November, Generalized

November was a tumultuous month, but I survived. While I got Dancy stabilized into bottle feeding and gaining weight (she's gained 3 lbs in 2 months now, putting her just over 13 lbs), I also had to deal with the hormones and PMS of quitting breastfeeding. That might sound like too much information, but given that I've been pregnant or breastfeeding or both for the last 4 years, that was a lot of turmoil for me to suddenly be done. I was getting my house ready for 11 Thanksgiving house guests, and coordinating a photo shoot over the holiday. At the same time, I was also getting 4-5 emails a day for a week from my mom's family trying to coordinate their family reunion next summer and book a lodge big enough for the group. It was a pretty urgent matter as accommodations were filling up fast. To complicate life more, my British pen pal offered to fly us out to Southern France to finally meet him and spend time with our mutual Chinese friend who is studying at university there. So I rushed out and applied for passports for the kids. Remarkably, they arrived back in exactly 2 weeks! Unfortunately, scheduling didn't work out, so we'll try again later. We've been trying to get things to work out for 5 years. We'll get it right some day:) We celebrated Shad's birthday. I canned 7 quarts each of Chicken Soup, Harvest Chicken Chowder, Split Pea Soup, and Manhattan Salmon Chowder, and 9 pints of enchilada sauce, and vegetable broth made from scraps I've stored up in my freezer.

So while I was otherwise busy taking care of everything, Tom and Katie had quality cuddle time with each other and their DVD player.

 

Note Katie's leg warmers. She's always wearing a pair, if at all possible.

 

Katie loves to help feed Dancy Cheerios.

 

 

We had lots of hot chocolate treats, and the kids were quick to open up my baking cabinet to find marshmallows and sprinkles that they could throw in.

 

 

And Katie had loads of fun playing with all the dress up clothes she got for her birthday. She plays dress up 24/7. Seriously, she'll dress up before going to bed. She loves to be Batman.

 

 

Oh, and our furnace pilot light went out, and our water softener broke, filling our water lines with sediment, both just a week before Thanksgiving. Shad got to scoop it out of our toilet tank.

 

 

Luckily, we got all that fixed before guests arrived. Cherean and David arrived Tuesday night before Thanksgiving with their son John, who is 2 months older than Tommy, and Hyrum, who is one. Vern, Pris and Levi, and Dan and Ryan arrived the next afternoon. Jimmy and Kerry came up in the evening, but didn't spend the night. Shad gave Cherean, David, Dan, Levi and I a tour of Natoma that afternoon after work while Vern and Pris watched their grandkids. We all left the kids with Vern and Pris again after dinner and went to the theater to see Catching Fire. Shad and I got in for free because we had worked at the theater the previous Friday for opening weekend, but then the theater was full, so we couldn't get in.

 

Believe it or not, I didn't take any pictures over Thanksgiving, and the few Shad took on his phone are all blurry movements of kids. The kids had fun playing and watching movies, the adults had fun chatting, playing games, Frisbee golf and ping pong. I taught Hyrum how to go down the stairs, and he had so much fun playing on them.