Branson

This post is a little lengthy so feel free to skim!
We picked the kids up from school on November 7Th at 2:30. They had no idea why we were there early or where we were going. The 2ND picture is their expressions when we told them where we were going. We already had the van loaded and off we went.

Jake and Layne watching the movie Journey to the Center of the Earth. Sadly the 3-D part wouldn't work on the portable DVD player. They enjoyed the movie though.

Cody had the backseat to himself to start then felt a little car sick so he moved up and joined Kaelyn.

Kaelyn is all ways happy to draw or color and I had printed of some High School Musical posters for her and Holly packed all the art supplies so she was set.

After our 41/2 hour drive we dropped our bags and headed to Ripley's Believe It or Not. Jake had been waiting all 10 of his long years to visit this place. When we arrived the sign said "Winter Hours closed at 8:00". I had 8:02, luckily we have very sad looking faces and a wonderful gentleman let us come on in. WHEW that was a close one, we would have found time for it later in the weekend but we had a lot planned.


We just thought Cody was tall. Here he is by the tallest man.

Kaelyn tried to look up to him but I think she may have strained her neck.

Jake found the largest man pretty funny!

Then we went to the Trail of Lights. Beautiful!

I love the way they light up the Tower!

Saturday morning started off with a great show at the Mansion. Again we all cried at Celebrate America. Kaelyn got the autograph of the little girl in the show who was amazing. She can really yodel. Jake wanted to talk to her because she is the same age as he, but he chickened out in the end. His face was very red. We followed the show with a great lunch with some fun family members. Gene and Rita joined us and Jim and Ardith happened to be in town also so we got to have lunch with them.

Off we went to Silver Dollar City. Burr it was so cold most of the big coasters were shut down. :(

We still had a great time and got some fun pictures.

See I was there. Bet you didn't think you would see me.

I was hoping for a good Christmas card photo. I think I got one and I didn't post it so you will have to wait for it to come in the mail!

Huge gorgeous Christmas tree.

Cody and Jake with the huge tree.

Holly and Billy fitting I think!

Jake in cuffs. Can anyone tell me where I could get one of these? At least then I would all ways know where he is.

Train ride, lots of fun. We stopped further down the tracks and listened to "Grandpa" tell the story of Christ's birth. Very moving, hopefully it will remind everyone the Reason for the Season!

On Sunday we got up and took the kids for warm Krispie Creme donuts. A ritual for sure, they couldn't believe how soft they were. Yumm I am ready for more.

We went to the Titanic. You couldn't take any pictures inside. Which is sad cuz it was beautiful. We all cried, mom because her entire family was wiped out, me because the beauty of the staircase overwhelmed me, Holly because she cries if we do.

After a couple of hours in the Titanic (which I highly recommend). We went to the House of Wax.

Bet you can't find the Allison in this picture.

Jake loves the movie Ghost Rider. Too scary for me.

Jake and the Duke!

The Watkins kids with Layne's idol Jeff Gordon.

All of the kids at the Manager where Christ was born. Our church that Sunday.

Then we ended our weekend with a Ride on the Ducks. Everyone with there honkers. Which I confiscated before the 5 hour ride home. Can anyone say Tylenol?

Jake driving the duck.

Cody driving the duck.

Captain Kaelyn!

Layne got a turn as well.

Hope you enjoyed our trip to Branson. We definitely did!

Halloween

On Halloween the Grade school kids were out of school, so we decided to try something new. We went to several of our parents places of business and trick or treated. You can see the big bags the kids are carrying. Those bags were 3/4 the way full by the end of the morning. We followed it up with Happy Meals and thankfully, naps. The kids had a great time and the parents kept telling me their coworkers were so excited.


The first pic is Sheila's office.


Then Tish Hermann, unfortunately this one is a little blurry.

Then Holly at her office. Love the bunny ears. Man my girls are ornery.

And some of you may recognize Cher aka Grandma Becca! I am cracking up at Super girl and her muscles. And who doesn't think my clown is adorable? :)

Grade School Costume Parade

On the day before Halloween the grade school had their annual parade. Here are some pictures of the kids walking with their friends on Main Street.


Layne the boxer with his dad. Layne's costume was actually a scary bloody guy but he couldn't wear it to school so he was a boxer for the parade.


Cody is getting to the point where he doesn't really want to dress up. But if you don't dress up you can be in the parade. He decided to just wear his football uniform and I thought that was a great idea. Might as well get my monies worth.

Jake just wore a scary mask and some torn up clothes. I just called him scary guy this year. Sadly the years of cute costumes are behind me.

Here's Kaelyn and Holly walking in the parade. Kaelyn was Gabriella for those of you who don't know that would be a main character in the High School Musical movies.

Here's my cute little girls waiting for the parade to start.

Daisy Halloween

Tuesday October 28Th.
I am going back in time here for a little while, because I haven't blogged in such a long time. A lot has happened in the last month and I really wanted to share it with you.

I have mentioned before I get to help Holly with Kaelyn's Daisy troop. This was our Halloween party. Most all of the girls dressed in their costumes and then we did a Halloween project with black paint and our hand prints which we made into bats.

New Favorite

I had the opportunity last weekend to go see a movie by myself. Never happened before. Holly took all 4 kids to see High School Musical 3. I had no desire to see it so I went to The Secret Life of Bees. Amazing movie! Bring Kleenex and a girlfriend to this one. It's not been highly advertised in our area but I remembered reading the book. Great story, great movie, I am adding it to my favorites list!

Pumpkin Patch

On Monday the 13Th mom and I took the daycare kids to Meier's Pumpkin Patch. It was a bit of an overcast day which was great because it keep it from being to busy. The kids didn't have any school and mom was off work so it worked out great for us to go. It didn't start to rain until we were eating our lunch at McDonald's. This patch is great for so many reasons. They have huge slides and blow up jumping toys. They have big areas of places to jump into straw. They have a hay rack ride and a large patch for picking your own pumpkin.

The kids love to pick their own pumpkins and we take them home and color them with markers on a different day.

You can see that they love the big slides. This year I paired a school kid up with a preschool kid and I think it worked really well. Of course they were all ways somewhere where mom or I could see them but this gave the older kids a little more responsibility and the little kids love to hang out with the "big" kids. I am very lucky this year to not have any strollers or diapers and I have to admit that I like it that way. Yes I get sad for a baby occasionally but the freedom to go this year has been nice.

There is no way I could go and do this without mom. Thanks MOM!!