Smoothies

Brie is not that greatest eater, so in an attempt to get some fruit and veggies in her system I have been making smoothies for her.  She loves them thankfully, which is weird because she will not eat any fruit or veggies by themselves.  

I don't exactly measure when I make these, I just keep adding stuff until it is the right consistency. 

• 2 different kinds of frozen fruits (blueberries, mangos, peaches, strawberries, raspberries) ~ 2cups
• Greek yogurt (vanilla or plain) ~ 1.5 cups
• Apples (1 or 2)
• Orange juice (~ 1/4 cup)
• Spinach (as much as I fit in the blender! probably about 3 cups)

 

My blender is kind of.....not good quality.  So I have to first put in the yogurt, OJ, Apple, then slowly add the frozen stuff, and lastly the spinach.  

 

I bought these re-usable pouches for the smoothies.  They are perfect!  Bought them on Amazon (where I buy almost everything!).  

She loves them!!!

Decorating the Christmas Tree

We put our tree up the Saturday after Thanksgiving.  We put lights on it right away, but didn't get a chance to decorate it until Thursday night.  Between my work schedule and Alec's travel schedule we were never around together!  I was so excited to have an evening together; we ate dinner all together and then decorated the tree as a family.  Brie wasn't sure what really was going on, she just liked taking things out of the bins.  Probably our biggest mistake in this whole thing was how close it was to bed time.....Brie wasn't exactly the happiest little Elf. 

 

There was a small incident, Alec accidentally knocked over a lit candle.  There was wax every where....it definitely halted our tree decorating for a while.  Oh well....it got all cleaned up.  It was a red candle though and so it looked a little like a murder scene. 

 

And this is what happens when you stay up past bed time....

 

Alec and I finished decorating the tree just the two of us after putting Briana to bed.  

And Josie watched everything from her perch on the couch.  

Tree cutting

Every year for the DeLange family Thanksgiving we get together and cut down Christmas trees and have dinner.  It is always a huge production and so much fun!  This year there was an epic snowball fight since the snow was perfect packing snow.  I was holding Brie so thankfully I was safe from the wrath of the snowballers!
 

 

 

  

 

Tree day is literally Josie's favorite day of the year, she runs around the Christmas tree field like a wild animal.  She went and visited a few other groups of people, then would come back and check with us.  

 

 

Our 2013 Christmas tree!

 

Brie wanted to walk all over the place!  This whole walking thing is new, and we don't exactly have that many shoe options.  These Target brand boots were soaking wet after just a few steps.  So we had to take them off and hold her, she hated it!  I have since ordered her some new, good quality boots to walk around in the snow with.  

 

Snow ball fight! 

 

Brie was being super silly with her lovey, giving it to people and then snatching it back!

Playing with Bumma and cousin E

 

Brie was very interested in the bottle her daddy was feeding Evelyn.  

 

Jenna and Will decorating the tree

Ethan David, our new nephew!

I love being an Auntie, and I love being in a family where I become a new Auntie almost every year it feels like! Soon there will be so many DeLanges we will be able to take over the world!!  Aaron and Audrey had their 2nd baby November 16, an adorable little boy named Ethan David.   I worked day shift the day after he was born, so after work Alec met me at the hospital and we went upstairs to meet our new nephew!  He is seriously so cute, and I don't hand that title out to every baby!  I usually feel like all babies look a little alike, at least for the first month.  But Ethan is one cute little dude from the second I met him, 12hrs ish after he was born!

He is one loved little boy!  The last three babies have been girls, so we are glad to break that streak with this little guy.  I can only imagine though in a couple years what Ethan will have to endure with having two older girl cousins (Brie and Tia) pretty close in age!

Here is a pic at our family Thanksgiving gathering of their new family!  Big sissy E is doing very well, she recently had an ENT surgery and has recovered amazingly well.  Even though Ethan will pass her in weight in no time flat, Evelyn will always be his big sister!  Such an adorable little family, love them!

Isn't he so cute?!

Some of his Aunties fawning over his adorableness.

Just hours after he was born!

Thanksgiving

I have almost no pictures from Thanksgiving....not sure why I didn't take any, must have just been having too much fun!  But we had a wonderful Thanksgiving at my parents house this year.  First major holiday living in Michigan, and let me tell you, not having to drive 6hrs to my parents house was AMAZING!  We headed to Dearborn Wednesday afternoon.  We were able to go to my parents' church for the Thanksgiving service Wednesday evening, it is always fun for me to be able to go back to the church I grew up in and catch up with people there. 

Thursday my mom got the big ol' bird in the oven at 8am and started preparing the feast!  The extended DeKruyter family all came over from west Michigan to celebrate.  We had a great time!  Alec kept saying he waits for this meal every year. 

Brie didn't exactly know what was going on, she slept AWFUL the night before so she actually ended up naping during Thanksgiving lunch.  Oh well, it was actaully good because then Alec and I could eat our meal in peace (is that bad to say.....oops, but so true!).  She wanted nothing to do with Thanksgiving food, she was just being a stinker about food that day.  Pretty sure she only ate the applesauce and then some of the food I had packed from home for her.  She did enjoy playing with my younger cousins though, she thought Jack (he's in 2nd grade....I think) was hilarious for some reason. 

I have so much to be thankful for, and I definitely have been using this season of Thanksgiving to reflect on that.  God has blessed me so richly; an amazing hubby, adorable daughter, new job, health of myself and family, and living near family.  And that is just to name a few! 

Here are the few pics/video I did take:


In the car driving to Dearborn, my goal was to be able to ride in the front seat the entire 2hr ride....that lasted all of 45min.  Oh well, Brie and I both took a little mini nap at least in the back seat (I had worked the night before).

Briana loved all the attention.  I always love going to my parents house and finding all our old toys for her to play with.  I got out all the baby doll stuff this time.  She didn't care much about the baby dolls, but loved the bucket of all the little bottles, spoons, stroller to play with.  

 

Busy Toddler

Briana is certainly not a baby anymore!  Alec and I would always say things like "when did the baby wake up?"  or "Can you change the baby's diaper?"  Well no more of that, she is a toddler now!  And a very busy one at that.  She is full of opinion, attitude, and spunk! 

Here are a few pictures of the past month that capture some of our toddler:

First car wash, the whole time she was like "oooooo" and just watching out the window. 

I don't remember what she was eating here, but whatever it was she loved it and shoved her entire face full!  She is very particular how she eats.  Sometimes she will let you feed her, other times she wants you to spoon up the food then hand her the spoon, and other times she has to try it herself (which makes a disaster mess!). 

Here she had gotten into my work bag and was emptying out my pen bag and then refilling it again, she did this for like 15 whole minutes and it was great!  I am allllllll about letting her do whatever she wants as long as it keeps her occupied for a little while.  Is that bad parenting.....probably, oh well.  

Speaking of bad parenting....she has started watching Sesame Street, and will actually sit for a while and watch it!  It really is great, I use it mostly so that I can shower or make dinner.  Here she is all cuddled on the couch with her lovey watching Elmo.  

She has lots of mini 'fits'.  If you take something away from her, take her away from a situation, or not let her have something she sees and wants she will immediately do this BIG dramatic cry, sometimes flings herself to the ground, or bangs her head on something.  Normal?!  I have no idea.....but I just ignore it usually and then she stops and finds something else to get into!

Random pic, but this was the first 'snow'.  Our property looks SO naked without leaves on the trees.....I don't like that you can see the neighbors.  

Silly girl!  She is holding a fork and eating a granola bar.  

Watching Josie run around outside while I was quick unloading groceries.  

Reorganizing my closet.....thanks Brie!

 Big girl standing up!

For a very short period of time I considered doing 1 nap.  This was the result.....I wondered why it got so quiet.  

Teeth, teeth, and more teeth.  I tried giving her some frozen fruit to chew on.  No go, she was way to weirded out by it.   I honestly am not 100% sure how many fangs she has in her mouth right now, I am not exactly about to stick my finger in that lions den though and count. 

She loves stroller rides, this was on a nice day not too long ago.  

(I know I am mega behind, more posts to come!)