Belated 40th Birthday Weekend

Since my birthday is at a very busy time of year, I decided to have a belated celebration. I invited some of my oldest and dearest friends (which include my sisters and my mom) to hang out for a weekend at a house in Lancaster County. It was a great way to celebrate! I think everyone of us talked non-stop the whole weekend, except when we were sleeping (I am sure an event which would have put most men in a fetal position in the corner). Lots of good conversation and plenty of good food, with a sprikling of snow to make everything look picturesque. So lucky to have such great friends and family.

Holly Jolly Christmas

 Here we are decorating the house--the kids always have fun (but I think Bryce might even have more fun).

 Christmas Eve doing the Christmas nativity reinactment with friends.

 To increase the excitement, Tessa lost her first tooth during the Christmas Eve party! (you will see below there are no pictures of Christmas day--apparently I only took video and forgot to take pictures)

 Amy Beth came to visit and we made a fun gingerbread house.

Thanksgiving/Early Dec

 For Thanksgiving we visited friends in Charlottesville. We had a great time and got to see some sites and do some hiking. Thanks for a great time!

 The boys at Monticello.

 Bryce and Hathaway on the hike.

 Tessa thinking that it was too cold.

 Oakley and his friend taking a quick break--most of the time they were way ahead of everyone.

 Making it to the top of the mountain.

 Even Tessa liked it at the top once  she had warmed up.

 The family in an old fashioned sleigh at the farm Christmas celebration.

Afterward we went to find the perfect tree for our house.

Baptisms and Birthdays

 This weekend we went to DC to celebrate Cade's baptism and Fall and 40th birthdays. Lots of celebrating for one day. We all had a lot of fun.

 Amy Beth and I did the cakes. I made them and she was the creative, artistic genious. Here she is working.

 This is the fall brithday cake (white cake, chocolate cream cheese mousse inside with ganache outside).

 We (the siblings) got Martha a green house for birthday, so Amy Beth came up with the decorations for this cake for her to go along with it (it is Martha garden). Amy Beth made all of the vegetable decorations herself (this was the dairy-free cake, chocolate with marshmallow frosting).

Martha and Amy Beth with the cakes.

 The kids helping sing and blow out candles even though the kids pictured did not have birthdays.

 The girls helping Amy Beth.

The boys playing downstairs.

Soccer

 Here are my few pathetic soccer pictures. We had a lot of cancelled games and the only day I remembered to bring the camera was this make-up night game. Oakley and Tessa both had a lot of fun though and improved. I figure there will be many more years of soccer and opportunities for better pictures.

Halloween

 Sorry, my pictures ended up backwards, so we will go through our Halloween backward. Above is the end of Halloween trick-or-treating with all the loot. We got way too much candy and will be contributing most of it to Bryce's candy bowl at church (that people have been commenting needs to be filled).

 There was a snow storm the Saturday before Halloween so our ward trunk-or-treat was officially cancelled but Bryce was there cleaning and told us that people were there anyway. The kids really wanted to go, so we did.

 Oakley was a vampire bunny, Bunnicula.

 Tessa was a leopard princess.

 Hathaway was Alice in Wonderland.

 Oakley had a Halloween party when he was in kindergarten so Tessa had one this year (and we let Oakley invite a friend too). Here they are looking cute.

 We carved pumpkins. Hathaway picked her out and it was very small. I thought she could just color on it but she insisted we cut it open and carve it--it turned out cute.

Fall

We are into fall and having lots of fun. Here are a few things we have been doing.

 Since Hathaway is home while the kids are in school, she gets to do fun things with me. Here we are at Longwood Gardens. We went when we had family in town.

 My mom sent me a box of clothes that I had when I was little. My grandma made me this dress. It is a little small but I had to have her wear it at least once.

 We have been doing some weekend trips. This weekend we did a girl/boy split. The girls and I went to the Poconos to stay at a cabin on a lake with some friends (who are exactky the girls ages), and the boys stayed home for soccer, working in the yard and lots of baseball and football on TV.