The Bouncy Place

We went with the Karren's to The Bouncy Place this week. It was mine and Ellie's first time to one of these facilities. Wow.. it was FUN! I think I had just as much fun as Ellie did:) It was fun to see Ellie's progress in just an hours time. In the beginning she needed help climbing up a few of the obstacles to get to the slides and what not. She would also want to hold my hand and go down the slide with me as they are pretty fast slides. By the end of the hour she was climbing up the obstacles faster than I was and wouldn't dare wait for me at the top to go down the slide together! It was so much fun and we will defintely be visiting The Bouncy Place again soon!

The Belnap's Visit

I love it when company comes to visit because it is a great excuse to do all the "touristy" type attractions in the area. We had a great time showing my sister and her family all around Seattle.

We started off the day after Thanksgiving at the Holiday Parade in Seattle.

Ellie enjoyed seeing all the balloon displays and dancing snowmen, trees and clowns.
Ellie was SO excited to see Santa! This is going to be a fun holiday season!
We took the Belnap's to one of our favorite places in Seattle... Pike's Place Market.
Watching the fisherman throw the fish around. Notice the doughnut in Ellie's hand... the highlight of the day was the little doughnut shop at Pike's Place where you get HOT doughnuts that they make right in front of you.. yummy!
Saturday night we went to the Bellevue Botanical Gardens light display.
The kids loved see the light displays. The highlights were the pond display with a swan, the spider and its web, and the butterflies.

We also went to Snowflake Lane in downtown Bellevue on Saturday night. Drummers march down the lane and dance to Christmas music. Ellie's favorite part was the candy canes that they passed out. My favorite was the cold "bubble" snow that they shoot off of the top of the mall. It was fun to watch the drummers march down the lane and listen to Christmas music.The cousins left at 6 am on Sunday morning. We were sad to see them go. Ellie keeps asking "Where cousins go mommy? I sorry." It is so sad! It is like she thinks that she did something wrong and that is why the left! The poor thing! At least we get to see them in a month!

Thanks for coming to visit! We miss you guys already!

The Cousins are Coming!

My sister, Jeanette, and brother in-law Shane, and their five kiddos drove all the way from Idaho to have Thanksgiving at our house! It was our first time as host/hostess for Thanksgiving... but it all turned out great (a couple of hours earlier than expected but great nonetheless) We had such a fun time! Ellie loved every minute of the 5 to 1 attention from her cousins!

The Gang

Evie getting a ride in the shopping cart!
We had a FULL house!
Off to the annual turkey bowl!
My First Turkey!
The kids on the starting line of the turkey trot!Getting some exercise after the big meal!

Halloween

We had a Halloween Party at music class this morning.... probably not the best idea to start the kids off on Halloween morning with a sugar high... oh well. Ellie had a great time and some of the moms were smart and brought mini PB and J sandwichs for the party which Ellie ate so that made me feel a little bit better about the whole thing. All the kids were so cute dressed up in all their costumes. Halloween evening we went to our ward Halloween Carnival.
Ellie got her face painted, won some cookies at the cake walk and "caught" a prize at the fishing pond.

Jack-o-Lanterns

So I have to admit.... it has been a few years since I have carved a pumpkin. We never really got around to it in previous years... but this year we did it! Last Monday for Family Night we carved out our Jack-o-Lanterns... it was SO much fun! Ellie was so excited and anxious to help by sticking her hands in to get out all the seeds. Upon completing the pumpkins Ellie kept on asking where the ears were so we had to add a couple "ears" to the pumpkin. The best part was going out on the front porch to put a light the pumpkins....Ellie just sat out there completely mesmorized by the jack-o-lanterns.