The Big Brother

Several of you have asked how Kendry responded to our pregnancy news.

We actually waited until Thanksgiving to tell him. Lucky for you, and for posterity, we caught his reaction on camera.

Please excuse our three year old for sounding a little self absorbed in the first video.

His life as an only child is about to get rocked and he hasn't a clue.

Let's try that again, shall we?

Straight from the kiddo's mouth: he wants a baby sister.

Simply Having a Wonderful Christmastime!

The exhaustion of this pregnancy is more than I recall from the last one, but I refuse to let it derail our December festivities.

Last weekend we celebrated both of our work Christmas parties. The white elephant exchange at Justin's party made me the proud new owner of reindeer antlers and a red nose that attach to your car.

It was love at first sight.

Just call me Rudolph.

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On Sunday we saw our first few snowflakes.

If this isn't proof that my husband is still a kid at heart, I don't know what is: he promptly bundled up and took Kendry outside...while the Seahawks game was on!

The snowfall was short lived, but it inspired my very own Clark Griswold to string up a few more Christmas lights.

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Earlier this week we prepared some homemade Christmas gifts: chocolate dipped candy canes.

The kiddo ate waaaay too much chocolate.

 

He dipped four candy canes and then told us he needed to go lay down because his tummy was hurting.


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On Tuesday night we had our friends Wendy and Jacob over to decorate gingerbread houses.

The boys' attention spans were pretty short, except when it came to sneaking candy into their mouths.

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Up next?

Christmas baking on Saturday with some wonderful girlfriends.

Bring on the LB's!

I don't know about you, but I'm on doctor's orders to keep gaining until June.

We'll Be Home For Christmas

No, not in Alaska, which I still fondly refer to as 'home', but our real home right here in the LC Valley.

This marks the very first year in our marriage that Justin and I will be home for Christmas.

It will be Kendry's first Christmas waking in his own bed. 

Our first Christmas around our very own tree, warmed by a fire in our very own fireplace.

Can you tell how much I am looking forward to this?

So much, in fact, that it seems to have upped my expectations for creating a perfect December for our family.

Gingerbread houses, an evening drive to view the various Christmas light displays, a baking day and the Christmas Eve candlelight service are all on the calendar.

Egg nog and hot cocoa with marshmellows are available to the kiddo on demand this month, no matter the time of day.

We're taking the time to slow down and cherish each moment, remembering the real reason of Christmas.

Google

After all, this isn't any other Christmas; this is our last Christmas as a family of three.

 

Ten on Tuesday

{1}

My new crush just happens to be my 7th anniversary gift:

And one of many reasons I'm voting Justin for Hubs of the Year 2012.

{2}

Shall I go on?

Justin put our Christmas lights on the house Sunday afternoon.

Then he made us his famous meatloaf for dinner... after he finished assembling a painting booth in the basement.

(sigh)


I love that man.

{3}

It appears that Google/Blogger is getting a little picky about photo limits. Verrrry interesting considering a fellow blogger just happened to get the same "you're out of photo storage" notice the very day I did.

Coincidence?  I think not.

I think Picasa might be my solution.



{4}
Silly me for thinking that buying my boys matching semi-automatic Nerf guns would provide them with some fun gun battles, father v. son style.

Because father v. son isn't nearly as fun as "Let's ambush mommy!"

After the initial shock and awe, I was a good sport - even when they failed to tell me the velco bullet was still sticking to my bum twenty minutes later.



{5}
Remember those red cowboy boots a friend found for Kendry a few months back?

These days they are partnered with my straw gardening hat, a/k/a Kendry's cowboy hat.

I love this kiddo's imagination, and his dancing skills.

 

{6}

Parenting Memorable Moment #522:

Teaching your kiddo how be a gracious loser.

Kendry has a memory game we've been playing as a family (Thank you again, Alex and Gisela!). Sometimes we let him win, and sometimes we don't. And other times he skunks me outright.

Either way, he is stretching his mind and his character.

{7}

We had a wonderful and relaxing Thanksgiving at my in-laws.

Kendry was by far the most relaxed:

Poor kiddo got a sick tummy after trying Go-Gurts for the first time a few hours before our holiday dinner.

{I'm curious if anyone else has had this experience with Go-Gurts. Kendry eats regular yogurt (Tillamook, Yoplait, etc.) all the time without incident. The kiddo loves yogurt. So was it just a fluke thing? I thought it might be, until he tried a Go-Gurt again on Friday and got the same sick stomach. No more Go-Gurts for him.}

{8}

Pinned it and did it!

These cookies are divine!

Get the recipe here.

{9}

I cannot eat enough clementines these days.


google

Seriously, two a day.

I feel like a walking Vitamin C advertisement.

{10}

This Week's Blessing:

My in-laws. I married into an amazing family.

Ten on Tuesday

{1}

We voted, did you?

{2}

We celebrated the hubs' 32nd birthday this weekend, complete with a visit from his parents and delicious homemade cheesecake (without incident).

Happy Birthday, Justin!

{3}

Today I am thankful for excellent brakes. I had my closest call with a deer ever on my way home tonight.

{4}

Our Halloween was pretty low key this year, as was Kendry's costume. Gone are the days where I can propose a unique costume idea and be met with toddler enthusiasm. All Kendry wants to be these days is a basketball player.

So, a basketball player he was.

I'll admit this was one of the easiest costumes to assemble because we already had everything, including some cool Converse tennis shoes that, naturally, he refused to wear. He would only wear his Vans (aka skater shoes). Even showing him a photo of 1960's basketball players wearing black Converse wouldn't convince him otherwise.

{5}

That stubbornness stems from the Gimlin genetics, I'll have you know.

{6}

A certain lucky someone gets to escape to the Great White North with her kiddo for five days in January!

 

Woop woop!

I'm not telling Kendry until the week of our departure. Two months of "Is it time to go on the plane yet?" would surely do me in.

{7}

Angel Baby: consider this your warning not to ask my kiddo over the phone if he is excited for his trip to Alaska.

{You know I love you, sis!}

{8}

Snow in the forecast for this weekend. You know I'm loving that.

{9}

Is it too early for egg nog?

{10}

This Week's Blessing:

Celebrating 7 years of married bliss this week!

Yeah, baby!

Harvest Party 2012

Our harvest party this year got a little rained out, but that didn't stop us from having a grand old time.

In anticipation for the party, my friend Wendy had the great idea to turn our orange front door into a jack-o-lantern. Genius, she is!

All it took was some black craft foam and double-sided tape.

We kicked off the party with the pumpkin carving. Here are a few of the masterpieces:

After some hot cider and delicious snacks, including jello worms and mummy hot-dogs, we took the kiddos outside for some games.

This year we added a potato sack race to the festivities. By the way, if you're ever in search of burlap sacks such as these, check out your local farm/feed store. Amazon wanted $20 for four; I got these locally for $1.50 each. (Thanks to my big sis for the great tip!)

We weren't sure how the kids would do so we made the race track pretty short on the first race.

Too short, in fact.

They were done in no time.

Kendry had a ball.

Kacen missed the starting gun on the first race, but he sure loved watching the older kids finish.

The second (longer) race resulted in a wipeout or two.

Time for apple-bobbing!

Kacen knew just what to do on this game.

Each of the kiddos received a goodie bag and a jack-o-lantern smile (thank you, Pinterest!).

Getting a photo of all the kiddos together proved easier said than done, but we managed to round most of them up.

 

A big thank you to all our friends who joined us for our 2nd annual harvest party! See you again next year!

HAPPY FALL FROM THE GIMLINS!

Ten on Tuesday

{1}

Some outlying areas around us are on snow watch this week. I would totally be embracing this soon-to-be-winter chill if we weren't hosting our harvest party this weekend.

Chilly or not, its gonna be fabulous!

{2}

Speaking of the party, I did some shopping for supplies this week.

Who knew ranch and feed stores were so fun to browse?


It makes me wanna be cowgirl when I grow up.

{3}

Three cheers for the hubs who ran a 5k in the chilly wind last Saturday!

{4}

Kendry and I were bystanders this time around. We treated ourselves to some hot cocoa, a pretty walk by the river, and the luxury of watching the finish line from the comfort of the warm car.

{5}

Got our ballots in the mail this week.

I really miss going to the actual polls.


 

{6}

Oh, the simpler times...when the kiddo wasn't old enough to voice his opinion on a Halloween costume. This morning I mentioned how he was going to be a basketball player, to which he responded he didn't want to be a basketball player. He wants to be a power ranger.

Or maybe Batman.

And then Spiderman.

How's a mom to keep up?


 

{7}

I am greatly anticipating our first fire in the fireplace this weekend.

Mmmmm, toasty!

 

{8}
Working on the Christmas budget this week. I refuse to be caught on December 1st with no shopping accomplished.

{9}

Kendry has taken the 24/7 question stage to a new level. Now he asks for a play by play of every. single. day.

Kendry: "When we get home from school, then what?"

 Me: "Dinner."

Kendry: "And what after dinner?"

Me: "Cubbies."

Kendry: "And what after Cubbies?"

Me: "Bedtime."

Kendry: "And what after bedtime?"


You get the point.

I am seriously considering getting him a daily planner.


 

{10}

This Week's Blessing:
One heck of a chef for a hubs, who not only makes me delicious breakfast burritos upon request but also makes potatoes o'brien from scratch.

I love my personal chef!

A Little Organization Never Hurt Anyone

Let's not dwell on the fact that its taking me for-eh-ver to truly finish my guest room.

Instead, let's focus on the positive. Progress, however little or slow, is still progress.

And in order to really make progress on the guest room (aka my craft room) I needed to add some storage space.

I found two built-in cabinets at our Habitat store last winter. I used the first one in our basement to organize my paint and supplies.

The second one started out like this:

Now, if you recall, our guest room already holds a king size bed, not to mention a few other finished pieces like my desk, piano bench and nightstand. As much as I wanted to add storage to this room, I knew I needed the piece to blend in so it didn't crowd the room too much.

My solution?  I painted the entire shelf the same color as the walls (Fleeting Green) and finished off the bottom with white baseboard. In a sense, I tried to make it resemble a built-in again. 

Except it needed a little more Jody, so I coated the back of the shelves with a green/white floral contact paper I found at the $1 store.

The top of the built-in was unfinished when I purchased it, so I threw some natural colored wood slats on top.

I also kept some of the original hardware for added character.



Before:

After:





Everyone crafts better in an organized space.