Thanksgiving

I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving! As I mentioned before, we went to my parents. It was a nice day. The weather was great (although a little cool), so the kids tried their hands at fishing off the dock. They didn't catch anything, but Kent assured them that it was due to the cold front coming through and didn't have anything to do with their fishing abilities! :)
I've attached a a group picture from when we went to Whitewater Falls in North Carolina. Dad was the photographer, so he isn't in the picture. It was beautiful. You can see it from above (which is still nice) or you can walk down 160 steps below to get a closer view. The only bad thing about going down 160 steps is you have to come back up them! Grandma stayed at the top, but everyone else made the trip down and up with no problems.
Al and Lavon left today to head home. It was a nice visit, but I'm sure that after 2 weeks they are anxious to be home. We really enjoyed having them stay with us, and we tried to talk them in to joining us permanently out here. It might get a little too cold here for Al, though.

Tree Part 2

Since I posted an earlier picture of the tree, I had to post a new one showing the dramatic difference! Isn't it beautiful?

Thanksgiving is right around the corner! We are all heading to my parents house on Lake Keowee for dinner. My grandmother who lives in Colorado flew in yesterday, and with my brother coming up from Columbia that will make 11 for Thanksgiving dinner.

Josh was supposed to have a baseball tournament this weekend, but there aren't enough teams entered so we now have the weekend free unexpectedly! We're going to take Al and Lavon to Isaqueena Falls and the Stumphouse Tunnel tomorrow. I'll be sure to post pictures. I'm sure it will be beautiful travelling up the mountains with the leaves. I hope everyone has a fantastic weekend!

Happy Birthday, Ally!

Today was Ally's birthday party. Hard to believe that she is 7 yrs old! She had her party here at the house (a first for me... :) )and we all had a great time. We rented a moon walk, did face painting and had a pinata. The kids all had a great time and she got lots of great presents. Kent's parents are also coming in to town this evening from San Antonio. We are looking forward to a fun visit with them. They will be here through Thanksgiving. Time sure snuck up on us this year - we've got less than two weeks until Thanksgiving!

Fall!

Fall is officially here! The weather has turned crisp, and the leaves are changing. This has been such a great treat for us. We have been really enjoying seeing the season change. It was awesome last weekend at the baseball tournament to see the leaves blowing across the baseball field as we huddled in blankets. Or as we drive across town, to see the side of the road filled with red, yellow and green leaves. I know that it will only be a few weeks and the trees will be bare, but we're sure enjoying it while it lasts!

One of the things we are really enjoying since moving here is the change in climate. We love the fact that Greenville has four seasons. We made it through the hottest summer on record without any trouble (Texas more than prepared us for it! lol) and now we are enjoying the great autumn weather. Ally said tonight as we were driving down to my parents house that she can't wait for winter. I keep telling them that Greenville only gets about one snow a year, but even the possibility of that is super exciting to the kids. They can't wait to use the sled we bought in Colorado years ago on the hill in our front yard.

I've attached a picture of the tree in our front yard. In the last couple of days, the red is taking over. Before too long we'll be having to rake up the leaves from it....

Happy Halloween!

Happy Halloween! I hope that everyone had a fun day yesterday. Ally was our "Pumpkin Diva" and Josh was a "psycho clown". (kind of a joke because it was the clown that scared him so much at the Haunted House mentioned previously!)

Coming from a neighborhood that due to distance between houses and lack of street lights, we never trick or treated in our neighborhood - last night was crazy! We took off for trick or treating about 6:15 and the girls and boys in our group separated so that they could divide and conquer the neighborhood. Apparently, our neighborhood is the big draw of the area. People were coming from all over. The clubhouse parking lot was overflowing, the church parking lot right outside the neighborhood was packed, and people were parking everywhere. One of the houses had a really cool haunted house, and they turned our nature trails into the "haunted trails". The girls didn't make it to the trails, but Kent and Josh said it was fantastic. We all made it home around 8:00 with enough candy to feed a town. But it was lots of fun!

Myrtle Beach Oct 2007

We just came back from a long, fun weekend in Myrtle Beach. The kids had a 4 day weekend due to teacher workdays, so we took advantage of the cheap condo prices in Myrtle Beach and hit the road! This was our first time visiting and it was great! We have always heard that Myrtle Beach is over-commercialized and too expensive, but to be honest -- we didn't feel that way. Maybe we are just used to everything being bigger in Texas (smile), but we had an awesome time.

When we were driving in to town we stopped at a Tourist Center in hopes of getting some discount tickets to the Dixie Stampede dinner theatre. Little did we know, it was a timeshare company offering hugely discounted tickets, but you had to go sit through their 90 minute presentation. If we would have purchased tickets at the gate, it would have cost us $120. By sitting through this presentation, we would get all 4 tickets for $40. So we decided to do it. But while we were there, the kids picked up every brochure imaginable and one was for a Ripley's Haunted Adventure. Ally was dead set on going. Josh was not too thrilled with the idea, but he was talked in to it by his little sister. (something is wrong with this picture, right? the baby sister talking the big brother in to going to a haunted house? lol)

So after we left Broadway at the Beach that evening (tourist paradise!), we headed to Ripley's Haunted Adventure. There was a group of people at the ticket desk who were waivering on going in, but once they saw the kiddos they decided that if kids could do it, so could their group. So we all headed in together. Well...let me re-phrase that. Once we purchased the tickets and began walking in -- both kids decided that there was no way in the world they were going in. SO it was more like we carried them in (only to be told after entering we had to put them down). To sum it up in a short sentence, it was the longest 20 minutes of my childrens lives. lol. Josh and another person from the other group were hanging on to each other for dear life, Ally was crying "When is this going to be over?", and I couldn't stop laughing at the pure madness of it all. It was DEFINITELY a haunted adventure! And I'm pretty sure that it will be the last time our gang heads to a haunted house. Although, believe it or not, when we joked again on Sunday about going back, Ally was all for it again - rationalizing it to Josh "We know what is going to happen!". He was NOT taking the bait.

Saturday after our painful 90 min presentation, we went down to the beach. It was perfect weather. Believe it or not, it was about 85 degrees and we all 4 swam in the ocean. We had a great time! We picked up some cheapo boogie boards for the kids, and they had a blast. It was a moment that I had to sit back and realize that my kids are getting older. No longer were they hanging on to my legs scared of the waves, but it was me calling them back because they had ventured out too far. After they had had enough, we ventured in to the 3 indoor pools. They had a lazy river, a regular pool, and a hot tub. I never did venture in to the regular pool, but the hot tub (of course) and the lazy river were really enjoyable.

That evening we went to Dolly Parton's Dixie Stampede. If anyone ever has the opportunity to attend this, GO! It was great fun! There were live buffalo, horses, acrobatics, "battles", contests, etc. They divide the theatre into a "North" and "South" and you have various contests to see who wins the most. In our show, we were Yankees, but the Rebs won. They don't give you silverware, so be ready to get your hands dirty!

Sunday we woke up, went to IHOP for breakfast (if you haven't tried the Pumpkin pancakes - I highly recommend them!) and went for a round of put put golf. It was a huge 3 story course with views of the ocean. Kent beat us all, but everyone had a good time.

We were all sad to head out, but we had an awesome time. We can't wait to go back. Ally even says she wants to move there!

Starting Out!

I'm VERY new at this but thought that creating a blog would be fun and help keep us in touch with our family and friends! I hope that everyone will enjoy seeing our photos and stories as we explore our new town.
We have already started to make our way around the Greenville area pretty well, and we're looking to expand our comfort zone!