Life & Thanksgiving.....

So what most people don't know about me is that Thanksgiving is one of my favorite times. I have a LOT of great memories of this particular holiday. Some of them are old traditions, some of them are more recent. I mean, every single year for as long as I can remember, we would watch the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade. Now that I'm grown and have a home of my own, I get up early to watch it and I call my Mother about 900 times through out the morning to make sure she's seeing the floats as they go by. Funny thing is, I just recently discovered that my brother gets up early to watch it too. So next year, maybe I will call him too. I remember the last Thanksgiving we had my Pawpaw Bazil here, he spent Thanksgiving with us in Oklahoma. He was so happy to be here. Those memories hold a LOT of joy in my heart. I remember getting up to watch the parade like always and the look of relief on both my parents faces, "ahhhh someone elses turn!"....you see he was such a talker and it took him hours to tell you a story about someone that was long gone, and you had probably never heard of them or met them before, but just to hear his voice.....I sat there that morning and listened to him talk while I watched the parade. It always brings a smile to my face now watching the parade and remembering that morning. I remember how much he enjoyed going to my Mammaw & Pawpaw's house to eat dinner with the rest of my crazy Oklahoma family....he really enjoyed himself. I remember how thankful he was to be with us and how much he loved being with us that year and that is how I choose to remember him. He passed away in January of 2005. That was just a little over a month after his time with us. But, I know that he had that time with us, he had a great time, lots of fun, lots of laughs, and more than enough love.

I remember always spending time with my cousins on Thanksgiving and playing when we were younger. Going to get cokes when we were older. I remember always having family together and loving being together, getting to see my Uncle Joe throw marshmallows or rolls at whoever happened to be in the line of fire at the moment. For all of these wonderful memories, I am thankful and so grateful. I have had some wonderful Thanksgivings in the past.

This Thanksgiving was the first one I spent with my husbands family. I love my in-laws. They are wonderful people. This year my Mother-in-law wanted to have a Thanksgiving dinner at her house with her family. So I got the turkey, learned how to make dressing and chocolate pie, and we had a great family dinner. I went to my Mammaw's to night before to get everything ready, she taught me how to make the dressing, which I am proud to say I'm the first one to ever be taught to make it. And she taught me hose to make her chocolate pie, this got dangerous, we had a fight with the fluffy topping stuff....it was fun though! I had a good time with my husbands family. My pie turned out beautifully and my stuffing was delicious. I hope that we are able to do this again.

So basically what I'm saying is that I'm thankful for everything that I have been given. I have some pretty amazing people in my life. I have had some people leave my life recently that I wasn't quite ready to let go of. I'm sure in time I'll be alright.

Lightning Flashes....

So this week it was crazy. We had a storm that just happened suddenly. The weather was showing no rain, just 98 degree weather with lots of sun. I was sitting at the computer when I heard a loud crash and saw a huge flash of light. All of the sudden the house went quiet and dark. The computer, TV, air conditioner, everything went off. We checked outside and it was starting to sprinkle a little and so we looked around and notice the neighbors had electricity. We called and asked electic company to come out and check it out. They came and went and 2 hours later turned everything back on. Well when everything came back up the computer no longer would turn on, the stereo in the bedroom wouldn't work anymore, the fan blew up, and yesterday when I went to cook dinner the oven wouldn't work either. I wanted to scream. I know that I can turn all of this over to my insurance company and they can issue me a check and I can go and buy all new things but I know they have to schedule a time for the adjuster to come out and take a look around then I have to wait for them to review thier findings and then I have to wait for a check. It is just frustrating to deal with this crap. So now here I am waiting on figuring out how to fix all this. I'm not a patient person....I don't like sitting and waiting and so this is driving me nuts. I wanted it fixed 2 seconds after it happened. I guess we'll see what happens.

That's all for now....I guess we'll see how next week goes and if we can fix the stove and everything else. Cooking will be interesting next week. I guess we will get to eat out alot! Oh well.....here's to no more storms that destroy things.

Well I had a BLAST on my shoot with Ashley on Saturday! We trashed a wedding dress and swam in the other. It was a blast! I thought I would share one of the sneak peeks that she has put up for me to see! It's my favorite picture out of the ones she's put up so far! I just think it's a gorgeous shot!! We had a blast really! We had even more fun on Sunday when we got my cousins, Aunt, & Mom together for a girls only shoot!! She's a very talented girl!!

www.AshlynnPhotography.com

Long week ahead!

So this week my cousins are here! I love when they visit! They are like my mini mes....yes they have my attitude, and sometimes it's overwhelming but it's fun! Today we are going to go and take pictures together! A friend of mine is a photographer and she's going to do a photoshoot of us girls, my Mom, my Aunt Leaoma, and then the Mini's and me!! I can't wait! I'm going over to do hair & make up on them at 4 and then we have the shoot at 5:30!! It should be fun! These girls are just such a blast and they are going to be here all week long!! So I'm sure that we will be swimming if weather permits it and one day this week I plan on taking the oldest one out for a secret driving lesson! I'm excited about that! Once her mother reads this I'm sure I'll be in trouble, but every girl wants to drive...so it'll be fun!

Anyway, nothing else going on really. Seth & I have been out fishing a couple more times and I've caught some pretty big fish...I still am not taking them off the hook and that is irritating to him but I'm a girl so what do you expect? It's so pretty out there, so soothing to be that disconnected from everything. I LOVE it out there. If I could build a house out there and stay I would. It's just nice, no one out there to be noisy, no traffic really, just quiet. There have been deer out there every single time I've been and it's just nice. So pretty. Anyway, I'm off to get ready I'll write more some other time!! OH here's a pic from the last shoot I did with Ashley. And I'll post a link to her website!


www.ashlynnphotography.com

The Finer Things In Life

Tonight Seth & I went out to some land that his best friends family just inherited. It's one of the most gorgeous places I have ever seen. There's 750 acres of land with at least 3 ponds on it. I've seen my first wild hog and buck out there. I also got to see some gorgeous red bird today singing his heart out. He was so pretty. The only dash of color in a field of green! It's a really beautiful place out in the middle of nowhere. Seth caught a perch in one of the ponds. We drove all over the place and just kinda explored it a little bit until we get the chance to take our 4 wheeler out there and really take a look around. We really have enjoyed getting to be out there. It's a really neat place. We found a million of these berries out there too. I am thinking they are edible...maybe we will pick some sometime and see. >
Anyway that was all we did today. I just wanted to share because I thought it was gorgeous and I got some great pictures of Seth while he was fishing! We are going to send some to his best friend in Afghanistan.

As for everything else in my life. Dad's surgery went really great. They ended up only putting in one stint and they said that they think with a good diet and some exercise he will be good as new. Maybe even better! I appreciate all the prayers & thoughts everyone sent my way. I'm so thankful that he is doing better.