NATHAN!

Nathan just walked halfway across our living room by himself!!!!! WAHOO!!!! He took a few steps on his own in the kitchen this morning (which he does every now and then when he thinks I'm not watching), but apparently, he's feeling a lot more inclined to actually begin walking! I've got a feeling we may have a walkin' boy by Christmas! Oh, I could cry, I'm so proud of him!

Aiden the Artist

Aiden's preschool recently had their annual auction to raise money for the school, which is a big part of how they can keep the cost of tuition so low (they were able to raise $21,000 in one evening). We pay as much for his tuition per month as others charge per week.
Anyway, Aiden's class created a Jackson Pollock painting and donated it to the auction. I was able to help in the class on two of the days that they were working on the painting and it was so adorable to see these 2 and 3 year olds create this painting. The painting sold for $175. I thought it would be fun to have, but then I thought that it would be cheaper for us for me to purchase some blank canvases myself and have Aiden do some paintings on his own. That way, it's all him and I could choose the colors that I wanted.

So on Wednesday, I took a trip to the art store after I dropped Aiden off at school and spent a total of $15 on everything we needed. Much better than $175! Then yesterday, once Nathan went down for his nap, I got everything out and Aiden spent a little over an hour making me a wonderful painting that I am so happy to be able to put up on our very large walls. John was skeptical about this idea at first, but now we're both excited to have Aiden paint some more!

I bought two medium canvases and pushed them together during painting, so that they flow, but they will be two different paintings when placed slightly apart on the wall.

Taking a break to let the black dry. No, that's not paint on his mouth. We snacked on Oreos while waiting. :^)

Moving on to the red and white.

Having SO much fun!!

And this is our finished product! John and I were joking last night that we need to have Aiden do more and then we can open an eBay store and call it 'Aiden's Abstracts'. Hey, it could pay for his college education!

Hooray for Thanksgiving grazing

Most people probably wouldn't be pleased about this, but I am happy to say that I gained two pounds over the Thanksgiving weekend!! WOOHOO!!! I'm very thankful that I've been able to keep myself at a healthier weight than I did while nursing Aiden. And I'm thankful for family who completely supports my constant snacking and cheers me on when I take a 2nd piece of pumpkin pie with so much whipped cream on it that you can't even see the pie anymore. I'm now confident that as Nathan stops nursing sometime early next year, I'll be able to pop back up to a "normal" weight very quickly.

What is that feeling?

That feeling was relaxation. I'm not joking when I say we returned home and said to each other, "I feel different. What am I feeling?". It took about 20 minutes to realize that we were, in all it's glory, relaxed. Things have been so overwhelming lately that we had forgotten how to let it all go for a while. We escaped to the coast to spend time with family who we very much miss throughout the year and we were able to forget about everything to do with daily life at home.

We started Thanksgiving close to home with John's Martin grandparents. I think we all felt especially thankful this year after John's grandfather had such a rough summer with his health. John's Uncle Dan was able to join us from Florida this year and it's always nice to see him, since he rarely gets out this way.

Friday morning, we packed up and headed towards Tillamook. We were joining John's Minthorne side of the family at Twin Rocks. Everyone had gathered there for Thanksgiving, so we were latecomers, but I am so happy we made the decision to join everyone. We took Aiden down to the beach as soon as we arrived, as he had his rain boots and had spent the whole drive talking about the beach. Friday was spent chatting, eating, and playing games. John's cousin Jeff works at the camp there and was able to let us in to the shelter game area, where the kids could run freely inside and everyone could play whatever they wanted in terms of pingpong, air hockey, foosball, basketball...you get the idea. John and I got fairly competitive over air hockey and I walked away with three bruised knuckles, a dented fingernail, and a very sore right shoulder.

Saturday brought my 25th birthday and much more time with family. A little before noon, we all decided to take a trip to the Tillamook cheese factory. Aiden loved watching the packaged boxes of cheese go up, up, up the conveyor to get shipped to stores. We had some yummy samples and bought ourselves some "squeaky cheese". We also had some Tillamook ice cream and while Aiden's ended up in his lap on the way back to the beach house, I think it was worth it.
We played more games that afternoon, gave Aiden some more beach time, and I got in a little bit of reading while Nathan napped. We had a very delicious dinner of ham and potatoes, which both boys LOVED. But little Grace seemed to want tacos instead. :^) I was treated to a yummy birthday cake and had to take three breaths to blow out all my candles.
Later that evening, we played some new games and had an absolute blast with the last game of the evening after the kids went to bed. It was just a very good day.

Saturday morning was a little less relaxed as everyone was packing up to go home, but we got some fun family time down on the beach before we all left. It was sad to leave, but I left with the hope that this will become a regular Thanksgiving tradition. There were many who couldn't join us over the weekend, so maybe next year.

The highlight from the weekend that I will not soon forget are....shoes of peace, what pomegranates REALLY symbolized, Scotland Yard (we totally bought it online last night, by the way!), Hannah taking the role of Mr X very seriously, Grace wanting tacos, Nathan walking when my back was turned, and Aiden's connection with sneaker waves.

Here are some photos from our weekend. They are in no particular order and the link to this post will take you to an online photo album with MANY more pictures. Click on any photo to enlarge. Enjoy!