Dress-up Clothes

Kade is in a stage where he loves dressing up, and even though Kimber has 4 beautiful girls, I was impressed with all the fun dress-up clothes she had for Kade to wear. And the most amazing part is Kimber has made most of the clothes herself!

 Kade and Max had a lot of fun running around the house dressed up as different things. Tenley loved the princess dresses and all the necklaces. The Haddon's house is such a fun house to play at!

Family Pictures

My sweet sister-in-law Hailey took some amazing family pictures of us. I'm so grateful to have some updated pictures! It is fun to see our cute kids grow up!

Thanksgiving

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday with the Haddon's, Kyle and Hailey and their family, and the Haddon's friends who joined us. I was able to Facetime with my family for a bit and it was so good to see them all together! 

I'm grateful for many things, but most especially for the wonderful family I have! 

Tenley loved cuddling with her Dada today! 

Kade's new friend that he loved wrestling with.

Homemade Fruit Cocktail

Every year on Thanksgiving since maybe even the 1800's I learned, Brad's mom's family has cut up fruit to make homemade fruit cocktail for Thanksgiving dinner. It is a delicious tradition and we enjoy keeping up on it! Kade has especially grown to love this tradition and was excited to help cut up the fruit!

Our Gratitude Tree

We started this tradition last year of a gratitude tree where every day every person writes what they are grateful for on a leaf and tapes it onto the tree. I really like doing it! It was fun to hear what Tenley is grateful for this year as well! She was often grateful for her pajamas or her clothes. She is a silly girl!

Make Your Own Pizzas

For our pizza night tonight we got to each make our own pizza. Kade loved choosing and putting on all of his toppings. It was a yummy dinner!

New Places

Today we decided to go somewhere we haven't gone yet here in Indiana so we took the kids to the Museum of Art. It was a really cool building and there was a lot of neat art! Luckily there was a little spot for the kids to play and draw. They really enjoyed that!

There were a lot of security guards watching us everywhere we went, though, because of our little kids. We kept telling them to be careful and not to touch anything. Kade finally asked, "Dad, what does art mean? Don't touch??" Haha.

We had a fun day with the kids!

This was my favorite picture that I saw!

It was too cold to see the grounds outside, but they looked beautiful!

This was Kade's favorite part of the museum, but apparently he isn't supposed to play on top of it. I guess he is only allowed to walk and stand on it. And apparently I wasn't supposed to take any pictures on this level.
Oh well.

Kade's Questions

I learned at the Children's Museum that the average 4 year old asks 473 questions a day! That sounds about right! Normally I'm not as patient as I should be with all of Kade's questions, but tonight his questions were so sweet.

We were cuddling on the couch and he said, "Mom, where is Heaven?"

Wow, that is a hard question to answer! I've been trying to be as real as I can with my answers to him and to not just make it a simple answer that I think a child would understand. So I told him that heaven is all around us and that we just aren't able to see it or the spirits that are there. I told him that when we left heaven to come to Earth we had a veil placed over our eyes so that we couldn't see it anymore and that when we die and go back to heaven the veil will be removed and we'll see everything again. But even though we can't see it, we can feel that it is there and we can feel that there are little angels closely watching over us.

He said, "That is why I have a spirit in my body!?"

Yes, our spirits in our body have a close connection with heaven and the spirits there.

Then he said, "When the veil is all gone then you'll be able to see Grandma Hobson and then you'll be super happy!?"

Yes, Kade, we will be super happy!

The Superhero Game

Kade is obsessed with superheroes right now. He loves to watch the cartoon Spider-Man, Iron Man, Transformers, Batman, Avengers, or Superman on Netflix. He loves to dress up like the characters, and whenever we're at the library he always wants to take a comic book home. Instead of reading Dr. Seuss at night we've been reading comic books!

I didn't think he'd be in to superheroes and comic books this early but I guess he isn't a baby anymore!

His favorite game to play with Brad is the Superhero game. Kade will start out as Batman and fly to attack Brad with his batman knives and then Brad will become Thor and hammer Kade and then Kade turns into the Hulk and smashes Brad and then Brad turns into Wolverine and scratches Kade with his claws and then Kade turns into Superman and gets Brad with his red eyes and then Brad turns into Iron Man and shoots at Kade and then Kade turns into Darth Vader and gets Brad with his light saber and then Brad turns into Optimus Prime and gets Kade with his knife and they keep going back and forth. It is hilarious to watch and Kade loves it so much.

I love this creative stage in life that he's going through right now!

Kade's Favorite Part of the Day: Playing with his Daddy

Tributes

Every year since 2003 my mother-in-law June participated in Hymns of Thanksgiving in Boise, Idaho. Her brother is the one that started the program and continues to run it today. It is an amazing musical program and Brad and I were fortunate enough to attend it a few years ago and sit in the front row to watch his parents, uncles and aunts, and many others perform. The choir has grown so much and now has close to 300 members! It is truly amazing what Brad's uncle has done with it.

June loved it so much and was so dedicated to it that she rarely traveled during the months leading up to the concert so that she wouldn't miss a practice. I remember her being a little disappointed that she had to fly out to Indiana for Tenley's blessing and miss some of the practices in 2011 but she was, of course, here to support us.

This year her brother has dedicated the performance to her. I so wish we could be there at the concert on Sunday to show our support and love. Her brother was nice enough to put a tribute in the program just for June. It was so sweet to read. I'm so grateful for her never-ending example and the wonderful tribute that her brother shared.

Cousins

Cousins are the best! I'm grateful that we have family close and that we'll see them again for Thanksgiving and Christmas. The boys fought a lot this trip for some reason but there were also times when they got a long great! I hope they grow to like each other more and more as they spend more time together.

I'm grateful Kyle and Hailey made the trip down here. It was so good to spend time with them! 

Ever since Brad lost his Mom it has been hard to talk about that loss. Every time I think about it all the pain comes back and it is so hard again. So I just don't think about it. But I know I need to remember her and the great legacy she left and her example and goodness and all the ways I've been changed for the better. 

Even with Kyle and Hailey here we didn't talk about our loss very much, but it just helped to be together because we all understand what each other are going through in a way. 

When we're together with family I feel her love more because I know how happy it would make her to see us getting together and growing closer bonds with each other. I know how much that meant to her and how much it still means to her.

Family is everything.

Costumes

The boys had a lot of fun playing with costumes. They loved seeing Brad get dressed up too!

Safety, Movies

The weather was crazy today! We had tornado watches going on all morning and afternoon so we ended up only having Sacrament Meeting for church so everyone could get home and be safe. Luckily it only got really windy and rainy and we didn't have a tornado anywhere too close to us. Kyle and Hailey's house in Chicago was also safe as was Brad's sister Kimber and her family in Chicago. I'm not a fan of the tornado scares!

It was nice to relax, have a big yummy dinner (roast, potatoes and carrots, orange rolls, and caeser salad) and watch Monsters University together. Kade also introduced Max to the "Darth Vader" song. It was a good Sunday!

Coco-Motion Hot Chocolate

We had a lot of fun playing at the Children's Museum today! The kids were pretty tired so we weren't able to stay all day, but we enjoyed showing them the new playscape. I was hoping to show Hailey the Avatar exhibit since she loves that movie, but I guess they close it a few weeks ago! Bummer.

I found out tonight that Hailey has never heard of a coco-motion, so we made some yummy hot chocolate tonight to have while we played games with our husbands.