Thanksgiving in Arkansas

We have spent the past several years at our house for Thanksgiving, but this year, we decided to join my family for the holiday.  It is the first holiday that we have spent with my side of the family since Christmas of 2009...almost 3 years!

First, we have Brady's Thanksgiving project.  He was supposed to disguise his turkey so that the farmer wouldn't find him.  Brady made his a rainbow and see the glitter all round him?  That is the aura of God surrounding the turkey and protecting him.  Sweet Brady.

My brother, DJ, and his wife, Holly and their 3 kids moved out to Rosebud, Arkansas, about 20 minutes away from Searcy.  They live out on 10 acres of land and have 2 dogs and 2 cats and lots of room for running and playing.  We have very little room here in the city, so the boys loved having all that space and eventually they even warmed up to the animals.

Brady found he was great at climbing trees!  

The boys liked the little dog better than the big one.  They really enjoyed playing with him!

 

Grams experienced congestive heart failure the Friday before Thanksgiving, so we all hurried up to see her and God healed her!  We were told that she "might not make it through the night" and instead, she was out of the hospital in a couple of days and even came to Rosebud to eat Thanksgiving dinner!

Rachel's grandmother, Grams (Dorothy Elizabeth Otis Jones) 89 years old, with DJ's family.  DJ, Tyler, Holly in back, Katie, Grams, Haley up front.

Bill, Major, Rachel in back.  Brady, Grams, Eli up front.

Major with his great-grandmother, Grams

Grams with her 3 Belcher grandchildren: DJ, Rachel (me), and James

Bill and I both graduated from Harding University in Searcy, AR and twice we were able to go to Harding's campus and play with the boys on the front lawn.  Here are some photos of Brady, Eli, and Bill playing football!

 

Our family on one of the swings: Eli, Bill holding Major, Me (Rachel) holding Brady

 Papa (Don Belcher) feeding Major an ice cream cone at Chick Fil A

Sweet cousins having a great time together!  Eventually, they even fell asleep.  Here are Brady and Katie

Haley and Eli

My mom and dad (Don and Pam Belcher) had to go back to work on Thanksgiving Day, so we celebrated Thanksgiving on Wednesday.  Here are Brady and Eli waiting for our Turkey Bowl before dinner!

We sent the kids on a scavenger hunt to pass some of the time before the Turkey Bowl.  Here are Brady, Haley, Eli, and Katie

Turkey Bowl time! Papa was all-time quarterback.  One team was me, DJ, Katie and Haley.  The other team was Eli, Brady, Bill, and James.  Here is the first play of the game!

 

The game ended in a tie: 14-14.  Here are the proud Turkey Bowlers!  James, Bill, Rachel, DJ, Papa (back row) Eli and Haley (center) Katie and Brady (bottom row)

Grams with James and my mom (Pam Belcher, AKA Nana)

Thanksgiving dinner...on the floor!  Haley, Brady, Katie, Eli

Someone in this family has to have the role of Grams and take pictures of people while they are eating.  I guess that person is me! :)  My mom and dad (Pam and Don Belcher) with Grams and my Aunt Maurine and Uncle Buddy.  (Uncle Buddy is my mom's brother)  DJ is in the background in the recliner

Tyler in the high chair and Bill in the other seat with the kids sitting in the floor.

Major in his booster seat

Tyler Kyle Belcher

Nana getting Tyler

DJ's family: Holly, DJ, Haley, Katie, Tyler, with Grams

My family with Grams: Bill, Major, Rachel, Brady, Grams, Eli

Six great-grandchildren! Brady, Eli, Grams, Major, Katie, Haley, Tyler

James, Rachel, DJ with Grams

 Nana and Papa with their 6 grandchildren: Haley, Nana, Major, Papa, Tyler, Eli, Katie, and Brady

 The Belchers: DJ, Rachel, James, Mom and Dad

 Poor Brady had all the fun he could take at his cousins' house!  He fell asleep on Eli on the way home.

 Happy Major!

Halloween 2012

I'm so sad...yet again, there are not very many trick or treating pictures.  I would have taken pictures, even if they were bad, but after the first picture I took, the camera ran out of batteries so it was all over for me.  Then I tried to take some with my new phone, but it got real dark real fast, so that was a no-go also.  Sigh.  Oh well, I still have some pictures.

This year, I took the boys trick or treating in another neighborhood in Sugar Land called Greatwood.  We went with Shelley Gowens and Rebecca Pace and all their kids.  Total there were 11!  It was crazy and completely insane, but a very good time and the kids loved playing with each other!

 

This first picture is one I tried to get of Major.  He moves fast, but is still very cute! :)

Trying to get a picture of the boys in front of Shelley's house.  This time, Brady was a Texans football player.  His mummy costume kept falling off, so we improvised.

After trick or treating, we went to Big Daddy and Gran Betty's house to show the kids off to their grandparents.  I also used Big Daddy's camera and was able to get a couple of pictures of the kids.  Here is my little sock monkey...held in place by his father. :)

My sweet trick or treaters!  So tired and so ready to have some candy!

 

 The following pictures are some I tried to get with my phone.  This one is of Eli and Brady trick or treating.  Maybe you can see the bag in Eli's hand.  My mom made those for DJ, Jamie, and myself when we were young.  I have another one for Brady, but he said it was too heavy, so we used a pumpkin.

 Here we are trying to get a picture of all the kids...starting on the left...Alex Pace (army man-holding a gun) then the blurry kid with his back to us is Hudson, Shelley's nephew, then there is my cow-dog Eli, then Jack Gowens as Darth Mahl from Star Wars, then Major in the wagon, then Brady as my Texan, then Zachary Pace as spiderman, then Kate Gowens as Catwoman, then Allison Pace on the very bottom as Little Red Riding Hood.  Brady, Kate, and Zach are in pre-k together, and Jack and Eli are in 1st grade together.  They have been in the same classes together since we moved here when Eli was 18 months old.  Very cool.

 My friend, Rebecca Pace, holding down Major so I could get a picture of all 3 boys before we left for trick or treating.

Brady on Halloween right after school...ready for the night!

Our last stop of the night (before Big Daddy and Gran Betty) was to stop at Brady, Zach, and Kate's teacher's house.  Mrs. Drake also had Jack and Eli when they were 4.  Here they are sitting on her couch.  Allison Pace, Alex Pace, Eli, Kate Gowens, Brady, Major, Zach Pace, and Jack Gowens.

The kids got a ton of candy...and mommy and daddy got their chocolate candy tax!  We are all happy!  Happy Halloween!

Pumpkin Patch Party and Carving Spookley

It seems that the incredible difficulty getting pictures of the boys is going to continue as long as Major refuses to cooperate.  So for the church's Pumpkin Patch Party, I only have 2 pictures.  That makes me very sad, but the boys had a great time!

Eli is "Hank the Cow Dog", Brady is a mummy, and Major is a sock monkey.  Here they are right before they went into Pumpkin Patch Party...and then there were no more pictures.  Plus it is really hard to keep up with all 3 of them by myself.  But they had a good time, and there was lots of candy!

Tuesday night, October 30th, we had our traditional pumpkin carving the night before Halloween.  The boys got to stay up late since Daddy gets home late.  Daddy is a master craftsman when it comes to carving pumpkins. :)

 

Eli has really gotten good at sticking his hands in there and pulling the seeds out.  Brady, however, is still a little squeamish at pumpkin pulp.

Finished product...meet Spookley!

Rachel's 33rd Birthday

I am blessed with the sweetest family in the world.  My mom flew all the way to Houston from South Carolina, my husband got me one of the coolest presents EVER, and my boys said "Happy Birthday" all day long and tried to make it where I did nothing and they did everything.  They were so sweet.  It was a really, really good 33rd birthday.  It started off with my friends, Rebecca Pace, Shelley Gowens, and Stephanie Pace taking me out to breakfast at Le Madeline's.  Then Bill took some time off of work and met me at the Cheesecake Factory for lunch.  Then my boys took me out for pizza at Grimaldi's for dinner.  (They had a coupon for a free one, it was so cute.)  Then we went to church and there was Reese's Peanut Butter Cup ice cream cake for dessert and presents!  My sweet parents gave me a couple of outfits as well as a really nice watch along with my mom flying here.  (And I got a purple purse from them for my anniversary.  I still had the gift card, so I spent it on my birthday.  One extra gift, yay!)  Then Bill got me an iPhone 4s (see picture of it below).  It is so awesome.  I can speak to it and it will turn my spoken word into a text and I can speak to "Siri" on the phone and she will find whatever it was I was looking for.  The boys got me a gift card to buy games and stuff for my new phone.  It is so cool!  I love it!

 Eli and Brady with me having some cake.  (Major was already in bed and asleep.)

Here are the boys' new CCA jackets for school.  They are so cute!

A picture of my new iPhone 4s.  Of course, I can't take a picture of my own phone, so I got this one off of the internet.  But this is what it looks like.  I had a really great birthday.  October 25th was a really sad day for me.  All the great things were over!  It is hard to go back to normal after a birthday like that. :)

Nana Comes and Major's 1st Haircut

For my birthday this year, my sweet father sent my mother to spend a week with us!  It was so great to have her here.  In usual Nana fashion, she brought things for the boys to do...here are Eli and Brady putting together their haunted houses.

My mom and I got to do lots of fun things while she was here.  We went out to lunch, we went shopping, and it was just so nice to have someone around to talk to, do things with, and another set of hands to help around the house!  Bill is a wonderful father and husband, but during football season he is extremely busy and usually leaves before we get up in the morning and returns after everyone is in bed.  He does this for over 3 months of the year.  It was wonderful to have another adult to talk to! 

 

One of the things my mom and I did was to cut Major's hair!  At 15 months old it was finally time.  Sadly, I forgot to take a before shot, but I got plenty of after pictures.  He had some long curls which are now in a plastic bag in the baby book. :)  Now he looks like such a big boy!

Here is Nana with a happy Major.

After we got done cutting his hair, he started using the comb as a remote control!  It was so cute!  He would aim the comb from many different positions to turn the TV on.  I was standing by the TV and would turn it on from the TV set and he was just so proud of himself.  Then I'd turn it off and he'd find a new position to turn the TV on.  Here are a few of Major's attempts at turning on the TV with his remote control comb.

This last one is my personal favorite... "Abracadabra...TV, turn on!"