An Overview of November

I know I haven't been keeping up with your blog so well these days. 

Blogging and blabbing have awesomely been on a back shelf for awhile. :)

A friend of mine recently told me that she wishes she 

would have done something like this blog for her grown children, 

and it encouraged and spurred me on to write a quick overview of the past month. 

In short: 

The weather has been so wonderful. 

The temperatures have been unusually warm most weeks, 

and we have only had one snowfall in-which the snow didn't stick around.

It was Sarita and Apple's first snow ever.

We even got to go sledding!

The warm weather has allowed us to keep taking walks and hiking in the woods,

visiting with the neighbors while Apple and Zeus play, grilling outdoors, 

and enjoying the screen room much longer than we are used to.

It's been really really wonderful.

We collected lots of different leaves, pressed them in books under mattresses,

and created a beautiful work of art, which is not completely put together yet.

We've been enjoying our evenings of activities together; 

from your Daddy and I cuddling in to read Farmer Boy aloud 

while you listen and work on your Christmas projects, 

to baking cookies and drinking hot cocoa over Christmas music with Sarita. 

It's been a quiet, cozy month. 

Oh, and you've taken an active interest in learning how to 

chop quick and evenly like your mama does. ??? 

You've been doing very well and have been quite handy in the kitchen! 

  

Even with all the good weather, I've been geared up for Christmas festivities 

far earlier than usual this season. 

We started listening to Christmas music in the last week of October!

I feel way more relaxed about Santa and Frosty and Rudolph, 

now that you're older and understand the clear difference 

in things I've been so careful not to create fuzzy lines between for you. 

We're enjoying the songs, movies, stories, and even the occasional dress up of

the fun fictional characters that come along with the holiday. 

I love it when santa empties the dishwasher!

We finally did a Thanksgiving Tree, which I've wanted to do for a few years now.

It was fun to create it together, and it's been a huge blessing 

for each of us to write down our gratitude each day. 

Even our friends have participated now and then. 

Counting blessings has gone from being a repetitive menial task for you

to something you enjoy quieting and really thinking about.

Your lists have become so sweet and unique to the activities of your day.

They read like a little journal. :)

We just finished up our last few days of school for your first quarter of the year.

With only a couple of days off over the past three months 

we are so ready for our free December. 

I'm sure we will do plenty of pieces of school here and there over the weeks off,

but it will be such a nice break for the most part. 

Even the last couple weeks we were getting restless. 

It helped to move our "class room" time to different areas of the house 

to change things up a bit. :)

Other tidbits of current info on you:

You went to your first NFL game! 

Someone kindly offered to take our picture for us 

when I brought you outside to hear all of the loud cheering.

It was so much fun! And Sarita's first game, too. 

You're pretty much over needing to be called Kevin. 

We have been shopping and inspiration hunting together for a home 

beautification season coming up, and you have been a BLAST!

You're wearing your cat costume all day and night, just about every other day. It's so cute.

You LOVE cleaning the house with me. Amen!  

You are NOT allergic to gluten after all, 

but thanks to rice dream we have all finally stopped drinking cows milk.

You have not had any stomach issues and you are worrying a lot less. 

I'm not sure if or how they correlate, but we're glad for both.

You can NOT wait to go to Gra and Pepere's this month.

You're getting much more realistic about money 

now that you have your checkbook system.

You would like to watch Cars 2 every single day.

And you are finally in love with your new dog, Apple, 

who you work very hard and well with to train and play. 

Hopefully, I will be a little better at blogging for you in December. 

If not, I'm looking forward to an end of the month overview of our Christmas! :)

You are my sunshine.