Music Monday

I thought this was too cute! If you're a Disney fan, you should like it!

Fall Festival

Last evening was our town's Fall Festival. Unlike the town Easter Egg Hunt, the Fall Festival is great! Many of the business' in town set up booths of activities for the children to play and there is a costume contest! There are a few other activity for bigger kids, too.

When I put Chloe Jo down for her nap, I told her that we were going to go to the festival after she woke up. She was so excited that she went right to sleep! As promised when she woke up I helped her put on her costume and we took a few pictures before we left for the festival.
"Hey there Little Red Riding Hood. You sure are looking good. You're everything a big, bad wolf could want." Ha! Every time I see her costume I think that song! I think she is the cutest Little Red Riding Hood ever! I'm so glad she doesn't get eaten by the wolf!

When we got to the festival, the tables to sign up for the costume contest were the first thing as we came into the door. The ladies talked me into signing Chloe Jo up against my better judgement. We ended up leaving before the contest started so we just told them to take her off the list. I'm actually really glad we didn't do it because Chloe Jo is so shy. She would have hated getting up on the stage and everyone looking at her!

Even though we didn't stay for the costume contest, we did play a lot of games and had a blast! Chloe Jo started out trying to toss the rings on these tubes.
But then she realized it was a lot easier to just walk up to them and put the rings on from there.
She loved getting ducks out of the water. She wanted to stay and play. She didn't even care about getting a prize for this one!
Bless her little heart, she tried so hard to get these beanbags through this pumpkin. You can see for yourself how close she got. I don't think we are going to have a baseball player like Daddy would like.
Then again...maybe the beanbags were just a warm-up for her! She did great with this activity. I think she ended up getting 3 of the balls into holes.
Daddy really tried to help her golf the correct way...
But Chloe Jo's way was much easier and more fun! Of course, it didn't get the ball anywhere near the targets. Oh well!
We had a lot of fun taking Chloe Jo to the Fall Festival and seeing all the costumes! I'm so excited to take her trick-or-treating tomorrow!

I may or may not be more excited about it than Chloe Jo is!

Hey Paparazzi...

Please, no pictures.

A Mother of One

Kelly's Korner is doing a series for Show Us Your Life Fridays right now geared towards different stages of life. Today's topic is Mothers of Only Children. Since I fall in that category and this topic is close to my heart, I'm linking up! If you are a Mother to One and would like to share, check out Kelly's Korner and link up, too!

Right now, I'm at a really great place in life. I have my down days, but most days are up and I have a lot of hope and faith that God will bless us with more children if it is His plan. Instead of lamenting the fact that I only have one child, I am embracing the time I have to spend with my dear daughter, Chloe Jo.

Here are a couple of lists I have compiled about being a Mother of One:

Things I Love About Being a Mother of One

1. I always know who did it. I have 2 brothers and a sister. Growing up, we had an extra person in our house called the Not-Me Ghost. Mom: "Who made this huge mess?" Children: "Not-Me!"

2. I'll never have to be at a piano recital and a soccer game at the same time.

3. More money to spoil my One with! And I'm horrible about spoiling her, too!

4. There is no fighting or bickering going on up in here!

5. I have sole possession of all hugs and kisses (when Daddy is at work, anyway).

Things I Hate About Being A Mother of One

1. The Mine-O-Saur lives in our house. Mommy: "May I color with the pink crayon?" Chloe Jo: "No! Mine!"

2. Chloe Jo doesn't have anyone besides me to play with...and when I'm busy, sometimes it's not pretty in our house.

3. No more children to pass all those adorable clothes to. We do hand down to a cousin and donate, though!

4. No cute photographs of children in matching clothes.

5. No babies for Chloe Jo to love. I think she would be thrilled if we had a baby at our house.

And there you have it, folks!

And, for good measure, here's a picture of me treasuring my gift from God.

Fall Pictures

Yesterday, Russ and I took Chloe Jo to the next town over to take fall pictures. They had a great fall area set up in their town square. We had driven by it on Sunday and so I wanted to go back to get pictures. CJ was more interested in playing with all of the pumpkins than getting her picture taken, but I think I got a few cute ones!
For some reason, she loved this green gourd (or whatever it is).
I wasn't planning on getting a picture with me in it, but Russ wanted to. He didn't have anything nice on so he didn't want to be in any.
Chloe Jo thought this gazebo was great! She loved running up and down the steps and was very upset when we said it was time to go.
I had a fun time taking these fall pictures!

What I'm Loving Wednesday!

Link up {here}.

I'm loving the gorgeous weather we have been having. The leaves are just starting to change!

I'm loving the Halloween plans we have! We are going to the city festival on Saturday and then we are going to trick-or-treat and pass out candy Monday evening. CJ is so excited!

I'm loving the fall pictures I took of Chloe Jo this morning. The next town over had this area set up so we went out there to take advantage of it!

I'm loving lunch dates with Russ! We pretty much never go out to lunch on a work-weekday so it's a treat when we do.

I'm loving coloring with my sweet Chloe Jo.

I'm loving the pumpkins we carved/decorated this week!

I hope you all have a great rest of the week!

Pumpkin Carving

Last night we decided to carve our Halloween pumpkins! The daytime has been warm here, but hopefully the pumpkins will last through Halloween.

We originally were going to use Monster, Inc. stencils, but our pumpkins were too small for them! We ended up just doing faces which was still fun! It was nice to not have a complicated stencil this year!
Chloe Jo was fascinated when I took the lid off.
But, fascination or not, there was no way she was going to touch the mess that is the inside of the pumpkin!
Russ is going to kill me for posting this. HAHAHAHA! That's what he gets for making crazy faces for pictures, though!
Carving pumpkins is one of my favorite holiday things to do!
CJ did finally decide to help put the cut out pieces in the trash. She only touched them with the tips of two fingers to minimize contact.
She opted to go with the less messy stick-in face for her pumpkin. She was so proud of it!
And here we are with our finished pumpkins!
And here they are hanging out on our porch.
We had so much fun carving our pumpkins this year!

Music Monday

Who's your daddy?

Chloe Jo has recently been pointing at people and calling them Daddy and Mommy. I'm not sure why she does this because she clearly knows who we are. She doesn't do it all the time...just sometimes and only with certain people. It cracks me up because the people she chooses sometimes are so crazy. Like calling Justin Beiber Daddy. Um...not quite, dear. Not quite. Now most of the time, the people she will point at will look somewhat like us. Tall with dark hair for Daddy and tall with dark blonde hair for Mommy. And then there are days like last night.

We were watching Star Trek: Voyager (and she was liking it until the aliens started a battle!) and she saw Neelix.
To which she promptly pointed at and said "Daddy!" Bahahahahaha! Of all of the people on the show, she chose Neelix. She didn't choose the humans. She chose the Talaxian.

And then she saw Seven of Nine...
and said "Mommy!" I think I got the better end of the deal with this one. At least she is human (albeit with cybernetic implants, but human nonetheless). Plus, Jeri Ryan (the actress) did a lot of modeling work in the beginning of her career so she is beautiful by the worlds standards.

I'm sure Chloe Jo does this to be funny. And it works. She cracks me up!

I just wish she would stop calling Voyager a boat.
Spaceship. Say it with me. Spaceship.

Playin' in the Pumpkin Patch

For a couple of weeks now I have been telling Chloe Jo about going to pick out a pumpkin and carving them. Every time I told her about it she would get excited and want to go right then. It takes a while to get out there so I also told her that she would have to ride in the car for a little while first. I'm so glad she understands what I say because the ride out there was uneventful. We like to go to McLeod Farms to get our pumpkins. If you are in the South Carolina area, it is worth the trip out there!

Last year there was a hayride out to the pumpkin patch. This year, there were about a million children on field trips so the hayrides were full. We hitched a ride on a golf cart instead! Chloe Jo loves riding on golf carts (one of our friends has one she rides on some) so she was very excited about it.

What I love about McLeod is that it is enormous! They grow all kinds of things out there including strawberries and peaches that you can pick yourself. I really wanted to go out and pick strawberries this year but never got around to it.

It didn't take long for Chloe Jo to pick out a pumpkin. Since the school kids weren't out there yet we got the whole patch to ourselves. It was so nice to be able to let Chloe Jo run through the patch to find her pumpkin.
I think she loved the freedom. She wouldn't have liked it as much if there were a bunch of children out there with us.
We ended up picking out 3 pumpkins. I'm hoping to be able to carve them tonight. I doubt CJ will like the carving part since it's messy.
I asked the golf cart driver to take a family picture. This is the best we did. CJ was not happy that a stranger was taking our picture and reverted to shy mode.
As we were leaving the school kids were coming in on the hayride. I'm so glad we got out of there before all of that craziness started! Although, I am looking forward to one day going along on a field trip with CJ.
Once we got back to the main building, we took the opportunity to explore the grounds. They had several places set up to take pictures.
I think these hay bales are a little weird, but they were fun nevertheless. I'm really not sure what the thing on the right is supposed to be. Maybe a spider?
I love their windmill. Every farm needs a windmill.
Daddy loved this pumpkin. I would have liked to have gotten all of us in it, but there wasn't anyone around I could ask to take our picture at that point. Maybe I'll photoshop my face in.
And last, but not least, we indulged in one of their amazing peach empanadas with a scoop of ice cream. Yum!

What I'm Loving Wednesday!

Happy Wednesday
And you know what Wednesday means!
Link up {here} to tell us what you are loving today!

Today I'm loving our annual family trip to the pumpkin patch! More to come on that later!

I'm loving the 3-year Bible reading plan Chloe Jo and I started! You can find it {here}.

I'm loving eBay!

Chloe Jo was given two pair of Gymboree tights in the last few weeks. I didn't have the corresponding outfits to go with them and they are past lines so Gymboree didn't have them either. I got on eBay and found the outfits. I bid on them and have won and paid for one. I have to wait a few days to know if I won the other outfit. Crossing my fingers!

I'm loving all of the sewing I've finished recently. I have one more piece of fabric that I need to decide what I'm going to make with and then I have another project in my head (this one isn't for Chloe Jo!). I heart sewing!

I hope you all are having a fabulous week!

Baker, Baker, Cookie Makers

This is the last post about our week with my sister and her family! BTW, you should go give my sister some love. She is 24 weeks pregnant with my precious little nephew! I can't wait to meet the little guy!

One of the activities I had planned for our visit was to make cookies with the girls. They both love helping in the kitchen so we knew they would love making cookies together!
Now, Chloe Jo (who is the cleanest child in the world) would not help put the butter or the crisco in the bowl. She is an odd child. Brianna, on the other hand, was happy as a clam to get her hands dirty!
They both loved helping put the rest of the ingredients in the bowl.
Chloe Jo and Brianna both thought the best part was stirring! Chloe Jo helps me in the kitchen a lot and her favorite job is to stir. She also loves to set the table and empty the dish washer!
They both helped pour the chocolate chips in the batter.
Then it was time to mix it all up! Brianna loved helping me use the mixer. Chloe Jo..eh, not so much. The mixer scared Chloe Jo (as does the vacuum and anything else that is loud), but Brianna loves loud things (including the vacuum, she tries to ride it) so this was right up her ally.

I gave both of the girls beaters to lick. Brianna dug right in!
Chloe Jo held it long enough for Aunt Chelle to get this picture and then deemed it "a mess." What a weird child she is!
Even though CJ didn't like licking the beater, she loved eating the baked cookies! Brianna, on the other hand, doesn't like sweet things so she did not partake in the cookie eating.
We had a great time making cookies and an even better time eating them (with the exception of Brianna)!