Thanksgiving Break

I have a confession to make... I was sort of dreading the boys having a week off of school for Thanksgiving.  I envisioned non-stop fighting and whining, and the house getting trashed. But it actually turned out to be a pretty nice week of fun for the whole family. It really helped that John only had to work Monday and Tuesday. I survived those days with outings for lunch where the boys could get a lot of their energy out on a playground. Then on Wednesday, we went to check out the Dallas Arboretum...

It was beautiful, of course, and there were lots of fun things for the kids to do. It was the last day of their fall exhibit - a Cinderella theme with awesome pumpkin displays. I hope this makes up for the fact that we never made it to a pumpkin patch for Halloween this year :)

 There was also a big castle to play in...

As part of their regular exhibits, they have a little Pioneer town for kids to explore. They loved it!

It was a great day, and there were only a few flower casualties (not bad for 3 kids on the loose!)...

Thanksgiving Day was spent at my parents' house. It was just our little family and Granny & Pops for dinner, but the boys made sure to keep us all on our toes. They were thrilled when their cousins arrived a little later. Apparently, us old folks are boring. They had a ball playing together and I was too stuffed from our feast to take any pictures.

The next day, John took the boys hiking at McGee Creek State Park in Oklahoma. Our boys LOVE the outdoors, so they were in heaven...

John said they hiked at least 4 miles that day...they came home good and tired!

While the boys were away, Sadie and I were busy decking the halls for Christmas - hooray!

  

The next day, our elf on the shelf, Kringle, arrived back at our house to report on the kids' behavior to Santa. He brought a letter and a little treat/toy for each of the kids, and a yummy breakfast from the North Pole...

The kids love to see where Kringle is perched each morning after he returns from the North Pole each night...

And mom and dad love to remind the kids that Kringle is watching whenever they start to fight or whine...it's like magic! Now it's back to our regular routine, but the countdown to Christmas is on!

Halloween!

Our Halloween fun began a couple weeks early at a church party (for adults only). John and I were stumped on what to be and we didn't want to spend a lot of money, so I hit up the thrift store and came up with this...

Yep, pretty homely. We were a polygamist couple, complete with a fake pregnant belly and infant in tow (I have to give a shout out to my sis-in-law, Mandy, for the idea)! Not bad for $2 at the thrift store, especially after we won a $30 Amazon gift card in the costume contest...woohoo!

The following week was Mo's preschool party. To say he was excited would be an understatement...

Matt Mo - a "minion" from Despicable Me (we LOVE that movie!)

Sadie obviously didn't have a clue what was going on, but she LOVES to dress up so she was excited too...

The moms/dads and little siblings were invited for the pinata at the end of the party...so much fun!

Matt Mo gave it a good couple shots, but no luck. Sadie was absolutely obsessed with the thing. She kept squirming out of my arms to get a closer look...

I even helped her take a swing at it after all the preschoolers had their turn. None of them could bust it open, so the moms/dads took a few turns and finally had success!

That same night was Trunk or Treat at our church. Matt Mo got another coat of yellow face paint and Ben and Sadie joined in on the Despicable Me theme...

This was our inspiration:

I'm not sure anyone could tell who Sadie was supposed to be unless she was with the boys. Oh well, she still looked darn cute...

The boys actually won a prize for their costumes at the Trunk or Treat...more candy, just what we need! Hope everyone else had a fun and safe Halloween too!