In the Spirit of Thanksgiving

Abraham Lincoln was a wonderful man. It was he who made Thanksgiving a national holiday! Here is part of his Thanksgiving Proclamation:

"We have been the recipients of the choicest bounties of heaven; we have been preserved these many years in peace and prosperity; we have grown in number, wealth and power as no other nation has ever grown. But we have forgotten God. We have forgotten the gracious hand, which preserved us in peace and multiplied and enriched and strengthened us, and we have vainly imagined, in the deceitfulness of our hearts, that all these blessings were produced by some superior wisdom and virtue of our own. Intoxicated with unbroken success, we have become too self-sufficient to feel the necessity of redeeming and preserving grace, too proud to pray to the God that made us. It has seemed to me fit and proper that God should be solemnly, reverently and gratefully acknowledged, as with one heart and one voice, by the whole American people. I do therefore invite my fellow citizens in every part of the United States, and also those who are at sea and those who are sojourning in foreign lands, to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November as a day of Thanksgiving and praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the heavens." - October 3, 1863

Wow! I hope we will all take time to remember where all our blessings come from this Thanksgiving.

Also, here is a great clip about Thanksgiving that I thought was neat. Enjoy! Hope you all have a very happy Thanksgiving!!

Leaves, Birthdays, and Spooks!

I woke up one morning. My body ached all over. I moaned and groaned and thought to myself, "I'm getting the flu - oh, I hurt so bad." But I had no other flu symptoms. Then I remembered that the day before I had raked leaves. Millions of them....

And all the while my girls frolicked in these leaves that had had the nerve to fall to the ground without first changing color.And they had the time of their lives! They rolled in them, threw them in the air, and even buried eachother in them. And Life Was Good!

Then I had this birthday. And it was okay as far as birthdays go. Just a normal day of regular stuff. But I did have something to look forward to...
An amazing overnight trip to Billings with my husband. ONLY my husband. No Children. It was a dream come true. And I didn't even feel guilty when at 11:00 p.m. I realized that I had not called to check on my kiddos. In fact, I had not given them a second thought since we left home. I think it was some sort of a break through!
I had been able to enjoy an entire meal without feeding, wiping, hushing, or pulling my hair out. I had been able to put on my swimming suit and sit in a hot tub at our hotel and thoroughly enjoy it. I actually closed my eyes and smiled as I listened to some little girls splashing and screaming in the pool...because they were not mine.
Relaxing, eating, shopping, spending time with my true love. It was Heaven - and it was the best birthday present in the whole world. I wonder if we will ever get to do it again - I hope so!
And as for Halloween, well it was fun. The girls had been excited for weeks about their costumes and trick or treating. We made it back from our weekend just in time to get the girls into their costumes and load them up to go collect their candy. I think they had fun. But I think they had even more fun handing out candy to the trick-or-treaters that came to our house. The sound of the doorbell sent them into quite a frenzie!!
Our Wicked Witch and our Little Cinderella:

Happy Birthday!!!

Just wanted to sneek on and let Catherine know we are thinking of her on her special day!!!!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!! We hope you have a GREAT Day!!! :)

(I need to take more pics of you! :) I still think this is a cute one even if its blurry!)

Love you!

Oh "Deer"

We have been cheated by Mother Nature. With fall being one of my favorite seasons, I have been quite disappointed this year. We had an early freeze and all the leaves dropped off the trees before they even had a chance to change color. I hate winter. Winter is no friend of mine. And the beautifulness (is that a word?) of fall buffers those depressing feelings that surface when I know winter is on its way. And so, unfortunately, we will crash into winter this year. Whatever - lets get it over with.

And with fall, naturally, comes hunting. Lots and lots of hunting. Hunting for elk and everyone else's elk. Hunting for deer and everyone else's deer. Hunting for pheasants. Hunting for mountain lion. Hunting, hunting, hunting. I hate hunting. However, my husband does not. My husband LOVES hunting. We don't see much of him during hunting season - and around these parts it seems like hunting season lasts pretty much all year. Exaggerating is one of my specialties.

He did finally get an elk. Even though he was disappointed with its size, I was quite pleased with it. It was just a spike. Hadn't had much of a life yet I suppose. But, it has provided us with some nice, young, tender meat. I like elk meat pretty well. We got a lot of steaks and roasts, jerky, and of course, a lot of hamburger. I have already started using it and its not too bad at all!! The best part about Kyle finally getting his elk is this - the terrible mountain man beard thing that he had going on is now gone!! Our deal was that he had to shave it off as soon as he got an elk! Yay for me - I cannot stand the feel of a beard on my face. Good riddance!

In my opinion, this next image is rather disturbing. Thank goodness I know that my husband is a good man - because he looks really creepy here. Did he just murder somebody in a fit of rage?? No - he just made the mistake of going hunting all alone, shooting an elk, and having to drag it back to his truck and lift it into the back of his truck all by himself. I suppose I would have a little bit of blood on me if I had to do such a thing. Which I never would. That is a situation I would never ever find myself in.
We (especially me) really lucked out this year when Kyle got his deer just a few days after the season opened. And Tyler got one too. And then a couple days later Brent got one. That just leaves Kaleb. Maybe, just maybe, Kaleb will get one this weekend and we will be DONE!!! That is unless Kyle's friends start asking him to go along with them to get their animals. Which usually happens. I think I (not Kyle) might start charging people for his services. A hunting widow's life is not easy, you know.

This fall we have also enjoyed watching Kaleb play football. It has been fun. The girls love to go to the games and cheer him on! Matty's favorite part is the popcorn. She can finish off a whole bag by herself - and she doesn't like to share it either!! So, here is a picture of our little Lovell Bulldog Football fans!!