Dauphin Thanksgiving

 Thanksgiving Gabriel's dad rented a plantation house to have dinner because it is a little tight in the house. It was a super nice place of course with an industrial kitchen and lots of space to run around!

 Room to shoot guns

Fun wagon rides

And a good game of softball

Plenty of room to spread out and eat...

 The kitchen had lots of things to play with...Brigitte really loved her Uncle Duane!

Official taste tester!

 Just some interesting games we played!

 Us with Gabriel's sister Sarah on the far left and his nieces Savannah and Katie and nephew David.

Took a little love to get Violet to like Uncle Denny but he did get to her to like him. He just had to squeeze her extra tight!

Fun in Georgia!

So in our week long trip we got to do plenty of stuff. Sadly not sure how this happened but we didn't get any pictures with grandma or grandpa! Brigitte had a really hard time understanding that she has two grandma's and grandpa's. She really didn't understand until a good day or two after we got there. She is still talking about Betty Boop and the piano at grandma's house and all the "guys" as she calls them (her cousins and uncles) at grandpa's!

First stop that we always have to make is to Gabriel's sisters shop to get our hair cuts. The girls were not excited about this at all!!! Violet had to sit on my lap with a sucker and Brigitte just sat very still and wouldn't talk until she got out of the chair! I got my hair hi-lighted and Gabriel finally didn't have to cut his own hair for once!

We also spent a little time downtown. Moultrie has some pretty nice decorates and Brigitte of course likes anything Christmas. It is always fun to me to hear Gabriel show and tell me about things he did while he lived there!

Brigitte had so much fun with her cousins! She has never been around them but once she meet them she never wanted to leave them. The girl cousins are much older but of course just like any little girl she loved playing with them and then the ones that her are her age are boys which Brigitte loves playing with little boys better than girls!

 Riding grandpa's tractor and kind of helping...

 This is my favorite picture! Brigitte just adored Katie! We told her she could come live with us anytime!

This trip is also the first time I have ever met Gabriel's oldest brother and his family! After 6 1/2 years of marriage I have finally met all 7 siblings. And of course Denny is just another goofy Dauphin boy just like the rest of them! :D

Run with the husband

I accomplished many things with this run! 1. I kept up with my husband!!! 2. Ran in the rain 3. Didn't have to worry about a babysitter! It was really fun to run with him and wish we could do it more often. Please family come move closer!!! Of course I haven't ran since this so I better get on it!

Probably Gabriel's favorite was getting to go on his first hunting trip. They went quail hunting at a plantation near by! Plenty of stories to be told from this adventure. They said it was cold but of course it was fun!

 Austin's turn

Duane helping David

 

Traveling to Georgia

We had decided early on in the year that we would be spending Thanksgiving with part of Gabriel's family in Georgia. However I never concerned how long that drive would be! 20 hours of driving! Come the night before we left I was anxious, exited, and worried about the trip! I always get anxious before any trip and wake up super early....this trip I woke up at 3:45 am and didn't sleep until well after 11 pm and then jumped in the van at 4 am!

I must say I am getting pretty good at finding deals and such besides the fact that I am cheap I am a deal hunter. Anyway I must brag because we ended up getting our rental van for free!!! We had some major hail damage to my car and decided that we finally need to fix it. So while it was getting fixed we just happened to be traveling to Georgia! My car was only going to take 3 days to fix but we were going to be gone 10 but the nice guys at the shop said oh we can just tell the insurance we need it for 10 days! So bam free rental because insurance was paying for it. Oh and I didn't have to pay a deductiable because the shop takes care of the deductables on hair damage cars! Double bam! Alright enough of my bragging onto the fun stuff.

So as stated before we left at 4am thinking that it would be easier to just pull the girls from bed and then they would fall back asleep. Well both girls were pretty excited. 1. because we were going on a trip and 2. Our rental had a DVD player in it. So they didn't fall asleep for awhile but they were entertained by the "new" DVDs I got at the library.

Of course I looked up all kinds of blogs giving suggestions about what to do/bring on a long road trip. The most helpful besides the DVD player in the car was cookie sheets! The girls could basically play with any toy! Brilliant idea! I did go to Target and bought a bunch of little $1 toys too. So every hour or so they got a "new" toy.

We were trying to make the trip a little more fun by finding cool places to stop but between Hutch and Moultrie there really isn't much beside Memphis and even there there wasn't much kid friendly things. We did however find a really neat restaurant that was perfect!

It was a resturant inside an old Southwest plane. It was also perfect becuase the girls could run around and let some energy out!

Brigitte is really into airplanes right now so it was perfect! She was so excited. She was a little nervous about the cockpit but we just made her take a few pictures! Violet loved running up and down the aisles! Hopefully she won't we doing that in January when we are on a real plane! :S

 

The restaurant is actually at a small airport so we even got to see a plane kind of take off. He drove around a building and we didn't get to see him lift off but we saw him in the sky. Brigitte thought it was funny that they put their two dogs in the airplane too! The restaurant is in Walnut Ridge, Arkansas so if you are ever close by it is so fun!

Boo!

This year is going by so fast I can't believe we have already past Halloween! Brigitte had fun trick or treating. I was really surprised that she remembered what we do for Halloween but she quickly reminded me in Septermber when she saw a Party City commercial on TV. She has been asking when she gets to go ever since!

 

She was a lot more shy this time around. Last year she was saying trick or treat at every house. This time she was just more worried about the candy I guess.

 

From the Trunk or Treat a church....

 Brigitte and Jazzy!

 Halloween Night:

My poor small baby....Violet's costume didn't exactly fit because she is so small I had to get her size 6 month costume and the legs weren't long enough! She got very cold! She also quickly learned about candy and got upset she didn't go up on every porch!

 Walking like a cowgirl...

Violet finally gets some!

 Brigitte always wanted to me the only kid on the porch...not sure if she was scared or what but this is her waiting for kids to get off the porch!

 Ye-haw!

She was sooo excited when I actually let her bring her horse. I bought her a different/smaller horse but she wanted to bring this "homemade" one instead. She would hit people because the back end is way to long! This is what happens when you have a hat that doesn't fit and you go galloping to the next house. She would just stop where ever until I fixed it! Usually in the middle of he road!!! ERRR

This was probably Violet's favorite part of the night! We made it to the Knapp's house (friends from church) and Violet was in love with this thing! Plus it was warm inside so that probably helped!



My first 5K

Gabriel and I's very first Thanksgving together he ran a 5K and said the next time I run one you are going to do it with me! I laughed in his face! I have never been a runner but always wanted to be.

 

So after I had Violet I was determined to loose all my baby weight that I kept on from Brigitte and her by Christmas. We have a treadmill but like I said I wasn't a runner and just usually walking and kind of jogging. So I did successfully loose that extra baby weight and in the process began to like running. So in the spring I decedided to start training for a 5K with the couch to 5K app. Well I made it to about week 4 or 5 and then summer got in the way.

 

Violet turned one and I had lost all the weight but wasn't liking how I looked. Ya know having babies your body tends to shift in places that no one warned me about! So I said the only way I will stick to training is if I actually sign up to do it and pay for it! So I signed up to do one in November later to learn that Gabriel would be in Peru during that time and he refused not to be there for my first 5K! Like I said this is a big deal to him as well because he also thought this would never happen. So I had already paid for it but found another one 2 weeks before it and signed up!

 

The week before the race I thought I better start running outside to see how my "training" was doing on a tredmill compared to really running. I quickly learned I run so much better outside!!! It was so refreshing! I couldn't believe it. I now understand why people run outside to clear their head! It really works. Of course I was training still and the only thing I could keep thinking about was not dying! ha

 

So last Saturday was the big day!

I didn't run the whole thing but most of it! My goal was to finish in 35 minutes but finished in 36:20. My goal for my November race is 34.
 

I love running outside now. Needless to say I really am going to hate daylight savings because I will only get to run outside on the weekends. Gabriel leaves before dark and it will be dark when he returns as well and I can't run with a stroller yet so the treadmill it will be! 

Fair Time!

We live in the town that holds the state fair! So every year of course we go a few times. Gabriel always gets a few free tickets and then Monday night is free if you have a Dillons Plus Card. This year we went 3 times!!! The first time we went was Saturday while my parents were here. On Monday just Gabriel and I went for our annual "fair date." Then Thursday I braved it alone with the girls since daddy was gone on a business trip. They aren't kidding when they say time flies when you are having fun because we were there 7 1/2 hours!!!

 My baby girls love horses so the fair was just a dream come true! We even splurged and paid $5 for her to ride a little pony! It was worth every penny to see her face light up like that!

 We got to meet a cowboy!

 Fair corn!! Expensive but oh so good!

We stopped by the arena and there was a few horse going around. Violet was so excited. We even had a girl come over and let us pet her horse. Violet wanted nothing to do with it. She wanted to watch the "moving" ones. Brigitte loved it though. She kept asking when she would get to ride Twister...who was the horse.
Here are all the pictures from our girls day out at the fair:

Our first stop...miniature horse pull! Violet was mesmerized my the "moving" horses again!

 Brigitte also enjoyed it. She liked copying the sounds they said. They were really enjoying it I think we actually said for about 40 minutes! They were some pretty strong horses!

 

 Then there was the HUGE new Robot. Brigitte was scared of him but Violet liked him.

 Baby pigs in the birthing center! There were also 2 babies calves and a baby lamb!

 Train ride

 

 Brigitte loved the rides.... we didn't get too many pictures because Violet was not happy she couldn't ride!

We arrived at 1:30 and left at 9:30 she was so tired!!!