Lucas gets creative

 Lucas decided he was going to take a few pictures of some of his favorite friends at Christmastime.  These are some of his best and most prized snapshots.  As I am blogging about these little treasures he popped up over my shoulder and pronounced, "I love those photos I took!  Aren't they wonderful? The first one is during the middle of the day and the last one is me pretending it is night time."  I love that little guy!

Here is the night time picture.  I love how he made a tee pee with the pillows to make it appear darker for the photo!

Christmas Activities for a great 2017!

We moved the playroom table into the kitchen.  I am so happy that they all wanted to make cookies!  They still want to make cookies at Christmas and even though the kitchen is a mess I love every minute of it and happily clean it all up when they are through.  And yes, Hunter was wearing a button up shirt for the occasion.

You can see how the kitchen looks.  It may have stayed like this for days.  We made several batches of cookies and they were all delicious.  This year my favorites were the Gingerbread cookies and the gingerbread men.

The whole family made the trip the fancy theater at the Pinnacle to watch the newest Star Wars movie, The Force Awakens.  Gaga and Papa had never seen ANY Star Wars movies and they loved it!

We did this on a whim.  The weather over the holidays was terrible.  It was wet and rainy the whole time.  I had heard that the escape game in Bristol was a lot of fun so I booked us a ticket and off we went to escape.  Poor David had to work that evening so we took the earliest game time of the day.  Despite having his big brain abilities with us we were unable to successfully escape the game!  We were an epic FAIL. Who cares tho, this was so much fun and engaging and I would love for us all to go back and try again.

A Christmas tradition.  Each year the kids receive a letter from Santa letting them know if they made the nice or naughty list.  Every year Lucas is a little worried about his outcome.  He is a great kid with one of the biggest hearts I know.  He can be frustrating on so many levels but truly at the end of the day he is an awesome kid and should never worry about being on the naughty list.  And, guess what?  They were ALL on the NICE list.  We are some very, very lucky adults.

Another tradition is that we decorate the golf cart with Christmas lights and garland for the holidays.  We ride around at night and look at the lights in the neighborhood thought the holiday season.  This year the boys said they wanted to decorate the cart.  They worked for over an hour and then came and got me saying they were done and wanted me to come and look.  This is what I found!  They decorated the entire cart with their nerf guns and the front of the cart was loaded with the bullets!  I loved it!  We left them hanging for one trip around the neighborhood and I apologize for any stray bullets you may find in your yard!  I love having boys!

Another pic of our theater trip to Star Wars.

Cuties in the kitchen.

Chloe turns 12 on 12/12!!

This was Chloe's magic birthday.  She turned 12 on December 12th!  I think that is the coolest birthday date ever.  We helped her celebrate by ice skating and then dinner at a Japanese steakhouse in Winston Salem.  It was a super fun weekend.  And to think next year we will have a teenager in the family!

Out for Christmas Break! PJ days are the best

 Who doesn't love wearing their PJ's to school?  Hunter, Hunter hates this day!

The fourth grade had the pleasure of providing the school with a Christmas performance all about Snow Days!

Bristol Christmas Parade

 Here is the float the Sullins decorated for the parade.  Me and a bunch of other Sullins parents spent all day making this float.  It was a candy float named 'Sullins Sweeties.'  It was an impressive float and we won third place!  The boys all rode on the float while I walked and handed out candy.

The Christmas parade ain't for wimps.  These guys were toast by the end of the night.

Girls night out in Charlotte

 LeeAnne and I took off for one night to Charlotte, NC to shop and to simply get away for 24 hours.  It was so much fun.  We met up with Tres, my cousin, at one of the local restaurants and had a great night after a full day of shopping!

 It had been way too long dear friend!  We need to get together more often.  Many thanks for a great, super fun night!

And many thanks to my dear friend for taking me away for a day of fun shopping and an evening full of excitement.  It is fun to get away with good friends and I need to do it more often.

Randoms worth mentioning...2017

 Brothers working together as they play a few holes behind the house.

 My youngest cutie in the fall Program at Sullins.

 My eldest with a solo part in Phantom of the Opera.

 My Thanksgiving Cake I get every year at the bake sale.

Friends having fun watching Wonder after reading the book in class.

Speedway in Lights 5k! Add this one to your list!

This was another one of those races we hear is so fun but we have never actually raced.  This year we decided to go for it and we all headed to the Bristol Motor Speedway!  This race is held at night and you get to race around the speedway around all the lights for Christmas.  You finish on the racetrack! Our finishers all got medals!  We will add this race to our annual fun 5k runs.

It was a little rainy at the start but stopped before we finished.  Another great thing about this race is that Jenny got to run with us!!!  She did great!

Shut In 2017!!! FUN TRAIL RUN!!!

My new kicks for the Shut in race this year.  I love this race and  we haven't done it in a few years so when David signed us up I was surprised!  I was waitlisted but was fortunate enough to snag a spot with a few weeks to spare.  I had no expectations for this race.  I had had a big racing season already and needed to start my recovery and rest block but this is my favorite trail run so my coach gave me the OK!  It was a great run, warm and mostly sunny.  I enjoyed the romp in the woods and crossed the finish line in 3 hours, a PR for me on this course.

A nice award for the finish!

David crossing the finish line!  YES!!  He made it.  He has struggled with his running this year but I know he was really proud to finish this very difficult race.

Halloween 2017

Halloween is a big deal around this house.  We decorate and party for the whole month and then it is a race through the Christmas holidays.  We start with parties and festivities at school.

Then we celebrate with the GCC family with a hayride and fun dinner and haunted house.  This year Hunter was dracula, Lucas was a scary Jester and Chloe was Winnie the Pooh.

Then we hosted our annual neighborhood Halloween party.  The dinosaur was Derek and I wish I had a picture of him crossing the golf course in that outfit.

More parties at school with friends.

Lining up for the traditional Halloween costume contest.

Carving our pumpkins is always fun.  I think the boys like eating the seeds once I bake them more than they like carving the pumpkin.

Some of our beautiful fourth grade princesses.

This was the school wide winner.  I mean, who could really compete with the Golden Girls.  This totally cracked my up!  You should have seen these boys trying to walk in heels.  They are classmates of Hunter in the fourth grade.

Lucas's class up on the stage and the only opportunity he had at school to wear his creepy mask.

This was the cast of one EPIC Halloween haunted house.  I should do a whole blog dedicated to the hard work these kiddos put into pulling off the best Haunted House in the neighborhood.  The boys worked on transforming the playroom into a haunted house.  They had it scripted and every detail covered and they also offered various degrees of scary for the littles that wanted to go through.  It was  a lot of work, more than I think they realized.  They led groups of 4 through the house from 5-8.  It was crazy and I have to say they did an amazing job.  It was the hit for the night!!  I am curious to see if they will be up for hosting another one next year.

Our community service project was to donate items to make Kindness kits.  We made kits out of the various items folks donated when they came to the party.  The kits had water, gatorade, chapstick, a bath cloth, pair of socks, hand sanitizer and granola bars.  The idea was to keep them in your car and hand them out to people begging on the side of the road.  I little was to spread some hope and kindness, acknowledging a human need without simply handing over money.

A wonderful neighborhood filled with family and good friends!  A great time every year!

Back on the hayride!

Saving the best for last!  The hosts every year.  We tried to dress up as Velma and Shaggy..oh well, we had fun!  Until next year!

Hunter's pumpkin project

We have a rockstar forth grade teacher.  One of the assignments was to make a pumpkin out of a book you read this fall.  Hunter chose Paddington and I thought this turned out really well!  So cute!!