And November's a Wrap

Basketball practice started - David and M are coaching again

We joined our neighbors for the Clemson vs. USC game!

The boys doing a little reading:)

My Lil' Turkey!

Making Christmas cards for military sodiers!

Our bible study girls - we made blessing bags to keep in our car for homeless
people as our final Christmas gathering:)

He has to get creative while waiting on his sister at dance!

Putting lights up on the tree!

Finally getting to decorate our tree!

Visiting Santa at the mall!

Got Our Christmas Tree

We tried a new tree farm this year, Sandy Hollar Tree Farm!  

It was more off the beaten path and the drive to get there was so much fun!  Straight up mountains and then straight back down!  We took a tractor ride up to the mountain where the trees are, the kids enjoyed free hot chocolate(they might have had more than one each..lol!), searched and searched until we finally found the "perfect" tree and then had a fun group of people on the tractor ride back down the mountain and sang carols with them along the way!

Thanksgiving in Raleigh

On Wednesday, we drove up to Raleigh for my favorite time of year - Thanksgiving with the Bells!!! 

We stayed at the same hotel again this year and so did lots of cousins who were there to greet us as we arrived and the kids were off exploring around the lobby and playing hide and seek allowing the adults time to visit the hotel's happy hour festivities and catch up! 

Thursday we went to Chaney's house for lunch!  And, every.single.family.member was there this year!  It was so wonderful to see everyone and enjoy the amazing food and time with our family!

Gathering for the blessing before we all dug in!

C and Bo - inseparable! 

All the girls joining forces against the crazy amount of boys in
the family!

 

Uncle Bobby insisted on fishy faces!;)

Tradition:)

Connor flying the drone - such entertainment!

The weather was gorgeous this year and lots of time was spent
playing outside!

Cousin craziness!

Truck ride for the boys!

The girls and Grandpa's turn!

Friday we continued our tradition of going to the fish camp - which all of the kids look forward to I think even more than Thanksgiving Day!  There was, again, food, fishing, boating, games, hammocks, s'mores!  It doesn't get much better than that!

The game from S's birthday resurfaced!

Miles and C - two crazy goofballs!

Cousin love:)

Kate and S - even through the age difference, they were tight again this year!

After all the fun, it was time to say goodbye!  We loved our time with our family and had dreams of next year dancing in our heads before we even got back to the interstate:)

Color Run

The kids' school hosts a color run every year and this is the second year we have participated!  Last year, our first year, we ran the one mile instead of the 5k, and S ran with a cramp after just half a lap and M ended up carrying little man most of the way!  This year, we again signed up for the one mile and the kids rocked it!  C ran the entire way without slowing down at all and S ran with some friends who would sprint/walk/sprint/walk but I think they could have run the whole thing if they'd wanted to!  Next  year, 5k!!!

Garth Brooks Concert

AMAZING!!!!  Last night we went to the first concert I think we've been to since probably early 2008 when we saw Brad Paisley!  Seeing Garth Brooks was absolutely amazing!  We both said, that if it weren't for the cost of the evening(dinner, concert and babysitter) we'd go again tonight in a heartbeat and enjoy it just as much!  We couldn't get enough!!!

By the time we ate dinner, waited on our incredibly slow friends
to finish their drinks and then find a parking spot, we were a
bit late getting to The Well for the concert!  However, we
were not the only ones and ended up having to wait in a line to
get into the arena!

Just a snippet of the fun!!