Treats for School

For the girls school we had to bring all kinds of stuff. For each class we had to bring a present for Secret Santa, stickers, teacher presents, and a treat. I thought I would try making some reindeers my mom told me about.

After Grayson and I put them together, I thought, "aww these are cute".....well.....

This is how they turned out after I baked them...fat reindeers!!! ME still knew they were reindeers so I figure that's all the matters.

For Grayson's class we had to make cupcakes, which is pretty hard to mess up...well just keeping the girls little fingers from eating the mix.

Busy...our family...no way!

This weekend I kept the girls and Ben busy....haha!!! Friday night my parents watched the girls for us to we could go to dinner. We met up with Heather and Ryan at Pizza Joint for pizza and beer. It is always fun to have a night out and break from the girls.

 Saturday morning my mom took Mary Elizabeth and I shopping, well I basically picked out all the Christmas stuff, which I love doing!! ME did very good considering we took her in tons of different stores. I knew when she started hiding under the clothes and everything, it was time to go. We went home and ate lunch and headed to Edventure, where the new exhibit was Snowville. After Snowville we stopped at Wendy's for a snack and then headed to the Zoo for the Christmas Lights. My wonderful friends came along with us. It was so nice to have the change for us all to do something and something where the girls could be included. The zoo was SUPER crowded, but we had such a good time. After the zoo, we went and ate Mexican with everyone. I knew I had worn them both out when ME was singing to herself and Grayson was putting her head down on the table.

Sunday, Ben and I were able to finish our Christmas shopping. He was worse than the girls trying to take him shopping..."How many more stores", "Are you going to feed me at some point"...I swear!

Overall a good weekend, we are finally finished our shopping and are ready for Christmas. This weekend will be focused on getting the house clean for Christmas!

 The girls at Edventure playing in the kitchen section.



 Snowville!!!

ohhh ME!

 My mom put ME in my old tap dress!



Prize Money for the Year

Date               Race                                           Place              Time              Prize Money

2/11/2012        Race to the Place 5k                 1^st                     18:42               $75.00

3/17/2012       Get to the Green 5k                  3^rd                    18:48               $100.00

4/20/2012      Run for Her Life Mile                1^st                     5:20                 $100.00

4/28/2012      Heart and Sole 5 Miler              4^th                    31:30               $200.00

5/12/2012       Get in the Pink 5k                    1^st                     18:27               $150.00

5/26/2012       Jailbreak 5k                              3^rd                    18:32               $50.00

6/29/2012      Harden St. Mile                         1^st                     5:18                 $200.00

7/4/2012         Born in the USA 4 miler         1^st                     25:09              $50.00

9/3/2012         Labor Day 5 Miler                    2^nd                   32:52               $100.00

11/3/2012        Governor’s Cup Half Marathon 3^rd              1:28                 $100.00

12/1/2012        PattyPacks 5k (tough course)   1^st                     19:58               $100.00

                                                                                                               Total: $1,225.00

Next year I need to save all my prize money for Christmas!!! I have one more race these year, but hopefully next year it will be even more. My times got slower towards the end of the year, but I have been forcusing on longer distances rather than 5k's. Hoping to get a good time in the Augusta Half Marathon in February.

Christmas Card Pictures

After over 100 pictures, we finally got a few good pictures for the Christmas card. But here are some I just had to share...

Christmas Season

December is finally here, even though I keep thinking Christmas is next week. We got an early Christmas present Friday, which was Wes coming to Columbia and hanging out for the night. Ben and Wes spent the afternoon together, while I worked and the girls were at school. We all came home and hung out, my parents and Daniel stopped by to see him to, we ate dinner, and then Wes got up early Saturday morning and headed to Virginia. A short visit, but we will see the whole gang after Christmas.

Saturday morning, I went and did a race that my boss’s friends were putting on. Ended up with a TERRIBLE time, but I got first place, walked away with $100, and got some brownie points from the boss.

After the race, I headed downtown to meet Ben at the Christmas Parade. The girls were of course more excited about all the candy the people were giving out then the actually floats. Course ME ate all her candy as we sat there, but Grayson held on to every single piece.

Two hours later...the girls were done. Saturday afternoon we left Ben to watch the Georgia game in fear he would scare our poor children. So the girls and I walked down to Elizabeth and Nick's to watch the game with my friends, course that lasted about 20 minutes. After that we headed down to Uncle Bruce's store in 5 points for their Christmas function. Of course children and nice, expensive jewelry don't really mix either, so that trip didn't last long. Our final stop was the new Whole Foods. If I had had a blood pressure meter, it would have been off the chart at this point. Finally, we headed home where I left Ben with the girls so I could go out with Theresa to Mark's Birthday party. We had a lot of fun hanging out with no kids and seeing some old running faces.

Sunday we decided to go see Santa. Well ME sat right on Santa's lap and told him everything she wanted. Meanwhile Grayson you probably could of heard her scream from one end of the mall to the other. No pictures of these fun times. But everything was better when we got lunch at the Mexican restaurant. That afternoon I attempted to take them to a Christmas light show at Shandon Baptist Church, but again fail on my part. They only made it halfway through the program. Oh well, there's always next year. We ended the weekend with going to my parent’s house for dinner. The night ended with Grayson eating way to many marshmallows and a dance party, which is just what I needed to see!!!

Stressed

I have been so stressed over anything and everything lately...maybe I need to run like Phoebe and that will relieve all my stress.

Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving is all about eating and enjoying time with friends and family. Well we did that and more. We had a scare over the break and Ms. Riddle actually ended up in the hospital. Not going to go into details, but she is doing better now and we are thankful that she is doing better and things could of been a lot worse.

Over Thanksgiving, we tried to do normal traditions that we do each year. Thursday we got up and were all running around like crazy trying to finish all the cooking that needed to be done. Of course I had the keep the girls occupied, so my grandmother brought us some HUGE pinecones, so I thought it would be fun to decorate them. ME picked out the eyes...so the kindof look like owls, but that's okay.

For Thanksgiving we went to Ben's Aunt Mari's house. The girls love Aunt Mari and kept saying all morning, "I just want to go to Mari's". We ate some, drank some, and hung out with family. Mr. Riddle took Mrs. Riddle to the hospital after we ate so we took the girls home to get them settled down.

I went to bed early and ended up getting up at 11:00 pm to go shopping. I went to Toys R Us and got all the girls shopping done. I had to wait in line for over an hour, but it was totally worth it. I went to Walmart, Belk, Old Navy, Target, etc and was back in bed around 4:00 am. I just love shopping and more importantly I love shopping without two little ones grabbing everything.

Friday morning, we got up and went and visited Mrs. Riddle in the hospital. After the hospital we went to get our tree, which is something we have done for several years now. The pictures aren't that great, since the Riddles weren't with us.

These next few pictures were taken in 2011...crazy the height difference in both the girls. 

I just love the big baby!!! The rest of the weekend was followed by cleaning, helping the Riddles, putting up both trees, and of course watching the Gamecocks win against Clemson for the 3rd year in a row. Overall, not the best Thanksgiving, especially without the whole family being there but at least we had some extra days to spend with the girls.

Things I'm Thankful For...