Thanksgiving Dinner

This year, we had a fairly relaxing Thanksgiving day. We took some dinner to an elderly lady, ate our big "dinner" at my parents house, visited the Toronto family and ended the evening with pie night at my Aunt and Uncles. Maddie has the cheesiest smile these days complete with squinted eyes!
Robby chowing down on his traditional Thanksgiving dinner

Aunt Lori and Uncle Tyler at the table

Do we Live in a ZOo...or aRe we GoIng tO thE zOO??

I suppose the answer is both on a day like this. :)

In mid-November (I am attempting to get my life updated on my blog from the past few months before baby #3 makes his way into our home), my mom was so sweet and came to the Phoenix Zoo with the kids and I. We arrived in the morning just after it opened and walked all around the zoo in search of our favorite animals. It truly was a perfect morning: perfect weather, perfect company, perfect sack lunch food, etc...

--- although the Phoenix zoo is known for it's environmentally friendly habitats for the animals, it also makes it hard for two tiny little kids to be interested in animals that are nowhere to be found---

Some of our favorite animals were: rhinos, elephants, giraffes, large fish in the pond, birds snacking on food on the walkways, etc.

As I have said before in the past, getting both kids to sit with me AND take a picture is an impossibility. This is the closest thing I get :)
Miss M sitting in her stroller at the beginning of the day.

Grandma Sheffield, Maddie and Robby looking in on the elephants.

Maddie loved being able to put her face right next to the chimpanzees and informed me that they had "owies" on their bums.

Robby's favorite animal of the day. When Grandma lifted him up to have a clear look at the Rhinos he loudly said "Whoaa" and then kept making roaring noises as he looked at it

Thanks mOm for all the help you are constantly giving me with my kids. They recognize your doting and love you so much. They are always talking about their Grandma and asking when they are going to see her!

Every once in a great while I can coax one of these beautiful smiles out of her AND capture it on film.

Right before we left, we found the big fish pond near the front entrance. Maddie was ready to hop right in and swim with them.

I always get this grumpy face when he doesn't want to look at me for a picture.

-the only downer to the whole day was when a lady came up and asked sympathetically when I was due. After I announced to her I had 7 weeks to go and felt pretty good she replied "your kidding, you poor thing. You just look so big" I wish people felt less comfortable offering remarks like that.

Sun Devil Fans

Anyone who knows Jesse and I, would know that we are BIG ASU fans. We both graduated from Arizona State and have been season ticket holders for about nine years now. We have stuck with them through all kinds of ups and downs.

This year has been a particularly down year for the football program, especially with such a promising outlook before the season began. The lowest point was just recently when we lost the rivalry game to U of A (we WILL get you next year!!), thus no bowl game :(

Nevertheless, we still attended many of the games decked out in our ASU gear and rooted for the home team. We even brought BOTH kids along to several games this year. I have to admit, I was pretty worried before the first game with our tribe along, but they made me proud. For the most part they stayed in their seats and watched the airplanes go by, pointed out Sparky and the "football game players" as Maddie says, ate snacks, and in general had a blast! After the first game we realized it was actually pretty fun and so we took them along another time as well.

Well...good try Sun Devils and better luck next year!

{pictures from a game in September that we attended with tribe Toronto...}

Birthday Dinner

November: My big sister turned 28 last month and we had a fun Sunday birthday dinner for her on November 9th (actual b-day is the 8th).Lori, Mom, and Pregoville USA
Lori holding Kaylin with Maddie getting ready to "help" blow out the candles. She absolutely loves singing Happy Birthday to anyone. She did not disappoint this time around. She was the first person to break into song and had a big grin on her face the entire time :)

Robby COULD NOT wait for his cupcake and looked quite pleased with himself once he got one!

Another fabulous preggie picture of myself......

Addresses PLEASE!

Hello All!

If you haven't already sent me your current mailing address, and/or it has changed from last year....PLEASE either leave a note with your address or you can e-mail me your address at tiffanyltoronto@yahoo.com for privacy :) I would love to send you a Christmas card; I am hoping to be done with them by early next week and moving on to the rest of my Christmas things!

What Have We Been Up To????

Jesse- work, work, and more work. Has got his wife on his back constantly (sorry honey) about finishing up all the projects before baby number 3.

Tiffany- in the full swing of pregnancy and all the fun details that go along with it. Tired all the time and yet when it is time to sleep is up all night with back aches. Sick of people asking when that baby is due... and giving sympathetic looks when they hear another 4 weeks. Has completely 100% hit the nesting instinct and is constantly worrying about finishing everything, including Christmas, before baby.

Madison- growing up WAY too quickly, no longer taking naps (part of why mommy is soo tired), constantly talking to her imaginary friends, LOVES her fish tank compliments of Uncle Adam, and continues to add new things to her wish list for Santa (pink lipstick, chapstick, white jacket "like Kaylee", and most recently fishy candy from Home Depot).

Robby- also growing up too quick, but thank heavens still takes 3 hour naps and sleeps in until 9am!! Favorite phrases now include "what's that noise?" and "where daddy go?" STILL going through a massive hitting and throwing phase (does that ever end with boys??). His latest victim was his cutest ever cousin Kaylin, who now has a blue goose egg on her forehead and a fear of going anywhere near her cousin.

Family Life- Went to the zoo with Grandma Sheffield and thoroughly enjoyed seeing different animals, eating a sack lunch, playing by the fish pond, and eating cotton candy together. Had a fabulous Thanksgiving, that included me sleeping in with the kids while daddy had fun playing mud football, cooking our VERY FIRST turkey EVER, dinner at my parents house, visit with the Toronto's-- with Uncle Adam included!!, and pie night at my Aunt and Uncle's house. Fun, fun, fun! Day after Thanksgiving had me up at 3:20am for shopping madness with my mom. I am not quite sure I have yet recovered from the lack of sleep, but it is a fun tradition we do every year.

.....perhaps at some point, some pictures will follow as well!

Maddie Loves....

Makeup.

In fact she seems to enjoy it a little too much. When I am not working, she will sit in the bathroom while I get ready and beg to put her makeup on. Today, while I was trying to rush to get ready and make it to church on time, this was her newest "do". She was really upset when I cleaned it off her face and proceeded to tell me in the middle of a sobbing session that "I need lips on to look like a princess. I won't look pretty like a princess without makeup." I finally convinced her that the "lipgloss" (chapstick) I had in the church bag would make her look very pretty. :)

HALLOWEEN OVERVIEW

***updated*** Above: my mom and I handing out candy. Below: Jesse at our street party.

My in-laws invited us to their ward Halloween carnival on Wednesday, Oct 29th. We happily obliged and the kids got decked out in the costumes a few days early. Robby was the cutest ever ASU football player and Maddie went as "Cinderella, Cinderella," as she says. I have to say that Robby HATED when we put his football padding on, but luckily forgot about it after a few minutes and rather enjoyed the endless supply of popcorn, candy, and hot dogs at the carnival. This was our attempt at taking a picture of the kids in their costumes that evening: Robby, Grandpa Toronto, Maddie, and Mommy (Tiffany).Another picture of my Maddie and I. As you can tell she just loves posing for pictures, NOT. So for those of you who have been asking for a lovely 7 month prego picture of me...there you go. There probably won't be too many more like it; I tend to be the camera-man most of the time, but especially when I am pregnant!
There were tons of games at the carnival, but the kids especially like riding these metal horses behind a tractor (aka the train ride) On Thursday morning we had our joyschool Halloween party, so Maddie was able to dress up AGAIN. I am loving the fact that she was able to wear her costume several times this year and she LOVED the fact that she could be Cinderella again.

I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE this picture of Robby in uniform. This is such my little guy, always on the run with his sippy cup held in his arm just like you would cradle a football. Even though ASU football is in the pits right now, we are forever ASU funs and thus Robby went as an ASU football player anyways :) My pretty Cinderella all ready for the ball (she even insisted that she wear lipstick so she would look "gorgeous")

Yep...this is the ONLY picture I was able to take of Robby and Madison sitting together out of all the pictures. At least they are both sort of looking at the camera, although there are NO smiles to be found :( A group picture of some of our neighborhood street kids in their costumes.

In the afternoon/evening, we had a block party for our street where we each brought a side dish, meat and drinks. It was so much fun to meet many of our neighbors for the first time. Some poeple even set up games in their front yard for the kids to play. For one of the games, our friends had doughnuts hanging from strings. The kids had to try to eat them off the string. Maddie loved this game and seriously was hanging out by it forever (I think she had four doughnuts for dinner). Oh I guess she also had four or five sodas as well; every time I turned around she was picking up some random soda and drinking it....how do you teach a three year just how disgusting this habit is?

When it was dark, we set off trick or treating with our good friends on our street and Nona and Grandpa (Jesse's parents) even joined us. Maddie totally got the concept of sitting in the wagon and then jumping out and running up to each door to say "trick or treat". She loved sitting in the wagon with a neighbor friend. Robby sort of understood the candy part of Halloween after a few houses and would drag his bag up to the door and hand it to whomever answered the door. He had to have some sort of candy piece in his mouth between each and every house.

(don't you love Maddie's white face in the picture below after the doughnut game. Naughty mommy for not noticing and cleaning off that face before we went trick or treating)

Later on in the evening, Grandma and Grandpa Sheffield stopped by as well and visited with us for a few minutes. They were the cutest Gandalf the White and his young wife that died before the time that the books were written (according to my mom).

It was friends at first sight for these two. They loved riding their bikes together and did so for literally hours. The next few pictures are mainly just for my own delight! Robby was such a stinker all of Halloween and wouldn't give the camera the time of day. But as soon as we headed home and got ready for baths he was all grins. His smiling, happy face makes me want to spoil him rotten and give him everything he wants--even when it is covered with food, candy, soda, etc...... (for some reason Robby has this odd fascination with anything that belongs to his sister...aka the pink princess sippy cup)

After baths were done, he was more than ready for bed and actually tossed his blanket in his crib and was reaching to lay in there. Two minutes later and he was zonked. Once he was down for the night, I headed back over to clean up our stuff at the neighborhood street party and then took Maddie home for bed. When she finally made it to bed, all she kept telling me was "Mommy, I so tired." I have to say, that this year Halloween was a FUN holiday. I am loving the age that Maddie has reached where she is so excited for each holiday.

State Fair

Last month, my parents were so sweet and took the kids to the state fair with them for the WHOLE day. They had so much fun and both even managed to fall asleep for awhile in their strollers. I am seriously so grateful for such wonderful grandparents for my kids!!Robby REALLY wanted to ride the elephants

Later that evening as I was putting Maddie to bed, she kept telling me about how she got to ride an elephant named "Dixie" at the fair with Grandma!