November

November was a pretty great month for our family. Brek officially participated in his first Primary Program at church. (Primary is for all kids ages 3-12). (And, last year when Brek was still in nursery (ages 1.5-3) he got to join the bigger kids and sing a couple songs, but this year he was up on the stand the whole time, sang the songs, and had a speaking part.)

He took his tie off and wore it on his head, tossed it around a bit, and fought when dad tried to take it away. He picked his nose and ate it. He said his lines quietly, but clearly. And he held notes out WAY longer than anyone else, requiring Daddy to give him his own, special cut-off. It was cute and endearing and funny and precious.

One day, Brek and I were wrestling. I declared that I won. And Brek responded, "I'm four!"

Other "highlights" included our microwave blowing up and the furnace going out one night. When the microwave died, Brek suggested we just ask Santa for a new one. Thankfully we were able to purchase a used one from some friends. When the heat went out, honestly, we didn't notice at first. But once we did figure it out, it felt like quite the ordeal to get things working again. Here's a picture of our thermostat, and it had actually started to warm up at that point. I think the lowest the house got was 50 degrees. I ended up being late to work waiting for the guy to come and fix it. Thankfully we have a space heater, so we set that up in our bedroom and tried to contain Brek there (which didn't work.) So grateful for heat!

Another fun story from the month: One morning, just as I hopped in the shower, my body wasn't even all the wet yet (thankfully) Brek came into the bathroom and said that someone was here at the house, and that he opened the door for them. *Great* So I hurriedly dried off and put my pjs back on, and came out to 2 sheriff officers standing in my front room. *Trying not to panic* They were responding to a report from our back alley neighbors that someone in a purple car came into our yard and sneakily carried something away. So, thinking that they had broken into our garage or something, the neighbor called the cops. Turned out, it was just the tree-trimmers from the day before who had left their chainsaw in the backyard (un-covered and in a PERFECT place for my 4-year-old to play with), and then came to retrieve it for that day's job, or so I assumed.

Apparently when Brek answered the door, he also told the sheriff that neither his mom or dad was home. 

(And a side story to that, which is the reason for the tree-trimmers anyway, was that the big tree in our backyard started to fall and was leaning on the power lines going through our back yard. The tree-trimmers had to come out 3 different times to get the job done right. And still, they broke the back fence and hit the neighbor's house as well.)

We spent one weekend up in Chadron visiting some family friends and receiving a much-needed piano lesson. On our drive up, Brek was telling us about a fight he was in at daycare that day. As we started asking him about the details, he told us that he was playing "Elsa" and was "zapping" but his friend Grady wanted him to stop and pushed him. 

It was wonderful to get away even just for a night. And I really learned a lot and all the advice from Jim has really helped. Brek had a blast playing with Jim's youngest Westley, or as Brek says it, "Wrestley," who is 7. Brek said it was the greatest sleepover ever! They started getting ready for bed around 7pm, but were up well past midnight. After we came home, Brek told me that he wanted to join Wrestley's family. He did say that Joe & I could join Wrestley's family too.

Two days before Thanksgiving, as we were anticipating my parents' arrival that evening, and shortly after I got to work, I got a phone call from daycare that Brek had thrown up (which he has never done before). So I got to go get him and bring him home. And after arriving home, he of course had no interest in resting and wanted to eat, and thereafter never acted sick at all. And then I got sick, and ended up with an ear infection. Otherwise, Thanksgiving was wonderful!

It was great to have my parents visit for a couple days. It of course snowed, but we survived several trips into town despite the weather. We carried on our Thanksgiving tradition of making fancy turkey panini sandwiches. This year I also made homemade stuffing (which I slightly ruined by misreading the amount of spices to add) and we made pies. Joe made homemade pumpkin pie which was DELICIOUS as well as my family's tradition of chocolate peanut butter pie. It was low-key, not a ton of kitchen/cooking time, and just good time with family. We played games each night too. It was a really wonderful Thanksgiving!

Joe making his homemade pie crust

 

My mom taking her Thanksgiving Day nap

Joe & Brek playing "Pass the Pigs"

Posing for pictures with Grandma and Papa

Brek's favorite part was the pie. Scratch that. Brek's favorite part was the whipped cream on top of his pie.

Brek made this really cute turkey at daycare.

Here he is having a converstaion with the turkey:

Here are our 2 yummy pies:

The day after Thanksgiving, Grandma and Papa took us into town to see "Big Hero 6." We all LOVED it! And Brek has been on a pretty big "Baymax" kick ever since. We were sad for Grandma and Papa to have to leave the next day, but we were grateful knowing that we would see them just a few weeks later at Christmastime.

After my parents left, we decided to decorate for Christmas. Last January, Joe's mom gave us her old Christmas tree. So this was our first year ever having our own Christmas tree. Brek enjoyed helping to put it together and then adding the lights and ornaments.

Gotta love Brek's "creepy eyes" before he hung up his Brek bear that I made last year. (My family had these ornaments growing up.)

A little less creepy

The last element of our November was that Joe participated in "No Shave November." He decided that he wanted to know what it was like to have a beard. People kept asking me how I felt about it, which was kinda strange. I guess I really didn't care. It wasn't the most fun to kiss, (as my dad can tell you!) but I wasn't against him trying it out. I actually thought he looked pretty good, and it was kinda fun to play with it. But Joe didn't like it. He didn't like how long it took for it to actually look good since his hair is so light and hard to see. But mostly he didn't like how much it itched. I started making fun of him during band because he would be conducting with one hand and scratching his face with the other. He was very excited for the month to end so he could shave it off.

During one of our family conversations, Brek said, "Mommy, our family needs to have another little kid so that I have someone to play with."

"Well, you should know that even if we had another kid, she would be a baby, and she'd be too small for you to play with."

(pause)

"Well, maybe we could just *borrow* a kid from another family..."