Garbage Truck Re-visited

Well, not much has changed in a few short months and E still LOVES when the garbage truck comes to our house. We took a couple of updated videos of him watching and commenting on it.

Here's the original. It was last January so around 14 months old.



Here's the updated. We refer to them as "bossy big trucks" or "garbage trucks" interchangably.
**Note: We've since figured out that he says "di di di" when the garbage truck comes because he's imitating himself from the original video from when "ellie was baby". You'll hear it once or twice in here and at the time I didn't know what he was saying.**



We also talk a lot about trucks that "scoop it" and "dump it" and he has a full body motions to go with each. This was the best I could get out of him. Also his first time to eat popcorn, and we had just returned from Yosemite, so there's some confusion about that:

E and his tree

So on Black Friday, we decided to go all out and splurge on our first Christmas tree!! $30 from Target!! It's a little scrawny but pretty perfect for us, and we would have spent 3x as much if we would have known how much E was going to love it!!

He was instantly fascinated, and kept saying "Ooooo, lights! So pretty!". We have a big countdown every evening when we turn it on, and the first few days he would just sit and look at it. Or pull us over, insisting that we both "Come see! Come see!!"

We've explored the view of it from all angles, particularly looking up!





Then one night this happened unprompted ... sweet Christmas boy!


We love our little tree!

Yosemite!!!

So, as part of our "explore the west" effort, we planned a little mini-getaway with our LA uncles to go explore Yosemite. It was totally amazing, and photos never do nature like this justice. We rented a great little cabin and spent 3 nights exploring, hiking, etc. Daniel and Mike were INFINITELY patient with E as he constantly wanted to be with them, including an 8-hour drive in the car (one way!).

I can't adequately describe Elliott's excitement in writing. He was BESIDE HIMSELF with getting to be outside so much and having 2 of his uncles with him for days straight. He was practically manic, repeating ..."Go outside! Climb rocks! See waterfalls! Climb mountains!" He loved every second of it, and cried every time we had to pull him off his rocks.

I've been trying to re-learn to shoot film these days, so I shot about 95% film while we were there ... here are a few favorites!

mees-mees

Elliott loves to help "mees-mees" aka mix-mix in the kitchen. It's kind of becoming a problem as he wants to help EVERY time one of us is in the kitchen!

Here we are working on a birthday cake for Uncle Mighty (the uncle formerly known as Ah-Mommy aka Mike).




Good news ...we are in November now which means lots of fun stuff coming soon ... a trip to Yosemite, Elliott's birthday, decking our first Christmas tree! Check back!

Pumpkin Patch

We loved getting to go to the Pumpkin Patch in Nashville this year. It was so cute and the best part was that we got to go with our AL cousins. It was a little boy's dream ... pumpkins, tractors, animals, etc. E was beside himself. Another slew of photos:




I think we would have lost AT LEAST one child if Mither hadn't come with us and helped wrangle them all! Thanks Mither!!

Lake Trip

In the middle of a crazy crazy fall, we got to sneak away for a few days to Adam's aunt/uncle's lake house. It was a MUCH needed break! We stayed for a few days just us 3, then some more of Adam's family came up to join us! It was so fun!

Just going to post a slew of photos!


This was not posed ... watching the John Deere mo-mo (SO exciting!):