1-year pictures

Thanksgiving

We had an incredible Thanksgiving.  It was so fun to have so much of Casey’s family with us.  Casey’s parents along with his brother, Tyson, and Tyson’s wife, Jami, flew in from Utah.  Then Casey’s sister Tearsa, her husband Ben, and kids Cole and Elise drove up from Des Moines. 

 

I was a little worried about hosting Thanksgiving because I had never cooked a turkey before, but after a chat with chef extraordinaire I gained confidence in my turkey-cooking abilities and pulled off an awesome feast.  I brined the turkey overnight.  I had never heard of brining turkeys before, but now I will never cook a turkey without brining it first.  It made it taste amazing.

Here’s Casey posing with the turkey brining in the bucket, and yes that is a belt around the bucket.

 

Just about ready to go in the oven!

We had a monumental Thanksgiving dinner, all the kiddos napped the entire time!

 

Carly got so exhausted at the end of each day after playing with her cousin Cole and chasing him around the house.  She loved to cuddle up to GG and fall asleep. 

Casey’s dad, aka The Deal Master, with all of his Wisconsin treasures:

We had an awesome time.  Thank you everyone for making the trek to visit us!

There’s Something about Carly

This morning Carly and I took the car to Scrub A Dub to get the oil changed. One of our Scrubbadubbers kept laughing at Carly and told me that Carly’s hair reminded him of a scene in “There’s Something About Mary.”

Yes, this scene…

Hmmm, maybe I should remember to do her hair before we go places? In my opinion, I’ve always thought that her hair looks like Turk’s more family friendly, naturally-styled hairdo.

My baby is ONE!

Last night Casey and I stayed up late and reminisced about the day Carly was born. I got emotional thinking about how much joy this little girl has brought into our lives. I love her so much!  She has the cutest personality already. I feel like the luckiest person in the world to get to spend everyday with Carly.  I honestly can’t believe how fast this past year has flown by.  Last year at this time we finally got to meet Carly.

It was so fun to have a day to celebrate Carly.  I could tell she knew something was different about today.  She woke up and couldn’t stop pointing at this banner that I made for her.

She saw her presents and after some coaxing from Casey and me she finally opened them.

Then tonight we had some friends over to celebrate.  I made a cake for Carly that was rainbow inside.  She didn’t know what to do with the cake and with all the people staring at her!

After a few seconds she went crazy eating chunks of cake.  She loved it! She still doesn’t have ANY teeth but she sure could get that cake down fast.

It was awful to clean up but I’m glad she had fun eating it! I made a bigger cake for the adults that was also rainbow inside. 

 

Thanks everyone for making it such a special day for Carly!  Also, I am so grateful to our amazing friends who have been like our family while we’ve been living here in Milwaukee.  I honestly get teary-eyed thinking about how much I love and appreciate our friends here.  They have been like Carly’s aunts and uncles this past year and they have taken such good care of us.  We love you guys!

Winter wear

I bought this sweater last winter at Old Navy for $5.  It was too good of a deal to pass up.  I have never worn it because the sleeves drive me crazy.  They are really wide and a weird length (I just grabbed it and bought it without trying it on).

So I decided to make it into a sweater dress for Carly using the tutorial here:

It was really easy to make.  It only took about an hour to do everything!  I cut the large sleeves off the original sweater and cut them up to fit Carly’s arms.  Then I cut the collar of the neck to make it smaller, and then sewed everything together.  This has been my favorite creation.  I love it!

Day of mourning

Today is our last day with our beloved cable and DVR.  We’ve been so lucky to have them in our lives these last 2 years, but now it is time for us to make a life without them. Although Casey and I have been dreading this day for a long time we’re excited for our productivity to hopefully increase without them.  I’m spending this last precious day with Bobby, Tyler, Alton, and Stacy & Clinton.  I will miss them dearly.

We love candy

Our Halloween weekend started off a bit rocky but turned into one of the best Halloween weekends ever. The rocky part started off on Friday night while Casey was in Northern Wisconsin camping with the Scouts. While Casey was literally freezing, Carly and I had a party and stayed up until 4 a.m. But, it wasn’t really a party because Carly was sick. She had a fever of 103 degrees! Ibuprofen AND Tylenol would not bring it down. Poor girl. I’ve never seen my child so sick. After being sick with bronchitis myself I hate thinking that my little baby has to go through it now.

It was horrible having Casey gone especially when I knew that if he were home he’d know how to take care of both Carly and me and we’d probably all be fast asleep. I have no idea how single parents do it. When Casey came home on Saturday morning we were all ready to go back to sleep. We got some really good naps. Casey could only make it onto half of the couch before he passed out:

After a morning of rest and relaxation, Casey tried on about 10 different Halloween costumes. He finally settled on a David Beckham ensemble pretty much because it was the only one that I approved of. I LOVE how excited Casey gets for holidays!

In the evening we headed over to the Callister's beautiful new home for a festive dinner. It was so fun to see all the kids dressed up:

Then when all the kids went to bed we enjoyed a fabulous dinner. We had stew cooked in a pumpkin – you can’t get more festive than that! It was so much fun to tell scary stories, laugh, and play games with these people. We had a blast.

From left: Callisters, Pattens, and O’Neills