Thankful

Thankful for this girl!

 



Thankful for this little Indian!



 





We are thankful!  Thankful for our family, our health, our friends, our school...the list goes on and on.  We are so proud of the kids.  Sadie competed in a lamb jackpot a few weekends ago--she walked away with reserve grand champion and champion junior showmanship.  (I even pulled the gooseneck trailer to Happy and back home without incident.)  Sadie competed in UIL last week.  She worked very hard on all of her events.  She was on the second place Art Smart team, 1st place calculator team, and 2nd place listening skills team.  As an individual, she was 2nd in calculator and 4th in listening.

T.S. was very brave and participated in UIL storytelling.  Although he didn't place, we were proud of his effort and commitment.  As you can see, he was an Indian at the annual Thanksgiving feast at school.  Notice "SWAT" on the back of his vest--we are thankful for his creativity. 

Take time to count your blessings.  Happy Thanksgiving from the Bows!

Thanksgiving

We celebrated Thanksmas (early Christmas) and Thanksgiving with family then headed to Aledo for Bow Thanksgiving.  The cousins had a ball building their clubhouse in the woods.  We all enjoyed meeting Evan--I'm sure he was thrilled to be held by all of us for so long.

The Clubhouse has a special sign in desk.

The girls pause for a photo during their grand tour of the clubhouse.

T.S. is definitely smitten with Evan.



Sadie and Evan



Thanksgiving Recap

Here's a recap of our holiday. We were out of school early on Tuesday and enjoyed a day of not much on Wednesday. Wednesday evening we celebrated "Thanksmas" (Christmas the day before Thanksgiving) with the Tireys. The kids enjoyed bouncing in Shipo's barn. They exchanged ornaments and the adults had Chinese Christmas. We celebrated Thanksgiving Thursday with the Tireys and then were on the road to Aledo for more celebration with the Bows. (Sorry, as usual, got to the Tirey shindigs with no camera.)


The weather in Aledo was great. Robby and I went shopping Friday and the kids stayed with their grandparents and had a great afternoon of adventures with some of their cousins. We returned to dirty, tired, excited kids. They had worked all day on their clubhouse in the woods. PaPa has a treasure trove of items for clubhouse building. He let the kids paint, use the cordless drill, hammer all they wanted and drag stuff from all over to outfit the club--The Double C (Cousins Club). Meda and Sadie gave me the grand tour. The kids ended their evening around the firepit with PaPa.


On Saturday, we had the Bow Thanksgiving feast. More cousins were on hand for adventuring and improvements were made to the Double C. Sinks and cooktops were added. The kids had so much fun making their club. Some of the adults enjoyed more shopping and Sadie had a ball being a model so her aunts could get some photography practice in. A highlight for T.S. was "writing on the wall, because you never let us do it." Grandma has a wall that is waiting to be finished, so the grandkids get to draw pictures on it.


We arrived home today to this:

I guess it was our first official snow--we're back to the reality of Panhandle weather.

Halloween 2009

We carved the pumpkins we grew. The walls seemed very thick this year. I chose to carve a white one. The kids were surprised that the inside was orange; it's walls were almost three inches thick and it didn't have much "guts." The kids had fun doing the majority of their carving by themselves.

Sadie was a "good witch"--the hat has been misplaced. T.S. chose to be Spiderman--he didn't care for the mask. We had a fun time trick-or-treating.

Big Night

Last night was a big night. It was the last home football game. Sadie got to cheer in the second quarter since she had participated in the high school cheerleader's mini-cheer camp last spring. Here are some pictures of them practicing before the game--they love "The Cupid Shuffle."

At halftime, they announced the winners of Punt, Pass and Kick. T.S. placed second in the Kindergarten division.

We were very proud of both kids last night.

Fall Fun

C.W. came home with us after school today. Sadie, T.S. and C.W. enjoyed picking our "big" pumpkins (they aren't very big, though, because the gardener didn't water them like she should have).

The kids enjoyed counting the little pumpkins that I picked this weekend. Sadie was the official counter as the boys attempted to drop them in and count. The final tally was 77 little pumpkins, 17 white pumpkins and 27 orange pumpkins. The only question now is where to put them. I'm pretty sure that Annie will drag them all over the yard since she is such a helpful puppy these days.

Thanksgiving Turkeys

Aunt Jen found a really cool way to decorate cupcakes to look like turkeys. The kids had a ball and the neat thing was that every turkey in our flock was unique.

More from the Gaylord Texan

Gaylord Texan Resort at Christmas

We took the kids over to meander through the atrium at the Gaylord Texan, check out the decorations and have a treat. The kids really liked looking for fish in the "river" that runs through it. They enjoyed the koi and even saw a catfish (we think). T.S. really liked all of the different trains...I didn't seem to get a picture of them.
Robby and Randy took a moment to pose with the "ice girl" directing you to the ICE! exhibit.

The gingerbread house was pretty cool. We were all amazed at the list of ingredients. Beside the gingerbread house was a very large (and fake, but very realistic) oak tree. It was funny listening to people try and decide if it was real. We saw Santa Claus from a distance and also checked in on one of his reindeer. The lights outside were really neat. It was a great afternoon/evening of just hanging out with the family. Thanks Hico Bows for planning the outing! We're ready for our next grand adventure!