Happy Thanksgiving!

To friends and family,

Happy Thanksgiving to you! I hope you all have a wonderful day full of turkey, pies, friends, and goodwill because you will need the extra calories and goodwill if you decide the hit the stores tomorrow. Seriously, if you haven't taken the time to tell those people that mean something to you that they do indeed mean something (and yes, I am talking about something good!) do it today. Time passes so quickly and honestly, are you really going to have time to write that meaningful of a message on your Christmas cards? Personally, you are lucky if I write all the names of everyone in our family instead of "The Bracken"! So, Thank you for reading this blog and for being my friends even after you read it and to all the KUPC people who read this: I LOVE YOU! You mean a lot to be because you give me a creative outlet (through this blog) that I need to keep from becoming a dull little girl. Okay, not little. Especially after everything I ate today. But you get the idea. God bless you all!

P.S. The picture above is of the little pumpkin cakes I made for Thanksgiving.

The headless saints and other funnies

As you may already know, I am one of the teachers for the 6 years old and under class. We always have tons of funny things happen in our class, but Evita and I usually manage to somehow keep the class going and not laugh. That was not the case a couple of weeks ago. I can't remember the lesson she was teaching, but she had given all of the children two finger puppets each. (She had made these, just like all of the puppets we use in our class.) Well, she had the Jesus Puppet and he prayed for all the other puppets. Some of the puppets were sick and some were old and some just had a nasty cough. Well, of course, after "Jesus" prayed for them, they got better. Or so we would have wished. As she continued her story, one of the kids suddenly held up her puppet and it's head had fallen off! Something about having just prayed for them and then the puppet's head falling off just hit us as being so funny. Evita and I lost it laughing. Then the other kids realized they could take the heads off and ALL of the puppets lost their heads! Poor Evita! She gave up on the lesson because we couldn't stop laughing and just collected the puppets and their heads. On days like that, it is best to just go to snack time. Here's a picture of the puppets with their heads reattached:

Show me!

The other day someone gave Abigail some stickers and didn't give any to Ethan. Which is perfectly fine, in theory. Ethan wanted Abbey to share and she didn't want to share her stickers because "I only have 8, momma". I thought we had the issue settled, but in typical sibling fashion, the next day Abbey pulled out her stickers and started showing them to Ethan. Then when he wanted one, she firmly denied him. Well, since the rule is that you can't tease, we told Abbey that if she showed the stickers to Ethan, she had to give him one. This sounded great to Ethan, because in the middle of the discussion, he immediately began yelling, "Show me, show me!" And the yellow smiley face sticker goes to the yelling brother. Case solved.

Abbey's Birthday Party

This year, I had this great idea. We always have family celebrations for birthdays, but thought it would be fun to have some of Abbey's little friends come over. It started out as a simple idea. A little princess party, a few snacks with the cake, maybe a game or two and that's it. However, it grew faster than the Veggie Tales' Fib from outer space. Abbey went into church on Sunday inviting everyone to come to her party. (Note to self, next time plan a surprise party.) And so you can see how it grew from there. I also had this dream of making her a castle cake. Ethan had a dog cake on his birthday and she wanted a castle. I didn't sleep the night before the party, but she had a castle. Here's a picture:

I had also read somewhere about this idea of making sugar cookies on skewers and the end result looks like wands. It sounded great, but I had no idea how long it would take to make them. However, I was really pleased with the end results.

And please don't forget the castle for all the kids to color and decorate!

Overall, it was loads of work, but she was really happy. I doubt I will have the energy for another one for about 6 more years.

Catching up.

Hello to everyone of my dear friends that reads this and has wondered if I was dead or alive. I am alive. This month hit our household like a runaway train and I now have a great admiration for bloggers that stay faithful. I mainly appreciate them because I have been reading their blogs instead of writing mine! But, I am happy to say that a writing spirit is on me and I am going to use it before I lose it. Before we get to the stories, here is a little of the latest news. Abbey is now six years old! (There will be a blog more about that!). The last English home group swelled to 33 people. Abbey has started kindergarten and Ethan and I are still adjusting. We had a wonderful leaders retreat last weekend and a teenage girl got baptized on Sunday. She had previously gotten the Holy Ghost at our ladies conference. The temperatures have dropped to the glorious land of the low 70's and I am lovin' it! We are hoping that it will hold out through the holidays so we do not have to turn on the air conditioners while we drink our hot chocolate. So, now that you are caught up, on to the details!