happy birthday, daddy! (and happy thanksgiving too!)

madelyn has been waiting (not so) patiently for daddy's birthday to get here and today was the day! she and i have been working on birthday cards for him (i didn't take a picture...) for the past few weeks. there was lots of gluing involved and not a lot of time we could work on them without daddy finding out. of course madelyn couldn't keep the secret so he knew that we were making cards. when i asked madelyn was she wanted to put on the front of her card to daddy she said, "um... a palm tree, i think." i don't know what would inspire a palm tree, but i think we did a pretty good job of making one - complete with button coconuts - out of crayons, construction paper and a last minute popsicle stick.

matt got an amazing birthday dinner, courtesy of yours truly, and had his parents and brother here to celebrate with us. for desert/birthday cake we had "frosty pumpkin pie". this is an ice cream version of pumpkin pie that matt loves (i make it).

the candles for the cake is one of the reasons madelyn has been excited for daddy's birthday to get here. when we were picking up some halloween candy last month we found some fun candles that spell out "h-a-p-p-y-b-i-r-t-h-d-a-y" and madelyn was really happy to get them for daddy. so happy that she carried them to the cash register, told the clerk that they were for her daddy's birthday, and told daddy that we got him "surprise birthday candles" when he got home that night (obviously madelyn does not have a future as a spy). here she is putting the candles on the cake for daddy (she had been singing softly to herself before everyone else came to see what she was doing).



now we are all full and relaxing a little before bed. i wanted to share a little before finally letting myself rest after a really long day!

papa, nana, and uncle derek flew up yesterday afternoon to visit for thanksgiving. we failed to get a picture around the table tonight (i look pretty rough so it is probably just as well), but papa had us take one of him while he was holding both kids today - unfortunately the flash didn't go off for this one which came out the best.

this is the largest number of people we have had stay with us since mason was born and we had to do some bedroom shifting. mason is sleeping in matt and my room in the playyard, madelyn is sleeping on mason's crib mattress on the floor of mason's room, derek is sleeping in madelyn's room, and papa and nana are staying downstairs in the guest room. the sleeping wasn't so great last night which was too bad since i had a migraine starting during dinner and then a long day of cooking today. (although, the cooking today wasn't too bad because i had made a lot of the sides and pre-work on tuesday and wednesday.) mason woke up at 12 and madelyn woke up at 1 before settling back down at 2. mason got up once more at 5 before madelyn got up around 6:30 and woke him up again when she came into our room crying. i am hoping tonight goes better for everyone.

tomorrow we are going to brave christmas shopping so that papa and nana don't have to ship the kids' gifts. the plan is to go late morning so that we catch the lull between the pre-dawners and the late sleepers. i know that the kids and i will be happy to get out after being inside for the past few days. it will be nice to stretch our legs a little.


while we were waiting for papa, nana, and derek on wednesday, mason kept getting up on his knees. he has done it many times before but after his big roll-over on monday he is really ready to get moving. and with the baseball bottom i just thought that it was cute enough to post.

happy thanksgiving! i hope that you all had a wonderful day with lots of good eats. bring on christmas! love.