Thanksgiving

We had a bit of dilemma over where to spend Thanksgiving this year.  We wanted to go visit Mark's brother in Virginia and Washington D.C.  But we really started to feel like we should go visit our grandparents, since they're getting on in life.  As soon as we made the decision to go to Idaho and Utah, we found out that Mark's grandpa had fallen and broken his hip.  His grandma's macular degeneration was starting to progress pretty rapidly.  We knew we had made the right decision!

We had a great time visiting our family.  We were even lucky enough to see the snow, which Brielle enjoyed.  She also discovered the movie Cinderella, which we watched about 3 times a day.  We have "princess syndrome" at our house - if it has anything to do with a princess, Brielle is all about it!  Here are some picture highlights from our trip:

We love playing in the snow!

Visiting Grandpa Herbst in the hospital

Trying out Grandpa's walker

The lights at Temple Square

Trying out Grandma's trampoline.  Brie gives it two thumbs up.

Playing in the leaves at Grandma's.

Halloween For Reals

As I mentioned earlier, I love Halloween in the south because of the weather.  It really is gorgeous.  And because of that, people sit on their porches to give out Halloween candy.  It's so fun to sit on your front porch and watch all the costumes parade up and down the streets.  And you don't have to keep answering the doorbell.

We kicked off our Halloween festivities with a neighborhood block party.  Then we came home and ate dinner - our traditional mummy dogs and sweet potato fingers - while we handed out treats.  Once dinner was done, it was Brie's turn to trick or treat.  She learned quickly at the ward Trunk or Treat, so this was old hat to her.  She had a great time!

Ready for the block party with the neighborhood girls

A witch as a fireman... it could happen.  I actually love how she's crammed in that little car.

Chillin' at the block party.  Quite the pose she has going on...

Eating dinner and waiting for trick-or-treaters

Enjoying some of her spoils

Yet more candy shoved in her mouth (see the chipmunk cheeks?)

Our last stop of the night - the neighbor across the street.  Brielle LOVES him.  No really.  Don't let the face fool you.

Trunk or Treat!

The thing I love about Halloween in the south is the weather.  It's glorious!  The days are warm, the nights are cool, we can wear costumes without coats (most of the time), and it's just dandy.  We stated celebrating the Wednesday before Halloween with the ward Trunk or Treat.  The Young Women were in charge of the activity, and I being in charge of the young women made sure that my family was in the spirit of things.  Mark was a good sport and dressed up.  Brielle kept her witch costume from last year, I was Gretel, and Mark was Hansel.

We didn't get a picture of the car because it was dark, but we made it look like the witch's oven from the Hansel and Gretel story, with fake flames and witch legs sticking out of the trunk.  Mark did a fantastic job of capturing the vision and making our trunk look great!  Brielle's little friend joined us for the trunk or treating.  The girls had so much fun going from car to car together.  There were also some carnival games interspersed among the cars, and they had a blast with the games.

This is the trick or treat bag I made for Brielle.  I don't break the sewing machine out very often.  I'm kind of intimidated by sewing.  So I kind of like to show off my projects when they actually turn out.

And a shot of Brie after the trunk or treat.  This little gal sure loves dress up!

Day Trip

I'm a bit of a history fanatic.  I LOVE anything to do with American history.  So moving to the south has been a wonderful experience for me.  We are now living within driving distance of some civil war battle sites.  We took a day trip to Port Hudson, about 45 minutes north of Baton Rouge.  It is the home of the longest seige in American military history, when the Union troops held the Confederate troops under seige for 48 days.  There is a museum there now, with trails you can walk to some of the battle sites.  There are several trails, none of them very long, so it made a great day trip with a toddler.  We just walked to as many sites as we could before she got tired.

Mmm.. PBJ on daddy's back.  This is the life.

One of the lookout towers at the battle site

Look at all the vegetation.  Hard to believe there was ever a battle here.

A classic Brie face

On Being Two

Dear Brielle,

It's hard to believe that 2 years have flown by since you came to our family.  Daddy and I are so happy that you were born to us.  You have been such a delight to us as you continue to grow and learn.  You are so smart!  You know all of your letters and their sounds.  You LOVE to sing.  You know all the words to "I Am a Child of God", "Home On the Range", "Popcorn Popping", "Daddy's Homecoming", "The ABC song", and "Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star."  Those are the ones you walk around singing all day long.  You have a CD of childrens' songs that we keep in the car.  You like me to play it non-stop.  You really appreciate music.

Just the other day, we went to the zoo.  Of course, you wanted me to play your CD on the way.  A pretty lullabye song came on.  As soon as it ended, you wanted me to play it again.  And again.  Pretty soon, you were sobbing.  I wondered what was wrong, and I asked you, but you just kept crying.  As soon as the song ended, you sniffed and said "Again."  I played the song again, and soon you were crying again!  I guess the song was so beautiful to you, you were moved to tears!  You are such a sweetheart.  You are quick to apologize when you have done something wrong.  You are quick to help others that you see need help.  You love to help me do the laundry, and insist on putting the clothes in the dryer by yourself.

You are our little tease.  You love to play games, and tease Momma and Daddy.  We love to play games with you too.  Daddy has been teaching you to play football, and now whenever you have a ball in your hadn you scream, "Blue Forty-two!  Set, Set.....  Yah!!!!"  It always makes me laugh.  My favorite times are when you snuggle up to me with your seek-and-find books and we look for the pictures together.  Sometimes we sit for a long time. You also like to play "matches."  You love looking for the pictures that go together.  You like to learn with your hands!

This year for your birthday, you wanted to have a Mickey Mouse birthday.  And you told me "I want Daddy make my cake."  When I asked if I could make it, you said, "No.  Daddy do it."  And you stuck by that wish.  So, Daddy made your cake (but Momma decorated it).  You like Mickey Mouse, Veggie Tales, Strawberry Shortcake (occasionally), Sesame Street (ELMO!), and your LOVE (with capital letters) Curious George.  We get lots of Curious George books and dvds from the library.

Daddy and I are so happy that you are our little girl.  You are so happy and fun-loving.  You have a determined little spirit that rarely admits defeat.  It is a characteristic that will serve you well as you get older, and I am so glad you have it.  I'm so glad that Heavenly Father sent you to me.  I love you so much!

Love,
Momma

Silly

Lately, we just LOVE to be silly.



Ch-ch-ch-changes

The tile in our Master bathroom was aqua blue.  The tile around our fireplace was salmony-orange.  Before we bought our house, we both new that the tile would have to go.  We finally got around to making the change.

Master bath before:

Please ignore the random tiles on the floor.  We were trying to pick a replacement.



Master Bath After:

Improvement?  I think yes.

Fireplace Before:

Fireplace After:

(The white sticks were holding up the tiles as they dried.)

I love it.  :)

Labor Day Part 3

There was supposed to be a big tropical storm to hit Louisiana, and specifically Baton Rouge, on Sunday night/Monday morning.  We decided to wait until the afternoon to drive home in hopes that the storm would have already passed through by the time we got home.  Turns out we needn't have worried.  The storm never happened.  However, we got to see some fun things.

First stop:  The Pink Palace.  It was the home of Clarence Saunders, the man who started the Piggly-Wiggly grocery stores.  The house was later turned into a museum and houses an IMAX theatre as well as a planetarium.  We just wandered through the history exhibits.  The house is huge and amazing inside.

The Pink Palace

Mark and Brielle outside the Pink Palace

Just FYI

The weather was beautiful, so we headed downtown to check out the sights.  We ended up on Beale Street, which is pretty cool if you're there at 10:00 in the morning.  Here we are, walking in Memphis:

On Beale Street

A. Schwab - one of the oldest general stores in America that is still operating

Outside the Hard Rock Cafe

On our way back to the car, we walked up to Union Avenue and made a quick stop at the Peabody Hotel.  The Peabody is a ritzy hotel that is famous for the ducks in it's lobby water fountain.  It apparently started as a joke in the 1930s, when someone put duck decoys in the water fountain.  The guests loved it, and it became a tradition to keep live ducks in the fountain.  The hotel keeps a duckmaster, who marches the ducks to the fountain every morning and back home every evening.  Needless to say, this was a huge hit with Brielle.

Checking out the ducks



After buying a book and a shirt to commemorate our visit, we struck out for home.  We had a really great time visiting Memphis.  I hope we have the opportunity to go back some day.

Labor Day Part 2

On Sunday, we drove an hour north to see what Memphis had to offer.  It was a rainy, rainy day.  We drove to Graceland to see where Elvis lived.  We didn't opt for the tour, since we didn't know how Brielle would handle it.  But we got some great pictures.

Graceland

Elvis' life in a nutshell

Elvis' plane, the Lisa Marie

Brie and me hanging out by the gift shop window

After taking in what Graceland had to offer, we headed downtown to the children's museum to let Brie have some run-around time.  She had a BLAST!

Putting on her seatbelt in the "automotive" section of the museum

Daddy putting on a puppet show.  "Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain..."

Starring in her own music video

We ended the day with dinner at one of our faves - the Olive Garden.  Brielle thought the food was delicious, and she was super interested in the little boy next to us.  She kept giving us a play-by-play of what he was doing.  He was a super-active kid, and Brielle kept saying "That boy being naughty.  He need a time out."  Like she never stands up in her chair, or hits her mom, or shouts things out in public.  Takes one to know one, I guess!

Labor Day Part 1

BYU played Ole Miss over Labor Day weekend.  Since Oxford, Mississippi is only a 5 hour drive, we decided to get us some tickets and go to the game.  Brielle was SOOO excited!  She wanted to see the Cougars!  She made double sure that I packed her "cougar shirt" and practiced up on all her cheers ( "Rah rah, Gooooo Cougars!").  She made the drive well - as long as "George" (as in Curious) was on.

The morning of the game, Brielle woke up at 4:00 a.m. shouting, "I'm in Missippi!  I go see da cougars!"  It took a little bit to help her understand that she wasn't going to see the Cougars for several more hours and that she might want to go back to sleep for a bit.

Acting on advice from our fellow hotel patrons, we got to the game early.  Way early.  6 hours early.  Good thing we did, because we barely found a place to park - about a mile from the stadium.  And we were introduced to the concept of tailgating such as we have never seen.  Ole Miss is famous for its tailgates.  There is an eight-acre piece of grass in the middle of campus called "The Grove."  On game day, The Grove is filled with tents.  It's not uncommon to see men in blazers and ties, women in dresses and heels.  Some tents are adorned with chandeliers, china, and we saw more than one flat-screen tv with a dish hooked up.  The amount of food was amazing.

A view of The Grove

As we walked around campus, we passed the bookstore and decided to go in to take advantage of the air conditioning for a few minutes.  As soon as we walked in the door, I saw the back of a man that I instantly recognized.  It was my high school cross country coach.  I hadn't seen him for about 11 years!  How random that we ran into each other in Oxford, Mississippi of all places.  It was so great to see him and catch up on the last few years.  Of course, we got a picture.

Brielle was having none of that.

We took her to the car where she zonked out for an hour. Poor baby!

At last it was game time!  We found our seats and cheered our loudest.  Brielle was in heaven watching the cougars and cheering with the fans!  She even found a pom pom (Ok, so it was an Ole Miss pom pom, but it served its purpose) and waved it wildly whenever the Cougars made a good play.  I guess it worked, because we ended up with a win! 

Mark had a "Blast From the Past" moment himself.  We ended up sitting next to an old buddy of his from BYU.

Our family after the game.  Wins always make us smile!

We got close enough to get a good picture of Jake Heaps giving an interview.



After the game ended, my family called to tell me that they saw us on TV!  As soon as the game ended, I guess they turned the camera on the BYU fans, and we were right there.  They were so excited to see us at the game.  :)  We had a great time.  Go Cougars!

Actually...

ACTUALLY has become Brielle's favorite new word.  She uses it frequently when answering questions.  For example:

Mom:  Brielle, who are you talking to on the phone? (Brie was holding her pizza crust up to her ear like a phone)
Brielle:  Actually, I talking on bread.

Dad:  Brielle, do you know why you're in time out?
Brielle:  Actually, cause I throw my cucumber on the floor.

Mom:  Brielle, do you know where this puzzle piece goes?
Brielle:  Actually, I do.

Actually, here's a little of what our monkey has been up to:

 Trying on Mom's headbands.  Love the 80's vibe.

 Climbing in Mom's suitcase.  Ready to go on a trip!

Channeling her inner diva.

 

Drinking her weight in smoothie.

Harvesting our pomegranates.  She's been waiting all summer to have a taste, and she's a fan!