Tanner & His Beloved Truck

 Tanner drove for the first time today and he couldn't have been more happy about his new found freedom. Chris and Tanner have worked so hard on this truck. They basically resurrected this truck and they've done so much work. So Tanner is so proud of his truck and loves getting to drive it. 

Tanner drove himself to church today and we followed behind him to make sure he got there ok. 

It was so cute! He's so happy to be driving and so am I!!

Yay for our 16-year old driver!

'Tis the Season

 Since getting back from Mountain Home, I've been slowly getting Christmas out and putting it up. We finally got our big tree up and the kids helped me decorate it.  We also got our "trip tree" put up and decorated. I love decorating the trip tree, it has all our ornaments from our family trips and its so fun to reminisce together. We got so many ornaments on our New England trip this summer, it was so fun to put them up.  

I love the look of our home all decked out for Christmas. It's so cozy and it's just my favorite. 

Last night before Chris left for drill we had a family movie night. I had asked my kids what holiday traditions they really wanted to do this year and a holiday movie night was Tanner's request. That was an easy yes from all of us. 

I made each kid a small movie basket with treats, popcorn and snuggly socks. We watched "The Best Christmas Pageant Ever" and "The Naughty Nine". It was a fun night and I'm excited to have more family time this holiday season. It's going to be great!

Light the World Kickoff

 With today being the first day of December, we had to celebrate with our traditional "Light the World Kickoff". This year I picked a "nice list" theme. I called it "Light Up the Nice List" and it was pretty fun. I served cupcakes and dipped Oreos. Our elves came back too. Only two elves came back this year and no one seemed too broken up about it. I feel like maybe next year, only one elf may come back. We will see. 

While we ate our treats we talked about ways to "light the world" and share the love of Christ this holiday season. I'm particularly excited to be working on a "Giving Machine" committee again this year and can't wait to take the kids back to visit again. 

We also read "The Giving Manager" book and talked about how to serve within our own family. We have a few ideas on serving in our community. Bailey is planning to volunteer at "The Giving Machine" and we are all going to volunteer making beds with "Sleep in Heavenly Peace". Also our ward is doing a service project next weekend that we will take part in. 

I love that the season inspires so much good and generosity. It's amazing. 

So here we go, bring on all the crazy holiday happenings. We are here for it!

Thanksgiving in Mountain Home

 We got home last night from a wonderful Thanksgiving break in Mountain Home. Joseph and his family joined us there as well so it was fun to have some of the cousins together. 

We drove over to Mtn. Home a week ago on Saturday. We waited a day because Chris had to work a shift at the temple on Friday night. So we got up on Saturday and drove over and we got in a little after lunch. The weather was so gorgeous that the kids immediately went outside to play. 

We had a wonderful week with family. We mostly just chilled and the kids played together and lived out of the basement, basically only coming upstairs to eat their meals. It's pretty funny. They absolutely love making their forts with the PVC pipes an sheets. Then they just live out of their forts the whole time. 

We kept our tradition of doing "Pie" night on Wednesday and that was fully enjoyed by everyone. But the real news from Wednesday was that Tanner took the driving portion of the driver's test and passed. He's now fully licensed. We are so proud of him!

Of course, Thanksgiving day had the adults up early working on food. It warmed my heart to see my parents making the stuffing and stuffing the turkey together. My Grams use to make the turkey but she always had my dad help her stuff the turkey and she would say "don't overstuff that bird" whenever she felt like my Dad was overfilling it. So this year when I heard him say that to Mom and I, I had to laugh. 

I have numerous pictures of my parents prepping and stuffing the thanksgiving turkey over the years and for some reason I really cherish them. 

 

Thanksgiving dinner was delicious as usual and well worth all the hard work. And in true Drake tradition, we went around the table sharing  what we are most grateful for as we ate. My Dad said he was most grateful for my Mom and it was the sweetest. Life has definitely been getting harder for the two of them as my Dad's Parkinson's progresses and I'm eternally grateful they have each other. 

I was able to do a pretty table setting and everyone really loved it. However some of the kids took their meal outside to eat on the porch because the weather was so incredible. 

After dinner the kids played football in honor of Uncle Johnny. Whenever the Allreds come home for Thanksgiving, Uncle Johnny brings flag football supplies and he organizes a game for everyone. Well without his flags, the kids ended up using dishrags, but they didn't seem to mind. Even Chris went out and played with them. 

Then yesterday those who wanted to go, went to see "Wicked: For Good" at the theater. Both Tucker and Bailey wanted to go from our kids, then Nanny & Laura joined Chris and I. We were all really excited to see it and although it wasn't as good as the first movie, it was still really good. I loved it. 

Besides that outing, we really didn't spend much time outside the house. We did a lot of hanging out and talking. We played some games and mostly just enjoyed being together. It was a great trip. 

This time with my parents is feeling more and more precious and I'm feeling the need to get home more often as it gets harder for them to travel. I'm grateful they have plenty of room for all of us to come home and invade them. 

I'm super excited to be all together for Christmas. All my siblings are coming home for the week and I can't wait. The cousins just love all being together and I love having my siblings and their spouses around. The older I get the more grateful I am for the wonderful people my siblings married. There is no drama when we are all together. We just all love spending time together and it makes for wonderful holiday visits. 

Now we are home and gearing up for all things Christmas. It's going to be a wild and busy month but I'm excited. Only three weeks until we are back in Mtn. Home again with everyone but there will be so much fun until then!

Happy Thanksgiving!!

Our All-Star Kids

 We got to celebrate our two younger kids this week. Tucker received a "Star Student" award and Benson was picked at "Student of the Week". 

I also got to go have Thanksgiving lunch with Tucker and Benson. 

I don't get to the school very often so it's always a special time with the boys when I get to have lunch with them. 

We are so grateful for our sweet kids and how hard they work in school. They are amazing kids! 

Band Grand Nationals Competition

We just got home from Indianapolis after attending the Bands of America Grand National Competition. It was so cool to watch. There were 109 bands from across the country. Some bands came as far as Alaska to compete. This was Bentonville West Band's first time competing at Grand Nationals. We didn't expect to place, and we didn't, but it was just an awesome experience. I feel like the kids have never performed so well and it was just incredible to be there. 

Bailey and Tanner left with the band on Wednesday after school and they drove the whole way. They got in late on Wednesday night. Then on Thursday, the rest of us got up early and drove up to Indianapolis. The band was performing in the evening so we traveled all day to get there on time. 

I also made us all "Midnight Regiment Fan" shirts to wear to the competition. We got there with a little time to spare and we sat down and watched about 5 bands before our band performed. 

The band did such a great job and we were so proud of them. As soon as they finished their performance they went to take pictures. 

Then we all walked back over to their hotel so they could eat dinner. We were so excited to see the kids. We had traveled all day to get there and it was so fun to share in the excitement and enthusiasm. 

After walking back to their hotel with the band, we said our goodbyes and they left to get dinner.

 We decided to go find dinner too. We ended up at this delicious Italian place. We all loved it. 

After dinner we went to our hotel and got checked in. Friday was full of more preliminary performances for the other bands and our band went to watch. The younger kids, Chris and I decided to explore Indy. 

We found this really cool playground called the Colt Canal playspace. The boys loved it. It was a pretty awesome playground and we played for a couple of hours. 

After playing, we went to this yummy Jewish deli called "Shapiro's" and got lunch. We loved it. I had this super delicious sandwich and soup.

After lunch we went to the Children's Museum and we spent the rest of the afternoon playing there. They had some really cool exhibits and the boys loved it.

Friday evening we went back to the band's hotel and helped serve them dinner. The band boosters had Olive Garden catered for the band. We were grasping at any chance to see our band kids and so it was fun to be there to help. 

After seeing our band kids a little bit, we went to find dinner. The kids wanted to go back to "Shapiro's" and I wanted Greek food. So I got my Greek to go and the kids and Chris ate at "Shapiro's" again. Twice in the same day. 

We watched the live-stream of the awards ceremony. They announced the 32 bands that made it to finals. Sadly, we didn't make it. Bentonville High did though- so that was exciting. 

Regardless of the results, we are so proud of our band kids! They worked so hard and they did amazing.  

Saturday morning we woke up early and hit the rode to drive all the way home. It was a 9-hour drive and we had to get home in time for a ward activity that Chris was in charge of running. The band left a few hours after us and the kids got home late Saturday night. 

Who knows if Bentonville West will go to Nationals again, but it was so fun to be there this time. Now band is basically over and we get our teenagers back. We are so excited for some serious family time. Here's to an awesome band season!! Go Midnight Regiment!!