Wonderful Wednesday of Thanksgiving

Today is one of my favorite days of the year...the day BEFORE Thanksgiving! It's the day family and friends begin to gather to celebrate Thanksgiving! I have so many incredible memories from Thanksgiving. I know I share it every year, but there is just something warm and cozy that creeps in every year to remind me how much I love this holiday!

Today, I am thankful for my mom who taught me how to cook! I've been cooking some of my all-time holiday favorites. I've already made my absolute favorite - Strawberry Butter! I've also completed my grandmother's recipe for Dressing (or stuffing) as some call it!! I also made her Cream Party Salad, or what Ray C. calls "the green stuff". The turkey is thawing in the fridge!

Today, I'm making Pumpkin Pie and my great-grandmother's Pecan Pie! The only things not made from scratch will be Cranberry Sauce in a jar and Sister Schubert's Rolls! Hers are good enough for me!

Anyway, I love that my mom taught me how to bake! I love it so much that if cooking was a love language, it would definitely be mine! I love to cook good food for my family, and more than anything, I love making baked goods for (and with) my kids! I LOVE baking cookies for them just before they get off the bus and inviting over the neighbors to share them! That is straight from my mom! In fact, she just recently told me that the way to keep the kids at my house and not someone else's is to have the best food! After all, I can keep a much better watch on them when they are all playing over here, right?

I'm so grateful for so many things my mom taught me and modeled to me over the years. Being a good mom means building your child's character and the base for who they are and how they behave. The difficult part about that is how hard it is to pick out specific things my mom has done for me. My mom was just always there - doing everything, but little that is considered glamorous! Now that I'm a mom, I understand this dilemma!

So, I am thankful to my mom for molding me into the person I have become. That may seem much more simple than a list of incredible feats, but, really, it's the most impressive thing a person can do!

Thankful on Tuesday...

Today I am thankful that my children love each other so much. They seem to consider themselves as one unit. If one goes to the doctor and gets a sticker, they ask for two more and actually save them for later. If one gets a lollipop at the bank, they ask for two more for the others. This happens ALL the time! It is very rare for them to not consider the others.

One of my favorite memories, that I have blogged about before, is when Mary Frances went to stay with my parents for a week while she was two. Wherever we went that week, Thomas would tell everyone, "There are three kids in our family. Mary Frances is visiting our Honey and Grandaddy." It seemed like he did not want anyone to forget her!

Today, I took Chase with me to the grocery store. As we were checking out, Chase ran over to some pink roses and said he wanted to buy them for Mary Frances. It melted my heart that he thought of her when he saw the pink flowers. We decided on some purplish flowers that were a little less expensive, and he held on to them all afternoon until it was time to pick the kids up from the bus stop! He took the flowers with him, and gave them to her when she got off! He was so excited to tell me that she said they were beautiful!

Not only do they think of each other when they are apart, but they thank each other for doing so! Mary Frances will often say, "You are the best brothers in the whole world!" They certainly have sibling arguments, but I love how closely they are bonded together!

Thankful on Monday

I think I'll make a week out of Thanksgiving! Chase is home for the week from school. So, we were playing Old Maid earlier, and I realized someone I am really thankful for!

This picture shows how much easier playing cards is when we use my mother-in-law's idea! We cut slits into the bottom of egg cartons to hold the cards so the kids don't have to fumble with them! It makes cards much more fun with and for the kids!

So, today (and countless other days) I am thankful for my mother-in-law! She was such an inspiration to me. She was a fantastic cook. She was a great kindergarten teacher who loved seeing her students all grown up when we were out shopping! She was very creative - always able to figure out how to make things work for us! One thing I loved about her was her willingness to do ANYTHING and to do it right now! If someone needed a seam or hole patched, she got up and did it right away!

She had a lovely attitude and a funny sense of humor. I really miss her corny jokes and her New Jersey accent when she said them!

But what I miss most about her is how much she would have loved my children exactly the way they are - crazy and full of endless energy.

I am thankful for the values she and my father-in-law instilled in my husband. I am thankful that she cared so much about her children. I feel like she is a big part of who they are even without them getting to know her!

One thing I will never forget is how she used to always tell me, "I never cared if my house was clean! I just played with the kids! I knew I could clean it later!"

Thank you, Mom, for inspiring me to be a better mom! We miss you SO MUCH!!!

Baseball Fun

Fall Baseball is over! It was fun, but our schedule was crazy! I don't know how we will do this as they get older! I try to limit what they do, but with three kids, we are all over the place!! Here are some pictures from Chase's last game!

Although it looks like a fight, this is a victory dance! After the game, they asked "Coach Ray" if they won. Although no one wins in t-ball because of the rules of the game, Ray C, told them they did because they did great! So, this is what their excitement looked like!

One last team picture! Actually, this team will stick together! We are forming a Friendship Team with this group. We're really looking forward to seeing them grow and get better together! They are so sweet, and their parents are very pleasant!! We have a pretty good coach, too!

The Sun'll Come Out Tomorrow...

Mary Frances' Musical Theater Class put on "Annie" this past weekend! It was so much fun, and she did such a great job!I was so proud of her! She wore an outfit that my great-grandmother, Mama Taylor, made for me when I was in middle school! It was a perfect costume for the play.
After the show, we went to Starbucks with our friend, Heather, to celebrate! I was so glad she could come with us! Mary Frances was thrilled, too!
The boys couldn't make the show because they had a baseball game, but they made it to the after-party!!
Doesn't she look pretty? She wanted to know why everyone got flowers!?! I said, "I don't know! It's just a showbiz tradition!"
We were so excited that Mary Frances' teacher, Miss Crosby came with her boyfriend! I can't believe she took the time to come on a Friday night! That just shows what a special teacher she is!

Turkey Cupcakes

That sounds gross, doesn't it!?! Anyway...I saw these on the Today Show this morning and thought it would be a fun after-school project! So, I got everything together and baked the cupcakes. Once all the kids came home, I set up a table outside and we invited the neighborhood kids to come over and decorate them with us! They had so much fun! Aren't they cute? We did the best we could!

Yummm....

Halloween

The kids love Halloween. We don't go very far from our end of the street because there is so much going on! All of our neighbors come outside and sit in the driveway just before dark. So, we hand out candy from there! The kids have such a blast together!

This is a picture of Thomas and Chase carefully checking out the Haunted House next door. Our neighbor's son came home with a friend and turned her garage into a haunted house! I told the kids before we went outside that it would be too scary and they shouldn't go in, but they wanted to see it. So, they walked in and got the scary part but it didn't affect them! It wasn't too bad! Although, someone did jump out at them!


My cow, fairy garden princess, and cowboy! Thomas had suggested that Chase could take a rope and that every time he hit Thomas with the rope, Thomas would have to give him a piece of his candy. However, after explaining to Thomas that Chase would take all of his candy, he saw the problem and gave up on the rope idea!


Look what I did! The kids and I chose what we wanted and then I carved it! They helped pull out all the guts and seeds!

Our neighbor's son and daughter! Meredith is mentally handicapped. She was afraid of her mom (the witch) all night. So, she stayed with me and helped hand out candy! We had a good time!The Haunted House - and Chase checking it out once again! He was determined that they were not going to scare him - AND THEY DIDN'T!

Howl-o-ween Fest

Our neighborhood put on a Howl-o-ween fest for Halloween. We took the dogs up to the park for several hours and enjoyed the parade and costume contest - which we participated in! Thomas and Sugar were cows. Curly was an angel. Mary Frances was a Fairy Garden Princess - also wearing wings, and Chase was a cowboy - go figure!! We didn't stray to far from reality this year - except for the dog being an angel!
This is Mary Frances and Payton - our "front-door" neighbor!

We had so much fun watching the dock-diving contest and the Frisbee Dogs! I really want Thomas to do frisbee with Sugar! It is an awesome sport for a person to do with their pet!! And Sugar would LOVE it!!

Doggy Day Care

How funny is this? My mom has a friend that owns a doggy day care in Georgia. It's called Pawtropolis. You can learn more at http://www.athenspetropolis.com.

Anyway, she decided to take her little "Bailey" for a few days this week to let him play with some friends! They are dropped off in the morning and then picked up when the owners get off of work. It is seriously like a kid daycare!

They have toys and playground equipment for the dogs. You can even pay extra for them to watch a movie!! My favorite part is that you can watch them play online. Go here to see Bailey playing today. Click on "watch the tiny tots play". He's the shih tzu with the darker coloring on his back!

Veteran's Day Parade

Waiting to be dropped off at school!

The school had a Veteran's Day Parade today. I was so excited to be there and watch! The kids worked on their signs last night and were excited to show them off!

Here's a close-up of Mary Frances sign. It says:

MY HEROES:

Grandpa Duke - Army Air Corps

Papa Griffin - Army

Grandaddy Stephenson - Army

Papa Hughes - Coastguard

Thank you! We love you!!

HAPPY VETERAN'S DAY TO ALL WHO HAVE SERVED AND ARE SERVING!!

The Cuckoo Girls

Mary Frances was telling us about an event on the playground today when she added, "so I ran back to tell the other Cuckoo Girls."

I said, "Whoa...wait a minute. Who are the Cuckoo Girls?"

She told us it is a group of girls in her class and that she just "joined up" yesterday. She was so excited that she even sat by the leader of the Cuckoo Girls at lunch!

So what do the Cuckoo Girls do? They chase boys on the playground!