Thankful!

Happy Thanksgiving!

I hope you had a great holiday weekend and enjoyed your turkey day!  I have so much to be thankful for.  I am most thankful for my family!  

And speaking of family, I had lots of family fun this weekend ...

Before Thanksgiving, Mom and I made hand turkeys.  Obviously Mom traced my hand but I did the "coloring" and placed the feathers.  Pretty good for a 23 month old, huh?!

On Thanksgiving, we went to my Nana and Papa's house.  I got there early because they had an early birthday present for me!  Here they are leading me to the gift ...

 Ta-Da!  It's a motorized Barbie car!  Isn't it awesome?!  I sure am thankful for neat toys like this!

 I was excited to get in but also a little timid at first.

Once I got in, I had to check out all the buttons.  My car even has a working FM radio!

And then it was off to the open road!  I loved driving!  Look out Mom and Dad ... 16 is just around the corner!

 And then it was turkey time!  I especially liked the mashed potatoes.

After Thanksgiving dinner, one of our family traditions is to decorate a gingerbread house.  Here I am helping to put on the candies.

 Another fun thing I got to do this weekend was go to the movie "Happy Feet 2."  Here I am with my little cup of popcorn and juice! I'm thankful that Mom and Dad take me to do such fun things!

Another thing I'm especially grateful for is ice cream!  I love me some "cream" as I call it!  In fact, I love it so much that after eating my chocolate ice cream with my spoon, I decided to put the entire bowl up to my face and "drink" it.  What a chocolately, gooey mess!  Yum!

I'm also thankful for my little brother-to-be, Teague.  He should be arriving in a few weeks.  Here's his room.  I helped put it together.

And finally, to round out my Thanksgiving weekend, Dad bought me a special cookie!  It was my first gingerbread man.  I sure thought he was cute!

And he tasted pretty good too! 

 My favorite part were his red M&M buttons and the icing (as you can see, I'm licking off the icing).

Happy Thanksgiving!

Snowing!

Sunday, November 20th, 2011

Oh My Gosh ... It's Snowing!

Yesterday and last night when the snow was coming down, I was sooooo excited!  I kept telling Mommy and Daddy, "snowing," "see it," "outside," "cold," "brrrrr," and "chilly."  I was even talking about the snow during church!  

Mom and Dad promised me that we could play in the snow after I woke up in the morning.  And I held 'em to that promise!  Here I am (still in my jammies because it was only 8:00am) getting ready to go out into the cold, white snow!

 Even though my face doesn't really show it (bad angle), I was super pumped to try out all my new snow gear!  I actually have "big girl" snow stuff!

 All ready to go!  Don't I look cute?!

 Daddy and I had SO MUCH fun playing in the snow!  It was awesome!

 Wheeeeeee!

Happy Snow Day!

Baby Brother Teague

Tuesday, November 8th, 2011

As you all know, I normally write from Faith's perspective, but tonight, I need to share something from my own.  This evening, as Faith was taking a bath, we had one of the most heart-warming conversations that I've yet had with my almost 2-year-old daughter.  Faith's adorable words not only melted my heart but filled my eyes with tears.  She is the cutest, most kind-hearted, gentle little girl whom I am so proud of!

Here at the Flanagan household we are anxiously awaiting the arrival of our son, Teague (71 days until my due date ... not that I'm counting)!  And when people ask me, "Do you think Faith has any idea about having a sibling," I could never quite answer the question.  I had been unsure if she was fully grasping the idea of becoming a big sister.  So, in preparation for Teague's big arrival, we have been doing many things to try to explain this whole concept.    We have been playing with baby dolls a lot!  We feed them, burp them, change/diaper them, rock with them, and put them to sleep in their crib.  We have also been talking a lot about Teague and how he's going to come live with us.  And most recently, we have been preparing his nursery.  Faith has been spending a lot of time in Teague's room and loving every moment of it.  In fact, just the other day, Faith ran down the hall and I found her knocking on Teague's door, saying "Teague ... In" (meaning she wanted to go into his room).  So, I figured that Faith had an idea that a little baby is on the way but I didn't realize just how much she understood until this evening's bath time conversation.

So ... Faith was playing in the tub and out of the blue, she starts saying "Teague, Teague, Teague."  Which of course, I think is cute.  She then goes on to repeatedly say "Sister, Sister, Sister ... Faith, Sister."  Again, adorable.  She continued to describe Teague to me by telling me, "Teague, brother, boy" and repeating "Sister" again.  At this point I'm thinking my daughter is a rocket-scientist because she can describe all of these things.  But it got even better as she vividly described to me what she was going to do with her little brother.  And this is all in her language now: 

-"Hold him, sleep, rock, books" (meaning she is going to hold him and rock him to sleep and read him books before bed).

-"Eat, favorite cookie" (meaning she is going to share her favorite cookies with him) - Upon which I asked her, "What is your favorite cookie?" and she responded, "Chip" (meaning chocolate chips).  So cute!

-"Swimming, kick" (meaning she is going to show him how to swim and kick in the water).

-"Play."

-"Diaper"(meaning she is going to change his diapers).

And she rounded out her conversation by saying "Teague, brother, friend, buddy."  I sat there laughing and crying at the same time at her sweetness.  I am beyond blessed to have such a beautiful little girl, inside and out.  And Teague is blessed to have such a loving big sister.  I am so proud of my little monkey and the lovely little girl she is.  I could not love her more!  

Faith, you are the absolute love of my life ... Thank you for making me the happiest woman and mother ... You, my dear, are a true gift from God!

Happy Halloween!

Happy Halloween Everyone!

Before Halloween, we carved pumpkins to display on our front door step.  Here I am helping Daddy clean out the pumpkin!

And here I am helping Mommy draw a happy face on my pumpkin!

Carving pumpkins was super fun, especially because my "boyfriend," Brady, came over to carve with us.  Here we are displaying our masterpieces!

A few nights later, we carved another pumpkin (in honor of my little brother, Teague, who should be arriving in about 2 1/2 months).

I used a sand shovel to help Dad scoop out the pumpkin guts!

And on the "big night" of Halloween, I had an amazing time!  I got dressed up in my Elmo costume...

I went over to my grandparents' house to trick-or-treat.

I got to go trick-or-treating with my best friend, Kendall, aka Minnie Mouse, (and her Mommy and Daddy). 

We rode around the neighborhood in this cart behind my Papa's John Deer tractor!  It was so fun!

I liked the tractor-ride a little bit more than Kendall did!  She wanted out!

Kendall and I held hands going up to the doorstep to get candy!  We are such good buddies!

And after all the trick-or-treating, I took inventory.

"See Papa, look what I got!"

Mmmmmm ... chocolate candy bars are so good!