Happy Thanksgiving

We spent a few days up in Angels Camp celebrating Thanksgiving.  Who wants to make it a one day holiday anyway??  We played card games, went on hikes, watched movies and just relaxed.  Here we are teaching the older girls how to play Skip-bo.  It was a hit!

These are our little hiking buddies.  They did a great job making it to the "waterfall".  Except there hasn't been any rain so there wasn't really a waterfall. How disappointing!

Oh well.  Happy Thanksgiving!  Gobble, gobble!

Happy birthday to Moi!

I turned 34 this year!  I dare say I cross into my mid 30's next year.....how did that happen??  I woke up to these little schweetie-schweetie's making me breakfast first thing in the morning.  I had no idea what they were up to!  They surprised me by bringing up a banana pancake just as I was getting up.  For it being a school day, they sure were on top of things!  

Later that afternoon I was surprised to see my nephew Reese show up at the door with an envelope for me.  Apparently the spa was awaiting me and my tense muscles.  Really, it was the best massage ever and my poor shoulders needed a good work over!  After that I headed to my "surprise dinner".  The family was waiting for me at Texas Roadhouse where we partied!  Because I was showered with gifts and desserts at the restaurant, I saved my angel food cake for the following day when I could actually enjoy it!  

And unfortunately this is the only picture I have of the cake.  Oh well.  Here's to another year!  

Happy Halloween!

We decided to be a family of superheroes this year for Halloween.  It took weeks to come to that conclusion.  Weeks.  And even then we didn't have everyone on board.  Which is why we also have a ninja.  I assume ninja's are superheros in their own way.

This was the first year the kids were able to wear costumes to school.  The kids had a blast and it took me back to my childhood memories when we would have a costume parade at Parkview elementary.  This is Kendri during her costume parade!  It was fun to see all the kids in their costumes.

And here is Shayli on Halloween night.  We were ready to trick or treat by 5:30.  That's what we are used to. Start early and end early and everyone is happy.   But this year we waited.  And waited.  And waited.  We kept looking outside for trick or treaters and they were no where to be found!  Finally when it was dark they started to come out.

We joined the cousins over in Redbridge to trick or treat for the rest of the night.  We came home with bags of candy. And here was our pumpkin carving......a little out of order, but oh well!