Catching Up Once Again!

Okay, I'm back after a long break!  Wow, have I been busy!  This is the most wonderful time of the year like the song says, but it is also a very busy time of the year.  But before I get started catching up, I have to say WAT TO GO TORI!!  She aced her first semester of college English!  She just checked her grades tonight and I am sooooo proud of my baby girl!!!  Now on to playing catch-up.

Thomas went to visit Santa at school last Saturday.  He insisted on taking his list so that Santa would know just what to bring him.

Not everyone was as excited about seeing Santa as Thomas was.  Collins didn't want any part of Santa! Ha!

Here is two that are so excited about Christmas!  Thomas is the most excited that he has ever been!

After the breakfast with Santa we went to the parade.  It was pretty cold, but Thomas didn't care.  We went to Clayton and Eulene's front yard just like we do every year.  Here is Thomas waiting for the parade to start.

Last Saturday night we had Christmas with the Bryan's at Aunt Glinda's.  I think everyone was there except Tonya and her family.  Everyone had a great time.  This is a shot of all of the grandchildren except Tonya.

Here is a shot of all of the great grandchildren that were there.  Scott and Scotty were not there either.  Kelsey had already left by this time and Collins wasn't in the picture, but she was there.

Okay...that is all the catching up for tonight.  I will try to pick back up tomorrow night and hopefully get caught up just in time for Christmas pictures next week!  Can you believe a week from today is Christmas day????

Our Lives Lately

Well, lets see, where do I start????  We have been soooo busy!  We are in the process of re-doing our kitchen and trying to decorate a little for Christmas.  I decided to go ahead and try to get a jump on decorating since we will be going to help Dan-Dan and Pop decorate the day after Thanksgiving.  Steve and I have been working every night and that is why I haven't blogged, I am pooped when we get finished working for the night and I go to bed and CRASH!  But, it is going to be so worth it, the kitchen already looks so much better!  We started last week-end and have really gotten a lot accomplished in a week.  We only get to work a couple of hours at night, but everything has been going really well and we are coming right along!

There is Steve getting ready to take down the cabinets over the bar.  It wasn't as bad of a job as I thought it would be.

I was a little scared that I wouldn't like having the cabinets down or that I would miss the cabinet space, but I LOVE the way it has turned out! 

This is what it looked like after we took down the microwave.  I wasn't to sure as to what we would do with the backsplash, but when Steve painted the wall, it looked so much better!  I think we will leave it alone and maybe I will try to find a pretty little picture to go in the space between the backsplash and where the hood will be.

Steve and Thomas are reading Thomas while I work on my blog and then Thomas and I are going to read Runaway Ralph.  That is the book we are reading right now and it is a chapter book, so we try to read one chapter a night.  Thomas doesn't want anyone to read that book to him except me.  We are on the 2nd book in the series.  We had our Thanksgiving lunch at church today and I ate WAY too much!  But everything was so good!  Tori is gone to Adam's tonight.  She is finished with school until after Thanksgiving and so is Adam.  They were going on a double date tonight to the Chicken Shack!  Well, this week will be a short week.  Thomas just has 2 days of school and I have 3 days of work WOOHOO!!  I guess I had better finish up here and go to bed, 5:30 a.m. will come mighty early!

Halloween 2011....Part Two

Last Monday night was a perfect night for trick-or-treating!  It was cool but not too cool.  We went to a few places in Bullock and then we ended the night in Elba.  We usually go eat at Dan-Dan and Pop's, but this year we ate at the Chinese restaurant instead.  We were going to eat at the Mexican restaurant, but it was packed!

Before we left to go trick-or-treating we just had to carve our pumpkin.  Thomas had been wanting to do this for a long time and I was taking a shower, he came running in there and said we have to hurry and carve the pumpkin because it was the last night!  So, I delegated Steve because I was busy trying to get out of my costume and trying to take my fake eyebrows off!

A really cute FBI agent and a really cute Alabama cheerleader!  They had loads of fun this Halloween!

And another precious Alabama cheerleader going trick-or-treating!

Trick-or-treating at Mr. Malcolm's...he was ready for us this year...last year Halloween slipped up on him, but this year he had individual bags fixed up for the trick-or-treaters!

I think this is about the cutest little FBI/ policeman I have ever seen!  Tori rode with us, she didn't last year so it was fun having her tag along too!

We stopped by Ms. Jimmie's, Ms. Margie's and Ms. Audie's...they are our regular stops on Halloween.

When we got to Elba, Monterrey's was PACKED...they were having Pumpkins on the Square and everyone decided to go to Monterreys and this is what we found at Burger King! We stayed in the drive-thru for a while trying to get Thomas something but then decided to leave.  I ended up going back to Monterrey's and running in and getting him chips and cheese dip to go and we took it with us to the Chinese restaurant.

What a great end to a great night!  We ate with Dan-Dan and Pop and Aunt Lynn and Uncle Greg.  It was really good and we had a great Halloween!

Halloween 2011...Part one

Well, here I go again, I am behind!  I just can't seem to get caught up on all I need to do!  We have been gone all day today Christmas shopping and I am pooped!  But what a great day it has been...just the four of us!  That is such a rare thing that we all get off together, but we pulled it off today and had a great day!  So tonight is the big game between Alabama and LSU ( I couldn't care less! HA!). But Steve is watching the game and Tori is up at Cindy and Dodd's and Thomas is playing with his new toys he got today, so I thought it would be a good time to try to play catch up on the blog.  I'm going back to some pictures from the Fall Festival we had at church last Sunday night.  We didn't have a huge crowd, but we did have a great time!

This is Thomas and Campbell playing in the jump house we rented for the festival.  They always LOVE jumping in those things!

Go Fish was a HUGE hit with Thomas!  He really racked up at the Go Fish game!  I really lost count of the times he fished!  I know he came home with a lot of stuff though!

Thomas and Campbell were playing pick up ducks.  "Look what I got Campbell"!  Thomas can never get enough trucks or tractors to play with!

Campbell and Thomas were playing the knock down cups with a pingpong ball in a gun game!  Ms. Shelley was in charge of this game and it was a hit! 

Pop and Steve were doing the cake walk.  Steve won the chocolate pound cake I made and Pop won a chocolate layer cake the Duke made.  I think they both came out pretty good!

Thomas liked the cake walk too!  I think everyone had a great time!  I know I did.  Tori was at Adam's so she didn't make it..she missed a treat!  We also had a hay ride and we had so much fun playing BINGO!

The next day was Monday, but it was Halloween and at DHR we go all out for Halloween!  I was an old man and we had a black widow spider, clowns, a bull rider, someone with a lost puppy, a gypsy and Flo, the Progressive lady!  We also had salt & pepper! And a bumble bee, an old lady and a witch!

What a fun day!!!  We played all day and didn't get a whole lot of work done, but hey...it's one day...might as well enjoy it!  Now we were all geared up for a fun night of trick-or-treating!

Day Break Farms...Part Two

I took so many pictures on our field trip to Day Break Farms that I had to break it up into 2 posts.  It was such a pretty day and everything was decorated so pretty with the beautiful pumpkins and mums and hay...I just couldn't resist snapping so many pictures!

Thomas and his little friend AJ were taking a break.  As well as the surroundings being so pretty and fall looking, the kids were pretty darn cute too!

They had the neatest little train that was made out of some drums and they were painted to look like cows.  The owner of the farm had them hooked together like a train and he pulled them behind his mule.  Thomas and I were in the very first car and it was a fast, bumpy, dusty ride!  But it was loads of fun!

Bon Jean went with us and she had a good time just watching and talking with Ms. Retha Sue, the bus driver.  They talked all day and had the best time.  The farm had the neatest shelter fixed up for eating under.  They had a little "store" too where you could get drinks, chips, and candy.

The next to the last thing we did was walk through the corn maze.  I could have gotten soooo lost if we had not been following the leader.  The owner of the farm just took us on a little loop through the maze...but boy was I getting turned around..all I could think about was Children of the Corn HA!!

This is Ms. Alison and Thomas.  She is Ms. Ceil's helper and she is so sweet.  She is a high school student but she got to go with us on the field trip.  This was taken at the corn cannon game.  That was the last thing we did.  We paid $1.00 and Thomas got to shoot 3 corn cobs out of a cannon...he thought it was the coolest thing!

There is my little "punkin" in grinning for the camera!  He was so tired when we left the farm, I figured he would be alseep before we got to the end of the drive, but he stayed awake the whole way home!

Look at all those pumpkins!  Thomas wanted to take one home with him!  What a gorgeous fall day at a beautiful place with some precious children!  I definitely want to go back!

Day Break Farms...Part One

Last Monday we went on a field trip with Thomas' class to Day Break Farms and we had soooooo much fun!  It was a blast!  This was a shot of most of the class, some had already left with their parents when this was taken, but most were there.  Don't they look adorable in their pumpkin shirts Ms. Ceil made them???

When we first got there, we looked at all of the animals and petted them and even fet them.  There were cows to feed, horses, goats, pigs, and rabbits.  There was a little shetland pony there named "Trigger" and he was so cute. Thomas got a kick out of him because he would show you his teeth! HA! After the animals, we went on a hay ride and it was fun.  Then the kids just got to run around and see what all there was to do.  Thomas ran straight to the little tractors and played and rode around the hay bails.  What fun!

Another fun thing was Hay Mountain.  It was just a bunch of haybale's piled up and some sewage pipes that you could slide down.  All of the kids had a ball playing in the hay.  Just think we spend all of this money on toys and all we really need is hay! HA!

One of the most fun things they did was play in  the corn in this big area filled with corn. Wow it was so much fun!  Thomas had never done anything like it before and he thought it was the coolest thing ever!  Well, that was part one of the DayBreak Farms post.  Maybe it won't be a week before I get to finish it!

Catching Up Once Again!

I always seem to be doing a catch up post on this here blog!  There just isn't enough hours in the day to do all I want to do!  Oh well, I want to recap back to Thursday night when we had the Fall Festival at school.  It was a BLAST!!  There were about a gazillion people there...no, seriously...there were A LOT of folks there.  Thomas had a great time!! Steve drove one of the mules with a trailer behind it to pull kids through the haunted hay ride.  Thomas rode it about 3 times and he wasn't scared a bit!  He said the man with the chainsaw was "hiwarius" (translated hilarious)!  I worked at the cake walk and had a lot of fun watching the folks win cakes!  I would say it was a huge success and everyone is already looking forward to next year!

This was taken right before we left to go to the festival.  Isn't Thomas's shirt so cute???  Ms. Ceil made them for the whole class.  She tie-dyed them herself and painted them like a pumpkin. 

Thomas loved the Go Fishing game.  He was really only interested in it, the haunted hay ride, the bouncy thing, pick up ducks, and beating the car on the outside HA!

This was taken just before dark when the haunted hay ride started.  Thomas was ready to go and told me he wasn't scared of "nufin" (nothing) HA!  But....notice Zeke in the mule...he was scared!  Leanna Johnson rode with Steve and helped him take up tickets.  Thomas likes Leanna a lot!

Picking up ducks was another favorite thing to do!

He wasn't at all interested in the cake walk....but I was!!  I didn't win a cake but it was fun!

Campbell got her face painted and she won a cake too!!  Thomas wasn't too happy to get his picture made.  So, I think the festival was a huge success and everyone had a great time!

Parent Day

Today was Parent Day at school.  I went to school and sat with Thomas while he ate lunch.  I didn't eat because they eat at 10:00 a.m. and I just didn't think I could eat lunch at that time HA!!  So, I just went and sat with him while he ate and then we went back to their classroom and Ms. Ceil read a book and then they played at their centers.  Thomas was the only one that could tell Ms. Ceil what the Spanish word for orange is!  He is so smart, but.....he has no interest whatsoever in writing his name or coloring!  We have got to work on that!

Thomas and Savannah are getting ready for their lunch and Thomas took about 2 whole bites of his sandwich!  But...he did eat his Sunchips and drank his juice.  He was way too excited that I was there with him.

Thomas was getting ready to listen to the story Ms. Ceil was reading.

Thomas and his best friend AJ were playing with blocks.  Thomas says Aj is his one and only friend! HA!

They were really getting into it!  Thomas and AJ are almost exactly the same size...I was noticing that today!

I took this right before I sneaked out.  I told Thomas bye and that I was about to go and he was like...okay, see you this afternoon.  I'll take that anyday as opposed to leaving them crying!

When I was leaving I ran into Campbell Hawthorne and a few of her friends!  They had jsut enough time to stop and pose for a picture!

What cute little girls!  Oh well...after all the fun at Parents Day I had to go back to work and what a busy day at work it was!  Tori has had a virus and she has been "under the weather".  I am so thankful she is feeling better and she thinks she will be able to go back to school tomorrow...I sure hope so!!