The Thanksgiving of all Thanksgivings

Holidays, Vacations, , , , , ,

This year Thanksgiving was especially awesome because Josh and I got to be with both of our families, all at once. Yay! Josh and I basically come from mirror families: both the oldest of six kids, with siblings all the same ages, Josh with all brothers and me with mostly sisters (and one awesome brother Cole we all love). So when Josh and I got married, our families got along great and became best buds. Josh’s mom was so nice and invited my whole family out to their house for Thanksgiving, and it was a blast! Thank you so much Lymans, and thanks for coming, Ellsworths! There was lots of good food, some great Just Dance 3ing, gingerbread houses, games, family photos, and fun.

We got to spend a whole week with the Lymans, too, which was a blast. Carson never lacked for attention, and it turns out he’s got some awesome uncles who love to hold him and make him smile and laugh. And Grandpa and Grandma Lyman, wow! They were the best. Carson was so good and happy all week.

Here’s some photos from the trip! Thanks again family! We love you all!

Halloween 2011

Holidays, , , , , ,

Happy Halloween! For his first Halloween, Carson dressed up as a cuddly (or rather, cowardly) lion. I was Dorothy and Josh was the Scarecrow – yes, okay, mine and Josh’s costumes were recycled costumes from two years ago. A Halloween costume faux pas, perhaps, but hey, they were economical. (Actually, my Dorothy costume was recycled from several years ago…I think this is at least the fifth time I’ve been Dorothy in my life…oh, well…) Anyway, using recycled costumes was worth it because Carson the Lion was so cute. :) Check out more pictures at this post.

So dressing up was a lot of fun! I recently got a sewing machine, so I was going to attempt to make Carson’s costume, but I’m so glad we found a low-price one at Walmart instead. I know I’m not quite that pro yet. :) I did make a hat and some other improvements for Josh’s costume, so at least I did some sewing! (The nice thing about sewing a scarecrow costume is that you don’t have to worry about straight lines since it’s all supposed to look scraggily anyway.)

On the Friday before Halloween, Josh’s company had a family Halloween party that we dressed up for and went to. And holy cow! What a party! It really just consisted of waiting in line to take a tour through the intensely decorated building, but in line they had cotton candy, popcorn, ice cream, soda, jugglers, magicians, and guys with snakes and tarantulas as entertainment.

Yes, that’s a real tarantula, inches from Carson’s face. They guy put it up there before we could do anything. So there, Carson’s not cowardly at all.

Actually, Carson was too sleepy to be cowardly. He slept through pretty much the entire thing in Dad’s arms.

At the end he woke up, but by then he was ready to get home, get a bath, and get some food.

It was fun to get out, see lots of fun Halloween costumes, chat with some friends, and walk through the awesome building, which, seriously, was intense. Parts were more like a haunted house (but they always had shortcuts to skip past those. Good thing, because Paige Carson got scared). Lots of fun.

And we also celebrated Halloween this year with the very first pumpkin Josh and I have ever carved together! It turned out great, thanks to Josh’s pro handling of the carving tools. I was better at scooping out the pumpkin guts; that’s always been my favorite part, anyway.

So all in all, a great Halloween! Complete with leftover candy since we only got four trick-or-treaters last night.

Fall colors and family pictures

Just Life, , , , , , , , ,

We love the fall! It’s such a pretty time of year. Each year when the trees start to change colors on the mountains, we think, “Oh, we’ll have to go up and take pictures!” But then it seems like a week goes by and we’re too busy and before we know it, all the leaves are gone. This year we were a little more on the ball and made it up the canyon to take some pictures one evening. So pretty! It was fun, too, to take Carson and feel like we were our own little family on our own family outing. I’m not sure if we got more pictures of the trees or of Carson, but either way we (meaning mostly Josh) got some beautiful ones. :)