Happy Thanksgiving!

We hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving! We certainly did. We hosted 10 adults and 9 children at our house for Thanksgiving. It was a little crazy to say the least but we wouldn't have had it any other way. Everyone came over for lunch around 11am and we started in on the first round of our feast. Since everyone has children they all left to take naps and returned again around 4pm for some more fun, fellowship, and food. We had a 23 pound turkey that was almost completely devoured and surprisingly not that many leftovers. We are already planning on how we will have this exact meal again at Christmas! We have so much to give thanks for this year. We praise God for all his blessings.

The wonderful feast!

The kiddos ready for some food!

This was supposed to be our Christmas card this year until we decided to scrap it since Zeb looks like he is zoning out. He was actually pretty sick with what we think is an ear infection.

The boys and the destruction zone!

The girls are taking a rest from the action.

My Sweet Zeb is 18 months!

My sweet Zeb is 18 months and has been for a while but I am just now getting around to writing this post. He will be 19 months on Sunday. I just love this age. He is so sweet and fun and brings so much joy to my day. He is learning new things everyday. One day about a week or so ago he woke up and started trying to repeat words that we say. He even has a certain "language" he uses when he tries to speak like the locals. It is so funny! He loves to laugh when we are laughing even if he has no idea what we are laughing about. He just wants to join in on the fun. At the same time, he loves to cuddle and is very affectionate. When I ask him to say I love you he just gives me a kiss. He is all boy in so many ways. Zeb, this post is for you little man. I love you so much!

Train rides and other things.

I realized that my last couple of posts have been about sickness so I plan to write one more post about sickness and then move on with another topic. Since my last post Kayleigh has thrown up again! Really?! I am starting to expect to clean up throw up once a week now. John and I are starting to think that it might be a food allergy and not just virus after virus. We are going to make a food diary to figure this whole thing out. I am praying that she will not get sick this week because I am hosting a ton of people at my house on Thursday for Thanksgiving.

While I was sick a couple of weeks ago Kayleigh and Zeb spent the afternoon riding the train. Their little friend Brennen had a success party for potty training and invited them to come along. I wish I could have been there to see Zeb's reaction. We haven't ridden the train since he was little. He loves trains now and talks about them often. John said that he had the most fun playing with the rocks in the train yard while they waited on the train to arrive. Looking at these pictures I am reminded of the warm weather. We have been freezing this past week but it is looking like we might have a nice warm Thanksgiving.

If you look closely you can see the drool coming out of Zeb's mouth. Maybe it was due to pure excitement!

Brennen the guest of honor.

On the upward slope!

Well, I am feeling much better now however right when I started feeling better Kayleigh and Zeb got the stomach virus AGAIN! I am pretty sure this is the third time they have gotten it since September. I have decided that all the sickness is due to Kayleigh going to pre-school. She is bringing home all these new germs we have never been exposed to before. The good news is that when Zeb starts school he will hardly ever get sick since Kayleigh has been kind enough to share all the germs with him. In other news winter arrived today without any warning. Yesterday, John and I were talking about how beautiful the weather was and how nice fall as been here this year. John and I both miss the fall in America out of all the other seasons. It has been a nice blessing to have such a beautiful fall. Today it was freezing and the high was 60 degrees. Tonight the low is going to be 45 degrees. Where did the fall go? I guess it is time to get out the layers and tell Kayleigh that she can not wear her flip flops any more. She was still wearing them in the afternoons when it was warm. She would wear flip flops everyday of the year if I let her. Today she told me that it was not too cold to wear her flip flops. I politely disagreed!

Sickness Abounds!

This past weekend I went a way for a mom's conference. It was wonderful and a much needed break for me. I enjoyed tons of fellowship with some very treasured friends. John, Kayleigh and Zeb survived without me and were all very happy to see me on Sunday afternoon. I was also very happy to see them. Just when I felt like I was getting back into the groove of things I woke up yesterday morning feeling a little achy and tired. I didn't get a lot of sleep during the mom's conference because I chose to talk instead of sleep so I just thought it was the fact that I needed to catch up on some much needed sleep. Oh no, yesterday evening I started running a high fever and felt like I was dying. I think that I have the flu! To make things worse we had already planned for John's teacher and her family to come over for dinner. I barely made it through dinner and putting the kids to bed. I basically sat on the couch and tried to look like I had it together. John and his teacher washed the dishes! I couldn't believe my guest was washing the dishes but inside I was SO thankful. As soon as they left at 8pm I went straight to bed. I have spent most of the day in the bed or on the couch. I feel good when I am full of Tylenol but as soon as it wears off I feel like death again. I am praying that this will not last long and praying more that my kids don't get it.
In the last month or two I feel like all we have been doing is battling sickness. We will have one good week and one bad. We have battled two rounds of the throw up virus. One of those rounds was topped with Zeb having a really bad cough and cold. The cough he still has and it has been a month! So if you can't tell I'm done with sickness in my house. I am ready for us all to be well for a long period of time. I am praying for that anyways!

B is for Bus

Lately, I have been trying to teach Kayleigh the letters of the alphabet. We usually do a letter or two a week. Along with talking about the letters I try to come up with some activity or fun thing to do that starts with that letter. A couple of weeks ago we were studying the letter B and I thought it would be fun to ride the double decker bus with her. Kayleigh and Zeb had a blast. We rode on the top right in front so they could see everything. I actually enjoyed it to because for the first part of the ride it wasn't too crowded and it was nice to see a different view of the city. Zeb goes crazy over buses when we see them on the street so he was especially excited to ride.

Our New Ride!

We decided about two months ago that it was time to purchase an electric bike. The traffic in our city has become increasingly worse over the years so it takes twice as long to get any where in our city now. We can ride in the bike lane with our electric bike which means that we can get places a lot faster and we also feel the freedom to go more as a family. So to be honest this ride isn't as new to us but it has taken me a long time to get a picture of us on the bike. Kayleigh and Zeb love riding! A note for the grandparents, Zeb is actually strapped to me with a baby carrier so he is safe and secure!