Getting Ready for Christmas

I hope Christy and Elizabeth are reading today.....Get your game face on girls....

We started preparing for Christmas at the Kinsey house. Of course everything is in the elementary stages but decorating is underway. I figure by the time I get finished it will be time to take it all down!


So far we have put up Anna Claire and Sarah Beth's trees....Here they are randomly posing in front of them. I think random may be the understatement of the year. Oh FYI Summer....(http://www.memoriestoo.com/) after taking the picture with the hat on, assortment of pajamas, with the owl, Anna Claire said "oh that one is good, send it to Summer for the catalog!"

Here's the start of the mantle, oh and bare with me on the quality of the pictures, I'm trying to work on the manual side of the camera and take things with out a flash to capture more "natural" light.

We also put up AC's favorite, the Christmas Village... They love to play with all the characters and I've had to replace the Department 56 ceramic people with Walmart people for financial reasons. After these pictures were taken, Prince Phillip took over the boat dock and Sleeping Beauty arrived for church with her 3 fairy aunts.

We tried to adjust the NOEL on top of the kitchen china cabinet but again, things are only in a beginning phase. This needs more tweaking....maybe when the tree gets up beside it I will like it better.

I also took out the Eternal and put in the Holiday in the china cabinet.....Just a minor detail but very essential....

Tonight we hope to get started on the kitchen tree, find our stockings and holders (why weren't they with the rest of the mantle stuff??) and wrap more presents :) PS- Rhonda and Thom-- Look who's smiling in all her pictures!!!!
More to come....

Wrapping up October

Hello November! While I love seeing my children having a good time, I will say that I'm so happy last week is over with! We started the week off with Sarah Beth's party at school on Monday (see cutie pie witch in previous post), dancing on Tuesday night, church on Wednesday, Thursday night Anna Claire cheered with the Spanish Fort cheerleaders at their last game, Friday was Anna Claire's Miss Spider's Tea Party at school with all the Room Mom duties that come attached to that, then of course Friday night was Halloween.

Anna Claire had an absolute ball cheering at the football game. However, who knew it would cost $40 for a family of 4 to go to a high school football game?? SHOCKING! Anyway, down to business....First, of course they have to stretch...

Then a quick game of duck duck goose...

I think now we're ready to cheer?

A little bang bang choo choo train

get it get it get it get it get it, got it got it got it got it

Toe Touch-- FYI sorry to the cheerleader that had to do this 100 times

We've created a monster!

How sweet is this? Anna Claire's biggest cheerleader...she was so excited to watch her SISSY!

With the TORO

On to Halloween... After working Friday morning, rushing to AC's school party and then back home, she and I started preparing for our Halloween party. Here are a few of the treats we had for our guest...

Goblin Cheese-Dip Ball

Taco Dip (Just for you, Jennifer & Brandi!)

Kitty Litter Cake

Cookies, Spirals, & Pigs-in-a-Blanket

Princess Anna Claire, Witchy Sarah Beth, Will aka Julio Jones, Mayme Cakes, and the creative Chef Kiri

The whole Halloween gang loaded up on the hayride

Here's Saturday, or what I'd like to call the Halloween hangover. It took all day to get everyone settled down off their sugar highs to even take a bath

(check out those wrinkled feet...maybe a little bit to much bathtime!)

Then we're off to church on Sunday

And believe it or not....after all of this, we packed up Halloween and put up Anna Claire & Sarah Beth's Christmas trees in their bedrooms. Yes, I like to enjoy Christmas so we are getting started early around our house!

Up next time....Christmas prep! :)

Pre-Halloween Planning

So....I haven't blogged in a while and my 4th quarter of the year resolution is to try to do it more! I was beyond excited to see that a total celebrity (at least in my eyes!) had commented on one of my previous post. If you want a good laugh and love adorable children, please read super-mom Mo's blog: www.mojoy.blogspot.com . Her nephew was at St. Jude while Noah was there and I feel like I know her and her family and have come to love them all and reading about their lives.

I wanted to include some pictures but then I realized I don't have a picture everyone that knows me hasn't seen already. Maybe I should slow up on the Shutterfly albums so I would at least have something to blog about. My goal for this week is to photograph all my fabulous Halloween planning/cooking/decorating and showcase it here next week. In the meantime....here's the world's cutest witch in all her glory!

ATTENTION NEW ORLEANS....

Remember this?


Seriously, go on and pack a bag. Call your Mom and nem and see if you can go stay at their house. Don't be dumb. Pack up.

Look Who Has A Green Thumb!

I'm usually not one to go around tooting my own horn (and of course now that I'm about to it will all come back to bite me in the you know what) but....I'll have to admit, my Summer flora is just outstanding! As a novice (and very much the beginner) gardener, I'm very proud of how my plants are coming along. Since my life is pretty boring, I thought I'd bore everyone else with a photomontage. Here's the progress at Bellingrath East aka 11429 River Birch......

First, the Caladiums came back in full force this year....I was surprised to see how many actually survived the cold weather this winter. I'm not one to dig up bulbs and save so if you are a Caladium at 11429 you best hold what cha' got through the winter because your tail is in there to stay.

Next we have my wonderful roses. They are all doing really well, thanks to some advice from my friend Summer and a little bit of Miracle Grow rose food.

Up next is my current fav, and for the life of me I can't remember the name of it at the moment. It starts with a "P".......anyway, I saw it all over Disney World last September and it was gorgeous. Since there is no Master Mickey Gardener working at 11429, mine isn't up to the quality found at Disney World but I do like to think I have a little bit of Main Street USA in Daphne. :) (Especially for you JuJu)

The ol' stand-by....Lantana. Lantana made a huge come back this year. My next project includes filling in more lantana in some bare spots. Lantana is a good choice for the beginner. Doesn't require much water or upkeep, usually comes back every year. Just a good choice for the novice (or in my case, the lazy).

East Pot

West Pot

Now for one of my larger "Showcase" areas. My porch pots. These are 2 years in the making, covered in the winter to guard against the freeze. The back is either ornamental grass or a lily, I can't remember which one I ended up putting back there. There's some purple ornamental grass, which I've used through out the yard because.....yep you guess it, it comes back and it's real easy, sweet potato vine (which is the bright green), red begonias, 2 pink Vincas given to be from the girls at Mother's Day, and some left over Creeping Jenny that has seen it's better day but I'm trying to fertilize and improve it's quality.

As most of you know, we have Delta, and now a few puppies (which we'll discuss at a later date exactly how many we have because it changes daily) and for the 2 years we have lived here, we haven't been able to have a backyard. Dogs and nice backyards just don't mix....OK, let me rephrase that, Dogs and PO' FOLKS backyard's don't mix. I'm sure the rich peeps send their dogs off to some "How to Behave in the Manicured Backyard" school but at 11429, where we live in the real world, dogs are just dogs and they dig and mess up your yard. Well, Delta has now been reduced to a smaller area in the backyard, thanks to a picket fence and electric collar. I've spent the past month or so trying to reclaim what 2 years of unruly dog has done.

So far we've worked on 2 beds extending out from each side of our back patio. It's definitely been S L O W progress. All of the plants are coming along but there weren't too many worthy of the photomontage yet so here's a small glimpse of the backyard:

Making use of the never used Chimania? Chiminary? .....Fish made out of stone.... A little sweet potato vine coming out of the mouth.

Marigolds finally made an appearance. Not really my favorite flower but hey, they were cheap and I got a whole flat of them so they actually are making a BIG appearance around back.

Last but not least, a little purple Salvia surrounded by some Dusty Miller. It looked better before we went to the beach for the weekend and they went with out water. I'm thinking this Salvia might be a little too much maintenance for my taste but since it's right outside the backdoor and easy for me to water, we'll give it one summer to prove it's worth.

So, that about wraps up the Tour de River Birch. Maybe my next blog won't be so boring.

Oh yeah, I almost forgot, if there's a chance a Master Gardener from Disney World happens to read this, I'd like my P plant to look like the ones there....could you hook me up with some tips to make that happen?