Halloween 2015

Halloween was a lot of fun this year. But first we had a fun first for our kids. We decided to go to Six Flags for a little while that morning. We were there a little bit before the park actually opened so we were able to get over to the Mindbender first thing. Sam had never done a ride that went upside down so he was super nervous. Reese was nervous too which was funny but once we finally rode the ride they both loved it.

They loved it so much and there was no one else in line so we rode it a second time. After the second time, Lance and I knew we couldn't do it again but Reese wanted to do it a third time. We were there with some of our best friends so Reese rode with Maddy. Luckily, Clint and Dylan were on the ride at the same time because as they went up the hill, the ride stopped. We thought for sure Reese was going to be done for the day after that but she took it all in stride.

We had a lot of fun and ended up staying until around 2:00 (I think). The kids rode the Mine Train, the Scream Machine, and several other fun rides. We were surprised at how little crowd there was there.

Hayes didn't get to ride too many things but he LOVED getting to drive the car.

There is the cutest toddler area where Hayes and Denver got to ride rides of their own. They had a blast driving the trucks and flying in the airplane.

After all of this fun, we headed home to get ready for the evening. The kids were super excited about Halloween so it was easy to get everyone ready. Reese was a black cat, Sam was Willy Wonka (the Johnny Depp version), and Hayes was Chase from Paw Patrol. That evening our neighborhood had a cookout at our pavilion and then a neighbor pulled a trailer of hay around the neighborhood as the kids trick-or-treated. Once everyone was happy with their candy stash, we headed back up to the pavilion to watch Hotel Transylvania.

It was a fun night!

Reese's Cheer Competition

Reese competed in her first cheer competition this past weekend and I think it is safe to say that she is hooked. Her team has been working so hard, three days a week (plus an extra tumbling class), to get this routine down. And they nailed it! It is amazing to me what second and third graders can do out there! Her team won their group division and then won Grand Champions of their whole division. Her coach sent an email the next day saying that out of all teams, kindergarten through 8th grade, they got the fourth highest points. 

I don't think this is the end of our cheer journey. I see many more of these in our future if Reese continues to love it the way she does now.

Sweet Papa ~ 85

My Papa turned 85 this past weekend. We had a party at my aunts house and we had a blast! They have a good bit of land for the kids to run around on, two really awesome tree swings, and lots of other fun things for the kids to see. We had a photographer come to take pictures of everyone together and I can't wait to see those!! After getting to see my cousins and family who I don't get to see too ofter, my heart was so happy and full. I didn't want to leave that night but I knew we had a big day ahead of us the next day. I'll let the pictures tell the rest of the story...

October

When school and all activities started, I looked at my calendar and realized October was going to be a crazy month. And now here I am on the other side of it! It was indeed crazy but we made it through with little scars.

Every weekend we had a football game to attend. This coming weekend will be our last regular season game and then we will find out if they will be in the playoffs. October, of course, is breast cancer awareness month so the girls traded out their blue and green pom-poms and hairbows for some pink ones. Reese loved the pink. The first Saturday in October it was raining during the game but that didn't slow Reese down one bit and she won the "Spirit H" that morning.

October, luckily, was a pretty gorgeous month! We spent tons of time outside playing after school doing homework outside, and just enjoying the beautiful weather. Every Wednesday night was spent at the ball field watching Sam play. Not a whole lot of pictures were taken at the ball field though because I was constantly having to keep an eye on the little guy. His best friend Denver is there too so they play really well together. Kristin would bring ride-on toys, I would bring a bag of trains, and Denver's Paw-paw would buy them ring pops each week so they were pretty entertained. We often found them running off in to the woods to go potty together. Sam played well this season. It was coach pitch and then the tee the first part of the season and then the end of the season it was only coach pitch. Sam usually only used the coach! 

The next weekend, Lance had a work retreat so he was gone Friday and most of Saturday. When the kids got home from school on Friday, I took them to Smallcakes for a special treat. It was the end of the first nine weeks of school and I wanted to tell them how proud I was of how hard they had been working. Saturday morning we were so grateful for time. Reese's game was not until 4:00 so we enjoyed being able to be at home for a change. I think we stayed in our pjs until after noon. Lance got home just in time to go to Reese's game with us.

The next weekend Lance was out of town again. He went to Jacksonville with Bryan. While they were there playing golf, going to nice dinners and going to the Jaguars game, Claire and I made the most of our weekend. Friday we took Hadley and Hayes to the zoo. They had so much fun together. Saturday was Reese's Homecoming game. Claire and Hadley come to the game and Reese was so excited to have them there. We took the kids to lunch and then a pumpkin patch for a little fun after the game. We had a lot of fun and stayed a lot longer than I thought we would.

Sunday I packed our day full of fun! We went to church, headed straight to Owen and Emme's birthday party, and then straight back to a birthday party for Reese to attend.

And then that night we all felt like...

Yes, those are our kittens and they are getting so big. They are driving me crazy though. I swear I have to clean up after them more than anyone else in this house. They are so messy and Chase is going to be the death of me. The boys absolutely love them though. If there wasn't so much love for them, I would find them new homes. I think Chase was meant to be an outdoor cat but I don't think that would go over so well in our neighborhood. Scarlett is super sweet and pretty calm. The only thing that makes me crazy about her is that she always makes a huge mess with their water. She will stick her paw in it to watch the water ripple and then shake her paw. Then she will just start splashing it and before I know it the whole water bowl is on the floor. I finally took that bowl away and gave them a smaller one so she would stop making such a mess. I need to do a better job of getting the kids in on the chores of taking care of the cats and then that will help me to like our cats more. Ha!

I have so much more that has happened in October but there will be separate posts of some of those.