Christmas with our family

our annual gingerbread house decorating extravaganza:

Snow at the zoo!

Our "little" drummer boy

Jacob plays percussion in the middle school band and this was his Christmas concert. He has had a small size drum set in his bedroom for years that he has banged on but this is his first year actually playing in a band. He had to try out at the beginning of the year and he made it in and now he is already learning to read music and we were sooo impressed at the recital. The 6th graders only did "pieces" of songs but they played 5 different songs and sounded wonderful! We got a kick out of watching Jacob and the other percussionists move around in the back to "trade" instruments each song. Drums are definitely his favorite but he also likes the bells. He got to play the drums for "Little Drummer Boy" and I couldn't believe that was my"little" boy up there:) Guess we really have a drummer now!!!

Visit with Santa

Santa, Will you please bring me a new dollhouse, and a barbie doll and a horsey, maybe a pink scooter, and a Dora backpack, oh! the Elephant game, some mice for my mouse house, a Tinkerbell movie, some lipgloss, oh! and I LOVE candy and lollipops too!!! Ofcourse I prefer "pink" lollipops though. oh yes and I love to sing, maybe you could bring me a microphone. Thanks Santa! And don't forget my mommy could use some of that kitchen cleanser stuff I saw on that commercial to help her clean the kitchen because that is what mommy likes to do:) Thank you Santa!

Our little artist!

Hannah colored a Thanksgiving turkey for a coloring contest at Bank of America a couple weeks ago and we got a call today saying that "Miss Hannah is the winner!" So we walked in the bank this afternoon to claim her prize (thinking that it will be a candy cane or something like that...she was excited just to go and get her usual pink lollipop)...and when we walked in the door I was very suprised that the ladies knew who we were as they yelled, "Miss Hannah is here!" The lady in charge of the contest came running out from her little office and they all clapped for her...it was soooo cute and she was so proud! And then they handed her a $25 gift card for Wal-mart...how cool is that??? I was so suprised! Mind you, her "art work" was that of a typical 2 year old..."scribbling"...must have been "age appropriate":) It was very colorful! Funny thing though, she looked at the gift card with a "confused" look...I'm sure she was thinking "all I get is a little card?" She then asked for her pink lollipop and was as pleased as could be.

Our family Thankgiving in Carolina

The kids had the day off of school today so my girlfriend Heather and I let the boys do a sleepover here at our house and stay home (Josh in charge!) playing videogames all morning while we took the girls on at outing to "Monkey Business". Here are a few pics from our girls morning out:

Monkey Business...

Well Bill just got home from a 2 1/2 week business trip to Australia. He went to a town called "Hope Island" which was outside of Brisbane. He stayed in a little condo on a bay while he was installing cabinets for a man who lives there (well when the 24 "thousand" sq. foot house is ready, that is:) But it was a beautiful resort town in Australia. Of course most of Bill's time was spent working, but he did get a chance to walk through a rain forest and visit an animal sanctuary where he got to hand feed the kangaroos and hold a cuddly koala bear. Here are the pics...

Australia

We are all excited dad (" daddy" to Hannah:) is on his way home from a business trip he took to Australia!!! (Since I messed up his camera at the beach last summer:), he took mine along to take pictures, hence the lack of pics and posts the last couple weeks) So, hopefully I will have a few pictures up soon from "down under".
I just home Bill doesn't get sick when he gets home traveling from summer weather to the colder weather here on the East coast. The Fall colors here have been beautiful the past few weeks and we are now hitting the 30's at night and only highs in the 50's and 60's during the day. Anyway, I will share more about his Australia trip when I get the pictures to post (hopefully he will have taken some as he is not the "picture taker" in our family:)!!!

Trick-or-treat!

My fairy princess at library story time...

Boo at the Zoo with my fairy princess

Harmon's pumpkin patch and hay ride

I pulled the kids out of school early Wednesday (in order to miss the HUGE crowds over the weekend) and we headed off to the state fair. Bill was out of town so it was just the kiddos and me. Well, actually the boys got their wrist bands for unlimited rides (since that's all they cared about:) and they took off. So, Hannah and I enjoyed our afternoon together (which is why almost all the pictures are of her:) We found the boys a couple times and got a couple shots of them on the rides. There were hardly any lines so they hit EVERYTHING and there were a TON of rides there. They were actually pooped by the end of the day. As were Hannah and I. We missed having dad with us though:(

a day at the fair

our 2 hour tour through the corn maze

Prayer Request:

Please keep my friend, Michelle, and her family in your prayers as she just lost her baby. She was Josh's favorite teacher in elementary school. Check out her link under my blogs: Castro family...what a wonderful testimony!!!

jacob's birthday take 2...with family

morning out with my lil' carolina girl

This post is for my grandma and grammy...

This is the smock dress mommy got me when we were in Newberry. (She took the pic after I played in the park so as you can see my hair is a mess and my bows are falling off my shoulder) but anyway you can see what my mommy was talking about at how easy it would be for you to make these cute dresses for me:) Just a little hint in case you get bored and decide to take out your sewing machines on a rainy day:) Love you grandma and grammy...miss you!

An afternoon in downtown Newberry

Happy 12th birthday Jacob!

Suprise!!! He knew about his sleepover but his friends beat his bus after school so everyone was here when he walked in. They played dodgeball on the trampolene, played some video games, went on an "air heads" treasure hunt all over the house, had pizza and ice-cream cake, put together some legos Jacob got, and now they are all watching "Iron Man". And tomorrow I was planning on taking the kids to a Fall Festival they are having in one of the nearby towns but we have to be back for the Gamecocks at 2pm. I'm sure I'll have some tired kids tomorrow! At least Hannah's in bed. She's so funny, when we were eating the cake she kept thanking Jacob for his birthday so she could have cake. And she was sooo excited for him to open his presents but I think she was dissapointed there was nothing cute or "girly" for her to play with:)

Our newest addition...Happy Birthday Jacob!

Jacob has been asking for a parakeet, so we let him pick one out last night for his birthday present. Can our house get any noisier??? Josh has a cockatiel so now with 4 kids, 2 dogs and 2 birds...we are turning into our own little zoo:) But, really, he (or she?) don't know which yet...too young to tell, but he is a beautiful tropical blue color and he is sooo sweet!!! Already loves to be held (and you never know with a parakeet what kind of temperament they'll have at first) but this one LOVES to be held and is not biting...Jacob is so thrilled!!! He named him Kokomo...calls him "Koko" for short.

I'm a big girl now!

Look at my big girl!!! She went on the potty today for the very first time! Her incentive was these little doggies she really wanted for her little"mouse house" she LOVES to play with. It was soooo cute...I kept telling her all she had to do was "go" in her potty so today she decided she wanted to take off her diaper and REALLY try this time. So, we went about a half hour-45 min. with no diaper and I'm not kidding she kept going to sit on her potty, probably about 15-20 times. We brought it to her room so she could play and Bill was SUPPOSEDLY playing with her (although he was actually trying to nap on her carpet:) while I was cleaning the kitchen. I sent Josh up to check on the "two" of them and he walks in and says "What's that smell in here?" So, sure enough, Bill looks in her potty and THERE IT WAS!!! I hear Josh yell, "She did it!" so we all ran upstairs (yes, this is a very exciting event for the whole family:) She was sooo excited! The first thing out of her mouth (after we all calmed down) was "My doggies!" So, off we went to the toy store (good thing there's one just around the corner:) and here is a pic of the proud "big" girl: