Sweet Home Alabama Thanksgiving

What a wonderful treat--Hallie and I flew into Birmingham *early* on the Saturday before Thanksgiving!  We were very thankful to be spending some extra time with the family during our break.  Jonathan joined us Wednesday morning.  We had a lot of fun visiting and relaxing.  Several days were dreary, but Thanksgiving day was beautiful!  We enjoyed some delicious food (too much of it!), played outside, and then Jonathan and I went to see a movie with my brother and his wife while the little girls played with Nonna and Pop.  After the movie, Jessica (my SIL) and I talked Jonathan into heading to Target to try to get some Black Friday deals.  We thought they opened at 9:00...nope.  Midnight.  We weren't going to stand in line, so we went on to Wal-Mart.  Talk about cray-zee!  Oh.  My.  Word.  Seriously...it was a madhouse.  Even if we had found anything to buy, the check-out lines were so long...we'd have been 3 hours getting out of there!  So we opted to just head home.  I have never been Black Friday shopping...or "pre" Black Friday shopping.  The experience (as short as it was) was quite interesting to say the least.  Next year I just might join the crazies. :o)

The feast!  Yummy!  It was my intention to get a picture with all the guests.  Alas, I failed.

Jessica and I tried snapping some pictures of the girls after lunch.  I hope her pictures are better because this is what Hallie was doing in most of the ones I tried to take of her!  Ha!

Cheesing for Aunt Jessica

Ah...she can smile for me. :o)  Sweet girl!

Sweet Abby Brooke

Hattie Grace giving me a big smile.

Sweet girls

Love them!

iPhone Thanksgiving

Daddy & Hal ... Hallie on the plane
  

Hallie & "Trunki"  ...  Hallie at the outlets
  

Hallie & Nora  ...  Love my Steph!
  

Hallie was promised a pedicure when we got to Alabama...sweet HG couldn't get one because she's allergic to the lotions they use.  We tried to get her to get a manicure--she had picked our her fingernail polish and everything and then wouldn't have it done.
  

Abby  ...  Hallie & HG in the "Kids Cart" at Wal-Mart.  That thing was CRAZY to drive!
  

Love my Mandi!  ... Cailin and Hallie
  

Abby & Hal watching the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade  ...  Three tired girls after a long train ride.
  

Nonna, Pop, & Hal    ...  Hallie sleeping on the way back to Texas.

 

The weekend from...well...

Oh my word.  Last weekend (Nov 4-6) was quite possibly the worst weekend of 2011.  There were so many factors that went into it...school, students, my health, Hallie was sick...and then the cherry on top of all cherries on top, Jonathan ended up in the hospital.  (He'll probably be mad that I'm posting this...)  He started feeling a little uneasy--his heart was beating rapidly and then it was hardly beating at all.  So he went to Urgent Care.  They sent him to the ER (but not before getting their $75 co-pay).  We spent Saturday afternoon/evening in the ER...figured out that he had atrial fibrillation...he got lots of meds, shots, and more meds...and then he was admitted to a "real room" around 8:00 or so.  He was not happy about this, but the cardiologist wouldn't release him until he converted (until his heart rate was back to normal...it was all over the place--120, then 70). I stayed with him until almost midnight and then came home to stay with Hallie (who had been staying with Jonathan's mom).  Then Sunday morning I got up and took Hallie to Gramps's and RahRah's and headed back to the hospital.  Around 5:30 am Jonathan "converted".  He was thankful that he'd be released...he felt OK and really just wanted to go home.  We were both thankful that he was going to be OK!  On Monday I had doctor's appointments...and as it turned out, no substitute picked up the job.  So my class had several different people in and out of my classroom all day.  So frustrating!  Nonetheless, I enjoyed lunch with Hallie and then met up with Jonathan in between my doctor's appointments (and trying to get my driver's license renewed).

Like I said.  Not a fun weekend.

So...at the end of that week (which was this past Friday), Jonathan and I decided that our sweet little family needed a little pampering.  Hallie had stopped biting her fingernails...and that deserved a manicure (she didn't even know what that was when I said, "If you stop biting your fingernails, you can get a manicure.").  She was thrilled that she was having her special day!  Daddy and I were thrilled that we decided to both get pedicures to relieve a little bit of the stress we had gone through last weekend and last week.

While Mommy and Daddy got pampered, Hallie was treated like a princess. The ladies at the nail salon were so sweet to Hallie!  She sat in a massage chair beside us and just relaxed.  She wanted her feet rubbed, too...but there weren't any kid chairs there and her feet wouldn't have reached into the little tub.  So she settled on getting her "fingertoes" painted, too. :o)

The little sweetie pie leaving the salon...the sweet ladies cut some of the pedicure flip-flops for her so they'd fit her little feet.  Hallie was so proud. :o)

Pink polka dotted fingernails and rainbow "fingertoes". :o)

Love my girl!

KoKo

 Two weeks ago, Hallie had homework.  They were studying Native Americans...so for show-and-tell they had to make an Indian headdress.  Also...all the cute little preschoolers had been given Indian names of their own.  Hallie was KoKo.  Fit her to a T!  Ha!  Hal and I went to Michael's to do a little headdress shopping when I realized I didn't have *any* of the things Hallie wanted for her special task.  This turned out to be one fairly expensive headdress!  She had so much fun making it...lots of concentration on her part to get it just right.  Daddy helped Hallie make her headdress just perfect. :o)

Fixing the front...Hallie placed all the jewels in just the right spot and made a jeweled "H" on the very front with her flower. :o)  She makes me smile.

Halloween Recap (slightly late)

 Hallie had a super fun Halloween evening...er, "Hallie-ween" evening. :o)  As mentioned in the previous post, it was a very busy day.  And you can tell by the look on her face in the last pictures that she was super tired by the time we left our church's fall festival.  It was a fun evening, though we decided that next year we'll go to the fall festival the last hour it's "open" because there were just way too many people there when we got there on time (see what happens when we get places on time...we should have stuck to our usual lateness!  lol).

Hallie's sweet little ballet/tap class.  Her sweet friend, Ivy, is the mermaid to her left.  Her other sweet little friends didn't make it to class.

Daddy and Strawberry...such cuties. :o)

The hayride!

Hallie stood in line for a long time to ride the mechanical bull.  She *loved* it!  She is so full of adventure, and this was right up her alley.  Cute little cowgirl!

And the last game of the evening...a little Putt-Putt.  She was pretty good!

Mommy & a tired Strawberry Shortcake

Hal & RahRah

A Strawberry Cutie Pie Preview

Tomorrow will be a super busy day.  School, then ballet/tap,grab a quick bite to eat, do a quick trick-or-treat at two houses in our neighborhood and then head to church for the Fall Festival.  Whew!  I'm already tired and it's just Sunday night.  Ha!  Hallie finally tried on her costume today (she was sick last week when it arrived...so sick that she didn't even want to try it on!  Yikes!).  I decided to snap a few posed pictures of this sweet little thing in case I didn't get to tomorrow (well, I'll get "action photos" tomorrow--lol).  I've gotta say...she makes a pretty stinking cute Strawberry Shortcake! :o)  We even bought some Bath & Body Works spray today so she'll smell Strawberry Shortcake sweet!  She's super excited about that!

Can you tell who the real Strawberry is?! :o)

 

 Look at those freckles! :o)

Hallie had to put freckles on me...and take my picture.

I'm not going to lie--when I later looked in the mirror (having forgotten that she dressed me with freckles), I nearly screamed for Jonathan to come see what was wrong with me!  LOL!

(Side note: Hallie totally posed me--lol.  Oh, and this picture does sport my new haircut that I got today.)

Nonna Box!

A Nonna Box was just what Hallie needed after three days of feeling extremely under the weather!  She has been suffering from a pretty icky inner ear infection that has finally taken a turn for the better.  We took her to the doctor Wednesday afternoon, started meds (or triied to) Wednesday night, and then Hallie stayed home Thursday (and slept the entire day) and Friday (rested).  

The Nonna Box arrived Thursday afternoon and Hallie waited until I got home from school to break into the cardboard goodness!  She was so excited to open it.  I know it made her feel better. :o)  There was even a little treat (OK, two new pair of pants) for Mommy tucked inside. 

Thanks, Nonna!!  We *love* You!

No Words for This Cute Face!