Thankful in November

November always seems to be a month of few pictures. The weather has gotten cold and it is dark so much earlier. We don’t have the fun colors of fall anymore because all the leaves have blow off the trees.

We have been up to a lot of Girl Scout stuff this month. The Thursday before Veterans Day we had a sleepover at a local church. One of my scout’s dad is the pastor at the church and let us “lock in” for the night. We are working on a cooking badge, so they had to do all the cooking! They had fun playing games and watching a movie.

The cold weather has warranted trying some new soup recipes. I made a fantastic broccoli soup that the girls liked and Mike made a French onion soup from scratch! It was SO delicious. I can’t wait until he makes it again! I LOVE soup!

This weekend I went to an all day training for Girl Scouts. This time I was taking “Encamporee Director” training. That means now I can organize a weekend camp for our Service Unit. I’m planning a “She and Me Encamporee” in the Spring. At the event I attended they had a display old Girl Scout uniforms. Here’s the one like I would have worn as a Brownie. I remember the little coin pocket!

Then, yesterday we had a troop meeting with a guest speaker. She talked about the watershed and how we pollute and how we can take care of our waters. It was fun, hands on interactive.

Today I took my Junior/Cadette troop to the middle school cafeteria so they could volunteer to help prep for the community Thanksgiving dinner. However, they didn’t have enough work for us to do. They let the girls peel oranges and that is it! Oh well, they got the chance to help a little bit.

Tomorrow is Thanksgiving. We’ll be watching the parade and making a pecan pie. This year everyone is healthy, so we should be able to go be with the Wright family. Last year we had to do it at home alone.

I have plans to go shopping with a friend for all the sales. I’m just going for the company. Don’t plan to buy much…since I had the bad timing of wrecking a car near Christmas time! The van was totaled. Then, I found a great replacement van from a local guy on Craigslist, made him an offer, and bought it…only to find out in the next few days that it was leaking coolant! I should have taken it to a mechanic before buying, but I didn’t. I had to put $450 into it. It has all the bells and whistles like stow and go seating and automatic doors, but it is probably just stuff that will go bad. It is a pretty van at least and a 2005…seven whole years newer than the last one! I’ll have to take a picture.

Anyway, all that made me decide to get my paperwork done at the school district so I could be on the classified substitute list (teacher aide, food service, and secretarial) so I could maybe make a little money. On Tuesday I turned in everything and Tuesday night I already got a call to come into work! I didn’t take the job at first because I didn’t know if I could do it, but I called back and said, “Okay, I’ll give it a try.” I ended up working with two special needs boys in a regular classroom setting. It was fun. I enjoyed myself.

Now we enter the holiday season. Hopefully things won’t get too hectic around here. I’m hoping to keep things fairly simple….because there is no time for anything more!

I missed my Grandma and Grandpa’s 50th wedding anniversary! [I’m so sorry. I hope you guys had a special day and get to enjoy the whole special year! That is a huge milestone. We love you and are so amazed at your love and perseverance together!] Isn’t that amazing…50 years!

Happy Thanksgiving! Hope everyone has a safe and happy and thankful day!

Bye bye October!

We started out our delightful October with fun on the farms, and more importantly, with Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory caramel apples! We hit the “Festival of Family Farms” again. This time I got to come along because I didn’t go to my annual scrapbooking retreat.

The next weekend was our last opportunity to go camping. The girls had a three-day weekend. We went to Lone Fir on the east side of our mountain range to find some sun. It was chilly, but still sunny.

Gramma Debbie and Grampa George joined us on our trip. We relaxed and enjoyed a nice hike. Then we had a nice campfire.

Gramma made her special popcorn for us.

The next day we all went for a hike up to Blue Lake. It was a beautiful day for it!

Michael  and Kelby went fishing up there and caught a bunch of little ones.

We love camping in the fall. It keeps us all cozied up in the trailer playing games.

Debbie and George only stayed one night, but we stayed two. The next morning it was a little wet and we kept hoping it would get nicer. Instead, it just got wetter. We played games and relaxed.

For our second Girl Scout meeting of  the year we took off and went letterboxing…looking for treasure boxes in the woods. Fun! Everyone had a good time, but it was pouring on our heads!

Kelby has been busy with Cross Country every Monday through Thursday. I tried to go to practice one or two times a week and then we went to all the meets. She does great…coming in in the middle even though she starts out in the back. She has a steady pace and keeps running even after the other girls start slowing down and walking.

The next weekend in October I was gone the whole time at a Girl Scout camp training. I took a Quantity Cooking course. It was just a weekend spent cooking, but it was great fun….except when I cut my finger. I met some great new ladies.

Anika’s Girl Scout Troop had a Halloween party….and started off the costume season.

Then we went out to visit the pumkin farm we always do every year. Just love the pictures from there!

What a cute family I have!

The next weekend we got to go to a Girl Scout event sponsored by Dove about self esteem. They had a great time doing their crazy hair and Zumba!

Then we got to celebrate Gramma Debbie’s birthday by going out to dinner with the whole family! We had a great time with all the cousins.

The older Girl Scout troop had their Halloween party this last Tuesday. The girls planned it all and had a blast.

Then on Wednesday Kelby’s band had a special concert. They played some great spooky songs. She kept whacking people with her wings!

Then there was all the pumpkin carving. This year the girls did a lot of it themselves. They are getting so big.

Then, of course, there was the fun at school. Anika had a Halloween party.

We went to visit all the family to show off our costumes. The girls are getting so grown up now. I don’t think we’ll have too many more years of this sweetness.

The girls all went Trick-or-Treating for awhile and then I took Anika over to a nearby church for some “Trunk Or Treating”. This cowboy was the trunk we voted for...mostly because he gave Anika a whole handful of candy.

That is the fun part of the end of October.

The bummer part, in the last few days, was our water heater was acting up and I wrecked my car! I’m still waiting to hear what has become of my car. I have full coverage, but it is on the edge of being totaled. I’m so sad. (It was my fault too, so that is a major embarrassment. Luckily the water heater is still under warranty and we got a part shipped overnight to us. Mike got it replaced and now we have hot water again…mostly. The pilot light seems to go out every now and again still.

Cross Country is over now and I missed Kelby’s last meet because I wrecked on the way there. Very sad!She doesn’t seem to think she’ll try Cross Country again next year. I’d love to see her do it again, but I understand not wanting to do it.

On the bright side, I got a job as an AVID tutor helping 8th graders and I LOVE it! I might even go out for more jobs in the school district as a classified substitute (not a teacher, but as a teacher’s aide). I’ve also been working on a new website project, but I’m not sure how that’s going to go, so I save that for next month.

 

Love you all!