Thanksgiving, etc.

What.

I wanted to make sure to get a post in before Christmas-- if too much time goes by, then it is overwhelming to try to get everything in one blogpost!  Serious problems, people.

We had a really nice Thanksgiving here in Michigan-- a nice low-key morning watching the Macy's parade with coffee.  We ordered our Thanksgiving dinner from Boatwerks restaruant here in Holland, and WOW was it good!  And no work at all!!  If we are in MI again in the future for Thanksgiving, we will probably go this route again because it was SO SO SO good, not that expensive (way less than what we would have paid to get all the ingredients to make our own Thanksgiving dinner!), and was no work at all!  Plus we got all of the good Thanksgiving staple foods, and had just the right amount of leftovers (we were not drowning in turkey and gravy at the end of the day). :)

After dinner we met up with some of my extended Wiers side of the family who were in Zeeland.  Jeremiah got to have his very first downhill sledding experience, and from what I hear he was quite brave and had a TON of fun!  We really need to buy this kid a sled now that we live in Michigan.  We enjoyed pie with the Wiers' and then moved on to Grand Rapids to hang out at the Diekema's house for a bit.  It was nice to be able to see so much family!

One of J's Thanksgiving preschool projects:

I love this for 2 reasons: 1) "Molly the Dog" not to be confused with Molly his classmate!  And 2) Who isn't thankful for mowers and trimmers?!?!?

On Black Friday we opted not to go to any stores, and had our family pictures taken instead (by my sister's good friend Lauren!).  They turned out SO WELL-- I did not know what to expect with our 4 year old and 5 week old (at the time) and Michigan weather but the kids did great and the weather actually cooperated, and Lauren  was just awesome!

I just love all of them! :)

We also got our Christmas stuff out and got the tree up.  Hope was enamored with the tree and all the lights!

She was telling it an exciting story!
 

Jeremiah likes to play with my Willow Tree nativity, and so far we have only had one casualty-- 1 of the wisemen was knocked over and lost his head.  Thankfully super glue was able to fix that!  J has a great imagination and had quite a story going with the shepherds and his Transformers.

"And then the shepherds cheered for the Autobot..."

J and I made and decorated some Christmas cookies last week-- he was very proud!

Also last week we hit Crazy Bounce for J to burn some energy on one of his non-preschool days.  He had been begging to go back there since we went there last June!  Not sure how much longer that place will be open though, since both times we were like the only people there.  I'm not complaing, though!  Made it easy to keep track of J and push H around in the stroller.

The one slide he is brave enough to go on (and on and on and on over and over).

Hope is 7 weeks old now!  I can't believe we are closing in on 2 months already-- makes me so sad!  She is really such a good baby, and mostly just fusses if she is over-tired or hungry.  Her little coos and frequent smiles just melt our hearts!  HERE is a video of Hope having a nice conversation with the lambs on her swing. :)  She is so funny-- sometimes if she is fussing and she is NOT hungry or tired, it is just because she wants to be laid down by herself to chill for awhile.  I'm trying not to take that too personally!  She loves laying on the couch and talking to people or hanging out in her bouncy seat- she is figuring out that if she kicks her legs and waves her arms she can make the seat move and make some noise!

She is growing like crazy, too!  She has not been back to the doctor since 2 weeks-- she goes on January 5 for her 2 month appointment.  But we were curious about her weight, so we did the very scientific and super accurate way of weighing her on the scale with me, then me by myself, then subtracting. :)  Using that method, she is almost 12 lbs!  Aaaagh!  She has been wearing 3 month clothes since she was about 1 week old, and some of them are getting a little snug already (yeah.... she's getting some chubby thighs which we still try to squeeze into 3 month leggings.)

I love this baby butt in pink GAP corduroy skinny jeans!

We usually get out every day to do something (run errands, get J from preschool, Starbucks....), and H is (usually) pretty happy to go along for the ride.  Sometimes she feels the need to eat while we are out and about, and we're getting good at backseat or passenger seat nursing.

Passed out.

Bath time is lots of fun, and Hope really seems to enjoy it!  She just kicks back and relaxes in the warm water, and tolerates us while we do things like this:

Baby mohawk!

Way back in the summer time, my cousin (or, more specifically my cousin's daughter) Tess asked if we'd be willing to have baby girl play Baby Jesus in a production called "The Promise" which is put on by the dance school where she is the choreographer (Turning Pointe School of Dance).  We of course thought that would be fun!  And it turned out to be so wonderful!

Hope was out on stage as Baby Jesus for part of one song-- HERE is the song, "Born in Me" by Francesca Battistelli.  Yeah.... the song is just beautiful, and seeing my baby out there as Baby Jesus with this song playing?  Um, tears. every. time.  We did 2 rehearsals, and then she was Baby Jesus for 3 different performances.  She really did well each time!  The hardest part for me was trying to make sure she stayed quiet while we were backstage!  That was what made me nervous because there was nowhere to go to quiet her down without the audience hearing.  I think the Saturday afternoon performance was the only one where she really cried, and that was after she came off stage (she was always fine while on stage!).  Everyone was so nice and of course thought Hope and her amazing hair were just adorable. :)  It was such a wonderful experience and I'm so glad we were able to be a part of it!  So thanks, Tess!  There are still performances next weekend, so I'd highly recommend going (I'm kinda sad Hope won't be Baby Jesus anymore!).

This was the morning after one of the rehearsals.  Exhausting!

We will be heading to Wisconsin next week for Christmas, so I am sure I will have that to post about, as well as Hope's 2 month stats and Dr. appt, etc!  Hope you all enjoy a blessed Christmas and New Year!!