We are SO thankful

I can not believe Thanksgiving is only 2 days away! I have all of my shopping done and I'm ready to enjoy a few days relaxing with the family. We have gone to Josh's Grannie's house ever since our very first Thanksgiving together. But this year she is very sick and in the hospital, so we aren't sure of our plans. It's so sad that she is sick and especially right before Thanksgiving, I'm hoping we will just delay our feast until the weekend when she is feeling better.
I decided to have fall pictures of the kids done this year and send out fall cards, rather than Christmas cards. This was in an effort to minimize my stress during the holidays and planning of Trey's party. (early January) And it totally worked! I'm so glad to have pictures and cards marked off my list of things to do for the holidays. So... without further ado ;)

Wordless Wednesday

Pumpkin Patch 2011

We had so much fun at the pumpkin patch this year. We went to a new one that is actually a Christmas Tree Farm and they bring in pumpkins in the fall. The kids and I met my Mom, my cousin and her husband and their kids there. 

 It was a pretty far drive, but we chose to go to this particular pumpkin patch because they had so many activities. They had shopping booths, food and drinks, photo props, a small petting zoo, a slide, a maze, duck races, a train ride, and a hay ride! We did everything but the hay ride. It was so HOT! It's absolutely insane that at the pumpkin patch, in October, it was 90 degrees! The kids were sweating and complaining and the lines were really long. I'm so glad we have finally gotten some nice fall weather here in Southeast Texas.

One Year!

GUESS WHO TURNED ONE...

We had so much fun celebrating Lakyn's Very 1st Birthday with family and friends!

Wordless Wednesday

Lakyn's 1st Birthday Photo Shoot

Check out Memory Lane Photography on Facebook!

Utah

I am entire month behind on blogging, but I can not make myself just skip ahead. I want to always be able to look back and remember all the fun times we had as a family!
So... back in mid to late August Josh was gearing up for his annual hunting trip to Utah. He was throwing around the idea of taking Trey with him, but I thought he was kidding, silly me ;) When I realized he was serious about taking him, I got really nervous and anxious. I spent the next few weeks pleading my case and coming up with reasons for him not to go. But I kept coming back to the fact that I would miss him too much! 12 days without my baby boy!?! No way.
Well, as you can see in the following pictures, Josh was very persistant and I caved. Seeing how excited Trey was made me feel way better about him going. He woke up every morning for a week saying, "Is it today? Are we going to the mountains today?" I couldn't stand between my Little Hunter and The Mountains, lol!

Josh and his friend text me pictures of him every single day, and most days I got 3-4 pictures! They knew this would keep me off their backs. I saw him riding the Ranger, eating, sleeping on his cot, playing on a mountain, riding in the car, posing with deer they killed, etc. It made me feel a lot better getting to talk to him every day and seeing pictures and videos of him having fun. What did mother's do before cell phones? I can't imagine!

Josh said Trey was a perfect angel and he got so many compliments on how well behaved he was and how tough he was. A lot of his people were expecting it to be a miserable trip taking a 3 year old to the mountains. I mean, it is an 18 hour drive! But thankfully, they were wrong! They had so much fun and I over hear them talking about next year all the time :)

That, my friends, is a chipmunk! Don't worry, they tanned the hide and it was perfectly clean and safe. That's what they told me, anyways ;)

First Grader!

The summer flew by as usual and it was time for Harleigh to start school again. I was readyto get back to the routine, but I sure do miss her being home with me. She and I went to Meet The Teacher night, which was pretty uneventful. BUT... don't even get me started on how stinking adorable it is that her and Trace are in the same class AGAIN! These two have been together since Parent's Day Out at the Church in town. They started out in the 3's class together, then moved to 4's, had the same Kinder teacher, and now 1st grade too! Harleigh Shirley... has a good ring to it ;) kidding! kidding!


We both loved her teacher and everyone I talked to told me how great she was, so that was a relief. She was her usual Sassy self on the first day and posed for the camera in her new outfit! I'm excited to see what this year has in store for her!

Gulf Shores

The past 2 years we have gone on vacation as a family for the 4th of July. It's a lot of fun to get away for the week and float the river with our little family and a lot of fun friends. But with the drought, there just wasn't enough water this year and we were worried it may be stagnant. So, we decided to go to the beach instead. Josh called me one day and said some friends of ours wanted to see if we wanted to go to Alabama for a few days with them. I was like, "What's in Alabama!?!" Dummy me did not realize there were gorgeous beaches there! So we said what the heck! And set off for a fun vacation to Gulf Shores, AL with friends.





The drive was LONG! And HOT! We drove about halfway at night, got a hotel, and then made the rest of the drive in the morning. It was nice to break the trip up, but it was still a really lobg drive. And this heat is just insane. Even driving down the road with the a/c full blast, it's hard to stay cool. It was over 100 degrees the entire time we were there.

We took a short cut on a ferry. The kids really enjoyed being able to get out of the car for a while and see the dolphins and seagulls. They were so excited to finally be at the ocean. They asked us the entire 8 hours if we were at the ocean yet ;)

Our Condo was awesome and the beach was blissful! The Condo was 3 bedrooms and 3 baths and had a kitchen and living room and wrap around balcony. We shared it with 2 other families, we had a blast! We cooked every morning and every night and spent the day at the beach. Our friends bought the kids beach toys and boogie boards, they were in Heaven! They built sand castles and buried each other in the sand. The resort also had a really nice pool and we went down there every evening so the kids could swim.

One day we went to a go cart track/ arcade. They had 2 seater go carts, so we paired up and drove the kids. Then we realized they had mini go carts! They has so much fun racing each other on the go carts. It was a really cool place with lots of games and rides, but we didn't stay long. Remember, 100 degrees? lol! We also went on a dolphin cruise, just the four of us. It was an old Marine boat, it was really neat. We went out about 15 minutes and found some dolphins and spent about 10 minutes with them and then went back. The guy that was driving the boat told us some history about the area (Flora-Bama) Josh and I are such dorks, we love any kind of tour! We had a great time and I'm so glad the drought didn't keep us from taking a vacation. Big thanks to Mimi & Moose for keeping our Precious Lakyn. We missed her terribly, but it was nice to spend some quality time with our big kids!