Thanksgiving Break

We had a great Thanksgiving break!  Although we squeezed in a dentist appointment, the rest was mostly just fun.  We had a fun time visiting Kansas family for Thanksgiving.  Too much to eat and drink, but lots of laughter and memory-making ... perfect visit!  We made it back yesterday evening, and then spent today hanging our outside lights and preparing to head back to school tomorrow.  We cheated a little bit by putting up our tree and inside decorations before leaving for Kansas, and I also took the girls early last week to see Santa.  That's not something I usually do before Thanksgiving, but the idea of beating the lines was just too tempting.

We like going to see Santa at Willow Bend, where they have a fun snow globe for the kids to play in and stuffed arctic animals to look at on the way to see the Big Guy.

 Emma really wanted me to take this pic of her winking.

 They let me put them in matching outfits.  It was a pre-Christmas miracle.  Let's hope we have a repeat for other upcoming holiday events.

 Willow Bend will be getting a Crayola Experience this spring.  Sara went to the one at MOA with my mom and sister, and I'm excited to take both girls here when it opens.  In the meantime, there's lots of advertising for it at the mall, including a life-sized box of crayons!

 Silly faces!

 Cute pic with Santa this year.  This one was the first picture they took.  Emma asked for a pop-socket for her phone, and Sara asked for the book Wonder.  My plan to beat the long lines worked: we were through the snow globe/polar bear paws in ice + other such attractions/Santa visit + pic/picture purchase in under twenty minutes.  Win!

The next few weeks will be exciting and busy.  We have Sara's birthday, a visit from my parents, and of course lots of shopping to do.  I love this time of year!

Weekend Fun

Last weekend Steve and I got some rare time away as we headed to Waco for the ISU/Baylor game.  We had a HUGE alumni tailgate with other alums from all over (many from our DFW club attended).  It was a super windy day, but still beautiful, and we had the best time.

 Of course someone was giving away delicious smoked pork.  Only at a tailgate with Iowans...

 We did not stop at Magnolia, but someone who tailgated near us had gone to get cupcakes.  I didn't have one, but they looked pretty.  He said he waited 45 minutes for these cupcakes ... no, thanks.

 We had awesome seats among a sea of Cardinal & Gold inside of McClane Stadium.  On top of the fun and camaraderie, the win made it a great day to be a Cyclone!

 *still windy*

On Sunday, my cousins Tim and Emily were in town from Hawaii and Minnesota.  We took advantage of the nice afternoon and spent some time catching up outside at Katy Trail.  It was fun to have some familiar faces in town for a bit!

We're out of school for the week, and will be heading to Lyons tomorrow to celebrate Thanksgiving with Steve's sisters in Kansas.  Our week is already going by too quickly ... yesterday was filled with putting up the tree and some much needed R&R.  Working on a little more of the same today before we hit the road tomorrow!

another photo dump

Here I am again, playing catch-up.  Story of my life right now!  I can't believe we are staring down Thanksgiving.  Our day-to-day has been a contest with the current to stay above the water ... I'm sure looking forward to breathing a bit next week.  I have a lot of work I could be/should be doing right now, my I'm going to spend a few minutes doing this instead.  

Last month we hit up an ISU game watch for the TCU game.  It was an amazing victory!  Not shown: someone's fireball shots as the fans in Ames rushed the field.

 A former player, James Reed, was in attendance, so we had to take a little celebrity photo.

 We enjoyed carving pumpkins and making what was possibly my best batch of pumpkin seeds ever.  Nobody walked through the kitchen without grabbing a few!

 Somehow, in the midst of the October Cyclone victories, "Dilly Dilly" became the ISU rally cry.  Even Bud Light got into in on Twitter.  So of course we had to have a Dilly Dilly pumpkin.

 We had a cooler Halloween evening, but at least the expected rain held off.  Our neighborhood was SO quiet during trick-or-treating.  I don't know if it was the weather, or the Tuesday night, or the World Series, but it was weird.  Maybe we just hit the wrong streets.  Still, the girls came home with enough candy to last a lifetime.

 Fall soccer season ended.  Emma will play again in the winter with her friends and beloved Coach McAlister.

 The 3rd graders at Sara's school presented a really nice Veterans Day Program last week.  Sara was proud to have a speaking part, and she did a great job.  It was fun to watch her - she was totally in her element performing on the stage!

School has been crazy-busy-great.  Many people told me that my second year as principal would be harder than my first, and I'm finding that to be very true.  I have a variety of theories on why this is.  Still loving my job very much, but finding myself a little more thankful for Amazon every single day.  Mostly I'm just trying to keep my $%*& together so I'm not a terrible parent by the time the evening rolls around, and I'm sorry to say I'm not being super successful in this arena.  Forever a work in progress... Anyway, that's all for now.  Back to Amazon to check a couple more things off my list!