warning: lots of caps-usage.

so...after my long stint of posting pretty much every day (then setting the date stamps for later so that people wouldn't catch on to just HOW frequently i was blogging), i kind of dropped off the face of the earth. here's the 411 on all things van voorst:

..atticus and i had the flu at the beginning of this week. NOT. FUN.

..i felt the baby move for the first time this morning.

..todd and i carved pumpkins last night. i carved "tom brady" ish. todd carved a dashing tom sellack.

..atticus can clap, wave, high-five, and stick out his tongue, and has been experimenting with new dance moves (including one we like to call the 'magic man'). no words yet...:(

..atticus had to be woken up at 8:15 yesterday morning, and still took awesome naps. it was amazing.

..we're going to the cornerstone openhouse this afternoon, and atticus will be the stinkin' cutest tiger.

..in a week and a half, i'm going to start watching kaiden beukelman during the day.

..on thursday i got to hang out with my good friend megan for the first time in MONTHS!!

..everyone at todd's office dressed up for halloween yesterday, and todd went as his dad. hilarious.

..we attended a rock band party at andy's a couple weeks ago, and atticus really got into the spirit of things as well.

..last weekend, we got to see both todd's parents and my parents for the birthday hoopla weekend (our moms' birthdays are on the 23rd and todd's birthday is on the 24th - crazy). it was awesome!

..not to toot my own sewing machine or anything, but i made the CUTEST christmas stockings out of salvation army sweaters the other day.

i can't believe that tomorrow is NOVEMBER already! i'm SO SO SO excited for the holidays this year. i usually get excited, but this year it's different...i think it's because last year we didn't do much advanced planning for thanksgiving because atticus was due the 30th (so i didn't want to cook, and i didn't want to drive anywhere). and since he was born 3 weeks before christmas, we didn't do much there either - it was the first year ever i didn't have a christmas tree...:(.

so this year i'm prepared to go ALL OUT. the thanksgiving menu is already being fine-tuned, and i'm planning planning planning for christmas decorating. (we still can't have a tree this year, due to space issues and the fact that we realized that our lease doesn't allow us to have a real christmas tree and we don't own a fake one. plus, atticus would be all up in the tree's grill.) oh man, this year is going to ROCK!!!!!

however, as a welcome addition to the typical holidays, atticus also has a first birthday party in between to plan for! so i've also started thinking about that...oh man, so much to think about and i'm SO STINKING EXCITED. any bash ideas, pass them my way!