Two Thanksgivings and a Tree Farm

We have had a busy week celebrating Thanksgiving and making our annual trip to a tree farm.


We started by celebrating Thanksgiving with Mike's side of the family last weekend. We always have a big family meal with lots of extended family the Sunday before Thanksgiving. The weather was nice, so we were able to eat outside and enjoy the fall afternoon with lots of cousins, aunts, uncles, and grandparents.


The boys played football and Anna Grace loved "helping" to feed the newest baby cousin.


Then on Thursday, we celebrated Thanksgiving again with my side of the family.



Even though we did not have a lot of extended family come to my mom's house, we still had a huge spread of food. This is my mom doing her "Paula Dean" pose with all of the food that she prepared.


After we ate, my mom and I took a walk with the littlest grand kids before we tackled the dishes.


I stayed at my moms while Mike took the kids home so that she and I could brave the after-Thanksgiving sales. We woke up at 2:45 in the morning to start our shopping. My goal was to get to Toys R Us before the items that I needed would go on sale at 5:00 am, but neither of my brothers believed that my mom would actually get out of bed and get ready in time for us to make it. She surprised everyone by getting up even before my alarm went off! I had a lot of fun pretending to do stretches and planning our strategy while she finished getting ready to go.

Today we made our annual trip to the tree farm to get our Christmas tree. We have so many fun family memories and stories from our tree farm trips. One year it was frigidly cold and snowing and the wind was blowing so hard that we jumped out the car and just pointed to a tree without really even looking to see if it was good tree or not. Another year, someone stole our tree after the tractor dropped it off by the cars and the tree we ended up with had a nest of baby spiders that crawled all over our ceilings!



This year, our trip was not quite as eventful and we brought home a beautiful tree.



We spent the evening putting on the lights and decorations.



As usual, most of the ornaments ended up on one or two branches on the bottom of the tree (thanks to little helpers) so I had to redecorate while the kids ate their supper.


We have lots of parties and other events planned for the coming weeks, so I am going to have to make it a priority to enjoy the Christmas season and take the time to remember the true meaning of Christmas. It is so easy to let these days rush by without taking the time to stop and reflect on God's blessings and appreciate the life that He has given us.

Three Little Turkeys

I did a post a few weeks ago about the pumpkins that Cole & Alex planted back in July. They hoed the garden, planted the seeds, and watered the plants throughout the end of summer and beginning of fall in hopes of having big pumpkins for Halloween. However, their big pumpkins never really grew very much. Finally, yesterday we decided that it was time to pick the only two little pumpkins that had turned orange. We were happy to have one pumpkin for each boy.





We decided to turn the little pumpkins into turkeys to use as center pieces on our Thanksgiving table. Anna Grace had a tiny pumpkin left over from Halloween so she had one to decorate too. Tonight the kitchen table was completely covered in construction paper, wooden sticks, and googly eyes, but the kids had a lot of fun creating their turkeys.

The boys worked late into the evening putting finishing touches onto their feathers, long after Anna Grace had gone to bed.





The turkeys will travel with us to Mike's parents for an early Thanksgiving tomorrow and then to my mom's house on Thursday.

We have so much to be thankful for...a roof over our heads, food on our table, and our three precious turkeys.

Halloween

No long post today- just pictures of Halloween...






...and one picture of Anna Grace before school this morning...

Pumpkins, Football, and a Perfect Fall Evening

The boys have been growing pumpkins in the backyard since July, but so far none of them are ready to pick. So, with Halloween just a few days away, we finally had to make a trip to buy pumpkins.




Cole and Alex chose big carving pumpkins, but Anna Grace had her heart set on a little pie pumpkin. We tried to explain to her that she could not carve such a little pumpkin, but she did not care. She liked the little ones. We decided that she could paint hers instead.

We invited some friends over for a little football and pumpkin carving party. They brought some yummy taco soup and pumpkins for their kids and we made a bunch of other finger foods to eat while we watched the football game.

The girls painted pumpkins....



...and the boys started cleaning out their pumpkins during the first half of the game.





We had perfect cool fall weather for pumpkins and football.


During the second half of the game, it was time to finally start carving the pumpkins. I bought kits with little saws and carving tools so that the boys could carve their own.


The evening ended with cups of hot apple cider while we admired the work of our little pumpkin carvers and celebrated a win for our football team.

Busy!

You can tell that we have been very busy since I have not posted in a long time. I have lots of ideas for blog posts, but I don't ever seem to have the time to write about them. Here is a glimpse of some of the activities that have kept us so busy recently.

The kids had "Crazy Hair" night at church.




Cole was too cool to make his hair look crazy, but Alex and Anna Grace had fun with their crazy hair.


Alex was awarded the "Art Award" at his school.

Each one of the activities teachers (art, music, and PE)gets to pick a student from each grade level to recognize per quarter, and Alex was chosen by the art teacher this time.


My mom and I have been busy sewing cute outfits for Anna Grace.

This is the adorable outfit that my mom made for her recently.



We took a trip to Stone Mountain Park. Anna Grace and I wanted to go to the Rice Festival, and the boys wanted to hike up the mountain.





We were having so much fun that we decided to stay for the Lazar Show.



Anna Grace had a blast dancing to the music on the lawn before the Lazar Show started.



Now, we are busy getting ready for Halloween. The boys' pumpkins are growing very slowly, so I think we will be making a trip to buy some Halloween pumpkins this weekend. We will also work on our costumes since the kids have to wear them to several different activities in the coming week.