A HAPPY HEART IS A THANKFUL HEART

 I'm so thankful!  I really am.  I'm grateful for the gospel.  I'm thankful for my home.  I'm thankful for the beauty of the earth.  I'm thankful for my family (and my "adopted" family).  I'm thankful for friends.  I'm thankful for EVERYTHING!

Bettenhausens and DeGooyers for the WIN!

Our thanksgiving was full of traditions!  And I'm so glad!  And we spent it with OUR Bettenhausens!  And I'm so glad!  We needed the break from the world and the daily grind.  So we... did are annual Turkey Trot 5K.  But because of the weather... we decided to walk inside the church building... in circles... listening to Christmas music... wearing Scott's tie-dyed and designed by Scott.  It was sooooo much fun!  We also played frisbee before the Bettenhausens showed up.  It was PERFECT!

Skittles is learning to play frisbee.

He learned that Uncle Skylar loves frisbee.

So he's trying to keep up.

Aren't the shirts awesome?
And the red head is even awesome-er!

These two were competitive.

Although Kiara and I participated in the frisbee toss.

Showing off the shrits!

Running with Grandpa.

These two powered up.

Skittles and Starburst Level

Starburst and Skittles with Grandpa!

When they got tired of walking in circles...

they could sit together and talk.

And Raisin, after twirling in circles for over 10 minutes nearly passed out.

Couldn't do that on the trail....

I had to get a selfie of "the girls!"

And of course, Scott and Mark photo bombed.

Stretching out after hitting the 5K mark.

Then we had a traditional turkey dinner with all the fixings!  Delicious!!!!

Kiara and I broke the bread.

And this is Skittle's contribution.

Stealing and eating the bread... like a boss!

The gang!  The table!  The food!  The LOVE!

Afterwards we played lots of games.  Ate pie.  And made a craft project with the kids.  It was an absolutely SPLENDID day! 

Everyone made their own set.

I forgot to get pictures.

This one is mine.

As an aside... my Bettenhausens are moving.  And I'm soooooo sad about it.  The Lord is helping me deal with it.  And he gave us this PERFECT day to celebrate with them and solidify our happy memories.  They truly are family... so we are going to handle our best friend status and family adoption remotely.

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!  I love all y'all!

SKITTLES PHOTO DUMP & CLOCKS

We made clocks on Sunday... just for fun.  I collect nativities.  And I didn't own a nativity clock.  Now I do!

Mine
Scott - Kiara - Katia's - Cody

And then there is this delightful grandson of mine...

Skittles loves Karmel.

Karmel doesn't always love Skittles.

This is a good moment.

Planks with Dad

Planks with bestie, Starburst

Chilling with Sloth and friends.

(He's supposed to be napping.)

He literally just said, "I'm dead."

We all have days like this.

And I love my Kentucky home in the Autumn!

The red tree is ours.  The orange tree is our neighbor's.

#thankssage AND SANTA

 My crazy co-ed and her crazy cousins decided to serve chicken nuggets and apple cider to unsuspecting elevator riders.  Yes... they dressed up and had a lovely candle-light treat for the unaware "guests."  How fun!

Katia - Shanae - Sage

Mmmmm, nuggets!

Can't stop laughing....

#thankssage

Silly and Beautiful!

And afterwards... Kiwi Loco!

I love my beautiful, young, fun-loving, sweet, talented, baby girl!

And then... Skittles got to see Santa!  He was nervous, but smiled because "grandma was going to blog the picture." (I've got him trained.)

He's so adorable!

I love my grandson!

He makes life soooo much fun!

FaNoWriMo - ONE WORD AT A TIME

November is time to write a novel!  And we are continuing the tradition, except instead of NaNoWriMo, we are celebrating FaNoWriMo (Family Novel Writing Month).  The change is due to not wanting to support the progressive agendas that National Novel Writing Month has been promoting this year.  We feel that writing should be fun and a political-free-zone.  Sooooooo Scott made us shirts.  And Cody is still working on creating a website for us.  And we are ALL writing and working towards are goals.

Our FaNoWriMo Participants

(minus Katia and Skylar - who also got shirts.)

Scott's writing was interrupted by these two cuties: Starburst and Skittles.

Raisin wrote 5 words!

And then she ate all the candy!

Candy and Soda make the kick-off fun!

We love writing!

Scott and I also went for a two day vacation to Indiana.  The Jets were playing the Colts (or as our foreign exchange student, Luise, used to call them: the Ponies) on Thursday night.  We went to the game.  The Jets first and second quarterbacks got hurt and they had to put in their 3rd string.  It made for kinda a depressing game for Jets fans.  But we enjoyed the time together, and we enjoyed wearing our green and white. 

J-E-T-S!  Jets! Jets! Jets!

The next day, we got to go to the Indianapolis temple for a session.  It was absolutely beautiful, gorgeous and peaceful.  The difference between a football game and worshipping in the House of the Lord was extreme!  We both agreed that the temple was our favorite activity!

Scott insisted I needed a picture by myself in front of the temple....

He looks so handsome!

I love our eternal relationship - thanks to the restored gospel!

We ended the day watching the new James Bond movie, "No Time to Die."  It was surprising good!  I'm not a huge Bond fan, but this one was exciting, fun, thought-provoking, and a tear jerker.  I actually had headaches the rest of the night from crying in the theater.

And I must add... that we really missed our grandson while we were gone.  So here are a couple of pics from my favorite grandson (so far).

Could he be any cuter?!

These two boys are some of my favorites!

This was where Skittles fell asleep during nap time.

I heard him leave his bed, and he thought he was being so quiet and pulling a fast one on grandma.

I pretended to not hear him and he got bored enough to sleep.