First Sleepover

Taylor got to have her first sleepover in December with her favorite friends, "Big Tayler" and "Evan Scott". She goes to daycare with Evan (and sometimes Tayler) and absolutely loves them. When we pick her up at night and ask her who she played with it's always, "Evan Scott!!!". We've been friends with their parents (Scott and Angie) for a long time and they so graciously offered to let her spend the night while we had a work event that we had to attend to. Angie sent me these pictures and you can tell that Taylor had a super fun time. Love these kiddos!

Taylor-isms

• My mom picked Taylor up from daycare a couple of weeks ago and ever since she's been saying, "My Grandma pick on me". She's going to start rumors that way :)

• John and I finally had a chance to go get our drivers licenses changed. I had the day off and John took the afternoon off and we were going to drop Taylor off at daycare so that we could just get it done and she wouldn't be bored sitting there waiting. Well it ended up that our daycare was closed that day so we took her with us. She was really good and entertained all of the grumpy people sitting there waiting. She played peek-a-boo with a sweet little baby and another guy let her hold his newborn baby. We were there for an hour and a half. Yikes! Anyway we were just about finished up and John was sitting there getting his picture taken. Taylor walked up to him and said, "You big boy daddy?" It was so stinkin' cute and the whole place started laughing. I love what comes out of her mouth and how her mind works. So, we left with new drivers licenses and a bunch of new friends :)


• This morning Taylor was coming down the stairs and slipped on the last one and landed on her butt. I asked her if she was okay and she said, "My tail hurts. You kiss my tail daddy." hehe


• We've been talking a lot about Baby Jesus with Christmas coming up and today she started calling Him "Baby Jeez".
"Mommy, it's Baby Jeez' birday?" (birthday)

Playing in the snow!

We spent part of our day today playing outside in the snow. Fun stuff!

Thanksgiving Weekend

We hosted Thanksgiving at our house again this year. In the years past my parents always came down to CO. This year we were lucky enough to have John's parents join us. My parents ended up going to see my grandparents in Chamberlain so it was just the 5 of us but let me tell you, we had plenty of food. We had a great weekend together!

Taylor helping mommy clean

Thanksgiving morning. Taylor got all fancied up for us (crazy hair and all) while we were watching the parade (see the SD float in the background). Such a goofy girl!

pretty girl

Singing maybe??? Who knows? The many faces of Taylor Grace to follow...

Grumpy...

Surprised...

Sad...

Happy...

Helping mommy make dessert

Papa Stan & Taylor reading books. Notice Papa's pretty necklaces :)

Thanksgiving is tough on puppies too. Sweet Sadie girl!

On Saturday we went to Rapid City and had dinner with John's sister Jenny and her kids Kelsey, Madison and Chase. After dinner we went to the parade of lights. Taylor really enjoyed it and afterwards talked a lot about the "big horse" and "big truck".

Papa Stan, Daddy and Taylor watching the parade

Nothing to do with Thanksgiving (and maybe TMI) but I couldn't resist. Good job baby girl! Congrats on your first #2 on the potty!

Trip to Colorado

In November we took a four day weekend over Veteran's day and took off for Colorado. We hadn't been back since we moved so we were really missing our friends and family. We were incredibly busy the entire time we were there and didn't have a spare second but had SO much fun seeing everyone and so did Taylor. Thanks to everyone for your hospitality. We miss you!

We started off the trip on Thursday and it just happened to be the first snow in CO. Every year Uncle Weed makes his famous Sweet Weed's chili on the first snow so we got really lucky to be a part of it again this year. John's cousin Jenni and her family and his cousin Jodi came over to see us and friends Ben & Mackenzie were there too. Two years ago Ben, Mackenzie & Mimi joined us for chili when the girls were still babies and we got a picture of them sitting in Papa and Nana's chair. We took the same picture this year. Wow, have things changed!

Mimi & Taylor - November 2008

Mimi & Taylor - November 2010

We had such a great time with some of the best family on earth. We are SO blessed to have you in our lives. Can't wait till you all move to SD (hehe). Thanks for the hospitality Weed & Denise! You're the best!

On Friday, we had breakfast at our friends Leigh and Corrie's house. Unfortunately Leigh had to work so we didn't get to see him but we got to see our friends Dan & Mel and Taylor got to play with her buddies Noah & Mia. We miss our small group friends and hope they come visit us soon. :) (bummed that I didn't take any pictures).

After that we went to spend some time with John's grandpa (Opa). He is such an amazing man and it's such a gift to be around him.

Taylor & Opa

After Opa's we went down to our friends Kole & Shannon's house for dinner. We got to meet their precious little girl Payton. She's such a sweet baby girl. Josh and Kelsey came over for dinner too and we had a good time catching up. We miss you guys tons! Thanks for dinner and hope to see you again soon. xoxo (once again, no pictures...bah!)

On Saturday morning we got spoiled with breakfast again at our friends Ben & Mackenzie's house. Mackenzie is such a good hostess and made some amazing food (Can you say Nutella croissants...Yum!) Taylor and Mimi had fun playing and we had fun catching up. Thanks guys!

Taylor and Mimi giving goodbye hugs

and kisses

It makes me sad that we're not closer so that these two can grow up together. They are so sweet to watch when they're together.

After Taylor got a quick nap we packed up and headed down to Cherry Creek Mall to meet John's sister Becky and niece Riley and my cousin Matt and his family. We played in the playland for awhile and then headed up to Denver to our favorite restaurant - Marco's pizza. We enjoyed lemon basil martinis, limoncello chicken wings, proscuitto pizza and Nutella pizza (Nutella twice in one day - pretty lucky). We then went to Matt & Courtney's house (which is beautiful by the way) and hung out for the night. The girls had a great time playing and dancing together and we enjoyed a glass of wine with a couple of our favorite people. Thanks for letting us crash at your house guys. We loved getting to see you, your sweet sweet girls and Dakota.

Sunday morning we packed up once again and headed over to John's sister's house and had breakfast (man, we're spoiled) there. Yet another fantastic meal (are you seeing a pattern here? I think we gained some pounds on this trip). Taylor and Riley had fun playing and we enjoyed chatting with Becky. We miss you guys and wish we were closer for our girls to grow up together, especially with baby Wolfe on the way. We'll have to come visit lots! Love you!

That pretty much sums up our trip. Such an amazing weekend! We really do miss all of you but this trip was also good for us to confirm that our move back home was the right decision. It just feels good here. Now if we could just talk all of you into moving here. Perfect!

Halloween 2010

Carving her Dora pumpkin (did you expect anything else - she's a fanatic). She wasn't really into it and didn't like the messy pumpkin goop but she had fun watching and seeing the final product.

Taylor coloring her baby pumpkin

Dora pumpkin!

Cutest little ladybug ever! Getting ready to go trick-or-treating.

Trick-or-treat!