Vero Beach for Thanksgiving

We spent Thanksgiving at home this year, our first Thanksgiving in our new house and we were blessed to have our family visiting from Ohio including Grandma, Grandpa and Aunt Megan.  We have had typical Florida November weather with lots of sunshine, bright blue skies, cooler mornings and nights and warm sunny afternoons. 

We baked three pies Wednesday night, and grandma and grandpa helped us to pull together a fantastic meal Thanksgiving afternoon/early evening. We set a beautiful table with all of the pretty things we received from our wedding so many years ago (I love to get this stuff out at least once or twice a year) and we had a great meal shared with family and our good friends the Shine family. Here are some pictures from this special day, what a year it has been and so much to be thankful for!!

Breakfast with Santa at Festival of Trees

Today we attended breakfast with Santa...here are some pictures of the kids.  SB is NOT a fan of Santa, while Jack can't get enough of the man in the red suit!  Jack is definitly at one of the best ages for Christmas this year and little sissy will just have to watch and learn!!

Independence Day!!!

TOMORROW IS MY ONE YEAR ANNIVERSARY of practicing on my own which I am deeming my  "independence day"!!!

It has been a good year, but undeniably a very hard year, a year of self discovery, a year of immense personal and intellectual growth a year of promise and a year or prosperity best of all!!!  I cannot even begin to tell you all what we have been through in this year, the amount of responsibility I have taken on, the amount of personal growth and maturity I have experienced.  It is amazing and the success I have experienced in such a short 12 months is also amazing.  Last year at this time, I had no idea exactly how this would all shake down, I had no idea I would have my own fully functioning office with my own employees and staff that works with and for me.  I had no idea the clients I would encounter, and who would entrust me to resolve their legal problems...I had no idea of my own capabilities.  This year has been a hard year, a good year, a game changing year for our family financially, a year of growth for Jon and I as we built my business together.............I am so thankful for this opportunity, for my family, and for my clients who believe in me!!!  When people say to me, you're so young...how did you do this and you have no debt from this (that's right, NO debt, the entire thing has been paid for with proceeds from the business, we don't even have a credit card bill from the build out of the new office) I say hard work, dedication, and willingness to take risk because without risk there is no reward.

weekend in one sentence

It's a busy weekend around here...pictures tomorrow...maybe....here goes...Friday night we hit our parish's annual harvest festival for rides and games and some not so healthy treats.... Saturday morning mommy had to volunteer and set up for Festival of Trees at 8 at the beachside children's theater....followed by attendance by all at Jack's last soccer game at 9:30 clear out at the fair grounds...followed by soccer team party and bbq at teammate Grady's house...followed by nap for all...followed by mommy running some beachside errands to get ready for Thanksgiving visitors arriving Tuesday and Wednesday and doing some early Christmas shopping since we will be celebrating Christmas early with my family here next week...check out the laughing dog gallery vero beach online...mommy got some cool stuff for a few family members  lucky Grandma, Grandpa and Mimi and Papa...followed by dinner out with our little family of 4 at a local favorite, Mr. Manatee's because who has time to cook or grocery shop on a day like this...followed by more family errands...to get ready for next week....followed by a random visit with Santa at the mall BEFORE Thanksgiving in the midst of our errands... but who really cares, why not extend the season....next up tomorrow...breakfast with Santa at the Children's Theater sponsored by Disney Vero... and our family will attend the Festival of Trees..."season" is in high swing here, our town is full...we are starting one of my FAVORITE weeks in Vero Beach when EVERYONE is here..our little town is flooded with people, the beachside shops are brimming with cool stuff and good tidings...everyone has a skip in their step and some sand in their shoes..weather is AMAZING and we are SO excited to celebrate and spend some time with my family next week for Thanksgiving...even if my work is still totally crazy...but totally crazy is good for a new business owner so for that, and all of the above, we are so very thankful!!

RIP great grandpa Gary

Jackson and Sarabeth lost their great granpa Gary today, and Jon lost a wonderful
grandfather as well.  I'm at work with no access to pictures, but he was a good kind
soft spoken man.  Jon always talked about fishing with Grandpa Gary, and the
nights he spent over at his house as a child. He will be missed, and we will
be sure to tell Jackson about his Great Granpa's legacy as a police officer.

sickness strikes...must be fall!!

With the change in the weather always comes some sort of nasty virus...it did not escape us this year and this year it was poor SB that took us all down...go figure...the one who stays home and goes out the least gets sick and takes us down one by one!!

Jon was gone all last week traveling for a work conference in New Orleans so it was already a hectic week for me and then on Wed SB came down with a terrible cold.  She got worse and worse and I think finally has turned the corner today..in time for me to now be coming down with it and of course Jon caught something while he was traveling and brought back a different cold bug and a double ear infection for himself, ugh.  Jackson (so far) is the lone one of us without a cold (seriously go figure since he was always so sick as a younger child...guess the old adage about daycare immunity is correct...he's got immunity of steel now lol)!!!

So, it was a sick, slow, restful weekend around here....we are hoping to clear the germs this coming week just in time to prepare for all of our Thanksgiving visitors who are set to arrive the following week!!  We can't wait to welcome Aunt Megan, Grandma and Grandpa into our new home for Thanksgiving:)  This is really special for us as it is our first Thanksgiving in our new house and our first Thanksgiving to share with my family in Vero since we've been married.  We are looking forward to a great week together filled with good food, sunshine and good weather, and good memories to be made!!

footie pajama candids

Who remembers wearing footie pajamas as a kid??!!  I don't know where my mom found them, but I know I have seen pictures of my sisters and I wearing them well past the age that I would think I should have been wearing the one piece zip up wonders with plastic "footies" but she found them and we loved to wear them...all except for Megan who could not stand to have her feet hot and would make my mom cut the bottoms off and THEN would wear them, ha...slight digression as my mind took me back to those days!!!

Anyways............it has FINALLY started to get cooler here and feel like fall.  With the cooler temps that the weather brought in last week, I've been going through the kids warmer weather clothing to figure out what fits, what doesn't and what we need for the cooler months.  I found a unisex set of 18 month jammies that Jackson had worn that I figured would fit SB now (I have a very small pile of hand me downs that he had that I set aside to save for her) and then I got into Jack's closet and found two of the footie pajamas that I bought on clearance last year for this winter.  He has grown so much I was not sure they would fit but he was a sport and tried them on tonight and sure enough, they still fit!  Sarabeth also tried on her hand me downs from Jackson and went to sleep in hers tonight.  Since she does not sleep in a traditional bed yet, she tends to uncover herself and wakes up if she is cold so I think she has a few months of footie pajamas ahead of her:)

They were both delighted to have their crazy jammies on tonight after bath time so I grabbed the camera and snapped a few candid shots of them running around.  These are my FAVORITE kinds of pictures that capture them just as they are at this very moment.  What the lens reveals most to me is just how BIG they are getting...where does the time go??!!  Looking at these pictures tonight, it is hard to believe that Sarabeth was a tiny baby at this time last year and could not even sit up yet!!!

Halloween

We had a great Halloween in our new home and new neighborhood.  We had two other families over to trick or treat with us and to enjoy a home made pot of hot chili and freshly made cornbread after trick or treat!  Jackson was a police officer this year in honor of his Papa, and Sarabeth was an angel, needless to say, I felt very protected that night, haha!!

Here are some pictures of the kids in their costumes before trick or treat!  We had 3 four year olds and 2 almost 18 month olds and little Sophia who is just learning to walk and coming up on her first birthday!  Even the littlest trick or treaters enjoyed going door to door!!