life by numbers

19 = number of days since my last blogpost (sorry!)

25 = days until Christmas

12 = days until my latest metacognitive research review is due
(sounds like a good time, doesn't it?)

6 = number of pies baked at our annual pie-baking extravaganza Wednesday before Thanksgiving

7 = number of mini-pies baked by my boys and their cousins

3 = number of pumpkin rolls baked for Thanksgiving festivities

4 + 1 = days we just had off for Thanksgiving
~ LOVE the bonus "1st day of hunting season" day off

7 = hours spent shopping by myself yesterday with ALL 3 BOYS!

2 = number of meals we ate out while said shopping

4 = number of Free Frosty coupons we cashed in at the end of the long day of shopping to treat ourselves for our good behavior ~ even Mommy :)

3 ~give or take an hour~ = number of hours spent trying to tweak a Christmas card template (curse you, Photoshop!)

Billion + 1 = number of things I feel need to be done this time of year!

thankful thursday

Today, Veteran's Day, I am thankful to my Pop-Pop Spence,

and my Pop-Pop Tom, who both defended our country in WWII.

They are truly heroes.

Have you thanked a vet today?

wordless wednesday

no scrappy share

Remember this post?

Yeah, well, I do, too. And I'm dying to get into all my fun new paper.

However, I've been a bit busy with other creative endeavors these past few weeks....

Nathan's birthday party invitation:

Ryan's book character pumpkin for the contest at his school library:

[Can you guess our character????]

And putting together costumes for

1 Indiana Jones....

1 Mario Brother....

and 1 Wyatt from Super Why...

Hopefully, I'll get to scrap again soon....

thankful thursday

Today, I am thankful for my sister, Megan.

She is a wonderful wife to Jim, who doesn't realize how good he has it.

She is an amazing mom to Abby, Chris, & Alex.

She is a terrific sister to me, Jill, & Michael.

We have tons of fun when we're together.
I don't know why I ever washed her hair with Vaseline
or threw shampoo bottles at her
or thought she was annoying.

Megan likes to have a good time....


And although she's probably going to kill me for these,
apparently, she likes to dress up....


a lot.

Happy Birthday Megan!
I love you lots! :)

Party on, dude :)

P.S. No revenge postings allowed ~ hahaha!

wordless wednesday

our very own jack o'lantern

Evan lost his second tooth in as many weeks this past Friday. He is our very own resident jack o'lantern. Good thing, too, since we didn't get around to carving one this year ~ hahaha!

And by the way, the new but apparently not much improved tooth fairy almost blew it again.

Lucky for her, trying to wake Evan up in the morning is like trying to wake a hibernating bear and she was able to buy some time.

We've hired her only on a trial basis.

happy birthday to nathan

Four years ago today, Nathan Mark was brought into this world an astonishing 6 1/2 weeks early [I was induced due to Rh complications]. I'll never forget the MFM doctor coming in to see me before delivery to tell me what I could expect with such an early preemie.

Well, Mr. Nathan is quite the scrappy fellow and blew her predictions right out of the water. He weighed in at a whopping 6 lbs. 2 oz.! He was the BIG kid on the NICU block for the ten days he had to spend there.

Who knew that he would steal our hearts with his big brown eyes and cheeseball smile?

Nathan, we love you and are so thankful that God placed you in our lives.
We don't know what we'd do without your sunshine :)