Happy Birthday Grandpa!

Today is Grandpa Stuart's birthday! We were in St. Louis last weekend to celebrate his birthday and Hanukkah (Hanukkah post coming soon!) According to Brooke, he turned 5 today! I'm sure he will agree with that. The logic was: she is going to be 3 on her birthday, so mommy must be 4 so Grandpa must be 5! I like that thinking! Brooke had a fun weekend celebrating. We went to dinner Saturday night and when dinner was over, out of no where, Brooke looked up and announced, "HAPPY BIRTHDAY, GRANDPA!!!!!!" It was adorable!



Hope you had a great birthday, Grandpa, We love you!!!

Snow days...

We got about 8-10" of snow over the last 2 days so Brooke was very excited to get out in play in it! It was about 12 degrees when we went out to play so we didn't stay out long but she had fun! It was a very pretty, fluffy snow so we couldn't make a snowman. We couldn't even really make a snow ball!

The dogs had fun too and Brooke had fun throwing snow at them!

More stories...

Addendum to the best friend story:
Brooke continues to talk about how I am her friend or best friend. When we ask her, what about daddy? her response is, "He's just my daddy!" "Mommy's my friend, but daddy's just my daddy!"

Bananas:
Brooke LOVES bananas. She would probably eat 2 a day if we let her. Grandma and Grandpa Nickell know this so always have bananas for her at their house. One time Grandpa said, "I think there's a banana here with your name on it". He proceeded to show her a banana with her name actually written on it. This has happened a few times. The other night at dinner (here) Brooke was eating a banana. She said to Jason:
"Grandma and Grandpa Nickell always have bananas with my name on them....
I wonder if they write it on there?!?!"

Really???? She figured THAT out? Great! We're never going to get anything by her!!!

You make me laugh!!

It seems like everything that comes out of Brooke's mouth these days is funny or adorable! She is constantly talking about something, but the things she says never cease to surprise us. Here are just a few examples! It always sounds funnier/cuter when you hear her 2 year old voice say it, but I had to at least try to share some of them. Sorry, I've been bad about pictures (didn't take a single one on Thanksgiving!) but hopefully these stories will make up for it!

Scene: Brooke has her new t-shirt on that has a picture of a dog and says "my best friend"
Brooke: What do these letters say, Mommy?" (this is her new question whenever she sees writing on things)
Mommy: It says my best friend. Are Macie and Bo your best friends?
Brooke: No, Mommy, YOU are my best friend!
(She is so sweet, I about cried when she said this!)

Scene: driving home from daycare
- Brooke was very excited to show me their new blocks when I picked her up and how they had rearranged the classroom
Mommy: I like your new classroom, its very nice.
Brooke: Sooo...What do you think of our new blocks?
(It sounded like a question an adult would ask!)

Scene: In the kitchen, getting ready to go play after dinner
Brooke: I'm going to be a vet, daddy!
(she was referring to her dress up vet stuff, but it was still funny (scary?) to hear her say it!)

...and my favorite....
Scene: the three of us in the family room, one of the dogs made a weird noise in the kitchen...
Jason: What was that??? (referring to the noise the dog made)
Brooke: That was me tooting!

Weekend in St. Louis

Last weekend, Brooke and I went to St. Louis for Aunt Jen's baby shower. In between 2 very long drives, we had a fun weekend and enjoyed a very nice baby shower. Brooke even got some presents of her own!

Getting ready for the baby shower

Giving Aunt Jen the present Brooke picked out (and then she took it back!)

One of the presents Brooke got: princess dress up things..including earrings! She had to add my shoes to complete the outfit!

Some Random Pics...

These pictures are a few weeks old, but I had so many others with wedding pictures and Halloween, I figured I'd save them for when I was in need for some new blog updates...

Helping daddy rake leaves

(this was when it was much cooler out!) and this is not even a fraction of the leaves that were in the yard!

Practicing...this was after she had given the baby a bottle, is currently rocking her, and then proceeded to put her to sleep. She's going to be a great big sister!

Brooke LOVED to be swaddled when she was a baby. I think we swaddled her until she was 6 or 8 months (way longer than most people do). Her blanket was loosely covering her when she went to bed and this is how we found her when we checked on her! We often find her like this and aren't quite sure how she gets her self so tightly wrapped up!

Happy Halloween!

Flower girl dresses make great Princess Halloween costumes! Brooke was thrilled to get to wear her dress again. She was not so thrilled with carving the pumpkin. She didn't want to get her hands dirty! But, she did LOVE the pumpkin seeds that I roasted! She enjoyed trick-or-treating too, although we never actually got her to say "trick-or-treat." She did say thank you though! After EVERY house we went to, she would say, "I got candy!" and then later it changed to: "I have LOTS of candy!" She was pretty excited with the candy!

Our little princess

Aunt Arianne came to trick-or-treat with us!

The princess in her chariot

Eating candy when we got home!