Recap

Friends,

It has been over a week and a half since my last post and I have been busy.

I have no clue what the hell I have been doing... but obviously it has been enough to keep me away from the blogging world!

First off, I hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving! This has been quite an off year for me - the only bright spots in the year have all encompassed my children in some fashion. But because it being such a weird year, it's made me really focus on the good in my life and I know I have a lot to be thankful for!

We spent all of our break traveling (because if you know me and my family of five, that is what we do best). We spent Sunday at Matt's grandparents house, eating great food. We stayed there until Tuesday - the kids and I went to visit my aunt Sally and her crew on Monday which is always wondeful - then drove to Manhattan Tuesday afternoon.

Off to Aunt Sally's!

Matt and I got to go watch the K-State basketball team play Tuesday night, which was a nice way to spend the evening. Away from those beloved children of mine for two hours. :) Too bad I was so tired, I could barely keep my eyes open.

We had pictures scheduled with our favorite photographer, Wrenn Bird Photography, for Wednesday morning and as my luck would have it, it was cold. We've taken pictures with Wrenn since Sloane was one and not until last year have we had cold weather. Now we are back-to-back cold weather picture takers and though my oldest two are Minnesota-born, you'd think they grew up in south Texas.

"Mom, it's so cold!" "I'm freezing!"

And in classic Allyson/Mom fashion, I told them to suck it up, they lived through 50 below temperatures, they can handle 37 degrees! :)

Poor Wrenn did the best she could with what she had to work with!

The rest of my siblings and their respective families arrived Wednesday evening: my brother Jordan, Alex and their mini dog, Stanley, my sister Lauren, Sam and little Perry.

The rest of the time at my parents was spent either in front of the TV, drinking all of my mom's Coors Light (that would be Jordan, Sam and Matt), at Target (that would be my sister and I), reading Black Friday ads (that would be my dad), or holding babies (that would be my mom). Alex is almost eight months pregnant so she got to do whatever she wanted! :)

Saturday was spent at beautiful Bill Snyder Family Stadium with 56,000 of my closest friends, watching as my Cats played poorly against the worst team in the Big 12. BUT it was a win, and we take a win in any fashion! Plus it was Bill's 200th win at K-State so it was fun to be there for that!

We got up Sunday and packed the car up to get back to Arkansas, in hopes of missing the rain (we drove the truck and Wrigley, our 10-year-old lab was in the back). We did not miss the rain.

Because that is my luck!

Can I just say that seven days of vacation is no vacation for me! I'm more tired now than I was when I left!

BUT... it was a wonderful getaway. And whenever I'm with my family, I'm in my happy place. I can be myself, I can pass kids off, I can laugh really loud, I can speak my mind, I can just be. And that is what family is all about!


XXOO,
Allyson