Thanksgiving

We're sitting here watching Charlie Brown's Thanksgiving- well the kids are watching it while James and I watch the kids. Hillarious to hear them cracking up! OK- that was almost 2 weeks ago but we've had a blur of excitement celebrating Thanksgiving and Christmas with my parents this past week. Here's some pics:

popcorn on the cob

Family Time about Thanksgiving

Fun turkey snack-  but where are all the pics of our turkey pancakes?

Our wonderful Thanksgiving book and our new Thanksgiving tablecloth

Papa and kids enjoying beautiful weather outside

James during our 15th anniversary celebration at Ravens Game

The good weather was a great time to put everyone to work- 35+ bags of leaves

We went Friday morning to a tree farm and decorated our tree Friday night

Christmas books are great!

James smoked 1 turkey breast & 1 chicken and deepfried 1 turkey and 2 chickens- next year- we're buying more turkey! 

Nana helped Kayleigh decorate our nutter butter snowmen

Monday we went to Mount Vernon- the kids loved seeing Alladin the camel

watching (and smelling) the chocolate making demo was fun

KG in Martha Washington's wedding dress

Papa bought the kids old fashioned chocolate bars- best hot chocolate every! 

"Hot Hot Hot Hot Chocolate. Yeah we got it!"

Fall Fun w/ Friends

Wild Wagon ride at Sharp Farm

Cow herding

Bee class

Wizard of Oz kids 

Church FallFest with Super Friends

Trick or Treating with Neighbors

rest of reunion weekend

Kids sporting new USMA shirts from Nana

Janelle's last day we enjoyed brunch at Broadway Diner (a DDD  diner)

enjoying free day at Baltimore Zoo

boys' hiking trip with Daddy

it's fall!

tractor driving at the zoo

While KG and I were off in NYC, James and the boys had some boy time. I joked that they were going to eat lots of vegetables and go to bed early and they laughed.

3 generations of girls

I started to title this USMA 15 year reunion but 3 generations of girls really fits better. We'd been planning this trip for a little while now and I'm so thankful that we went. What a great trip. The two day reunion stretched into 10 days of fun with friends and family. Janelle and her little girl flew in a couple days early and we got to see our other roommate from West Point. Janelle posted tons of great pics here and here but here are a few

Kristen, Nana, and KG at the awesome new tennis facility

the whole gang- two Nana's, two roommates, two cute little girls

enjoying lunch in NYC on Thursday- KG loved the squid

three roommates and our youngest girls

Inner Harbor- we had a great trip to aquarium

6 USMA 96 grads

me and Coach Peck- Patriot League Coach of the Year many years in a row

We had such a super trip- a few days here in Baltimore with Janelle and AG. a terrific day in NYC with 3 generations of girls. a wonderful 2 days at West Point, then a couple fun days with Nana here in Baltimore! Good times!

beach trip

we're loving homeschooling- especially when it means we can go on a super beach trip when it's not so hot & not so crowded. when we can learn math through nightly battleship games, learn music through gospel brunch at the House of Blues, practice PE through swimming in many different pools, ...
we were blessed with good traffic as we drove down Friday to Myrtle Beach and met my parents here.  it was chilly here our first day so we enjoyed the playground and indoor pool. James got here Saturday night and we went out to a yummy brunch Sunday morning for "church."  After relaxing and board games, we went to the cottages for swimming, bocce ball, shuffleboard, and a cookout with birthday cake. Then ended the day with more games and 1940s cartoons.

we had several more days of fun in the sun and sand. we're loving days with no housework! but lots of time to enjoy swimming, sand castle building, floating down the lazy river, & KG's favorite: hot tubs. Tuesday night we became pirates- at Pirates Voyage. We even got to be part of the show: C got to go meet Kim the sea lion; Nana and I pulled K and T across the sea on a boat. Wonderful trip!

salute to heroes fall festival

We were so blessed to be able to go to Summers Adventures Heroes salute. We had a wonderful trip to a pumpkin patch, complete with hayride, pumpkin donuts, big orange bouncy thing, tons of farm animals, apple shooting, hay maze, beautiful weather, pumpkins, ...