It's a Marrvelous Life: Birthdays, Thanksgiving and more

Hanging out in early November

No-shave November chocolate milk mustache

Adeline's first cup of regular milk

Hanging out with Great Grandma and Grandpa Marr

Adeline stayed snuggling with Grandma for a long while

A quick glance into how Adeline plays peekaboo

Marysville trip for the girls' birthdays (C is already running around!)

Uncle Joel was Adeline's favorite.

These next pictures are taken from Whitney Marr's facebook so the credit goes to her, her dad, Devon, and anybody else who may have taken them. C wasn't too keen on her birthday cake, but Addie ate it up.

E helping feed the neighbors' chickens.

Everett's first movie theater trip! to The Peanuts Movie. When we asked him about the movie afterwards he said "What was Caillou doing?" and "We saw Uncle Jeff."

(Kira in front with Everett sitting in Dallin's lap.)

Everett was very proud of the fact that he helped me make these savory rolls.

Adeline was pleased with her ability to climb over these bins from the bed to the blue one without touching the floor, as I sorted through kids' clothes.

All dressed up to go to a Relief Society Thanksgiving Dinner

Ev asked me to take a picture to show that they were both wearing bear jammies.

And then things got silly

Everett trying to stop Adeline from doing the same thing he used to do as a baby- put toys inside this play cube. It was kind of a funny process. Upon discovering that she could stick her hand inside, she tried a block. Success. She then headed over to the block box and started chucking blocks behind her. Once she got a large enough supply, she started putting the scattered blocks inside the cube.

Our kids were a little jealous that their neighbor friends were playing outside.

Adeline (and Everett) like the new doll she got for her birthday.

Adeline went a long while shaking her head a lot. She doesn't do this as much anymore. The video also shows her playing with her new doll a little.

Bundled up to stay warm during our power outage adventure. We lost power during a big windstorm the Tuesday the week before Thanksgiving. Trees and powerlines fell over all over town, blocking roads and making returning power to everyone a long process. At least one family in our ward had a tree cause massive damage to their house (fell through the roof into the kids' bedroom). The wind brought in a lot of cold, and we were bundled up all week. It was heartwarming to see all the neighborly concern and community actions to help out those affected. Our neighbors, family, and friends were constantly checking on us to make sure we had what we needed, and we were doing our best to do the same. Dallin got to reconnect with an old friend (Thank you Thuy!) who let us come and get warmed up at her home one evening (she had power). Everett was our light checker: periodically he'd go around and check the lights to see if they were working. Click. Click. "Nope!" The kids were great through the whole thing. On Saturday, after a bitter cold night, we decided we should take Thanksgiving a little early and head to Utah. It turned out for the best, as a big snowstorm hit the roads after we'd gotten through. Our apartment didn't end up getting power back until Thanksgiving. When we got back, we had to throw out most of our food.

Emergency supplies we kicked ourselves for not having:

Car phone charger
Candles
Matches/lighter
Hot plate/food warming device not run on electricity
Ice box
More emergency-oriented food storage, like tuna, canned fruits, jerky (though our powdered milk turned out to be awesome)

Things we were glad we had:

Glow sticks and flashlights (the kids loved playing with them)
Lots of blankets
Thermals and warm clothes
Running water, and it was even warm for a little while. This would have been a much more difficult experience without running water.

Our hotel in Idaho Falls was right across from the temple.
Later we drove by the Provo City Center temple

Adventures at Grandma Lowe's house
Had a wonderful visit with Grandma Lowe before Thanksgiving. Both the kids loved to explore the house. One of Ev's favorite things to do with Grandma was line up chairs to make a train, and then drive said train with a Frisbee steering wheel that he kept calling a screw driver (it kind of makes sense?).

Making pumpkin cookies

Playing with (naked) dolls. Ev is in that taking clothes off stage, I guess.

Out in Great-Grandma's yard

A visit to Brandon and Calista's home

We met up with Becky and Joseph at BYU

Rooting for Jacob's basketball team

Olive Garden with Andrew and Heather and their son H

Hanging out with cousins at Jacob and Susan's home, where we stayed the most nights of our trip

Thanksgiving Day at Brandon and Calista's home
Cousin B is ready for Thanksgiving!

Adeline mooching off of Uncle Michael's Thanksgiving dinner

Cousins and friends played upstairs most of the day

Everett's birthday bash

Saying goodbye

Back at home in early December
pretending to sleep in the living room and playing with Star Wars toys

One of our early Christmas gifts was a toy organizer system. We found one for a third of the price of the other kinds we were looking at and it has worked out wonderfully.
The first picture was while I was putting it all together and Adeline wanted double comfort- from me and her doll.
The second shows the finished product (the colorful bin thing on the left).