What are you thankful for?

This is quite possibly the most precious thing I've seen this week (and this is coming from a woman with a lot of "precious"). It got me to thinking of how blessed I am to get to witness these moments every day. Here are some of my other blessings (in no particular order):

my wonderful husband, our kids and our family (all of them-near and far)
our home
food on our table
my Savior and friend, Jesus
our church
good friends
blueberry jello salad-my new favorite!
hot coffee in the morning
a fire in the fire place at night or on a cold day
that both sets of my grandparents are alive and our kids know them
Godly parents who are examples of love, patience and kindness
good health
carpool
that I get to stay home with our kids
freedom, and a husband who fights for it

What or who are you thankful for?

Testing

On Monday night Gabe got to test for his next belt in Taekwondo. They also let him break his first boards. Me being the superb photographer that I am, missed the actual breaking shot (I'm blaming it on the fact that I was trying to take the picture and watch at the same time), but here is what he looked like just after it broke.


He got to break two boards, one with his foot and one with his hand.


Normally, if you are a white belt you can test for a yellow belt. But, Gabe is in what they call "Little Ninjas" (for the 5 and under crowd), so his belt is now a white belt with a yellow stripe. He's pretty excited about it.

Game Night

We love to play games in our house-it could stem from the very competitive nature of both parents bred strategically down through the Hatchitt 5-but that is beside the point. The point is, we love to play. Here Chris, Emily, Grace and Gabe are all gathered round their newest obsession-heroScape. It was a battle for the ages but I'm pretty sure Grace and Chris pulled out the win.

Giddy Up

That's right, it's Preschool Program time! Gabe's 4-year old preschool class gathered around the campfire for a night of singing and fun. He may be the only cowboy I know who works the range in Crocs.

Serenity Now

This little face melts my heart. His sisters and brothers will swear to you that he gets away with so much because he's a baby or because he's THE baby (as in the youngest), but I tell you-it's the face. As I am taking this picture he is trying to sneak the pencil (in his right fist) back out of the pew pencil holder (I've already taken it away several times because he was poking his brother and drawing on the hymnals) and you know what . . . I let him have it. And it's not just the face, it's the strategic pats and kisses-he knows how to work his mommy, and he's only 2! I think I may be in big trouble . . .

"All I Want For Christmas . . ."

Sunday morning during breakfast Gabe lost his first tooth. He has another one working its way out as we speak. I know I just said this about Emily, but how is it possible that he is old enough to loose teeth already?

Baking 101

Emily baked her first batch of brownies last Thursday-all by herself! She read the directions, measured, poured, mixed, baked and frosted a pan of very delicious chocolate fudge brownies. And, more importantly, she even cleaned up after herself. Her next conquest-cookies!

Squirrels In My Pants!

If you're wondering what we do for entertainment around the Hatchitt house, this is it.

We like to watch the Disney cartoon "Phineas and Ferb" on occasion. In this episode, one of the characters has an unfortunate encounter with some squirrels. The resulting song is one of Jonathon's favorite dance numbers. If you watch closely, you can see that he is actually trying to mimic the dancing characters on screen.

Pretty, pretty princess(es)!

Have you ever seen a lovelier group of princesses? I think not! Emily and Makayla recently celebrated their November birthdays together at a princess themed extravaganza!

Pink was our predominate theme, hence the strawberry cupcakes with pink frosting.


We decorated our dining room with pink tulle and white Christmas lights for a fairy tale look.

And then we partied! Okay, really all we did was eat and open presents but the girls had a great time.

Trying To Catch Up

Here's a quick recap since my last post: Chris returned home from Maryland after being gone for a month for National Guard training. Here is a picture of what he learned about while he was gone.

Emily turned 8 years old on November 4th. The saying "time flies" doesn't even come close to describing how I feel when I look at her. How can she be 8 already?

Gabe started Taekwondo at the local YMCA. Here he is practicing his flying side kick. He gets to test for his second belt (and break his first board) in two weeks.

AHGGGG!

I'm not sure why, but blogger does not seem to want to load my recent photos on our blog. Needless to say, I'm a bit frustrated at the moment. Hopefully, we'll have new pictures and an update tomorrow!

Sweet Little Angels . . .

This picture was taken the day we brought Jonathon and Isaac home from the hospital. We laid them in their crib and I remember thinking how big it looked, and how tiny and helpless they looked in comparison-like sweet little angels . . .

Today, while I was upstairs in the bathroom, I could hear these two precious angels downstairs laughing and squealing with delight as plastic crinkled in the background. When I came downstairs to see what was so funny, I found both boys standing in our family room in a pile (more like several mountains) of cereal. They had emptied an entire box of shredded wheat and a full bag of cinnamon toast crunch cereal onto the floor and walked around on it.

Where is the picture you ask? Let me refer you to the picture above-the one that helps me keep my sanity on days like today . . .

No Tricks, Just Treats!

My parents and I took "the kids" (Emily, Grace, Gabe, Makayla, Jonathon, Isaac and Jordan) to Living History Farms on Saturday for an evening of pre-Halloween fun. Everyone got to wear their costumes and walk through the 1875 town of Walnut Hill.


From left to right: Batgirl, Batman, Biker Chick, Wonder Woman, The Flash (minus his costume) and Superman (with a penguin hat on his head to keep warm).


Here we are again, waiting in line for more yummy candy! Sorry again about the quality of these pictures. They were taken with the camera on my phone-I'm waiting for our nice camera to come back home with Chris.

More Birthday Fun!

Birthdays are a pretty big deal at our house, therefore we tend to extend the celebrating from birth-day to birth-week. I picked up Gabe and one of his best friends from preschool today and took them to lunch at our favorite pizza place.


I know everyone has their own opinion of who makes the best pizza, but around here, it's hard to beat The Pizza Ranch buffet.

Just looking at the Cactus Bread makes me hungry for more!

Guess who's 5!

That's right, Gabe is five years old today! He wanted me to wake him up singing "happy birthday" this morning, but he was so excited he came into our room 3 times before my alarm went off to see if it was time to wake up yet.



He got a new Wii game for his birthday. His comment when he opened it . . . "Boo-yah, boys rule!"


Warm, gooey cinnamon rolls for the birthday breakfast. YUMMY!

Star Student!

Emily received a "Star Student" award at school today. She loves school and is a great role model at school and at home. We celebrated with ice cream from McDonald's (exciting I know) and dinner at home on our "Celebrate You" plate.

More Superheros

Here are the final two superheros rounding out our posse-Superman and Ben Ten.

Super!

I sent the boys upstairs to get ready for bed the other night and this is what I saw next-Isaac's version of pj's-Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle pajama shorts and a Batman mask and cape. (sorry about the picture quality, I caught this lovely moment with my phone)



If you haven't already heard, we're a little Super Hero obsessed here at the Hatchitt household. Hence the "Super" Halloween costumes this year. Meet Wonder Woman (Emily), Bat Girl (Grace) and The Flash (Isaac).

Insomnia

This is what I'm doing tonight (instead of sleeping). Thought this would be a fun way to share our many adventures with family and friends. Much more to come in the future-now that I've got this set up, I'm going to go catch up with Dancing With the Stars!

Have a great night,
Mindy