Mismatch Day

Happy Halloween!

The Month of October in Picture Review

The month of October has been a busy month.
We had dinner at Maggianos for the first time last weekend. Oh my goodness!! We did the family style dinner with our neighbors and friends. We were celebrating the husband's birthday. Above is a picture of Mom's lasagna from Maggianos. YUM!
And this is the Chocolate Zuccotto (I know I spelled that incorrectly) cake. Its a seven layer chocolate cake and its wonderful!! I couldn't even begin to calculate my weight watchers points for this!
Aidan had Farm Day at his school. It rained so we had to move it inside. The kids got to go around to all kinds of fun centers. Above Aidan is searching for chicken eggs (not really- they are plastic Easter eggs). I volunteered and got to work the pumpkin vine limbo!
Farm Day wouldn't be complete without the Chik Fil A Cow. This is Aidan's class and his teacher Mrs. Harris.
We carved pumpkins, although Aidan decided he would use the Mr Potato Head pumpkin pieces kit to make a "witchy" pumpkin.
Jim went to Avery's school and spoke to the 2nd grade about maps.
Aidan finally figured out how to put the plastic vampire teeth in his mouth without choking himself. :)
Our neighbors came over one evening to decorate Halloween cookies. We LOVE our neighbors!


My boys love the Smith girls! Avery is playing beauty shop with Selah. She's drying his hair.
Aidan and Adeline are playing beauty shop too.
Avery did carve his pumpkin. He used a template and made Anakin Skywalker with a little help from dad.
Avery's elementary school had their Fall Carnival. Here's Avery with some friends from 2nd grade.
The Carnival had games in each classroom. This is the first time Avery has ever played twister.
Digging for Dinosaur eggs
Pumpkin Ring Toss

Add in a trip to Chattanooga for Fall Break, dinner with friends at LaRivierres (sp?) on the Gallatin Square- also a first, 2 trunk or treats, a birthday party at Honeysuckle Hill Farm, a visit to the flea market, and the ALS Walk and that's our October.
We're wrapping up the month with trick or treating with friends on Halloween night and starting our November with a bonfire at the White House (with Meredith and Ralph, not George.) We are so thankful for good friends and good times together.

Play That Funky Music White Boy!

The Waters (I know it surprises you) Family has no rhythm whatsoever. It always makes me laugh to see one of my boys dancing. But they do enjoy themselves. :) Just a little Monday morning chuckle for you to start the week.

Who Ya With?

Click here to take the ABC News Match O Matic quiz. After you choose your answers, it matches you with the candidate your views most closely mirror. Who ya with? (if you want to share) :)

Souper Easy Loaded Potato Soup

5 Large Baking potatoes

1/4 cup butter
1 medium onion chopped
1/3 cup all purpose flour
1 quart half and half
3 cups milk
1 tsp salt
1/8 tsp ground white pepper

1 1/4 cups (5 oz.) shredded cheddar cheese
8 fully cooked bacon slices crumbled
Garnish- sliced green onions

Prick each potato several times with a fork. Arrange potatoes 1 inch apart in microwave on paper towels. Microwave at HIGH about 20 minutes, turning and rearranging after 10. Let cool.

Peel potatoes and coarsely mash with a fork.

Melt butter in a large pan (Dutch oven if you have one) over medium heat: add onion, and saute until tender. Add flour, stirring until smooth. Stir in potatoes, half and half, and next three ingredients, cook over low heat about fifteen minutes or until thoroughly heated.

Top each serving with cheese and bacon and garnish with green onion if desired.

The Ghosts of Halloween Pasts

Did you dress up and go trick or treating as a kid? If so, what was your favorite costume as a child. If you don't have a favorite, what's your most memorable?

I don't really have a favorite. My parents were very frugal so most of my costumes were made out of whatever I could come up with at home (and that was actually a lot of fun). The only store bought costume I remember is The Road Runner. I'm not quite sure how I arrived at wanting to be the Road Runner but apparently that is what I decided on one year. I remember my mom bought my costume too big and I kept trying to tell her but she just wasn't as concerned as I was with that. Anyway, my brother and I went out to trick or treat in our neighborhood. About the third house into it, I fell down our neighbor's concrete porch steps (because my costume was too big) and that wrapped it up for me that night. :)

At the Drive In

Sarah blogged about the Franklin Drive In theater back in the summer. I went to their website and signed up for notifications on upcoming movies. It is in Franklin, Ky so its a bit of a drive but at $9 a car load, the price for a movie can't be beat. This weekend they are showing two kids movies. My boys never got in to High School Musical so we've not seen any of those but you would have to be from another planet not to realize how popular it has become. HSM 3 and Beverly Hills Chihuahua are the two movies showing with gates opening at 6pm and HSM 3 starting at 7pm, Beverly Hills Chihuahua at 8:50pm. Just thought I'd pass along the info.





SHOWING FRIDAY, SATURDAY, AND SUNDAY NIGHT ONLY
Closed Monday thru Thursday
ADMISSION $9.00 car load
Gates Open 6:00pm Movie Starts7:00pm
FM Stereo is required for movie listening.
Gates may open early due to the high volume of traffic on our main road
In case of a SELL OUT the gates will close and WILL NOT RE-OPEN for the second feature.
As always PLEASE take notice of others, put your hatches down while the movie is playing and if you are in a large vehicle, park in the rear or on the sides if room is available.

What's The Scoop

Product #1
Mr Clean Mega Shower Foamer
Sometimes I like to clean. In a weird sort of way its therapeutic for me. Maybe its just that sense of accomplishment I get when I look at my shiny kitchen floor and enjoy it for the all of two minutes it will stay that way. When you have two boys ages 4 and 7, nothing stays clean very long. :)
The one room I hate to clean is the bathroom. The bathroom is hard work. Anything I can buy to make cleaning that room easier, I'm going to do it. Last week I bought the new Mr Clean Mega Shower Foamer. Its basically the old scrubbing bubbles with a spray foamer that covers a wider area.
I have to say that it does cover a bigger area with a good layer of scrubbing bubbles. I like scrubbing bubbles. I use it to clean because it really does do a lot of the work for you. I don't have to scrub the soap scum on the shower near as long and as hard when I use the bubbles.
I liked the Mega Shower Foamer and it does do what the commercial promises; however, it is quite a bit more expensive than the regular Mr Clean Scrubbing Bubbles which with more careful application can cover the exact same area just as well.
And having used the Target generic brand which is even cheaper and does the same job, I just don't see myself paying $4 plus dollars just for the wide spray.

Product #2
Mr Clean Magic Erasers

The Mr Clean Magic Erasers have become a staple in my house. Once again I have used the less expensive target brand with the same satisfactory results. These are so versatile. You can get just about anything up with the magic eraser. Crayon marks on walls- check. Shoe scuff marks on linoleum- check. built up crud on lawn chairs that were left outside through the winter-check. Sharpie marks on the kitchen table- check. The only drawback I've come across during my use is that you have to be careful what surface you use the eraser on. It can remove the finish from some things. I used it on my kitchen table when my boys got sharpie marks on it. It wasn't until the sun hit the table later that day that I noticed I had taken the finish off as well on the spots where I used the magic eraser. But, I would do it again because the sharpie marks on the table looked far worse than the spots left behind with the removed finish.

Goblins and Ghouls

I love this time of year for many reasons. Mainly I love the crispness of the air, putting away my shorts and pulling out the jeans, the beautiful colors, and Halloween. I love Halloween. Let me clarify. I love the Halloween that is just the fun holiday (nothing to do with All Hallows Eve or with anything evil.) As a kid I have to admit that I had more fun passing out candy from my front porch than dressing up and trick or treating. Sometimes my dad would dress up too. I just enjoyed seeing everyone in their costumes.
We lived in a neighborhood with a ton of kids so we always had a lot of trick or treaters. On many occasions I remember my mom closing the door and turning off the porch light at around 8 because we had run out of candy. And let me tell you, my mom was not a skimper when it came to candy. She bought the good stuff and tons of it. So when I say we ran out of candy you know that we had a crazy amount of trick or treaters.
My mom bought milky ways, snickers, reeses, and three musketeers. If you came to my house, you were gonna get some chocolate. The one thing my mom bought every year were those gross gooey, can hardly chew them, stick to the roof of your mouth peanut butter chews- you know the ones- wrapped in either orange or black. Yuck! I would refuse to give those out so we always ended up with mass amounts of it left after Halloween. Thinking back, the smart thing to do would have been to give that yucky stuff out and horde the good chocolate!
Even after I moved out, I came back every Halloween to my mom's house to pass out candy. And after we had the boys, we took them to her neighborhood to trick or treat.
My boys LOVE Halloween and if I asked you why you thought that was, I'm sure most would think because of the candy. They do like the candy but what they love more is dressing up. Avery has been a duck, Barney, Woody from Toy Story, Shrek, The Thing, the red Power Ranger, The Human Torch and this year will be Anakin Skywalker from Star Wars. Aidan has been a pumpkin, Frankenstein, a glow in the dark skeleton, and will be Captain Rex, leader of the Clone Troopers from Clone Wars.
Once back home from trick or treating, the boys like to dump out their bags and sort their candy. They take great joy in this. :) We immediately pull out any candy they don't like and that goes with Jim to work the next day. They then get to keep their candy for a couple of days and whatever is left after that goes with Jim once again to work where he puts it on his secretary's desk to share. Jim said that its fairly busy around that candy bowl until the chocolate runs out. After that it takes days for the smarties, gum, and tootsie rolls (oh yeah and those orange and black wrapped yucky chews) to get gone.
So Happy Halloween in the dress up, trick or treat, Its the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown kind of way. :)

VOTE!

Ashley posted this on a mommies message board. I thought it was worth posting on here. I can tell you from personal experience with the last election, early voting is the way to go. I stood in line for a LONG time to vote during the last election. Early voting gives you a chance to get it done without the crowd.
Whatever your political persuasion, please vote. Too many people have given their lives so that we have this privilege.
If you live in Sumner County, here are your early voting locations, dates and times.

Early Voting Locations:
Hendersonville- Sumner Co. Gov’t Bldg (old water dept. on Dunn St)
Oct.18,25- 9am-3pm
Oct. 27,28- noon- 6pm

Gallatin- Sumner Co. Admin. Bldg.
Oct.15-17, Oct.20-24, Oct.27-28- 8am-4:30pm.
Oct.18,25- 9am-3pm
Oct.29-30- 8am-7pm.

White House- White House City hall
Oct.21-23- noon-6pm.
Oct.22- noon-7pm.

Westmoreland- VFW
Oct.27-28- noon-6pm.

Portland- JE Kerly Bldg.
Oct.20,21- Noon-6pm.
Oct.22- noon-7pm.
Oct. 29- noon-7pm

ALS Walk, Rock City, and Chattanooga, TN

Avery had Fall Break this week and was out of school from Thursday through Monday. We kicked our weekend off with the Walk to D'Feet ALS on Saturday at Centennial Park. Its always bittersweet because the Walk is fun and a wonderful way to raise money and awareness for this horrible illness but its also sad because all of our thoughts immediately go to how much we miss Nana. There were many more people present this year. The Vanderbilt baseball team was there and started the walk off for everyone. Thanks to everyone who donated money, pledged to walk
with us, and prayed for us.



We decided last minute that after the Walk we would head to Chattanooga for the rest of the holiday weekend. I have grown up in Middle Tennessee and have seen the "See Rock City" signs. I have to admit that I have made fun of it and joked about it. I mean how exciting could Rock City be?



We ABSOLUTELY loved it. The boys had a blast. From Fat Man's Squeeze to the 1000 ton balanced rock to seeing seven states, we loved it all!! We also went to Ruby Falls where we trekked deep down to the center of the Earth (ok that's a bit dramatic- Avery and I are reading Journey to the Center of the Earth by Jules Verne so he kept saying that..) and made our way to the Falls. Beautiful! Aidan was a little scared in the cave and didn't enjoy the Falls quite as much.





The next day we drove to downtown Chattanooga and walked around the city. Chattanooga is such a beautiful city and so family friendly. We played at the downtown playground by the river, walked through the water outside the Aquarium, and ended up at the Children's Museum. To end our trip, we walked to Ben and Jerry's for some ice cream. Avery was playing air guitar and singing to Van Halen playing over the intercom. :)













Even with all of that, there is still a ton of stuff we didn't have time to do. We will definitely be planning a trip back. And if you haven't........ SEE ROCK CITY.... and Ruby Falls- you won't be sorry!