Traditional Fall Outing...

If you have been around here for a while,

you know that we

LOVE

LOVE

LOVE

a place called

Hillridge Farms

located not far from us...

(well a little farther now,

but totally worth the drive).

My sister 

and her family

(hubby and daughter)

decided they wanted to join us this year.

So we turned it into a birthday celebration....

for ME!

I love it,

all the family was able to be there...

why not!

Daddy graciously agreed to it...

I say graciously,

because he had kindly taken our oldest

to a campout birthday party

the night before 

with some of his old 

public school friends...

an hour away!

Then he drove another hour north to meet us.

He did stop by my parents' to atleast

jump in the shower.

The other 3 and I hit church that 

Sunday morning,

then quickly headed to 

Hillridge Farms.

And what you have all been waiting for...

the pictures!!


Little Miss trying to catch a CHICKEN!!!
Yep!
The hubs (little miss' uncle)
was happily snapping away
waiting to see what she did.
My sister (little miss' mom -
second shadow seen in the pic)
was arms distance away
just incase the chicken
decided it did
not want to be pursued by a toddler
and attack!

(Luckily Lucy did not catch the chicken

and it didn't attack - 

no children or chickens were

harmed in the snapping of this photo!)

Love this beautiful picture of my girl!
Coming off the mega tunnel slide thing...

Everyone has a smile on their face

when coming down this thing!!

(Nana & Mr. T)

(Rico)

(My bestie, Ms. Teena, and her adopted kid of the day)

 (Me, yes I was the only adult that came down
kid-less!!)

Uncle Jack, NeeNee & Lucy Mae...

LOVE!

Either our first or second part
of Hillridge Farms,
its a toss up...
The corn!!!

Picking on the littlest one!!
Bless her heart!

Mr. T, plucking off his socks...

And hurling them out the door...

(sigh)

And here goes sock #2!! 

This was the best shot we got...

out of 6.  

I won't bore entertain you 

with the rest...

(yes, that is a flying piece of corn blurring Rico's face,

no, he is not strangling Lucy...much, she can still breathe...

just not move!)

Mr. T's no long requires a stroller...
He has dad!

Hay ride to get our pumpkins...

NeeNee is on there with us...

but unfortunately got cut out of the picture...

those are her legs on the

bottom right, 

beside Nana.

(Lex, Uncle Jack, Papa, Lucy)

Lucy got booted off of her own daddy's 

lap by her cousin!

Lex loves her some Uncle Jack!!

The rule in our house is:
you can get whatever pumpkin you want...
so long as YOU can carry it!!


Tony got his.

Lex got hers!

Nice try Lucy!!

Tony still searching...

and picking up...

(no pumpkins were sacrificed during our hunt)

Jackson stopped and posed for me real quick.

My nana...

what big...

pumpkins

you have.

Jackson finally found his!!

Then we HAD to get a good picture of all the kids with
the pumpkins...guess how many
shots I took and THIS
was the best one!!!

SEVENTEEN!!!

And this is the BEST I got!!!

Then naturally Nana

had to jump in there

with them.   

This is what it looks like when you 

try to take pictures of a bunch of little people!

After we took pictures, 

the daddies got to take 

all the pumpkins back to the cars,

while the women and children

went and watched the newest attraction at 

Hillridge Farms...

PIG RACES!!!! 

Squeal!!!

We LOVE the pig races!!

And duck races...

And goat races,

and pot belly pig races...

Too stinking cute!!

After the races,

we went and indulged in my 

favorite cake of all time.

The White Russian 

from 

Blue Moon Bakery

in Cary.

It is a white cake, drizzled with Kaluha

with a mocha buttercream filling and frosting,

then a chocolate ganache on top!

Oh.my.starts!!!

I indulge every year, 

and am 

STINGY!

Luckily we had lots of Mr. T's cake leftover

from a few weeks earlier..

because I did

NOT share!!!

I ate the entire cake 

BY.MYSELF!!

(what didn't get eaten the day of).

I had every intention of slicing it up,

and freezing slices,

so that I could have some later on...

it didn't make it through the week.

Oh well.

There's always next year,

right?

After cake,
we had to bid farewell
to the others...
but my crew decided to hang out
for a bit longer.
We hit the corn bin again...

The corn gets in interesting places

when you play in so much of it...

Instead of where's Waldo...

this is a version of

find the corn kernel.

And yes,

corn was coming from everywhere when we got home.

It was all over all the bathrooms,

came out in the wash...

EVERYWHERE!!!

FOR DAYS!!!

And we got daddy to go on the slide with us!!

It is IMPOSSIBLE not to have a smile on your

face when you hit the bottom of that slide!!!

Then I had this GREAT idea

that we should all go down

TOGETHER!

Luckily we ran into someone we knew...

I handed off my camera...

and this is what she got!

And, that my friends....
Is what I will leave you with.

This family knows 
how to have fun together!!!


Luv My Life!!

September In Review: Lost Teeth, Cooking & More Football!

Lost Teeth

Look at this face!

Seriously...

Look at that smile...

that beautiful

sweet

precious

TOOTHLESS 

smile!!

Shortly after we returned from our

marathon camping trip...

Jackson had a VERY loose tooth.

We kept expecting it to fall out,

we tried talking him into

NUMEROUS 

"fun" ways to get it out.

He politely declined

ALL

suggestions.

Eventually,

it just fell out.

The one beside it,

was also loose,

but just getting good and loose...

after insisting 

on waiting til 

the extremely loose

one fell out on its own...

his older brother,

assisted him in removing the other one.

They were wrestling in the playroom,

then Jackson came running in 

super excited about something...

then showed me the SECOND tooth 

that was no longer in his mouth...

but in his hand!

And after all the drama 

surrounding the first tooth falling out...

that one...

was a piece of cake.

Homemade CornDog Muffins

We were kinda stuck in a lunch rut.

I wanted to try some different things for lunch.

I made mini quiches...

I loved them,

my guys...eh,

they didn't love them.

That was ok with me,

because they were SOOOO

time consuming to make!!

So I tried something else,

my guys love corndogs,

I do too!

I don't love how they are 

LOADED 

with fat and calories!

LOADED!!

So I attempted to make my own,

well, something similar.

I cut 6 all beef, low fat

hot dogs into fourths.

Then put them in the center

of the muffin tin.

I mixed up one box of Jiffy Corn Bread mix,

per the instructions.

Then spooned it around the cut up hot dogs.

Baked them a little less than the instructions called for,

and wound up with this!

Cute, huh?

They like these!

Not as much as the "real" 

corndogs..

but they will do!

We finally started school in September!

This is where Jackson started out reading...

but the littles have

quickly taken over that corner,

and Jackson has been booted to 

the living room sofa.

That's ok though, 

less distractions in there...

when he is by himself.

More Football!!!

We were surprised to see some 

old friends

had a parking spot 

right across from us!!!

My bestie and her youngest

also joined us at this game.

Sweet daddy/daughter moment.

That's a lot of "fan"nies

hanging out down there!

This happened to be the 

Military Appreciation Game.

This is my absolute favorite game

EVERY.YEAR!!

For many reason...

MANY.

But the hubs is actually a vet.

So because of him,

I have a new found respect

and 

admiration

for all things military!

I asked my bestie

to take a picture of me and my baby boy...

He wasn't cooperating!!

My face says it all!!

And I eventually just gave up.

 This beauty always stops to smile for the camera!

And this picture...

(Sept 2013)

Is a recreation from 3 years ago...

(Nov 2010)

Me and my boys

cheering on the

WOLFPACK

Year after year...