Wishing you and your families a wonderful Turkey Day.
May you be blessed today with lots of family time, good food and friends!
(And maybe a little more appetizing looking turkey than this little guy here.)

I am thankful for…

…taking a gamble and winning. Right after we decided (or rather the price of airfare decided for us) we were not going to Michigan this week, I received a jury duty summons in the mail. Wasn’t it just a few months ago that I was called in? Oh, yeah. That would have been two years ago and apparently it is that time again.

So I told J. that I was not going to try to reschedule it, even though it was Thanksgiving week. In fact, I was betting that since it was Thanksgiving, not many cases would be called during the short, holiday week. So I stuck it out, called in faithfully every night (well, one evening I forgot and had to get up at 4am when I remembered the next morning) and it paid off. I didn’t have to go in and my “service” has been completed for another two years.

So I am adding it to the already very long list of things I am thankful for today and all that God has given me: my sweet girls, my amazing husband, my entire family, good friends, J’s good job, plenty of food in our stomachs, a great roof over our heads, the good fortune to live in the United States, and every once in awhile that feeling like I “beat the system.”

Meanwhile, Kimberly took our challenge this week to heart. Her half of the dipy is just beautiful, isn’t it? I sat staring at it and wondering if she snuck up and took the shot of him deep in thought or if she “saw” the shot and asked him to pose for her.

Guess we’ll have to go over and see.

Hosted by Megan and Hip Momma

Jamie and I finished the capes, party favors and cupcakes for our Birthday Party package last week. And I packed them all up in a box, and didn’t take a single photo of it!!

The cupcakes were cute. We did half of the favors, capes and cupcakes for Chase in a superhero theme (red and blue) and the other half for Peyton in a princess theme (purple and pink.) They loved it, so that was a job well done. (And I’m so happy that it IS done.)

We were running through the Christmas aisle today at Target and Addie found these sweet little bird ornaments and was ecstatically trying to show them to me. Emma took one look at them and said, “Oh, we could so make those Mama – couldn’t we?”

Yes. That IS my girl. So we had to buy one to use as a sample. We’ll see if we “so can make them” or not.

But first I will frantically be sewing so I have something – ANYthing – to put out on the table at the Boutique next week. Right now all I have are a lot of pillowcase dresses cut out and pinned with bias tape. We will be cramming for the next week and a half.

Since we will need to display the little dresses with long sleeved tees and leggings (the dresses won’t work in winter – even here in California) does anyone have any ideas where we might find a little kid dress form? Preferably a cheap one?

And anyone have any good crafty stuff to show this week? I know Jen and Stacy must…now that Christmas season is upon us.

…is for a new photo of the girls and I.

For the past three years I’ve had this one as my backdrop on my phone…

Look at the girls – they are such babies!

So instead, I can now choose from this one…

Or how about this one…

And finally I gave up ended up with this one…

I have a feeling I might be waiting another three years for a new phone photo.

Do you believe this? The ORANGE with the blue. It is almost like we had some sort of art direction… “take a shot with blue on the top and a swath of orange in the bottom half of the photo.” It is eerie sometimes and always such a trip to open Kimberly’s photo each Wednesday night, I so love it.

We are also loving our “fall” here in California. Our leaves are finally changing and it is a mere 88 degrees. (Oh yes, I did have to throw that in here.) Sure we have our share of crazies and a very high cost of living, but I do love me some California weather come winter.

Hop on over to see what other kind of orange the ladies are coming up at Megan’s and Melody’s. (I have a feeling there might be a pumpkin or two!)

Hosted by Megan and Hip Momma

…a frighteningly good Halloween!

Happy Halloweeeeeeen!

Oh…hey. Looky here. It is Tuesday all sneaking up again.

I’ve got nothing yet again.

I’m a single mom this week (Oh, hey! And next week too!) and had big plans for Crafting yesterday – for I have a leaning stack of fabric mocking me from my sewing room right now. Seriously. It is a huge stack and very close to toppling over and I would go take a photo of it for proof, but….I’m lazy. (And…theeeere it is.)

I’m going to drop the girls at school. Finish the #%*@ PTA newsletter once and for all. Go for a run. Find and buy J. a tie for his next trip…which he leaves for exactly 12 hours after he gets home from this one, and did I mention is then gone next week, too? Not that we are counting the days until he is home for awhile, or anything. (12 days.) Make two phone calls I’ve been putting off for weeks. And then…THEN I am going to sew.

Inspiration for me today?

Just checkin’ in for a few minutes down here in North Carolina, y’all.

It has been a bit of a whirlwind week but I think we are all ready to get this show on the road tomorrow, despite a few little speedbumps. The first being a trip to the ER for Em yesterday afternoon. Hey, it isn’t a good vacation if someone doesn’t end up at the ER, right? She was having some girl issues and they put her on an antibiotic, which in turn made her feel pretty rotten tonight, I think.

We went to rehearsal, all was good. Came back to get prettied up, took our medicine, all was good. Got to rehearsal dinner, Mama was all psyched up to do her little toast for Uncle Jeff, all was good. Emmy ate, and suddenly all was not good. So we had to cut our party time a little short and headed back for some rest.

While we were sitting on the bed together, all fresh from her bath and looking a little less pale, Em looked up at me with her serious, sweet little face and said, “I’m sorry we had to come home Mama and you didn’t get to tell Uncle Jeff how much you wanted him to get married.”

I told her it was fine, and Uncle Jeff already knew and JB knows how happy I am for them. And then she said, “why don’t you just do the speech for me, Mama?” So I did, and when I finished she clasped her hands together and said, “Oh, I’m glad you at least got one person to hear your wish! But it was kinda long.” (Nice. Even the 7-year old is a critic.)

And then she suggested that maybe I just write it in a card for them. “Or I got an idea, Mama. You can write it in your blog and then they can see it whenever they want.”

And that I thought was a very good idea from my smart little girl.

So here is my “cheers” to Jeff and JB….

For those of you who don’t know me, I’m Carrie, Jeff’s sister-in-law, married to the guy over there who looks vaguely like Jeff. I met Jeff (& Jamie) many years ago when my family moved to Leslie in the middle of my freshman year. It was my very first day of school, in the new town, I didn’t know anyone and I met a girl who invited me to sit at the “cool kids” table for lunch. I was sitting across the table from Jeff and Jamie and I only remember three things from that day. I can’t tell you what we talked about but I just remember I laughed at the two of them the entire lunch hour. I remember laughing so hard at one point that I spit chocolate milk out of my nose. And then I remember being so incredibly horrified that I would never, ever get asked to sit with the “cool kids” again.

Luckily for me they overlooked my nerdiness (and drinking problem) and kept me around for all these years. I feel like we have kind of grown up together and I don’t even see Jeff as a brother-in-law. He is just my brother. A fantastic brother. He is also a great uncle and an amazing friend. My only wish has ever been for him to find someone who would make him truly happy. And so it makes me insanely happy to see him with Jessica because I can see that she does just that.

So to JB, I’d just like to say – “Welcome to the cool kids table, baby.” And I wish you both a lifetime filled with nothing but happiness and much, much laughter.

Love you two!

Hey…and Happy Wedding Day (I just looked at the clock!) – today is it!

We need the weekdays in between our weekends to rest up.

Clearly our weekends are just exhausting. (But fun!)

Think we are all feeling a little like this after our crazy week/weekend…

We’ll be back with all the details soon. Hope you all had a great weekend, too.