Elfina and Sweetie are back and ready to PARTY!

Elfina and Sweetie arrived on their normal day this year - December 1! They started off in the liquor cabinet, whoa girls! The 2nd day they decided to pretend they were having a little picnic. We'll see where else these little cuties end up this month.

December girls' trip in San Marcos

This was our 6th annual Christmas girls' trip, and we met up in San Marcos this time. Of course, Mom had to bring Lucy, dressed in her Santa outfit! It was one of those beautiful winter days in Texas, so we went to hang out at a park right by the river. The park was really fun, and we spent hours there playing and exploring the river area. There was a rapid there that kayakers were practicing riding down. We also saw a group of tubers just floating the river! While it was a nice, warm day, the water had to be freezing!
That night we drove through Santa's Ranch, which was just a little space with a bunch of different Christmas light set ups. It wasn't the best one we have ever seen, but it wasn't horrible by any means.  These little trips are always so fun!

It's a BIG leaf!

Brooke found this gigantic leaf at the park, and the crazy thing was that we couldn't even find the tree that it could have possibly come from. There weren't any other leaves around that were that big, and none in the trees around. It was really weird, but super cool! She loved it and kept it in her room until it got too flaky.

Volleyball Buds

Adilyn and her friend, Jessa have been playing at the same club this season. They are on different teams, but they had the same picture day, so we had to snap a quick picture of them in their uniforms. It's always nice to have familiar faces around!

An Arkansas Thanksgiving and Diamond hunting

Unfortunately, we couldn't take the whole week to camp this Thanksgiving, but we did get away for half the week! We decided to go up to Arkansas, so we drove up and stayed at a state park for two nights, and then we went to the Crater of Diamonds for another night. The first state park was really nice and there were some great places to hike and climb rocks. The fall leaves still had some pretty good color to them. More than we usually get in Texas anyway! We had an awesome leftover Thanksgiving meal on Thanksgiving night in our cozy little camper. We cooked all our favorites at home earlier in the week, and then we brought the leftovers. It was the easiest Thanksgiving meal, ever! The weather wasn't great for some of the time, but we spent those rainy days in the camper playing games and watching movies.
Crater of Diamonds was pretty fun! We brought our own shovels and buckets, and I was pretty amazed at how huge the area was. We felt very determined to find something cool, and we dug with a passion for about 45 minutes. After that, we realized that the ground was really hard, and it was really messy. We still kept trying for a pretty long while until one by one the kids gave up. We did find some stones that we thought might be something, but unfortunately they were just quartz. The thrill of the hunt was fun, even though we didn't find anything too cool.

The tale of the trapped hamster

I am not sure how we ended up at the pet store, but we did. We were looking at all the cute little fuzzy animals that we will never own, and we saw this guy. He was running all over the cage, clearly distressed, and chewing on the little hamster wheel. We were watching him for a few minutes, and then we realized that he had a buddy that was trapped under the wheel. He was trying to rescue him. It was so adorable, and we went and got a worker who freed the little trapped fella. The reunion was just as sweet as you could have ever hoped for. They ran around the cage together as happy as could be! Who knew that we were going to make that special moment happen for those two little furry rodents?

The dedicated French Horn player

Most of the times parents know best. Not always, but let's be honest - we pretty much know what we are talking about. When Adilyn told us that she wanted to do band in 6th grade, we told her that she wouldn't like it. We told her that it's hard to learn new things, and that she we didn't think she would want to put the effort into it. She begged and pleaded for us to let her try it. We reluctantly gave in. So...here we are in November and this is what she looks like while she "practices" her French Horn. Her favorite thing to do while she is "practicing" is to make her horn make noises like an angry baby elephant or a hive of angry bees. The only funny thing about it, is that she has to carry that huge thing back and forth on the bus everyday! Maybe she learned her lesson, and next time she will listen to us. What am I saying, of course she didn't!