Life in the Busy Lane

It has seemed SO busy around here lately, and I know things are only going to pick up steam as we get closer and closer to the holidays. Here is a brief re-cap of everything we've been up to lately. In reverse chronological order because that's how the pictures uploaded (as always!).

I had a Star Wars party at work! It was a HUGE success, but I take no credit because all you have to do is mention Star Wars and the kids come flocking! I do take credit for being brave enough to have it at all because my knowledge of Star Wars is lacking to say the least. But I survived, and the kids didn't even know how clueless I was!

My brilliant co-worker had the idea to frame the party as Jedi training, and the kids had to complete four phases of training to earn a Jedi certificate. It was chaotic (we're talking 35 kids, their parents, costumes, the whole nine yards), but fun!

Here is my book display:

And here is half the snack table (we also had Wookiee Cookies :-)

We also put up our Christmas tree earlier then we said we would. Well, earlier then Ben said we would. :-) I talked him into dragging it out on Sunday night! And we are SO proud of how it turned out. We still need a tree skirt, but we're getting there.

The final product

After the craziness of not working last Christmas and going home early for a wedding, it was so nice to start Christmas traditions here together. Definitely something we'll remember forever.

Putting on ornaments

The first ornament we put on

Ben bringing the tree in! :-)

And I can't talk about decorating the tree without mentioning that we wouldn't have a tree at all without our very best friends' generosity! They gave us their tree last Christmas and we hauled it up here in the trunk of Ben's car. They got a new one to better fit their nice space in their house, and we got the most wonderful hand-me-down EVER. Thank you best friends!!! :-)

I also finally pulled out my Thanksgiving/Fall decor.

Turkey towel!

I realized I never got out most of my Halloween stuff at all, so we went to pull out the Christmas ornaments, I grabbed our fall towels, too. I haven't set our Thanksgiving table yet, so the towel is pretty much all we've got for now. But it does feel festive! :-)

We also went home in the middle of the month for my grandfather's memorial service. It was a sad reason to go home, but the unexpected time with my family was a huge blessing. The service was beautiful, my sister wrote the most wonderful piece for us to read together, and I made it through without completely breaking down. She did WONDERFUL up there (and she's the shy one!). I wouldn't have made it through any of that without her.

Later on in the weekend, we went bowling together! :-)

Sweet Carter/Isley women

Benjamin T. bowling

I may or may not have been terrible at bowling. Hard to say. :-)

I snapped this picture on our way home from the airport

And who can forget my Junie B. Jones luau at work?

Book display

HANDMADE palm tree

The luau was a blast to decorate for because we had lots of luau stuff leftover from a past party. But the palm tree was definitely my pride and joy because I am so UNartistic sometimes. :-) They pinned coconuts on it!

And that pretty much sums up what's been going on here for the past couple of weeks. I am already well into my Thanksgiving prep work that I want to accomplish this morning before I head into work this afternoon. I can't wait to get our whole meal together and EAT.