Thanksgiving in Tennessee

For Thanksgiving this year we visited my parents and brother in Tennessee, and my Kristin and her family came too! It was a whirlwind trip of hanging out, visiting the aquarium, eating, drinking, and visiting with extended family! It was funny to watch Evey and Collin interact; they are very different toddlers;)

We celebrated Xmas with my family and aunt, uncle, and cousins; my mom even decorated early! So the kiddos had plenty to play with while we were there!

We had breakfast at the Vegas airport. She slept from Reno to Vegas, which is wonderful because she got up at 4;)

We had a really long travel day because we decided to save money and drive from Nashville to Seymour, which was a little over three hours, instead of flying into Knoxville. I was exhausted, but I don't think I'd do anything differently.

Evey and Grandad chillin.

My parents got her a stroller and baby doll, which she pushed everywhere! She even made sure she gave her baby a bottle on occasion. She hasn't played with her much at home, it's probably due to the fact that she has too many toys!

Group photo with my cousin Madison, her niece, and Collin.

She seems so innocent, doesn't she?:)

Evey did not voluntarily walk to anyone in the beginning, so Uncle Andrew lured  her over with TV, genius!

 

We all went to the Ripley's Aquarium. My cousin and her baby from Georgia joined us too!

Swimming with the fishes.

My cousin Christina with the pops and husband.

This was our whole group, minus the photographer, of course.

Crazy family selfies are awesome!

Evey enjoyed playing with Collin's chain saw...

And Collin enjoyed playing with her baby 

 

Aunt Kristin was able to snag some Evey time.

Oh yah, this was Evey's thanksgiving dinner, a roll. <sigh> My mom made an amazing Thanksgiving meal, as always, and we went to my Aunt Sandra's for dessert, which was also absolutely amazing. Christina made the best bread pudding!

We took photos in front of my parents' house the day we left, so I will share those soon, but here's one that Kristin took of Chris holding the wee ones and the comparison from 14 months ago! We've decided to do this every single time we meet, and Chris said that he will continue to hold them both, we'll see about that;)

She's Walking!!!:$:&!:!:!!!:!

Seriously, I am so freakin excited, our kid is finally walking!! Woo hoo! She started when we were visiting my parents for Thanksgiving (more on that soon). Already she's become more independent, and is into more things, but whatever! We've waited soooo long! Yaaaaay!!!

Bueltel Family Reunion in Indiana Part Deux

Welcome to part two of our Indiana trip! The next day we went to the actual reunion and I didn't take many photos, and really only have this one of Evey, but Chris took tons of photos with his camera, so maybe I'll sneak some of those in as soon as he's done editing them (how many times have I said that on this blog??).

Of course we all had a great time because the room was full of awesome people and food, always a winning combo. We took tons of photos of all the Bueltels!

The reunion happened to fall on Chris' cousin's husband's 40th birthday, so an epic ping pong game occurred that night in celebration. 

The next day we fished and hung out at one of Chris' cousin's wive's parents' place! It was rather cold and windy, but everyone was in good spirits.

And we visited another cousin and hung out at their amazing and idyllic house, yard, and shop!

It was definitely a crazy whirlwind trip filled with tons of awesome family. I'm looking forward to future visits when Evey is more aware of the world and people around her and she can truly appreciate it.

Baby Painting

If you live in the Reno area and have a wee one, I highly recommend doing a baby painting class at the Nevada Museum of Art! Meghan and I decided to take the kids a couple weekends ago and we all had a blast!

The class consisted of about nine babies, whom we all stripped down to their diapers. Butcher paper covered the walls and floor, and the babies were given an 8 x 11 canvas to paint. 

Red, yellow, blue, and green paint were passed out and soon dug into by tiny fingers! I was pleasantly surprised by Evey's willingness from the get-go, which I think has something to do with daycare's love of creating art with the babes. At first she was apprehensive about leaving the paint on her hands, but was soon painting her tummy, so that was a very fleeting feeling;)

I really can't wait until they're older and they can look back at all of the pictures they're in together from when they were babies:)

She was covered, and decided to share the love. She got me in the neck with the paintbrush and left painty Evey handprints all over my shirt and pants!

I love how messy she got! And I just love her and her wonderful craziness:) 

So yah, take your babes to the class if you can, you won't regret it!

Halloween 2015

Halloween definitely snuck up on us this year, I didn't feel nearly as prepared as I would like. Throwing a week long vacation right before Halloween definitely did that, but that's ok, we still threw a great party and had an awesome Halloween night! 

We haven't thrown a Halloween party on Halloween in a while, so that was different, and I not think we'll do it again; now that we've all got kids, families have other plans, of course, so some of our friends couldn't stay as long. But we still had a pretty good turn out! 

As usual, we offered soup and a wide array of snacks and goodies. Our theme this year was video games, and Chris and I dressed up like Luigi and Mario and Evey was our little Princess Peach, although she was not content wearing her crown. 

Pinterest inspired my food choices, as usual! Here's my fire flower veggie tray.

Toadstool Cupcakes.

And my Pacman Brie!

Per tradition, we sat outside and gave out candy, and this year Evey was with us all night. We didn't take her trick or treating, we think she's still too young and the walking independently is a necessity in out book, so maybe next year;) But she was amazed by all of the strange people that came to our door constantly and thoroughly enjoyed having glow stick wars with her dad. 

We projected Hocus Pocus on the garage again this year, and it was a big hit like last year. We were going to project singing Jack o lantern faces on pumpkins, but time got away from us, but we're definitely going to do it next year! We did it the day after Halloween, just to see how it would work, and it was fantastic! Here's a sneak peak...

Can't wait for next Halloween! I already have our theme in mind;)

Bueltel Family Reunion in Indiana Part Un

The week before Halloween we went on a whilrwind trip to Indiana for a Bueltel family reunion! To be specific, this is Chris' dad's side of the family, all of whom still live in Indiana, John is the only one of the siblings who left! 

Our week was jam-packed with visiting family and friends and experiences we can only get in Indiana. Soo, let's start with the morning we left!

First day: We left the house around 4 am! Gotta love early morning flights so you can get to the east coast at a decent time!

A little morning yogurt in the McCarran airport made the day that much better for this tired girl.

And plane naps are even better! She's pretty good at napping on planes and actually napped very well while we were out and about during the whole trip.

Thanks to grandpa for bringing the head phones! They only lasted about five minutes, but we got a cute pic.

We met up the Vegas Bueltels and flew to Indiana together and all piled into a huge van! 

Our first full day in Indiana involved family, boats, fishing, and a lake on a gorgeous fall day.

Chris' Uncle Mike was our captain on the pontoon while two sets of Chris' other aunts and uncles drove their speed boats.

Evey enjoyed herself, even though it got a bit windy at times. She even napped in my arms the last hour we were on the boat.

We had a lot of fun on the lake, and stayed longer than we meant to! But we were all just enjoying the weather, and company, so much. For dinner, we went to Mike's awesome house and had BBQ and pulled pork; it was a delicious ending to the day. (Side note: we are alllll the time, and some of us drank a lot too;) I seriously gained a couple pounds, thanks Indiana family!)

The next day I had to snap a photo of Chris' family's gorgeous tree out front before we headed to Freddie's for one of his famous impromptu get-togethers in his barn which involved food, family, friends, food, alcohol, food, and more food, some of which was wonderfully fried. 

Freddie's property is massive, he's got corn fields, this lovely pond and park area where they party it up on a regular basis, and a million tractors, which a lovingly call the tractor museum.

We went for a hay ride, too! 

When we got back from the festivities, I couldn't resist a selfie with Evey and the gorgeous tree.

That evening's schedule consisted of going to Charlie and Gail's house for pizza and some general crazy kid play! Throw in a couple of birthday cakes, a ton of family members, and it ended up being a lot of fun!

Stay tuned for the second half of the Reunion post!