Thanksgiving Hunter

We had a wonderful four days over the Thanksgiving holidays at my parent's ranch. I read two books, we ate, walked, shot, played, and had a great time. But I can tell you that the highlight of the entire trip was Slade. He got his first deer, ever!!! Shot it entirely by himself and we were super proud!!! He even has the shell of the bullet as a keepsake!

BD2

Have I mentioned to you that this is my boyfriend? Maybe you all have heard it before, right? I can tell you that I have watched the final movie of the series. I can tell you I stood in line three hours for a seat. And I can tell you that I have seen it twice since Thursday. I cannot tell you what I will do without any more Twilights.......sighhhhhhhh.

Crib.....Less

As of 10 days ago, we are crib-less in the Smart household. With a sad little heart(mine mostly), Kyle and I broke apart the white crib, drug it down the hall, out to the truck, and just like that, we were done. For the last 10 years, we have had a crib in this house off and on.

I cannot believe we are past this stage in our life. Yes, yes, I know-it's only a crib. But you start with a bottle, and then it's a crib, and then it's a backpack, and then it's a car, and so on and so on until you find your house empty, your hair is grey, and you wonder how it all happened so fast.

Ok, so I'm being a tad bit overly dramatic. But it stings, man. It's just sad. Milestones that you never get a chance to do over-that's a punch in the gut. I mean, don't get me wrong, after an estimated 23,000 diapers I've changed. Do the math....approx 7 diaper per day x 365 days x 3 years x 3 kids =22,995. And I'm waaaayyyyy under estimating this, folks. I will say a small party, ok, large party will be thrown when I don't have to spend one more penny on Huggies. But it still makes you have a big lump in your throat to see your sweet babies growing right before your eyes. I will soon be telling my 8th grade daughter she is most certainly not getting those bikini panties. And here, yesterday, she was just in diapers. It happens. They grow up. And get rid of cribs and Barney and want to buy bikini underware.

Only I can make a toddler bed welcome into a three paragraph sentimental journey. Sorry about that. Do yourself a favor and stop and enjoy the little things. Enjoy every cent you spend on diapers, though, and don't get upset when you are changing puke crib sheets in the middle of the night. In a flash it will be gone.........

Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it. — Ferris Bueller

Say No to Window Clings

Learn from my mistakes........

When I was in Target before Halloween, I found some cute gel window clings in the dollar bin. I bought some for my kids and Campbell thinking it would be fun for them to stick on the glass doors and windows. Well, it was lots of fun. Gunnar stuck his to the back door which is what he's doing in the photo. Finley put hers all over her windows. They loved playing with them.

 They played with them and moved them all around their room. Well one morning I went to put laundry on Finley's dresser and THIS is what I found on top of her WHITE dresser when I picked up the pumpkin gel cling. I was horrified! We had three jack-o-lantern stains on her dresser. I tried to scrub and there was no removing the stains. They were there to stay.

I did find that luck was on our side for once! We had bought the "protection plan" two years ago when we bought this furniture. I guess I was wise enough to see that white might be a problem in a kids room. I took these pics and sent them into the claims department. They sent a company out on Friday and the man sanded the stains off and repainted the spots. He was finished in about 30 minutes and it was good as new! The moral of this story.......1. I don't recommend buying gel clings out of the Target bin and 2. If you decide to buy white furniture, a protection plan would be in your best interest!

Birthday Cakes

We did lots of celebrating the week of Gunnar's birthday!

 When Cita and Nana came on the Wednesday before his party, he got to have his traditional Nana's chocolate cake that night.

 This was the first year he really was into his cake. He knows how yummy it is. I heart this photo.

 Oh and the fire, well he REALLY likes the candle.

 He wants to blow it out numerous times. He had to re-light about four times.

 Having Brandi's birthday on the 25th, three cakes for Gunnar, and Kyle's birthday on Halloween, you can imagine all the candles he has got to blow out!

 Gunnar and his Mickey Mouse cake. We were all Mickey this year!

 Gunnar and Cita

 Can you tell somebody dug into the cake with their finger before I could get a pic.

 Daddy lit his two candles.

 Blowing out his candles!

 And Re-lighting the candles, again.

 He really digs candles.

 Campbell made red velvet cupcakes for Brandi's birthday.

 We let him open his gifts from all of us on Friday night so he wouldn't have tons at his party to open.

Pretty good bday so far! 

Pumpkin Patch 2012

Pumpkin Picture Overload

 We had fun at the pumpkin patch this year. I was able to get lots of great pics-as you can see!

 This was G's first year to enjoy the patch!

 Slade-9, Gunnar-1(at the time), Finley-6

 My boy looks so old.....

 Slade wanted a pic with Gunnar but he kept running off.

 I wasn't really planning on being in the pics.

 Kyle and Fin

 Fin searched the whole yard for her perfect pumpkin!

 I love this picture

 Careful not to step on the baby pumpkins!

 We ended up with 3 large ones, and lots of white and orange baby pumpkins. We left the pumpkin patch and ate dinner at Buns Over Texas. Then we headed to to the Garden & Arts Center.

 They had a Pumpkin Trail. You could walk through the garden and there were hundreds of lit pumpkins. It was pretty neat but it was super crowded.

 Pumpkins galore!

Pumpkins were carved in just about every was you can imagine. They were great!

A Few Years of Costumes.....

Just because I'm distraught with the fact that my kids are growing up, here are a few years of costumes..

 2008-Finley, a skunk
I repeat, this is Finley.
 (Doesn't Gunnar look like his sister! The whole time I was typing this, Gunnar was pointing to the photo, insisting it was him. He kept looking at me like I was crazy when I kept telling him, "no, it's Finley when she was little" I finally just agreed and said, sure, it's you, Gunnar!!!

 2008-Slade, Dracula

 2009-Finley, ladybug

 2009-Slade, pirate & ladybug

 2010-Slade is Mario, Finley is Minnie Mouse, and Gunnar the 4-day old pumpkin

 2011-Slade is a Ghostbuster, Finley a witch, Gunnar Superman

2012-Slade is just creepy, Finley a candy corn witch, Gunnar a pirate