Give thanks with a Great Wolf heart......

Happy Thanksgiving!

"Give thanks, With a Great Wolf heart, Give thanks......" Well, at least that is how Kate thinks the song goes. Cutie girl. We had a great thanksgiving and are truly blessed with a great family!

We had and ate more than enough food to feed a small village. I am still stuffed. And notice my cutie birds, yep I made them. Thanks to Jami Nato for some inspiration!

Family Photo opp!

and another...

Great time with a great family!

A trip to Nonnies......

We hopped on a plane and headed south to Nonnies house. The kids were so excited they had never been on a plane before that they could remember. She lives south of Houston in a small town called Alvin. We rested and watched movies and ate yummy food. Then we headed to the beach for two days of fun. The first day we were in search of crabs, found lots of little ones but could never catch a big one. The other fishermen said it was too cold for the the big ones to come to the surface. The kiddos didn't care, they were just thrilled to be there. The second day we tried out fishing and that didn't pan out either but the kids loved gathering up as many sea shells as they could and trying to build the biggest sand castle/fort they could. Lots of good memories were made at the beach those two days. Memories I'm sure my kids will never forget. Oh, and I forgot bathing suites so that is why you see them in soaking wet clothes. oops.

Happy 70th Birthday! Uncle Geary..

Last weekend most of my family headed down to Austin to surprise my uncle Geary for his 70th birthday. My cousins planned a big, fun party to Roast and Toast him at the Hyatt Lost Pines Resort.  We all had so much fun catching up after not seeing some of them for many many years. Family came from all over the United States. It really ended up to be such a great weekend with lots of good memories made. Turns out we have a pretty competitive family to put it litely.
The best part of the whole trip was the surprise party. To see the shock and surprise on Uncle Geary's face was priceless. The food was amazing and the stories were hilarious. Josh and I left the party thinking that was one of the neatest things we had ever been to.  It was so fun hearing stories of him being a good daddy, loyal friend and a bit of a stinker of a husband. My favorite and the one I laughed hardest at had to be the Coffeepoto el broko, no workie!  Good Good times......

just keep running.....

I did it... After 13 weeks of training, I ran my first half marathon! Yep 13.1 miles. However.... I did not do it in my desired finish time but I can say I finished. And that in itself is a big accomplishment to me.
There are so many emotions actually being there with 30,000 runners that I wasn't prepared for. I was so nervous and almost physically ill. I was so excited and scared all at the same time. When I walked into my corral, I looked in front and as far as I could see there were people and then I turned and looked behind me and there were more people as far as I could see. The energy was overwhelming and intoxicating. Once they said 5. 4. 3. 2. 1.... and we took off, all the nerves went away and it was so fun!... For about 10 miles anyway,... then I started not doing so hot. Oh well. I have already decided that I will be running Oklahoma City. I have proved to myself that I could do it, now I want to improve.
( and I will just say this,... I found no hidden comfort in those socks. they lied. )

Well 8 years ago today......

Today is our 8th anniversary! wow. I don't want to go into super duper lovie talk so.... I will just say... I love you Joshua Alan Franklin. May we have many many more anniversaries!

Busy Busy....

We have been incredibly busy lately. And it seems like everyone I talk to their life is as hectic as ours... so I guess it's just the season of life we are in. So I thought I better blog a little bit of what has been going on.

First Kate got glasses! We went to the doctor a couple of weeks ago because Kate had been running a fever on and off for a couple of days. So after waiting for 30 minutes in the waiting room then waiting another 30 minutes in the room... we finally see her and figure out that it's just a virus and treat it with tylenol/motrin and wait it out. Awesome, great tip for $70. But while we were there she thought she noticed Kates eye slanting slightly out, which I couldn't tell at all, and she suggested we go see an eye doctor. So we go and come to find out she has a much weaker eye than the other and its causing her vision in that eye to get worse and worse.... so here we are with our cute glasses. We had to get two pair, red and brown, just in case we needed it to match an outfit!

On to the next thing...

We had parent watch day at gymnastics to see all the new tricks our kiddos have been hard at work learning.. they are too cute!

This last weekend was the end to our NRCBA baseball season as a Bantam league player. We fought hard recovering from a loss early in the tournament and had to win our way back up to the championship. We won the first game but had to play them again because they hadn't lost yet and it was double elimination. So after playing 2 games on Saturday and 2 games on Sunday we fell short in the last game and got second place. Our boys were so sad until they realized that they too got a trophy! So it was all good...

We came home from playing two hard games to get ready for trick or treating and Lord of the Harvest. rush rush....  So we changed into costumes, well Kate did, and hurried out the door. I convinced Will that it was such a great costume idea to be a Texas Ranger baseball player since they are in the world series and he agreed, thank goodness! And yes, I made their treat bags along with the help of a sweet friend.