Thanksgiving

We started off Thanksgiving with a trip to the ER on Thansgiving eve.  We were at a friends house to pick up bunk beds and Eli's face caught the corner of Joeys tailgate. He was actually very good through the whole deal that the bar has been set high.

It hurt to smile so he gave thumbs up

5 Stitches and a half smile later we were done!

When we got home the bunk beds were here and set up! Top bunk was decided and they fit perfectly in nook I wanted them in!  

Thanksgiving was a 58* degree day so why not do an outside home project.  Since we were not going to Ohio I freshened up are outside and painted our doors and shutters.  Joey deep fried a turkey, I painted, the kids played and I never got out of paint clothes!

Here's the start with the 90's green

And here is the new color

This is on the doors and shutters and I am super happy with it.  I got it done except for the window next to the door on Thanksgiving.  Finished up the window on Saturday.  

We had our turkey, all right!

And we kept our tradition alive and set up our tree the weekend BEFORE thanksgiving.  We are officially onto Christmas, but we did not forget to give our thanks for our many blessings and gifts! 

Eli just cannot wait for Christmas and keeps asking how many days to it!!  

 

Odds and Ends

We have been bent out shape with all this Covid virus stuff.  Our numbers are increasing and we are getting our second wave.  Here is what we've been up too!

Ella, making my back hurt.

The girls declared this day at school national pigtail day.  Unofficially.

They got all their little friends to do pigtails this day.  Look at all those masks ;)

The girls and their friend in their onesie PJ's

Our friends have moved back to the Quad Cities from Louisiana with Deere.  So we made a trip to their beautiful home and spent the night.  It was nice to reconnect with the fellow Buckeyes and now I want a new house :)  They have 3 teenagers in the house and lets just say.....I'm not ready for that!

Our dear friends and neighbors moved :(  They were who we camped and boated with ALL THE TIME! The boys were the girls first friends.  We were all sad to see them go.  

Here are the cards we made for the boys before they left

I framed this picture for the boys too!

I was able to run a 5K and I took my running buddy with me.  He was in stroller until the end of it then he took off running for the finish line.  I had a decent time, the weather was PERFECT and the course was pretty.  

Scooters are life and just enjoying this unseasonably warm fall

Halloween 2020

This year was super hero year.  Josie was Batgirl, Ella was Wonder woman and Eli was Spiderman

This was also what we happened to have in our basement in our dress up bin.  Bonus!  

Covid did not ruin this holiday for us.  We went trick or treating with a small group, but the kids really ran around on their own and were not by each other that much.

We totally lucked out with weather for both of our halloween events as well! Yeah!

Batgirl

All their LOOT!

Wonder woman

Our small little group

And a few weeks before Halloween and local campground does their halloweekend night and the campers can go around trick or treating at the camp ground.  We took costumes and planned the dirty job of carving pumpkins while we were there.  This also happened to be our last weekend of camping for the year!  We did so much camping!

Eli with his scary pumpkin!

Ready to go trick or treating! I had forgotten Eli's mask but I had what I needed in our camper to make one out of paper plate. Whew!

Our lit up pumpkins! Joey had a great idea to carve these there.  No mess really and it was an activity they could do since we were not boating this late in the season.

A group of campers did glow stick people and walked around the campsite like this.  It was AWESOME!  I thoroughly enjoyed their costumes! 

 

Family Pictures 2020

Well here are our WINDY family pictures that my friend and I, took and I edited.  

Our outfits are fails, except for mine! I look great in that jumper :)

 

She tried and she did!

Ella has been working so hard to learn how to dive and she finally DID IT!  She is doing so great and really does so well at swimming. I can definitely see improvement from last year.  She loves freestyle the best!  

Here are some videos of doing her thing.

 

The Restructure

We have been back at the grind of school and work in full force.  Some more than others (Joey)! But that hasn't stopped us from twinning!

Or realizing how much my child actually does look like ME!

This is Josie by the way.

Or coloring!  Eli has sure been on a coloring kick.  I gave him this color by number and he did it all himself except for the cat that I messed up on. LOL!  He is such a good colorer.

Or Trying all the tricks!

Since covid, most of our appointments had been cancelled.  But we finally got back into the dentist and all 3 were good to go!

Ever since Ella's surgery we have had follow up appointments, which usually mean a day of just the 2 of us, shopping, eating and doing all the stuff when out of town.  Josie has been adamant that she has a mommy me day every since Ella's last appointment.  I am breaking it down from a day to a few things that don't last all day.  So this particular event we did race for the cure virtual style.  We both ran 1 mile and logged our times and then she jumped on her bike and I finished the next 2.2 miles for my 5K.  Then we refueled at breakfast!  She enjoyed the breakfast the most, but she rocked the mile run!  I need to plan a few more things for just her and I.

I managed to have a low stress, last minute garage sale with a neighbor and I actually had a pretty good success with it.  I had pretty much gone through all the kids clothes and changed out sizes and had them sitting in boxes ready to go to the attic when my neighbor asked me to do a sale with her.  PERFECT! 

It was very successful!

Now onto Joey's current life!  His work has been re-sturcturing and that has been all the talk.  Joey called me, while I was at work, and told me that he was offered a position and it is his current position plus about half of 2 other friends positions.  I asked if he wanted that much more work and he responded with "the other option is no job."  So needless to say, he took the job.  He has been VERY busy, but doesn't show his stress too much.  Cool, calm, collected Joey! Always his style.

Because of the shift of positions and all the re-structuring our good friends and neighbors are being re-located to Wisconsin.  What an ABSOLUTE bummer!  Our kids and all of us adults are great friends! I am not happy about them moving.  

This past weekend I hosted a going away party for them.  We did it early, before all the moving/showing of house and chaos begins for them.  Plus we wanted it outside to social distant and minimize chances of covid spread.  The weather was cold and rainy and miserable, which suits how I feel about their move.  Anywho, I had ordered 200 doughnut holes for their party and Hy-vee messed up and ordered 200 DOUGHNUTS!!  Needless to say we had a lot left over and I have increased my doughnut intake for the year by 200% just this week! Here is the little poster I had made for their party!

"Doughnut leave us! We will miss you!"

I am also keeping VERY busy at work as well.  Being a school nurse during a pandemic sure has been interesting/busy/stressful/etc...  I think you can imagine.

The kids are continuing at school, in person at the moment.  Swimming has begun and we added a little fish to the water this year.  More on that later! :)

 

Never ending spring break ended

 The kids went home for spring break March 10th and just finally went back to school August, 24.  I went back to work the week before.  As a school nurse I can't think of a worse time to have this job than during a pandemic, but I am ready.  My office is usually busy and constant flow and that was a concern of mine.  My exposure rate goes up when I go back to work.  I did request this plexiglass to go around my desk cause the kids walk right up to my desk and I felt very exposed.   I didn't want their droplets all of me and my desk.  So I have one more added protection in addition to mandated masks.

The kids were definitly ready to go back to school.  They couldn't wait to see their friends and have routine back.  Josie and Ella are going into 2nd grade and Eli in his second year of preschool.  I really cannot believe the girls are in 2nd grade.  I have thouroughly enjoyed the school age with them, still young and innocent, yet able to communicate well and have a conversation, so of course it is just flying by. 

And Eli is in preK again but he is definitly ready.  I really hope they work on social and emotional learnign with him and really cut his temper tantrums.....

Josie

Ella

And everybody ready to go! I hope we have a full year of in school learning and that we all stay healthy.  This year will have challenges but I think we are all ready, masks and all!