Happy Birthday!

This guy really wanted to go bowling for his birthday....every time we drove past the bowling alley he would mention it.  He would say, "there's where I'm celebrating my birthday when I turn 7 years old!  Really, Mom, I am!"  And every time we would go to my parents, you had to drive past this bowling alley...there was no way around it.  So, guess what we did on December 27th?  Noah & all of his cousins (plus some adults), headed out for a delicious lunch at Chick-fil-a and then off to the bowling alley! 

There were a ton of pics capturing the great form of these kids, but this one is enough for you to get the gist of the day!

Noah with his cousins

All of us (minus the photographer, my sister Deanna)

Afterwards we headed to Grandma & Grandpa's house to open gifts and have some cake.  This kid loves Scooby Doo right now and he really loved his new shirt!

Did you know if you squeeze extra hard when making your wish that it just may come true?

"this was the best birthday" quote from Noah.  Glad you liked it so much buddy.  We love you and it's still crazy to think that you are seven years old. 

He is a tall boy, if you can believe, his cousin Savanna (far left) is only 7 months younger than him.  She is super short though, but look at the height difference!

Happy Birthday Buddy!

Happy Holidays!

We had quite a few friends ask to come by and see our home decorated.  Our December month was busy, just like most everyone else's.  It's crazy how busy the month becomes.  Our month was cut short even more because we were leaving on the 16th to go home to Ohio for Christmas.  So, on a whim we decided to just have an Open House and invite our friends over to see our home. 

This post has a lot of pictures in it, but it was requested from a dear friend...She said she was coming to my open house, but she never showed....I'm not quite sure why?!?!?!  And it has taken me two hours to load these pictures and it was not working the way it should...

so it is what it is (out of order and all!)  

Enjoy....and Merry Christmas!

Making their home....a family tradition

This family activity has become a yearly tradition. 

 We were kind of pleasantly surprised when we opened up the box and the house was already assembled!  That's like the hardest (and most frustrating part of the whole thing!) 

Gotta love Costco!!

     

My two boys really love making their Gingerbread House.  I really think that Noah just wants to put one piece of candy on and then eat one, put one on, eat on....repeat, repeat, repeat.....

He was super excited when Dad told him he could do the Gingerbread Men all by himself. Aren't they the best looking men you've ever seen?

They did a great job...wouldn't it be so sweet to live in a cute house like this?

All I want for Christmas.....

This was a long time coming! 

 I never thought it was going to come out....

BUT, Thanksgiving night we drove over to Andrew & Tami's house (my brother and sister-in-law).  Tami is on bed rest and has been since Halloween night.  She's going a little stir crazy....but she is close to having her first child (and I am beyond excited and looking forward to it!).  We wanted to bring them some yummy Thanksgiving food and my Mom's delicious chocolate pie...Andrew requested it...so we were visiting and talking and all of a sudden Noah hopped up and excitedly said, "It CAME out!! It just fell right out of my mouth!"  He was so excited. 

A few weeks before this tooth came out, a space started to "grow" next to this tooth, it was getting quite large too.  I guess there needed to be space for this new tooth that will be growing in soon.  But now because of the space and then the tooth gone, this space is HUGE!!  Kind of awkward and I'm really hoping that the new tooth won't be that large....because then it will definitely be the beginning of the awkward geeky stage, and it's too soon for that and I'm not ready for my cute boy to go away.

Grateful

 The day was full of love, good food, laughter, Grandma (who will turn 99 in February) and a game of football (well the kids played)...it was a good day and we are grateful for our family, all of them...those here and those far away.  

 Happy Thanksgiving!

Pilgrim Day

Noah's class has been studying the Pilgrims and how they lived.  He's enjoyed learning how things were different and definitely harder compared to how we live.  One day they learned how to make candles.  The kids thought this was a fun thing to do.  

 Today they went to school dressed like a pilgrim.  They looked so cute!  When they got to class they got their hats to complete their outfits.  They were adorable!!  Thursday is my normal day to work in the classroom so I was there to see their Pilgrim party.  They learned all about corn today and even had Johnnycakes (pancakes made out of cornbread mix).  They were pretty tasty!  Thye also watched a Charlie Brown Thanksgiving.

 Noah was pretty excited to tell Mrs. Williams that he is related to William Bradford, the governor of the pilgrims.  She thought that was pretty cool too.  Everytime he was mentioned in a story or the movie Noah would get a big smile on his face.

My cute little pilgrim!

Spooky....

 It's here....the countdown seemed to last forever!  But it's finally here!!

It's so crazy that kids just live for this one day, although the activities seem to last at least one week long!  This year Noah knew that he wanted to be a NINJA.   He decided this quite a long time ago.  I looked online and found him a costume that was pretty cheap, plus free shipping wasn't too shabby either!  I know that the time is coming, much sooner than I want, but he's going to be pretty opinionated about what he wants to wear.  All the cute costumes are probably gone, huh?!

 Here's a quick shot of our front porch, I almost for a teeny tiny second, felt like I was back in Ohio with my beautiful potted plants, thanks to my gardener, I mean husband...isn't it beautiful?

 Noah was so excited to go trick or treating with his buddy Madison and her sister Abby.  They were troopers, just walking and walking and most of the time being polite and saying Thank you!

 We also got in the car & rode over to our friends house who built a haunted house in their driveway.  It was too much for the Barbour's to enter, we choose to stand outside and listen to the screams!

 He needed a timeout to have a sugar break...

 This super cool "spooky" car was a place we had to stop and take a picture of.  This was our "act scared" photo.

 Blake, Madison's brother, was also a Ninja....these two are a fearsome two.....

One scary fightin' Ninja!

Carvin'

 This year Noah actually wanted to participate in carvin' our pumpkins.  Usually he's all excited until we make the first cut & start to pull out the "guts" as we call them.  Then he's done!  But not this year....

 Maybe it was different because we grew our pumpkins this year...that's pretty cool, huh?!

 our final results...............

in order....Noah's, Dad's, Dad's and Mom's....I like my cat!