Fall Vacation 2009

We had lots of ideas for our Fall vacation-the beach, OBX, Grandma & Grandpa's, the mountains, California. We settled on Tupelo, MS! What's better than the birthplace of Elvis, right! Both Jim and I have recently felt God telling us to slow down. Things are about to pick up even more and our two little boys will be big brothers before we know it. So our plan was to relax for 9 days. We cleared our schedules and made no commitments, except to enjoy our family and to have fun doing it!

The Lord kept our boys in the bed extra late every morning for us and we were able to spend extra time in His Word and together, quality time between Jim and me in the daylight is hard to come by, so we took every advantage to adore one another.

We wanted the boys to really feel like we were on vacation, so they got to do things that they would not normally get to do, eat breakfast on the couch, have waffles, pancakes and french toast all in the same week! They got special sweet treats and I baked some really yummy suppers! Taylor got to stay up late every night. Jim and I would make a daily trip to Redbox and were finally able to catch up on our movie list.








On Monday we went to the Memphis Zoo and Taylor absolutely loved eating lunch with the monkeys! It was freezing that day, but it was perfect because the zoo was almost empty. We would have like to have stayed longer, but Jim HAD to get back for the Vikings/Packers kickoff! (Go Brett)
















































On Wednesday we went to the Pumpkin Patch in Blue Mountain. (see previous post)
Thursday we went to Lowe's to pick out Mum's and to shop for screen doors. Then we went to Hobby Lobby for Taylor to pick out our scarecrow. Then home, to decorate for Fall!!! Do you notice the change in clothing from Monday...this week's temps were all over the place.















Another day we played at the mall and had Chick fil A for lunch-Taylor's favorite.
On Friday we had a pajama and pancakes day! We stayed in our pjs ALL day! I loved it!!! Friday night was date night, Parent's Night Out at church. Jim and I were really looking forward to getting some adult alone time together. We started out at Kyoto's. As we waited for our Hibachi table, we browsed the menu...maybe I am not really hungry for Japanese tonight..me either...we left, went to Chili's and got Fajitas! I think I had 4 cokes! Then Jim took me shopping for a dress for my 1o year reunion.
We had big plans for Saturday and Sunday, head up to Florence, AL, early for a 1-miler for Jim and shopping for me, and then to a Pickwick cabin of a friend, but, Taylor woke up with a fever so the boys and I stayed home, Jim brought back a $100 reward for his race finish! Go Jim! Good thing we didn't go, it rained the entire time and Jim froze! When he got home just before lunch, I had some wild rice soup on the stove and fresh loaves of bread in the oven! Perfect day for soup! The boys loved it...we ate the entire pot of soup in one day!!!

Sunday morning was family devotion and WAFFLES...you know the ones, the homemade kind made with buttermilk, smothered in butter and syrup, that just melt in your mouth...yah, those! We couldn't believe that we pulled off a vacation at home and loved every single minute of it! I highly recommend this vacation to anyone!!!

Mud from the Pumpkin Patch

Okay, so maybe Jim & I are spoiled, but there is something to be said when your 3 year old asks you if you went to the wrong place when you drive away from the pumpkin patch! We did all the right stuff, asked around, googled, looked at pictures. What went wrong. There are 3 pumpkin patches that accomodate little kids in this area- Circle Y Equestrian (Corinth), Pumpkin Patch Farms (Blue Mtn.), and one in Fulton, but is only open for families on the weekend. The friends we polled couldn't decide which they liked better, Circle Y or Blue Mtn......

You see, the first-ever pumpkin patch I ever went to was the year before last in Chantilly, VA, Cox Farms. Absolutely blew me away! tons and tons of animals all spread out, fresh kettle corn, potato sack slide built into hay stacks all over. Lemonade stands throughout, a huge and fun hayride through the fields which was littered with all our favorite cartoon characters. Fresh, warm apple fritters...need I say more? Jim says the pumpkin patches in the Midwest were even better than that. (pics from Cox Farms, Oct. 07)

So you can easily see why pulling up to someone's side yard, seeing the orange extention cord running from their back porch to the moon bounce could warrant a "OH MY WORD." To make things a little more backwoods, they didn't accept debit cards and not a single apple fritter or kernel of kettle corn to be found....Taylor asked if we could go to the popcorn one next! Poor little guy.

HOWEVER, we had a blast. For the first time, Taylor went right up to the sheep and began feeding them. He has NEVER done that before, EVER! He is a fraidy cat and is scared of a cat, but he thought the sheep were like his little sheep and just held his hand out...We were sooooo proud of him!

Andrew....he loved the water pump, yes, the water pump and the LLAMA, which was located right beside the chickens and ponies. He kept mimmicking one of the animals saying "Hack" over and over and giggling when he did it. He would tease the sheep by running up to the fence, enticing them to come over, then running away when they got close!