happy thanksgiving

we are so thankful for all of our many blessings.
wishing you and yours a safe and wonderful holiday!

now off to my kitchen for some holiday baking.

in my kitchen

lately, in my kitchen, i have:

*made mexican casserole. next time i think i am going to omit the chips in the baking process and just serve them on the side so they'll be crunchy. i also think that this might just work in a heated tortilla!?!

*popped lots of popcorn for my boys.

*been working at whittling away on my rotary apples. here are two great recipes to use:

one bowl apple cake and quick and easy apple tart

*baked blueberry banana nut bread for a mama with a new baby. i hope to post the recipe soon.

*worked on eating up our frozen leftovers.

*and tomorrow i'll be working on my version southern living's chocolate pecan pie. i make my own crust, omit the bourbon, and use light corn syrup instead of the dark. sinfully rich and good stuff!

thanksgiving program

many of august's friends were in a thanksgiving program this past friday.
so mandy invited us to join them for the program and the feast.

august couldn't wait to see all his friends perform. kacee

cline

brooker

and lauren

they all did such a good job!

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i updated my shop today with children's aprons, some boy and girl one piece cuteness, and a christmas tree tea towel. check it out!

creating

each our own projects.

paper cutting
christmas card holder

custom order cake toppers

i'll be sure to share the finished products.
of course, august's ended in "snow" all of the floor,
and i feel quite certain you get an idea of what that looked like.

getting our requests in early

saturday we headed over to bass pro to see santa.
to get in our requests in early and to say thank you for last years gifts.

they have a whole section dedicated to play and our little man LOVED it!
shooting, remote control cars, and trains, is there anything else a boy could ask for?

he started shaking as we got closer to santa, but got up there without any hesitation.

he took his picture (which turned out really good...maybe i should scan it and put it up.).

put in those requests and said our thank yous.

august is not asking for much, just presents.

i think that is an order that can be filled!

i have a hunch that this will grace his list one day.

and since trav and i both had them as children,
he probably will too.
i just don't know if my nerves we be ready to handle it when the time comes.

trains and building tunnels

our boy loves trains and building tracks.
we build them almost everyday.
today we needed to add a tunnel.
making use of our recycling pile.

but it just kept falling over.

so after some engineering,

we came up with this design.

and it worked much better.

i simply adore our melissa and doug set,

just as i adore all their wooden toys and puzzles.

they are timeless as are most wooden toys.

congrats & an update

congratulations nonae on your award.
quite an honor for a very special person.
read about it here.

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i have also update the shop with christmas and gameday rosettes.

it's thursday

and i'm finally posting about our busy halloween weekend
which was jam packed with fun: adult halloween party, treat-or-treating,
wedding reception, and a community get together!

mom and i decked out in 70's and 80's attire for the adult party (the men were off hunting).

trick-or-treating with friends in the neighborhood.
i just love this picture, which is a little blurry, but that face is priceless
amongst the craziness of trying to get 8 kids to pose.

lion from the lion king.
(won't even attempt to spell the character name!)

the girls would pose nicely together.

a hunting football player, which is exactly where we are right now in life!

this is what you could call being in the right place at the right time.
parker hugged his mama for a few seconds and my camera just happened to be ready.

an airplane

and the boarding pass. (kari, you are so clever!)

a very beautiful beauty queen

the peacock all ready and willing to smile and pose.

the lion just had to be hunted.

loaded up and ready to go get some candy!!!

august getting his flirt on all evening with aunt jamie.

on sunday afternoon, we hit papa g and nonae's community party.
bounce houses, haunted houses, hayride and dinner.
he just did the bounce house.

and mama joined him.

august doesn't do "spooky," so we visited for awhile and headed home.
such a fun and busy weekend.

just a few more weeks of pretty pumpkins.
it seems as if we just got to set them out.