At the Playground

While most people were Black Friday shopping, Mimi and I took the boys to the park and she went for a walk with the boys while I went for a quick run. After my run, we went to the playground for a while. The boys are always up for checking out a new playground, so this was a treat! 

Lots of fun slides!

 

Post Turkey Day Play Time

After our Thanksgiving nap, which everyone actually got to participate in, we got some comfy clothes on and went out to play.

Love this face!

Mimi helping Caden swing the bat

 Uncle Chad taking a turn showing Caden tee-ball pointers

The big "kids" playing a little ball

Scootin' around

And, of course, more playing in the leaves. While everyone else was busy playing ball, Ethan was interested in the leaves.

Then, he decided to get high powered...notice the cord is not attached :-)

And finally, winding down under the Christmas tree that we somehow managed to put up that afternoon as well.

What a wonderful Thanksgiving at Mimi's!

Turkey Time

Mimi and I had some help on Thanksgiving Day preparing our dinner. Ethan decided he wanted to be involved this year and LOVED helping in the kitchen!

While Ethan was busy helping us, Caden was busy, too. First with a snack,

 then getting into some mischief stomping his feet in the dog bowl

Can't you tell how pleased he is with himself!?!?

 Everyone else was busy watching this...

 and gratefully Aunt Ashley stepped in to help with Caden after I changed his pants so that we could finish cooking.

So thankful for Uncle Chad and Aunt Ashley who helped entertain our two rambunctious boys!

Week at Mimi's...In the Leaves

 After our visit to Troy, we returned to Mimi's to spend the week of Thanksgiving with her. So thankful that Daddy has a job that allows him to work from home! It allows us to go wherever as long as he has a data connection. Mimi has a huge backyard with lots of leaves so much of the week was spent raking up the leaves and playing in the pile. They never tired of running through them, throwing them in the air, and rolling around in them!

 

 

Then Daddy got a better idea...a high powered idea...

 

 Since it was stirring up dust, I took the boys up on the deck to watch the action until he finished.

Of course, they were only interested in watching for a few minutes but there were plenty of toys on the deck to keep them entertained...with Mimi's help, of course!

Much more to come from our week at Mimi's!

A visit to the ole' stomping grounds

Since both boys were out the week of Thanksgiving, we packed up the weekend before and dropped them off with Mimi so that Ben and I could travel down to visit my alma mater, Troy University, for Homecoming. Because of so many years spent in Texas, it had been a long time since I had been back to visit. The campus looks amazing and we had a wonderful weekend catching up with my sorority sisters and their husbands! One of my best friends has catered box seats for all of the games so it was an awesome football experience even if we did lose.

Although we had the best of intentions and there were plenty of photo opportunities, this was the only one we stood still long enough to pose for. It had been so long since we had seen each other that it was wonderful to catch up and the guys had tons in common which is always a plus!

We definitely decided we needed to be more intentional about getting together more often! 

Love you girls!

Thanksgiving at Shadowbrook

One of my favorite events that the boys' Mother's Morning Out program puts on each year is their Thanksgiving program. This year it was 2 weeks after Halloween and I'm sure they started working on projects at the beginning of October. The program starts out in the church sanctuary and the children sing songs of thankfulness and recite scripture set to music and hand movements while dressed as Pilgrims and Indians.

After the program, everyone moves to the Family Life Center where all of the teachers serve the families a Thanksgiving Feast that they prepare themselves. The tables are set up with spots for each family member and the children make special tablescapes and placemats for each place setting with their little projects scattered in between. 

The older boys and girls are the pilgrims and Indians. 

Here's Ethan coming on stage as an Indian this year.

The little ones wear aprons that they decorate in their classroom. 

Here's Caden in his apron.

 The ever present thumb...

After the program while everyone was in line for the feast, Mimi and I decided to let the boys have their own concert since the line was so long.

 

 I forgot to take a picture of the table when we got to the FLC and somehow we didn't make it back home with all of the boys' projects, but here's what did make it back.

Ethan

Caden

We love our school and can't wait until next year's program. Hopefully, I will do a better job of taking pictures.

Playing Catch Up...Halloween

 Lots of posts to come as I try to play catch up from the last 6 weeks of whirlwind activities! It seems that we have not stopped moving since our tummy bug and this is the first time I have actually sat still enough to try to post some updates.

 ...Starting with the lack of Halloween pictures. I set out to capture some pics of the boys and our little friends in their costumes but they were so excited to get started that NO ONE would stay still long enough to snap the shot! Hence the blurry images. Caden's costume may look a little familiar :-) He's not really into the gathering of candy or the wearing of a costume(huge understatement...he cried as soon as Ben started trying to get it on him) so we decided to wait another year on getting him his own costume. The plan was to take Caden around the cul-de-sac then let him stay with Daddy and help pass out candy. He didn't have any desire at all to trick-or-treat so he didn't make it past our yard.

 However, this was Ethan's year and he had a blast! He is still into airplanes and although you can't tell, he was an airplane this year. Loved his costume!! It was an airplane with suspenders that you step into and wear. The best part of Halloween is that we have started the tradition of sharing our candy with other trick-or-treaters when we get back home. It was wonderful not having a bag full of candy at the end of the night!

Aren't these pictures just the best quality ever???