Bubby's 9 Years Old!
Wow, I can hardly belive that Bubby was 9 yesterday, where did the time go? I thought I'd post pics of Bubby every year from birth to age 9, just to see how he's changed. You'll have to excuse the quality of the older digital picutures and scans...technology is so much better nowadays :D
More birthday pics to come tomorrow
Just born! Alabama
1 Year Old, Alabama
2 Years Old, Alabama
3 Years Old, Keflavik, Iceland
4 Years Old, Keflavik, Iceland
5 Years Old, Misawa, Japan
6 Years Old, Misawa, Japan
7 Years Old, Misawa, Japan
8 Years Old, Alabama
9 Years Old, Alabama
Goodies Galore!
After our trip to IHOP on Thanksgiving, I decided it was time to get down to business and head to the kitchen to whip up some goodies! In generally I'm not the type who 'enjoys' making lots of goodies, normally this is Mr. B's favorite contribution to the holiday season. This year the kids and I dove in head first and had lots of fun, and many messes ;) It was worth the 4+ hours spent in the kitchen. We made Monster cookies, toffee (bet this shocked the socks off Mr. B!), and chocolate covered pretzels. And I even took some pictures along the way!
Bea with the ingredients getting ready to make some goodies
Bea and I, see I'm all decked out...apron and all ;)
Boo & Bea stirring the monster cookies, this is NOT an easy task as you can see from Boo's expression. I had to call him down to help stir as it was 9 cups of oatmeal with lots of peanut butter, then we had to mix in M&M's & chocolate chips! It was quite the workout. And YES I did require the assistance of Boo when I was trying halve the recipe...it was quite tricky at times, LOL
Our first Monster Cookies fresh off the cooling rack
Toffee on the stove, see I used the candy thermometer and everything!
Bubby & Bea working hard making chocolate covered pretzels, this is always a messy project but the kids love it!
Some of the chocolate covered pretzels.
Montgomery Zoo
The other day we decided to head to the zoo and use our family season pass. The weather was great, with just a hint of coolness. It did look like it may rain but it didn't so it worked out great. There were very few people there so we were able to cover the whole zoo & museum in 1 1/2 hours. It's been since May since we were last there (right after Bea's eye surgery) so it was nice to visit it again, and a great way to stay busy on a day off from school. Here are some pics from the day:
The kids with some flamingos
Bea checking out a swan, she was scared because it kept making loud noises at her, LOL!
Cute little monkey
Otters that were checking us out
Bea, Bubby, & I, taken by Boo
Boo & I, taken by Bubby
A close encounter with this guy!
Us
Bubby & Bea with a Lion
Bubby hanging out with a Lion
Boo with a Lion
Bea checking out the giraffes
Bubby & Boo climbing on the rope web at the playground
Boo & Bubby were cracking me up flying around on this gizmo!
Bubby with good ole Tom Turkey :)
Look out Boo, there is a bear behind you!
Bubby & Bea petting a moose exhibit
Thanksgiving 2009
Kids Thanksgiving 2009
Us Thanksgiving 2009, we went for a 'brown' theme :)
Happy Thanksgiving! Hope ya'll had a good one!
We had an interesting one here, and it was a great 'adventure' for us. This year we decided to be
very non-traditional celebrating Thanksgiving. Normally we spend Thanksgiving having a 'traditional' meal with friends (as we are generally not near family). This year was very different though, and I will have to admit that we did have a generous offer to hang out with friends but it just wouldn't have been 'right' this year, so alternative plans were made. Now before you go getting all concerned about the kids missing out on a Thanksgiving meal, hold that thought. We did have a traditional style Thanksgiving meal in Oct, so they are NOT deprived ;)
This year we decided that we would go eat at a restaurant and give the waitress a BIG tip. So yesterday Boo & Bubby spent some time calling several restaurants until we found one that would be open on Thanksgiving. We now knew we would be heading to IHOP. Several weeks ago when this plan had started forming, I started praying that we would get just the right waitress that the tip would really be a blessing to her day. So Thanksgiving day we head to IHOP around noon and the kids & I all prayed in the car that we would be able to positively impact the right person's life with the tip.
It worked out great the restaurant only had 4 tables filled, so there was no waiting and plenty of space, although it did start to get more crowded as we were leaving. I had already told the kids that the waitress we got was getting the big tip, even if she was having a bad day and her service was terrible, it wasn't about that but doing something for someone else. Luckily our waitress was great and went out of her way to take care of us. We ate our food and ordered hot fudge sundaes for all of us.
When it came time to leave the tip we had to wait for her to come back to the table, as I really was not comfortable leaving that large of a bill on the table and walking away, hoping that she would be the one to get it...especially with it starting to get crowded. So we waited for her to come back. She came over and asked if we needed anything else (we already had the food bill to go pay up front) and I told her no we just wanted to make sure she got the tip and I handed her the large tip. She pointed to the food bill and asked if I wanted her to go pay it with the large tip, and I told her no that was for her and I would go pay up front. She was nothing less than stunned, and asked "this is the tip?!" When I replied "yes" she hugged me and I told her "Happy Thanksgiving."
We went up front to pay (even got a military discount!) and then I took Bea to the restroom. Bubby & Boo were sitting on the bench in lobby and they could see our waitress through the glass windows. When we came out of the restroom the boys told me how the waitress was so excited she went over and showed one of the other waitresses. Then two other waitresses came over to see what the fuss was and she showed them as well. I don't know how the tip will impact her day or her holiday season but I do know that it sure made the kids & I smile, so it was well worth it!
I addition to the thousands of other things I am thankful for today I am thankful that we were able to make someone's day just a bit brighter and that I was able to be obedient to what I felt God was telling me to do.
New Bench!
I got this bench for a steal from Jcpenney's the other day, it was almost 70% off and I got free shipping, yippee! This works much better than the small vanity bench we have been using it as it's getting all wobbly from all the 'use' or abuse really from the kids. It will work great while we are here but if we ever move back into military housing I doubt there will be room in the bedroom for it...so I'll enjoy it while I can :)
New Bench
Close up
Shogun's
For Bubby's birthday (coming up on Sunday) he wanted to go eat at Shogun's Japanese Steakhouse, so we decided to go today for lunch to avoid a crowd. It was great we had the whole table to ourselves and the kids and I enjoyed all the food! I loved watching them use the chopsticks, yet it made me miss Japan :( All 3 kids ate the green onion soup, I was amazed Bubby tried it and all 3 of them even tried the salad! All of them ate so well it was well worth the trip! Luckily I had my camera in tow and was able to get some pictures to share :)
Shogun's
Bubby outside of Shogun's getting ready to eat his Birthday lunch
Boo & Bubby waiting for our food
Bubby eating with his chopsticks
Bea eating with her chopsticks
The boys eating their yummy lunch with chopsticks
Bea
