Thanksgiving Fun

Ok, so Brian has accused me of "begging for comments" in his words with my last post. But hey- I got some! :) (I was a full commission salesperson for 4 years...I ain't afraid to beg people.)

Quite honestly I was just trying to share my feelings about my blogging experience during NaBloPoMO...and let me tell you....trying to be witty, or creative, or exciting (three things I can't manage to be all in one day) can be challenging! Sheesh people.

Tristyn and I are off for a fun-filled week of Thanksgiving visiting family and friends. Unfortunately, Brian has to stay here and work! But he will be catching up with us soon and also getting a little hunting in.

Today, we are heading to Ruston to hang out with Honey & Papa and hopefully see a variety of friends and family. I'll try to keep you informed of our day-to-day activities, but they should include boot camp with Honey, seeing our family in Shreveport, Lunch with Aunt Meggie, Meeting our cousins Christen & Scott,(all the way from Cali!) and little miss Hannah! Not to mention baking and eating lots of yummy food :)

And that's just the first part of the week.

And of course a stop by Hobby Lobby, Target, and Starbucks. Yum!

Our last half of Thanksgiving week will be spent in fun with the Oswalt family with Thanksgiving Day at Mawmaw's and the LSU-Arkansas game.

This will be my first full week off for Thanksgiving since I was in High school- yippee!!

Is this thing on?

(tap, tap) Hello? Testing? One...two...three....

Is anyone here?

I guess I am experiencing the joys (er...trials) that most bloggers, writers, musicians, experience at some point. Let's call it "silence syndrome." When it seems like you're projecting into the wide open world and getting nothing back.

I post...and post....and commit to post for a solid month. But does it really matter?

Don't' we all ask ourselves that question at one time or another in our lives? Does what we do matter?

Does anyone read this blog?

Is what I'm saying important, relevant, interesting....to anyone?

This coming week is National Blog Comment Week. In the spirit of feedback, I'm going to leave a brief tutorial for all of you people who may have been dying to leave a comment on a blog (ha!), but don't know how.

1. Click on Comments to post
2. in the drop-down box, register as Name/URL (if you don't have a blog or Google ID)
3. write your name in the box
4. write your message/comment
5. You should have a word verification box pop up, once you type the word in then click comment.

I commented on this post as Tristyn just to make sure I'm giving you the correct directions. And if you feel up to it...

Leave some love....in the form of a comment :)

Happy belated 13 months!

What kind of mother forgets her child's 13 month mark?

ummm...guilty as charged. I guess I just got lost in all the craziness of finishing my paper and presentation for my class along with the regular life stuff of dinner, cleaning the kitchen, unpacking and repacking our lunches, bath time, bedtime and laundry....oh the ever-present laundry! (did you know there was a time when I could do laundry once a week? ha! I laugh in the face of that time....)

I can't even imagine how much laundry people do that have 4 or 5 or 6 people in their family! But I digress....

Tristyn Oswalt- Happy 13 Months! (2 days late)

You are gorgeous and funny and love to eat.

Case in point.

Right now, you are a great walker and will occasionally just walk off on your own, toddling down the halls at church like you're on a mission. You love to imitate mommy & daddy whether it's "snapping" your fingers, dancing to music, carrying your "purse" or talking on the phone. You just passed the 20 lb. mark and got to move to your big girl car seat!

You are very ticklish and love to play games with your daddy. You can say "beh beh" for Bear Bear, "arf" for puppy, "uh oh", and of course "mama" and "dada."

We love you so much!!!

The big switcheroo

"Bait and Switch" is a marketing term meaning that you offer a consumer one thing but in reality they end up getting another.

This is what I'm hoping to achieve with Tristyn- and soon.

We are still using bottles!

We need to switch to sippee cups!

But I have a couple problems with this:

1. I have tried this in the past by doing the recommended switching one milk a day to a sippee and doing it slowly. Doesn't work. My child WILL hold out for a bottle!

2. They (you know..."they") say that this should be done as close to a year as possible to move their attachment away from the bottle....BUT we are coming up on Thanksgiving and we will be traveling! Do I try this for next week? This week? The week AFTER Thanksgiving?? She's already 13 months!

3. I'm thinking of just washing and packing away all her bottles so she HAS to drink her milk out of her sippee...does this work?

Any advice? HELP!

Hawaii 5-0

Book em' Danno! Admittedly I am not old enough to have watched this show. But I did stay in a condo in Colorado skiing one year that was right next to one of the actors on the show.

Does that count?

I was seven.

I'm sorry.

We were recently asked about Hawaii from a friend who is planning a trip and since I've got a whole month to try to entertain the two people that read our blog (shout out mom!) I figured I could share a little about our honeymoon trip to Hawaii on the blog as well.

We stayed at the Princeville on the north side of Kauai and loved it!

I found this picture and just had to share. Raise your hands if you ironed on your honeymoon? Anyone? Yup...that's what I thought. This was a bad indicator of things to come....a very bad sign...

I positively LOVE this picture. Maybe its because it took us all day of driving and hiking to get to this beach? But look at the size of the mountains compared to the people! Incredible.

Pontihele' Beach

Gorgeous view from one of our hikes.

Really. You cannot take a bad picture in this place! View of the Na'Pali Coast.



This was the view from our hotel room...not too shabby eh?

They made the BEST snoballs EVER! We got one almost every day we were there. You could get this exotic fruity flavor with a scoop of macadamia nut ice cream in the middle. Which is exactly why I went home from my honeymoon 5lbs. heavier.

View of our beautiful hotel! Don't you just love honeymoon pics? You are totally at the mercy of having to ask someone to take your picture together all day long. We weren't very good at it and ended up with a bunch of awkward shots of just one of us.

At the end of our trip we went to Oahu and visited Pearl Harbor. Absolutely amazing and so worth every minute of waiting in line. The waiting in line seems so insignificant when you realize the lives that were given just in that day...not to mention all those that followed after in fighting the war that ensued. Such a great reminder that "freedom is not free."

Case of the Mondays

1. Our refrigerator is still not fixed, and Brian has threatened to haul it up to Home Depot and demand a new one.

2. Tristyn's nose is pouring snot and she has a cough.

3. We had a great weekend with family! (in spite of having to get up early and take the Praxis, which I feel like I did well on! Scores coming in 4 weeks!)

4. I'm looking forward to Thanksgiving and making lots of goodies for the upcoming functions:

Faculty luncheon- Thursday Nov. 19- Southern Living's apple & blue cheese salad with apple cider vinaigrette AND Pioneer Woman's Coffee Cake

Church Thanksgiving Potluck - Southern Living's Pumpkin Pie Spectacular (Can you tell I'm in love with Southern Living?)

Thanksgiving week- Thanksgiving cookies (the tradition) and going to attempt THESE from bakerella! (I am brave!)

5. I will gain approximately 5 lbs. from all the aforementioned created goodies.

6. I am writing this blog because I don't want to write a research paper that is due tomorrow. GULP! Can you say "late night ahead?"

Sweet Friends

Poor Stella, I'm surprised she wasn't the one trying to escape from this picture. After all, Tristyn has been following her around since the day Tristyn arrived at FBC LaPlace. She went to the same church, the same daycare, and would even show up at her house to watch LOST!

(picture credits to Scarlett taken on 08/09)

But she is so sweet to Tristyn (other than some early-on paci swiping action :) and loves talking to her and showing her how to be a "big girl."

And the other night she was reading our blog (well, I suppose her parents were helping her some :) and wanted to give Tristyn a call. So we heard sweet Stella saying "hello" to Tristyn on voicemail! How Cute!

We miss our sweet friends!

And maybe Stella even misses Tristyn some too :)