This weekend following the Thanksgiving festivities we worked on getting all of the Christmas decorations up. As the tiny one's are getting older, they are able to help out more with the whole experience. You can see their contributions to the family tree (notice all of the ornaments bunched in clusters!) We have several on a few branches to add to the beauty of it all.... but it's our tree and as much as I wanted to move things around, I held myself back and left it as is. These 2 in particular are mighty proud of their hard work. Today, I found the above when I came around the corner. It's like looking up at the stars, only indoors-- any way you slice it, it's a super special time of year.
Zack has been really enjoying 2nd grade this year. He has recently spent a lot of time learning about different tribes of Indian's and the details of where they live, what they ate, how they traveled, the weather condition's of their homestead's etc. He worked very hard on his home made of twigs!
4) Apple pie- Just because I love all things apple and it says Fall to me. I should have probably picked Pumpkin Roll... because it too is delish- and something we have for Thanksgiving, but apple is where its at for this ol'girl. I made this following our apple picking trip, and trust me it will not disappoint.
God gave me you for the days of doubt
And for when I think I have lost my way, God gave me you.
-Blake Shelton lyrics
Tuesday we had our Mops harvest party- and the kids loved it. They made a turkey pumpkin craft, a thanksgiving foam craft, and decorated sugar cookies to look like turkey's. Can't you see the turkey below? Squint real hard! My musically inclined little fellow had a blast. He is definitely the creative one out of the duo.
We made a trip to the park- on quite a chilly day I might add. But they had a blast until the princess one hit the mud- that was the ender. That and the fact that she got to see a "princess getting a married ring". (Ie a wedding was happening and she peeped the bride during the ring portion of the ceremony.)
We worked on getting ready for winter. The rockstar's comment to the overstuffed princess- "you look awesome". I've heard that we are going to have a pretty decent amount of snowfall predicted this year.... has anyone else heard this as well?
The little one's have spent a good amount of time building blocks and playing their new favorite game. Hide 'n seek. We actually played as a whole family last night and the kids had a blast.
We finished up our week with an awesome weekend. We got a surprise visit from Ga-Ga and Pop-pop. We got to go out to dinner with them and had a breakfast treat, and even got a date night! It was a great surprise to spend some quality time and a real treat to share some popcorn with the hubs over a movie.
4) More closet space. For Me.And for the love of my life. And for the little tiny princess that lives here. We all could use the space. And as mentioned in #3, organized that looks like something as delicious as this.
5) And this space. I mean, hello- where have you been all of my life? This space speaks to me, like sweet little nothings that make you all mushy inside. I can totally picture myself right there on that seats with a nice cup of coffee with my lovebug by my side and maybe my barking dog at my feet.
please forgive the poor quality of the photo's... they were captured by the ol'beendroppedtoomanytimes blackberry. 
This year we are changing up our normal Thankful tree for November - I decided to do Thankful cards, same concept- just more room to write! My plans are to capture 1 thing that each member of our family is thankful for for each day in the month of November. At the end of the month I am going to put them in a book to keep and each year we will add to it. It will be a great way to capture all of the things we are thankful for each day, see them as we go throughout the years, and see how the handwriting (and spelling) changes for the kids as they grow. This year I am filling in for the tiny ones, although the contribute by drawing a picture on the back of each card. I write exactly what they tell me... for example on the first day the princess was thankful for makeup.... Yes, you read that right. But they are getting better-- today (day 3) the princess is thankful for painting with her daddy and the rock star is thankful for his friend Mia and his daddy. Sweet. 
This morning the kids and I headed out to Club Mom. They always love to go-- they get yummy breakfast, some entertainment, and loads of kids to watch. This morning was no different... I love to go because I can score coupons for free meals for the kids at Qdoba- love! This morning the entertainment was Silly Bus. I used to work with one of the Silly Bus guys prior to my gig of SAHM, so it was great to see the kids really loving on the SB songs. The kids danced, and giggled, and twirled, and jumped- they had a great time, and they loved singing along to "crazy bus guy". It was a fun little morning out.
Ride'm cowboy! This year Luke and Bella decided to be a cowboy and cowgirl. I use the term loosely because in the eleventh hour, they wanted to be superhero's. I pressed forward with our plan, as all of the accessories were purchased at this point... cowboy hats, boots, and you can't forget a pony on a stick.... which by the way, was not very fun to lug around the fall festival. Our church always does an amazing job with the Fall Festival and this year was no different.... however the weather had different plans. There were tons of inflatables, rock climbing walls, obstacle courses, pony rides, and train rides that were left lonely outside during the rain. However inside, the fun did not disappoint! There was free food, candy, tons of games, bounce houses, inflatable slides- and the most exciting thing-- so many new faces from the community. It was such an awesome experience to see so many people coming in out of the rain, enjoying themselves and hopefully some hearts pricked to learn more about our church. With that being said, there were tons of people... and little miss Bella is a chip off the ol' daddy block and doesn't particularly enjoy crowds-- so we headed out after a while to go home and unwind from such an exciting time. The highlight? Getting to spend some much needed time with my bro... the kids and I loved hanging out with him.
You can tell in this pic, Bella is clinging to Uncle R due to the crowds.
Here they all are, in from the rain and post sugar rush!
This weekend we decided that we would paint the pumpkins that Luke and Bella got from
the pumpkin patch, when we visited with friends a couple of weeks ago. The kids loved spending
some craft time with Daddy and painting up some funny faces on their pumpkins. It was a great
afternoon activity on such a chilly weekend. We followed up our pumpkin experience with 
Bunk beds at it's finest. 
These two love to play in Zoey's bed. Friday they decided to test out the bunk bed option. Today, Bella-grace loaded up all of her favorites and snuggled in tight, while Luke made himself comfy with a pillow (a book) and a cozy blanket. I'm not sure the appeal, but these two were giggling for well over 30 minutes as they set this up, you can see the joy in baby girl's cheeks in the above photo.
Since birthing the Twinkies, the traveling has pretty much come to a screeching halt. As they are getting older, it is fun to start thinking about places that we may be able to go in the future- so when I saw my girl Leigh's post today, I knew I had to jump on board and get that travel bug flowing (well not exactly travel bugs, because those are gross- but you know what I mean!).
1) Bora Bora Tahiti- Ok, so this would be a Dra-eamm with my hubby. It just looks beautiful-- seriously, how more gorgeous can you get. I have visions of me ( a much skinny-er me) with an exotic flower behind my ear, sun burnt, trailing off to dinner on the beach with the handsome hub beside me. Ahh...
2) California- I have loved hearing the stories of Mike's time he was stationed in cali-- perfect weather, fresh food, tons of stuff to do outdoors, and the scenery. I would love for someday to make this a reality.... and kids can be in tow for this one, lots of fun stuff for them here.
3) Next up... Hawaii. Need I say more? Fun in the sun, a little volcano action, and a luau to round out the day. Sounds fabulous.
4) Seattle- I know kind of random for some folks, but I have always been interested in life on the western side of the US. Bella and I could sport some sweet rain boots while here.
5) Australia- They have hands down the coolest accents. So for that, it ranks in the top five. That and kangaroos.
This was a hard, but fun task. It was hard to narrow down the options. There are several honorable mentions to hand out here : Niagara Falls, Vancouver, Boston, Martha's Vineyard, and of course taking the kiddies to Disney.
