Turkeys & Birthday Cakes

This is an exciting week in our family.

There is usually always something unexpected that happens around the Thanksgiving holiday.

Babies have been born and heart attacks have been known to take place instead of Thanksgiving dinner.

We always pray that it will be an uneventful holiday and we're always thankful for the two family members that joined us around this time of year and the one that survived that massive heart attack to still be with us.

Along with our pecan pie and other desserts we always have birthday cake.

This year our little princess will turn 8 on Thursday.

I can't believe it's been that long when it seems like she should still be toddling around the house. "Happy Birthday Sweet Girl - we love you!!"

Two days later we celebrate the birth of our first child, our active athlete.

11 years old. That is unbelievable.

"Happy Birthday B - we love you!!"

So, from our family to yours Happy Thanksgiving!

"Enter into His gates with Thanksgiving and into His courts with praise; be thankful unto Him and bless His name. For the Lord is good."

Psalm 100:4, 5a

We will be traveling to NC to celebrate with our family and will be back next week ready to prepare for Christmas.

Enjoy this time with your families.

Gymnastics Meet

Last weekend the kids & I got to have an overnight trip out of town.

It wasn't as bad as I was thinking it might be.

We checked into our hotel, then headed out to dinner (my son has a new favorite restaurant - Cracker Barrel), and then we took in a movie (Madagascar 2) in our host town.

The next morning we had to get an early start - we had to be at the competition location at 7:45am. We found it with plenty of time to spare. The event was being held on the grounds of Winthrop University - a beautiful college campus. I wish I had more time to explore with my camera but no luck.

Here are some photos of the events of that day (for the long distance family & friends that would actually be interested).

For all of the rest of you - sorry.

Warming Up.
Waiting to start her floor routine.

Finishing the floor routine.

Competing on bars.

This was the highlight of the meet.

The girls hanging out before the awards ceremony.

Yay, girls, good job!

Now, time to go home & prepare for the next one.

I'm Confused

First of all I want to start out by thanking everyone for the well-wishes.

I am feeling a little better - still coughing but better.

It's nice to know that I have friends out there who care, so...."Thank You."

The next thing on my mind has absolutely nothing to do with Thanksgiving or Christmas preparations (well, I guess it might have some connection with Thanksgiving but I really don't think it'd be very comfortable if it did).

Are you wondering what I'm rambling about??

This:

I'm sure you've all heard about the new great "body shapers" that are sooo popular right now.

Well, I go online to see what all the hubbub's about & this is what I see.

Can someone please tell me what in the world these girls are doing in body shapers??

They already look pretty tiny to me & I'm pretty sure that putting one of those thingy's on is not going to make my waist, bottom or thighs look like that.

What has happened to truth in advertising? Was there ever such a thing?

Just looking at all of those pictures makes me want to invite them over for some Thanksgiving turkey & dressing and force them to eat it.

I think I'm finished with my rant for the time being - thanks for letting me vent.

Hope your Thanksgiving preparations are going well - let's share those menu plans.

Retail Therapy

Sorry there hasn't been much going on around here to blog about.

I've been a little under the weather this week and am trying to battle this nasty cold & cough.


I do have a little retail therapy planned for today.


I'm meeting up with a friend & we're hitting the outlets to find a little of this:

Hope everyone is having a good week & staying warm. It was about 28 degrees here this morning - Brrrrr.

So, light those fires and finish those projects and I'll stop by to say "Hi" soon.

TV Ad

This afternoon G and I were snuggling up together watching one of our favorite movies....Matilda.

It was commercial time & what do they decide to advertise during a kid friendly movie but.....

birth control.

Mirena to be exact.

Not sure if you've heard of this one, as it's fairly new (at least to me) but it's effective for five years or something along those lines.

Well, during the ad my ever so observant daughter starts to ask me questions - especially when they showed a picture of the thing. (It's a Y shaped plastic thingy.)

G: "What is that for?"

Me: "It's supposed to help mommies not have babies."

G: "Oh....how does it work?"

Me: "I'm not sure." (Not totally a lie.)

G: "Maybe you swallow it...... or put it on your teeth,....... or maybe in your ear,..... or even in your belly button (laughs & giggles)."

Me: "Maybe."

End of conversation - I deployed distraction techniques: "G, want some cookies?"

I guess one day I'm gonna have to have a talk with that girl and if you really have to put it in your ear - no wonder it works for five years!

Local Home Tour

In our area the local paper produces a magazine appropriately named TALK.

I've enjoyed getting to know more about the local activities & people.

More than that, they usually add in a home tour for our enjoyment.

(It's a good thing too because I'd never be able to peek into houses like this otherwise.)

Sit back & enjoy this beautiful home that was featured on the Symphony Tour of Homes '08.

(None of these pictures were taken by me. They were done by the magazine photographers.)

Since I'm still living in Fantasy Land.....I'll take this house located on the water (down by Charleston) please.

Thanksgiving in my mind

I've been told by my husband that I have a vivid imagination.

That doesn't always mean a creative imagination.

I've seen the work of you wonderful ladies in bloggyland and there is no way I could ever come up with the ideas that y'all so brilliantly translate into reality.

So....I have to resort to translating other ideas & making them work for our family.

I frequently get a lot of these ideas from wonderful sources:

Southern Living

Country Living

Coastal Living

(there's a theme here)

Better Homes & Gardens

You all know I have an addiction to my magazines.

Well, in keeping with a system that has never let me down, I have put together the perfect Thanksgiving Day.

Would you like to take a look?

The location:

My dream is to live on the water one day so in my mind that's where we'll be.

The Table:

(There are several choices. Which is your favorite?)

Some of the wonderful food:

And afterwards:

Along with a nap.

That's what is going on inside my mind, however what we get may be something altogether different.

Thanks for playing along.

(All photos borrowed from one of the websites listed above.)

Favorite Photos

I was cleaning up some of my online photo files & thought I'd just do a post dedicated completely to some of my new favorites (taken with the new camera, of course).

Hope you like them, too.

I hope everyone had a great weekend.

Just a little update....we had a busy Saturday with G's second gymnastics meet. She did well but could've done better (as always), she did win the handstand competition for her level.

Way to go G!

I do have one question:

Does anyone else's coffee table look like this:

because you're reading this?

I'm almost done....they're soooo good!

What do you do when you finish book 4?

A little of this & a little of that

We haven't been doing too much the last couple of days.

G's been out of school with strep throat. 103 fevers are always fun.

We did stroll outside a little while ago to take a look at the beautiful color still in the area.

Take a look around our yard.

Our young trees. I hope we can stay here long enough to see them get a lot larger.

The river birch in front has already lost it's leaves.

G & I threw together a couple of grapevine wreaths for the gates.I'll change them up seasonally. I didn't put too much effort into the fall look since Christmas will be going up in a few weeks.

That's about all we've been up to. Stop back by again soon.

Oh, almost forgot, I finished New Moon last night. I need a quick trip out to get the last two.