Exciting News!

School Thanksgiving Lunch

Friday was the Thanksgiving lunch at school. This is the first year that Ellington was old enough to go, so we were super excited about it. :) It was also really nice that it was on Friday and since I don't work on Fridays I didn't have to balance being a teacher and a Mama. I got to go as a parent and not worry about anything else! Ellington was excited (although a little confused) about us coming to eat with her. Although, once we got there and started eating she just kept saying "But I want to eat with my friends". Haha. Gee thanks Ellington. :) Here are a few pictures I took with my phone.

We don't have school at all this week which is really nice!  We are attempting to lay a little low today and will be leaving for Brownsville on Wednesday.  We are all looking forward to a GREAT Thanksgiving!

A Few Thoughts

-So, I recently posted about how I wanted to blog more and well...it hasn't happened. :)  I had good intentions and then I put my camera card into the computer and it wanted to load ALL of the pictures rather than just the new ones and ya'll....I just lost the will to go on. Ha.  Hopefully one day soon I will get over it and deal with the situation, but today is not that day.

-We decorated for Christmas this week.  Yes, we are those people who decorate BEFORE Thanksgiving.  Gasp!  We are one Christmas loving family so the earlier we can decorate, the better. :)  We like enjoying it as long as possible.  And yes, we still love Thanksgiving.  I promise.  We do.  If we hosted Thanksgiving I wouldn't have things already decorated, but since we don't and will be out of town we just go ahead and get our "merry" on. :)

-I promised myself that I would do all of my Christmas shopping in November so I could relax and enjoy December more.  While I have bought some things (probably more than in the past), I am nowhere close to being done.  Buuut, since Thanksgiving is a little early I still have a whole week of November after Thanksgiving so maybe I can get some more done before December!

-I want to publicly say that I have the best.husband.ever.  He has done so much for me/us lately.  I have NO idea what I would do without him!!!

That is all.

Trick or Treat {2012}

It's so crazy to me that this is Ellington's 4th Halloween!  We had a BLAST with our little giraffe.  As a parent, holidays are so much more fun that I ever imagined.  She was so excited about everything!  We weren't exactly sure what our Halloween plans were until the night before.  We finally decided that we would go to FBC's fall festival and then trick or treat in our neighborhood.  This was our 3rd year to attend their fall festival and Ellington was old enough this year to get to play a lot of the games.  She LOVED it!

It was so fun this year being in our new neighborhood!  Where we lived before, no one trick or treated.  This was Ellington's first time to trick or treat at people's houses.  She was jazzed up to say the least!

The first thing we did was walk next door to the Good's house.  Austin and Ellington got to trick or treat together!

These girls were super excited to see each other!

Then they ran off to get some candy at our house!

And from there we all trick or treated around the neighborhood.  The girls had an absolute blast!!!  I think my favorite part was listening to their little conversations as we went house to house.  After every.single.house. Ellington would say, "I want to go to another house now!".  Ha.  She loved it sooooo much!

We left a bucket of candy at our front door and every bit of it was gone when we got back.  We didn't really have that many people stop by...some just helped themselves to quite a stash.  Oh well.  We didn't need that candy anyway. :)

Ellington ended up with a BUCKET FULL.  Oh my.  We have candy upon candy upon candy.  Having to ration it out for her is a full time job. :)

What a fun night!

Painting Pumpkins and Football Practice

One beautiful afternoon last week we headed outside to paint pumpkins.  Ellington was soooo excited!  She loves anything artsy!  

I got in on the painting action too.  Before I started I said, "Ugh.  I have no idea what to do.  I am not creative".  To which Robert replied, "You teach preschool.  I thought all preschool teachers were creative".  No sir, all preschool teachers are definitely not necessarily creative.  I can just fake it really well. :)

Ellington was SO proud of her pumpkin!  

Our finished products

After we were done with the pumpkins Robert and I wanted to stay outside because the weather was absolutely beautiful, but Ellington wanted to go back in.  She doesn't really like playing outside.  I think she gets bored or something.  I don't know...but I wish we could work on that a little bit!  Anyway, Robert decided to go get his footballs.  They had the BEST time throwing, running, kicking, etc.  Ellington absolutely adores every second she has with her Daddy.  I love watching them together!

We are LOVING fall!

Blogging About Blogging

As ya'll know over the summer our computer died, then we moved and well, I got really behind on blogging which lead me to blogging about the "big" things so that I could get caught up as quickly as possible.  This has kind of turned into me blogging only about the big things.  I have been missing blogging about all sort of different things - the small things, opinions, stuff we like, etc.  I am majorly out of a blogging routine but I am going to attempt to get back into it.  It's something that I enjoy but like many things, once you stop it is hard to start doing again.  I LOVE recording all sorts of things about our lives.  I think it will be soooo special to always have so many memories recorded.  

I need ya'lls help, ok?  I definitely do not blog for comments.  If that were the case I would have quit about three years ago. :)  But if you are reading this please comment and tell me that you are!  It's fun to know that there is actually SOMEONE out there!!  Also, if there is anything you want me to write about leave that in the comments as well.  Here's to more blogging!!!

{Ellington and I were enjoying a moment together by the open window.  

I love sweet moments with my girl.}

Homecoming Parade

Friday afternoon we went to campus for the Homecoming parade!  Ellington was soooo excited!  The weather was perfect.  We were all happy to have a fun afternoon activity!

Sweet sweet Bulldog girl :)

After seeing us taking pictures of each other with Ellington, a sweet girl a little ways down asked if we wanted her to take our picture all together.  I love it when that happens. :)

Here comes the parade!

Bully was pointing at Ellington in the picture below.  She was slightly star struck!

And the cheerleaders!  Ellington loves her some cheerleaders. :)  Because there were soooo few people at the parade, most of the girls looked right at Ellington and waved and smiled at her.  She was equal parts SO excited and overwhelmed/embarrassed.  

After the parade we went to the pep rally in the Junction.  Then we enjoyed supper out together.  What a fun evening!!!

We laid pretty low for the rest of Homecoming weekend.  We had some sweet friends come "watch" the game with us but I was having so much fun that I forgot to take a single picture!!  And I say "watch" because with a 1 year old and a 3 year old we mostly talked, played, and laughed.  Thankfully it was an easy win so it didn't require a lot of concentration. :)

Big Girl Bed

Monday after nap Robert took down Ellington's crib and set up her big girl bed.  Because Ellington slept great in her crib and never climbed out I decided to wait until she turned 3 to make the transition.  We have some more things that we need to do to the room (like hang the curtain...please ignore the trash bags!!!) and take the polka dot stickers off the wall (left from previous owners), but we are making progress on her room!  

We had to set her bed up against the wall the first night.  I bought double bed rails from someone but they didn't work out at all.  We went to Wal-Mart to buy some more, but they only had one.  So we got it and pushed the bed against the wall rather than put it in the middle of the room like I had planned.

Climbing up for the first time! :)

If you can't tell, she was a little tiny bit excited! :)

My "baby" is growing up soooooo fast.

I took this picture right before I left her room for the night.  She was really excited until she realized I was really going to leave her in there.  She said, "But Mama, it's too big".  

Ellington did great the first night in her bed!  She didn't fall asleep that afternoon at nap so she was super exhausted.  I think that worked in our favor! We have had a slightly major problem with the big girl bed.  She didn't nap at all this week.  :(  Boo.  She would just play and play and play in her bed.  Today she finally went to sleep at  nap for the first time all week so I am keeping hope that naps aren't totally over for her!  Not only do I need the break, but she needs the rest!  She has been sooooooo exhausted at bed time this week.  It's also kind of messed up her overall rhythm because she has been waking up super early too.  When my alarm went off at 6:00 Wednesday morning she was already awake...and I have no idea for how long!  Hopefully as she gets more use to it, she will start napping again.

We were able to get another rail and moved her bed to the middle of the room.  This is a picture with the rails folded down.  

I can't believe that we don't have a crib in the house anymore! (sniff sniff)

Pumpkinpalooza

Last night was Pumpkinpalooza in downtown Starkville.  It's definitely one of our favorite traditions!  Ellington decided that she wanted to dress up like a giraffe this year.  She has been telling me for months that that's what she wanted to be.  I think she's the CUTEST giraffe that I've ever seen!!!

Ellington was SO excited!  I don't think she had any clue what we were doing, but she was excited nonetheless! 

We started off the night with supper at Old Venice with our friends Todd, Stacie, and "baby" Wade (we all still call him that even though he isn't a baby anymore!).  It was extra fun because we ate there last year with them before Pumpkinpalooza!  I am corny and like doing traditions like that. :)

After supper we hurried outside and took some pictures before it got crazy crowded!

ADORABLE!

This was the best we could do with E and Wade. :)  In the picture I took of them last year he was just a tiny baby!

Next we met up with the Ketchums at the pep rally!

Little friends :)

After the pep rally they had a basketball demo (I have no idea what they actually called it.  They had a half court set up in the middle of the street and did basketball stuff.  Ha).  Anyway, the kids were kind of done just sitting there so we went and trick-or-treated at the downtown stores.  This was the first time Ellington had ever trick-or-treated.  So had no clue what was going on at first but once she figured out the gig she thought it was the best thing ever! :)

We had a great time but didn't stay just a really long time.  It started getting really crowded and ya'll....there aren't many things that frustrate me more than wild greedy children.  There were so many kids (who were too old to be trick-or-treating anyway) pushing, shoving, and being rude just to get candy.  Not fun.  So we had our fun early on and then went to Bops for icecream!  :)

When we got home Ellington went through her candy. :)  She didn't have much because we didn't stop at many place but she thought it was sooooo wonderful!

What a fun night!