Thanksgiving and Texas Tech game

 We had a great joint Thanksgiving this year. My mom, dad, brother, and nephew (my sister was visiting NYC with friends) joined the Trey's mom and dad at their home for Thanksgiving lunch. I was supposed to work the night before but the Lord blessed me with a cancelled shift! I was so happy to go to bed normally and be able to get up and watch the parades then make some Paula Deen mini pumpkin cheesecakes and Grits and greens (which both turned out yummy!). It was so nice and relaxing to not have to rush around to several Thanksgivings and there was less oppurtunity to overeat :) Then I got up early hit a few Black Friday sales and we left for Dallas area of Gun Barrel City where Trey's uncle has a beautiful lakehouse. We then met up with his sister and traveled to Dallas to meet Trey's best friend from high school/college Chad and his wife and 3 beautiful kids for a quick lunch before heading to the Texas Tech/Baylor game at the new Dallas Cowboy stadium. Trey's uncle and his friends got us tickets and box seats which was AMAZING!! The stadium was state of the art!

At church in our sunday school class we have been helping with the Operation Christmas child. We fill shoeboxes for various age group boys and girls and then the church has them mailed to underprivelaged kids all over the globe. We had a big breakfast potluck and stuffed 42 boxes! The goal for the class was 20 so we were so excited that all of these children would be blessed this year!

We went Sunday to my mom's neighborhood cookies w/ Santa to have Camden's pictures made. He did not enjoy it like we had hoped... He pretty much had a meltdown. Most of my pics were blurry because he was trying to wiggle out of his lap but there were a few and you can see how much he didn't enjoy it :(

Wedding Day December 3, 2005

Trey and I celebrated our 4th wedding anniversary this week. I am so happy to call Trey my husband and happier today than 4 yrs ago on our wedding day. Also I celebrated my 30th bday last week. I have to admit I had some issues with the big leap out of my twenties, even jokingly wearing all black in mourning of my 20s! But it is a blessing and I am happy with where I am in my life and excited to see what the next 10 years has to bring.

Our Christmas Bulletin Pic (had to tickle Cam to get him to laugh!)

Cam's post bath curly fro!

I want to wish everyone a Merry Christmas and remember to say that and not "Happy Holidays" or "Merry Xmas" it only takes the most important part of the celebration- Christ- out of the equation. So just remember HE is the reason for the season and give thanks for the blessings he has given you throughout the year. Pray for our friends Bethany and Casey who are dealing with a very serious illness in their family. Bethany's dad was diagnosed with stage 3-4 esophageal cancer with mets to the liver last summer and not responding to the chemo/radiation. We know Mr. Bill and love him and are praying for them fervently and hoping for a full recovery.

Fall Fun

So it's hard to believe that Thanksgiving is this week, but it is!! We've been having a great time lately. We went to Audobon Park a few weekends ago and took some family photos with my photographer friend Kim. I am planning on using them for our Christmas cards. My sister, brother and nephew all came to so we could get a family shot for my mom for Christmas (I won't be showing that one so it'll be a surprise :) After that we went around the corner to the Cancer Survivors Park and took some more shots in front of this cool tiled mosaic, a hidden gem in Memphis for sure! Last weekend Trey's uncle Gene and some friends came in from Dallas we went to the Ole Miss game. We had a great time tailgating even though we had to wake up at 5:45 to get down to Oxford in time to have time to go see some friends. Camden and Walker have been having a ball playing. I took them to the Snowden park around the corner from our house and they played so hard. We are currently attempting to sell our home. We went through realtor Larry Webb and we now have it officially listed on MLS. I am excited and nervous at the prospect of moving into a newer bigger home. We are busting at the seams as it is!This weekend we are excited to go to Dallas to see the Red Raiders play!! Trey went toTX Tech and his best friend Chad is coming over as well with his sons and wife. We are so excited to see them! Gene is going to allow us to stay in his lake house and we get to go to the game at the new state of the art stadium and hang out in a box!! We are so blessed to have such great family connections. Pray for safe travels and Camden will cooperate with the long drive its always a challenge.

Happy Halloween - Never Roam Alone!

Travelocity Gnome. Never roam Alone!

Camden loves books, he had our friend Abby read Peter's busy day to him!

Handing out candy

Ready to go trick or treating!

Here are a few pics from the past few weeks. Trey and I went our to Cedar hill Farms in Hernando, MS a few weekends ago and had a blast! They have a real pumpkin patch, hayride, petting zoo and lots of other things for little ones to get into. Camden had a great time. He even made a new friend (a girl) on the hayride and went over to her grandad and just climbed up in his lap! The man was very sweet and let him ride there for a minute, we all got a kick out of it. Last week mom and I went with Cam and Walker's daycare class to the zoo for a field trip. The weather couldn't have been better it was a sunny break from the downpours we had the rest of the week. We had so much fun admiring the fall trees and the new exhibits at the zoo. The Tetkon Trail was amazing! It is a huge log cabin that has an "old faithful" out front and features a huge bear's exhibit as well as elk, wolves, and other northern animals. The boys, mom and I had too much fun I was so glad I didn't work that night and got to enjoy the whole day with them. Last weekend was Halloween of course and Camden went as the Travelocity Gnome. We had come up the idea months ago and I was just going to make the costume, but then we actually found it in a store and he really wore it all night so we were excited!  We went to Jo Jo & Grandad's house and had hotdogs, then went Trick or Treating down our street and they handed out candy to all the neighbors (camden's favorite part) and then had a cookout with some friends. We are looking forward to some traveling soon, Oxford next weekend for the Ole Miss TN game, Dallas after Thanksgiving for the Texas Tech game and then of course our annual Texas trip to see all the great grandparents. Camden is getting more and more advanced. He now knows all of his body parts and is recognizing more things and calling them by name like "cat", "plane" (points up to the sky every time one flys over), and even said "TT" tonight when my sister came over (she is known as aunt "TT). We are having a blast watching him learn and grow!!

Cousins on their field trip

Loving the fall trees at the zoo!!

Made a new friend on the hayride! Ha!

Cam's first hayride!

Before Church

What we've been doing lately...

It's been a while since I've posted mostly because school is alot more time consuming than I thought it would be!! Camden is grown into a full fledged toddler. He is now 16 months old and every bit a boy. He loves his new daycare and now Walker goes there too which is nice and the boys have a blast playing together. They have lots of activities - Fire Safety Day (with real firemen & firetrucks!), a St. Jude Trike a thon (cam rode his push car and raised $75 for St. Jude!), and we have a field trip in 2 weeks to the zoo (I'll be going too). Trey's work had the Anheuser-Busch Clydesdales in town 2 weeks ago and it was a blast! Trey took Camden and Walker to the rodeo and saw the Clydesdales show then on Sunday we went to meet them up close and personal. Camden loved it! We also went to pick out pumpkins. Last weekend was the Ole Miss Alabama game and we braved the rainy cold weather to take Camden to his first tailgate. James & Joan had rented 2 RV's and had a big tailgate setup and we went and saw other friends in the Grove. I had alot of family in town from Alabama and we had a great time visiting with them too. Then this weekend Mom, Walker, Cam & I went to the Litcherman Nature Center to see the scarecrow exhibit it was so cool! There were some hilarious scarecrows. Both boys had fun. Lately we have been getting involved in church more. We joined a young married sunday school class which has some great couples our age and we really love hanging out with them. We had a couple's dinner tonight at the Ruff's house which was nice. Camden's new words are : Hot (he thinks anything that is warm, cold or hot is "Hot", he says "Bye" and somehow has learned "My" (he means it as "Mine" I think this comes from daycare :( and is constantly babbling. He knows where his bellybutton is, ear, and nose and will point to it when asked. He likes to climb -alot, on everything. He is in 18-24 mths clothes. He likes to pretend to talk on the phone. He's been going through a sleeping transition, some nights he will go to bed at 8:45 some we can't get him to sleep at all or he will wake up screaming at 2 am. I think he is teething and he no longer has the passie which I will still give him at night since he has started waking up crying. It's been a rough couple weeks especially on Trey since it always happens the nights I'm at work and they are there alone. Please pray this is a phase!! We are staying busy and have alot of traveling coming up!Here are some pictures from the last few weeks.

Decisions, decisions....

Going to class with "Mrs. Kittie scarecrow"!!

                  

Tin Man scarecrow

You can't have a contest without an Elvis scarecrow!

This one was made of recycled trash

Cece and Camden

Meeting the clydesdales, they were HUGE!

The professional tailgaters

Uncle Trey/Daddy at the rodeo