Surprisingly, I was able to get everyone to stand by the Christmas tree for family photos...
We did get a couple good ones. We accidentally put it on "continuous shooting," so it was funny looking back at them. Please note my photogenic husband.
Brant gave Ashley her Christmas present early: a miniature doberman pincher named Max. It was fun playing with him (but mainly watching him sleep because he's only 8 weeks old).
We went hiking at Mount Pleasant with the Boleys the weekend before Thanksgiving. It was a really fun overnight hike in and out. It's been nice to do a few shorter hikes, spend the night, and hike out, so it doesn't take up the entire weekend.
It was pretty chilly.
The views were awesome. We drank wine and ate Honey dijon Kettle chips as we watched the sun go down.
We ran the Outer Banks Half Marathon on Sunday, November 14th. It was a blast!
As my second race ever (and also second half marathon), I really loved it. I think I pushed myself more than the first, and it felt good to finish knowing that I did. The course was flat the entire way, minus a small section on the bridge. It was awesome weather-low to mid 50s, sunny, with a nice breeze.
Just like the first race, Bryce was the cameraman and videographer. It was funny looking back at the pictures and videos throughout the run. This time, I made a video, so now you can feel like you ran with us...without running it.
We stayed in a shanty little motel on the beach in Nags Head. It was fine for a one nighter, in and out thing. Don't know if I would want to stay there for a week, but the options in the OBX are limited, so we were thankful to find a decent place to stay within our budget.
We didn't really go out to the beach much, it was more of: we drove there, watched the Hokies play, filled ourselves at Outback, watched more football, went to bed, woke up, ran, showered, took a picture by the beach, got in the car, and drove home.
Oh, and we were sure to replace all the calories we burnt at Cracker Barrel for a late breakfast. I don't normally like pancakes anywhere other than made at home, but I would argue that Cracker Barrel has the best pancakes I've ever tasted.
My entire family came to visit us in Blacksburg a couple weekends ago.
On Thursday, Dad, Tim, and Bryce went to the VT vs. Georgia Tech game (28-21 GO HOKIES!). Abby, Emily and I stayed warm inside, cuddled up and watched Monsters Inc. until Abby's bedtime. Then we caught up on the game.
Abby also loved her first big girl backpack that Connie got for her! She used it all weekend around the house.
On Friday, we just hung out. Emily, Abby, Amy, and I went to the library to get some kid books for the weekend. Then we met Becky and Aunt Judy for lunch at Macado's. We had a big Thanksgiving dinner that night.
Over the entire weekend, we ate pumpkin pie, strawberry-rhubarb pie, Reeses cup cookies, snicker doodle cookies, chocolate chip cookies, banana bread, and Grandma's incredible coffee cake (thank you Aunt Judy!). Hello carbs! FYI: We ran a half marathon the next weekend, so we needed those ;)
On Saturday, we watched football and the girls went to the park with Abby.
Then we went to Sharky's for dinner (of course for the wings). I learned that Abby loves broccoli.
Abby: (sobbing as we walk out of Sharky's) "But I wasn't done with my broccoli!!" Me: (holding her and getting out of there so as not to cause a scene) "Do you know that Aunt Kiki has a whole bunch of broccoli at home just for you?" Abby: (still sobbing) Me: "We can make broccoli soup, broccoli sandwiches, broccoli hamburgers.....broccoli hot dogs..." Abby: (sniffling but smiling) "See, when you talk to me like that, it makes me happy"
She also loves dancing. Sharky's had music on.
When we got home, Abby was still in a dancing mood, and pretty soon, we found we were all in a dancing mood, especially when Beyonce came to the party. At one point, almost all of us were dancing with Abby in the middle of the room trying to imitate the dance moves. It's a lot harder than you think! And provides a lot of laughs.
Later, we introduced everyone to Settlers of Catan. Aaron won. It's officially on our Christmas list now. We love that game.
I love November! The leaves are all changing and will soon be all gone. There are a lot of birthdays this month. Thanksgiving is so fun, and even more fun after it because it's the Christmas season! I will start listening to Christmas music literally the day after Thanksgiving, if not the day of.
I think we had one of the first frosts recently, but our garden is still hanging on by threads.
For some reason, the Roma tomatoes are just now coming to life, so we probably won't get to eat them because it's just getting too cold. I guess we should've planted them sooner. We wondered what their problem was over the summer because we hardly got anything. The cherry tomatoes are pretty much done, except for a few stragglers here and there.
The green peppers are going strong, but again, it's getting too cold and they are going to die soon. The larger red tomatoes ("Celebrity" and "Big Boy") are pretty much done. The ones that are red on the vine are eaten through or rotten. The green ones are struggling, but I think I may try making a fried green tomato before it's too late.
Goodbye warm weather. Hello 30s (at night!) and 40s temps.
Can you guess what we are? No, Bryce is not a sniper in a gillie suit. I am a logger/lumberjack and Bryce is a tree. I think I looked like the least feminine female we saw ALL night. Bryce said I was the best looking lumberjack he saw (there were a couple).
He really wanted to be a lumberjack in the first place, but then thought, he could just be a tree and I could be the lumberjack. He insisted on making a genuine tree costume. Hopefully no one saw us stealing all the branches off of their tree by the golf course! I was pretty embarrassed when we looked in the mirror before we left the house. In fact, I refused to help him with the hat he made, because it was so ridiculous. But I think that really made the costume in the end.
We finally got to go hiking/camping this fall. On Friday we skipped out a little early and drove up to Buena Vista, VA off of I-81 and went on a hike called Cold Mountain. Since we got there in the late afternoon, we really appreciated the fact that the campsite was only about 1 mile into the forest. It was pretty frigid. Bryce usually collects way more wood than we actually need for the fire and tries to use it all up if we can. I really appreciated the roaring fire, especially with the wind chill.
We forgot our sporks, so we ate hard boiled eggs instead of scrambled. Bryce is usually the morning chef, while camping and while at home. I am known to take a little while to wake up.
The next morning, we hiked the rest of the loop that hooked up to the Appalachian Trail and along a ridge. On the ridge, the trail goes right through beautiful mountaintop meadows with awesome views. It was only a total of about 6 miles, a good amount for just an overnight.
So glad we got to get out of town and into the woods while the leaves were still on the trees and changing!!
