Addison & Isla: November recap

December is upon us and it finally feels like a SoCal winter. The rain has come and turned things cool, foggy and wet, which is a welcome change from the crazy heat wave we had through summer and fall. Life in the Barat house is crazy busy, with a full-blown house remodel (amazingly, DJ and I are working really well together, getting things done and making joint decisions without killing each other) that has every minute outside of work pretty much consumed with moving quickly through so we can be in the house by March. Huge thanks to Gramma Pam who is saving us a ton of cash by project managing this little "project", all while running her own business and spending a ton of time with her granddaughters as well. I have always wanted to do this, but now appreciate the amount of planning, coordination and work involved.

November flew by with Stacy's baby shower and Thanksgiving being some of the highlights. We're SO excited for the twins arrival - Isla especially. She loves to talk about how she will hold them and feed them. She's going to be a great big cousin.

DJ and I attended his company holiday party last weekend. It was the most amazing party I have ever attended. Seriously...never seen anything like it in my life. Completely over the top event that included:

Entire Bacara Resort and Spa rented out - rooms and all, overflow at the Biltmore
All gratuities covered, spa services and golf gifted
Employees received an iPad mini as gift
Amazing cocktail party with beautiful spread of appetizers
5 course sit down dinner in ballroom
Casino night with every game imaginable - prizes were apple TV's, MacBook pros and Apple giftcards - are you sensing the Apple theme here?
Winter wonderland "room" set up with ice sculptures, stilt dancers, snow, chandeliers...you'll see pics below
Amazing DJ that played until 2am
FUN people who partied on the dance floor all night - love that!
Elaborate brunch served from 8am-1pm the next day

Can I just say I did not want to go home? I wanted to lay in that comfortable bed all day, rain falling outside, and watch HGTV! :) BUt we missed the girls and were happy to get home to them. Thanks Grampas for having fun with the girls while we were away! We picked out and decorated our Christmas tree the next day, which made for a perfect Sunday

Addison and Isla are doing great, growing quickly and making us laugh every day. This morning, Isla tugged at my pajama shorts, grabbed my underwear and said "Mama, you have chonies on." HA! Anyone who grew up in CA knows that "chonies" is a Hispanic slang word for underwear - so I understood what she was saying, DJ was stumped. Of course when I asked her where she heard that word, she told me it was from Aurelia at preschool. Yikes.

We're getting excited for the Barats (Logan included!) to come visit for Christmas. We'll have some good quality beach time and be able to chill and relax over the holidays.

Picnic at the park

Beautiful November day at the coast

Isla relaxing while we shopped for kitchen appliances - love my new stove!

Isla's big girl bed. She hasn't fallen out once

We went through a couple of weeks of sickness during November. I think DJ and I each missed a full week of work when it was all said and done

Isla loves to grab anything she sees in any store and ask if she can have it for Christmas

One of Isla's not-so-great days when she was sick. All she wanted was to sleep on me or DJ. Then we got pink eye...gross

Stacy's Fiesta baby shower - we had a taco truck, mariachi band and....a torential downpour of rain! But everyone still had a great time, especially the mom-to-be.

Framed invite, next to baby pics of Stacy and Grant with favors - a margarita scented soap and a CD of songs (from a game we played) with "Baby" in the lyrics