Another day, another concert

Tonight was Harper’s 7th grade band concert.   It was also the 8th grade band and the combined choir.   It was all enjoyable, but the gym at Carbondale is just not big enough for multiple grade events.   We were lucky to find seats, and lucky that we could see Harper from where we were sitting.  I always enjoy the band, and am very proud of our program.   Harper did a great job!  The flutes owned the concert!   

Sunday funday

This post is a little bit photo heavy, but we had so much stuff to take pictures of today!   Remember waaaayyyy back in May, when we went to Eureka Springs, and the excursion train was flooded out?  Well on that day, GG felt so bad that we couldn’t ride the train, she got right online and  ordered tickets to the Snowglobe train in Baldwin.  This is a fun train ride, on a vintage train about 30 miles into the country, where they let you off at Santa’s village.  There are live reindeer, a petting zoo, hot chocolate, open fires for cooking s’mores, a giant Christmas tree, a big sleigh, some vendors selling Christmas merchandise, and of course the big guy himself is there.  Oh and we must mention Christmas music on full blast!   

We were pretty excited, Some of us for the Christmas  parts, some for the train ride, some for the idea of scoring snacks.  

The train was decked out for Christmas.  They had karaoke Christmas caroling, where Evie did a fantastic job singing jingle bells!   The kids wrote letters to Santa along the way and delivered their letters when they arrived at the village.  I feel like this was a pretty cool experience overall, although a tiny bit on the crowded side.   

I’m pretty sure I’ve never seen live reindeer before.  They are adorable. I sort of wanted to bring them home with me!  

On the ride back, Saige and Clayton wanted to ride on the upper deck of the train.  Jim indulged them.  

Thanks for the really fun afternoon GG!  It’s one we won’t ever forget!  

Of course, we didn’t have time to cook Sunday dinner, so we had to go try out the New Mexican restaurant in town.  It was pretty good!  The most amazing thing happened - and I got photographic evidence - Preston ate a taco!  

I love a Sunday Funday!   I can’t believe Thanksgiving break is over though!   What a fast break that was!  

Happy Thanksgiving!

We had a nice, but fairly quiet Thanksgiving here at home.  Cameron was supposed to come in, but Lauren got sick, so they stayed in Baton Rouge.  Colin was on call, and stayed in Wichita with Spencer’s family.   Madison and her family went to Virginia to celebrate the holiday with Andrew’s dad.  Quincy was lured into working all day with the promise of holiday pay!   My mom and dad and  Jim’s mom joined us.  We had a lot of good eats, watched some good games, and enjoyed a quiet kind of day.  

Lauren and Cameron sent me a couple of cute pictures of their day.  I accused Cameron of making jumbalaya with hotdogs.  He swears it was sausage.   

I hope Lauren is feeling better!   We missed all the big kids!   Except for Mallory, who came out, helped me clean and cooked most of the meal!   

Thankful, happy and blessed that even though we weren’t all together, we are rich in family love.  

Happy birthday to Jim

Today is Jim’s birthday.  He is easy to please- a little lunch at the Feed Bunk, a nice evening with the girls at home, a little homemade Chinese food, followed by some German Chocolate brownies - happy birthday boy!  He even let us sing to him, and consented to a photo.  

As you can tell, I pressed my luck with too many photos!  He loves me.  ;)

Jim has had a rough few months at work.  Today was no different, as they are wrapping up the water project, and people are never happy.   But he still stays kind to people.  The people in town absolutely love him, and it’s simply because he listens to them when they talk.  He helps them with anything and everything, even going way, way outside of the duties of his job.   Jim is a fixer.  If he has it within his power to fix something, he will.   When there are things I need fixed, I sincerely appreciate this trait.  When he is fixing literally all of the problems of every person in town, I admit that sometimes I encourage him to tell people to stick it.  He never listens to me. It just isn’t in his nature.  He is sweet, kind, and helpful.  We are so lucky he is ours. He’s a good man.   I am also relieved that since he had all of his friends send bottles of Heinz 57 sauce to Jay when he turned 57, we didn’t receive any in retaliation.  57 sauce is the worst kind of sauce!   

Happy birthday Jim!   We love you!  

Weekend of parties

 This was a catching up kind of weekend.  Last week, we had to cancel Saige’s birthday party, so we had the make up this weekend.  Friday night, she had 3 friends over.  I failed to take pictures while they were all here, one chose not to spend the night.   These girls squealed, giggles, and put away as much food as any group of teenage boys I’ve ever seen.  I think it was a success.  At least Saige seemed happy.   

Friday was also Rock Your School day at Mallory’s school. I let  Quincy take a day out of school to help her. Quincy said it was fun, but she has no idea how Mallory hangs out with that age all day, it was exhausting. I got several cute videos and photos from the day.  

Today was Langsgiving.  We hosted it at our house.  There were a lot of people here, but not as many as usual. I was still happy to see the ones who could make it.   Always fun to see my family!  

This is a 2 day week for the kids.  I am almost as excited as the kids!  Let’s go break!