Thanksgiving

We had a great Thanksgiving this year. I hosted it here for Nathan's family. We've decided that since we are close to both our families now we'll alternate Thanksgiving...one year with his family, one year with mine. Now Christmas is a long celebration so we can do it all! Anyway, Nathan's parents and his brother came down from Texarkana, and his sister and brother in law came from Conway. We had such a great time! I love getting together with his family. Everyone is so fun! It was nice having it here too. We had some yummy food...turkey, ham, dressing (my mom's awesome recipe! Betty I can't believe you had stove top! HA!), broccoli, cauliflower, and carrot casserole, mashed potatoes and gravy, plain broccoli mainly for Jonathan, homemade rolls, pumpkin pie, cheesecake, tons of cookies and other sweets. I am so sad that all of our leftovers are gone! Here are a few pictures from our celebration. We have much to be thankful for!

Just some random cuteness!

Now Michelle did our Christmas family photos and we got some GREAT Christmas cards from her, but I needed just a few more so I took these photos for those.

Stockwell Place Kindergarten Thanksgiving Feast

Every year, the Kindergarten classes at SWP have a Thanksgiving Feast along with a little play. Seth dressed up as an Indian. Jonathan's teacher, Mrs. Cockrell has a son who was in K last year so she let us borrow his costume. Seth's such a cute little Indian!

Some of the kids were Indians, some were Pilgrims.

Seth had a part where he dropped some of the 'harvest' in the soup pot.

Mrs. Penton's table all decorated.

The feast! Each parent signed up to bring something. Mrs. Penton made a big turkey and dressing.


Seth has SUCH issues with food. Here he was SO upset because Nathan told him (dad was playing, but it was mean!) he had to eat everything on his plate. Seth has a hard time eating at places besides home, even at restaurants sometimes. He's picky, but it's not even about being picky. Sometimes it will be a food he loves, but he won't touch it if he doesn't know who made it and if he's in a setting like this. Forget him ever eating the school cafeteria food. I guess he gets this from me. I remember growing up and moms bringing food into our class for parties, etc. I wouldn't touch anything unless my mom made it or one of my good friend's parents! I won't touch hospital food either! And I'll make a confession, like when I was teaching, if a kid brought a homemade food to me, in the garbage it went! Of course not in their sight.

Seth would not recover. His day was ruined...so he said.

We have a reader!!

I have tried for sometime to get Seth interested in reading, but haven't had that much luck. I mean he loves his bedtime story and all, but as far as just taking time out from the day and sitting down to read for a while, he really didn't want to bother. From day one, Jonathan has had such a passion for reading...his first word was even, "book". Seth's more the busy, atheletic type. :) Anyway, recently, as we were getting ready for bed trying to find a book to read together, Seth ran into his room, grabbed the Dick and Jane book from the shelf and said, "You know "I" can read don't you?" Nathan opened the book and Seth read the beginning pages like a pro! Honestly we were shocked! Now I know Dick and Jane is a beginning reader book (it's great for repetition), but Seth was sailing right through it! I asked Mrs. Penton the next day and she said, "Oh yes! Seth's my reader in class. He reads for me all the time!" And here I thought "I" was the one who had to teach him to read. ;) Oh and he hasn't let up at all. He's even asking to go to the Library and Books a Million!

Flashback Friday

Two years ago, Nathan and I went to Washington DC for his annual recruiting conference. DC is one of my favorite cities. I love the history and the beautiful landmarks of our nation's capital. My favorite is the Vietnam Veteran's Memorial. This picture shows Nathan doing a rubbing of Cpl. (USMC) Billy Devasier's name. Mr. Devasier was from my hometown and is the uncle of one of my childhood friends. One amazing thing I noticed about "The Wall", each time I've visited, is that no matter how busy and loud it is in the city, once you approach "The Wall", it's an eery quiet. The whole experience there is extremely emotional.



Soon after Nathan did this rubbing, we were approached by a New York Times reporter. The reporter specifically asked me several questions about why I was there and how I felt about John Kerry (he had just made a very negative, nasty remark regarding our servicemen and women). Needless to say, I gave him an ear full, but for some reason, my reponses never made it to that reporter's article. ;)

Halloween

We had a fun time on Halloween! I love living in this neighborhood...it was so fun getting to trick or treat with my friends and their families...Candy, Camille, Chrissy, and Jill. We had thought about planning a big party on our street, but everyone was so tired from the busy week. It was nice being able to relax and just walk the neighborhood while the boys got lots of candy. Next year we'll see about a big party.

Jonathan insisted on dressing up as a ghost (and my mom insisted on buying him this costume!). I'm not a fan of scary stuff so I kept saying, "Jonathan you're a HOLY ghost! :)

Seth and his little buddy AJ. We are so thankful that his family bought the house across the street!

Seth has been Batman two years in a row!

Jonathan loved it that we met up with his friend, Geoffrey.

The boys were worn out after we got home Friday night. They didn't even empty their pumpkins until the next morning and even then, I had to ask them to.

Honor Roll Assembly

Congratulations my smart boy on making the Honor Roll!

Our Trip to Florida

I'm going to admit this...I left my camera here while we were in Florida ON PURPOSE! Yes, I didn't want to be tied down to the camera on our trip, plus we didn't do that much that was picture worthy. Well, we did get all dressed up for the award's banquet, but oh well. One of the other wives is sending me some pictures of that. We had great time! We left on Friday, the 17th...which is was our 16th anniversary! We stopped overnight in Pensacola and then drove to Orlando the next day. I love Florida! I wouldn't be too upset if we 'had' to move to Eglin, Patrick, or McDill...I guess! ;)

While we were there, Nathan attended conferences most of the time, but I got to hang out with friends, old and new. I met a wife from Hill AFB, Utah named Rochelle. We hit it off and did alot of the Spouse activities together. I got to go to a chocolate factory and make my own concoctions! I went to the new Colonel's wife/old Colonel's wife tea and got to polish up on all my military wife etiquette (ha!). I did lots of shopping in Orlando! I got to go to some of my favorite stores that we don't have here in Louisiana, like The Body Shop, Pottery Barn, Williams-Sonoma, Macy's, Crate and Barrel, and Ann Taylor just to name a few. The Cheesecake Factory is my all time favorite place to eat so Nathan and I went there to celebrate our anniversary (late). I also got to eat at my beloved Panera Bread...several times! We went to Downtown Disney, but I have to admit, I was so glad we never darkened the gates of any other part of that place!

Each night, we'd go down and meet by the pool with several of our old friends. We got to hang out alot with Mark and Holly and Carlos and Joed, our friends that we made while stationed in MA.

The boys did great with their Ne-Ne here. She took such great care of them for us and I'm so grateful to her for allowing Nathan and me this wonderful opportunity to get away.

Pumpkin Light Night

Nathan and I drove back from Orlando, Florida to our house (15 hours!) on Saturday and then Sunday we turned around and hosted a Pumpkin Night Light decorating party for Jonathan's 2nd grade class. I worked so hard on his class display as well as Seth's class display. I had such a great time though! I never fully understood how huge Pumpkin Light Night was at Stockwell. That is until I experienced it myself or the first time this year!

Seth's class display, "Penton's Pasta". I feel like (as well as lots of others I've talked to) we should've won for Kindergarten, but we did win for most overall pumpkins. Oh and yes that is real spaghetti! 8 moms boiled over 100lbs of the stuff! Great job to Ali, one of the room moms for coming up with this super cute, creative idea!

Seth had such a blast playing on all the inflatables. Oops...sorry this is out of order!

Isn't this sign/menu the cutest?! My friend, Linda created it. Look closely...all the boy's names in the class are under Entrees and all the girl's names are under Deserts. Their price...priceless!

One of the dads carved this cute fork and knife...he also made a big spoon and the plate that held all that spaghetti and meatballs!

Jonathan decorating his pumpkin at our house on the day of the PNL decorating party. This clown rode in Seth's little toy fire engine.

Mrs. Cockrell's Greatest Show on Earth won it all for 2nd grade!

Jonathan trying to decide what he was going to jump on next in the inflatables area.

Jonathan's class singing

Jonathan's class display. It was so huge!

Kindergarten Farmer's Breakfast

Like one of my friends said last night, "Kindergarten at Stockwell Place is like a blur from October to January!" And she's right! It's non-stop right now. I love it though and am glad I can be apart of everything like I am.

My cute little farmer boy! Recognize the hat?! We were leaving for school that morning and I told Seth I wished he would've had a hat. He ran back to his room saying he did. He came back with his Woody costume hat. Perfect!

Seth with his friend, Michael from his class

Seth and his teacher, Mrs. Penton

Sidenote: I have to add this. One of the teachers at SWP that I talk to alot when I sub, well she came up to me and said, "Mrs. Penton told me that Seth was the sweetest little boy!" I was so happy...it made my day actually. I always wonder how he's doing at school and like I've mentioned before, we didn't have the easiest start to Kindergarten. Mrs. Penton gives me positive feedback when I ask and he's never had a bad behavior note sent home, but still it's good to hear this, especially that she told someone else.

I hate that there was a shadow on Seth's face, but I still love this picture. Seth's here with his classmate Elena and another one of his good friends, Jalen.

They go all out in decorating for Farmer's Breakfast. This was Mrs. Penton's table.

Nathan took time out of his busy morning to come join Seth.

A rare photo of me with Seth