Holly Ball

 Owen is participating in Jr. Cotillion again this year.  In early December, he attended the Holly Ball- one of two big dances that the organization holds each year.  He was not able to attend this event last year because it coincided with a robotics tournament.  Owen had a great time.  He and Claire were paired together for the Cha Cha dance-off, and they won.  They must get those skills from their mamas.

Wicked

 Over Thanksgiving break, the kids and I went with Hannah, the girls, and Granny Mel to Jacksonville to see Wicked.  It was so well done.  The costumes, props, and singing were top notch.  We enjoyed our trip tremendously and would definitely consider attending another of the broadway tour shows in the future. (It may the near future because the kids are begging me to go see Hamilton again).

A Day in the Golden Isles

On the first day of Thanksgiving break we were blessed with perfect weather- sunny and cool.  The kids and I decided to take advantage of this by doing one of our favorite activities- biking on Jekyll.  We rode for about three hours and traversed many of our favorite routes. 

After our bike ride we drove over to St. Simons to see a WWII B17 plane.  We were able to go aboard and check it out.  Our plane tour was followed by dinner at Mellow Mushroom.  It was a great day overall.

Coding Kick-off

Our high school started a Girls Who Code chapter this year.  This club was nice enough to invite Olivia and the other female members of the middle school robotics team to go with them to Atlanta for the state-wide Girls Who Code kick-off event.  Olivia really enjoyed herself at the event.  The girls were also able to tour the computing department at Middle Georgia State University in Macon.  Olivia loves anything tech-related, and I'm so glad that there are people and organizations that provide these types of opportunities for our students.

Soccer

 Owen played soccer with the rec this fall and had a great season.  Some of the games were nail biters but in the end, Owen's team went undefeated.  This is probably Owen's last season of soccer so I'm glad it was a good one.

A Classic Halloween

 This year's Halloween theme was "classic characters".  As you can tell, we were a witch, werewolf, vampire, and black cat.  We were joined by Q and her family (as a mummy, bat, and Frankenstein) and by Hannah as a pumpkin.  We went trick-or-treating in Granny's neighborhood.  Our party was a little small as the older girls have outgrown trick-or-treating (and this is Owen's last year).  I guess we'll be giving out candy from here on out. Even though Olivia didn't trick-or-treat, she still walked around with us and helped out with Maren.  And she still walked away with tons of candy- as did all of the kids. 

,Indiana Dunes

 We spent the last day of our fall break vacation in Indiana (state 29) hiking in our newest national park- Indiana Dunes  We hiked the Dune Succession / Long Lake Trail Loop.  It was a nice but sandy hike.  I do mean sandy- we kept having to stop and empty the sand out of our shoes.  Our favorite part was hiking toward Lake Michigan.  We had a very pleasant afternoon at this park and are glad that we stopped here to check it out.