Tuesday, November 29, 2011

A Thanksgiving Project

Evelyn's first Thanksgiving was warm and cozy, a small family affair, though we followed it up with a whirlwind weekend...

First we headed over to Nana's house (my MIL) for a little art project, which you may have already seen over on the Thanksgiving Day post and dinner. Anywho, this idea of starting a tradition of Turkey hand prints every year occurred to me at like 2am on Thanksgiving morning (of course).

It's not like no one has ever done it before, but for some reason these totally normal kid things have all just slipped my mind, you know in all these years that I have not been a kid myself. And then I remember and go, "Oh! We should totally do that! Good thing I remembered like .5 seconds before this holiday/milestone/special event was over!" The husband loves running out at the last minute to grab whatever thing is necessary to achieve the vision that I must.have.right.now.


Since we are always running late now (I blame it on the whole "we have a baby" thing, but let's be honest, we were late before) and we were on target to arrive just in the nick of time for the Packer's game kick off (husband's team). I knew he wouldn't take too kindly to the idea that we just "swing by" the Walmart that happens to be on the way to his mom's house to pick up some art supplies.

It was a holiday, so I backed off, and tried the, "Hey babe, I know the game is about to start and I have this super cute idea for a little project, so why don't we get to your mom's house and you can watch the game and then I will run out for just a sec...?"


Worked like a charm, and he even said, "Sure and I will keep Evelyn with me so you don't have to be in crazy Walmart the day before Thanksgiving, did I mention you are psychotic by the way, with a baby in tow?"

Visions of baby free errand running and a secret drive by to the Starbucks conveniently situated nearby danced though my head..."Are you sure babe? I mean I could take her with me..."

"No problem, she loves watching football with her Daddy."

Long story short, that's how I ended up at Walmart (which was surprisingly calm) the day before Thanksgiving with just a wallet, cell phone and keys and found myself reflecting on how my whole errand took me 2 minutes. Listen, I love my baby girl, and love having her out with me, but errands alone? I hardly even remembered what it was like! I haven't had anyone not stop me to chat or mention some comment about kids since I was visibly pregnant. Let alone once you have a super cute baby with you...

I grabbed what I needed, even had time to debate the choice of "Umber" vs. "Bark" or "Chocolate" brown, got a Pepperment Mocha Frappuccino (Yup, a frap - it has been surprisingly warm here) and headed back to Nana's. Total errand time? 20 minutes. And that was with a little semi-guilty aimless wandering around Wally World.

When halftime came, we started the project.

First, we stripped down this little lady...



Yup, I also failed at the "get a Thanksgiving outfit" Mommy task. 
We had pajamas! Isn't that enough? 
This overpriced, but adorable, Children's Place outfit will just have to do. 
Also, yes, she is wearing baby tights. 

Then we spread out the supplies and got crackin. Thanks to some Mommy determination (aka gritting my teeth and saying "This is going to work, no matter what!" - I had a vision, remember?) We got the project done, though we did every color individually. It's weird that you can't reason with a 4 month old on why it is important to keep her hand open so as not to mix the colors, amirite?

  



In the end, we ended up with a few Handprint Turkeys, and one mostly clean, and mostly naked baby.



And now, I have my first kiddo art project hanging on my fridge!




Evelyn Rae is 4 and a half months old

...and I cropped my husband's Christmas list out of that last photo of the fridge. True story.

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