Our Pre-Thanksgiving Trip (Alternatively Titled: Picture Happy Post)

Happy Late Thanksgiving! I feel like I should go ahead and say Happy Kwanzaa, Happy Hannakuh, Merry Christmas, and possibly Happy New Year, since I seem to be particularly bad at blogging on time. But who wants to do things early??

The weekend before Thanksgiving we went to see my grandparents. We chose to go the weekend before instead of on Thanksgiving because we knew they would have a house full on Thanksgiving. We’ve also learned the trick of visiting them when there aren’t as many people around so that we can spend more quality one-on-one time with them. But we’ll let that be our little secret.

We arrived on Saturday night and did the traditional Saturday night thing: going to Jack’s Fish House with my grandparents and several other – how shall I say – seasoned relatives. Fish is a big deal in southern Mississippi, and we always look forward to eating there even though we don’t really eat fish at home. I was hoping to get a picture of the kids with the Jack’s Fish House sign reminiscent to this one taken around last Easter, but unfortunately the light on the sign was out and it was really dark outside.

Sunday morning we, of course, went to my grandparent’s church. Typically, my job at church is to keep Granddad awake, but he didn’t nod off a single time this time! I felt useless!

We were a little bit worried about the kids getting bored and therefore destructive at my grandparents’ house, but there was no need to worry. My grandmother has two poodles (a mini and a toy, I think), and the kids played with them the whole time. Ava carried the tiny one around like a baby. They always get so excited to be around dogs that are small enough for them to control.

We took a late afternoon walk to “the hill,” which is where the horses used to have their pasture. Yes, my grandparents had horses until pretty recently!

There’s a pond that’s currently dried up, but I managed to distract Izzy from boredom on “the hill” by letting him play in the boat!

Yes, this is my boots for Jesus purchase. Very cute, no? Pretty cool pic, too – if I was more of a whimsical person, this would be a great profile picture!

Who doesn’t love a good tractor?

This was Gran Gran and Great-Grandad’s first time meeting Egan.

I made us do all of our group pictures on Sunday night because we had to leave pretty early Monday morning to get home in time to take Ava to ballet.

This was a great time to take this trip because the kids were really able to much better understand who my grandparents were and they spent a lot of time bonding with them. I hear them talking about “Mississippi” and “Gran-Gran’s house” in their role playing now!

I think this pic is very sweet!

I looked pretty cute until right before we took this pic, but OH THE ITCHING, those leggings had to come off!

The only pic we have of all of us, thanks to Josh’s self-timer skills!

My efforts at getting all the kids’ hands with Grandad’s.

We had a great trip and feel blessed to get to spend some quality time with the Mississippi fam. We’ll have to go back soon…there are some poodles calling Ava’s name.

Photography Nerd Disclaimer: When we went outside for our walk, it was almost dark, so I was experimenting with my camera using some tips from MckMama. (I was going to do a linky to her post, but her website seems to be currently taken over by a girl with a back pack – weird. Basically, put the camera in aperture mode, lower the F-stop all the way and raise the ISO all the way.) The results are grainier than I like, but I definitely like the sharpness of the pictures and the amount of light – twilight shooting is something that I struggle with. HOWEVER, I forgot to change my camera settings back when we went inside to do family photos, which is why those are super grainy. I know I could clean them up some, but you know, you have to pick your battles – or photos to edit. Just felt like there should be a disclaimer.

Because There Are Random Pictures to Be Shared

Yep, it’s that time again! There are photos uploaded to photobucket that I want to share that don’t really fall into a specific category. So here it is: a random pics; random and unrelated bullet point post.

My baby still loves the swings!

~ We just took a little pre-Thanksgiving trip to Mississippi to visit with my grandparents. We don’t get to see them nearly enough. All of my great-grandparents died before I was born, so I think that it is wonderful that my kids have so many great-grandparents still alive and healthy that they are able to spend time with. My Granddad is 95 and it’s always a treat to spend time with him and my grandmother, and to see my kids developing a relationship with them that is so priceless!

My oldest baby showing more and more athletic prowess!

~The kids were SO GOOD on the trip. They spent about 14 hours in the car over the course of 3 days, and they did GREAT. That was a huge blessing!

~ Josh has taken the entire week of Thanksgiving off for a few years now. We have a little tradition of making the first half of the week a “staycation.” It’s glorious! But I have a great husband – he spent a lot of his day off working on things around the house without being asked!

The cupcakes I sent to Ava’s preschool on her birthday, thanks to Pinterest! I’m liking this concept of using candy to decorate cakes/cupcakes, because I sure don’t have the skills to draw with decorator icing!

~ I had a gross cold last week. As in, it didn’t really keep me in bed, but I had a constant feeling of “blah” and went through all the lovely stages of mucus expulsion.

Lots of little owls ready to go!

~ Speaking of illnesses, Josh had an eye infection a couple weeks ago. His eye was swollen shut and it looked like he had been in a fight. The doctor said it was conjunctivitis and gave him a drop, but we are putting our money on a sty or an allergic reaction since he was the only one it affected and it didn’t look like pink eye at all. I guess this is just the time of year that one of us is going to be sick in some form or another.

This is what Izzy gets to do while Ava’s in ballet class!

~ So what’s everybody cooking for Thanksgiving??? We have the opportunity to do something fun Thursday morning that will keep me from being able to cook on Thursday, so I’m doing all my cooking tomorrow. Or I should say baking, as the time constraint allows me to handle the fun part of the meal: bread and dessert!

I FINALLY snagged a pic of Egan up on all 4s!

~ This also means that my annual pie pumpkin cutting/cooking/purreeing will take place tomorrow. Fun times!

~ In much less pivotal news, what did you think of the Dancing with the Stars finale? I’ve decided that they must have changed the rules of the Free Style because the Free Styles are not nearly as cool as I remember them being. Although I did like JR’s this time.

A rare brotherly moment!

~ Egan has developed this belly flop style crawl that neither of my previous babies ever did. He gets up on all 4s and then dives in the direction he wants to go, belly first. I think it’s painful, but he’s getting across the room that way!

~ Egan’s also been pretty clingy to me for the past few weeks, which seems to be a change in his personality. Who knows, maybe teething?

Egan found a good read!

~ We played Candy Land with the kids tonight, and it was actually fun! It’s the first time we’ve played that Izzy’s been able to grasp the concepts. Just another reminder that our boy is growing up!

I thought you might need some proof that Izzy does wear pants on occassion!

~ I’m not ready to celebrate Christmas at all yet, but we are working on making our lists so that we will be prepared when December hits. I’m thinking about doing an official 25 Days of Christmas thing this year using one of the myriads of DIY Advent Calendar ideas I’m seeing on Pinterest, but I haven’t decided on which one to go with or what exactly the 25 Days would be. And there’s only like a week before I’ll need it – yikes!

Ava all ready for “Cowboy Day,” her preschool’s alternative to Halloween. (Yes, me like-y the alternative. )

~ Izzy is a world-class hugger. Seriously, you should get a hug from him. They’re amazing.

Josh’s step-dad passed on a 4 wheeler to us, and Josh spent a couple days getting it to run. Once it was running, he, of course, had to take the kids for a spin around the yard. A very nice way to spend a Sunday afternoon.

~ I’m hoping to teach Ava a simple Christmas song on the piano. Any suggestions?

Not Me Monday: I Promise I’m Not an Arsonist

Welcome to Not Me! Monday! This blog carnival was created by MckMama. You can head over to her blog to read what she and everyone else have not been doing this week. I would put sweet potatoes in the oven with the purpose of baking them and then pureeing them into baby food. However, I would never then forget that I had put the sweet potatoes were in the oven, take the kids to the park, and then make a 4 hour round trip to take one of Josh’s little sisters home. I most certainly would not forget the ever important cooking sweet potatoes until I was about 15 minutes from home, spending the rest of the time calling Josh (to prepare him for the worst,) and praying fervently that the house would still be standing. If I were to do that, though, I probably would pray a prayer of thanksgiving when I found everything intact, let the potatoes cool off, and go ahead and puree the little bit of salvagable sweet potatoes into baby food.

Pumpkins: Part III

OK, so you’ve seen all our trips to the pumpkin patch…now it’s time to see what we did with the pumpkins! I kind of went overboard on purchasing pumpkins this year…resulting from taking two trips to the patch and having more cash on my person than I typically would (read: not more money, just more cash). I’m not beating myself up about that because all the proceeds go to missions. So it’s like an offering with some decorative gourds as a nice bonus!

It took me about 3 weeks to decorate and arrange all our pumpkins. But here’s kind of how things went down:

First, the kids painted the two medium sized pumpkins. Yes, it is preferable for Izzy to paint naked.

Ava’s finished pumpkin.

Izzy’s finished pumpkin. He painted a recognizable face and I was so proud, but then he – er – embellished a little, making the face harder to see!

A week or two later, I embellished the tiny pumpkins with letter stickers (a Target Dollar Spot splurge!) so that there was a pumpkin for each family member.

I did this while sitting outside Starbucks with some girlfriends! Multi-tasking at its finest!

Then, a week after that when I had a burst of energy, I decorated the big pumpkin.

Yes, those are thumb tacks. And yes, the idea came from Pinterest. You’re welcome.

Finally, instead of lining up all the pumpkins haph-hazardly like originally planned, I took advantage of another burst of energy to arrange some loose bricks to create a sort of display.

(The “Welcome” sign and scarecrow were also dollar store splurges.)

The display is in the carport/garage and not on the front porch. I wasn’t sure which would be best; the front porch is much prettier and people **might** notice the pumpkins from the road, whereas you have to actually walk/drive into the garage to see them there. I opted for the garage because I don’t ever use my front porch (and our guests don’t, either,) and I figured nobody would care more about seeing my pumpkins than me.

For the past few years, I have put out pumpkins a week or two before Halloween and leave them there until after Thanksgiving. (Another advantage to “not celebrating” Halloween is fall decorations can be kept out longer than the spooky Halloween decorations!) Alright, so that’s the fall decor story at our house! What’s yours?

Not Me! Monday: Cell Phone Picture Edition

Welcome to Not Me! Monday! This blog carnival was created by MckMama. You can head over to her blog to read what she and everyone else have not been doing this week.

~ I would never take a self-portrait on a good hair day to send to my husband in case it fell before he came home. (I also did not just now figure out how to use the bathroom mirror to center a self-portrait.)

~ I would never make my baby a construction paper Indian headdress for his 8 month portraits. I’m way too PC to do something like that!

~ I would never be so impressed by the sinks in the bathroom at the Mexican restaurant that I would take a picture of one and send it to my husband. Who does that?!

~ I would never get so excited to find Caffeine Free Dr. Pepper at Wal-Mart that I would take a picture of it and send it to no less than 5 people. I did not live off of that wonderful substance when I was pregnant with Ava, I did not grieve when stores stopped carrying it, and I do not plan to buy several cases a month now that it appears to have returned. Not me!

Pumpkins, Part II (and thoughts of a recovering Glee junkie)

Gigi and Josh’s 3 youngest sisters came to visit us the weekend before Ava’s birthday to join us for another trip to the Pumpkin Patch. Every Saturday in October, the Pumpkin Patch transforms into an all-out carnival, complete with pony rides, games, and concessions. Not so great for a photo shoot since there are so many people, but great fun for the kids! After the festivities we came back to our house for burgers and a special dessert the girls made.

Today’s random bullet point topic is one that I know every one is super concerned about: Glee.

I know, I know, this blog has reached a new height in ridiculousness!

But seriously, does anybody watch Glee anymore? Josh and I caught the first episode of the third season on Hulu and haven’t felt the urge to watch it since.

There’s nothing like a mediocre season premiere to make me not want to come back.

However, in honor of the fact that I still have a passion for a lot of the music from the first two seasons, I thought I would make a list of my top 5 favorite songs from Glee. I actually can only think of 4, so I’m hoping the fifth one will come to me by the end of this post. So, in no particular order, I present…

Kara’s Top 5 Favorite Glee Songs
(Alternatively Titled: The Top 5 List You Will Never Need)

1. “No Air” I had actually never heard this song before Glee. But I think it’s really pretty. And I may have at one point mentally choreographed a dance for it.

2. “Bills, Bills, Bills” (sung by The Warblers) Even though this song really doesn’t make sense when sung by a guy, this arrangement makes me all kinds of happy. All. kinds. of. happy.

3. “I Dreamed a Dream” (from Les Mis.) This song came at a point when we had almost given up on the show. Then they pulled this out from my favorite musical and, in my opinion, it is top. notch. Idina Menzel’s voice is amazing. And I thought that they placed this song in the perfect context, which for some reason became unusual for the writers after the first half of the first season.

4. “Toxic” (Britney Spears) OK, OK, so it is not typical for me to claim a Britney song…but you have to understand that this song comes from an era where half of the shows in our dance recitals were Britney Spears, so I heard them a lot whether or not I wanted to. I think that the accapella at the beginning of this arrangement of this song is incredible, and I love the edition of Matthew Morrison’s voice to the first verse.

5. (and this is a tough choice, because there are several I would like to include, but I’m going to have to go with…) “Safety Dance.” Because I cannot listen to this and not dance. Which, I think, is a good attribute for a song to have.

*

So what about you, what’s your favorite song from Glee?

*You, too, can have your own acorn dessert! Doughnut holes, icing, toffee bits, and a pretzel stem!

Because I’m a Glutton for Punishment…

Welcome to Not Me! Monday! This blog carnival was created by MckMama. You can head over to her blog to read what she and everyone else have not been doing this week.

~ I would never attempt writing another “Not Me! Monday” post after I did such a poor job on the last one.

~ I would never allow my 5 year old to man the point-and-shoot on a walk that we took down a bike trail with my parents. I have far more respect for my technology than that, and am also very good at setting boundaries with my children so that they know which of our possessions are off-limits.

~ However, if I were to hypothetically allow my 5 year old to use my camera, I would never punctuate my blog post with the pictures she had taken. I know that everyone has better things to do with their time than look at someone else’s kid’s pictures.

~ I would never slice into the middle of my left pointer finger nail with a potato peeler. I am aware that the peeler is basically a knife and therefore I exhibit extreme caution when using said peeler.

~ If I were to slice my finger nail with a potato peeler, I would never try to hold the finger nail together with scotch tape. For a week and counting. Not me!

~ I would never scream at my children drill sergeant style during clean-up time when they are not following directions. I always keep my voice low and overflow with grace toward my children.

~ I would never wait until a full week into the month to do my big grocery trip. I always make sure that there are fresh fruits and veggies available for my children. I would never let them live off of graham crackers and peanut butter for a couple days until I have time to buy groceries. Not me!

~ I would never forget to bring church appropriate shoes on a weekend trip. But if I were to, I would never spontaneously purchase a pair of boots that I had been wanting using Jesus as an excuse. We are always very cautious with our purchases and plan them out months in advance.

~ I would never make my husband carry me and my camera around on his shoulders so I could get the perfect angle for a photo shoot.

~ I would never give Ava the point-and-shoot during one of Egan’s monthly photo shoots so that she can feel like she’s a part of it. (I would say, “I would never set up a shoot in the bathroom,” but I know no one’s falling for that!)

~ I would never put two linky icons in one blog post. I know that goes against the rules of blogging, and my readers will be completely overwhelmed and possibly need psychiatric help. So I would never do that. Not me!