Moving on, here’s what we were up to during the month of November. We had some nice weather this month, so we spent a good bit of time outside. The girls were in school 5 days/week for most of the month (pre-Thanksgiving). It was a good month overall…here’s the recap:
After all of our Halloween festivities had passed, we were left with tons and tons of candy. It was funny to watch Abigail trying to eat a pixy stick. She kept sucking on the stick, which prevented the powder from coming out. Kind of a complicated candy for a 3 year old to figure out.
Sarah snapped this picture of some of our girls (minus Lucy and Abigail) on the way home from school that afternoon. I thought it turned out cute!
Brooklyn had art class after school, so we hurried home and got a quick snack before heading that way. It worked out nicely that I could take Brooklyn by herself and leave the other girls at home since Travis is working from home right now.
When we got home, Savannah and Abigail surprised us with their dress up clothes on :) Brooklyn and Savannah have really bonded during the pandemic, so it’s been good for Abigail to have some one-on-one time with Savannah while Brooklyn is at art.
Tuesday, November 3rd was Election Day! In 2016, I had to take 2 kids with me when I voted, so this was much easier only having to take one. Because of social distancing, the line stretched all the way outside and around the back of the building. Thankfully, it moved pretty quickly.
I don’t know if you can see the people lined up outside, but Abigail and I stood in a line that looked like that when we got there. I was afraid it would take hours, but I think we were actually in and out in 45 minutes.
Luckily, I packed Abigail some snacks and toys/activities to do in the stroller, and she was really well behaved.
She was pretty proud of her sticker afterward too ;)
We celebrated our successful morning with a scooter ride after lunch. Abigail brought Brooklyn’s baby doll along too.
Then she fell asleep on top of the doll during her nap…haha
One of the ladies from church shared this during a Zoom bible study that evening, and I thought it was really good advice to remember…
Abigail and I went to Sam’s on November 4th, and I was SO excited to finally find Member’s Mark toilet paper and paper towels…haha. I felt like a kid in a candy store ;) It was literally the first time I’d seen it in stock since the pandemic started. Crazy what makes your day when you are 34 years old and living through your first pandemic!
I love to see my girls wave to me as they get out of the car for school in the mornings :)
I think this started sometime last school year, but the girls love hiding behind this rock edging and popping out to “surprise” us as we walk up the sidewalk into the neighborhood. They love to jump out and shout “BOO!”
We had family pictures scheduled for November 7th with Cici and the family, and there’s nothing like some last minute shopping the night before to round out the outfits we needed to wear. Luckily, Old Navy had a gray shirt that was perfect for Savannah.
We also discovered that Old Navy sells fleece-lined leggings that are very similar to the ones at Target. These are Brooklyn’s favorite pants to wear in the winter!
The pictures were in Cullman on Saturday afternoon. The weather was pretty overcast and a little rainy, but thankfully we were able to get the session done. Hopefully I will be able to make a new post with all the pictures from that day soon.
Abigail was looking so cute on the way home from church the next day :)
On November 9th, we met Alisha, Luke, and Barrett at Creekwood Park to let the kids play for a bit. It was a nice morning outside.
I’m pretty sure this was Carter’s first day of school IN PERSON (whoop whoop!). He was virtual for the first 9 weeks of school, and then he had to stay home a little longer due to possible covid exposure. When Brooklyn started kindergarten a couple of years ago, I took Savannah and Abigail over to Alisha’s so we wouldn’t be at home feeling sad with it being so quiet and weird. So this was our way to return the favor now that Carter was going to school for the first time. However, I think by this point in the school year, Alisha was so happy to be done with virtual school that she wasn’t even tempted to cry…haha
Abigail really enjoyed playing with her cousins…
I’m so thankful that the girls have cousins that are so close in age. Definitely a blessing!
Brooklyn made this for her art teacher and gave it to her that afternoon…
She also wrote this letter to Santa. Guess she was getting a head start on things :) It said: “Dear Santa, I am Brooklyn. I am seven years old. I think you’re the best ever! I know your elves have been watching. I know I have problems with name calling. I am working on that. I have not been perfect, but I have been good. Love, Brooklyn.
I loved her honesty! :)
And here was Brooklyn’s Christmas list for Santa :)
We walked to school on November 10th. It was still shorts and t-shirt weather at this point, so why not? ;)
When the girls got home from school that afternoon, they had a big surprise waiting for them. John and his son were out in our backyard putting together our new playset! We had ordered it several months before, but it turns out that everybody and their brother buys a swingset during a pandemic, so it took a while for ours to come in.
The girls were so excited and couldn’t wait for it to be finished. They even drew some thank you pictures for John and his son. It was dark already by the time they finished putting it all together, but that didn’t stop the girls from getting out there as soon as they could to test everything out.
It worked out nicely that the next day was Veteran’s Day, and there was no school that day. The girls were outside by 8:15 AM ready to play some more :)
This swingset is almost identical to the one we had at our old house. We were excited that it actually fit in our tiny backyard!
One difference in this swingset is that we opted to go with a basket swing instead of a tire swing underneath the deck area. So far, it has been a huge hit, and it doesn’t hold water like a tire swing does. The kids LOVE it, and I’ve even caught Brooklyn and Savannah curled up in it reading a book.
Brooklyn couldn’t wait to do some tricks on the trapeze bar!
I enjoyed sitting at the patio table and watching the girls have fun. It’s hard to believe our backyard used to be mostly concrete and gravel!
We had to take a break from playing outside after a while for the girls to go to their dentist appointment. Two big things happened at this appointment: Brooklyn got sealant on her 6 year molars. (This was our first experience with any of the kids getting sealant.). She said it tasted yucky, but she did well…
…and Abigail got her teeth cleaned with the real dental tools this time instead of just a regular toothbrush! It was her first time to lie down like a big girl, and she did so good. I’m sure it helped that her big sisters went first :)
We celebrated our successful trip to the dentist with a picnic for lunch on the new playset!
Happy to be eating lunch outside :)
This little girl loves to be silly…
Abigail is getting big so fast, but then she’ll do things like fall asleep on the couch at 4:30 PM and remind me that she’s not all grown up just yet.
This was Savannah’s first year to write her own wish list for Santa. I liked how she made sure to say “thank you” at the end :)
More silliness…this time on the slide…
For Veteran’s Day this year, Brooklyn was supposed to write a letter thanking a veteran that she knew. We don’t have any (living) veterans in our family, so we suggested that she choose someone from church. I thought her letter was so sweet!
On November 13th, we invited the Hesters to go with us to walk the Galaxy of Lights at the Botanical Gardens. We missed going in 2019, so this was the first time we’d been in 2 years. They added several new features for the walking nights this year that gave it a little extra pizazz. It’s always hard to get good pictures with my phone at night, but we really enjoyed the evening!
Brooklyn and Savannah brought their letters for Santa along so they could put them in the big mailbox :)
Thankfully it wasn’t too cold that night, and we all managed to stay warm.
We loved getting to spend the evening with one of our favorite families :)
Saturday, November 14th was a beautiful day, and we decided it would be a good time to go ahead and put up our outdoor Christmas lights while the kids played outside…
I’d been wanting to hang outdoor Christmas lights for several years now, and we finally got around to buying the lights and clips to do it this year. With it being 2020 and such a crazy year, we felt justified in breaking tradition and going ahead and putting the lights up prior to Thanksgiving ;)
I will say that I’m not sure if I’ll be brave enough to have him do it again this coming Christmas. I didn’t anticipate how nerve-wracking it would be to see Travis that high up on an extension ladder with his arms above his head. Thankfully, he didn’t fall, but there were some tense moments where I was nervous and badgering him to just stop and come down…and he just wanted some peace and quiet so he could focus ;) Life can be stressful enough as it is…I’m not sure we need to add the stress of extension ladders and heights to the mix on an annual basis ;)
It was getting dark by the time we finished, but the end result really did look good. Travis picked out some really nice LED multi-colored lights, and they were so cheerful. The girls loved it, and I really did like the way they turned out. It was just stressful getting them up there. Maybe next time we’ll stick to putting them in the bushes instead…haha
We celebrated Carter’s birthday at Sunday lunch on November 15th!
It’s hard to believe Carter is already 6 years old. Brooklyn and Savannah really wanted to get him a gift with their own money, so I took them to Dollar Tree to pick out something special for him. I thought that was sweet!
Abigail wanted to spend as much time as she could outside this month testing out the new playset :)
I was impressed that she could climb the rock wall by herself!
She also enjoyed swinging on her belly–something I remember doing as a kid…although it sounds pretty painful now! ;)
Brooklyn made a book at school about things she is thankful for :)
She got to share some of what she wrote in front of the class too. I love how Mrs. Borys takes plenty of pictures of school for the parents to see what’s going on in the classroom.
I went to Publix on November 17th, and I ended up in the checkout line behind this woman. I had to discreetly take her picture because I thought it would be interesting to remember years from now how different people reacted to the virus. This lady was wearing an N-95 respirator, goggles, gloves, and a plastic trashbag over her clothes. I was wondering to myself why someone like that who was obviously so concerned about the virus would even come into the grocery store in the first place rather than just order groceries through Walmart Pickup or Instacart, but who knows. There has definitely been a large spectrum of reactions to the pandemic that I’ve witnessed from people who don’t care at all to people who are extremely cautious. More than anything, I felt sorry for her and wonder how she is doing now several months later.
Leaf fights on the way home from school are so fun!
Brooklyn also had to disguise a turkey at school, and she turned her turkey into Darth Vader. I thought she did a great job!
The girls wrote letters to their teachers for Thanksgiving. Here was Brooklyn’s!
And here was Savannah’s :) I liked the picture she drew at the bottom.
We also made some chocolate chip cookies to give their teachers along with the letters. I’ve tried to do even more than usual this school year to make sure the girls’ teachers know how much we appreciate them. It has been such a weird and stressful school year, and I know the teachers are working like crazy to make it as great of a year as possible.
Gabby had her annual checkup at the vet on November 20th. It cracks me up when she jumps up on the counter and tries to hide behind the computer. This wasn’t the first time she’s done that!
Savannah came home from school that afternoon wearing this hat she’d made. It said, “I am thankful for my sisters.” :)
Savannah also brought home all her farm animal artwork she’d made at school over recent weeks. Mrs. Curry had transformed their desks a few weeks earlier into barns since they were learning about farm animals, and they were so cute!! I love how she made lemons out of lemonade…no one would normally choose to have plexiglass shields, but she made them as cute as possible!
Savannah’s artwork was too cute to throw away, so we hung it all up in her room! Her favorite thing she made was the turkey (far left), but she really liked scaring Daddy with the spider hanging down too ;)
That afternoon, we celebrated making it to Thanksgiving break by meeting the Langstons at Kids Kingdom for a little while to let the girls play. Brooklyn has missed Avery so much this year at school, and they had fun playing together!
After that, we headed to to Cici’s for a fall family cookout. The kids decorated cookies, and we were supposed to roast hotdogs outside…except that we couldn’t get the fire to stay lit. Haha. So we moved the dinner inside. We still had fun though!
I loved that Savannah made a list of what she is thankful for. It’s so fun seeing her start to write things down for herself now that she is learning to read and write. Her list included: “the weather, my family, the months, my house, and my sisters.”
I’m going to go ahead and mark this down as one of my favorite things that Brooklyn has drawn recently. She knows that Daddy works on helicopters, so she drew her own diagram of a helicopter for him. If only they were this simple to put together!! ;) Travis liked it so much that I decided to frame it so he could display it in his office at work.
More writing from Savannah…and I liked how she spelled her name here…haha. It’s easy to get mixed up with all those As and Ns ;)
Brooklyn also made a list of what she is thankful for :)
This was the first year we’ve ever had a full week off for Thanksgiving break! On Monday, November 23rd, we went to the library to check out some books. I loved seeing Savannah and Abigail holding hands :)
Our Thanksgiving break took an unexpected twist the next day when Brooklyn started complaining that her throat was sore and she didn’t feel good. She was also running a low grade fever. My throat also started hurting around that same time. My first thought was naturally: “Oh no, we are supposed to go to Paw and Rae Rae’s for Thanksgiving. What if we have COVID?” To play it safe, we decided that Brooklyn and I would both try to get tested prior to leaving town. Brooklyn was able to get tested at her pediatrician’s office, but I had a hard time finding a place with tests available. At that point, testing wasn’t super accessible, and it seemed like everyone and their brother was getting tested prior to Thanksgiving travel. Brooklyn’s test result came back negative the day before Thanksgiving, but mine didn’t come back until after Thanksgiving. So we ended up just spending Thanksgiving at home by ourselves for the first time ever.
We picked up some free crafts at the library and decided to put them together. The girls enjoyed writing things they were thankful for on each leaf.
Meanwhile, I found this ornament on Etsy and knew I had to order it ;) 2020…the most emotionally exhausting year ever!
Since we weren’t originally planning on being in town for Thanksgiving, I didn’t have anything planned to cook as far as a big turkey dinner. It was too late to order from Cracker Barrel or anywhere that was serving a traditional Thanksgiving meal, so we ended up going with takeout from Metro Diner. Pancakes, waffles, and shrimp and grits on Thanksgiving…very non-traditional but yummy :)
We decided to go for a walk/scooter ride around the neighborhood after our Thanksgiving feast. It was a beautiful day!
Savannah wanted to practice riding her bike without training wheels when we got back to the house. She is slowly getting better at it! After that, we went inside and watched a movie together as a family. It was a different kind of Thanksgiving this year, but it was kind of nice in a weird way to just relax and not have any plans. I wouldn’t want to do that every year and miss out on family time, but we made the best of it and still enjoyed the day!
The next morning, we decorated our Christmas tree. I think this is the earliest we’ve decorated the tree since having kids! The girls were big helpers, and they all enjoyed unwrapping the ornaments and putting them on the tree.
Abigail was obsessed with this red dress for a while and wore it almost every day, so of course she wanted to wear it while decorating the tree!
We finally got my COVID test results back later that morning (negative – yay!), so we quickly packed our things and loaded up to head to Paw and Rae Rae’s for a belated Thanksgiving celebration. Savannah was excited to play with Charlie when we got there!
The girls always churn out lots of artwork when we are at Paw and Rae Rae’s house.
Dad pulled out some of his old records and played them for Travis while we were waiting on the Iron Bowl to start. It was fun seeing what kind of music Dad liked when he was younger.
The game went well this year (Roll Tide!), and Savannah and Brooklyn got into it more than usual.
Brooklyn has declared herself an Auburn fan, so she wasn’t too happy with the final score. She has become quite the trash talker and loves to tell us how bad Alabama stinks…haha
When Savannah got back to school on the Monday after Thanksgiving (November 30th), Mrs. Curry had redecorated their desks to be gingerbread houses. The kids got to decorate them with candy canes and peppermints. I thought they turned out so cute!
This was the start of quite a few “hybrid” weeks of school. The district decided that it would help cut down our COVID numbers by having the kids come to school twice a week in person and do virtual school 3 days/week. They split everyone up based on the first letter of your last name, and Savannah’s class was very lopsided. There were only 3 other kids in Group A with her. Group A kids went to school in person on Mondays and Tuesdays and did virtual learning the rest of the week. We were hopeful that the hybrid schedule would only last for the 3 weeks in between Thanksgiving and Christmas break, but it actually extended into January too. This has definitely been a crazy school year!
Notes and Quotes from November:
- 11/5/20 – My parent teacher conference with Mrs. Curry this afternoon went well. Savannah has made so much progress since she started school and has learned so much. Mrs. Curry said she is participating and getting a little more comfortable answering questions/speaking up in class. She is apparently really good at beanbag toss and the other kids have noticed at recess ;) She has befriended a little girl named Kayla in her class who doesn’t speak much English. She speaks Vietnamese but is still learning English and doesn’t have many friends. Savannah has started playing with her sometimes during recess, and Mrs. Curry said it’s been good for Savannah to take a leadership role and initiate playing with someone else and its been good for Kayla to have someone to play with. I guess you don’t have to speak the same language to be able to chase each other around the playground ;) Overall, she seems to be really enjoying school so far. My prayer is just that she’ll become more and more comfortable coming out of her shell and make at least one close friend this year.
- 11/9/20 – Brooklyn came home from school and asked, “Is anyone in our family a veter-tarian?” I said, “You mean a vegetarian? Yes, one my of my cousins, Kathleen, is a vegetarian. Actually, I think she’s a vegan.” Brooklyn: “NO! I mean…a veter-tarian!!” “You mean a veterinarian? No, we don’t have any of those in our family.” Then I realized she was asking about VETERANS…haha. They had been learning about veterans at school since Veteran’s Day was that week!
- 11/17/20 – I had my parent teacher conference with Mrs. Borys this afternoon. She said Brooklyn is doing really well! She said at one point, “I hope when I have kids one day to have a little Brooklyn.” What a compliment! Brooklyn loves 2nd grade and Mrs. Borys. She’s excited to go to school each day and comes home happy. Mrs. Borys said she encouraged Brooklyn at the beginning of the year to make other friends in the class besides just Maddie (who she already knew) and she has. She also has been encouraging Brooklyn to ask for help if she’s frustrated or doesn’t understand something. Mrs. Borys just seems to “get” Brooklyn and they have just connected this year so well. I’m SO thankful that Brooklyn is in her class! We really hit the jackpot this year with both teachers!
- 11/18/20 – Abigail: “I want to wear the pink heart jacket. Not the other jacket. The other jacket is not the good-est.”
- 11/18/20 – Savannah took Abigail to the bathroom tonight after bible class all by herself. She lifted her up onto the potty and helped her wipe and wash her hands. Savannah is going to be such a good mommy one day!
- 11/19/20 – Travis was at work (actually at the office today), and Abigail and I were in her room doing something. She excitedly announced, “Mommy, I locked you in!” (We turned her doorknob around several months ago when she was waking up the whole house so early in the morning after she outgrew her crib, so now her lock is on the outside of her room). So, there we were…locked in her room without Travis home. I didn’t have my phone in the room either. Thankfully, I didn’t panic. I figured out that I could turn the lock with my fingernail and open it from the inside. If my fingernails had been short, I’m not sure what we would have done other than climb out through her window!! Haha! It’s always something…
- 11/28/20 – Abigail: “Why does the (Christmas) tree have a hairbow?” She was talking about the bow tree topper…haha
- Abigail frequently tells God thank you for sunshine, rainbows, Paw, Rae Rae, Charlie, the car, and the stroller in her prayers :)
- 11/30/20 – Brooklyn (singing): “All I want for Christmas is my two wet feet, my two wet feet, oh my two wet feet…” Haha!
Thanks for reading!!
