McKenna's first Thanksgiving

With a new addition to our family this year, Kevin and I decided it's time to start creating some new traditions. One of them being trying our hand at hosting our first Thanksgiving. 

I was a bit anxious because I had never cooked multiple dishes at the same time for more than just Kevin and me. But when Kevin said he'd head up the meats- turkey and ham- it definitely took a little pressure off. 

I had begun shopping a couple of weeks in advance, and we began prepping a couple of days in advance so when the real day came it wasn't a chaotic madhouse. 

Kevin did a rum honey glaze that we perfected a couple of years ago on our Ham, and brined and smoked our turkey. It came out like heaven in your mouth. 

I made 3 dips for apps: Blue Cheese Herb Spread, Homemade Hummus, and Spinach Artichoke dip along with few block cheeses. 

For the rest of the meal I made 3-cheese Mac & Cheese, baked mashed potatoes, green beans with bacon bits, asparagus with bacon bits (asp is one of Kevin's faves so we HAD to have some for him), and sautéed carrots. Mom brought sweet potatoes, stuffing, and spinach casserole. 

I'd say our first spread turned out pretty impressive! 

(The greens are in the way back corner! lol). 

I spent a lot of time fine-tuning my time management in order to not overwhelm myself the day of. Even so, we told our family we'd start around 4 but dinner might not be ready at that time. Kevin and I did so well at planning that the last dish came off of the stove literally at 4PM.  We were lucky we didn't have to be cooking while our family arrived. 

McKenna tried almost everything (minus the Ham because of honey, and the stuffing because of walnuts). She loved it and thoroughly enjoyed sitting at the table eating with everyone. It was a blast. 

Grandpa, cousin Maddie, and McKenna 

We finished off dinner with Apple Pie, brownies, and ice cream. [Pie was from Publix, maybe next year I'll try my hand at homemade pie!]

Kevin took charge after dinner and started on dishes without any request... quite a man to be thankful for! After family left and baby went down we finished up all of the dishes! I often here one of the stresses of hosting is clean up. We just dove right in, got it done, and will wake up tomorrow to a clean home! I will say Kevin did most of the dishes though ;-).  

All in all, it was an incredible evening. Kevin and I both thoroughly enjoyed the process, to my surprise! I have so much I be thankful for. 

And now..... Time to prep for CHRISTMAS!!!

Octopus Baby costume

McKenna's Halloween costume ended up being a major hit this year for Halloween.

Yup, you guessed it, she was an octopus.

In all honesty, I was concerned it wasn't going to come out the way I had envisioned because it really came down to the wire. I hadn't tried the whole finished product on her until the day before Hallowen so there really wouldn't be much to do if it hadn't worked out! It turned out better than I had envisioned!

I came across several tutorials on how to make this costume easy and inexpensive. Per Usual, I made this craft project more difficult than it needed to be, and I often do that. It's just my personality. Why have things simple when they can be super complex?!

What you need for the tentacles:

• 4 pairs of stockings/men's socks (or 8 pairs if you want to keep the stockings)
• Thick Elastic (I used 1.5 inches)
• Pillow Stuffing
• Sewing Materials (needle/thread)
• 1.5 inch ribbon (optional)

What you need for the hat:

• Beanie
• Buttons
• White felt
• Plastic string
• Hot glue gun

I was originally concerned because I was finding stockings at like $5/pair... I was not looking forward to forking over $20+ on octopus tentacles that I could never use again. I lucked out finding pink stockings on major discount .... $1.50 a pair! I was able to nab all the same color too!

#targetdoesitagain

There is a way I have read to do this in order to salvage the stockings (hence the suggestion for 8 pairs of stockings), but it seemed complex and I found them at a good enough deal to not worry about it. I believe you end up tucking the second leg into the first leg.... but again, my brain was frazzled so don't quote me on it. Not sure what we would do with identical pairs in the same size and color anyway!

I started by stuffing the legs of each of the stockings with pillow stuffing (which a $5 bag was MORE than enough).

I then cut the legs off of the stockings. I suppose you could cut them first, but since this was my first try I didn't know how far up I wanted to stuff them.

With all 8 tentacles stuffed and cut, it was time to start attaching them to the elastic.

To get the elastic ready: measure around the child's waist and then double it. The reason you will be doubling the elastic is because you essentially will be sandwiching the top of each stocking within the two layers of elastic. I started out affixing them the tentacles with safety pins.

 

You'll want to do this so you can space the tentacles out evenly around the elastic. The spacing may depend on if you are making this costume for a crawler or a walker, then again, you'd likely want them space around the back with a gap in the front either way.  That way there is a bit of space in the front for their real legs to crawl/move/walk.

With the tentacles pinned, I began sewing.  NOW, I AM NOT A SEWER. I don't know the first thing about sewing.  But I figured just taking a needle and thread in and out a ga-jillion times would make the tentacles stay long enough to make it through the night. And to make it a little more appealing, I sewed both the top and the bottom of the elastic so it looked finished off (I don't have a picture of this, but I don't need to go flashing my awful sewing skills around the internet anyway).

The beanie was a hat we had lying around that had never gotten any use. I just cut oval shapes out of felt, glued on 2 black buttons, and cut some plastic-y type string from the craft store for the eyelashes.

I paired it all with a basic, pink onesie, again, that we had lying around.

 

And to address the [optional] pink ribbon. Since I used white elastic and her entire outfit was pink, I wanted to mask it in some way. Additionally, I also wanted something that was darker pink somewhere else in her costume other than her hat.  It helped pull the whole costume together. All I did was measure out a ridiculous amount of ribbon, centered it in the front/middle of the elastic, and ran a couple of stitches through it. I didn't sit perfectly over the elastic, but just kinda flowed around it and took attention away.

 

My Little Octopus was a hit.... and now, Momma is just having a hard time finding out how to store these suckers.  Because of course, there's no way you can get rid of Baby's First Halloween costume!

You can see a few more pictures of her Halloween Costume here.

McKenna's First Halloween

McKenna's first Halloween was wonderful! She was a homemade pink octopus.... any chance I get to make something homemade I do it... I love unique, one-of-a-kind stuff, even if it doesn't come out as good as something that you could just buy.  We also snagged a few more Pumpkin Patch pictures for your viewing pleasure. You gotta scroll through them to check out Octopus McKenna ;-).

I'll just share some pictures of her costume and from our Halloween. I'll do a separate post on how I made her costume since it was such a big hit!

While the tentacles looked best sprawled out while she was sitting (and hilarious while she crawled!), this is how most people saw her as an Octopus!

My precious little Octopus.  She was such a trooper because it took a while for her to get used to them around her!

We were joined by our friends the fairy and strawberry to get a little Trick-or-Treating in.

McKenna got just the right amount of candy for Mommy and Daddy to split... I'm sure in coming years that won't be the case!

Nine months old

Nine months is here. Three-quarters of a year is gone. And this little one just keeps sprouting!

She waves. She gives kisses. Her kisses are heartmelting. Not just open mouth ones to Mommy and Daddy, but kisses to dolls and herself in the mirror. She gets jealous when mommy pretends to give the baby doll kisses. She bounces up and down to music.

 

She absolutely LOVES Minnie Mouse. You start bouncing Minnie Mouse in front of her, she gets so giddy! (I used Minnie Mouse to hold her attention for the 9 month photos),
 

She makes the funniest noises, raspberries, grunts, farting noises. "Da-da-da" is still her favorite sound, but she's been practicing her "Mmmm" sounds, too so I think Ma-ma-ma is right around the corner ;-). 

Her favorite food is still carrots, but she's willing to taste almost anything! If she isn't in the mood for something, on the floor it goes. She loves using straws, though she'll suck water up and it is usually spit out all down her front. But teeth, teeth, teeth are sprouting everywhere, and she's beginning to figure out the concept of CHEWING!

 

We essentially skipped 9 month clothes (aside from what we already had) and she is fitting snuggly (some a little roomy) in 12 month clothes. She once loved her changing pad, and now it's like the changing pad of death. She attempts alligator rolls during diaper changes, often resulting in wardrobe changes (let's just say it ain't pretty). In fact, having her lay on her back for ANY amount of time is a feat in itself.

 

While she can be shy when put on the spot, she's gotten so independent. She wants to explore everything and tested her boundaries doing anything! She loves attention and will smile and giggle at complete strangers. She is the perfect mix of Kevin and me. No matter how busy or hectic of a day we're having, I am blessed to be able to stop, gaze at her in wonderment, and call her mine.