The Zorio Family: November 2012

The month of November seemed to fly by for our family. It felt like there was little time between Halloween and Thanksgiving, but we found enough time to fit in some fun! We started the month with a bonfire at a friend's house where we grilled hotdogs, made smores, and the kids ran around having fun!

The day after the bonfire John and I went to UT's Homecoming Game! Dawson and Carter spent the day with Lolly, Pop, and Uncle Logan. Dawson had a great time at their house as usual, but Carter decided on this day (and since then) that he no longer likes to drink from a bottle so he was a little out of sorts since we were gone most of the day. However, John and I had a great time back on campus and going to the game! We started out by having brunch at the Tyson Alumni House with our friend Lance! After that we checked out the Sigma Kappa tailgate and Homecoming float in Fiji Island and headed over to the Alpha Gamma Rho house where we saw even more friends! The game wasn't too much to talk about, but we did have fun being back in Neyland Stadium. John went to one game last season, but I hadn't been to a game since I was pregnant with Dawson in Fall 2008! I can't believe it's been that long?! We ran into several friends in the stadium which was great! After the game John's UT Ambassador Group was having a tailgate at Circle Park, so we stopped by there for a while! We had a really fun day and hope to go to a game or two next season, but we were ready to get back to our boys (this was the longest I had left Carter)!

I cannot remember if I mentioned this in the October post or not, but last month John traveled to Augusta for a week with work. This month he traveled again, but it was only to the tricities and just for one night.
We had a few playdates this month. One was at one of my new friends, Sarah's House. She has a little girl who is 4 and a boy who is a few weeks younger than Carter. Dawson really enjoyed playing with Charlotte! They did art, played outside, and she even painted one of his fingernails, I think...don't tell Daddy! haha! We met some friends at the Zoo to enjoy the Wee Play Area (kind of like a mini children's museum/play area inside in the heat! at the Knoxville Zoo). Dawson had a blast playing, and Carter even got to enjoy the baby area with mirrors and crawling area. Dawson had great fun playing with his friends Finn, Colt, and Anthony while we were there. When we were about to leave, we realized it had warmed up enough to walk around to see a few animals. So we checked out the elephants, monkeys, giraffes, and a few others.
On November 17th my Mamaw celebrated her 83rd birthday, so we decorated a cake for her with lots of sprinkles (per Dawson's request) and went for a visit.
The Monday evening before Thanksgiving, John's family celebrated Thanksgiving so he would be able to attend since he worked the night before and the night of Thanksgiving and would have to spend most of the actual holiday sleeping. We had a delicious Thanksgiving dinner, and Dawson and Carter got lots of attention while we were there too! I'm so glad we did this on Monday, because despite the plans I had made for the actual holiday we did almost nothing. On Thanksgiving Day while John was sleeping I had planned we would go to two Thanksgivings-one with my mom's side of the family and one with my dad's. On Thanksgiving morning we woke up to a sick Carter. He had a fever and a runny nose. As much as I wanted to continue on with our plans, I knew we shouldn't. So we made a quick trip to Lolly and Pop's to snap a couple of pictures and drop off a little Thanksgiving present from Dawson and Carter before coming back home. When John got up we had our Thanksgiving dinner that I always make for just our family. I started this when we were in Alabama, but I've decided to continue it because it's nice to have a dinner with just our little family too! We enjoyed using our china, and celebrating Thanksgiving at home. BUT...By the afternoon I knew Carter was definitely sick, so Friday morning I took him to the doctor and he had a little infection and had to get antibiotics. Unfortunately, it took several days of the antibiotic before he was back to himself! So we didn't leave the house while he was sick. The Monday after Thanksgiving was my birthday (more about that in a minute), and thankfully on this day Carter started doing a lot better. However the day after my birthday by the afternoon, Dawson was starting to come down with the same symptoms! So on Wednesday a trip to the doctor and antibiotics were in order for him, and he finally recovered just this past weekend! Needless to say since Thanksgiving we didn't get out of the house much at all! I was starting to go a little stir crazy! I'm so thankful that we're all healthy again!!
In the midst of all the illness, my brother turned 19! Since we weren't leaving the house, we invited him by so we could give him his gift and wish him a happy birthday. Dawson loved having his Uncle Logan come by for a while! He was really sad when he left, and he kept asking when Uncle Logan would come play again. Carter-even though he was feeling puny-was also glad to see his Uncle Logan!
So back to my birthday. Monday, November 26th, I celebrated my 27th birthday. I spent the day playing with Dawson and Carter at home (best way to spend a birthday-with my two sweet boys). The sweetest thing was that morning when Dawson woke up, I went to open his bedroom door. John was still at work so no one had told him that day (John had told him the night before that the following day would be my birthday), Dawson said, "Can I get up now? Happy birthday, Mommy!!!" So sweet! He remembered on his own! That made my birthday right there! Dawson is such a thoughtful little boy! That evening our family along with my parents, John's parents, Em, Drew, Eric, and Russell went out to dinner and then came back to our house to celebrate a little more. I had a wonderful birthday, and I'm very thankful that I have so many people to celebrate with me.
That wraps up our November! December will be a crazy month with John's busy work schedule, but we have a lot of fun Christmas festivities planned as well, some of which I hope to blog about very soon!
Enjoy the pictures! (I apologize for the odd order of the pictures, but I have struggled to upload pictures to this post for some reason so I'm just thankful they're finally showing up!) Enjoy!