Trick or Treat!

Trick or treat, smell my feet, give me something good to eat! We took McKenzie and Matt trick or treating tonight. This is the first year that Matt understood what trick or treating is all about -- and he liked it! He wasn't the most cooperative train that you've ever seen but he enjoyed the end result of getting dressed up in a silly outfit and begging for candy. He practiced his high-pitched "Trick or treat!" all day and delivered his line pretty well the first few houses. After a few stops he understood what the game was and he dropped the sweetness and got right to the point, saying, "Give me some candy!". We'll have to work with him some more. McKenzie -- excuse me, Dr. McKenzie -- had a very good time and took her doctor bag along with her and administered shots and check-ups as needed to our gracious candy providers. We capped off the night with supper at Shoney's and a hot fudge cake. Enjoy the pics from the night.....

Thomas the Temperamental Tank Engine


Let's go!


Dr. McKenzie


Joe gets a shot for trying to take Dr. McKenzie's M&M's


Take two M&M's and call me in the morning.


Trick or treat, Granny!


OK, I'm done.

The Waltons

No, not the TV show, the real-life family. I took pictures of the Grenada Waltons this evening at Bogue Creek. Anna Beth decided that we only had about 20 minutes to work with and then she was done! She did great, though. We had a dog and two cats that accompanied us down to the creek. The dog wanted to be in the pictures and kept jumping up on Michael. Terry swatted him a couple of times and he got out of the way. (No animals were harmed in the taking of these pictures.) Michael really enjoyed having his picture taken. I think he might be a model when he grows up!
Click here to see more of the Waltons.


Just joking! Click here to see more pictures of the Waltons.

Good night, John Boy!

Happy Birthday Amanda!

We would like to wish our very good friend, Amanda Branscome, a very happy birthday! We hope you have a special day.

You're getting three posts for the price of one today! Check out David's "frigga" post and my post about the Carrie Underwood concert below.

Get out of the frigga!!!

The title of this post has been a frequent command from Betty and me the last couple of weeks. Matt has discovered the refrigerator -- or the "frigga" -- as he calls it. Several times a day he opens the door and stands on the bottom shelf and looks over the selection. He likes to put his cup of water in the frigga....and get the cup out of the frigga.....and put the cup in the frigga.....and get the cup out of the frigga.....you get the idea.


Hmm, what do I want?


Maybe they won't notice me!

Carrie Underwood

McKenzie and I had a girls night out Sunday. She and I along with Marty and Jordan went to Southaven to see Carrie Underwood in concert. It was awesome! Carrie is our favorite American Idol, so with her coming this close we had to get tickets. Little Big Town opened for her and they were great, too. Our seats were really good except for the drunk woman in front of Marty and the tone deaf woman sitting next to me! Hehe. Try explaining that one to McKenzie! Carrie did many songs and had three outfit changes, which McKenzie and I were excited about. A few times she would come down to the end of the catwalk and sing and we could really see her well. My favorite song was when she came down to the end of the catwalk, sat on a stool and sang "Remember Me". Carrie talked about missing her family and that this song always helped her through that. She talked all through the concert which I really liked. She told us how the night before she had driven 13 hours out of the way to see the Back Street Boys in concert in Detroit. She also got to go backstage and meet them. Anyway we had alot of fun and did not get back till really late. It was then that Marty and I realized that we are not as young as we use to be. Here are a couple of pictures from the night. Most of them did not turn out but she did get this really good one of Carrie.

Fall Fest, The Sequel

We enjoyed our second Fall Fest of the season tonight. This one was at Kirk and was considerably colder than the one at the church a couple of weeks ago! Betty and I worked at McKenzie's class booth from 5:00 to 5:30, doing spin art. That is a little machine that spins a white card around while the kid squirts paint out of ketchup bottles onto the card. After our shift was over, we walked around and checked out the other games and booths. McKenzie took off with her friends and Matt took turns going with Caleb, Cassie and Anna Catherine. He played the basketball game, the football toss, slid down the giant blow up slide, and played in the blow up jumping thing. He also rode the train around the track about four times. He had a wonderful time. McKenzie said she had fun, too, although we hardly saw her. Sorry for no pictures....I decided I'd rather keep my hands in my pockets than on a camera tonight. It was COLD!!!

UPDATE: Here's one picture of Matt from the Kirk Academy web site.

Pumpkins and Pigskin

Today we went to Oxford to the pumpkin patch at St. Peter's -- or, as Matt calls it, the punkin catch. McKenzie always loves to go to the pumpkin patch and she had fun running around looking at all the stuff. This was the first time Matt understood what was going on and he spent his time trying to pick up all the pumpkins and would say, "Pumpkin stuck!" whenever he couldn't pick one up. He also enjoyed sitting on the pumpkins and adopted a "baby" pumpkin and carried around with him the rest of the day. You think I'm kidding? He took it to Applebee's, held it in the car on the way home, and took it to supper at Eskridge tonight and set it on the table. I never knew pumpkins could be so exciting!


On Friday night, I took some pictures at the Kirk vs. Heritage football game. It was the last home game for the seniors and I was taking some pictures of the kids of some friends of ours. Kirk, a class AA team, dominated Heritage (a AAA team) 35-7. The pictures here are of Collin King and his parents and then an action shot of Kyle Grubb running against the Patriots.

Go here to see some more pictures from the game.

Cow Habitat

I can't believe that class projects have already started in the second grade. A month ago we completed our seed project and today we created a cow habitat. The assignment was to choose an animal, fish, bird whatever and create a habitat in a shoebox. I have to admit I really got "into" it. Sometimes it seems like these projects are more for the parents than the kids if you know what I mean! You parents who have already been through all this know what I am talking about! Anyway, we enlisted the help of our very good friends, Amanda and John. Mr. John knows his stuff when it comes to cows, so who better than him to give us the information we needed to create this habitat. So a big thank you to you two for your knowledge and creative ideas!! McKenzie and I had so much fun doing this together. We both learned a lot about cows. Here are a few pics that I took of our afternoon.

Jones Grandchildren

This past weekend I took pictures of Susy Jones' grandchildren. They did a great job and were a lot of fun. Dillon tickled me when his Dad and Grandmother told him to stop squinting his eyes and he just opened them as wide as he could. Evie was very excited because her birthday party was going to be that afternoon. Sara Catherine was a natural model and seemed to enjoy having her picture taken.

Click here to see more of Susy's grandchildren.

Fall Festival and Mr. Mom

Today was the Fall Festival at our church. McKenzie and Matt had a wonderful time. We had blow up jumpers and slides and other games for the kids to play. They also went on a hay ride which Matt said he enjoyed and McKenzie said was "the longest hay ride of my life!". We stayed about 2 1/2 hours and I still had to drag Matt out of the jumping thing.

Betty didn't get to go to the Fall Festival because she's been sick for two days. I've been Mr. Mom for a couple of days and the kids and the house are suffering greatly as a result. I took off Friday and Betty was planning to go to Southaven shopping. She woke up Friday morning, though, with a sinus infection and spent most of the day in bed instead of in Target or Old Navy or The Olive Garden. She was very disappointed. Today hasn't been much better for Betty. Hopefully she'll be better tomorrow.

Cone Bus Come!

My grandmother stopped by this afternoon to drop off some things and she told me she has been enjoying our blog but that it seems to have turned into to David's blog. So Granny, I am posting tonight for you!!

One of McKenzie and Matt's favorite things about this past summer was the snow cone bus (or the "Cone Bus" as Matt calls it) coming into our neighborhood. We can hear the music it plays from inside the house and it sends the kids into a trance. To our happy surprise, it came this evening and as soon as McKenzie heard the music she started running around like a crazy woman screaming, "I NEED SOME MONEY! WHERE'S SOME MONEY!". Matt went into a panic saying, "Hold you, Mommy! Cone Bus come!". So, the whole family went running out the door to catch the Cone Bus. One rainbow snow cone later and everything was back to normal. Here is a picture that David took of us getting our snow cone.

Matt has lots of fun in the bathtub. Last night I told him that I would make him look like Santa Claus. He got a big belly laugh out of it!

Adam King

I took pictures today of another senior, Adam King. Adam is the son of Jim and Andrea King, formerly of Grenada. Jim used to work with me at Heatcraft before moving to Kentucky. We took the pictures at Adam's grandparents' house and the creek behind their house. The last time I saw Adam, he was pitching in Little League and now he's a 6'4" senior!

Check out the rest of Adam's pictures here.

We all had a great time at the movie tonight! We went to see Beverly Hills Chihuahua. Cassie came along with us and the kids really enjoyed her being there, too. Matt made it through the entire movie and seemed to really enjoy it. It is so much fun to watch McKenzie and Matt at the movies and see their reactions and watch them enjoy it. Matt was wide-eyed from the first preview to the closing credits. He was his usual vocal self, oooing and ahhing and narrating some of the action scenes. Cassie said she had as much fun watching Matt as she did watching the movie! Cassie's keyless remote keychain came off in the theater and when we got out to our cars, her car alarm started going off and she couldn't turn it off because she didn't have her remote! McKenzie remembered seeing it in the theater so David ran back in to find it so we could turn off the alarm! All the way home Matt asked, "What happened?". He was so concerned. We just had a wonderful night. It is precious times like this that I would like for time to stand still. Time is passing way too quickly for me and David and we realize that we must treasure every day with them.

How Do I Leave A Comment???

A few people have told us that they'd love to leave a comment on our blog if they just knew how. Well, today's your lucky day! Click on the "Comments" link at the bottom of whatever blog entry that you want to comment on. A new screen will come up and you can type your comment in the comment box and then select Name/URL under Choose an Identity and type your name and then click on Publish your comment. Of course, if you have a Google or Blogger ID, please use that. OK, now you have no excuse! :) Test it on this post.

We're all, yes ALL, going to see Beverly Hill Chihuahua tonight. This will be Matt's second movie. The first was Horton Hears A Hoo, and he made it through most of it. Judging from his first movie experience, Matt is an interactive moviegoer so hopefully he won't holler or bark at the dogs on the screen too much tonight. We're going in two cars just in case. We'll post about our experience tonight or tomorrow.

Happy Birthday, Chunch!

Wednesday is Andy's (my brother) 43rd birthday! He is also known as "Chunch" thanks to Matt. Actually, thanks to McKenzie who started calling him "Chunky" for some reason and Matt has morphed it into "Chunch". It's so weird saying that Andy is 43. His hair is certainly saying that he's 43, but his behavior is screaming "I'M STILL A TEENAGER!". That's a good thing! He's a lot of fun, a good uncle and the best Minister of Music I've every seen. Happy Birthday, Chunch!

OK, that's enough about Chunch. My Mom and Dad came tonight (Tuesday) and we all went out to eat. Before we ate, Grand took a little time out to read books with Matt. After the family went out to eat for Andy's birthday, we went to Songs and Sweets at Kirk to watch Cassie sing. She did a great job and had a solo in "Cowboy Take Me Away".


Tuesday, McKenzie was named Raider Of The Week for her class! She was so excited when Betty picked her up from school and they went to get a snow cone to celebrate.


I'll wrap this post up with a few pictures we took Saturday of our little ball player and cheerleader.

This One's For Mama....

For those of you who don't know, I sing bass in a quartet at our church. My brother is the Minister of Music so I guess there's a fair amount of nepotism going on there. Anyway, we sang "He Touched Me" a couple of weeks ago and my parents wanted to come see us sing but they couldn't. So, this one's for Mama, so she can watch her babies sing (along with Brad Branscome and Keith Johnson). Just so you know, her favorite son is the one on the far right of the screen!

The Guitar Man

Today, I had the pleasure of taking some senior pictures for my cousin's son, Evan. Evan loves music and brought his guitar along and I think we got some good pics with him and his guitar. It was fun having some music to accompany me taking pictures! I can't believe Evan is already a senior! I know his mom, Cindy, feels that way even more than I do. Maybe one day we'll hear Evan or some of his songs on the radio. Evan, I'll be available to take pictures for your CD when that happens!

Click here to see more pictures from our session.

School and Dancing

We thought we'd show you what Matt and McKenzie have been up to. Matt is going to Mother's Morning Out at the Methodist Church on Wednesday mornings. He's enjoyed it so far, but he did have a run-in with a friend a couple of weeks ago. One piece of useful information for this story -- "Oh" means "Yes" in MattLanguage. He came home and said, "Fwend push shirt!". We blessed his heart and asked him what happened. He said, "Push head!". Well, this was getting serious now. Daddy might have to go have a talk with the kid who "pushed" Matt's head! I asked him, "Your friend pushed your head?" Matt replied, "No". Uh-oh, maybe I won't be having that talk with that kid. I asked, "Did YOU push a friend's head?". After a slight hesitation, Matt admitted, "Oh.". Well, at least he's taking up for himself!

"Fwend push shirt!"

McKenzie is taking dance this year for the first time. She absolutely loves it! She goes every Thursday evening at 5:30 and then comes home and dances for us. She said tonight that she wants to teach dance when she grows up and she wants Betty to be her partner. (As long as Betty doesn't have to dance!) I don't know where McKenzie gets her dancing talent because Betty and I certainly don't have any! I have proof on video that I don't have any dancing talent but that will NEVER see the light of day! Matt tries to copy McKenzie's dance moves (as you can see in the picture below) but I think he's got his Daddy's dancing ability. We'll stick to playing ball!