Back to BBall

This past Saturday, Ava's basketball season officially began!  Her team is called Orange Crush and she's #3!  We really had no idea how her game would go.  They've only had a few practices and Ava hasn't practiced at all since last year's season.

This was right as they were doing the first toss of the ball.  Our team got it and Ava began dribbling down the court.  About 2 seconds later, the ref blew the whistle and pulled Ava out of the game.  My heart stopped.  I figured out that he was pulling her out to make her take off the bracelets she had on her wrist.  She headed to the seats, mortified and the game continued.  I couldn't breath.  Shawn headed over to her and she was crying by this time.  I could barely stay in my seat.  She was crying because she was embarrassed, but also because these bracelets couldn't just be slipped off her arm.  She's had them on since July and they mean a lot to her.  Shawn had to cut them off with his knife.  My heart just sunk.  I was worried that this was going to ruin her entire experience.  I wondered if she was going to be able to take a deep breath and pull herself together to play when it was time for her to go in.

Here's Shawn trying to comfort her.  I thought I was going to not make it.  I wanted so badly to get up and go comfort her too, but I knew that wouldn't be a good idea....and I knew this was one of those painful learning moments.

Finally she was able to go back into the game.  She was calmed back down and ready to win!  She played really good, considering this was her first game in almost a year!  Our team was ahead for much of the game and then slowly the other team caught up to us.  It stayed neck and neck till the end.

Unfortunately, we lost by 2 tiny points, but it was a great game!

My camera took great pictures till I got a team shot at the end!  Oh well...it's not the worst picture I've ever taken!  Let's hope that next Saturday is MUCH less stressful!  She was excited to have one of  her teachers and one of our friends from church come and cheer her on!

Metal Mouth

We officially have our first brace face.  Oh dear Ava.  We are so getting our money's worth out of the orthodontist!  She is missing 5 permanent teeth, has a pretty big overbite and teeth that are growing sideways in the gums.  Good times!  So, because we love her dearly and want her to have a stellar smile, we are forking over gobs of money to get this taken care of!  In three years, her teeth will look much better....but we won't be finished yet!  We'll also possibly need to get an implant for at least one of her adult teeth that's missing!  Good times indeed!

Here's the Before and PreAfter....we will wait 3 years for the true after!  

We prepared ourselves for this part by playing Speak Out for a few days before she had the braces put on.  Looks like fun right?

Our first National Junior Honor Society Member

Elle was inducted into the NJHS last night.  I've really never understood or paid much attention to this before, but now that my child is involved, I'm interested.  I pretty much think this is just something that will look good on her college resume one day.  She didn't do anything that she doesn't already do, to get into it so it was just a fun night to dress up and be honored.  Having said that, you do have to maintain A's in all core classes and have done a certain number of community service hours.  It's a good start in building up things that she's done that will look attractive when we are trying to get her scholarships and such!

Retreating

Well we got home from Christmas on Thursday and turned right back around an did a Winter Retreat with our youth group on Friday and Saturday!  We started the retreat with a ropes course.  I opted out this year which is weird for me but I just didn't feel the need this year.  It was fun to cheer others on and just watch this year! 

Our sweet little group.  If you will, please pray that we grow in size and faith.  It is a struggle with a small group to keep things going, but we want so very much for this group to succeed.

We game was pretty popular.  I played it in earnest for the first time on this retreat and I'm hooked.  It is exhausting to play this game!  How is that possible?!  I definitely played with a lot of intensity.

We also put together bag for our widows that consisted of a tea mix and a chicken noodle soup mix, both in mason jars.  It worked out so well with our group!

And with that, our December finally came to an end.  For New Year's Eve, our congregation canceled services because of how bad the weather was supposed to be and for once, Shawn and I were both ok with doing absolutely nothing special for NYE.  There's always a tiny percent of me that wants to be doing something worthy of history on NYE, but the 98.5% of me that didn't was pretty excited to just be at home.  We went through our good news jar together which was wonderful.  We drank sparkling juice together and I made it to 11:55...I could hear fireworks outside at midnight, but I was in bed with my eyes shut.  Levi made it to 11:30.  The girls made it past midnight and made Shawn stay up with them.  It was anti climatic for sure, but after ALL of the things going on the few weeks prior, it was kind of nice.  Maybe next year I'll plan big....I say this every year....

Christmas Mayhem

Maybe "Mayhem" isn't the right word, but the whole season is still kind of fresh with me, so it still feels like it was chaotic...but it a wonderful way.  That's confusing, but so is my life.

This was year #40 for reading this exact book.  Shawn spiced it up a little by wearing his Santa suit.  We all thought it was pretty funny.

On Christmas morning I always take a picture of them moving the moose to the 25 on our wall countdown.  Then I tease them mercilessly about if Santa left anything for them downstairs.  I just about stirred them into a frenzy as you can see by this picture.  They were ready to RUN down the stairs!

Stockings are their favorites!

I was so good, I got TWO stockings!  My santa really really loves me.  

This year I made the girls prairie dresses and aprons.  There costumes were pretty straight forward and easy to make.  It just required fabric for days...so much fabric.  But, it was so worth it to see there faces when they opened their boxes.

I made Levi a coat with tails, per his request.  He is now a full "London Boy."  This is his title made up by himself.  This coat.  People.  This coat.  I used a pattern company that I've never used before.  They were expecting me to be FAR more experienced than I was.  But as usual, I learned A TON by teaching myself to make this jacket.  I spent a LOT of nights fretting over this and walking away coming back.  Crying.  Swearing.  Ok I didn't really swear out loud.  But, lo and behold, the moment of truth came and he tried the jacket on and....and ...and .....IT FIT LIKE A GLOVE!  Not only did it fit, but he absolutely LOVES it!  I hope this stays in our family until his kids are wearing it!  

After spending a little time with our Christmas gifts, we loaded up the car and headed to Tyler.  First stop was my parents house, where true mayhem ensued.  I wouldn't want it any other way.   It was loud and rowdy and wonderful and dinner was PERFECT!  

We also spent time at Barbara's house.  This was the first Christmas without grandma.  It was still wonderful to be together, but someone was definitely missed.  The cousins completely took over her part of the house and played endlessly.  Emily came up with the Saran Wrap, like at Thanksgiving, but this time MONEY was involved.  It was serious!  And she made it a challenge!  It was a lot of fun, and I say that mostly because I got a lot of the money.  Ruthlessly.   Only one dollar was harmed in the playing of this game.  I got a little to rough.  But I still got it so that's what matters.

We also headed to Paul and Carolyn's for food and relaxing.  It felt so good just to lay back and chill on my phone for a while, as many of the grandkids invaded Carolyn's closet.  This has become a tradition.  

And with that, we check another family Christmas off.  It was wonderful.  And, I'm glad it's over.  It did feel way too short this year....maybe next year will feel longer!  Time to start planning! ha!

Elf Shenanigans

Mikey came back this year!  Here are a few of my favorite things he did.

I keep my eye out all year for anything that's a miniature version of an everyday object and I love it when I find something!  This year was fun and pretty low-key.

Thankfulness

We spent Thanksgiving at Camp Bee again this year.  My cousin's wife planned a fun game where you have to unwrap a ball of saran wrap while being timed and it was a lot of fun...even though I don't think I won a thing...but I was redeemed at Christmas....that will be another blog post.

I didn't count but there were LOTS of us and plenty of room for us to be.  The Thanksgiving meal was delicious as always!

This is all I had left on my plate.  In the background is my Uncle Ricky and my Memaw.

These is me trying the dessert I made, Ducle de Leche Pumpkin Pie and it was a keeper!

2nd cousins=friends

Boy cousins!

I spent much of Thanksgiving day working a 1,000 piece puzzle.  My only stipulation for people helping me was that they couldn't only work the easy parts!  Laura was the only one that stuck around a little bit.

New Year, New Posts

I have blogged 1,385 posts since I started this blog in May of 2006.   I can tell by the year, which years I was home more and which years I was either with a newborn or a job.  This past year has been my lowest posting year.  But, I don't in any way want to quit doing this blog.  I stopped family scrapbooks a few years ago, and this is my way to continue telling our story.  I print my blog out every few months and keep them in notebooks.  Maybe one day, they will make an amazing bonfire, or maybe one day, my kids will want to reread the story of us.  Either way, here I am, about to catch you up on the month of November and December 2017.  

As my kids are getting older and we as a family are moving away from family with babies, to family with tweens and teens, things aren't always as picture-worthy if that makes sense.  They are doing neat stuff and we are enjoying time as a family, but dynamics are just different and I am enjoying watching it, not through the eye of a lens as often, but with my actual eyes, which means less pictures.  Half of the time we use Shawn's phone!  Anyway, let's start back after our lovely trip to Vermont!

Right before Thanksgiving, we took our yearly decently dressed family pictures!  I love doing these as the years go on, because it gets less stressful every year.  Shawn would disagree.  He gets the brunt of my stress and it usually has to do with the weather!  On this day, the weather was actually as good as you can ask for as an outdoor photographer.  The kids are getting SO much easier to do this with FINALLY.  Man, have I paid my dues.

This is one of my favorite pictures.  I printed it out and it sits by my computer.  It makes my heart joyful every time I look at it.

This is the one that went our our Christmas card this year.

Shawn planned this picture and I love it.  Love endures, even through the stress of family pictures.

This is each of my kids in true form.  They LOVE to pretend and I love that about them.