The Bright Eyed Brunette

Happy Halloween friends!  We have been ready for Halloween over here since the beginning of October so I feel like a kid on Christmas morning getting ready for tonight's festivities.  The weather threatened to bring storms and rain so a lot of towns in our surrounding area did their trick or treating on Tuesday.  I'm glad we left it on the 31st because Halloween isn't on the 30th...duh!  We did move our Trunk or Treat indoors but you know what?  It didn't even rain one drop until we got back home around 7:30. We spent an hour or two picking things up down at the Fellowship Hall, setting up, and decorating our "area".  I had mad plans to do a monster themed trunk, but since we moved inside and the girls already had their own tables, I decided to just help them.  I have been fighting some kind of headache/neck problems since last week so I was ok with just helping and taking pictures. Carlie's was a 50's girl Makena as Belle from Beauty...

Wednesday night we did our annual pumpkin carving with our Discovery friends at church. I took a few pictures and about 75% of them are unusable. Somehow my settings got changed to something wonky and well, the pictures are some of the oddest I have ever seen.  Very strange. Anyway, while Bro. Adam read the Pumpkin Prayer we followed along by carving our pumpkin according to the story.  Now, I'm not gonna lie.  In years past this has been a very chaotic project.  I mean so many kids and KNIVES! This year seemed to go much better.  We tried to have an adult or teen for each small kid.  We were missing some of our adults because my uncle and cousin are still in FL and some of our adults are just in poor health these days.  Let's face it, people get old and health fades.  It stinks, but that's life.  Carlie ended up helping and was unable to carve her own pumpkin, but she did bring it home. First step was to cut the top off: Open my...

Yay for the weekend!   Our first Saturday not having to get up and go bowling was great!  Carl didn't work because it rained (again) so he and Trey got up and went squirrel hunting.  Trey loves going and I'm glad it is something that they can do together.  Carl said he could have easily stayed in bed but got up just for Trey.  He is such a good dad.  The girls and I stayed in bed until 9 or so then got up and made some cinnamon rolls before the boys made it in around 10:30.  Carl said they saw several squirrels and missed a few but got one and had a good time so I guess that is a success.  We finished up our Saturday by grilling and relaxing.   I Pinned tons of photography ideas for Christmas card/Family pictures.  I have narrowed it down to two options.  I just have to make a final choice and get all of the details worked out.  It should be fun.   Sunday is church day!  Carl washed the cars/truck after ...

We finished up our fall scholarship league in bowling over the weekend. We missed one Saturday and forgot to pre/post bowl so that hurt us a little. Trey ended up in 5th place. Makena had a super awesome second game on Saturday but the other two were rather suck-ish. She ended up in 6th place. She and Trey are in the same division this year, so they are competitors for the first time. They are pretty close in their bowling abilities but Trey will have more time and will probably end up with more scholarship money than either of the girls. I'm just glad they found something that they enjoy doing.  It was a fun eight weeks but I am thankful for a little break so I can actually sleep in on Sarurday mornings. I just realized that I forgot to post pictures of Elijah's birthday party at my parent's.  It was Fortnite themed. Trey doesn't play it except when Noah and Eli are around and not much then. My kids are not big gamers. They like being outside, pl...

Happy Fall~ only it doesn't really feel like fall, does it? Never mind that because we have been all about decorating fall and Halloween around here! Defusing a nice little blend to help with the allergy/sinus crap we have had going on. I ordered 2 of these huge mums from our school district's FFA And Trey wanted to put these hanging ghosts inside the fence with the party lights in the backyard. A little bit of fall inside as well. Carlie found this for me at the store where she works. I think one of my all time favorite activities is turning on some Halloween jams and carving pumpkins.  We have done this with the kids since Carlie's first Halloween. They have gotten quite good at carving free-handed and can get pretty creative. We carved them before Carl got home so he missed out on all of the fun. Trey, Carlie, and Makena's pumpkins. I think they turned out great!! Did I mention I love this time of year? ...