Thanksgiving 2009

Thanksgiving 2009 was spent at William's and Michelle's house in Hinesville, Georgia, a four hour drive from our house in Tally. Brent's family joined us from Pittsburgh(a decision made the Sunday before Thanksgiving).
Michelle, my sister-in-law, had the kids make these adorable placemats.
Eddie liked the rolls, mashed potatoes, and jigglers. Peter slept through the meal. Ben gave him a plate when he woke up. I missed it as I was on a walk. I feel very sad to miss Peter eating his first Thanksgiving food. Ben said he ate everything.

Cousin pics-I just had to put all these pics, mainly cuz Eddie is so adorable in every single one!
Eddie, so cheesy; Peter, so anxious.
E, still cheesy; Abs, "give me that bottle!"
I love Eddie! He just never gives up on smiling in this photo shoot.
Now we are beginning to make faces. If you keep looking, you will see even Peter gets into it!




We are a happy family, despite Ben's new horn.

I love my brothers. I am so happy I was able to spend Thanksgiving with them. This week just made me miss Mark, Tom, and Kaleb. And William and Brent, too, as I see them so rarely. I have the best family and I came from the best family! Who could ask for anything more?!?
Our first Christmas present.
Opening it together!

Peter, Peter

Peter's beautiful happy smile. (He's always holding one or two cars or trains).
He actually looks like he has a potbelly here, which is abnormal. I was taking pictures because his belly looked so huge during and after his bath.
I think he may have been coming in for a kiss. I don't remember, but he is cracking up. I see this happy little face all the time, and I want to remember it forever!

First Time to Fall Asleep on the Couch

I tried for over an hour to get him to sleep in his bed at nap time. He refused, and I was SO sick. I gave up. He fell asleep on the couch while watching tv.

Bathtub Pics

Just because my kids are so cute naked!

The Phone, the Phone is Ringing!

Pete-ch likes to pretend he is on the phone. He is adorable because he cocks his head to the side while he talks, though you can't see that here.
He is frustrated that I am taking a picture. It's hard to tell that he's not wiping his eyes. He is actually holding his hands to the sides of his eyes. He does this every time he's frustrated.

Chinny Chin Chin

Some nights Peter refuses to go to sleep at bedtime (or he goes to sleep just to wake up soon after). I try to get him back to sleep, but sometimes he refuses. Eventually I get him up when I am worried his screaming will wake Edison. I know he shouldn't be up, but Ben and I end up having a lot of fun with Peter. He really likes having his Mommy and Daddy to himself. We enjoy it, too. The night I took this picture, he was playing on our bed. He pulled the covers up and wasn't satisfied until they were under his chin. We love our fun and funny little boy!

Where's Peter?

The other night I couldn't find Peter. I'd poured him a bowl of dry cereal (great dinner, eh?), and I was going to put him in his booster seat to eat. While I searched the house, he found his cereal and took it with him to eat under the slide that had a blanket draped on top. Eventually he responded to his name, and I let him finish his dinner under the slide. My cute, silly boy!

Halloween Fun

Pinata at a Halloween party
Peter was first to go and couldn't figure out what he was supposed to do. He kept tapping the bat on the ground. By his second turn, he'd figured out the objective.

Maze at a pumpkin patch
Eddie successfully led us through twice. Here we are stopped at a dead end.

Picking out a carving pumpkin

We ended up buying these toys for Peter since he'd already put them in his mouth.

Carving a pumpkin
Eddie and Peter weren't all that interested in getting their hands messy. Peter tried putting his hand in the pumpkin once. Eddie wouldn't.
Traditional stew and breadsticks dinner

Costumes
Ben was a vampire; his was last minute. He only dressed up because Eddie said it would be fun if Dad dressed up as something scary.
Peter was Tigger. He initially didn't like wearing his costume. He didn't mind it by Halloween, though, and even asked to have it on after Halloween was over.
Eddie was a black cat, my idea. He liked it initially, though, the day of Halloween he kept mentioning other things he would like to be (a robot, a firefighter, something scary). I will let him choose next year. He's on a kick of wearing his rain boots everywhere! They go well with the costume!I was a black cat, too, cuz it's easy. Eddie was more excited about wearing his cat costume when he found out I'd be one, too.

Butterfly Festival

On Saturday we went to a festival held in honor of the butterfly migration. Here are some cute pics of my boys.
Hanging out in the trunk while we got the stroller set up (the only way to keep Peter from wandering off).

Peter was quite taken with the butterflies.

We enjoyed a nice walk around the wildlife refuge. Eddie and Peter loved the boardwalk. Peter walked the whole time!



Eddie and Peter got firefighter hats. We ended up eating at Firehouse Subs afterward, where they each got a second hat! (Eddie has always worn firefighter hats backwards. On this day he asked me if he was wearing it the right way. I was sad to tell him no; I thought I would never see him wearing a firefighter hat backwards again. He wore it the right way for a while, but he decided he likes them better backwards! I do, too!)

"Numnin" Patch

We went to the pumpkin patch with playgroup this week. Peter was excited to see all those "numnin"s, a word he had learned just the day before because we hung up Halloween decorations. Eddie and Peter loved listening to the stories.

What a handsome young man! Love that smile!

Both Eddie and Peter loved measuring pumpkins with string. Eddie told me later that this was his favorite part.


Eddie learned that he could use his string to knock pumpkins into the holes between the boards. He's pretty impressed with his little game.

Of course they loved picking out pumpkins. Peter's was selected for him by another mom because of its perfect size. It has proved to double as a ball.

Eddie kept changing his selection. Each pumpkin was smaller than the last. He came home with a pumpkin even smaller than Peter's!


I attempted to get a lot of posed pictures, which of course didn't work. It's practically impossible to get two little ones to look at you at the same time.
I love this one. I had told Eddie to put his hand on Peter's shoulder, not realizing it would be the wrong hand.

The best I got of E and P!
Peter didn't fight getting his face painted, though Eddie wouldn't even go near the table. Eddie enjoyed playing games. Peter joined in with the parachute.


We ended at the playground and with a picnic lunch. It was a fun day!