Thanksgiving in Iowa

We went to Des Moines for Thanksgiving and had a blast at Michael's sister's house. Westin was in heaven with Diana's family, their house is way more exciting than our little apartment! Fun kids and a dog, and Westin was just really entertained all week.

We left after Michael's morning patient to make the 7-hour road trip, and unfortunately it was on Westin's birthday. Luckily he doesn't know any better yet so he wasn't too mad about it. We decided to be really nice parents and let him eat ice cream for dinner that night to celebrate his birthday. You can see from the picture that he basically just wondered why we were giving him something so cold. But I think he still liked it? Happy birthday little guy, sorry about the car seat situation. Who wants to be strapped up to a seat for any amount of time, let alone an entire drive? Poor kids. Luckily we celebrated his birthday sans car seat the next day.

Westin's Grandma and Grandpa Daetwyler were there as well, so he had a lot of family around to sing him happy birthday the next morning! Holidays and birthdays are so much more fun with family. He didn't know what to think about everyone looking at him and singing a song he'd never heard before but he seemed to be amused by it all.

He needed his cousins to show him how to unwrap presents, and Michael helped with blowing out his candle. These are new concepts but he was happy to be in the middle of the action.

He needed no help, however, with his first chocolate cupcake. Westin eats two bran muffins every morning (plus fruit, plus yogurt, plus cheerios... this kid and breakfast, it's love), so when he started going at this cupcake you could just see his mind thinking, "This is the best muffin in the world."

Westin loved having Michael around for a full week. He hasn't seen that much of him all at once in a long time, and he now pushes me away when Michael is around. He can have mom time anytime he wants, so if dad's around, that is the only person he has eyes for now. I knew this was coming or I might be more sad about it. But really it's just so fun to watch those two together so who can feel bad.

Our nieces and nephews are such a good time. Michael and I were cracking up at the hand game songs that Jocelyn learns at school, and Madeline has such a fun personality. Ethan is talking so much more since last time we saw him and his voice is so dang cute. And it was SO fun to meet baby Elle for the first time! She is perfect.

For a while Westin seemed to be overwhelmed by other kids but in the last two months he has really started loving them more and more. So when he was suddenly surrounded by four kids all the time, he was so happy! Between cousins and a dog, I think he was ready to live in Des Moines forever.

Saying goodbye is always so much easier when you know when you'll see each other again -- we can't wait to play with the Findlays again at Christmas time! And if you can't tell from Westin's face, he's going to be pretty excited about that too.

We drove home that next Sunday and Westin somehow slept 5 hours of our 7 hour drive. It made for easy traveling but a super early morning the next day. He was rested and ready to party at 5:30 and honestly we still haven't gotten back on track somehow. I know 6:00 is a normal wake up time for so many people but I stopped loving early mornings the first day I was done with dance team in high school. Why are habits so easy to break? And soon we're headed to Utah for some time with my family, so we'll see how early mornings in Mountain Time go... Yikes!

Thanks for the fun Thanksgiving, Findlays! We loved visiting you!