November 2013

Ahhhhh......November...I really love November! Especially here in Pennsylvania. It is the perfect temperature for nearly the entire month. The leaves are beautiful....and for more than one day! The beauty lasts for almost 2 solid months here! We absolutely loved our first East-coast fall!

At LucyMae's school carnival in September, I used 5 tickets to enter the raffle to win a basket. There were different options like a craft basket, or a ski-package basket, or toys basket, etc. Some, like the ski-package basket, had TONS of tickets in them b/c everyone wanted to win those! I figured I'd increase our odds and go for a couple that weren't quite as "desirable"....and we won the "Culture Basket". LucyMae brought a huge basket home the next day, which included 4 tickets to Morris Arboretum, tickets to an art museum, tickets to a play, and some other fun things....but we sure enjoyed the arboretum tickets in November! The Philadelphia area is actually the horticulture capital of the country! We have gal in our ward who is a horticulturist. There are tons of arboretums here - and this one was/is amazing! The pictures speak for themselves...

 And the rest of November was pretty much filled with the usual busyness of life....school, Joy School, teaching violin lessons, work and more work for Sam, Symphony rehearsals, fulfilling our callings, etc., etc. And James getting really tired on Sundays...isn't he a cutie?

 We have thoroughly enjoyed the MASSIVE amount of leaves that fall in our yard. It makes for a GREAT jumping pile....and a lot of work to clean up too:)

 And then, we were lucky enough to get Brittani and her kids to come visit us for Thanksgiving, before they made their cross-country move to California. We met them in DC the weekend before Thanksgiving. The Friday night we got there, it had been a very warm day....but a major cold-front moved in that night...we could literally feel the temperature dropping about a degree every few minutes. Brittani was nice enough to watch all her kids and all our kids the next morning while Sam and I attended an early temple session. THANK YOU BRITTANI! And then we had some fun seeing some sights in DC. We toured the capitol building, and had fun at the Air and Space Museum. Britt did a little more with her kids, but our kids aren't quite as into that history stuff yet:)

 Aaron joined us for Thanksgiving, arriving the day before Thanksgiving I think...? But on Thanksgiving we went to our ward's turkey bowl game, hosted by a family that has an amazing and gorgeous property. Yummy breakfast and lots of running around to stay warm. It got SUPER cold on Thanksgiving (this is all relative....it doesn't even compare to South Dakota temps).

 We did a lot of hanging out inside with the kids to stay warm....Addie and Sera are such great cousins to these little girls:)

 And the football game was on...Theo is in the red, and Sam in the gray jacket...

 And I completely failed to get any other pictures of our fun with Brittani and Aaron and kids! DANG IT!!! We had a wonderful spread for our Thanksgiving feast. A rousing game of scrabble. Wonderful pies for dessert, and a lovely musical concert to round off the evening with the kids:)

And we always to get to finish of November with a bang! Samantha turned 4 this year! Why do these kids grow up so fast!? LucyMae was so excited to make a hat for Samantha for her birthday present. I helped a little bit, but she was able to do most of it on the hat-looms. And we decorate for Christmas on her birthday too...she thought that was AWESOME!

 And when the camera comes out, you can't get a normal smile out of this girl if you offer her the world.....she's just our little Samantha:)

 Sam likes to imitate her from time to time....

 The balloons from dad are always a big hit for birthdays. And a nice pumpkin-spice cake for her birthday cake was delicious! A simple, perfect birthday for a 4-year-old:) I think she deserves a party this year though...