Christmas with the Armstrongs

We started off our Christmas break with a trip to Jackson to spend time with Nonnie and Papaw and Erin and James who had made the long drive from Ocala, Florida.
We had so much fun together! It had been waaaayyy too long since we had last seen Erin and James.




We opened gifts and celebrated "Christmas" on Saturday. And I'm pretty sure we spent most of the day in our pjs which is always a fun way to spend vacation!
We then got to see Missy and her girls while we were in town. They came over on Sunday and we ate dinner and built gingerbread houses(a family tradition).

On Monday morning, I took the boys over to Molly's house for a playdate with some friends. Dan and James also went over to the Kirks to help Matthew build a swingset for the kids' Christmas. (cue Tim the tool-man Taylor manly grunt)
We went by St. Catherine's to see Amma that afternoon. She was thrilled to see all of us walk through the door!

Then, we celebrated my birthday dinner a couple of days early so that Erin and James could be part of the festivities.

Will and Andrew each got an email from Santa while we were at Nonnie's house and they were in shock. Just look at Will's face:

On my actual birthday, Nonnie and Papaw gave me and Dan a date night at the Viking cooking school. It was AWESOME!!

I have wanted to do a class for so long and it was everything I expected it to be! It was the perfect 30th birthday and a great way to wrap up a fun week with my family!

LEAP Graduate

Today, I got to attend a luncheon with Dan to celebrate his finishing the LEAP program at MSU. LEAP is a leadership organization where members are nominated by peers or supervisors to be a potential canidate for the program. There were 12 people from all over campus selected for this year's group and they met once a month for the past year to hear speakers as well as meet with mentors on campus to further promote their leadership roles.
I am so very proud of Dan and all he continues to accomplish in his career. Dan works so hard and yet maintains a great balance of being a wonderful dad and husband at home too. Thanks for all you do, Dan! We love you!

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas...

I am so sorry for the staleness of the blog lately. We have been one busy little family and I have been a major slacker in the picture taking department. But, I am going to try to play catch-up over the next few days.

First of all, we had a wonderful Thanksgiving celebrated in Jackson with Nonnie and Papaw. We had a lunch with all of my mom's side of the family at my aunt and uncle's new beautiful house in Madison. We had lots of laughs and a really nice time catching up with everyone.
Then, we headed to the complete opposite side of town to my sister's house in Star for the evening. My other sister from Virginia was visting with her children who we do not get to see that often, so it was a lot of fun seeing all of the them.
We headed back to Stark-vegas on Friday to go to the basketball game and then get ready for the Egg Bowl. The Egg Bowl was wet but so fun! Bulldogs keep the title of Egg Bowl champions once again...just as it should be.
Like I said, terrible picture taker right here, so there is no evidence of Thanksgiving week or all the fun events that took place.

We got our Christmas tree up and decorated last week. It just doesn't feel like Christmas until we have our tree up. The boys really loved decorating it. It was pretty cute though, because all of the ornaments were clustered in one small area just about the size of a toddler's arm's reach. Dan and I really contemplated leaving them just as they were, but eventually my OCD self had to even it out.




Santa made a visit to Starkville this week! Will could not beleieve that the "real Santa" came all this way. He was absolutely awe struck. Christmas really is more fun with kids and the wonder of their little minds.


And lastly, I don't want to ruin our Christmas card pictures for anyone, but here are some others that didn't make it onto the card but are equally as cute. Jude and Alisha took the pictures for us this year and I think they turned out great!

A Month of Halloween

Whew! What a month!? I have waited so long to blog about all of our Halloween events, that I hope I can keep them in the right order. Oh yeah! And you may notice that the kids are wearing different costumes. Well, we had several to choose from because of all of our dress-up clothes, so we had a little character identity disorder this year.

First, we went with some friends to Country Pumpkins pumpkin patch to pick out our pumpkin and play.
(All of these pictures are courtesy of my friends on Facebook because I did not bring my camera with me. Thanks for the back-up. You may also notice their superior picture taking ability and cameras! We need a new camera so bad.)






Then, there was Pumpkin-palooza in downtown Starkville.
Look at that awesome transformer and cute pirate.




We made caramel apples...with this yummy real caramel recipe!


Next, we went to a Halloween Egg Hunt at the Sportsplex.
Costumes change number 1!

This event lasted all of 30 seconds, but the kids were pretty pumped to find some orange and black eggs.


(I think that I am missing the Trick or Read event at Will's school, but I don't have any pictures from that one...Oh well, imagine two cute kids dressed up doing Halloween things. Okay good, you got the idea!)

Then, there was trick or treat on Sorority Row and the MSU Halloween Carnival.


Will really got into the games this year.


Andrew couldn't stop giggling at the girls running the games long enough to really participate. Lord, help me!



Another tradition...pumpkin carving!!

Will was an intense scraper(of course).


Our creepy, I mean well carved, batty cat!


Lastly, on actual Halloween night, we went to Trunk or Treat at St. Joe's. I am always so impressed with the effort that the college students put into decorating their cars and making this such fun.
This was my favorite...Mario and Luigi had a race-track drawn on the pavement and steering wheels with cardboard cars for racing. So creative!

Costume No. 3 for Will-man.

And look at our cute little friends, Joan and Charlotte, aka Dorothy and the pink monster.

Afterwards, we came home and everyone helped hand out candy. We ran out of our HUGE lot of candy at 8 on the dot and Halloween was officially over for the Wha-key house!
And it officially took me 2 hours to create this blog post! Wow, that's a whole lot of Halloween celebrating!

Go Cardinals!

While we were in Gulf Shores, Jabo bought this Cardinals hat at the outlet. Of course, you all know how much Will loves hats so he had to try it out. He wore that thing constantly for the last couple of days of our trip. Then, when it was time to go, he graciously took off the hat and handed it back to Jabo.
Jabo smiled at Will and said, "Why don't you just keep it?" Will was super excited!! Then, Will wanted Jabo to write him a message on the inside of the hat. (This was TOTALLY his idea!) We were all really surprised and even more surprised when Will dictated this message:

How sweet is that? And what a kid?
To say that Will loves the hat is an understatement. He only takes it off to go into school leaving it in his carseat to put back on afterwards, or to go to bed when he leaves it on his dresser and comes to our room wearing it first thing in the morning.
What a special gift and what an even greater memory!!

And who knows? Maybe it's bringing luck to the Cardinals in the postseason. All I know is that this "house divided" usually pulling for the Yankees or the Red Sox will be cheering on the Cardinals this year!

Whatley Beach Vacation

Sunday night:
We got to the house just in time for dinner with everyone. After dinner and bath, it was time to play dress up with the kids. Gigi bought these cute matching Halloween pjs for the babes.



Monday:
We all headed out to Foley to do a little shopping. Afterwards, the guys all went to play golf while the girls took the kids back to the house for naps.
Andrew and Kate singing "Happy Birthday" to baby Luke.

After nap time, we headed out to the beach.

The 3 amigos!




After the kids went to bed, the adults gathered around the table to play card games. (This is always one of my favorite parts of the vacation...what can I say? I love a little competition.)


Tuesday:
After a yummy breakfast courtesy of Clay and Michelle, we headed out to the beach for the morning.


We took a short break for naps for the kids, then out to the pool for the rest of the afternoon.





Wednesday:
We made it out to the beach early for family pictures.





I love this picture of Kelly and Kate.




Afterwards, the kids made owl smores with Gigi and Michelle.




Clay and Michelle headed home that afternoon, and we all headed back to the beach to build a sandcastle.

Who says white men can't jump? :)

Andrew and Kate buried a jellyfish.


Kelly and her crew made their exit that evening, while Gigi, Jabo, and the Wha-keys went to dinner at Bahama Bobs. Then back to the beach house for some cards and cigars on the porch.

Thursday:
We went out for a seashell hunt on the beach, before packing it up to head home.


"Stop waves!"


And what hunt would be complete without a dead insect?