Starting the Holidays...

Nick and I had a great Thanksgiving this year. We started off the day by going to Nick's grandma's house and having lunch with his family. There was delicious meatballs, appetizers, and even cheese fondue. Unfortunately, I didn't get any pictures mostly because my niece wasn't really feeling the whole picture taking thing. She was great entertainment for us though and is getting so big.

After visiting with the Hudson's we headed off to the Esslinger's for Thanksgiving dinner with my family. Andi went crazy this year coming up with great ideas to keep the kids busy and allow the adults to actually relax a little. Even she got to sit down for a minute while they watched Mickey Mouse on the projector screen...Uncle Brian is so cool. My favorite activity was going on a leaf walk with all the kids after dinner so that the dishes could get done and the kids could make a placemat with their leaves after. Here's a few pictures that I got from Andi of our leaf walk and Nick taking it easy watching football.


The next day Andi invited all the sisters over to her house to make these cool advent calenders that she found on a blog. At first it was overwhelming to have to create 24 cute little squares but once I got started I had way too much fun being crafty. Everyone's calender turned out super cute and fit their personalities. Here's a picture of mine:

I hope that everyone else had a great start to the holiday season and ate just as much as we did.

Part Wolverine

It's been a week since Nick's surgery so it was time for his first post-op appointment and apparently my husband might be part Wolverine. It went so well! The doctor said that he was amazed at how well his knee was healing and how little swelling there was. He can already straighten it which I'm told can take some people a couple of weeks. He also has excellent range of motion (can bend his knee 90 degrees) and was told that he could probably start driving and working out with the stationary bike by next week. My husband is pretty much amazing.

Knee BEFORE the surgery

Some AFTER pictures
(one week after surgery)

Prepping For Surgery

In preparation for Nick's knee surgery tomorrow morning I did the thing that ever wife does before their husband is going to be incapicated for a while: made Chex muddy buddys! He's been wanting them for awhile and I thought that since he wasn't going to have much mobility it would be nice to have something delicious easily at hand...and I don't hate having them readily available for me either.

Also a couple weeks ago Nick went and bought us a bedroom set! He practically picked it out all by himself. I didn't actually see it in person before he purchased it so I was excited to finally see it and be sure that it actually fit into our apartment. Lucky for us it fits, it's beautiful and it came just in time for Nick and Chad to put it together tonight. Chad brought Bri over with him so we played in all the boxes and with the styrofoam while the boys worked hard putting everything together...who needs real toys when you have styrofoam and boxes? Bonus: Now Nick has an awesome new grown up bed to rest in!

Styrofoam Stairs

Working Hard

Almost finished project (the dresser didn't have the hardware yet, but it's still beautiful)

Hopefully everything goes smoothly tomorrow and Nick can start healing and begin working toward the CHP again. Wish us luck!

All Things Halloween...

We started preparing for Halloween on Monday by carving pumpkins with our friends for family home evening. With a pumpkin for everyone it looked like a small pumpkin patch in Erin's kitchen. We had a lot of fun taking out the pumpkin guts and then later Erin cooked up the seeds for everyone to enjoy. The best part of the night though was when we decided to take pictures with our pumpkins and Nick actually put pumpkin guts in his mouth to match his pumpkin. It was gross and awesome. Erin took the picture so if you want to see it check out her blog.

On Friday was the Fall Festival at my work where we all dress up including the kids and just do a lot of different fun activities (making lollipop ghost, frankenstein cards, etc...) Here some silly pictures of me and the awesome ladies I work with.

Unfortunately Friday after work was the end of celebrating for me. I spent most of Halloween in bed with strep throat...so not cool. I'm feeling a little better now but I'm sad that I missed all the cuteness of seeing my nephews and niece dressed up. I did get to see my niece Braelynn on TV that morning on Good Day Sacramento though and that was awesome. I hope everyone else had a great halloween.