Age is just a number!

Charlie and Auntie! 

As of today my new number is 33. I'm not really sure how I feel about that. Don't get me wrong I'm lucky to be getting older, I don't take that for granted. What I mean is 18 is when you get to vote, 21 you get to buy a beer, 25 your car insurance costs less, but what is 33?
So I did a little research on the number 33.

• Oregon was the 33rd state admitted to the union
• 33 is the direct dial country code for France
• A normal human spine has 33 vertebrae when the bones that form the coccyx are counted individually
• For all the baseball fans, 33 was the number of innings in the longest game of baseball ever played! Go ahead look it up, 1981 Rochester Red Wings vs the Pawtucket Red Sox.
• 33 is the retired number of Patrick Ewing. (It may seem odd that I included this BUT I actually liked the New York Knicks and Patrick Ewing growing up. If you think I'm lying ask my brother. I don't know why, I just did. I liked Duke too, It doesn't make sense because Patrick went to Georgetown. I was a strange, confused child in SW Kansas.)
• The strangest thing that came of my Google searching was this whole conspiracy about the 33rd parallel. This is a real thing. The following things have happened at or near the 33rd parallel, the start of the American civil war, the death of Franklin D. Roosevelt, the assassination of JFK, the first known test of the atomic bomb, both bombed Japanese cities in WWII were near the 33rd parallel and Roswell, NM is on the 33rd parallel. 

Strange!

I'm starting to get word that people are getting their Christmas cards! This makes me so happy, I love Christmas Card time! There always seems to be a story behind the picture and this year is no different but I will save that for a few days. I will release the Christmas Card picture that did not make the cut. Merry Christmas from the Blockheads! 

Don't look at it for too long, it will give you nightmares! 

Thanksgiving on the Tundra

South Dakota is considered the tundra, right? It was actually pretty sunny Wednesday through today but it was still way colder than what our family is used to. You have to be made of tougher stuff than I am to thrive in South Dakota. Hats off to my brother and sister in law who enjoy calling it home, Asa just likes that it doesn't get above 90 in the summer!
Thanksgiving was a great time with my siblings and nephews and niece. We ate some turkey, watched a Christmas parade and had a lot of nerf gun wars. The kids had a blast! The ladies also went shopping yesterday in downtown Watertown and enjoyed not dealing with the crowds. We ventured out after lunch and the madness had died down.
Can't wait for Dec. 1st and then I can finish the Christmas shopping. I've already spent the Nov. Christmas budget so I have to wait for the Dec. budget to purchase the rest. Ugh, the struggles of being a responsible adult. ;-)
Lots of good stories from this weekend but my favorite probably happened on the drive to Watertown. We picked up cousin Cedar in Topeka so he was riding in our car for the seven hour trip.
Cedar-Let's play rock paper scissors.
Daryl-Ok
Cedar- Rock, Paper Scissors, SHOOT!
Cedar-What is that?
Daryl- A Gun, Bang.

Oh my gosh those kids make me laugh!

Turkey Time

I'm not sure if Alex ate anything. LOL

Charles and Alex aka The Twins. 

Both the Boys were champs on the car rides. They do seven hours pretty good! 

Footy pajamas for everyone! 

While in SD I finished everything on my cardigan except the pockets. Then it needs a bath! 

I did finish Tiffany's hat in time to give it to her last weekend. She is so cute! 

Well I haven't lost a kid...yet!

It is not strange to people who know me that I loose stuff. A daily questions in my house are where are my keys, where are my shoes, where is my phone?
I don't really have to ask that last one too much these days. The entire month of November I think I've had a working phone for about 8 of them. My first phone I smashed the screen. I dropped it like I have several times before and when I picked it up the screen was shattered. That one was my fault.
Waited until my week calmed down to go get a new phone.
Had that phone for almost a week and it walked off. At first I thought I lost it but at this point I think someone had sticky fingers. I say that because it was called only two hours after being missing and it was shut off.
So, I'm not really counting that one as my fault but being as cheap as I am I'm not running out to buy a new one just yet. I think I'll wait till December. I just can't make myself buy another new phone in the same month. Ugh.
The cutest thing was when Alex was telling me about looking for my phone with Kelly.
Alex-Mommy we no find your phone.
Me- It's Ok honey, thanks for looking.
Alex-Your phone play hide and seek and we no find it.
Me-It's hiding really good.

Well at least I still have knitting. I'm about to pack up to take some 4-H'ers to a youth leadership conference. I kind of enjoy this weekend every year because it is a lot of quality knitting time. I hope to post some pictures Sunday of all my finished projects. I'm taking Tiffany's baby hat, My handspun cardigan and a Christmas stocking that I should have finished last year! I hope to get at least one of the two stockings done in Nov. and hopefully the other before the big day in December. I promise Abby I have not forgotten! 

Do you know about smencils?

A couple of months ago I could not have told you what a smencil is. Now I can educate you about smencils. A smencil is a smelly pencil, see what they did there?
The PTO sells them a few times a year and they are $1 a piece.
Now this is the tricky part, smencils are not just a fundraiser for the kids, they hold many many lessons in their little plastic cases.

First, there is the investigate before you buy. The first time they were smelling them Daryl took one dollar to school. He picked Juicy Lime and when he got to class he realized he didn't want Juicy Lime he wanted Grape! We had a long talk that night about smelling all the pencils before you lay your money down. This is called being an informed consumer!

Second, we need to learn to control ourselves. According to Daryl they sell 10 different smencils at the same time. So he figured this week when they went on sale he would just take all 10 of the dollars in his wallet. Ummmmm, I vetoed that plan. I told him last time there were two or three smencils that he definitely didn't like. So I asked him WHY would he want one of each. Also, I explained we will never own everything that we want. True happiness is wanting what we have not having what we want. With Christmas around the corner we are still working on this one. But he did agree with smencils if he could get four he would be happy with that.

Lastly, smencils taught mom you are only 7 once. As crazy as I think the smencil thing is, you should see these kids rush the school door with their dollar in hand, I love that he gets excited about a special pencil. I used to get excited about little ceramic cats. My brother would not even come in my room because all of the cats freaked him out. Daryl is growing up so fast, it makes me sad sometimes, but then smencil week comes along and he gets really happy. And that makes me really happy!
PS-Rootbeer is my favorite smencil
PPS-I collected ceramic cats from ages 7-20, then I got a cat, I'm allergic. Go figure!

Trick or Treat

We had a wonderful Halloween at The Manor and are starting November off pretty good too! Kelly took the boys trick or treating last year so it was my turn this year. I was not excited at all because it is well documented I dislike the cold. Turns out, the weather was awesome! I totally lucked out on my year!
The boys didn't do any trunk or treats this year so we did the old fashioned walk the neighborhood. We went all up and down our street then they went to Ron and Claudia's and trick or treated there too. They both had a bag full of candy after that so they were happy. We were completely done by 7!
Alex was so cute this year, he really knew what was going on so every house he would run up to the door so he could be the first to knock. Him and Daryl would say, "Trick-or-Treat" in unison and then every single time Alex would say "Can I have some of your candy?" It was adorable.
Then in the middle of our adventure he said his signature line and the woman who came to the door said, "I'm sorry all I have is fruit snacks." Alex replied, "FRUIT SNACKS ARE MY FAVORITE, THANK YOU!" He screamed it just like that. Alex and the woman were both smiling ear to ear. It was pretty awesome.
I hope you all had a great Halloween too!
PS-On Halloween Kelly finally got Alex to put the pumpkin outside. :-) 

My Ninja Turtle and Football player

Daryl walking in the Halloween parade at school