Merry Christmas from us!

Lilly

Tree



Isn't this one of the most beautiful Christmas trees?  Our good friends took us to a great place near Indy for brunch over the weekend before doing some Christmas shopping.  I'm hoping to get our tree decorated soon!!



G&B visit

We had a great visit with Uncle Bill and Aunt Gay.  Grayson looks a little sleepy after the long car ride right before bedtime.

Grayson and Aunt Gay

Grayson got lots of love this past weekend!

But his favorite is Mommy!  She knows just how to make him laugh!

Grayson's first Christmas will be very special!

Birthday

We celebrated Craig's birthday with a great meal! 

The cake wasn't even his idea, I just wanted chocolate!!

I just had to add one more picture of downtown...just beautiful!

Grayson at Thanksgiving

Potters alley

This was our third annual trip to Potter's Alley for Thanksgiving.  A few things made it a little more interesting this year! 



New to the shop:  Marie has two very friendly furry friends that will gladly swipe their tale through your art work.  They have also been known to drink the paintbrush water.



New additions to the group:  Grayson and Mike came this year!  Mike kept Grayson entertained while we painted.  Grayson also loaned out his cute little foot as a stamp!   I love the look he has on his face in this picture - "What is my grandma doing?"



Mom's ornament will look a little different after it has been fired, but I love how it turned out!



Craig decided to paint a Starbucks inspired mug this year.
Craig -  Coffee?  Starbucks?  No way! 
(This is the same guy who received about 4 Starbucks gift cards for his birthday - he loved it!)



Eric and Sarah deep in their creative process of creating beautiful pieces!

Beautiful downtown!

Friday was the official lighting of down town. It looks beautiful! The whole square is full of lighted trees and strings of lights draped from the courthouse out across the block! Hope everyone has started their Christmas shopping - it will be here before we know it!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving to everyone! We will be celebrating over the next three days with great family and friends! It is hard to figure out what I'm not thankful for. We are blessed!

Busy, but great weekend!

Friday night Craig and I headed over to campus for the IU Homecoming parade.

 

Campus is so pretty.





Homecoming Parade!

 

The band was in costume!

I think I counted 11 cyclers and 3 extras on this "trike."

 

All the floats were supposed to be lit up - this truck did a pretty great job.



Saturday the game kicked off at noon!  IU vs. Northwestern.



Ben came for the game and then downtown for lunch.

 

Sunday we went to the farm to spend time with Craig's family on the anniversary of his Grandpa's death.  Craig's cousin, Lilly kept us entertained after church before lunch.  She is a very talkative 3 1/2 year old!

 

We even got a rundown of all her latest and greatest boo-boos!

 

It is always so pretty at the farm.   Beautiful blue sky, colorful leaves, wind rustling through the dry corn.



We visited the cemetery and placed some flowers for Grandpa.  Also heard a lot of history of family members buried there.



We decided that this was quite the headstone! 

Things Grayson is good at...




Being cute!!

 




and pulling mommy's hair!!



Childhood Experience

Sarah reminded me of this essay that I wrote at some point...I think college.  Going through some boxes, it appeared!  Good memories!



Everyone needs a good laugh...

and everyone needs to be humbled every now and then...

1st Grade...missing my front tooth (Tooth #E actually!)  I'm pretty sure Sarah has a school picture with this shirt on too.

 

Funny...I remember having friends in 2nd grade, but you wouldn't guess it by the picture!  PERM!!!  Sarah and I loved this outfit - the sleeves rolled up to show the blue flowers and with shorts to match!

 

3rd grade - pretty sure that was my best attempt at doing my "wave" bangs.  That was one of my favorite shirts for the longest time.  My dad and I went shopping while Sarah went to a church youth group party one Saturday.  The jeans we bought to go with it were way too big, but they had the blue flower accents on them too!



4th grade - turtle neck and elderly sweater...what can I say?  The retainer was a nice touch of bling!

 

5th Grade at the new elementary school.  If I remember right I had a couple vests that I loved to wear.  Awesome.  I started ortho appliances/head-gear in 3rd grade and then wore braces till 7th.  It was one of the best investments ever made by my parents!


 

6th grade - Also a favorite shirt, I think bought on one of our trips to Arkansas to visit my Grandparents.

I guess this just shows that I have always been a big nerd!  Hope you got a good laugh!