Friday, November 28, 2014

The Weekend Before Halloween

The weekend before Halloween was FULL of activities, festivals, etc around here! It was crazy! We narrowed it down to going to the downtown Olive Branch fall fest Saturday morning, our church fall fest Saturday evening, and Connor and Brody's church fall fest Sunday evening. We had a busy unicorn and ladybug!

First up was downtown Olive Branch.  Robert and I were really excited because we love small town festivals but......it was terrible.  I think my expectations were too high and maybe I have been spoiled by Starkville events.  In any case, we won't be going back next year.  Even Ellington (who is easily impressed), said it was NOT fun.  Ha!  Oh well.  It was also HOT so that didn't help matters!


I took the picture above when we first arrived and the picture below as we were leaving.  Clearly, I didn't think anything was picture worthy in between!


Saturday evening we went to the festival at our church.  Ellington of course had a blast with games and bouncy houses!




The girl at the face painting station asked Ellington what she wanted and of course Ellington said a unicorn.  I kind of laughed and told Ellington to maybe pick something else (because I thought it was too hard to paint!) but the girl said she could do it.  Sure enough...she did!


Poor Finley.  Old enough to want to participate but not old enough to actually participate.  Next year she'll have a lot more fun!




On Sunday evening we met Connor, Brody, and Aunt Julie at their church for their festival.  I didn't take my camera because I thought it would but just another festival but man...I regretted not taking it!  Theirs was AMAZING with so many fun activities, games, rides, pony rides, etc!  I hated I didn't have my camera but we all had a blast!!!  Pre-Halloween weekend wore these parents OUT but we had so much fun. :)

Wednesday, November 26, 2014

Saturday, November 22, 2014

Family Night

We had our first official "family night" in October. I don't know why I decided to name our night of fun but Ellington was ALL ABOUT IT. It definitely made us realize that we need to have official Family Nights more often!

We started off with French bread pizza which is something Ellington can pretty much do by herself.  She loved helping with supper!


At some point during the day when I told Ellington that we were going to have a special family night that night she decided that she wanted to make a card for Mommy and Daddy and let us pick something out of her treasure box.  Precious!  She was so proud and excited about giving us cards and surprises!  She's really the sweetest girl ever.  


Then it was time to carve the pumpkin!  Look at Ellington's face!  Ha!  She thought the inside was super yucky.



Robert told Ellington that she needed to help him think of a design for the face.  Ellington ran off to grab and piece of paper and then she drew exactly what she wanted.


She was just a little bossy as she supervised her Daddy. ;)


All done!




The last thing we did was eat snacks and watch Spookly the Square Pumpkin.


What a fun, simple night that Ellington thought was the BEST THING EVER. :)

Thursday, November 20, 2014

The Pumpkin Patch 2014

There are many hard things about moving but one of the hardest parts is not having your usual places and traditions.  One such thing is the pumpkin patch.  We looooved our pumpkin patch.  We found one here to go to and it was fun but I think we all missed our "old" pumpkin patch.  The new one definitely had more "attractions" but we have such a special place in our hearts and sweet memories of the other one. 
 
We got off to kind of a rocky start.  We were stuck in a line forever trying to get into the parking lot and then we were stuck waiting in line to pay to go in.  This probably set us off missing our old one more than anything.  We never were any kind of line at our sweet Country Pumpkins...and you didn't have to pay to get in! :)  Oh well...big city life now..ha!
 
We decided to take the hayride to the pumpkin patch first because we were in a bit of a time crunch since it took so long to even get in!  Ellington of course was super excited about everything! :)
 

Searching for the perfect one!
 


Found it!
 





Even though there were tons of neat things to do, all E wanted to do was swing!  It was kind of frustrating.  Ha!  We had to practically pull her away.  Someone needs to buy this girl a swing set!  She would swing for hours.
 



The singing chickens!  Yeah...I don't know?!
 








I tried HARD to get a good picture of the girls together but this is the best I could do. :)
 


Ellington loved running through this hay maze!
 



We weighed our pumpkin that we picked out for carving.
 



Sunday, November 16, 2014

End of the Season Soccer

The Connerley family was perhaps a little excited as the soccer season came to a close. :) It wasn't our "thing" but we were proud of Ellington for sticking with it and making the best of it!





Ellington had a big cheering section for her last game!  Uncle Brad, Aunt Julie, Connor, and Brody came to watch our soccer girl in action.
 


The season wrapped up with a little cermony at our church.  Ellington was soooo excited to get her medal!
 




Soccer was a great experience for all of us, but it's doubtful that Ellington will want to play again. She was a trooper but I think we might need to look into doing ballet again. ;)

Saturday, November 15, 2014

Zoo Boo!

Our first Halloween activity this year was Zoo Boo!  We had never been to it before (obviously since we haven't lived here very long!).  It was fun but it's definitely not a "must do" every year.  The girls were extra excited because it was their first time to wear their costumes.  Ellington was a unicorn and Finley was a ladybug.  Finley was soooo excited to wear her costume.  It cracked me up!  She kept patting it and saying "lady bug".  She also drug it around the house for days afterwards and one day she even took a nap holding it!  Funny girl. :)
 
Here they are...ready to roll!


There were kids everywhere in costumes so I obvisouly wasn't going to get a picture with them looking at the camera. :)
 


There were lots of different activities and trick-or-treat stations around the zoo.  Ellington and I had a blast in the straw maze together.
 



We also went on a hayride!
 



Happy girl!
 




Ellington loooved this little bat that she made.
 


E played a game and won this little ring.  She loved it so much you would have thought it was covered and diamonds! :)  Five year olds are pretty easy to impress. ;)
 



 
We had so much fun! After the zoo, even though it was late, we decided to be wild and crazy and go out to eat!  We went to a fun pizza place we had never been before called Pyros and had a BLAST!  I love special time with my sweet family!