2 boys, 2 girls, and a pumpkin patch

For the past few years we've meet up with our buddies the Arlitt's at some pumpkin patch. This year we skipped out on Sweet Berry Farms and went to a local church's pumpkin patch. The neat thing is the kids had a blast even without all the extra activities to do. (And it was a lot cheaper)

Here are the two munchkins being held against their will to take a picture =)
**Notice the sleeveless dress in OCTOBER!**

Here is sweet Thing 2, and she actually looked AND gave a smile.

Thing 1 has the picture taking down to a pat =)

Teague trying to decide which pumpkin was right for him.

Mac and Teague chased each other all over the rows of pumpkins.

The highlight of the visit was getting up on the big tractor! Troy and Teague were in their element, but my girls were fascinated by the tractor.

She couldn't get enough of taking this tractor for a spin.

Mac also searched high and low for the perfect pumpkin.

Apparently nobody liked this one. I really liked its character.

We brought home the most perfect pumpkins. They got a face lift with some stickers.

Here they were singing songs about pumpkins. We actually didn't carve a pumpkin this year. Which was kind of sad, but at the same time I didn't miss the clean up =)

A night with Shy Tree

Shy Tree recently played at the Historic Cotton Exchange in Temple. It was a wonderful night out listening to 2 of my favorite musicians do what they do best. It was fun to sit with friends as well and just be.

Alison getting the party started.

Mike and Lisa. My how nice it is to go out with them and know that it's not a short visit!!!
Brittany and Chris
Us girls!!!

Chris and Alison jamming out!

Leasha and Brian showed up. That was a nice surprise.

Josh!!!

This was such a great show!! So glad I get to follow them around and be a Groupie =)

Dropping Eggs and Bear Picnics

Aby's elementary school had lots of neat activities planned during the month of September. The first was Egg Drop day. Each child can make a container for an egg to be placed in, then dropped off the firetruck ladder. Aby and Chris worked together on this project. They ended up taking a plastic container filling it half way with flour, then placing the egg in, and topping it off with more flour. This idea was taken from Pioneers. They would travel across bumpy country side and placed their eggs in the flour so they wouldn't break. We decided to try it out, and it worked perfectly. There were definitely some creative containers made.

Here is the view from our back gate.

Egg going down.

Kinder patiently waiting their turn.

Declaring the end

So proud the egg made the drop.

Aby's class has Mystery Readers. Chris was excited to take part in this activity. He read the book Song and Dance Man. He brought his guitar and sang The Hokey Pokey and the ABC song with them. They had a wonderful time.

Aby was very excited that Daddy surprised her.

Another exciting activity was the Teddy Bear Picnic. All the kindergartners walked over to the park that is next to the neighborhood pool. They each had their teddy bears, and of course bear snacks.

McKinley loved getting to take part in this activity.

Sweet Aby and Beary. Beary won the Most Friendly Bear Award!!
Sami, Mrs. Liz and Bear

Me and my sweeties

Things I Like!

I have been looking back through old pictures here recently and it made me think about things that are near and dear to my heart. So, the following are a few of my favorite things.

Cousins

Kids Area at the Georgetown Christmas Stroll.

Cupcakes

No explanation needed!!!!

Christmas by the Fireside

A work in progress

Tattoo Parlors

Happy Customers

Funky, colorful trims

Little girls in pigtails

Miss Merry Mac!!!

I have several new blogs to write, and they mostly will be about the happenings in Aby's life right now. So, I decided I would share a little about Mac. It's been really neat to have her all to myself. She has not had the opportunity to have me all to herself. And it's been nice to get to know just McKinley. Our days consist of a lot of book reading, and pushing strollers around. It's also been nice here recently for her to get to hang out with a few little friends as well. She also has blossomed in her talking. I knew she could talk, but I am really convinced she didn't have a chance, or she felt she didn't need to. Aby is really good at taking care of Mac's needs. But now she HAS to talk to me when it's just us. Therefore, her vocabulary has increased tremendously since Aby started school. It's like she woke up the next morning talking in complete sentences. So, that's nice too. She is in the beginning's of my favorite stage. I know toddlers are hard sometimes, but this is when I really start enjoying children. When they are just starting to be independent, and really excited about life and learning new things. Here are a few pictures of my Merry Mac from the last few months.

McKinley has really observed how her Nana drinks her drink. Her Nana wraps her cup in a napkin!

Here she is with one of her favorite activities.

Nothing like a picnic in the living room while watching Mickey Mouse!

Besides her stroller packed with her goodies, these are her most prized possession.



We spend time together in the mornings putting on makeup and fixing our hair

When we first found out that we were having another girl I was a little nervous. I didn't have a sister, so I don't know how that relationship even works. But now I couldn't imagine our lives any other way. We are truly blessed!!