Life Lately: October!

 Mom and Dad have a time share in Lake Lure, and they were there for a week recently. They invited my brother, sister in law and my nephew to spend the weekend with them. Since we are so close anyway, they asked us to come up for the day and spend time with everyone. We had so much fun. Of course the first thing I did was snuggle baby Roman!  

This picture of my dad holding Roman is hilarious! The face he is making!! haha. I wonder what he was thinking???

We went out to lunch at a nearby restaurant we always visit, and it had turned into a Mexican restaurant! That's ok with us though. We had some yummy food.. and some of us had margaritas! ;)

That afternoon we went on a walk down to the pond... and took some pictures. Lake Lure is so beautiful!! It always amazes me, every single time. 

Even though the kids are getting older, I wanted us all to go to a pumpkin patch as a family. We went to one we had never been to this year. It took a little while to get there, but it was nice. Most of the of activities were for kids, but we still got to have lunch, do the corn maze, go on a hay ride, and of course pick out pumpkins. The pumpkins were so expensive!!! Which I figured they would be.. but it sucked because when we got home we realized we accidentally got one with a crack in the bottom, and it rotted really quickly. Should have just got some pumpkins at Publix ;) 

Caleb was sweet and helped us carry the pumpkins because his sisters were being whiny and dramatic! We actually had a long walk back to the car and I was struggling with mine! 

Arnold loves old trucks and had to have his picture with this one. 

We painted our pumpkins this year instead of carving them. This little one I got at the grocery store. I wanted to make it look like a donut like I saw on pinterest. The "sprinkles" ended up looking more like little polka dots though! oh well. 

Oh my sweet Rachel. She is usually doing something that is testing my patience. Lately she got all kinds of gunk in her hair.. we think it was paint that dried in there. She showers and brushes her own hair so we never really saw how bad it was getting.. but she had a HUGE knot in the back of her hair! Arnold and I both tried to get it out, and she would just cry and cry. We finally just booked her an appt at the salon so they could help us. Thankfully they didn't have to cut it out, but it took two ladies and over an hour to get it out! I think they were mad at us.. oops! But I am so thankful for them! They also cut a little bit off Rachel's hair, and she looks so cute and grown up now! And YES we made sure to tip them well! We really were so grateful they could help us! 

Brooke went with me to vote this year! She is really interested in politics lately, and so we talk about the news and certain issues going on around us. I never would have expected she would be into stuff like that, but its funny, because she reminds me so much of my dad! 

Our local bakery started making Biden and Trump cookies for sale lately. For 2 Tuesdays in a row Arnold picked us up some on the way home from work. They are delicious! 

On the 18th we celebrated my Mom's birthday!!! We met her and Dad at Wild Wok for lunch, and then went back to their house for some red velvet cake dad had gotten, and she opened her gifts. Then we just hung out for awhile. 

Arnold got a plate of sushi for lunch! YUCK! I do not like sushi at all. I did try it with some friends a few years back. Just not my thing. I got sweet and sour chicken, and rice. 

Beautiful flowers that Dad got Mom 

Brooke got her freshman school pictures back! I still cant get over that she is in highschool already! Every time I go pick her up at that huge school I get a little emotional. I really wish we would have curled or straightened her hair that morning, but oh well. It still looks good. Caleb and Rachel aren't even getting their pictures taken until Nov. 19 this year. 

We finally made it back to church this month, after several months of not being there!! It was so wonderful. Thanks to Corona, our church was shut down for quite awhile. Then it went to being open back up at limited capacity and masks were required. We still stayed at home for awhile, and I tried to watch the services online. Arnold continues to play music for the praise team, so he actually was at church all this time. He is practicing extra hard right now to play at the Christmas service in December!

We haven't been doing a lot of date nights this year due to Corona, but there was one night when the kids went with my mom and dad out of town, so Arnold and I took advantage of it! We ordered in Carrabba's Italian food, and ate on the couch and watched tv. It was quiet and it was wonderful ;)

Even though Rachel is getting a little older, I took advantage of this month to add some Halloween fun to her lunches! I have cookie cutters for different holidays, and I cut her sandwiches into shapes. I also added fun holiday napkins. 

On Halloween night we stayed at home as a family and had a little part of our own. Papa Johns makes pizza in the shape of Jack on Lanterns on Halloween, so we picked up a couple of those. I also filled up some treat bags with lots of different candies for the kids. Did you guys know they sell rock candy at Walmart now?! I found some that day.. the kids love it. 

We then watched Madea's BOO movie. Arnold and I have seen both the movies. They are silly, but we LOVE Madea! I know the language in these movies is pretty bad, but our whole family loves Madea.. even my mom :D

I ordered this cute cake from the walmart bakery! Their cakes are pretty good! I bought the cute topper on Amazon and added it that night. I also put out a halloween tablecloth on the counter. Yes I love holidays... can't you tell?! :D 

Arnold and his group at work decided to dress up as characters from the Wizard of Oz this year. They said Arnold should be the scarecrow. He didn't want to wear face paint, so he bought a mask offline. They mask was NOT cute... it was actually pretty creepy! He put it on in front of the dog and SCARED him!!! HE wore a plaid flannel shirt... no problem for him because his closet is FILLED with them!