Retail Therapy

Occasionally a girl needs a little bit of "retail therapy".  Our therapy sessions occur at the Valencia Towne Center (mall) with Grandma Beth.

Doesn't  get much better than lunch at Dink's.

 Gotta love the poinsettia tree

 A carousel ride is a definite must to keep the kids sane.

 Nina is all girl.  Here she is trying on knee high women's boots.  It's so funny how she is already interested in fashion.  She told Tyson this morning, "Dad, you look really cute in that outfit."  Are we in for some trouble or what?

 Nina must feed her obsession with trains.

Enjoying the ever-so-early Christmas decorations.

Christmas is Coming

 

The Fieldsted family has a Christmas tree!  We did our usual tradition: headed over to the local Home Depot, picked out a tree and brought it home.  Not much of a tradition.  Tyson wishes it was so much more.  I think he imagines us hiking through the snow to cut our own perfect Christmas tree.  Personally, I love the Home Depot tradition while we have two small kids.  It's about 2 miles from our house and takes us about 30 minutes to do.
Nina was so cute about it this year.  She picked out our tree and really looked forward to having a tree on the roof of our car.  She found that part fascinating and talked about that part of it for hours.  Anyhow, just love this time of year.

"Look Mom! I got another treat!"

That was definitely the quote of the night.  Cute little Sadie said that after every single door.  I think this Halloween was the most fun I have ever had trick-or-treating.  The little girls were so much fun.  They just loved every single second of it.  It was funny to see them coaching each other at the door.  Nina: "That's enough knocking Sadie.", Sadie: "Okay, you say trick or treat".  They both think they know it all, and in all reality, they pretty much do.

All ready to head out.

 Little Miss Snow White and her Poison Apple.  I tried to talk Nina into being Cinderella.  I thought it was an obvious choice because of her coloring and the pattern for Cinderella was much easier.  But, Nina insisted on being Snow White.  In the end she made a beautiful Snow White and loved wearing her costume, especially the cape that went with it.  Maybe those many hours spent on the costume were worth it!

 Grandma Beth went as Dobby from Harry Potter.  Nina was too afraid of her to get a picture with her.  Sadie was a good sport and apprehensively stood next to her for a quick shot.

Pumpkin Patch

Nina's preschool took a field trip to the local pumpkin patch.  Everyone had a grand old time.

Here's most of the preschool group.  Nina insisted on wearing a hat that day.  She has become quite particular about the things she wears and dresses herself almost every day.

 Nina thought this was the perfect pumpkin and rolled it around for a while.

 Here's our little pumpkin!  She's eight months old in this picture.

 She is seriously such a smiley little thing.  I think I love this age the most.

 Near the end the kids were a bit pooped out.  They had just finished the corn maze and were done.

Blast from the past

One of my best friends ever stopped by on her 30th birthday week, which happens to be mine as well.  Birthdays, that's actually how Kelly and I got acquainted in 6th grade.  She thought her birthday was October 21st, which is the same as mine.  We were so impressed and thought we already had so much in common. (Turns out Kelly's birthday is actually October 20th.)  We had much more than our birthdays in common.  We had good times doing band, district choir and ASB together.  Thanks for all of the amazing memories Kelly!  She and her husband are some of the coolest people I know!

Nina loved walking their cute little dog Pinky.  Poor Pinky is all I have to say about that.

 Here is everyone jamming out on the kitty keyboard.

Kelly and her husband Nate are amazingly musically talented.  Their band Good King Friday  just cut their first album.  You should check it out.  You'll be impressed I promise.

Three Years Old

Warning!  Long post to follow with a lot of pictures.  We celebrated Nina's third birthday several different days and we did a lot of fun things for her. 
Three years has flown by for me.  Nina has such a fun and feisty little personality.  She does some of the sweetest things followed moments later by something absolutely crazy.  I guess that is typical three year old behavior.  Nina loves a wide variety of activities.  She loves playing princess dress-up, riding her tricycle, swinging on her belly at the park like Buzz Lightyear, drawing, coloring, painting, singing, "playing" the piano and dancing.  She is a really good helper and always wants to pick out which diaper Susie will wear, which is usually the one with Baby Big Bird on it.  Every single morning she comes into our room and asks us, "How was your nap?" followed by "My nap was good".  She makes up silly songs.  Today she made up a song about Uncle Kevin peeing in Grandma's grass.  (I think it's made-up anyways).    We are so grateful to have Nina as our daughter and love the light that she brings into each of our days.

Our big preschool girl

 The Thursday before Nina's birthday we headed down to Disneyland with Grandpa Larry and Grandma Beth.  Disneyland is always such an amazing and magical place to go to around the holidays.

 One of Nina's favorite rides is Dumbo.

 Had to end the evening with a tasty Mickey Mouse cake pop.

 Nina got a wagon from Grandpa and Grandma and love strolling around the neighborhood.  Susie especially enjoys it.

 The day before Nina's birthday we had a family celebration.  It is so great having Brandon and Lindsey so much closer.  We love being able to see them more often.

 We are also so lucky to have Kevin and Jennalyn closer too. Our kids are definitely spoiled!

 On Nina's actual birthday we went to the local zoo with Nina's best friend Sadie.

 The girls loved the Bobcats and named them Simba and Pumbaa.  Very creative, right?

 This little girl was happy to tag along with everything we did.

 Nina also had a little princess party with all of her cute little friends.  It was so fun to have them all over in their darling little outfits.

A group shot of all the sweet little princesses.

Lucky

Today I left Tyson home alone with Susie for a little over an hour.  After three phone calls from him I came home to find him waiting in the driveway, ready to hand her over to me.  It made me laugh a little inside.  I've gotten used to the fact that our little baby needs a lot of attention.  Apparently Tyson hasn't.  If she isn't held 24/7, she's crying and complaining.  She has this "demon voice" she uses that is almost humorous.  I really don't know when our little easy going baby became so needy for attention.  Anyhow, it just seems like recently I have been more focused on how lucky/blessed I am.  Maybe it was the ten year anniversary of 9/11 or how busy and stressed I have been with my church calling, but I feel so blessed for all I have here at my house.  I love these little kiddos more than I ever knew I could and I am so lucky to have them, no matter how whiny and needy they can be (Tyson included).

I love this picture because of Susie's cute little pose.

 Although they may not fully realize it yet, these little girlies are so lucky to have each other.

 Nina is so lucky to have Grandma Beth to spoil the crud out of her.  Here she is with all her Toy Story dolls from Grandma.

 Seriously Tyson, all she needs is constant attention and she's happy as a clam.  Is that too much to ask?

 Tyson feels lucky to have football season back in his life.  Susie is sporting her Hawkeye black and gold.

 It's hard to get Nina to smile for pictures these days.  This is about as good as it gets.

 Lucky...