Giving Thanks and Happy Birthday

This is a little late, but I would like to wish everyone a Happy Thanksgiving! Luckily we got to see a lot of family over the extended holiday and to those we didn't, we are sorry we missed you!

We were very thankful that we got to celebrate Thanksgiving with Grandmama and Grandpa Rockwell and Nana Messenlehner. It was great for the kids to have their great grandparents their for another holiday. I was lucky to have NUMEROUS birthday cakes. (ALL chocolate of course (Is there any other type???)) This picture is from the celebration at Pop's house and I am being assisted by Landon, Lauren and my nephew Ian to blow out the candles on my cake. Now, that I am getting, ahem, older, I apparently need more help according to the younger generation (smile). (They also thought I needed to have every single candle on my cake because I was "old" . They didn't know how old I was, just "old". Got to love kids.)

On my birthday I played hooky from work and went to a scrapbook store in Hershey where I met up with my best friend Beth. Beth and I have been friends since the beginning of time or eighth grade, whichever came first. We're as close as sisters can be without being sisters. I've introduced her to the world of scrapbooking so I had to introduce her to Times to Remember. (Plus I had a 20% off coupon good the month of my birthday and who doesn't love an excuse to shop....) We both were able to leave all of the kids at home for some serious shopping AND lunch. Heaven for moms of toddlers. After lunch Beth had to leave I still had some time so those who know me knew I couldn't pass up the chance to go one more place....

Yup. Chocolate World. Had fun doing the ride and was restrained in the marketplace. My co-workers were disappointed that I didn't bring stuff back for them. I did bring back "fresh" Kissables back for Landon as per his request. Hopefully we will take the kids back to Candylane over Christmas break.

Hope everybody had as much fun as we did over the holiday and didn't eat too much. Hope to see lots of people over Christmas.

Hugs to all

Mary

Do Not Be Alarmed and Look who came to Dinner

Do not be alarmed if you see this young man at your house - he is just fighting fires! This is Landon's version of a fireman's outfit after his trip to the firestation. Notice the boots, hat, hood, air regulator, coat and helmet (that's too small but he won't give it up!)! He put this outfit together by himself, came into the kitchen and announced that he was off to fight a fire. I love his imagination. He constantly surprises me with what he comes up with when he's playing. Lauren is similar because she learns from Landon. We have one of the "bouncy" horses with springs that the kids can ride. Well, the other night they took trick or treat bags, pretended they were feed bags and strapped them on to the horse (both ends of the horse too). Then they proceeded to mix up food for the horse and then they "groomed" the horse. This kept them occupied for a good 30 minutes.

Tonight we hit Perkins for dinner. I found out that "Woody" from Toy Story was going to be there. We had a great time and had a nice dinner with Gram. The kids both posed for pictures (Lauren was slightly hesistant but by the end of the time she was blowing kisses goodbye and Landon of course was an old pro at posing with characters.) A bonus was that they got to get balloon masterpieces as well. Lauren got a purple puppy and Landon got a sword and hat. A nice way to spend an evening.

Until Later

Mary