It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas...

I can't believe Thanksgiving has already come and gone and Christmas is on its way! With Christmas comes winter and with winter comes snow! This is going to be the true test to see if we can hack it in New Hampshire.

Last week we had our 1st visitor! Daniel was delivering a load up here and stopped by for a visit. After a long hard day it was a great surprise. So nice seeing a familiar face!

  

We hope everyone had a Happy Thanksgiving! As much as we missed our family this year we really had a great day together. Cooking began at 9:30am and dinner was served at 4! Everything came out so delicious. The Turkey was moist, the sweet potato casserole creamy and the jello salad was just like Mama Sims makes it! The only thing we had a small problem with was the Pumpkin Pie. I made it from fresh pumpkin for the 1st time but used a regular ole store bought pie crust and the crust burnt! :-( It was pretty devistating but after looking at it closely we realized it was only the outter crust. So we just ate around it and everything inside was quite yummy! Phweew!

Getting the turkey ready

Making the pie

Preparing the Stuffing and Sweet potatoes

Green bean casserole

The Spread

My maple roasted sage turkey with bacon :)

Yay!

  

Joshua carving the turkey with the worlds smallest knife! hehe

Pie ready to go into the oven

Sparkling wine and cider

Woohoo!

Holiday! Celebrate! :)

My plate

Joshua grubbing! :)

Rufus got a plate too!

My burnt around the edges pie :-(

After dinner we took our annual Thanksgiving family picture. Sad not to have Libby this year. :-( I want a kitty so bad! (sigh)

Thanksgiving Family pic 10'

Thanksgiving 09'

Thanksgiving 08' - The start of the tradition. :)

After our pic my family called us on skype. We skyped for probably over an hour and it was a blast! My entire family got together this year (minus us) and I was bummed we were missing it. So it was really neat to skype and see everyone together. My parents, sisters, brother, Grandma, Aunt/Uncle, Cousin - way fun! It felt almost as if we were there. "Almost". :)

Cheers-ing with my sis! :))

Posing with my mom and brother. hehe.

Busted out the Christmas decorations today! We love Christmas and couldn't wait to make our home festive. We're going to cut down our first Xmas tree this weekend! Looking for just a little Charlie Brown one but still so excited! I can't help but think of Christmas Vacation in doing this. Don't forget the saw! :) The forecast said snow but it seems to change every 5 mins around here. :-/ We had some snow flurries last week but nothing stuck.... hope to get some by Christmas! Yes, we're dreaming of a white Christmas...

I cut Joshua's hair last week. Can you believe he hadn't cut his hair since the wedding?! There was sooooo much hair. His hair's so different from mine... thick and curly as opposed to thin and straight! Can't wait to see what carries on to our kiddos. :-) This was my 1st haircut. I was pretty nervous but I think it came out ok... what do you think?

Before

And after! :)

So I came to the realization over the past few weeks that the new job well... really kinda stinks. The job itself is high stress and the people I work with are D-R-A-M-A. Plus, I just don't find the medical field interesting and hearing about sick people all day makes me uneasy. It got me thinking about things though and it led me to a big decision. I want to persue my dream of being a Bridal Consultant. I thought about doing this while helping my sister plan her wedding in 01'! After planning my wedding I realized this is what I should be doing! Helping couples plan one of the biggest days in their lives and having my ideas, creativity and hard work put into that?! It would be pretty amazing. I love that Jack Johnson lyric "don't let your dreams be dreams".  Moving here was living a dream... why stop there?! I really think if I put my heart into this I can make it happen!
XoXo

Halloweenie past and present

Hiya everyone.We hope you all had a very Happy Halloween! Halloween is my faaaav holiday! Going back from when I was a kid my parents would throw a huge Halloween party every year and go all out with decorations, lights, dry ice, costumes, etc. I have to admit I missed dressing up and the annual parties with friends and family soooooo much this year!!! We debated on dressing up but decided against it as we just didn't have anywhere to go. You all know the Oingo Boingo song Dead Mans Party... well something about "all dressed up with nowhere to go..." was just a bit more depressing than simply not dressing up. Hopefully next year we will have made a friend or two and can paint the town red. But since we didn't partake this year I thought I'd share some of "The Ghosts of Halloweens past". Enjoy! :)

"Bonnie Parker"

Halloween 01'

"Jesus and Mary"

"Fairy, Geisha, Flapper"

Halloween 03'

Back: "Priest, Sumarai, Catwoman"

Front: "Devil, Pricsilla Presley, Hick"

Halloween 05'

"The Pirates"

"Pimp and Hooker"

"Dick in the box"

Halloween 07'

"Mary Poppins"

Preggers Misty :)

"Dwight Schrute and Rainbow Brite"

Halloween 08'

"The Witch and The Bandit"

"Devil and Breast Inspector"

"Snowwoman"

Halloween 09'

"All dressed up with nowhere to go"

Halloween 10'

Well not dressing up wasn't about to spoil our Halloween fun! We decorated our teeny apartment, carved pumpkins, drank pumpkin beer, ate pumpkin donuts, made a festive Halloween meal and watched scary movies. Here are some pictures of our 1st NH Halloween!

Grrrr...  hehe

He's very scary...

"Candy Corn is the only candy in the history of America that's never been advertised. And there's a reason. All of the candy corn that was ever made was made in 1911." - Lewis Black

  

Chicken and Biscuits!

Nothin' quite like homemade Apple Pie!

Rufus got a Halloweenie treat too

Scary movies

Just 10 mins East of us is the cute little town of Derry. This is where I like to do all our grocery shopping and what not as it has such an old fashioned cozy small town feel. We took a drive over there this weekend to check out the historical site of Robert Frosts Farm. I've been wanting to make this trip for quite some time as I'm a bit of a fan. I even have a quote from his poem "The road not taken" hanging in our bathroom. He lived on this farm from 1900- 1911 and composed many of his poems while living there. There was something extraordinary about this place. It was a bit magical...

Before heading to the farm we had breakfast at this cute lil 50's diner which reminded me so much of one of my fav childhood eateries. Johnny B. Good! :)

Robert Frost house

Magical

:)

Cotton

The Road not Taken?

♥

After our trip to Derry we cruised by Crystal Lake to check out how much the trees had changed since the last time we were there...

All the bright colors of Fall are turning into muted shades of brown... winter is on its way!

I came home to a great surprise... a card from the Bose family! :) I love and miss them soooooo much. My sister put this picture in the card that is now hanging on our fridge. It's one of my favs of our fam from last years Halloween at Bates Nut Farm.

I'll end this post with a pic of my fav nephew! This is him in the parking lot after buying the Robin costume that yes, he picked out! He had to wear it out of the store.... sooooooo stinkin' cute!