Baby it's cold outside!

Just some of the pictures of our trip out to the midwest the last week... We went to Kaney Jet center with Grandma and Grandpa where we got to climb in a 737. We went to our favorite Rockford restaurants and saw several of our favorite Rockford and Milwaukee people. We even got to check out their brand-spanking new Urgent Care and 24 hour CVS! Brett (the kid who never complains of anything) had an ear infection! We headed up to Milwaukee to catch the Marquette versus NC State basketball game, even though the outcome wasn't what we wanted! And, we got to catch up with the Mularski family. We tasted some Miller beer, had some not-so-strong Gin & Tonics and some stronger-than-ever Mojitos! We even go to play in the snow!

Happy Turkey Day!!

Thanksgiving was spent at my parents house (aka Memere & Poppy) and about 20+ other Harrison family members! This year was actually a little on the small side of things as far as Thanksgiving with the Harrison's is considered. I think we actually had around 50 several years ago... that's what happens when you have 9 kids, and they have kids, and they have kids. It happens. Anyway, it was a blast, and chaotic, and fun, and exhausting all in one! My cousin's two boys were there too, so the kids had some play buddies, which was definitely nice. Kate wasn't so sure what to think of all the commotion for awhile, but she finally settled down and had a good time too. I'm not sure that she ate more than 2 bites of sweet potatoes and a cup of yogurt, but who cares?!


Lunch time before all of the family arrived - Mac & Cheese


Kate was NOT interested in lunch at all!


Brett ate only because we bribed him with Poppy's car :)


We can't miss a Kodak moment on game day!


Kate with (one) Godmother, Aunt Dithy


Quick family photo


Memere and Poppy with the grandkids


Turkey #1 (yes, there were two!)


Jeff and Nolan


Kate LOVES to eat ice!


"Poppy, I see you!"


Funny girls!


Megan and Hayden


Mama Dana with Nolan


Kate was playing with soap suds with Aunt Mary


Cute little turkey!


Brett sat on Uncle Jeff's lap for 3 consecutive airings of the SAME Tom & Jerry episode


I'm going to start calling them the 3 Stooges - Hayden, Nolan, & Brett


They were nice enough to let Kate join in on the fun, too!

Preschool Thanksgiving Feasts

The 3 year old classes had Thanksgiving feasts in preparation for the holiday this week. Brett's Tuesday/Thursday class had their feast a week early because Ms. Kathryn was going to be out of town the week of Thanksgiving. His Monday/Wednesday class had it on Monday, their last day of school before Thanksgiving. I actually had the day off, so I volunteered to help out with their centers and crafts that day. God bless those teachers! There were 5 kids out that day and it was still a little nutty! It doesn't help that it was raining and nasty and cold that day too, so they didn't get to go outside at all. The kids had a blast making Indian hats and necklaces and eating their "feast" of chicken nuggets, mac & cheese, corn, carrot sticks, and muffins. Because Kate's class gets out an hour before Brett's class, Ms. Lynda said it would be fine for her to join in the fun too, so she got to be a big cool 3 year old for the day :) They ended the day singing some Thanksgiving songs for the parents - precious!

He knows if you've been bad or good

The morning of Harvest Moon, we had a random hour of time to kill, so we decided to venture down to the mall to go ahead and do the Santa thing. Being the realistic mom, I had visions of our Santa visits from the previous years in my head - you know, the tears, the "I don't want to!" and all of that fun stuff. We only had to stand in line about 15-20 minutes, but toward the end of that time, Kate started saying that she wanted to go home. Luckily, there was a family of 3 kids (the youngest a 6 month old baby) right in front of us. All 3 kids sat there, peacefully, and took a great picture with Santa. I made Kate watch it and and over-emphasized how good the baby was! It must've worked because Kate and Brett both sat on Santa's lap like perfect little kids and smiled beautifully! Yay!!

Waiting in line to see Santa

"Mommy, look at that TALL tree!"

Telling Santa what they want... I was close by to translate!

Gorgeous!

Harvest Moon

The Harvest Moon Festival is the St. Francis Preschool's BIG annual charitable fundraiser. All of the proceeds go directly to the Dan Kenna Fund, which helps needy families afford the tuition so that their kids can go to school there. In this economy, we all know families that suddenly need a little extra help, so it was extra important this year. Each class is responsible for assembling a basket to raffle (see post below), bringing in assigned goodies (juice boxes, chips, other food for the lunches the day of the festival), bringing in donated items (like books, small toys, etc.), selling raffle tickets for these baskets, volunteering for their class spot (I was at the food table) and, of course, coming out to the festival to have a BLAST! Needless to say, with 3 classrooms this year, we were REALLY busy helping do our part for Harvest Moon, but it is so well worth it!! The kids have so much fun playing the preschool-appropriate games and seeing their teachers and friends outside the classroom.


This is the cake that the kids helped me make for the Cake Walk... nothing fancy, but still fun!


This is the cake that Kate won while participating in the Cake Walk


And this is the cake that I won while participating in the cake walk... I let Brett pick it out for me!


Several of the games had to do with cars... Brett was really good at those games!


Kate dominated at the ball games, especially bowling!


Brett had fun being a wild man with the (thankfully) very lightweight bowling ball


Kate could barely reach the top of the table to spin the wheel to see how many tokens she won


Another car game...


She didn't quite get the concept of "behind the white line"


Digging through the rice table to find buried treasure

For each game (and we played more than 60), they could win tokens, which they could then trade in for prizes. Our kids racked up just under 100 tokens - whew! What a fun-filled day!!

We're all wrapped up!

In celophane that is! It's Harvest Moon week at the kids' preschool, starting with day #1 of the basket raffle. "Baskets" had to be in by 8:30 this morning, which meant that a lot of moms and their preschoolers were running around the school like crazy people bright and early today! Kate's class has the princess themed basket... I'm one of the room moms for that class, so I really lucked out on that one! (We don't get to choose our themes.) One of Brett's classes had a tailgating basket and the other class had a Coffee and Chocolate lovers basket. They all turned out great! I'll have to get a shot of the Superheroes basket - that one might be the coolest, even better than our princess basket. Although, I think you'd have a tough time making that arguement to the constant swarm of little girls staring down the 7 barbie princesses!!!

Oh, if you want to buy any raffle tickets for the baskets, they're $1 each and they go to the scholarship fund to help needy families afford the preschool tuition. They have a "Pampered Mom" basket (shown below), a "Handy Dad" basket, a "Stampin' Up!" basket, and the list goes on!