Month of Celebration! (Warning it's a long one again!)

November is a month of celebration at our house! We have National Adoption Month, Parker, both my grandpas, Tracy and Bryan's birthdays and of course Thanksgiving! It was one busy month! But we love it! We started off by attending the 5th annual Adoption Walk With Me event. We haven't been able to go before because we've always had something conflict with it the last four years! Finally it worked out this year and my brother Dustin, his wife Lindsey and our niece Rylee were able to come down from Idaho to join us! It was so much fun! Lindsey made us AWESOME t-shirts, they had raffles, balloons, hot chocolate and bagels! We had a great time and love celebrating adoption every chance we get!

Rylee and Parker walking for adoption

Parker giving adoption the thumbs up!

Parker needed a little break from all that walking!

Parker turned 4 this year! I know I can't believe it either! He wanted everything shark for his birthday! He opened presents from his birth family, we had a party for his friends, went to Boondocks on his birthday for another adoption event and then we had family over for cake and ice cream the day after his birthday. We celebrated for 4 days! It was awesome! We are so grateful that he is part of our family!

He got shark and ocean dvds from his birth father

Aunt Roberta reading the boys the book she gave Parker

Playing 'shark tag' at Parker's birthday party

Opening presents

Shark fin cupcakes!

Fishing pond

All that partying wore him out!

I always take a pic of Parker first thing in the morning on his birthday

So excited about his big boy bike!

We waited in line forever to ride these cars at Boondocks. It was freezing but he loved every lap around the track!

Riding the big boy bike!

The shark cake

We went to Idaho this year for Thanksgiving. Parker was so excited to spend a few days with his cousins! We stayed with my brother Jack and his wife Alison. I started the day going shopping with Jack and Al. Then we had a nice dinner and then Alison finally let us look at the black Friday ads! That night we joined my cousins for our traditional Thanksgiving bowling night. Parker LOVES bowling! It was fun to watch him bowl with his cousins! Then, Lindsey and I made our shopping plan and Heather and Jack decided they wanted to come too! We went to Toys R Us and the line to get in was ridiculous! So we headed to Walmart. Everyone helped me get a few things that I wanted. Then Jack and Heather went home. Lindsey and I waited for Target to open. We stayed up all night! I did that last year too, and I don't know if I can keep doing it! It was fun and I got most of my Christmas shopping done! I don't even know how many stores we went to, but I was able to take a nap for a little while after we were done. That night Mom, Heather, Lindsey and I went to Perkins for a treat. We talked and laughed (Linds and I were still so tired we were extra giggly!) It was a lot of fun!

Thanksgiving bowling with the cousins

I don't have any pictures from Bryan's birthday, lame I know! He opened his presents that morning and he wasn't picture ready! He got a new U of U t-shirt (you can never have enough) and he got the TV series 'Firefly' on Bluray. He's been wanting it for a while now and it really wasn't a huge surprise to him, but he was still really excited to finally have it! He worked that day, so that was about all we did. I still owe him a date night to Braza Grill for his birthday dinner! Parker and I ran some errands that day and ended up at Kneaders for a little treat. He wanted to take some pictures together and then he told me, "Mom, we can put those on our blog!" So, here you go!

Always with the licking of the frosting first

Get Comfortable...

You may want to take a potty break, get a snack/drink and get comfortable, this is going to be a lengthy post! Here goes! Against our better judgment, we signed Parker up for soccer. He spent most of the games running around chasing his friends, not the ball. He also learned a trick from his friend Cole. They would pull their shirts up over their faces and run around. He just recently started his campaign to sign up again, but so far he hasn't convinced us to fork out the $40!

This is typical for Parker and his friends at soccer

He might not really pay attention to what is happening in the game, but at least he's having fun!

This is one of his new favorite poses! Where does he come up with these things?

Here he is after his last game with his trophy!

Parker and I had about a month long discussion about what he wanted to be for Halloween this year. Apparently, gone are the days when I can just pick a costume for him and he will wear it without putting up too much of a fight. He started out wanting to be a shark, (he is just a little obsessed) then a crab, frog, octopus (and I'm sure more animals that I can't remember) batman, and finally we settled on the three of us dressing up as Alvin, Simon and Theodore a.k.a. The Chipmunks. He wanted to be Theodore, so one day we were heading to Walmart and I told him we were going to look for a green sweatshirt for his Theodore costume. He then informed me that he didn't want to be The Chipmunks anymore! He wanted to be a transformer! I couldn't figure out where he had come up with that one since he's never seen a transformer cartoon or movie. I had seen a Bumble Bee costume at Walmart, so this is how the conversation went: Mom-"Do you want to be Bumble Bee? Parker-"No, what's that other guy's name?" Mom-"Do you mean Optimus Prime?" Parker-"Yeah, I want to be Optimus Prime." So, we looked at the costumes and I couldn't believe they had an Optimus Prime costume, in his size, and it was only $12! They only catch was that it had a mask. I showed it to him and asked him if he would wear it. He immediately put it on and wore it the entire time we were in Walmart and in the car on the way home. We went to our ward Halloween Party, trunk or treat and then had our friends, the Moellers, over for a Halloween/Utah football party! We had a great time eating, passing out candy and listening to the kids play. I think we even watched a little football in there somewhere!

He won a cupcake at the cake walk!

Parker's friends Jacob and Tate at our house after trunk or treat

My masterpiece: Football Cheese Ball!

Our little Optimus Prime all dressed up!

We took advantage of some really nice weather at the beginning of Nov and went to the zoo. Bryan was able to come with us and we had a fun day together! Bryan and Parker we fascinated by the rattle snake that was drinking out of its water dish. I couldn't stand to look at it! Needless to say, snakes are not my favorite thing at the zoo! I did however enjoy watching this giraffe lick the door frame with its freakishly long tongue!

Watching the creepy rattle snake!

Riding the carousel is a must every time we go to the zoo!


Our long-tongued giraffe friend