California Trip!

Hudson and I took a quick little trip across the country last weekend to see Carrie and Andres and celebrate baby Rooney turning 1! We had a super early flight out on Friday morning...we had to be up by 4 and out the door by 4:45. Well Mr. Hudson was just so excited that he was up at 3 am and ready to go! Whew! It was going to be a long day. Who else looks this good at 5 am?!?!?

 

 The great thing about having such an early flight is that we got to California by 10, so we had basically the whole day. We might have been a bit groggy, but we powered through it! I was very proud of my big boy. He is just such a rock star and is so go with the flow. I was SO glad he accompanied me on this trip!

We visited for a little while and then since we were 2 blocks from the beach, we decided to head down an "look" at it!

 "Looking" turned into getting our feet wet (it was FREEZING by the way)...

 Then the pants just had to come off so he could go in further...

 And then that turned into swimming in his undies! I was clearly not prepared for beach time in November, but that didn't matter one bit!

 We had so much fun with Rooney. She loved the beach too!

 My favorite picture!

 Hudson literally fell asleep at dinner that night. Thankfully we had decided to just stay in because we knew the crash was going to come at some point, and it came at about 6:30. I thought that was pretty good for a boy who had been up since 3 am (that's 1 am California time!).

The next day was Rooney's party day! When we woke up, we had to hit up Sidecar Donuts. If you are near Newport Beach, you HAVE to go to Sidecar. I literally drool just thinking about those donuts. The one to get is the butter and salt donut. It is SOOOO good! Then it was football watching and party prepping the rest of the day. Oh and Hudson and I snuck in another trip to the beach...this time to where the surfers were! We had fun watching the surfers and once again, Hudson took a dip in the ice cold water. He is ca-razy!

 Then it was time to celebrate this princess! They had a Mexican party theme and Carrie went all out. It was so cute! They don't have too many friends with kids, so it was mainly adults, so they had a taco man come and make tacos and a salsa bar, and of course had a margarita bar! So fun! Hudson made friends with a little 5 year old that was there and they just played their little hearts out! Carrie had set out a stomp rocket, a ball pit, a tee ball set, and of course bocce ball and cornhole! There was definitely something for everyone!

 I was loving the party lights they set up...

 Finally it was time for the princess to have her cake!

 I don't think there was ever any doubt that she would tear into the cake! She LOVED it.

 Sunday morning, we decided to go to Disneyland! Poor Rooney and Andres stayed home, so just Carrie, Hudson and I went. We were sad to say goodbye to her for the day, but it was going to be a fun day!

 It was a beautiful day! This was on the main street. I have to say that the castle is not nearly as impressive as Disney World...actually, it was a little dinky.

 Hudson really had no interest in the characters. I was so sad...but also very thankful that we went to Disney World when he was 5 and was all about the characters then. I made him take a picture with Goofy!

 Hudson had us wrapped around his little fingers. I absolutely hate Splash Mountain...like my hands start sweating just thinking about it. I just do not like that drop at the end! However, Hudson is such a daredevil and he was not going to let us off the hook. It was pretty chilly at this point in the day too, so you can imagine how we felt after we got soaking wet too. :) All for our little buddy...

 He loves his Aunt Carrie!

 We literally rode almost every ride in that park! It's smaller than Disney World, and it was not that crowded, so we never waited for too long.

 The Matterhorn was Hudson's favorite ride all day. We started with it, and ended with it! And we did Thunder Mountain twice too! Space Mountain was unfortunately closed...bummer!

 This was the little castle up close!

 The one ride we waited on for longer than 30 minutes was Indiana Jones. We got all the way to the front and the ride had to shut down. We were not leaving though! Thankfully, they got it back up and running in about 15 minutes. It was definitely one of our favorites and was worth the wait!

 The teacups is another one that Carrie and I could have done without...

 Disneyland was all decorated for Christmas and was so beautiful! We even caught the Christmas parade on the way out and it got us in the Christmas spirit for sure!

We had such a fun day and a great end to our trip! I'm so glad we had the opportunity to go for the day! I love all things Disney. We were sad that Harrison wasn't with us, and it is definitely top secret that we went. He has NO idea and hopefully it will stay that way! He was just not old enough to make that kind of trip. Hudson brought him home a Darth Vader light saber though and he thinks it's the greatest thing ever.

 

Carrie showed Hudson how to use a selfie stick!

 

 Hudson was sacked out on both flights on the way home. This boy was exhausted! Heck, I was right there with him! We got home really late Monday night and then it was back to school and work early Tuesday morning. We have spent the weekend trying to catch up on our sleep!

It was such a wonderful, quick trip! We miss them so much already!

Veteran's Day

We had a great Veteran's Day last week! Since I've been traveling so much, it was nice to have a day off in the middle of the week with the kids.

 

First, we had Hudson's Veteran's Day program the day before. They sang about 10 patriotic songs and even played some instruments. It was really cute. The best part was hearing them sing while all the pictures of their family members who have served in the military played on a slide show in the background. We are thankful for Big Daddy and Daddy Bill for their service!

 

 I have been thinking about attending the Veteran's Day parade in Birmingham with the boys for several years now and finally this year we made it happen! It's apparently one of the largest Veteran's Day parades in the country. I have memories of my mom taking us as kids and I wanted the boys to experience it too. I am so glad we went. My mom even decided to join us! Love this picture of Mom and the boys!

 It was such a beautiful day in Birmingham so we were happy to be out in it!

 The boys knew a little bit about why we celebrate Veteran's Day before the parade, but after 3 hours of parade watching and asking eight million questions, I think they are now experts! Ha!

 They will tell you that their favorite parts were the marching bands, the army trucks, and the military men that were holding their guns. Hudson has been marching and holding his "gun" like they do all week since! Harrison loved the horses and the fire trucks too! It was all really good and entertaining. So good that we had to pry the boys away after 3 hours...the parade was still going on!

Such a fun day celebrating our freedom!

Halloween Week

We started off Halloween week with crazy sock day! Hudson was so excited to finally get to wear the long socks that all the boys his age are wearing (I hate them!). I figured for Red Ribbon week it would be ok! They ARE crazy, right!?!

 

 Next up was Harrison's Halloween parade and party at school. I made these cute cupcakes for the party! I was proud of myself! Ha!

 Harrison looked so cute in his parade!

 I could not get enough of Harrison's cute buddy, Carter, in this Auburn band costume. Hudson has been asking to wear a marching band costume for years and I actually looked into it last year and realized that there wasn't anything out there that he could wear. This child's grandmother MADE it! It was completely 100% accurate even down to the white tennis shoes! :)

 Harrison's cute Kangaroo class! His best buddy Owen was also a Ghostbuster, which I thought was just hilarious seeing as though Ghostbusters is not exactly a movie for a 4 year old! :) My 4 year old (and Owen too!), however, is obsessed with the movie, and has wanted to be a Ghostbuster for Halloween since last Halloween ended. There was nothing else that would satisfy him!

 Next up was Hudson's Carnival at school! Harrison had soccer the same night, so I took Hudson solo. While it is definitely not my favorite event of the school year, I survived, and Hudson had an absolute blast. So...it is good for that! And obviously good for the school to raise all that money!

 The weather man was predicting rain on Halloween all week, but we really thought it would be later in the evening and we would get some trick or treating in. As it got closer to Saturday though, I realized trick or treating might be a bust and so I decided last minute to take the boys to Boo at the Zoo on Friday night. It was one of those things that I had just thought we would skip this year even though the boys kept asking to go. However, I knew that it would at least get them in their costumes and they would get some candy, so if Saturday didn't work out it would be ok!

We ended up having so much fun and I am so glad we went! Joel wasn't feeling well, so he stayed home. I got there at 5, which was the trick. We got to do everything and didn't have to wait. We stayed until 7:30 which I could not believe since we did not have dinner before! The line to get in was UNREAL when we left. So glad we went early!

My favorite picture from Halloween!

 

The only thing the boys didn't like was that the train ride was not in the dark. However, we did do the haunted hay ride and it was dark by that point so I think that made it better!

 

 Trick or treating!

 Harrison asked for Auburn on his entire face. The look on the poor girl was priceless! However, she came through!

 The boys begged to watch the show before we left. I tried to talk them out of it because I was ready to go, however, I am so glad we stayed. It was super cute! Harrison loves him some "munions" (rhymes with bunions) so it was great. I don't have the heart to tell him that they are "minions!" Munions sounds so much cuter (and funnier!)! Ha!

The boys loved getting to see the Star Wars crew!

 

Saturday morning, I FINALLY got around to carving the pumpkins. They look so bad...pumpkin carving is definitely Joel's job so hopefully he can take back the reigns on that next year! Yikes! They were done though!

 

I just realized in the picture below that we didn't carve the last pumpkin! Oops! Obviously Harrison did not mind!

 

 We were told to expect rain by 5, so we started trick or treating at 4 and by 5, all the kids were done! So, it ended up working perfectly and I honestly loved starting earlier! We could actually see the kids trick or treating, and we were done in time to have dinner and fun afterwards!

We did a hay ride in the neighborhood and the kids loved it. Harrison did a whole lot more sitting in the hayride and eating his candy than actually trick or treating. I was thankful he could do that!

 Goofy smiles!

 Hudson and his friend Matt...it bothered me all night that I could not see his face! His costume had these crazy light up red eyes too!

 When it started raining around 5, it really started raining! We all had ponchos, but we still all got soaked getting back to the house. We hung out for a while and had dinner at a neighbor's house, and then called it a night.

 

And the rain continued into Sunday and we literally never got out of our pajamas that day! It was so nice to do nothing after a full week of fun!

Catching Up

 I'm playing catch up again! Joel has gone to Nashville to meet with a doctor first thing in the morning to hopefully figure out what has been going on with him for the past 8 months, so I decided it was time to update the blog. I haven't mentioned it here I don't think, but it's been about the worst thing you can imagine (aside from cancer), both for him obviously because he never knows by the hour how he is going to feel, and for the kids and I, who are just trying to get by right now. Maybe one day when all of this is over, he can write about his experience. Let's just say that no one should take their health for granted. He is meeting with a doctor tomorrow that specializes in Lyme Disease, and hopefully, he will be able to give Joel some answers and get him on the path to getting well!

Anyway...we've had a busy few weeks! I'll catch up with Halloween week in the next post because there was so much going on that week that I can't possibly include it in one post.

Auburn FINALLY got a win last night! We were so excited! This picture was taken a while ago when it was actually sunny (we haven't seen the sun in a while!). It's been a tough year to be an Auburn Tiger!

 Popsicles at Steel City Pops (again when it was sunny!).

 Birthday party with old buds...we sure do miss sweet Hen!

Evening trips to the Western in our PJ's!

Harrison was star student of the week the week after his birthday. We had fun making his poster!

 On Columbus Day, the boys had the day off so we headed out to the mega park in Leeds. The boys had a blast!

 I just LOVE Harrison's school pic! He asked to wear the pink shirt that day...I just feel like I can imagine him in college in this picture and it makes me sad! Ha!

 We had a fun Mommy/son day at Let's Play on Friday when I finally wasn't working! We had the place to ourselves and had a blast.

 I went to Orlando for a week a couple of weeks ago. This was view from my room. If you can't tell, that would be the security line at the airport down below. The conference was there, breakfast/lunch/dinner was there...we literally weren't able to leave or see the outdoors! I felt like I was in jail!

 A couple of my closest co-workers and I finally broke free and went to Epcot our last day there. It was SO fun!

 We decided on Epcot because they were having the Food & Wine Festival and it is a park that we can never really enjoy when we have our kids with us. We definitely ate and drank ourselves around the world and had so much fun. Wish I could go back!

 I came back in town for Halloween costumes to arrive...here is a sneak peak!

 And baseball ended. Hudson had a great time in fall ball this year. No rest for the weary though as basketball starts on Tuesday!

I went to Vegas last week for a conference. I'm not used to this much traveling and with Joel not really being able to handle the load by himself, we've had to use the grandparents a lot! We are thankful for their help!

One more trip this week and then I'm putting up my suitcase for a while! Ha! Thankfully, this week's trip is for fun as Hudson and I head to California to celebrate Rooney turning one!