This November was pretty busy and crazy, but also fun. Steve got in a car accident at the end of October. He was making a U-Turn and the driver behind him ran into his car. The damage was so bad that it wasn't worth it to fix the car, so we decided to buy a mini-van. We were at car dealerships almost every day for over a week. It's pretty stressful trying to buy a car in a hurry. It probably would have been more enjoyable if we would have had more time to search for the best car at the best price. We did however finally find one for a pretty good price. We bought a 2010 Chrysler Town and Country. It has all the automatic doors and stow and go which is wonderful.
Mom and Rachel at the park. It was pretty chilly this day.
One Saturday we went to the school parking lot to help Andrea get more
comfortable at riding her bike. It ended up being so much fun. Rachel
rode the bus and Andrea rode her bike.
So adorable on her bike.
Then Steve and I ended up riding the bike and bus. Instead of just riding, we ended up racing on the bike and bus. It was so fun that I was laughing so hard I almost cried. What a fun day with the family.
Rachel wanted to hang from the bars like Andrea. We put her up there and she held on for at least 10 seconds by herself. We couldn't believe it.
Rachel climbs on and into everything. One of her favorite places to climb is in the dishwasher. In fact, she sits inside of the dishwasher. :-)
While searching for our mini-van the girls played inside of a play house inside of the dealership. This was on the night of Andrea's 3rd birthday as we were finalizing the sale.
We rushed home that night to Skype with Grandma Barclay and open the present that she sent her in the mail.
This is a picture of Andrea and Daddy drying off the car after it rained. We wanted our new van to stay looking nice.
To make up for spending her birthday buying a car we celebrated all day the next day. We originally made Andrea an Ariel Cake, but I didn't spray the pan enough, so it stuck to the pan. We made a Bear cake instead. Andrea wanted to decorate her own cake this year, so we mixed up several different colors and she painted it how she wanted it.
Andrea got a beautiful coat for her birthday.
Andrea's cake turned out beautifully. It was a fun birthday.
Andrea also got a shopping cart that she could strap her dolls into. Rachel found it pretty fascinating and wanting to climb inside too. :-)
More climbing for Rachel. She climbs inside of the lazy susan cupboard. She is so excited about everything and is always exploring.
Rachel started to eat with a spoon and fork by herself. She really can scoop up food and put it in her mouth by herself. She's not completely accurate at it, but pretty darn good for only being 10 months old.
Rachel's culminating climb! She climbed onto Andrea's table and stood up to get to the fish tank.
Erma Poulsen, a lady in our ward came over to our house and taught me how to make her delicious chocolates. We made caramels and fondant and then dipped them in chocolate. We had the missionaries over for dinner the next night and had them help us finish dipping the chocolates. It was a lot fun for us. I don't know how much the missionaries liked it, but at least they got to take the chocolates home with them.
The trick to dipping really nice chocolates is sticking your hand in the chocolate and then squeezing the caramel or fondant in your hand so it gets completely covered with chocolate.
The beautiful girls on Thanksgiving Day. The girls played dress up while the boys played with balls and other toys.
Thanksgiving was different, but really enjoyable this year. We are so lucky to have such great friends from the ward. We went to the Curtises house for dinner. There were three of us families (Curtis, Bentz, and Bishops) and a total of 11 kids. Needless to say, it was a lot of fun. Actually the kids were great. They played in the garage/play room and outside in the backyard. They played tag, dress up, and other games.
This is the best family picture that we could get on Thanksgiving. At least everyone is looking the same direction. :-)
That night I went Black Friday Shopping with Cami Curtis and was able to get a lot of our Christmas shopping done. It was a great month.
