons get married anymore :)

We started the festivities back in May with an engagement party at Jaime’s parents’ home.  It was of course beautiful and we had a fun time meeting the wedding party and both sides of the family.  Then in June we met for lunch at Mimi’s Cafe and then off to David’s Bridal!  We went to pick out our bridesmaids dresses and see her Little Mermaid inspired wedding dress.

Yay!  She had found the one she had been eyeing for years and looked gorgeous in it!

In October we threw Jaime a bridal shower at Mike’s parent’s home.  His mom went way above and beyond and the shower was gorgeous!  It was kind of fun throwing a party for my friend in the same home that I hung out at in high school :)

The sign in frame, the beverage table, and the spread of divine food.

Name tags for everyone to wear, advice cards for Jaime, and the cupcakes from Sprinkles that I heard were way way good.

 

The back of every chair had this cute bow, Auntie Shar was nice enough to keep an eye on Allie.  Thanks Shar!

 

We kept it simple: only 2 games.  The first one was a memory game.  You only had about 10-15 seconds to look at the tray of “wedding items” and then you had to write down as many as you could remember.  Then we played the bubble gum game.  Jaime’s friends always play this at their bridal showers so we had to have it at hers!  Jess and I recorded Mike while we asked him some questions about Jaime and some about their time dating.  We then asked Jaime the same questions and if she answered different than Mike she had to put a piece of Bubbilicious in her mouth.  I think out of 15 questions she only had 6 pieces of gum…not too shabby :)

The week after the shower we got together and helped Jaime make the centerpieces.

Allie was also very helpful as you can see.

The weekend before the wedding we had a blast at Jaime’s bachelorette party.  We all wore little black dresses and had dinner at fancy restaurant called Avalon in Scottsdale.  Oh my goodness it was good and although it was quite pricey, it was definitely worth it!  After dinner we went to a friend of Jaime’s to open her little, barely there gifts :)

This is the happy couple at the grooms dinner the night before at Rustlers Roost.  Jaime’s sister-in-law to be made her the bouquet out of the bows and ribbons that were on her bridal shower gifts.

4 1/2 years and 2 kids later we are still a happy couple too!

I had a blast with these two!  Jordan and Mike were some of my best guy friends in high school.  They were always there when I needed someone and I’m so glad we’ve stayed friends!

We were taught some line dances and made a conga line at one point!  (We were standing in front of a fire so that’s why the pictures have that weird texture.)

AND THEN THE BIG DAY FINALLY CAME!!!

She had her hair…

and makeup done before we rode to Stonebridge in…

this fun thing!

We laughed and danced to a CD Jaime’s soon to be sister-in-law made for the ride.  There were a few tears shed along the way when we thought about what was about to happen!  Little Jaime and Michael Hass were getting married!  Jaime had to keep tilting her head back and blinking those dang tears away…we didn’t want runny makeup!

Oh my goodness I love this girl!  (Thanks to my mother-in-law for altering my dress for me!!)

I’m pretty sure these two were supposed to be sisters!  Thanks to nursing school at least they are best friends :)

Leah’s mad hair skills and Shaela’s mad makeup skills gave Jaime the flawless look!

 

We had a lot of fun taking pictures and getting ready in the bridal room!

Allie had fun putting on lip gloss in front of the bridal mirror :)

 

I may or may not have taken these from someone else’s blog ;)  I promise I have never done it before…but I was standing in front and Nick was keeping Allie entertained so I didn’t get any of the actual wedding.  Ok, enough rationalizing :)  How gorgeous is Jaime and how sweet are both of these pictures!

Again with the may or may not have been taken from someone else’s facebook :)  Wow, the more I think about how easy it was though the more I think…should I go private?  Anyways, how happy does Jaime look walking down the aisle as Mrs. Jaime Hass!

So being the maid of honor also meant I had to give a toast.  A little nerve racking, but it wasn’t too bad actually.  It was fun standing up there with 3 of my best friends and yes, that is only sparkling cider I am toasting with.

Their first dance as Mr. and Mrs. Hass.

I am so grateful for what a good husband Nick is.  Long story short, my cousin also was getting married that day, so Nick took the girls back and forth and did outfit changes while I helped with Jaime’s wedding all day.  Then he sat and held our sleeping baby or crying baby at times, danced with Allie, and I even got to dance with him while others helped with our girls.  So thanks honey for letting me be with Jaime all day and for driving all over town to get to everything! 

Their cake was gorgeous!  Jaime made sure I didn’t put the garter too high up her leg…she didn’t want Michael to have any excuse to dig around under there for too long :)

Since we were all in nice clothes I had to get a family picture!  Of course the one that Brooklynn is actually looking at the camera Allie is making a kissy face…goof ball.

Ok, now this one I will fully admit I took from Michael’s sister Ashley.  She takes the BEST pictures and obviously knows how to do some cute editing.  They rode off into the night to their honeymoon in a gorgeous old school Rolls Royce. 

Congratulations Mike and Jaime!  Driving to Zoo lights last December I would never have imagined things would have gone this smoothly!  I’m so happy for you two and am so grateful to be friends with both of you!

Allie’s 3rd Birthday Party

Ok, you’ll scroll down and really see that these are out of order.  Oh well.  I blog on!

Allie’s birthday lasted a couple of days this year.  On her actual birthday we made the crown seen above…

  made a breakfast of bacon and mickey mouse pancakes…

  braided her hair, per her request because she wanted braids like Princess Fiona from Shrek…  (Now I know it’s not exactly her hair style…but we had to work braids in somehow and this is what I came up with), and watched Elf.  That is what Allie wanted to do, so that’s what we did!

Her birthday was on a Thursday, but we had her birthday bash on Saturday.  That meant I stayed up super late…like 4am late…frosting cakes Friday night.  I am quite the procrastinator and can’t start things until the last minute.  So I started baking cakes and cupcakes at 10pm.  Allie wanted so badly to stay and be a part of it all, but she was exhausted so I pulled out her princess couch and she watched for a while before falling asleep.

Last year Allie had a Cinderella cake with gluten-free pumpkin carriages made out of cupcakes.  This year she had Ariel with a gluten-free ocean :)  I L-O-V-E the star tip!!  It makes for a really easy yet good looking cake.

We all ate way more of the blue frosting than we should have, as you can see by the blue tongues.  Brookie didn’t get any frosting this year though :)

I also had this Bundt cake available for anyone that didn’t want blue or red teeth.

This face cracks me up.  It’s like she is mesmerized by the cake…or is it the fire?

We had quite the turn out!  Thanks family and friends for celebrating our Allie Mae with us. 

Allie’s 3rd Birthday

This posts are out of order…I know.  But at least I’m finally blogging, right?

Allie turned 3 this year on the 16th of October!!  Where did the time go?  I can’t believe that I have a 3 year old! 

We love Allison so much.  She brings such a fun personality to our family.  She loves to sing, dance, play with Brooklynn, let Brooklynn suck on her toes “because it tickles Mom!” (obviously she does this when I’m not looking and I tell her to stop when I catch her), color with markers and cut with scissors, wear only her underwear (this drives me bonkers, but the minute we walk in the door she is stripping and taking her hair ties out, argh!) and play with stuffed animals and dolls.  We often hear her playing with her dolls and animals and it is a crack up to hear the things she has them say to each other. 

She is such a smart little girl and we are learning quickly that we have to be careful with what we say around her.  The other day the curtain rod fell down.  I was frustrated because I had flowers drying on it and clothes too.  I let, “Oh crap!” slip out when it fell.  Two days later when I was finally putting it back up (don’t be hatin’ we’re busy around here :) )  Allie said, “Mom, I saw this fall down and I said Awww, crap!”  Oops, let’s not say that Allie. 

Allie likes eating mac n’ cheese, quesadillas, spaghetti, apples, corn, peas, green beans, pop tarts, fruit snacks, granola bars, marshmallows, and absolutely loves sour cream and salad (not together though).  Allie always talks about how excited she is to start pre-school.  She really keeps us laughing with how dramatic she is about everything. 

The other day on the TV there was a commercial for an iPhone.  Allie watched the whole commercial and then whipped around to look at us and with her hands clasped together she begged, “Please, please will you buy me an iPhone Mom and Dad?  Please!”  She loves playing with my mom’s and Rick’s.  She, all by herself mind you, can turn it on, put in the security pin (so much for security, my mom showed her the code once and a week later she was punching it in herself), play games, take pictures, listen to music, and occasionally we have to stop her from buying things online. 

The other day she was getting some ice out of the ice machine on the freezer and some spilled on to the floor.  She walked by the table where Nick and I were sitting and said with her hand in the air, palm facing us, “My bad Mom.” Then gave a totally fake breathy laugh and said, “I’m sorry Mom, that was my bad.”  She is quite the drama queen and it cracks us up.  We could not imagine life without our little Allie girl. 

This morning she ran up to me and gave me a hug.  As she was squeezing me she said, “I love you Mom!  You are my best, best friend!”  Please oh please let her remember that when she’s older!  She makes us laugh whenever she wants to watch Alvin and the Chipmunks because she calls it Alvin and the Chick Punks.  Too cute to correct.  She loves to quote movies and her favorite line to quote with me is from Fox and the Hound.  She has me say, “You’re my best friend Copper!” And she says, “And you’re mine too Todd.”  Then I follow with, “And we’ll always be friends forever, right?”  She ends with, “Yeah.  Forever.”  Allie Mae I really hope we are best friends forever.  You can always bring a smile to my face.   

As I type she is begging me to let her pour salt into her hand.  She assures me, “I am not going to eat it Mom!”  And when I ask why she wants to put it in her hand she replies, “So I can hold it and rock it to sleep Mom!”  She tells me this while cupping her hands together and rocking them back and forth. 

We love you Allie Mae!  Thank you for being our little girl and such a good big sister to Brooklynn.  We are so blessed to have your strong spirit in our family!

lllllllllmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm

(Allie’s contribution to this post)

Brooklynn’s 4 month check-up

Photo courtesy of Allie

Brooklynn’s 4 month check up the beginning of this month went perfect!  She is getting to be such a big girl!  We love her so much!

It cracks me up how she can fold herself in half.  And you can kind of see how long her hair is getting!  So see…I’m not such a bad Mom after all for shaving it :)

Her stats as of 4 months are:

Weight: 15lb. 12oz.  90%

Height: 26 1/4 in.    97%

Head Circumference: 17 in.   95%

Yay for percentages in the 90s again!

Halloween

Well it’s about time I blogged about this!  This year Allie was super girl (she loves PBS kids Super Y, so she wanted to go as Super Allie) and Brookie was the green M&M. 

 

We started the Halloween season (is that the right word?) by going to a Halloween party at Martha Stewart’s house…oh I mean Jaime’s house (aka Martha Stewart’s protégé).  We love parties at Jaime’s!  I wish I would have taken a picture of the outside of her house.  HUGE spiders complete with spiders eggs everywhere and a life size man completely wrapped in spider’s web and hanging upside down.  Jaime does not spare any details :)  Thanks Jaime for a fun party!

The spread…and this was just the sweets spread, not the meal she had also prepared.

Martha inspired pumpkin decorations and gluten-free cupcakes! 

I just love these girls!  They are so good to my girls!

And thanks Mike for sitting with Allie outside for most of the night roasting marshmallows and chatting about whatever it is 3 year olds have to chat about :)  Allie loves you!

 

The day before Halloween we finally bought and pumpkin and carved it.  If you do it too early it shrivels up outside!

Allie’s making the same face as the pumpkin!

Brooklynn was also very helpful by providing her usual grins and squeals :)

Our pumpkin wasn’t super creative, just the usual Jack-O-Lantern face, so Allie added a few of her finishing touches.

Gotta love that kool-aid mustache

 

Halloween night we went trick-or-treating with my cousins in Mesa.

We started out the evening by visiting Craig, Jaime’s mom.  She is so sweet to my girls and they love her!  We consider her one of the girls’ grandmas, so naturally we had to stop by her house and trick-or-treat.

 

Chris wore his plumber costume again.  Allie had no clue who it was at first, but she soon realized it was Chris and laughed because she could see Uncle Chris’ bum :)  His costume says McKrackin Plumbing: We’re #1 when it comes to #2. 

Don’t mind how blurry the picture is :)  This is the famous Talking Pumpkin!  Allie and the other kids talk about him all year.  A man my mom’s family has known for years owns this house and sets up a Jack-O-Lantern with a speaker in the mouth.  The man stands in his cul-de-sac and talks to the parents as their kids walk up to the door to get candy.  As they walk by the pumpkin the man talks into a microphone he has in his hand and his voice is heard from the speaker in the pumpkin.  The pumpkin thanks the kids by name for coming to see him and comments on their costumes and how much bigger they are than last year.  The Talking Pumpkin is a HUGE hit every year! 

 

Schnepf Farms Pumpkin and Chili Festival

Well we said we weren’t going to do it again this year…but we did.  This year was actually a lot better than this year because we took advantage of the things that DIDN’T cost extra.  We still spent way more than we should have, but Allie had a blast!  Unfortunately Nick and I, like last year, went later than we wanted to and by the time we got on the train it was after 6:30 and so it was “spooky”.  I was a little peeved that the ride was so scary for kids as this is a family festival, right?  Poor Allie lost it when a girl dressed in a really scary costume with a ton of blood makeup on her face jumped out of the trees and screamed right in Allie face.  Then the girl followed along side the train next to Allie while dragging a foot.  Most of the train ride Allie was crying with her head buried in Nick’s chest so she wouldn’t see the other scary “actors”.  However, in their defense they do tell you that after 6:30 it will be a scary train ride and so it is definitely our fault…but really…does it have to be that scary?  Can’t someone in a pumpkin costume jump out of the trees and say BOO! ?  Other than the train ride Allie loved it!

Brookie had a ghost painted on her cheek and Allie got a pumpkin like last year.

Allie went down the HUGE, LONG slide several times and we rode on the bee, too.  Why go stand in the long lines at Disneyland to ride Dumbo when you can go to Schnepf Farms and ride a Bee that goes up and down?

This was by far her favorite ride!  As you can see :)  She got to ride in it all by herself and it would move up and down when she pulled on the lever.  She was so proud of herself!  She rode it three times and we finally had to drag her away to something else. 

Nick is always such a fun dad.  Allie loved climbing to the top of the haystack and jumping down to Nick!