Two Days Late

So I know this is early to say anything, and last month I was two days late too, but I'm just so anxious!  I feel like I can't think about anything else.  We've been "trying" for a baby for a couple months now, since we finally both agreed that it felt like the right time.  So not long, but it still kills me every time I am late!  I'm sure it will feel like the end of the world if I do start.  That's okay, I'm pretty used to that.  With most of my pregnancies I have had a "false alarm" of sorts.  Where I am thinking/feeling like I am pregnant, then I'm late, and then I start just when I finally convince myself that I am.  It usually ends in tears.  I am always ready for another baby, and always anxious for them to come in those circumstances.  I have always felt like it was a chance to see just how I really would react to the news.  And at first I thought it was a way for Heavenly Father to know how I really felt, then after the obvious realization, came to the conclusion that it was more about me finding out how I felt myself.  But this last time, it occurred to me that maybe it's so that the sweet little Spirit who is choosing to come can know just how anxious I am.  I like that idea the best :).  I hope that whoever comes next (whether they are on their way or not) knows how anxious I am (and their dad for that matter!  I've never seen Nate this anxious this early on....).  I hope they hear our prayers for them to want to come, and for us to make our home worthy of them.  I love preparing a home for a new baby.  I love all that it entails.  The pregnancy part is not my favorite, but I think it's easier to handle when you think about the way it feels to NOT be pregnant when you want to be.  Ultimately it is up to the Lord.  He decides.  And whether I think it's time for a new baby or not, I need to put it all in the Lord's hands.  We've done our part, and will do our part, He will have to do the rest and it will have to be in His time.  He always knows what's best and things always go better when they happen in His time.  It's just being patient I guess.  So anyway.  My ramblings on the  matter :).

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas at our house!

Monday night was our big put up the Tree FHE.  We LOVE this one.  We did all our usual traditions with a picture of everyone with their ornament from Grandma Hatch.  She's given all the kids a "first Christmas" ornament with their birth year on it, so those are special ones.  I couldn't decide which picture to post.  I always like a few of the kids in one and the other few in another.... too bad I can't just be easy to please :)

This felt like the first time for Erika all over again.  I think she felt that too.  And it was fun that we could decorate the bottom half of our tree again!  She really got into it and acted like such a big girl the whole time.

Noah had a good time too, and felt relatively new at all of this as well.

Charity had fun helping the little ones a lot.  She also took a picture of every ornament she put up with her newly found camera.  That was fun to watch :)  

I liked how well it went this year.  Usually seems lots more chaotic.  Everyone waited their turn for the most part and I was able to unpack all of the ornaments in a relatively orderly fashion.  That is priceless in my opinion.  I was surprised at how few ornaments we had this year.... I mean, I guess I shouldn't say few, we have too many, but it's a lot less than past years.  I think we had a lot more casualties last year than I remembered, being that it was a hard floor and all.... anyway, I guess they can't last forever!

Bradley struggled a little this year, with wanting to be able to do more than I was letting him do.  So I put him in charge of one of the boxes of ornaments and let him pass them out with the hooks.  He did a great job.

Look at this adorable face :)

I let Nate man the camera this year.... he does some fun stuff.  This was my favorite.

This is one of our traditions that just kind of snuck up on us :).  We take turns putting the angel on the top.  It was Noah's turn this year.  I had to go check the blog to be sure, I couldn't remember, but he was so excited, and was very honored.  Charity did a drumroll and videotaped it all with her camera, so it must be special to her too :).  Fun stuff.

This is our other one... the Holiday Specs!  Still just so cool!

Here's our beautiful overdressed tree :)  We love it and that's all that matters :)  I know I'll miss the randomness of this tree one day... I just know it.

It was fun to put our stockings up again this year!  I love them so much more than the old ones!  It looks like so many when they're all strung up like that :)  I love it.  We went in birth month order this year.  Noah, Luke, Charity, Kelly, Nate, Bradley, Erika, and Me.  Fun stuff.

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas at the Maynes' house!!!!!  YAY!!!

Luke for Thanksgiving

Usually the Kindergarteners get to have a Thanksgiving feast where they eat all the fixins at school in the cafeteria and it's all cool and they feel all grown up eating at school.  Well, this year they didn't get to do that because of something with SEP conferences (none of it really made sense to me and seemed like a poor excuse, but that's beside the point :) ), so they just had a little snack feast in their classroom instead.  But we were relieved to see that he still got to make the cool little paper headdress and the fun pasta necklace.  

I guess they're going to do the school lunch thing later in the Spring, but anyway, doesn't he look adorable!  I think my favorite thing he was thankful for was his back pack :).  

He's in his pajamas because that was when I finally managed to go through his back pack :)

Thanksgiving.

Thanksgiving was a nice day.  I think I made it a little more stressful than it needed to be, but we remained calm through it all :).  Nate had to work during the day, and the night before, so he wasn't there to help with the millions of rolls I had to make.  And it would have gone more smoothly if I'd left the bread maker out of it (as I found out the morning of).  I messed up a couple dozen rolls, but the rest were decent.  I think I ended up with about 8 dozen.  Kinda crazy.  That's the most I've ever made at one time.  It's flattering though, to know that Nate's Mom likes them, requests them, and openly compliments me (probably too much :) ) when I make them.  Makes staying up til 3:00 am all worth it.

So the morning was (as you can guess) hectic, with me making rolls and no Nate to supervise.  The kids were kinda nuts.  We managed to get ready though, and out of the house with 8 dozen rolls, and a pie by 12:30.  We had plans to go down to Heidi's to hang out for a little, maybe go out for a bite to eat.  

The drive down was nice and pleasant, but when we got there, the hungry little people were a lot harder to deal with when we realized there were no fast food (or even NOT fast food) places open because of the lovely eating holiday.  That was a bummer.  We broke out a bag of the rolls, and snacked on those a little while we played Bananagrams with Heidi.  That was fun.  Until Erika freaked out all over the place.  She was clearly tired and hungry.  The rest of the kids were in and out, on the playground, opening and shutting Heidi's door.... whatever else they could think of, and we left in a tizzy to go up to Nate's parents'.  I hate when we're like that around Heidi because we don't get to see her enough for her to feel like they're not always like that.  Oh well.

So we got to Nate's parents' house at about 4:00, just before Nate got there (thanks to my Mom we were able to drive separately and make the visit to Heidi's).  The dinner was lovely, didn't feel as cramped as I remember it feeling in the past, in the old house.  But either way, it's always nice to be with everyone.  

My favorite part about Thanksgiving is sitting around afterwards.  And I took full advantage of it this year. 

I loved watching everyone.  I'm a people watcher.  The kids all played games, played outside, Nate made the rounds and talked with everyone.  It was a good time.  I loved the hour or so where Nate was holding our niece Maryn's new little baby boy.  He looks so good with a baby in his arms!  And even better with two :).  Erika just had to get closer to the baby.  Yes, she still LOVES babies.  It's quite the obsession actually.  But I love it.  

We got lots of pictures.  And thanks to my goofing around with Manual, some of them didn't turn out so well...

I love this one.  Nate's parents with their youngest Great-Grandson.  How cool will that be!!  

Luke spent a lot of time playing with Nate's phone.  And Jarom enjoyed it as well :).

Darren spent a lot of time harassing Erika.  I don't think she ever did warm up to him.  But I think he was thoroughly entertained ;).

The tradition is to make Gingerbread houses after Thanksgiving dinner, and Nate and I both usually love this part, but for some reason we just weren't feeling it this year.... I'm not sure why?  But we sucked it up and tried to make it fun.  It was difficult because we didn't have any frosting (I distinctly remember that being provided in years past :)... it's all good though) so Nate mixed the frosting in his Mom's fridge with some cream of tartar, and we called that good.  It was a sorry excuse for Gingerbread frosting.  It was virtually useless.

We trudged on though, doing our best with what we had.  It was somewhat frustrating and the entire time, I had the thought, "We're totally going to have to have another Gingerbread house making session before the season is over" in the back of my head, so that helped.

Brad's fell over quite a bit... he had to keep readjusting and compromising the structure... but he was a trooper.

Kelly got the good idea to make them shorter so that they would be more structurally sound.... and that worked for her....

But not for Charity for some reason...

Noah's fell a couple of times as well, but he managed to enjoy putting the candy on it anyway :)

Erika and Jaycee had a few cute run-ins.  They're starting to notice each other more and not just to give back a toy or a baby anymore.  It's kind of cute.

Luke's was amazingly really well-done and stayed put the entire night and all the way home.  It was the impressive little pieces from the Gingerbread making kit maybe.... he had fun!

This was Erika's.  I think she enjoyed it a lot until she realized she could just sit and eat the candy and lick frosting.  But her's stayed up pretty good too.... again with the kit stuff....

This thing was AMAZING!!  The boys did a good job at making it structural.

Here's the closeup of Noah's.  I just loved that he wanted those little "windows" on there.  And that they stayed :).  What a cutie.

I think in the past I've done an "I'm Grateful For..." post, but for some reason I'm just not feeling it this year. Not not feeling grateful, but not feeling like posting it all.  It's okay to just be thankful in my head right???

Anyway.

Thanksgiving was nice.  And now it's time for Christmas :)

"Who gave you THIS?"

So I know I've probably already said enough about this, and these were actually taken over a week ago, but Erika is STILL talking about who gave her what for her birthday!!  It's been 3 weeks!  

Me: What did Aunt Heidi give you?

Erika: my baby.

Me: What did Charity give you?

Erika: my boddoh (bottle for her doll)

Me: What did Luke give you?

Erika: ...... my bubbles.

and she can do it the other way too!....

Me: Who gave you your dinosaur?

Erika: Sophie!

Me: Who gave you your caterpillar?

Erika: Bad!

Me: Who gave you your Tangled?

Erika: ...... Jen!

!!!!!!!!

She even remembers what LUKE gave her!!!  One of the last presents she opened, it disappeared as soon as she opened it, and got used by the gift giver himself, and she STILL remembers it and that he gave it to her!!!  I'm just amazed.

So anyway, the other day, I decided to expound on this, and let her make little thank you pictures (I didn't have any cards that day) for everyone that gave her a present.  She LOVED the idea!  And she was very thrilled about each one!  It was so fun!  I hate to admit that we kind of got busy doing a million other things that day, and never got back to them to fold them and put them in the envelopes that I addressed, and since then the pictures have managed to disappear, but hey- she did her part :).  I loved these pictures of her, in her pjs, shoes though since we had to take the big kids to school, messy breakfast face (and regrettably, probably some of the dinner from the night before), and of course, her amazing bed head!!  She's so fun though.  And what a cute little person to remember the gifts, and take them so seriously :).  I love it.

This was when she learned how to do dots!  She loved that!

Funny Stuff

Me: So Noah, I heard that there are quite a few, cute, little girls in your Nursery class who really like their friend Noah!
Noah: I am just so tired of girlfriends.


Nate picked up Noah from Nursery and a bunch of the kids were calling out to Noah, telling him goodbye, and Nate says, "Noah, say goodbye to your friends."
And Noah said, "They're not my friends, they're GIRLS!"
hilarious!

Luke: Mom, guess who Audrey has a crush on!
Me: Audrey?  Is she cute?  Let me think....
Luke: Well, I told her that I had a crush on her, and then SHE said that she has a crush on ME and Brayden.

I just love how he didn't need it to be just him ;)

Noah (as I was getting him out of his car seat): When I sit down on my bumb, it's weewy hard to toot.

As I was tucking Noah into bed I smelled something suspicious and said, "Eww, did you toot or something?!!  It's stinky!"  And Noah goes, "no, *sniff**sniff*, smells like popcorn!"  HA!

Leaves

I really can't remember much about this post-ful of pictures, but I liked them :).  I do remember that Brad had chosen to rake leaves as his job.  He's been doing really good at the really active jobs, the ones that take a lot of physical activity, so that's what I've been requiring of him.  I like it because those are the ones I don't want to do ;) and also because what boy doesn't need more activities.  Plus he does a pretty good job as well.

I'm pretty sure this was the night that Nate grilled us up some baby back ribs!  SO tasty!  And now that I think about it, it was the same night that Bro. Hinkle came and offered me my calling.

I know her face is horribly messy, but I don't care.  I love her eyes, and I just love this little girl!  She's such a fun kid to have around.  It's funny because most people that meet Erika think she's really serious, shy, and in the words of my mother "carrying a lot of anxiety", but it's really not true.  She is a little serious at times, and she makes serious faces, but she is a little trickster!!  And she's pretty goofy at times!  It's fun to know her and be part of her circle of friends :).  She definitely loves me and lets me know the real her.  And that I love!

I have no idea who took this one, or what the intention was, but I thought it looked kinda cool :)