I'm thankful...

for this one:

The most supportive, considerate, wonderful, loving, helpful husband around. I am the luckiest, luckiest girl!

for this one:
So funny, original, smart, handsome and loving. I miss him so when he's in school and have LOVED having him home all week!

for this one:
I had no idea how much I would love having a daughter. She's sassy and sweet and beautiful and smart and this girl and her mamma are tight!

for this one:
I'm so grateful to be pregnant one last time. Don't get me wrong, I'll complain to anyone who'll listen (sorry Chris, Lauren, Jaimee and Mom!) about the heartburn and the tree trunk ankles, but I really feel so so blessed to be doing this again!

and...
tonight I'm grateful for the cute new purse Clare picked out for me for my birthday! :-)
HAPPY THANKSGIVING!

New favorite dinner

Personal chicken pot pies!

So easy...
-Saute some onions in olive oil. (Remove onions)
-Add small diced potatoes and carrots, cook until fork tender. (Remove veggies)
-Add diced chicken breasts or roaster chicken, cook until done. (Remove chicken.)
-Use pan to make a quick chicken gravy, or toss in a can of chicken gravy, add a little water so it's loose.
- Toss back in all the veggies and chicken.
- Cut some circles from ready made pie crusts, and lay them in your muffin tin. (I rolled out my pie crusts, so they wouldn't be so thick, since the pot pies were small.)
- Fill with filling and place pie crust rounds on top. From pie crust scraps cut your families initials and place on top.
- Bake at 425 for 20 minutes -ish.
- Delish, healthy and easy. The kiddos loved that their letters were on top and they gobbled them up!!
Thanks Alicia for the idea!!!

(Don't you love my awesome styling for the photo? The pink and green plastic plates the kids ate them on. I know, I know, classy!!) :-)

My 36th.

I actually like having birthdays. Even now that we're up to these impossibly high numbers. It's all thanks to Chris and my parents - they are sooooo good at birthdays! I had a wonderfully relaxing, happy, low key day. It was exactly what I wanted and we capped it off with a family dinner at PF. My all time favorite food.
Then there's the fact that Jaime and I share a bday and Lauren's is a few days later - which always makes for some fun birthday celebrations. This year was Jaime's 30th and she decided to have a Barbie party. I wasn't all that excited about dressing up as a Barbie, they don't exactly come giant and pregnant :-) but Bedtime Barbie and the party turned out to be so much fun! Anyone having a girls only party soon should do this. It was a blast!! Everyone looked so cute and it was actually fun getting dressed up and it's always fun hanging out with the girls!!
We ended up with:
Dressy Barbie, Holiday Barbie, Toy Story Barbie, Bedtime Barbie, Sweetheart Barbie, Bridesmaid Barbie, Asian Barbie and Doctor Barbie. (Not pictured, Lingerie Barbie and Ballet Barbie.)

Success!

Clare is potty trained! Yippee. :-)
I've been holding off putting up this post, I didn't want to jinx us, but I think it's official now. She hasn't had an accident in a week and has now been dry 4 nights in a row too. I have to say my potty training method is pretty painless. Do it for a few days until I get sick of the accidents and then go back to pull ups for a month, then do it for a few days until I get sick of the accidents and then go back to pull ups for a month or so and so on and so on... I'm not sure exactly what try we're currently on, but this time it took right away. Only two accidents and voila!! Success! :-) Now I have 8 weeks diaper/pull up free until baby arrives. I guess that's better than no time at all.

Girly girl

Much to daddy's dismay (he hates all that princess/barbie stuff!) we definitely have a girly girl on our hands. She loves wearing dresses and skirts every day (thanks grandpa for keeping her stocked up!) loves having her hair done pretty and is now all into the princesses (she will only wear the Cinderella pull-ups) barbies and polly pockets. I love it!! :-)

She earned a toy a few weeks ago and chose her first pollys. We spent hours putting the shoes on, taking the shoes off, putting them on, taking them off and on and on and on.

Annual Farm Trip

The annual co-op field trip to the farm really makes it feel like fall around here.

Clarey riding Rosebud again! This is the pony our family gets every year!
Picking the perfect pumpkin.
Clare's co-op class.