Happy Thanksgiving!

Kevin and I headed up to Greer on Wednesday morning to spend some time with my family for Thanksgiving. Wednesday I started Christmas shopping and Kevin helped my dad chop up a tree that he had cut down. That night we helped my mom prepare food for our Thanksgiving lunch at my aunt Ann's house. Every year, since I can remember, we have always had my mom's side of the family Thanksgiving at Ann and Bobby's house. Thursday, we started our traditional day by watching some of the parade while we finished preparing the food and getting ready. We spent the entire afternoon over at their house, as always. This year, though we were 8 people short for Thanksgiving. We had plenty of food left over for everyone to get a plate to carry home. Friday, my mom and I ventured to Khols' at about 8:00 am (neither one of use likes to get up early or shop). We were so pleased with how well we did. By 10:00 I had almost bought all my Christmas gifts and had saved about $200 worth! Friday night, we had Thanksgiving with my dad's side of the family, Susan, Dan, Tim, and Amanda. This morning, my mom and I went out to finish up Christmas shopping. We were both amazed at the fact there was no traffic, lines, or people out shopping! After we finished shopping and came home, I helped decorate the tree while Kevin, Papa, and my Dad watched the Clemson/Carolina. I didn't watch one minute of the game! And yes, Kevin was very happy about the end result, but neither one of us has spoken to each other about the game. We left to come home after the game. Since we have been home, I have been busy putting away my fall stuff and now the house looks ready for Christmas. We are just missing our tree, which we will get sometime this coming week. Tomorrow, we have Thanksgiving with Kevin's side of the family, then it will be back to work or school mode I guess I should say.

Kevin and I are so blessed to both have such wonderful families! We are so blessed to have each other and just are truly thankful for all that God had blessed us with. We are both so thankful to have a God that loves us and is in control and that we can put our faith and trust in. He is good at all times. There is nothing that He cannot do!

*On a serious and tragic note, Friday night we were informed that our former preacher of Taylors First Baptist Church, Dr. Frank Page, his oldest of three daughters, committed suicide Friday afternoon. She had fought a hard battle with cancer about a year ago and had been cancer free for a year and a half. The cancer wasn't back, but she and her husband had been having marital problems. They had been married for about 3-4 years. They had either separated or thought about it and she shot herself in the chest in her bathroom. I'm posting this for you to keep the family in your prayers. I can't imagine what they are going through and what she had gone through that drove her to that point of seeing no other way out. So, please keep that family in your prayers.

Tis the Season

Well, Thanksgiving is almost here! Tuesday at 2:45 my Thanksgiving break will begin. We are going to visit my family in Greer, then come back to have Thanksgiving with Kevin's family. Yesterday and today I have been watching all the Christmas movies on the Hallmark or ABC Family channel. Kevin teases me about watching them after I have already seen most of them several times over. But it's part of the Holiday to watch your favorite Christmas movies. I look forward to that every year. Today it seems like a winter day with the cold and rain and leaves constantly falling. It finally feels like November. Kevin even said that this afternoon he would build a fire for us to relax by. I am very excited about the up coming time off to relax and not worry about school, doing lesson plans, students, etc. I probably won't blog until after Thanksgiving, so I hope that you and your family have a wonderful time getting together and just enjoy being with each other. If you are my family, I look forward to seeing you in a few days!

*Enjoy the elf video below. I saw this on Mandy's blog and decided to help get you in the holiday mood. Kevin said that he didn't know he could move like that.

Send your own ElfYourself eCards

Update on Us

Tomorrow, I will finish my graduate class that I have been taking. I'm very excited to be done with it. I enjoyed the class and I'm very glad that I decided to take it, but it will free up so much time for me. So, tomorrow we will share our final project with the class and we are celebrating with some goodies to eat. Kevin has been busy planting a strawberry patch. The patch is half an acre and he planted 4,500 strawberry plants. He said that he had a new found respect for anyone that had to pick cotton. He planted them last week and there is already small green plants poking their heads out of the plastic. The idea is that this summer we will have a strawberry patch for people to come and pick strawberries. There's also talk of some vegetables that we will sell as well. I guess that will be Mrs. Katie's and my summer job. :0)

The weather here is so crazy. The beginning of the week last week, it was in the 40's and 50's and this weekend it's back in the upper 70's. I am ready for cold weather. It doesn't seem like the holidays when it's so warm. It's hard to believe that it will be Thanksgiving day in 11 more days. Then Christmas is right around the corner. Time is going fast, but I'm not complaining, I'm ready for June! (ha ha) Tomorrow it will be the 63 day of school; just 117 more days to go! This week will be a regular 5 day week, then next week we go Monday and Tuesday, then have the rest of the week off. Then we just have 3 weeks until Christmas break.

Kevin and I went over to visit his Aunt Arie yesterday. She is finally back at home; she came home on Wednesday. She looks like she's doing a lot better since we last saw her, which was in July, but she said that you had no idea how it was to go from being able to do everything yourself to having to totally rely on someone to do it for you. Her birthday is on Tuesday and she will be 81 years old. Our mennonite neighbors, Mr. Sam and Mrs. Mary invited us over for dinner last night. We had a great time and great food! It was also very interesting to Kevin and I to learn about the Amish ways and what they had to go through and how they are still not accepted by family because they left that lifestyle. They told us that they are so thankful that God got them out of that lifestyle and they realized who He was and the true way to get to heaven was through accepting Jesus as your Lord and Savior.

I was really Alissa Stewart's blog (you can check it out on my blog) and she had these verses on there and I copied them to share with you. I could really relate to each one. I hope they will be some encouragement and peace to you as well.

Don’t be deceived, my dear brothers. Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows.
James 1:16-17

Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever. Hebrews 13:8

For our present troubles are small and won’t last very long. Yet they produce for us a glory that vastly outweighs them and will last forever! So we don’t look at the troubles we can see now; rather, we fix our gaze on things that cannot be seen. For the things we see now will soon be gone, but the things we cannot see will last forever.
2 Corinthians 4:17-18

The steadfast love of the LORD never ceases; His mercies never come to an end;they are new every morning; great is Your faithfulness.“The LORD is my portion,” says my soul, “therefore I will hope in Him.” Lamentations 3:22-24

Veteran's Day

Today is Veteran's Day and for the first time in my school history, we are out of school. Normally on Veteran's Day we have a special program and invited Veteran's to come to the school so we can honor them. Last year at Kelly Edwards, we had a special program and Veteran's came to the school and we were able to show our appreciation for all they have done. My last year at Brushy Creek, I actually had one of my student's dads to come in and speak to the class. He was at home on leave from Germany. (I have enjoyed my day off , especially with the weather as bad as it is. I have been able to clean my house, go to the grocery store, and work on school work) With all that aside, ....my Papa lives next door to Taylors Elementary School. He was asked by the principal to come up to the school to eat lunch. Then tonight, Applebees had a special today, if you were a veteran or still active you could get a free entree at lunch or dinner. My mom was going to go with my dad (he served in the national guard) and my Papa (who severed in WWII and followed Paton, hit Normandy, and was 1 of 3 out of his crew to survive on that beach).

I just wanted to say "Thank You" to all the men and women that have served and are still serving in all branches of the military. Without you we wouldn't be free to live the way we do. I try hard to make my students understand the sacrifice that you have paid, but it's hard for me to understand it all that you have had to give up for our country.

I tried to post the music video of Toby Keith's "American Soldier" but it wouldn't allow me to play it from my blog. So here's the link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3qUzrueLin4 I think this song and video really reaches the the heart of an American soldier. Thanks for all you have done and still are doing. You pay the ultimate sacrifice.

Cookie Monster

I have noticed that all week, anytime I go to google, which I use google a lot, they have the Sesame Street characters as part of the word google. (which google is always changing the google sign on their page) anyway, today was Cookie Monster. Which I found out it was the 40th anniversary of Sesame Street. I just thought it was cute with the letters as Chocolate Chip cookies with milk dripping off them. I love cookies and sweets just about as much as the Cookie Monster. I was also a child that grew up on Sesame Street and loved it. I was mesmerize the first time I saw "Sesame Street Live". My children will be exposed to Sesame Street more than likely, more so than Barney. I'm not a big Barney fan. Just from all my babysitting I did when I was a teenager, never really liked Barney. Anyway......

Just for Teachers

If you are a teacher or if you know a teacher, please pass along this link: http://www.teacherdevotion.com/Home_Page.html
This link was shared with me today by a fellow teacher at my school and I thought this was the neatest web site. It gives a weekly devotional for teachers. How cool is that! We so desperately need all the prayers and encouragement we can get. I just had to share. Even if you are not a teacher, but you work with kids, or even if you don't work with kids in any way and just need some encouragement, check out this website for Weekly Teacher Devotionals. So again, please pass this site along, especially if you know a teacher or are a teacher.

Newest Additions to the Family

Our family is growing in the animal kingdom. Mr. Tim got a new horse a week or so ago. He wanted to start training horses again, or really just one horse. I think he just needed a new project to do. So he bought this chocolate brown quarter horse named "Peanut Butter" (my neice Kayla named her). I don't know how old she is, but I don't think she's a year yet. He was out trying to break her Saturday afternoon, when Kevin and I stopped by.

Peanut Butter

Well, stopping by to see Peanut Butter lead to us seeing Ms. Helen. One of Mr. Tim's uncles or cousins had this Belgium horse that had a colt and he didn't want to keep the colt, so he gave it to Mr. Tim. She's younger than PB, but a lot taller and bigger. She was named for Mrs. Helen, one of Mrs. Katie's friends and also the mom of Kevin's friend Eric. Kevin and I got the scoop on how they came about naming her, but it's a long story and a funny one too. You'll just have to ask Mr. Tim, it's best for him to tell.

Ms. Helen

Sunday, I went over to see the other new additon, a six week old boxer puppy named "Riggs" after Lethal Weapon. When Kevin and I first started dating, they had an Irish Setter that stayed outside and at the beach this summer, they were talking about getting another big, yard dog. They got Riggs from someone in Bamberg that breads boxers. He's very cute and very playful. Daisy, doesn't like him very much. Abby didn't pay much attention to him. (She was too focused on her tennis ball). Riggs kept on growling, barking, and snapping at her. He finally snapped at her one too many times, and Abby quick turned around and snapped back and growled and barked all at the same time. It was quit funny, because Riggs ran and hide behind Mr. Tim's feet. Mrs. Katie told Daisy that she needed to do that and let Riggs know he wasn't the boss. We will have to bring Abby around a good bit to get those two use to each other, because once Riggs gets bigger, he could destroy Abby if he wanted to. I tried to get a picture of Riggs, Daisy, and Abby, but Riggs keep going to sleep, and Daisy wouldn't stay near him and Abby just wanted me to throw the tennis ball...it was like working with three two year olds...it didn't work out.

Riggs, I thought this was a very cute picture.

He was getting ready for a nap as you can tell.