Thanksgiving 2011

I am SO SO behind in my blogging... which translates to... life is busy as HECK with 2 kids. So here goes... my attempt to catch you and myself up to date.

We visited Kansas City for Thanksgiving and my Dad's retirement party the following weekend. It was probably a bad omen when Patti called us the night before we left to tell us that Caroline had thrown up. But we decided to go anyway... needless to say, the stomach flu made the rounds at my parents house that week. First Caroline, then Charlie and Mark and finally Patti got sick. Not fun. We quarantined ourselves to the house most of the time we were there so we wouldn't infect anyone else in KC. All in all, I'm glad we went on the trip and were able to see everyone... but it was rough. It's actually good I am writing this over a month after our trip, because now I have some perspective. LOL

Here are a bunch of pics from our trip:

Charlie & Caroline had a blast playing together.

And Charlie was a huge fan of Caroline's playhouse (aka. the cardboard box).

Ella cozied up to Grandaddy (and his iPad) for some quality time.

More C&C playtime

The weekend wouldn't be complete without some yogi headstands.

Finally feeling (somewhat) healthy, we headed down to the plaza to see the holiday lights.

All of us together at the lighting. I just LOVE Mark's mustache. Don't you? (It's awful, I know... but at least he raised a couple bucks for a good cause, right?)

Ella giving Caroline an early Christmas gift-- a shopping cart. Caroline loved it! Ella did too! I think she played with it ALMOST as much as Caroline during our visit.

We finally got out of the house and went for a short lunch visit to the Cowies. Ella had a blast with Evie and Nora...

...and Charlie put up with all the girls pretty well.

Our last day we took Ella ice skating at the rink across from my parents house. This was actually her 2nd try at ice skating... which went way better than the 1st (see post here).

Most of her "skating" consisted of Tom holding one hand and me holding the other so we could pull her around the edge of the rink. Baby steps!

Thanks for taking me skating Uncle Tom!