Thanksgiving Treasures

Memories are treasures. Aren't they? We had a fun time making memories this Thanksgiving. My mom drove back to SC with us and spent Thanksgiving week at our house. It was so nice to have her see our trailer as well as just experience life in our neck of the woods. We were also able to drive to my sister's house in NC on Thanksgiving day. Ethan was so excited to see his cousins again (he calls them "my friends") as well as Dixie, the dog we were watching all summer. One memory is hearing my 3 year old nephew say "Why is her tummy so big?" as I got up from our Thanksgiving table. Maybe he thought I ate too much :-) After nap time we had the boys decorate gingerbread houses. My son let me do all the decorating while he sat there and pigged out on marshmallows :-)

Family Fun & Fall Favorites

We love the fact that we are now stationed at home until baby #2 makes his appearance. It is so wonderful to be able to spend time with family. Here are a few pictures of Ethan and the fun he's been having with his cousins...

Ethan couldn't figure out how to get his shoes off. Leave it to a girl :-) She does so much better with shoes than he does!!

Best of Friends

Ethan was proud to show of his "fif wheel" to his cousins when we arrived home. It was like a big play place for them!

Enjoying the fall leaves in Pennsylvania!

Visiting Papa at his store, Home Depot. Ethan was fascinated by the forklift and all the Christmas decorations. He even got an orange apron like Papa.

So glad we were able to see my Pop-pop (Ethan's great-grandpa)!

Ethan is ready to help in Grandma's kitchen

We had such a nice trip to Pennsylvania to see my family and church. Wish we lived closer! (I am 7 months pregnant by the way with boy #2)

The Case of the Missing Hat

As we have been traveling, I have been teaching myself to crochet. It helps to pass the time while we are driving and it keeps my "creative juices" flowing :-) One of my creations this fall was a winter hat (as modeled above by a cute little boy). It was fun and relatively easy to make. At the beginning of this month, he finally had a chance to wear it! As I was cleaning up after his first day of wearing the hat, I couldn't find it anywhere! We were packing up our trailer at the time, so I thought maybe it got mixed up with all that I had packed so far. I couldn't get it out of my mind though. Not that it was an expensive hat, but I had put a lot of time into making it, so I really wanted to find it. Well, at the same time I was looking for a missing hat, I was also wondering what had happened to the pile of trash bags I had sitting outside our trailer waiting to go to the dumpster. It had mysteriously disappeared during nap time. I normally wouldn't care about that, but the place we were staying that week was back in the woods, and I was often "home" alone. Naturally, I started to wonder if there was someone creeping around outside my trailer taking trash and a random hat that I may have dropped outside. Well, I put my husband to work on the case when he got home that day, but we had no answers by the time bedtime rolled around. The next day being Sunday, I scoured the church for the missing hat while my husband searched the dumpster for me, in case whoever took our trash took the hat by accident. (what a sweet guy!) Nothing turned up with either endeavor, but as we were heading back to our trailer, my husband noticed a dirty diaper in the woods a few feet from our doorstep and then about 20 feet away, the rest of the stolen trash. Hoping that the hat would be there too, he looked around the area, but did not find it :-( Apparently Greenville must have unusually strong squirrels to have carried the trash that far away, not just one bag, but 3. And judging from the size of the acorns around our trailer, they must be well fed squirrels too. Well, we went inside, still very disappointed that the hat was no where to be seen. At this point I had started making another hat and hoping that whoever took the first one really needed it. Before church that evening, my husband was packing up the trailer and walked to the opposite side of the trailer where the trash incident occurred. There, about 20 feet away in the opposite direction he saw the hat!! It looked like the squirrels had tried as hard as they could to tear it apart to make a nest out of it, but the seams were too tight and they just left it! O happy day!! I had my hat back, although it looked pretty pitiful. But with a little TLC, it is back to normal and ready to be used. Who knew what a bunch of squirrels could do!