Thanksgiving Week

I am so incredibly thankful for everything that God has blessed me with. I couldn't even imagine my life without my wonderful husband, my sweet little girls, our extended families, and all our friends. We are so lucky to live in a free country where we can worship the Lord how we want when we want. Ryan and I have a beautiful home and lots of nice things. I could go on and on listing all the gifts God has given us...but I won't :). I'll just make it simple and say Thank You Jesus!

Now for a quick update on our week:

Saturday
Nick, Annie and their kiddos flew in from Texas last Saturday. We were so excited for them to be here for the holiday. For Ryan's mom's birthday in August we gifted her professional grand kid photos, so on Saturday afternoon Corrie Kraft came over for a photo session. Let's just say it's not exactly easy to get four little kiddos to all cooperate for photos! It was actually pretty hilarious. Even if they weren't all happy the whole time, they all looked super cute and I'm sure we got some good shots. After the photo shoot we had dinner at Ryan's mom and dad's with a bunch of other family members. Cameron was a trooper, she stayed up until almost 11pm that night.

Cameron hanging out in her jammies at Papa and Mimi's house

Sunday

We went to brunch with the whole fam on Sunday afternoon. It's so much fun to get Cameron and Cole together now because they have so much fun. They had a great time being silly at the restaurant. Then on Sunday night we got a sitter for all the kiddos (minus Sydney) because we had a special little outing planned...a surprise party for Annie's 30th Birthday! She was completely surprised since her birthday isn't for another two weeks.

 Cameron and Cole being silly at lunch

 Cameron and Cole holding hands as they walked out of the restaurant...so cute!

Annie, Courtney (Annie's good childhood friend), and me when we walked into the surprise party

Monday

We celebrated my wonderful husband's birthday on Monday. I had the fam over for a birthday dinner at our house. On the menu: Abo's pizza and carrot cake... some of Ryan's favorites.

Tuesday

Tuesday the girls and I hit the store to get groceries for Thanksgiving dinner. I wanted to get it done a little early so that I didn't have to fight any crowds.

Wednesday

Annie taught me to make the super cute bows. I'm so excited that I know how to do them now. Cameron and Sydney are going to have bows to match every outfit! I love it. After bow making it was home to start prepping for Thanksgiving dinner. Ryan and Nick went to the Avs game on Wednesday night, so it was just me and the girls getting the food ready. Cameron actually "helped" with ripping the bread for the stuffing and a few other things. I love that she is getting old enough to participate in holidays. It's so much fun.

Thursday

Turkey Day! Yay! Ryan and I got the turkey ready and then we took the girls to the park for a little while before we needed to get everything else ready for dinner. Ryan's family and Jenna all came over for our Thanksgiving feast. I think we did pretty well for it being our first time to host Thanksgiving dinner. My tummy was definitely happy.

 Getting the bird ready

Cameron chillin' watching the Macy's day parade

 Jenna and Sydney

Ryan, Annie and the grub

 Nick and Annie's sweet family

 The closest thing we got to a family picture

Daddy and Cameron

Sydney swinging while we ate

 Finley hanging out on the blanket

 Cameron and Cole playing with Uncle Nick

Uncle Nick and Cameron

Friday

Friday we had a little family day. Ryan and I took Cameron and Sydney to see The Muppet movie. It was so much fun. Sydney pretty much slept the whole time and Cameron LOVED it. After the movie we went to a pizza place for lunch and then ran into REI for a little bit. By the time we got into the car to head home, Cameron was pooped. She zonked out right away. Friday night we got together with a whole bunch of Ryan's family again. Brady and Kinsley were there so again, Cameron had a bunch of kiddos to play with.

Walking into the movie theater

 Getting ready for the movie to start

In the hall after the movie

 Saying hi to Alvin in the lobby of the movie theater

 Lunch at the pizza shop

Tired girl

Saturday

We had lunch with Nick and Annie before they left for the airport and then we came home and everyone took naps. We were all pretty exhausted from a busy week. Ryan also gave Sydney her first bottle on Saturday evening. She was great. She took it without any problems and drank almost the entire thing.  

 I love that Sydney has started to smile! So sweet.

Drinking her first bottle

Sunday

Today we got to go to Cameron's friend Mason's 2nd birthday party. Cameron had a blast playing with all the other kids, eating snack mix and ice cream, and helping Mason open his presents. (Yeah that's right, she got right in the middle of everything and started opening presents with the birthday boy. Good thing he's a nice kid! At least we know she's going to get into Christmas this year.)

Now it's back to our normal schedule for a couple weeks. Thank goodness! We absolutely love having family around, but we are always so busy when everyone is here that it's kind of nice to slow down a little bit afterwards.

   

This and That

I'm back to running again. I was officially cleared by the doctor yesterday at my 6 week follow up appointment, but I cheated a little and went for a couple runs last week. It's nice to get out again, even if I am slow and my body hurts. Tuesday Cameron spent the morning with Mimi, so I bundled Sydney up and we hit the road. I thought she looked really cute all bundled up in the stroller, so before we left the house I grabbed the camera for a few quick shots. After all, I need to keep up with the ungodly amount of photos we took of Cameron when she was a new baby. :)  

I had to get a picture of this. Cameron is so great with Sydney. This particular day she was helping cheer Sydney up when she was crying by giving her a pacifier and saying "Sydney, it's ok", very cute! (Don't mind the fact that she smothered her while giving her the pacifier, HA!)

This just makes my heart melt. What a good daddy!

Last Saturday, we got to go to Cameron's little friend Madi's first birthday party. Madi is super cute and Cameron had a blast playing..and eating ice cream at the party.

We're going to be celebrating Thanksgiving with the Volks this year, so we had an early Thanksgiving celebration with my parents. I don't really have any pictures of Sydney with Superop, so we got a few really cute ones. My sister made that hat for Sydney.

And of course we had to get some pictures of Cameron and Bullseye. (Side note: Bullseye is on his last leg...I noticed that he's close to breaking like Freddy did. Yikes, we might be in trouble if both Freddy AND Bullseye bite the dust!)

Ryan's Aunt and Uncle were in town last weekend from North Dakota so we got to spend some time with that part of the family. Cameron had a blast playing with her cousins (or second cousins...or something like that) Brady and Kinsley. I love that she can play with other kids so well now.



Our Beautiful Girls

I'm definitely bias, but we have the most beautiful, sweet girls in the entire world! Ryan and I are so lucky. The photos of Cameron are from a photo shoot we did with her in August and the photos of Sydney are from a few weeks ago.  

Cameron Brianne 

Sydney Kate



Sisters

At first I thought Cameron and Sydney looked exactly the same. However, now that Sydney is getting bigger you can totally tell she is her own little person...but you can definitely tell they're sisters! Here's a few pictures so you can compare and decide for yourself.

On the day they were born...

SYDNEY

CAMERON

Going home from the hospital...

SYDNEY

CAMERON

Hanging out in the Boppy pillow...

SYDNEY

CAMERON

In the swing...

SYDNEY

CAMERON

One month old...

SYDNEY

CAMERON