Decorating Christmas

For some reason, I only took one picture of us putting up Christmas decorations.  (Probably because I was so busy working.)

I thought this was soooo precious.  Faith fell asleep in the Christmas tree box.

The Nutcracker

Every year, we start off our Christmas with the Nutcracker.  Tony plays the trumpet for it & the kids love to see him in the pit.  

Our friends, Mrs. Laura, Whit & Addie joined us this year.

After the ballet, we met up with some of the ballerinas.

GA Aquarium & Johnny Rockets

We went to the Georgia Aquarium our last day in Atlanta.  We love ocean animals. 

Faith, Tony & Will (beside some strangers on the right) at the shark & sting ray petting pool.

 

 :Bonnethead shark:

Faith, Will & Collin petting sea urchins. 

:Puff fish:

:Collin & Faith in another petting pool:

 

:albino alligator:

 

:The kids at the huge aquarium.:

:Collin & the spotted sting ray.:

We were fascinated by this Beluga Whale.  They had 5, but only 2 were in this tank when we stopped by.  There were so many beautiful animals, but only a fraction of God's gorgeous ocean animal creation. As we were looking at some strange looking, beautiful, ugly, etc. animals, I was in awe by His creativity.  Sometimes I wondered why He made one look the way He did.  I am so excited to continue to get a glimpse at His handy work.

After our great time at the aquarium, we were walking back to our van & spotted Johnny Rockets.  It is a 50's style restaurant, so we decided to go in.

They gave us lots of nickels to play the juke box.  We all enjoyed the 50's music playing.

Me & the kids.

 

Faith's First American Girl Doll

The excitement was building...... Faith could hardly stand it.  As we pulled up to the mall, it was raining ~ hard, but that didn't damper her excitement.  Tony let the kids & I out while he parked the car.  We were right outside the American Girl Doll store.  Faith wanted this to be a "girl thing", so we had to wait for Tony to get inside.  This was the most excited that I have ever seen Faith.  The wait was torchure.  Finally, Daddy came inside the mall.  After the boys took off, we headed into the store.  Right inside the door, Faith did a very slow 380 look around the store.  (I wish I had this on video, she was in awe.)

Then she spotted the doll that she had been wanting for months..... Kit.  She took off.  Watch out, people, this girl is on a mission.

 She pulled Kit off the shelf & just held onto the box.  She stood there looking into the circle cut out for quite awhile.  Now let me remind you there was a Kit doll in a glass box right above her, but the one in the box was hers.

She began taking pictures of everything she saw.

Then she began playing with everything that was set up.

 I'm not one for toilet pictures, but I thought this was too funny.  AG thought of everything...even a place to put your doll when you have to take care of business.

:

Faith & Kit:

After a wonderful time at AG, we met the guys for supper in the food court.

:Above is my favorite American Girl:

Faith & I went back to the AG store the next day to have our brunch.

:Faith & Kit:

Faith & Kit

We just love this little Bistro.

World of Coke

Faith wanted to use her birthday money to buy her first American Girl Doll.  So we decided to plan a family trip to Atlanta.  Our first stop, World of Coke. 

I was so excited when I found out that you could get free tickets from Coke Awards.  So we asked everyone we knew to save us their bottle tops, cardboard boxes, etc. from Coke. We were so blessed by so many people giving them to us.  When Tony played at his high school alumni game, the kids & I grabbed all the tops of the bottles that people left in the stands.  (Can you imagine what the clean up crew must have thought the next day.... why is every single Coke product drink topless?)  So thanks to many wonderful friends, family & hard work after a football game, we got all 5 tickets free.  Yay!

:Coke bottles from all over the world:

I loved watching my children as we entered the World of Coke.  There is a huge bottle hanging from a very high ceiling.  There is the sound of someone pouring Coke, then drinking it & the famous Ahhh.  My kids were mesmerized by this.  Then we decided to hit the bathrooms, which were gorgeous.  We could have left right then & the kids would have had a great time. :)

:Faith:

:Me, Faith, Coke Polar Bear & Collin:

:Collin at the "Coke" counter:

Will trying to write "Coca Cola" like on the bottle.

Will watching how they bottle Coke.

Let the tasting begin.

There were different Coke stations set up around the tasting room. Different Coke drinks from all around the world.  This was a lot of fun, but after tasting so many, we all felt pretty yuck.

When we enter the World of Coke, they told us that "Beverly" was the most talked about drink Coke had.  They don't tell you why that is.  Can you guess by Collin's expression?  After seeing this & Tony's expression I didn't taste it.  Tony said that it tasted like motor oil. 

This ended up being our Christmas Card.

Will wrote why I love Coke to put on the Wall of Fame.

Collin resting on the 2005 American Idol couch.

I just thought this was a charming picture.

They let you take home a souvenir Coke as you were exiting, which lead right into the gift shop. 

Leading into the Olympic Park.

11-11-11 Happy 6th Birthday, Faith

Today, is my baby girl's 6th birthday. 

Faith's 1 yr old pic.

Time has flown by so fast.

Let me tell you a little about Faith.  She is the spice in our life.  She loves to be dainty, wear pretty dresses, curl or straighten her hair, paint fingernails, loves pink, have tea parties, go shopping & look at all the pretty girly stuff.  Faith also loves, loves frogs (did I say loves?), likes to fish, find worms, chase lizards, ride 4 wheelers, shoot guns, play in the mud and karate.

She loves to help cook, do crafts and keep her brothers in line.  She loves to sing about Jesus & have "God talks".  She loves school & memorizing scripture.  She gets so excited about the little things as well as the big.  She loves being silly.  Giving hugs & kisses are her speciality.

Thank you, Lord for blessing us with this precious young lady.  We have lots of fun things planned this weekend to celebrate her birthday.  She is so excited.

Pumpkin Carving

 I love fall.  The beautiful colors of leaves, crisp air, apple cider, pumpkins & the excitement on the 'lilbucks faces when they talk about what they want to carve on their pumpkins. 

First, the scooping out of the pumpkin.  Everyone complains (including me) about this because it's slimy, but we still enjoy it. 

 

This year, Collin decided to use gloves.

After we scooped out the pumpkin, we had a pumpkin chunkin' contest.

They threw the seeds & slime all over the yard.  If my husband stopped cutting the grass, we may have a pumpkin patch in our yard.

Last year, we started doing character pumpkins.  They would pick a picture of what they wanted to carve.  We would print it out, tape it on the pumpkin, use a hammer & nail and trace along the outline with punched holes, then carving the design out. 

Faith had fun hammering away with her hand and a small screwdriver.  Unfortunately, her fish didn't turn out right because of the shape.  So we did a "F" on the other side.

 

Angry Birds was Will's choice.

:Faith's Pumpkin:

:Will's Angry Bird:

:Collin's Clemson Pumpkin:

Faith & I decided to paint our toenails like candy corn.  I found this cool idea on Pinterest.  It takes 2 coats of each color & you can only paint 1 section at a time.  Very time consuming, but love the final product.