Billy D's 4th Birthday Party

Notice the shirt? It was the party favor from his 2nd birthday. It's a little big even still two years later. When will this kid grow up...(secretly I kinda hope never).

So my sweet little Billy turned 4 years old. He thinks it's about time, he's been waiting patiently since Emily's birthday back in September. We were pretty busy (as seems to always be the case when it's time for his birthday) with Thanksgiving at the beach and all the Christmas activities already getting started so he had dual parties with each side of the family this year. The first was at mom and dad's a day before the "actual" day. The Pezzelle's, Walker's and Jason and Laurie came down to celebrate and mom made a tasty pork roast with potatoes and salad. For desert Megan brought a gorgeous pumpkin spice roulette and I brought the completely delicious and addicting mud pie from Deatsch family tradition. I think everyone was sick of hearing me drone on about how great it is.....now they know!
Grandma got two new kitties for Halloween. Jack and Annie. Abi's head nearly exploded when she figured out they were real live animals. Fortunately, they loved her and were not at all phased by her toting them around by their necks. They even curled up in her lap for a rest. Sweet.

Remember that thing about the obsession with helmets? Grandma got him a Transformers voice changing helmet! He loves it, but it's the exact proportions of a bobble head when he puts it on.

Party day two: at home with the Deatsch Family on the "actual" day. Grandma and Grandpa, the Craft's and Chauncey and Maddie all made it for tacos and Spiderman cake. Birthday boy's choice!

After tacos and presents (all kinds of exciting stuff!) My personal favorites are his Carhardt jacket and Wrangler cowboy shirt. The kids took off to play out back with all the new goods and a serious game of guns, or war, or cowboys and soldiers, or whatever it is they imagine up. Squish was having so much fun her hair was standing on end!

After a great day nothing is better than hanging out with daddy.

Daisy's Induction Ceremony - Troop 1060

Emily joined the Daisy's along with 11 other little kindergarten and first grade girls. This was their induction ceremony where they got "pinned." Pretty cute. They have some neat activities planned for the year and best of all....She gets to sell Girl Scout Cookies!!! No worries, I will buy enough to keep the troop financially backed for at least a year. So everyone can rest easy, I won't be pushing cookies on you all.

In order to get pinned the girls had to recite the Girl Scout Promise:

On my honor, I will try:

To serve God and my country,

To help people at all times,

And to live by the Girl Scout Law.

They also made a gingerbread house at this meeting and next month (so exciting) is the He and Me Country Barn Dance. A date with daddy!

Thanksgiving and things to be Thankful for...2009

This Thanksgiving we packed up the fam and drove to the Beatsch House to spend a few fun filled days with Bill, Bette, AC, Erin, Hayden, Chloe, Ellie, Tara and Keith.  Whew!  It might sound crazy, but we have a pretty good system worked out.  Each family gets a bedroom to squeeze into and who cares anyway, no one spends any time holed up in their room, much less the house hardly.  There is always an exception though.... 

We had a great time.  Grandma Bette (and Grandpa too) bought us all passes to Legoland and the kids are more than willing to spend a day or two or three there.  They had a blast with their cousins this time.  The rides were great, the lines were short and best of all everyone was happy.  The kids also spent a few afternoons at the beach with Grandma.  Rain or shine Grandma goes to the beach.  The kids love that.  Thanksgiving itself was pretty low-key.  There were too many of us to sit inside and the patio table was like sittting on the face of the sun so we ate in the garage.  People pointed and laughed as they drove past.  Can't say I blame them! 

I almost never have my camera handy when Erin is around...She takes better pictures.  This time though I couldn't retrieve them and they were just too cute to leave out so grab your bi-focals and turn on the lights...

An Artist

My sweet, precious, percocious Abigail Browning (2 years 4 months).  I hope this is not a foretelling of her future...  She draws allover herself every chance she gets.  She is always very proud of her drawings and cannot figure out why I will not let her use the markers anymore.

High School Football Phenom

There is just something about high school football games...

Chauncey recently had a home game and the whole family made it down to watch.  Billy LOVES to watch his games, Emi is a good sport about staying entertained and Abigail...Well let's just say Abi doesn't get to go to many games yet. 

There he is SCA's greatest player ever, #11!  It's really hard to get a picture of the guy because; one- he NEVER takes off his helmet (Billy has become obsessed with helmets of any sort as a result) and two- he rarely ever turns around to acknowledge he has a boisterous group of groupies behind him.  It would be sooo uncool and Chauncey is very cool. 

Christmas Card 2009 ~ Take 2

After 10 minutes of "PULEEAASSEE stand still, get closer, pretend like you like each other..etc."  I settled on one of the photos below.  Amazing what a little photo editing software can do!  So I guess you'll have to wait for the mail to see the winner!  Merry Christmas.

      

     

2009 Christmas Card ~ Take 1

Russell Maynard.  I was trying to get a picture of the kids for this years Christmas card.  As you can see Russ proved to be an easier subject...

Jeeps came over to see what was going on and she is certainly not fast enough to out run me, so I got a couple of her too.  None of the kids though, imagine that....