November has been a lovely month. Here's some of the fun things we've done in addition to celebrating Mia's 14th birthday and taking our annual family pictures which I posted about separately.
Ryan and I attended Stonehaven's gala in the spring, and we won a weekend stay at the Kelly family's home on Lake Oconee. This lake is so beautiful, and we have many great memories of visiting the lake years ago when Mom and Dad had a condo there. We were excited to win this at the auction! We were originally supposed to go over the summer, but when the girls got covid and we changed their camp schedule, this needed to change too. This weekend ended up being a great time to go. It was a little bit cooler, and it was definitely not as busy which was nice. We spent a few hours in nearby Madison which is a cute little town. It was fun to window shop and walk around here. Otherwise, we spent time watching movies together (Enola Holmes 2 and Bad Guys), catching some football games, and playing games together. The Kelly's have a beautiful home, and we greatly appreciated the time to relax and have family time there together!
Mia has been taking a sewing practicum class at school with Mrs. Wilkinson, and she is loving it! She has made several cool projects, but I really loved this little zipper pouch. So cute and practical!
She has loved this so much that Ryan and I were excited to get her a sewing machine for her birthday. She was ecstatic about that! As soon as she was able, she started making items on it. First up was a cute multi-pattern pin cushion.
Then she made this great Tennessee pillow (shhh, it's a Christmas surprise for Granna!) which has the amazing end zone checkboard pattern on the back. She's already bought supplies to make gifts for others, and they're coming together. I can't believe all the cool things she is going to make!
Lily had a lot of fun at Addison Corley's 16th birthday party. They went to an ax-throwing venue! Lily even nailed the bulls-eye once!
Lily had such a great volleyball season! We were so proud that these girls made it all the way to the state tournament. This is a black and white version of their yearbook picture that they took recently. It turned out so good!
The school hosted an end of season banquet for the JV and Varsity teams recently which Lily and I were excited to attend. It was fun to see Lily receive her Varsity Letter and pin.
We flew down to Florida the morning after Mia's birthday, so we could spend a few days with Grandpops and Grandma Jan over Thanksgiving break. We often go down over Christmas break, but this timing worked out better this year. It is always nice to see family. They surprised Mia with a Beetlejuice themed birthday party (thanks to Allie for putting that together!). We spent some time at the St Pete pier which we had never visited before. It was a beautiful day, so it was fun to walk along the pier. There were people fishing, walking, and roller skating all around. This was a nice time.
We were so glad to drive over to Tampa with David to visit Aunt Helen for a little while. The girls had actually never met her before, and it's been way too many years since Ryan and I had the chance to be with her. She is also so kind to send the girls birthday and Christmas gifts. It was really wonderful to have this time with her.
Mia (and Lily) always enjoy having time with Taz and Pip, their two little dogs. When Nick, Allie, and River come over, their pup, Halo, comes too which adds to the fun!
We went to Frenchie's for lunch one day which was a treat! We went to the location that sits right on the beach which gave us incredible views; it was a beautiful day. Ryan and Lily split this fish-shaped pretzel which made us laugh. It was pretty tasty in addition to being adorable.
Lily and I took the golf cart down to the beach one evening to watch the sunset. I always love time with this girl, and the beautiful sunset made it even better.
It was a lovely visit to Florida, and we're always grateful for that opportunity. We flew home on Wednesday afternoon. We were glad to pick Decker back up from puppy jail, and we ran a few errands. Thursday was Thanksgiving which is one of my favorite days of the year! We ate our traditional sausage casserole in the morning while we watched the Macy's Parade. After that we all got ready, and I made a quick appetizer: phyllo shells with goat cheese, baked for a few minutes then topped with fig jam and crushed pistachios. They were really good! We then went over to Sid and Elaine's house to visit with my family for a bit. I think it's safe to say we had enough food!
Wayne's ham and fried chicken; these are the stars of the day in my opinion.
We snapped a picture of our family on the front porch. We were glad Papa was feeling well enough from his knee surgery to come today.
I'm thankful for this group! There are 71 of us in this picture which was just before we ate lunch; 8 more came a little later after they had visited with their other family earlier in the day. I'm thankful for this big group!
It's time to turn our attention to Christmas after Thanksgiving ends! We spent a lot of Friday getting out decorations which I always enjoy. We all love The Grinch, so we had a Grinch themed "breakfast for lunch." We made Grinch molded pancakes which turned out so cute! We used our maple syrup from our recent Canada trip and ate them on our Grinch plates and placemats. Ryan even has this awesome mug for drinking hot chocolate out of! We enjoyed watching the most recent Grinch movie afterwards too.
How cute are these pancakes molded to look like Grinch, Max, and a Who tree?!
Lily and I thoroughly enjoyed going to see the Roswell Dance Theatre's presentation of The Nutcracker too which her friend, Katie Brooks, dances in. This year she was the lead jester and a flower girl, and she did great! More fun time with my eldest!
December is always a busy (but wonderful) month. I am thankful that November is a little slower paced. What a great time to be still and count my many wonderful blessings. There is always something to be grateful for.
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