Thanksgiving with Grandma and Grandpa Peacock

I didn't really get any specific shots of Thanksgiving. These are just random shots of what we did for 3 days at Grandma and Grandpa's house.

On Wednesday I was in the kitchen making a pie and Jorgan, bless his heart, was just trying to be helpful. Except that really he was tearing out the pages of my recipe book. So thankfully, Aunt Kyla took him over to the book shelf, grabbed a book, and sat down with him so that he could turn the pages. She couldn't find any little kid books, so she grabbed the next best thing, "Ripley's Believe it or Not". He enjoyed the pictures, but it was grossing Elizabeth out. After a few pages she told Aunt Kyla, "It's time to close this book now... I can't look at it any more!" It was so funny!


Here's Jorgan sitting on Grandpa's lap during dinner. I think that he was unhappy about sitting in the high chair and not being up at the table with everyone else because he was being a stinker. He wouldn't eat anything, and was just dumping his eggnog on his head. So Josh cleaned him up and got him down, then he went over and sat with Grandpa. He was fine after that!


Rachel wasn't too big a fan of Thanksgiving dinner either. We don't have Turkey, stuffing, and mashed potatoes much... she kept getting down from the table and getting into stuff. I told her that if she would stay in her seat and be nice I would let her eat as many rolls as she wanted. And she did! Then she decided to try Pumpkin Pie... she didn't eat that either!


Here we are driving home. As you can see there is green in the background! Yah!! No more snow at home and it was in the mid 40's! Never thought I'd be so glad to see the temperature gauge say 44!


Elizabeth was funny during this vacation because she wanted to be in charge of Daddy's cell phone the whole time. She took good care of it and even left it in a safe spot before going to bed! (After searching we found it in a dresser drawer) So since daddy was taking a picture of her, she had to take a picture of him!

Ellensburg Snow

When we got to Ellensburg it was much colder than we could have ever realized. The temperature stayed between -8 and about 20 degrees the entire time we were there! The kids loved the snow though... I couldn't believe how much they wanted to play outside!
So here are pictures of them playing in the snow at Grandma and Grandpa's house.




















This was so funny! After watching Josh shovel the sidewalk, Rachel decided to take a turn. Except that she wasn't strong enough to control the shovel. She would pick it up and then you'd hear, "whoa.. whoa..." as she was falling over and spinning around trying to gain control. I was laughing so hard!






And of course this is Jorgan at 3pm after not sleeping at all in the car and then tromping around in the snow all afternoon. Josh said he laid him on the bed, gave him his blanket, and he was gone! So cute!

Our first snow

When we chose to move to Seattle, we knew that it was possible to get some snow. We didn't, however, know that it was possible to get 3 inches of snow before Thanksgiving!
This is a picture of the first snow that started last Sunday.


This is a picture of what our house lookied like on Tuesday morning right before we were leaving to head to my parent's house.


We were a little bit nervous because we have to drive over Snoqualmie pass to get to Ellensburg and Monday night there had been closures and accidents because of all the snow. Monday night I braved the snow with all 3 kids to get a set of snow chains and got stuck in the snow at a traffic light! Luckily a nice man gave us a little push and we made it home. Heavenly Father must have known how bad I needed a vacation because Tuesday morning the pass was open, still lots of snow and ice, but no chain requirements. It was a bit slower than normal but we made it there and back without any problems! Yah for vacation!

The Sunshine Girl

I think it is Elizabeth that is missing the sun and the warmth the most. Every day for school she begs me to let her wear a skirt. It's just too cold! I can't send her off to school knowing that she'll be freezing, so I never let her wear them. Sometimes after school she'll come home and change into a skirt and that seems to keep her satisfied. Until Saturday when Elizabeth and I were going to go on a date... She already had a skirt on, but I told her that she needed to have pants on if we were going to go on a date. It was like 30 degrees outside! So after a long discussion about why she had to wear pants, she came out of her room like this!


Josh and I were laughing so hard! Maybe I should have let her wear that! But I guess sometimes I forget that it doesn't really matter what other people think. I did make her take it off.
We had a great date though! We had dinner at Applebee's, then we went jeans shopping. It was really fun to get to talk with just Elizabeth. She was able to tell me about her friends at school and play tic tac toe with my undivided attention. She was so sweet the whole time! I really love her sweet-fun personality. I hope I can always show her how much I love her!

The Tupperware Drawer

One morning I was in the kitchen cooking some breakfast. Jorgan was toddling around the kitchen opening and closing cupboards. I realized all of the sudden that he wasn't right under my feet. When I glanced around to find him he had emptied the Tupperware drawer and sat inside! As soon as I looked at him he gave me a huge grin! I ran and grabbed the camera and he posed some of his favorite faces! He was pretty proud of himself for being able to get inside that drawer. It was the getting out that was hard...
This is "cheese!"


And once again, the thinking face!


He's so fun to have around! He really is a super good kid. He's happy all the time and loves to play and smile. He's starting into the 2's because he's beginning to through temper tantrums when he doesn't get what he wants. Oh, well we knew it would start sometime!

If You Give a Cat a Cupcake

One day for preschool we read the story "If You Give a Cat a Cupcake", so of course we had to make cupcakes! Rachel and Jorgan were having so much fun with frosting and sprinkles. Rachel was actually doing pretty well at getting frosting and sprinkles onto the cupcakes. Jorgan was just licking frosting! They were pretty cute!


Josh came in and helped with the frosting so that I could help Jorgan try and get his goodies onto a cupcake. Luckily, Josh took a plate of cupcakes to work so I didn't have to sit home and eat them all day!

Ballet Dancing

We used to have the computer desk in the corner of the kitchen, but just recently we decided it was too crowded so we moved it into the front room. The kids love it because we've been playing lots of music and dancing! Rachel of course always has to be dressed up to dance. She put on her ballet outfit and when Josh tried to dance with her she told him that he couldn't be a ballerina because he was a boy. So this is a video of him proving her wrong!

The Thinking Face

Ok.. so I'm way far behind in my journaling, but I'm catching up right now!!

Jorgan is still not talking a whole lot. He says "MaMa" and "Daddy", "more", "gator" (his teddy bear's name is alligator), "drink", and then jabbers that are unrecognizable. He does communicate a lot with hand gestures, some sign language, and facial expressions. We call this one, "the thinking face"!

100 Posts

I didn't realize that blogspot counted the number of posts until just now! And guess what! I have 100 Posts! That's awesome!

Ballard Lockes

This weeks field trip was to the Ballard Lockes. This was a fun and different place for us to go. With all this water around we are really experiencing some new things! The Ballard Lockes is a dam on the river that joins Lake Washington to the Puget Sound. The Lockes make it possible for the boats to travel from the low level of water on one side of the dam to the higher level on the other side of the dam. They say that the Ballard Lockes are unique because they join the fresh water of Lake Washington to the ocean salt water of the Puget Sound. So, here are the girls outside the Visitor's Center. We didn't get their early enough to really see much of the visitor's center before it closed. I guess we'll just have to go back again!


Here we are watching them get the water level ready for a boat that is coming from the Puget Sound into Lake Washington.


Here is fancy Yacht inside the Locke before they raise the water level. Josh and I were admiring this boat thinking it would be cool to ride in one of those!


Here I am with Jorgan. I wanted to carry him on my back so that I wouldn't have to worry about him trying to take a dive into the water. Good thing I did because he was definitely in love with looking over the side!


Here are Liz and Rachel looking down into the Fish Ladder. The have created this fish ladder to help the spawning Salmon get through the dam into Lake Washington. We happened to be past the season for seeing lots of fish... bummer... we'll have to come back next year in May!


Here is a panorama Josh took of the ocean side of the Lockes. I love the fall! It is so beautiful here!


This is a picture of Jorgan after he begged Josh to take his picture! He is so funny! I think he just likes to say "Cheese!"

Elizabeth's Broken Arm

Elizabeth got her cast off yesterday! She was so excited to get it taken off her arm! She called me from the car as Josh was bringing her home and I asked her what she was going to do with her cast. She told me that she wanted to put it in the closet in case someone else broke their arm... then they could us it too! She's so thoughtful!!