Surprise!

Nate turned the big 3-0 a few weeks ago and I threw him a surprise party. I still can't believe I pulled it all off...he had no idea! Here were the invites I made for the par-tay:

So I got him out of the house by asking him to run a few errands for me that would take a couple hours to do. Then he stopped by my brother and sister-in-law's house to "help them plan the building of their garage shelves". (Thanks again E'Shell!) She kept him there until I texted her and said we were ready. Then I disabled the garage door (by pressing the "lock" button), so he had to come in the front door. We crammed over 30 people in our front room and waited for him to walk in. Funny thing was, I always have the front door locked, so he didn't even try to open it. He knocked, Claire knocked, they rang the doorbell...so finally we just opened the door, turned on the lights and yelled "Surprise!" He was shocked! Here's the sequence of pics (take note of Claire's face - she seems so confused and slowly starts to catch on to what's happening)...








This is the only pic I got of the party...its hard being hostess and photographer at the same time...


Thanks again to everyone who came! We have such wonderful friends.

Happy birthday Nate...I hope it was a memorable one!

Love and Logic

I keep meaning to write a post about the Love and Logic parenting class I took. It has truly changed the way Nate and I parent. We took the class from a girl in our neighborhood who is a certified Love and Logic instructor. She is amazing! She is so patient and is an excellent teacher. Before we started the class, we were kind of unsure if we were taking it too soon. Claire was only 16 months at the time. I cannot tell you how glad we are that we did. Now we have a parenting style we are both comfortable with, just in time for when we need to start giving Claire real boundaries. I learned so much about having empathy for Claire and giving choices. I've also learned to give away some of the control...at least when its on small decisions! :) I definitely feel more confident as a parent.

If you can't tell, I loved this class. If you live in this area, I highly recommend taking it! Click here to see Angie's Love and Logic blog.

3AM

...the time I got home last night. Probably the time most women got home last night. Twilight was awesome (even for the second time!).

Went to dinner first at the SkyBox where we had our own room...


Some of us in the theater...


Becky and I with our "Bitten" shirts


Then I just had to share this picture of when my mom, Claire and I waited in the line for the premiere...for 3.5 hours. Can you tell Claire was ready to go?

I'm off to take a nap!

Ahhhh...Edward

I went with my mom and sisters to

PREMIERE of
TWILIGHT

last night!! Just know that it DOES NOT disappoint. You will be more in love with Edward that you ever have been before. I can't wait for tomorrow to go with my girls to the midnight showing! Woo hoo!

"More more movie Claire?"

This is what I hear at least 15 times a day, every day. "More, more movie Claire?" She loves to watch home videos of herself, so we'll pull up the blog a couple times a day and watch her videos. I once asked her if she wanted to watch a movie of Claire and that's how it started. Well, to keep my sanity, I'm posting another "movie" so that we can have something new to watch.
Here is Claire, reading her favorite book, "Jesus book".

She has four books like this and has to read at least one a night.

Also, here are some more of her 18-month photos:

He he he...the face she makes when you tell her to smile.

Eighteen months

No way. I am once again dumbfounded by the speed at which time passes. Why is it that when you are younger all you want is for time to pass quickly so you can be older? Then once you are older, you want time to stop. Claire is officially 18 months old. I'm still not sure how I feel about it, but I'm attempting to come to grips with it.

I'm hoping to do her official photo shoot tomorrow (puh-lease...no snow!), so I'll post those pics soon. For now, here are some snap shots in the front yard.

And here's my little ladybug. We went trick or treating at a rehabilitation center just up the street and by the time we finished that, Claire had a ton of candy and was exhausted! So we changed her into her PJs and she helped pass out candy the rest of the night.

Pumpkin, pumpkin, who's got the pumpkin?

We headed up to Pack's Pumpkin Patch in Farmington this week. Of course, we chose the coldest day of the week to go. I only brought a light jacket for Claire and the poor girl was freezing. Nonetheless, a good time was had. Here she is being ever so careful, as always, not to fall.

Can you see the purple lips?? Bad mom.

Claire's cute friend Chloe (Ashlee wins the most prepared mom award...love the jester hat!)

Claire and me

One of my new favorite pictures ever. Boys tend to be more reckless than girls, don't they?

Drew after the fall

They loved being pushed around in the cart.

We had to get this picture. Props to Angie for keeping them both in place behind there!

We definitely need to make this a yearly tradition.

All right...

So a few weeks ago when Claire was eating breakfast I said, "All right Claire!" and she loved it. She kept saying, "more, more" and made me say it over and over. Well, ever since that day, Claire says "all right" to everything. "All right Daddy!" (her favorite), "All right toast!", "All right bow!", "All right bye bye!". Everything is preceded with "all right". I had to document...

Oh yeah...

If this doesn't make you all tingly with excitement to see the Twilight movie, I don't know what will...



Woah.
I CANNOT WAIT FOR NOVEMBER 21!!

Who doesn't love a carnival?

A couple weeks ago we went to this really great carnival at Wheeler Farm. It had everything a kid dreams of...tons of blow-up slides and toys, a train, cotton candy, face painting, etc. A kid's own personal heaven.

Claire and Drew waiting in line...

Jumping in the Bouncing Room. I never got a photo of her on the big slide, but she loved it.

I attempted to get a pic of the star on her cheek and butterfly on her arm, but this was a good as it got.

Here is Claire waiting for the train ride to begin. It was so funny to see her sitting in her own little car, all grown up...she looks a little confused.

She giggled and smiled for the first half of the ride, but then somehow managed to push the little bar away from her body and started to fall. Luckily, the conductor saw too and let me jump in with her. Then she liked it again.

I try to do a photo shoot with Claire once a month...here are a few of my favorites from her 16-month shoot.

She was trying to be funny in this one...

Love this one. On her toes. Always on her toes.