Turkey Trot

Tonight was Hudsonville School's Turkey Trot! I helped work at the event... they put me in charge of the 4th graders :) What a fun night. The weather was perfect and the kids were fully energized. Each grade competes in a running race anywhere from one time around the track to one mile. First place gets a turkey, second place gets apple cider and third place gets a pumpkin. I loved being there and cheering on my students. They all did a great job! And I even got a free, long sleeved t-shirt ;)

Haunted House

Saturday was our annual Wierda Haunted House. I believe this was the 6th or maybe 7th year we have been doing this. (I lost count) The kids get to invite their entire class to the party (Almost 50 kids). It is a blast. There are 4 or 5 games set up in the basement for the kids to play, all with prizes to be won! Erin and I turn the rest of the basement into a haunted house. And I'm not talkin' some dumb little thing, I'm talkin' we can probably become professionals at it. (okay, maybe not that good) But I'm not gunna lie, it's pretty cool :) Then after about an hour or so of play, the pizza comes. Rebecca always orders ginormous pizza's from Palermo's and are they ever delish! You are probably wondering where 50 kids eat dinner.... the garage :) Then, shortly after dinner to kids settle down in the living room for a magic show. We have had a different magician ever year and it is so much fun! So, after hours and hours and hours and hours of setting up... at 8 o'clock it takes about a 1/2 hour to tear down, I would have to say though, after all said and down... it is so worth it! Smiling kids all night long!

Here are some pictures of our night! Now, these were taken with the lights on and before everything was completely finished. For the actaul haunted house we turned off all the lights and had the floor lined with dark purple christmas lights! Also, you will find no pictures of the little kiddos, totally forgot to get my camera back out and I am so bummed because they all looked adorable in their costumes!

Road Rally

Last night the staff from my school and our spouses got together for a road rally. Oh my goodness, I have not had that much fun in a long time! It was a riot. We were given clues and had to drive all over Hudsonville to figure out the "riddle" type clues. My team came in second place... not bad for three girls and Jon. :) We all ended up at one staff members house afterwards for drinks and snacks. We all laughed so hard at all the fun we had. You sure see a different side of everyone there. Not typical teachers :) I LOVED it! Just hanging out as friends. It was a great get together and also a great one for spouses to be invited to. Very easy conversation starters. :) And after talking, every guy there was a hunter, and all us wives, made them stay home. Phew... I felt so much better. Sorry, no pics. The only pics I took were the crazy ones that we had to take while out and about and I am not posting those ;)

Christmas Cards

Yes, I know what you are thinking... Talking about Christmas cards in October? Actually I am! This year I decided that I wanted to create my own Christmas card using Photoshop. I paid big bucks for the program, I may as well use it. Of course I always think I am way craftier than what I really am. I have been messing around with it for a couple weeks now. So, tonight I decided to call Katie for some help. She is my ever-so-creative friend that went to school to do stuff like this. Well, to make a long story short, we created both mine and Jon's card as well as my parents. They turned out awesome! I really want to show you what it looks like but I am thinking I am going to make you wait until you receive it in the mail. And if you didn't get my card last year, sorry. I will post the card on here in Decemberish or you can tell me you want one and I would be happy to mail one out :)

Happy Feet #2

Remember the post about my Happy Feet this summer? Well here comes happy feet #2, my winter happy feet. Can you guess what it might be? ...UGGS it is! I was so stinken' excited when it started cooling off a bit so I could finally pull my UGGS out of the storage tub. I am telling you people, best boots I have ever owned in my entire life! I have always been one to get very cold feet, Renaud's, the whole bit. Well, with these babies, even wearing them barefoot, I have yet to have cold feet. It's Awesome! Now, I know they are a bit expensive, but you will not be disappointed. I was lucky enough to get mine as a graduation gift last year from Cally. She said they would be perfect for recess duty and man was she right. :) However, sometime in the near future I see myself owning another pair!!!

Hope you all have your winter boots out and ready. It will be here before you know it ;)

Weekend Recap

Friday night...

I had nothing to do! Does that fly with me? NO! So, what do I do? MAKE PLANS! Simple plans. I just bought the movie The Proposal (Funniest movie ever by the way!) and invited Erin and Joel to come over and watch it with us. Just a take-it-easy kind of night.

Saturday...

I woke up and headed to the Grandville craft show with my Grandma, her friend Geneva, my Mom and two of her friends, Kathy and Janet. WE WERE THERE FOR 3 HOURS! Yup, 3 hours! After that we went to Breton Village Mall to go to the Carol Roeda store. Of course I bought a new magnet for my mirror. At night we went out for dinner at Hop Cat for Erin's brothers 21st b-day. That place has the best fries EVER! Hence the name "crack fries" because you can't stop eating them. Then we bar hopped a little and kept her "little bro" safe. :) I have not done that in forever. I felt so old :( We came back home and Joel wanted to have a sleep over at our house, so we did :)

Sunday...

We woke up and had some yummy eggs and toast for breakfast. We then attended the 11:00 service and Erin and Joel's church. (Ada Bible). I LOVED that place! I think that is where I want to go. Jon even said he has not seen me stay that focused on a sermon in the five years he has known me. It was Awesome! Great music, and they have visuals on a huge screen during the entire service. It's hard to explain but it makes it so easy for A.D.D. people like me to follow along. The only bummer part is that it is a 1/2 hour drive. However, it just might be worth it. :) Oh, and P.S. the kiddy area is the sweetest thing I have ever seen. Finally, after church we ventured over to Robinettes Orchard for some yummy pumpkin donuts and the best apple cider on the face of the planet.

Lastly, enjoy this picture of Jon and Joel as we were leaving Robinettes. :)

My Lindhout Week

Hello Fellow Bloggers,

It feels good to be back in the blogging world. It feels like I haven't been on here in forever. I have so much to catch up on. :) I did however have a fabulous week with the Lindhout boys. It was very busy with school and hockey but we managed to squeeze some fun time in there as well. I have to admit, I was a little sad to leave there on Thursday. I don't get to see them as much as I used to so I cherish the time I do get to spend with them, and let me tell ya, I was SO not ready to give them up. They were such honeys this week. Lukie even sat on my lap last night for 1 hour and read me an entire kiddy chapter book all by himself. I was so proud! ;) They are growing up too fast. Noah, in 5th grade? Crazy! He was such a big help. And you gotta love Tyce. Anyways, it definitely feels good to be home but I am looking forward to my next over night in December. :) On an end note, keep Tyce in your prayers. He woke up not feeling well Friday morning. Call if you want details, I'm not going to post that on here.

I hope everyone has a Great weekend!

My one and only picture from the week. My first time watching Lukas play hockey. He looks so sticken old I could cry! I know I am pathetic but man do I love this kid :)

Klackle Orchards

Just a quick post about Klackle Orchards. Very cool place for kids. We went there today and there are 18 million things for kids to do. So, my point of this post... GO THERE!

Enjoying pumpkin donuts and HOT apple cider

Mom made us take a picture by the apple tree, we all look thrilled don't we?

And we picked out pumpkins. (This was not at Klackle)

Now, time to go pack b/c my procrastinating self has yet to do it. And be patient, no more posts for about a week.

Camo

Really? Guys take pictures of each other in hunting gear? I was laughing quite hard as I looked through the camera today to find pictures of the guys all decked out in camo while hunting. Love it :)

Birch Run

Okay, the story of my weekend... It's hunting season so of course every weekend Jon will be up north hunting. This weekend nobody could go up with him. (he usually goes with my dad, grandpa and uncle.) So, what does he do? He calls up Matt. Matt is NOT a hunter, but of course the idea of it sounds awesome to him, and he says yes. Thursday night the two of them go shopping for camo and a hunting license and Friday they are on their way. (Along with Lori's brother Dan, who is a hunter.) So, there I am again, alone on the weekend, this time with no plans. To make the rest of the story short, I called up Lori and she came over Friday night right after work and has been here ever since. :) Friday night we went for a yummy dinner at Big Bob's Pizza in East Grand Rapids then came home and watched TV. We woke up Saturday morning and made a random trip to Birch Run, leaving the house at 8:45. SO MUCH FUN!!! We bought so much stuff the trunk was overflowing. We finally made it home around 11:00 that night. We literally "shopped till we dropped." I would share my awesome purchases but some of it is for Christmas so I don't want to spoil the surprise. However, I did get lots of new clothes, not paying full price for a single thing. :) And by this I am talking a pile of shirts that were between $2 -$6. The deals were AWESOME!!!! I also got a new North Face that I am WAY excited about for only $40. It's not the one I went there wanting to buy but I love it! Anyways, hope you all had a great weekend. I now need to pack up my suitcase because I am moving into the Lindhouts for a week. Wish me luck!

ArtPrize Pictures

I am finally getting around to posting pictures from ArtPrize. I went downtown for the 3rd time tonight, I can't get enough of it. Seriously, if you haven't made it down, try! It's all there until Saturday. There are some things that are amazing and then there are others that make you think, why? Here are just a hint of what all we saw.

This piece is way cooler at night, it changes colors. However, after the wind storm last night many of the pieces blew off, huge bummer!

This is what Jon wants in our backyard now. Does that surprise you? :)

This man was a huge hit. Yes, he is real!

This moose was made entirely with nails

A bedazzled Guitar

This was made out of Army Men

Cool looking metal people

A cool orange sculpture

Art? Really? Someone actually entered these signs as art.

Her quote was something like "I see art as a campaign"

This was really cool, some type of bird made from snowmobile and car parts.

The popular table and chairs.

Nessie, this was one of my top favorites!

Spinning wheel in the fountain in front of the Ford Museum. If you look closely, while it was spinning it looked like horses were running. (in the white part)

A walkway made out of trash, and yes it STUNK!

These were flowers carved out of metal. I believe it said it took this guy 20 hours to make each flower.

This made the top 10 so we thought we would go check it out tonight. At first I thought it was just a picture of waves and thought it was pretty dumb. Well, after looking at it, it's not a picture, the dude actually painted it. It was very sweet!

A bunch of tiles... it looked cooler in person

Another top favorite! These are pictures made completely out of push pins. That's right, every single piece of this art is a push pin. VERY COOL!!!

These bowls were made out of rice from Vietnam.

Not very interesting compared to other art pieces but must have been a lot of work

Okay, this has a story to it. You have to hear it, but you have to call me. I can't post it on here. The title of this "piece" was Random thoughts. There was one random chair in the middle of a ginormous room. There were billions of papers with "random thoughts" that the artist made. That's the reason you have to call me... for some of the thoughts. I will post one example, the one that almost made me pee my pants under my comments section. No Kids Allowed! But I have to share it ;)

Honestly, clothes hanging from a ceiling? We decided that we are entering the competition next year, apparently anything goes?

This roof was made of egg shells, video is demonstrating how he did it.

A room covered it pink frosting! Yum! It smelled delish too :)

Okay, this is not art but an elevator we had to take to see some of the art pieces. I took a picture just in case we died on the way up. It was seriously the creepiest thing ever. Let's just say we took the stairs back down!

The reason we took the elevator - this piece of art was done by a lady in my parents bible study.

A wood house thing, it seemed to be popular so I took a pic :)

Court's ugly face but I loved these chairs. I want them for my house :)

Just thought it was cool

These were kinda cool. They were made out of paper and they moved. As one went up the other went down.

This was like a giant balloon animal. Very cool to see.

Just a painting but I liked it! These poor people don't get much credit with all the other crazy stuff that was entered.

Well that does it with my pictures from the ArtPrize! This was a great thing for Grand Rapids to bring into the area. I have never seen so many people downtown. Even tonight, on a Wednesday night, it was packed! Nice work GR!