Thanksgiving Feast and Christmas Wishes

Not our thanksgiving feast, Ainsley's! I decided Thanksgiving was the perfect day for her to try her first real solid food. :) In honor of the day, we started with Sweet Potatoes, for all you yam fans out there. At first she seemed a bit wary, but once she got a taste of them she was gung ho! Another step towards growing up. My little girl.




I don't know if anyone's checked out my link to Beansprout Designs, but MAN, i want one of these bags! Tom, if you are paying attention, this is the one i want :) This lady makes these amazing bags, they are super high quality fabrics, hand made, i love it. She also makes most of the really cute baby head bows you see on Ainsley. I wish I had that kind of talent, I am totally envious of people with such crafty natures and the skills to back it up. Anyway, i thought i'd share, I know every girl likes a cute bag. There's a bunch more at the site, feel free to check it out. :)

BEANSPROUT DESIGNS

Husband of the Year Award!

and the prize goes to.... Tom Christensen! for taking his wife's week long absence to clean the entire house and surprise her when she got home!!

He could have watched sports and ordered pizza, he could have slept in and done nothing.. but no! He LOVES me! He loves me and wanted to do something to make me happy! :D
He called up Kirty and asked her to give him some guidance on how to start. My clean, organized, selfless friend brought her two little kids over to my overly messy house and helped my husband get started at putting it back together. I really want to thank her as well for her amazing willingness to help us out, but she definitely wanted to make known that Tom did most of it, sometimes I guess you just need a little push to get started, i know i do.
So thank you, thank you, thank you to my wonderful husband, who worked 40+ hrs last week and still managed to give me the best surprise I've had in years. My house feels so warm and welcoming. I feel like I have a fresh start and am excited to get on with Holiday plans without that dark cloud hanging over me.

My Tom is such a sweet thoughtful guy, I know I don't acknowledge often enough how much he does for me and Ainsley. He works so hard, but still has time to brighten our days with his warm silly nature. He makes my life interesting, and makes me feel safe wherever we are. Thanks honey, I love you!

Over the River and thru the Woods....

to grandmother's house we go!

This week we went to see the country side of the family, lol. My mom, Kelly, Matt, JaNae and Gavin all live in the same small town. :) It had been a while since my mom and Ainsley had seen each other, and I couldn't wait until Christmas to get them together, so I picked a week and decided to sneak down. The weekends have become harder and harder to get away, when we leave on a weekend it feels like we don't get any days off really, and since we've been teaching our primary class we feel guilty each time we aren't there. So, since Tom works a lot during the week, and didn't really need to go anyway, Ainsley and I took off by ourselves.

It was really fun to see the cousins interact with each other. Gavin's a step ahead of Ainsley, crawling all over and starting to pull himself up and trying to stand by himself. Ainsley was fascinated by him! :) She was staring and smiling at him all weekend. I'm not sure what he thought of her, at time it seemed he was a bit jealous of this new person in his territory, but I think he really did want to play with her, and just didn't realize how much more powerful than her he was, lol. (check out the video)

It was great to see everyone and spend some time down south. I miss those guys so much, and I know Ainsley and Grandma Cinda miss each other more than either can say. Love ya guys! See you at Christmas! LOVE!

Best Buds

Three Unhappy Babies (hehe)

Hangin' with Grandpa Kelly

Ok, I will succumb to the Tagging.

This one is a list of 6 little known facts about me.. hmm..

1. I brush my teeth in the shower. Tom thinks this is ridiculous and yucky. I like it cuz I can be as messy as i want to be, lol.

2. I've been engaged twice. The time before Tom was at 18 and stupid. SO glad I didn't go thru with that. But it is how i met my wonderful Thomas, so i can't wish it never happened.

3. I hate watermelon.. it's the texture, it's like water logged foam. ick.

4. I'm not an outdoorsy person at all, but I once went snowboarding and took rock climbing classes to impress a boy.. (spent the snowboarding on my butt, and twisted my ankle rock climbing.. guess i'm not outdoorsy for a reason!)

5. I told all my friends for years that I was allergic to coconut.. it was just easier to get out of eating it, i didn't have to make anyone feel bad or eat something i didn't like. I did eventually tell most of them.. now i say I'm allergic to coconut unless it's on shrimp.. yummm.. hehe

6. i participated in a peace rally before the war started. I like to imagine myself as a flower child hippy at heart. I wish I was more politically active now, I miss my Poli Sci major roommate, midnight discussions and keeping me up to date on what's going on.

Gingerbread House Festival

Well we had a fun outing the other day. :) Kirty and her kids and Ainsley and I went to Thanksgiving Point last week to see the Gingerbread House Festival. It was really cute, I couldn't believe how intricate some of them were. There were a couple of castles, a few trains, a couple of cute ones kids made. After looking at all of them there was an area set up to decorate cookies, it was fun to get out and even though I know she doesn't really know what's going on, and isn't really old enough to appreciate what we're doing, it's nice to show her anyway. :) I get so sad thinking of how fast she's growing up, but I try and remember all the fun things we'll get to do together as she gets older. :)