End of November and Thanksgiving

Here are a few pictures of the end of November...

Taylor being a rock star student and practicing math and reading on the ipad
At home...

And at school...

And a little sample of Taylor's writing that she did at Mem's house about Cam and Speedo (my mom's cat)
"I see Speedo, (is) Cam is petting Speedo" 

We are working on her letter s - as it sometimes turns out like a 3 instead!

Taylor being silly at Meijer with an elf hat (we ALWAYS have to visit the Christmas aisles when we go)

Cam being cozy after a long day at school

Camryn's "thankful" list she made at Toddlerville.

For Thanksgiving this year, we went to Mem's house
 Always fun to see the cousins together

And they always are intrigued by uncle Drake :)

The whole group hanging out, watching the Thanksgiving Day parade (we didn't get a picture of all of us eating Thanksgiving dinner - next year!)

My little coloring buddies - Tess and Taylor

Speedo likes to seek out Ryan's lap ;)

Laying down for a nap with Cam

Hanging out in the kitchen with Jen, Abbey, and Mem

Taylor and Tess watching Beauty and the Beast

Cam wasn't feeling the best, so she made herself a little bed on the chair. 

We spent most of Friday in Battle Creek as well, and had some extra play time with Tess while Jeff and Jen left for a wedding
Reading books in the morning

Making gingerbread houses together - always a little more work for the adults (and monitoring how much of the decorations are being eaten ;-))

But they turned out so cute!

It was a good Thanksgiving break - next up is the Christmas tree! 

First snow, sledding, and a snowman

Last year, we had a couple school days cancelled for snow before Thanksgiving, but I haven't minded easing into the snowy season a bit slower this year.

Saturday, we had our first snowfall and the girls were SO excited.

Camryn waking up Saturday morning - first reactions to the snowfall.

Playing on the back deck

Sledding - so many giggles, and SO much work for me hauling them back up the hill, and getting them going with a running start each time (there wasn't a ton of snow, so it was a bit hard to get started :)).

Taylor was aiming a snowball at me while taking these pictures...stinker :)

And something that I have never done with the girls is make a snowman - but the snow was PERFECT packing snow and made it easy to make one!

Curious what winter will be like THIS year...hopefully a bit more mild and less snowy!

November Randoms - car accident, CrossFit, no cavities, conference for Tay, the start of Christmas!

At the very end of October, I was heading home from the gym, and watched a person run a red light, hit a truck in the intersection, which then crashed into the front of my vehicle. It was one of those frustrating moments where you watch it happen, and there is nothing you can do to prevent it!
Luckily, two weeks later I got the Pilot back - good as new. :) Taylor was concerned about if they would have "black parts" to fix it. ;)

My favorite way to start the day continues to be getting a good sweat in with these people.
This coach has me SO close to getting a ring muscle up!

 And I love my 5:45am chats with this girl

And the picture above was a Friday morning fun picture where I was wearing my new "Buddy the Elf" shirt I got - it says "I just like to lift. Lifting is my favorite." :-)

The girls had a sleepover at Mem's house for two days this past weekend, and I got lots of fun pictures while they were gone.

And then when I picked them up, they slept almost the whole way home. Mem's lake house = tired out ladies from all the fun. :)

Just a couple of random pictures of the little ladies. ((Love))

The girls are getting so big, so much older in so many ways. One way that has been a HUGE difference from when they were young was our most recent dentist visit! Taylor was so hysterical her first two visits when she was little that they didn't even get to clean her teeth. And then in the spring we had Cam's first visit with Tay. Cam had to sit on my lap, but at least both girls got their teeth cleaned. But THIS time, both girls went to their own chairs, got their teeth cleaned, and Tay even had her first xrays. Whew! So much easier now!

This was them watching the train go by on the track overhead in the waiting room - they were pretty excited about this, which probably helped the visit start off smoothly!

Speaking of getting older, Taylor has started working hard at her sight words. We practiced and practiced her baseball words, and she was SO excited when she passed this first list!

Her drawing and coloring has also come pretty far - her drawing of Rudolph!

We had Taylor's parent-teacher conferences - my first time being on the parent side of the table!
Bottom line, we are going to work on some math concepts and name writing, she can sometimes be a bit of a daydreamer when instructions are being given, but she is a rock star in terms of behavior and being a friend to others in class.
Here is her self assessment

This part cracked me up.... "what is hard for you in school?"....

A peek at her report card so far

And a writing sample. This kid loves the movie "Inside Out". I LOVE how she sounded out so many of the sounds in the words as she wrote!

We are very proud of our Kindergartener!

And another part of the start of November is the START of the holiday season in this house! On November 1st, just like last year, all the Christmas stuffed animals and toys "flew back from the North Pole" and surprised the girls! They were so excited!

This was a snapshot of the video of them sprinting out of their rooms to discover all the toys by the fireplace.

So excited

Except Cam - who in true 3 year old fashion - her moods change every minute, and she was all of a sudden sad about me wanting to take a picture. Lil drama queen ;)

The girls love to play with the Christmas toys at Meijer, too!

And we do have one little Christmas tree up in the house until we get our real one. The girls love redecorating it over and over!

Bring on the holiday season!