Grateful!

Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday. I love it! I am also a little possessive about it. I get very perturbed when all the Christmas stuff goes up right after Halloween, thus jumping right over my favorite day of the year! Thanksgiving just gets chipped!

I love all things about Thanksgiving. I love the pumpkins, the fall colors, the weather shifting to cool days and cooler nights, the family time, the cooking, the food, the shopping! I love everything about Turkey Day!

I also love how we all take the time to slow down and think about those things that bring joy and thanksgiving into our lives, our homes, and our hearts. SO, I thought on this Eve of TURKEY DAY, and before the joyous chaos that is Thanksgiving hits my home full blown, I would jot down the 5 thing that I will be giving THANKS for this year!

1) My Faith. I am grateful for the Gospel of Jesus Christ and all that it has brought into my life. Meaning, Purpose, Love, Gratitude, Humility etc.

2)My Family. Paul, Sierra and Logan bring me the greatest joy I have ever known. XOXOXO!

3) Extended Family. You are an extension of my own family and you bring me unmeasurable happiness. Seriously some of the most awesome people that I could ever hope to know. I love you all! Can I just say I know how to pick 'um!

4) Friends. Living far away from family has been one of the greatest challenges of my life...and yet it has brought about some of the greatest blessings. We have met many wonderful friends..many that I now count among my family. Paul and I definitely could not have made this journey on our own. We love you!

5) Freedom. I am grateful for those that are fighting over seas to maintain our freedoms. Freedoms that I am beginning to feel many of us at times take for granted. I am grateful for the freedom to say and do and be what I feel is best for me. That is a blessing!

So, there you have it the 5 things that I am most grateful for this Thanksgiving Holiday!

Now go have fun and hopefully I will run into you while shopping Friday! :)

Santa's Worshop aka. Home Depot

My friend, Gina, invited Logan to the Home Depot for one of their crafts for kids events. They have them every 3rd Saturday, and they are totally free, but I thought they were just for kids 5-12 so I never thought of taking Logan. Home Depot supplies the craft, an apron, and this time a great hat to go with their theme.

Santa's Shop at the Home Depot!

Apron, CHECK!! Goggles, CHECK! Elf Hat, CHECK!!

Rescue Puppy, CHECK!!!

READY TO GET MY HAMMERING ON!

Tyson V. Showing off his own finished project! Tyson is one of Logan's friends from church and his Friday playgroup! Tyson and his family are moving on Wednesday!

We will miss you "V" family!!!!!

Friends Busy at work:

Anna A., Clayton Girls, Matthew, Maddy and Lyndon E, Tyson V.

Finished Project! A "Winter" Planter with plant!

Great job Logan the Builder!

It's DONE!!!

After 16 months we have finally finished and shelved the Carpet Incident of 2008.

For those of you who don't remember we had a slight incident with some rugs purchased at a store that dry transferred die onto my carpets. It was pretty awful. Well, after 16 months of persistence we finally got the settlement with the insurance company, and after much debate decided to re-carpet the entire house!

I am IN LOVE! I am so happy to have it done! I am so happy to not walk into my living room and see "red" literally on my carpet!

OH! HAPPY HAPPY DAY!

Before: Old Carpet!

During: the install took 1.5 days so this is the hall with half the house done! What a difference already!

New Carpet completed!

One of the things about installing the new carpet was that we had to move all the furniture out of the house. This gave me the opportunity ( a little stressful) to re-organize the house, and to rearrange some of the furniture.

It has been great to fall in love with our home all over again!

Thanks to Kevin S., Kevin T. And Milton F. for coming over and heaving all of our heavy pieces out to the garage! We appreciate it!

Lipan Apaches of Texas

As part of Sierra's 4th grade curriculum she is learning about Texas history. Starting of course with the Native Americans that lived here! For her first project she was to research, and then create a triorama about some of the facts that she learned. Sierra selected the Lipan Apache Tribe, and decided to do her triorama on their food, and shelter. I think it turned out pretty cute! And she did a kick butt presentation too!

The Food Side! This was our personal favorite side. We loved the acorns Sierra turned into baskets filled with food but, our absolute favorite thing is Paul's Salt Dough Bison that ended up looking like it was going to take a bathroom break on the Texas Plains! Sierra insisted on keeping it!

Shelter Side!

Sierra was so creative with coming up with the idea to put the fire inside the Tepee!

Completed Triorama!

Next Project: The Explorers. This is another blog worthy one for sure! I will post pictures as soon as we get it back. Hopefully in one piece!

Interesting?

Anyone have those days, those weeks, where you just feel uninteresting?

Well, I am having one of those days
one of those weeks
one of those months.

Life here is just....Mundane.

But, let's be honest..in about 2 weeks I will be blogging about how busy everything is and how Un-Mundane and Interesting life is- because in my opinion everything is more interesting when done to Christmas music.

For now I got Nothing!
Zip
Zilch!

I'm just going to have to be okay with being Un-Interesting!

Happy Halloween!

This Halloween was great! Once again I lost my mind and made the kids Halloween Costumes! It wasn't as bad as last year though, and I was able to do them all by myself. That's right! I can now read a pattern! I am so excited! Anyway, here are the pics!

Two cute kids ready to get their load of loot!

Sierra was Elizabeth Cole from American Girl, or a colonial 1700's girl!

Logan decided he wanted to be Batman. He wouldn't wear the shoe covers I made him, but he did wear them later that night trick or treating!

HAPPY HALLOWEEN EVERYONE!!