Last Sunday night we surprised the kids with a trip to Lights of the South in Grovetown. It was cold!
We stood in line for a hayride through a fun light display. {We were pulled by a tractor which, of course, Joseph loved.} The pictures are certainly not great, but it'll give you an idea.
That was possibly the largest flag I've ever seen and it was all made of lights. We rode through the castle made of lights…
…and then we had to run back down and play inside of it afterwards.
We roasted marshmallows and made s'mores. Then it was time to hop in the (warm!) car and drive home. A nice family night of Christmas fun.
I have been so busy sending out Christmas cards, decorating, shopping, and catching up from being gone, that I haven't had the chance to sit down and blog about our Thanksgiving. It was wonderful!! We were gone for a whole week - and spent nights in three different places - but the kids did great.
We left that Saturday morning and drove to Auburn (with a pit stop at Lane Packing) to take Hannah and Joseph to their first game at Jordan-Hare.
We did Tiger Walk and saw the cheerleaders, dance team and band at the alumni tent:
The game was a little chilly, rained off and on, but we had a blast! Thankfully, our seats were lower level and close to the overhang. We actually didn't get that wet. Hannah and Joseph cheered their little heads off…
Sunday morning we drove over to Atlanta to attend worship at Passion City Church - something Joe and I have wanted to do for a long time. Louie Giglio is the pastor and he lead 7:22 at North Point on Tuesday nights back when I was in college. Amazing.
Chloe Puppy-the-Monkey and Raffie navigated us through the ATL…and, later on, I obliged when Joseph wanted to take pictures.
We spent Sunday with my sweet friend (and sorority big sis) Julie and her precious family. So much fun to catch up and watch our children play together. They had a ball! {I cannot believe I didn't take a single picture. So sad!!!}
On Monday we had breakfast with Auntie Jen and her girls. We got to see their new house and play for a little bit. {Again, no pictures. Shame on me!}
We left Atlanta in our rear-view and headed to Highlands and the beautiful mountains of North Carolina where we spent the week. I don't think I've ever used the words "Thanksgiving" and "relaxing" in the same sentence, but boy was it! We lounged in front of the fire, played games, snacked, strolled around downtown, slept in (well, I did), took long bubble baths, and watched movies. It. was. wonderful.
Meme joined us for a few nights and we met Aunt Kristie, Aunt Trudie, Uncle Marc and Jackson for pizza one night.
Sour lemon faces:
The kids' first time watching Home Alone was priceless. They laughed hysterically.
And we woke up to a white Thanksgiving Day!
We bundled up and went to church, then threw snowballs at each other and made a little (tiny) snowman.
Thanksgiving dinner was just us four. We had smoked turkey, squash casserole, butter beans, sweet potato casserole, salad, rolls and of course cranberry sauce out of a can. Delish!
We packed up (quite a process) and headed back towards reality. First a photo op with our little snowman:
He lost some of his size as the temperature rose above freezing on Friday, but we still needed to document the experience of building a Thanksgiving snowman.
On our way down the mountain, we stopped at the tubing slope where our cousins work for lunch at Annie's Cafe. Aunt Trudie hooked us up with free passes so Hannah could take a couple trips down the slope.
I went with her the first time down and it was a blast - much faster than I thought it would be. Joe filmed from afar (first video, that's Hannah and me on the right), and then after lunch he took Monkey down. Such a cutie, that girl.
There is a little slope/mound for smaller children and for those that want to practice. They both enjoyed that, though Joseph was a little hesitant at first. He felt safe enough with Daddy.
Hannah went on a field trip last week to Sunny Day Farms in Louisville, GA. I wasn't sure what the field trip entailed, or to where it was exactly, when I dropped Hannah off at school last Thursday. But after talking to her teacher and realizing many other parents were going along, I knew I had to change my morning plans.
I put on jeans, boots and a warm coat and drove 45 minutes into the country to surprise my little brown-eyed Monkey girl.
She was excited and we had a ball! First…feeding the goats.
We sent Daddy a picture of his girls:
Then a lesson at the pumpkin patch before heading inside to learn about bees and taste fresh honey!
I watched as she hunted for treasure in the corn box.
Which got a little interesting when the whole class ended up inside at the end… Hannah became way more concerned about the kernels in her boots than in finding hidden treasure.
After a group picture on the tower of hay bales, they were given permission to climb and play (barring no objection from mom or dad). The kids loved it.
No surprise that my fearless five-year-old was at the top first…and, again, no surprise when she was quick to help her classmates up.
Afterwards we headed over to the corn maze.
We followed a cute little story through the maze. It was really neat; the corn was well over my head.
It's hard to say, but possibly the highlight of the day was the jumbo jumper pillow.
Wow. So cool! This girl loves a trampoline so she was in heaven. And I really wish I would've tossed my boots aside and jumped myself. No other adults did, so I thought it was just for the kids, and then later I saw a teacher jumping with her class. Darn!
We ate lunch at picnic tables and I watched Hannah run around on the playground for a little bit before heading back home.
As I was driving away it started to sprinkle. The classes were soon to board the bus, but I did miss out on the last-minute pig race they got to see.
It was such a fun (cold) morning and I am so glad I went.
