Breakfast with Santa

Santa was kind enough to stop by the boys' school today to hear about their Christmas lists, take some pictures and have some donuts.  Luckily, Nate had spent a (painstakingly) long time last night perfecting his list (and leaving room in case he needed to add more) so he was fully prepared.

Matthew was completely indifferent to Santa and the whole experience...he is only standing still in this picture because he knew candy canes were coming.  But we did get out of him that he wants "Donald Duck" for Christmas...hmm...

Garden Lights

Another activity last weekend was joining some friends for Garden Lights at the Botanical Gardens.  I love this event.  Matthew was rather unruly (seems to be a common theme these days - I would wish for 3 to get here but I know better) but it didn't stop us from enjoying the evening.

Nate and Amanda hadn't seen each other in a little while but they picked up right where they left off...they spent the evening walking around holding hands...completely adorable.

Getting "Merried"

The holidays are officially underway around here...the tree is up, the elf is out, and the festivities have begun.

I have a new advent calendar this year so I thought I would try putting some type of "activity" and a bible verse in for each day instead of treats.  So far it has gone well and Nate has been excited to pull his card out each day (a little tricky to come up with 24 activities but surprisingly easier than remembering to move Elfie everyday).

So the first "activity" was Family Night - Nate was very excited (not that we don't do it often, but I guess actually calling it "Family Night" made it sound more exciting!) and as we were talking about what we were going to do he says "Yeah, we are going to get married!".  I was confused as to why his mind went there so I just gave some lame motherly speech about how daddy and mommy were already married and had him and his brother because we loved each other so much...blah blah...he looked at me kinda blankly and let me talk.

So we had a nice evening of watching Rudolph while having a Pizza Picnic in the living room and drinking hot chocolate and decorating the Tree.  I wish I could have taken pictures but I was a little busy cursing at our strands of lights who finally decided they had had enough....but Matthew found a Santa hat and was practically skipping around the tree saying "I am Santa ho ho ho Mewwy Cwismas!".  He picks up an ornament, puts it on the tree and starts exclaiming "I did it Mommy!  I mewwied the tree!"  Light bulb!  They thought "getting married" meant being Merry! No wonder Nate was not interested in my speech about love and families!

The kids had so much fun going through all of the ornaments and rediscovering all of the decorations.  Now if only Nate could convince Michael to put lights up outside....I think he is slowly breaking him down. :)

Thanksgiving in TN

We hit the road for Thanksgiving this year and had a wonderful weekend with Papa Steve and CC.  We got in to town Wednesday night so that we had all day on Thursday to enjoy family time.  The boys were so excited to see the girls again...but Nate clammed up when they finally got there...apparently they were just so pretty they were making Nate shy. :)  Once they all came out of their shells they had a fun afternoon!

That's Max on the right...a little bigger than the last puppy pics I posted!  This was his first road trip, and we discovered that he is prone to car sickness...but other than that, he did pretty well away from home and had a BLAST running around with McKinley...I am quite certain McKinley was exhausted when he left!

There is just so much to be thankful for in our lives - family being at the very top of that list.  Thank you CC and Papa Steve for hosting such a lovely day to celebrate that.

On Friday, we headed to Waynesville to have lunch and do a little bit of Black Friday shopping (we went in one local store) and to spend the night at the mountain house.  We had a fun night playing Zingo with Nate and lighting some sparklers that Nate dug up from two 4th of Julys ago.

And since we can never just go straight home, we drove through Gatlinburg to play a bit first.  First we took Max on a quick hike down by the water (he is camera shy)...

Then we took the sky tram up to Ober Gatlinburg...the perfect level of touristy cheesiness to thrill the kids.

It was pretty chilly at the top of the mountain...and by the time the sun started setting it was downright cold.  So, naturally we spent a good amount of time around the fireplace in the snackbar drinking hot chocolate.

Nate begged to go ice skating but neither Michael nor I felt up for a skating lesson (or a sprained ankle) so we promised him a raincheck on that activity.  So as a consolation prize they got to ride the little cars that go in circles.

We got home pretty late that night but that was ok, it was a fun day with the kids and a fun weekend.  Luckily we still had the next day to rest and get our Christmas tree before work and school started again!

A Spooky Halloween

This was the first year that Nate wanted to be "spooky" instead of a character.  A catalog came one day with a skeleton costume on the cover and his mind was made up...he had to be a spooky skeleton.  Which, of course, meant that little Matthew had to be spooky too...just like his big brother.

So, since I vowed not to do any costume arts and crafts this year, I found the least creepy costume I could find (I was really surprised at all of the little kid costumes that had masks that scared me) and he was thrilled with it.  Matthew got to be a spooky Mummy...and luckily I was able to pull out the mummy costume I started for Nate a couple of years ago and didn't get to finish and he never wore.  Unfortunately, I couldn't find the same gauze material I used before so I didn't get much further with it...but he was happy so I just let it go!  (I probably could have just painted his face and he would have been ok with it)

The weekend before Halloween, we had our neighborhood carnival....Alie joined us and we played for a bit, but it was really windy and cold that afternoon so we didn't hang out too long!  (This was my trial run with the face painting...I don't think make-up artistry was my calling!)

Then came the big night...we went to the annual Halloween Party at our neighbor friend's house and most of Nate's school buddies were there...and then we hit the streets.  I think the boys had as much fun just running around playing as they did trick-or-treating, which was good bc the amount of candy we got, while still excessive (we are still eating our way through it), was not extreme due to the distraction.  Plus it was chilly and the kids refused to cover their costumes with coats so they were good going back at a reasonable time.  It was a fun night for both the grown-ups and the kiddos!

Fall Finale

Where did November go?  The Christmas Season is officially getting underway around here so let's look back on the past month before the fun holiday posts begin!

Nate had two big accomplishments last month:

He finished his Fall Soccer Season and I think it was his best yet...he really had fun with the Ninja's (very fitting name) and he still talks about "really missing his Ninja friends".  This is his first real trophy and he carried it around for days, but it has finally (thankfully) found it's home on his desk in his room.  He is very proud.

He also had his first karate test and moved up to an Orange Belt.  I was extremely impressed and proud of him.  He took the testing very seriously, performed all of his skills and was so excited to get his new belt and the oh-so-cool headband.

Showing off his "Stranger Danger" skills....

his Power Punches....

his High Kicks....

and his new Tiny Tiger Orange!

Road Trip!

The weekend before Halloween we made a last minute decision to take a road trip down to Pcola Beach to celebrate the 4th birthday of this spunky little girl:

Our little Rayne turned 4 and the boys just had to be with their cousin to celebrate.  And celebrate we did.

The trip started off a little rocky...we left on a Friday evening and realized about 15 minutes from home that Stinky wasn't in the car with us.  I don't think we have ever done that...he normally screams for him before he is even buckled in, but he didn't this time so we assumed all was right. And it was, until our first night in the hotel.  The next morning we went out and bought what we hoped was a temporary replacement but we knew that was a long shot...and it was.  Lesson learned...never leave home without Stinky!

Back to the sunny side  of the weekend...

We kicked off the weekend with lunch at Flounder's on a gorgeous day.  There is nothing better than lunch on the beach on a beautful day - and a playground in the sand to keep the kids occupied!  

Then it was on to the hotel for some presents...a little beach time...and then the kids had a blast in the (slightly heated) pool.  

And a fun birthday dinner at Crabs - where, once again, the kids had way more fun on the sandy playground.

Nate picked out the birthday crown for her

On Sunday, we kissed our cousins (and sister) goodbye...and headed to Ft Pickens to explore before we began our journey home.  Another place where I spent most of my childhood but now appreciate so much more as an adult...it is a pretty cool place, so much history.

Then we had a (not-so-relaxing, tantrum-filled) lunch at Hemingway's (I was really missing my fresh seafood beach restaurants. Was disappointed to miss Peg Leg's but the wait was way too long with antsy kids!) and then hit the new "Observation Wheel" (i.e. ferris wheel).  It wouldn't be a Cox Family road trip unless we filled every minute of the 36 hours we were in town!

Then we wrapped up our whirlwind weekend by grabbing ice cream, putting on our headphones and settling in for the long ride home....

It was a gorgeous weekend and it was so much fun celebrating Rayne's big day with her!

Fantastic Fall

What a fun and fabulous fall this has been...I love fall so much, it can be overwhelming trying to do as much of the wonderful things there are to do around these parts during the month of October.  So we have crammed in as much as we possibly could have which has made the month fly by...

The weather has been perfect so we have spent a lot of time outside...we spent one Sunday afternoon hiking at the River...

Another Saturday we went to the Fall Festival at the boys' school after Nate's soccer game

The kids were looking at the wrong camera but it was the only family picture that didn't include a certain 2 yr old's tantrum face

Another weekend, we drove up to Ellijay with Neena and Fred for the Apple Festival.  By the time we got there, got faces painted, bounced in all of the bounce houses, ate festival food, got apple slices to dip in caramel and ate apple doughnuts, and browsed some of the local "artists's" wares, the boys were winding down and we realized we hadn't even hit the area with the rest of the big attractions...but luckily the boys didn't notice.

Nate went up the man selling marshmallow guns and asked for a demonstration...the man was kind enough to let Nate have some target practice, which of course means Nate came home with a marshmallow gun.  He did put the red one back and chose an orange instead - daddy was proud.

And this past weekend, after soccer, the weather was just too perfect not to stay outside so we stopped by Cagle's Farm to play at the corn maze.

After Cagle's, we came home and carved jack-o-lanterns, made chili, made a fire on the back porch and roasted marshmallows.  Nate said, in between marshmallows, that "this was the best day".  I agreed.

Well, that about sums up our last few Saturdays...minus a quick visit from CC and Papa Steve.  The only thing we didn't do this October was actually go to a Pumpkin Patch wearing something besides a soccer jersey for a cute kid photos...but we had fun and I am sure that will be just as memorable as a cute pic.  I just love seeing smiles on these boys' faces.