November Recap

Here's a quick recap of some of the highlights from November:

Emmy and I attended Gavin's Thanksgiving Feast…so darling.  Gavin was quite funny.  His teachers had set up place settings for the children and their parents around tables, but Gavin wanted to sit by Turbo, the turtle, so we were antisocial and sat alone by the turtle tank…that's my boy.

 Above: Gavin, wearing his turkey hat and sporting his FAVORITE shirt.

Below: Gavin and Turbo. :)

The week of Thanksgiving, the kids were out of school and the Museum of Aviation had a model train display set up, so we took the kids over to check it out.  I was pretty impressed by some of the displays…so much time goes into those things!

Our favorite display was, of course, the Christmas display, but all of them were really pretty cool.  It made me really want a nice train set to go around our Christmas tree...

Below:  random photo from after church one Sunday.  Emmy had been laying on the floor alone, and pretty soon all the other kids were laying next to her, so I snapped a pic.  :)  Not a very good picture of Emmy…:/

Thanksgiving day we had several families over for our afternoon feast and to play games.  we all had a great time and ate WAY too much delicious food.  :)

Below: the kids helping me peel 10 lbs. of potatoes! 

I managed to photograph all the kids, but never did get a shot of a SINGLE adult.  Pretty typical.  In all, we had 11 children, 2 infants, and 10 adults…probably the largest crowd we've ever hosted.  :)

And, just to round things out, here's a shot of my favorite baby smiling at her (and my) favorite man.  :)  She lights up when he starts talking to her.  TOO cute!

Happy November!

October & the first week of November

Man the months fly by!  Thanksgiving is just days away and I'm just getting around to blogging about October!  Eesh!

Well, the kids had crazy hair day during their homecoming week (I had no idea Elementary Schools had a "Homecoming"…maybe that's a southern thing.)

Anyway, you can't tell from the picture, but Carter's hair is sprayed orange…leftover from Gavin's Halloween costume last year as Ron Weasley.  :)

And, I just noticed poor Emmy…just in a onsie and her swaddling blanket all messed up.  That poor girl is definitely a 4th child!

And yes, before the time change, it was dark when we were eating breakfast!  Super depressing.

 The kids went with a Pirates of the Caribbean theme this year.  Again, my awesome mom made their costumes!  Jemma was Elizabeth Swan, Carter was Jack Sparrow, Gavin was Captain Barbosa and Emmy was a cannon ball.  :)

This picture was taken before our church Halloween Party.  Carter's wig hadn't come in the mail yet and I hadn't been able to find black pants for Emmy…so it was what it was.  :)

Halloween Night we had a super fun, festive dinner with our good friends, the Winwards.  Unfortunately I forgot our camera, so I sent Brandon home to grab it and by the time he got back, the kids were so antsy to get out the door to trick-or-treat, that I didn't get any pictures of ALL the kids together!  I'll have to steal some from Karrissa's blog when she posts them.  :)

Elizabeth with her cannon ball.

Captain Jack Sparrow with his wig!  

The whole crew…the boys wouldn't wear their facial hair this time…said it was too itchy.  I don't blame them.  :)

Trick-or-Treating really wore Emmy out.  ;)

November 2, Brandon's parents and Aunt Jill and Uncle Jerry came to visit us!

We LOVED having them.  They so wonderful!

While we were at church, they went antique-ing and found some really awesome stuff.  Jill came back with this AMAZING old wooden box…but it wouldn't fit in her suitcase, so I inherited!!!  I actually feel REALLY bad that she didn't get to take it with her!  I have promised myself that when/if we move back west, I am going to give it back to her.  I'll just babysit it for now.  ;)

Left: The kids with their Nina and Papa.

Right: Emmy and Nina spending some one-on-one time.  :)

We had the biggest bawl fest when these guys pulled out of our driveway.  All the kids were besides themselves with grief.  Jemma kept saying, "Life is just gonna be normal now!"…apparently she has it pretty bad. lol!  We had to console them with ice-cream. :)

Thank you Zamaroni's & Betencourt's for coming to Georgia to see us!!!  Thank you for doting on our children, for supplying us with gazillions of diapers, and for giving us a super fun weekend!  We LOVED having you!

And just because I can't STAND that she's changing so fast, here's one of little Emmy.  She's smiling and talking to us all the time now!  I am yet to capture it on camera, but I'll keep trying.  She is such a sweet, happy, CHUBBY baby.  LOVE HER!