That Thankful Time of Year

 We started November with one of Tanner's favorite past times...family pictures. Ok, so it isn't Tanner's favorite, but he loves me so he "suffers" through it. Vivi was hilarious and this picture Tanner got perfectly captures her essence throughout the whole photo shoot. 

The kids had their primary program at church and all of the kids did so well. The spirit is always so strong. The primary got to play a game with the Bishopric where they got to put different things on them whenever they answered a question correctly. Luckily I was pacing the halls with Asa so I was able to snap this picture: 

Tanner got creative with dinner one night...

Mariah got braces; just three brackets on her top teeth. She's got a long road of braces ahead of her so she wasn't exactly excited about this milestone.

We don't have any pictures of this, but we went to Kidsymphony's performance of Peter and the Wolf with a performer acting it out as well. It was so delightful and we all had grins on our faces watching it. 

We went down to Tiff and Cameron's for Thanksgiving this year. We split the trip there into two days, leaving on Sunday afternoon. The kids did pretty well at the hotel. We've learned that long car rides help Asa to sleep really well because he wears himself out screaming in the car. But we didn't have a pack and play for Vivi so she was a little bit harder to get to sleep. She thought she was going to sleep in a bed with Eliza and Austin but she kept going between our bed and theirs. So finally Tanner wouldn't let her leave our bed and she was being so funny. She would get really quiet and then try sneak out from the bottom of the bed. Tanner would grab her by the foot and drag her back up between us where she would flop down and go limp, I think hoping we would think she had fallen asleep, but she wasn't patient enough to fake it for more than a few seconds before trying to escape again. She finally fell asleep though and did great between Tanner and I. 

The next day was longer and we started the morning with some throw up (never my favorite) but everyone was pretty happy and excited to see cousins.

Well, almost everyone. Asa was not a fan of the car but we got a few naps out of him. 

We were real excited to make it to Tiff and Cameron's. And then Vivi threw up again and I began to wonder if we may have just brought the stomach flu to the Barrs. 

Aunt Tiffy's house was so fun! She did the girl's nails and fixed their hair. They all had a blast outside riding the four wheeler and motorcycles. Chet and Austin went to a basketball camp with Brigs and had a good time. Austin wasn't feeling well for the scrimmage that night so he stayed home with me. Austin wasn't feeling the next day but he still tried to be outside as much as he could. 

That night we went to a Mexican restaurant and had some really good tacos. We have missed good Mexican food. Midwest Mexican just isn't very good...sorry guys, I said it. 

These cousins don't get together enough, but when they do, it's a party. 

Vivi loved Irie and wanted to hold her, even though they probably weighed the same. 

The Barrs saddled up the horses and everyone got to ride. 

Eliza kept wanting me to run as I led her horse. The elevation about killed me...it had nothing to do with me being incredibly out of shape. 

Vivi loved riding and didn't want to get off. I even got to ride but I've realized something, I'm much more scared of being bucked off now that I'm a mom. The horse I was on gave one little crowhop and I wasn't too sad about getting off. I'm not going to jump right up after being dumped like I used to. 

The kids had so much fun dancing with the surround sound music and jumping on the couch. And Eliza loved petting all of Uncle Cameron's mounts. 

They went and caught crawdads and saw all the animals at Grandma Delio and Papa Barr's house and even got to go for a ride in the Razor. 

Eliza and Jude had fun playing with snakes all day. Those two are cut out of the same mold. One night Jude was sitting next to Eliza in the car and I heard her say, "Jude if you don't stop I'm going to punch you in the face!" To which Tanner quietly said to me, "he'll just punch her right back." But they got along so well. 

We had some really rough nights with Asa where I could just tell that he wasn't feeling good. Tiffany reminded me so much of my mom, coming in asking how she could help. And then Vivi was feeling sick again. Chet started throwing up and then Thanksgiving day I started feeling sick. I ate our big meal and almost immediately regretted it. I was sick all night long, haven't been sick like that for a long time. I was feeling better the next day but then Mariah was sick. So yeah...we were the Typhoid Maries of the trip. So sorry Barrs. 

Look at these two together! Irie is the cutest thing! She is especially good at hissing, which makes sense with her brother's snake obsession. 

This is the only picture of Tiff and I. I just love this girl so much. She never made me feel bad about bringing sickness into her house. She's a good one. Tanner got to go on a scout day (or whatever hunters call that...) with Cameron. It was so good for him to get outside and talk about Bishop stuff with Cameron (they were called just weeks apart). 

Adele pointed out how much Benny and Vivi look alike. They pose the same too!

We headed out early the next day. Mariah was still feeling pretty sick and Eliza started throwing up as well. Poor Mariah was covered in hives and looked miserable. Tanner got her some Benadryl and she spent most of her time sleeping. Asa did much better on the way home and I think it was probably because he was so exhausted from so many bad nights.

The roads were snowy for the first hour of the drive and even worse the last three hours. We decided to head straight home because we didn't want to deal with sick kids in a hotel. But we were so grateful that we all got good sleep that night at home. 

Although we had lots of sickness and some really miserable nights, I'm still so glad we went. Tiff and Cameron may think differently...but they were such great hosts and we're excited for the next time we go. 

We've still been dealing with sickness but hoping that we'll get it all out of the way before Christmas, because seriously, I think we've had every virus going around.