Read this book!!

I am a little ashamed to say that I do not read as often as I should. With all of the busy of the last year (you know, having a baby...going back to work...being a resident's wife) - I have neglected to keep up one of my favorite hobbies - reading! Anywho - my mom and dad got me a fabulous book for Christmas and I think all of you should read it too - that is, if you have the chance. I finished it from start to finish in a couple of hours last night after putting Barrett to bed. If you have a few extra hours this weekend, go pick it up - or better yet - order it from Amazon!!

Heaven is for Real

Get yourself moving and read this book - you'll love it!

(Thanks Mom and Dad for the great read!!)

Turkeys, Turkeys, Turkeys

A few weeks ago, we celebrated my favorite holiday - THANKSGIVING!! I love everything about this day, from the preparation and cooking the night before to the abundance of wonderful food and football, but most importantly, that it gives us a day of reflection on all that we are blessed with throughout the year.

In our society, it is easy to get caught up in the "busy" of daily life and forget how many blessings we have. Thanksgiving is a wonderful opportunity to do just that - and share in the blessings of family and friends too!! We have a wonderful second family here with our fellow residents - and we are SO very THANKFUL for each and every one of them.

We started off Thanksgiving Day by running The Turkey Trot as a family - even Barrett!! We dressed him up in his turkey costume to help keep him warm and put him in our jogging stroller. We met a few friends there and had a great time with our running buddies!! It was a cold morning, but a GREAT way to start off our Thanksgiving celebration!

Lynne and Ellie joined us for the race and we were SO glad they did. It was so nice to have some friends there who were running with strollers too. Barrett and Ellie have such a great time together! Over 3,500 people registered for the race and it was their biggest race yet.

All set and ready to go!

Ellie and Lynne - ready to RUN!

Look at all of those runners!

Daddy and his little turkey

We couldn't help it!

Ellie wanted to meet the Turkey too!

Mamas and their babies

A few post race snacks...

After the race, we rushed home to finish our cooking for our Thanksgiving celebration. Lynne was such a wonderful hostess and invited everyone to her home for a yummy lunch! We bought the turkey from Honeybaked Ham (it was DELICIOUS) and then everyone brought their favorite sides. I think it is always fun to see how everyone else thinks of Thanksgiving. My favorite side dishes are corn casserole and broccoli rice casserole at "home" so of course, I had to bring those along. To me, it is just not Thanksgiving dinner without those dishes!

Auntie Marianne has her hands full with these boys!

Barrett - checking out the goods

Daddy - I have no time for pictures!

Barrett and Zach

Barrett trying to find his OSU Cowboys on TV - next week buddy!! :)

Family shot

Look what I can do!

 

Sharing some snacks with Aidan

All of this playing has worn me OUT!

We had such a wonderful day! It is hard to believe that we have celebrated our fourth Thanksgiving here! Great friends, great food, great fun - GREAT day! 

Chosen

It's Wednesday, which means we are halfway to the weekend - YEAH!! I wanted to share with you a post that I thought was very appropriate for this season of life. This is written by another blogger who I think is just brilliant. Please take a few minutes and read this. I hope you are as blessed by her words as I was.

Have a great Wednesday! It's all downhill from here!

Trick or Treat!

We are a little behind on this one, but wanted to share a few cute pictures of Barrett's first Halloween! With such wonderful friends, we had a weekend FULL of Halloween events! Our first stop was the costume party at Patty's house. They hosted a great party complete with a chili cookoff. I took chicken chili (our favorite) and just happened to WIN! Such a fun party!

Daddy and the Turkey

The Turkey and Ellie Ballerina

Ellie and Barrett

Miss Lynne with all of the kiddos - look at all of those sippys!!



Our little family

The next stop on Sunday was the annual Halloween Bash at The Champney's! This is a wonderful fun party with Heather's famous chili and all of the kids. They FAR outnumber the adults. Everyone comes in costume and we all have such a great time together! The fun part about our parties is that someone is usually on call, but you never feel out of place - LOVE our friends!

Barrett the turkey and Jon Michael as Mickey Mouse

Aidan and Barrett the skeleton - these are his jammies, which worked out so great!

Zach as Yoda

A cheerleader and genie performing as Taylor Swift

This skeleton needs to put some meat on his bones!

Sweet Ellie in her pumpkin dress 



For our grand finale, we went trick-or-treating with our "Resident Family" the Denhams, the Moss', and the McDonalds. All of the kiddos had a wonderful time and were SO cute!! We were quite the sight to see walking down the street with nine adults, seven kids, a wagon, and two strollers...

Getting ready for the main event

Daddy and his boy

Our sweet neighbors Fred and Brenda

C'mon Miss Brenda - I have GOT to show you something!

Barrett decided he was finished and wanted to just camp out on this man's porch 



That's all folks!

Barrett's First Birthday!

On Saturday, November 12, we celebrated Barrett's First Birthday with a Barnyard Bash!!

We had so much fun and Barrett was so blessed by the love shown to us by both our families and friends on his special day. Our Barnyard theme was inspired by his favorite book, Barnyard Dance! We served pulled pork sandwiches, chips, a vegetable "garden", a goldfish "pond", marshmallow pops, a pig cake, and cupcakes that looked like pigs, cows, and chickens!

The yummy treats!

Miss Lynne with Ellie and Barrett

The birthday banner - (Note to self : cut the ribbons!)

Our animal cupcakes



Miss Taryn with Ellie and Jon Michael

The wonderful gifts!

Maddie and Maddie

Noa and Adi

Barrett in his birthday shirt - courtesy of the wonderfully talented Allyson!

Maddie, Barrett and Ellie plotting their takeaway of more marshmallows!

My birthday boy

Family shot

Birthday Boy!

Happy Birthday to You!

Smooch!



What is this sticky stuff??

Okay, I am DONE!

Loving on Snoopy

Our sweet friends

Zachary, what do you say we get out of here??

Maddie as a hula girl

Happy Birthday Barrett! Thank you to everyone who helped to make Barrett's First Birthday such a wonderful event! I don't know what we would do without our wonderful "family of friends" to help celebrate life's special blessings. We love you all and Barrett loves you too!