Thanksgiving weekend

We had a wonderful long weekend! There were 19 of us eating on Thanksgiving. Some are harder to see in the picture in the very back though! Emma sat at the coffee table where she had more room. She had to be extra careful that the dogs didn't get her food!


After pie and the table getting cleared, Aunt Denise and Emma made a parade with cars, turkeys and pumpkins!


The next day we got an updated four generations picture which I just love having. Also, Great Grandma and her girls (including Zoe)!

We had a ton of rain on our drives there and back, but thankfully there were a couple of days over the weekend where it didn't rain! It was still pretty chilly outside, but not enough to keep Emma from playing!

Since Emma loves to play firefighter, Papa got out an old fire extinguisher that just had water in it. They built a fire in the pit and Emma got to spray it and put it out with water! She wanted to do this many times but the fire pit was already wet so she squirted the grass later :)

Ready, set, race! Papa and Emma took their tractors down to see the neighbor's horses.

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Happy turkey day!

Happy Thanksgiving from the lil' baker! We hope you all have a wonderful holiday, and we feel blessed that you're in our lives!

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Farm cat

Yesterday we went to Papa John's farm, and he had a toy Bobcat, I mean machine, to drive around the property with. Emma was very excited to go for a ride! She didn't have to hang on too tight as there was a seatbelt to keep her in.


We brought Zoe with us and she loved running around the farm. She and I walked behind them until we got to a creek, which Zoe would have gotten very wet and muddy if she crossed! So we climbed in the back as well. Zoe didn't know what to think, but when she jumped up on the hay bale she enjoyed looking where we were going and digging in the hay.

The neighbors had these big pigs that came right over and oinked at us. Two of them were mamas! We enjoyed watching them.

Emma's ready to get her farm driving license!
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Cover girl

After our Bible study this morning, we headed straight to the mall to the new Hanna Andersson store. Hanna is a Swedish clothing store known for striped cotton clothes (very comfortable but pricey!).
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They were having a "Merry Little Cover Shoot" today where you could dress your kids in their Christmas clothes and get a photo taken as though the kids are on the front of the catalog! It was also a promotion for the Windows 7 phone, which you got to use while you waited in line.


They also had a raffle, which we won! A free pair of pajamas! I'll have to get a picture of those on Emma later tonight but here's what they look like:


Update! Wearing her new jammies tonight:

We've been joking that she looks like a pink cheetah!
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Hoop dreams

Emma was practicing her basketball "tricks" today. What a great sunny day to be outside! We waited until it warmed up a bit from this morning. (We're trying to not get too excited about the s word that is showing up in the forecast...!)

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Children's Museum

On Friday we went to the Children's Museum with PapaGrammyCuz. It was quite busy there since it was Veteran's Day, but we slowly made our way through each exhibit. Plus they had new things since we had last been there, like a pet hospital with stuffed animals to examine!

The rock climbing wall was new too. She made her way back and forth, and back and forth again!

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Arts and crafts...

She loved the building exhibit. She connected many pieces of PVC pipe. I thought - what a great thing to have at home to construct with since they actually connect?! She currently uses pieces of wood and builds things in the garage.

Getting those crocodile teeth sparkly clean!

The rotating exhibit right now is Lego castles, and there's this big Lego bench in the entry way!

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Brushing your teeth has its rewards!

It's true! I received a phone call today from the dentist's office. They were calling to inform us that Emma's name was drawn out of the bowl of "No Cavity Club" kids for the month of October! This means that she won a prize, and we headed to the office to see what it was. She was incredibly excited to hear that she had won something.

As it turned out, she got to choose her prize from a whole wall of toys! I estimate it took her 10 minutes to finally settle on her prize. She also received a baseball style t-shirt. I love how on the back it says "Cavities 00"!


She has been playing with her prize all afternoon. She chose a battery operated truck (Ford 150 if you're keeping score) and she loves chasing it as it zips around the house!
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Yep, it's Fall!

We've had plenty of leaves falling in the backyard over the past few weeks. Emma really likes to help out with yard work, especially with her own little rake. I tell you - if a kid has the right tools, they are willing to do any chore because it's more fun!


Then of course I need her help to jump on the leaves and squish them down good!


I like to think of this as "Oregon Gothic" :)

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Harvest Festival

Whee! We had a fun night last night at our church's harvest festival. This was bigger and better than before, and it was incredibly well done. The first thing Emma ran to was the inflatable slide! She went down it a few times before hitting the bounce house next to it.


Daddy and Emma tried to win a dessert on the cake walk! This is also the best picture that shows her wearing her Tae Kwon Do uniform costume! After this, she got too hot and took the top part off and just wore a t-shirt.


She played a few games to win candy prizes, including target practice with a BB gun!

Score!

But what she REALLY loved most of all was the dunk tank! Outside! In the chilly weather! Those poor guys. We only hope the water was heated! We stood and watched them get dunked over, and over....!

Emma slipped and got a little hurt at the end of the night. She tried to brave doing down the slide one more time through the tears, but it was just time to get going and head home after that. Later she said how much fun she had (until that point)!

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