Playgroup Halloween Party

We hosted a Halloween Party for our playgroup today. Lots of little boys age 3 and under!  And 3 little sisters....Even though it was chilly and windy, we played outside all morning; enjoyed some yummy Halloween treats; and decorated our pumpkins.

 mummy juice boxes

 Halloween cupcakes

working on his lawn mower

 Graham and Cole, decorating their pumpkins

baby girl, all bundled up!

Disney on Ice

Yesterday afternoon,  Brent and I took the Avery and Griffin to see Disney on Ice for the first time...and they loved it. Avery's favorite was seeing the Little Mermaid and Griffin's was whole second half of the show which was Toy Story.  Graham was home with a sitter but he would have had a fit to see Mater and McQueen!!

Some of the Toy Story crew

 Waiting for the show to start!  We let them each pick out a souvenir - Griffin picked out a light up sword and Avery picked an Ariel doll...could have predicted both of those!

 We were literally rink side - floor level - less than 10 feet from the ice! We had lots of eye contact and waves from the characters!

wide-eyed!

Trout Fishing

One of our new mountain traditions that we started this year is taking the big kids trout fishing. Since Graham + water = disaster, I stayed back with he and Carsyn while Brent took Avery and Griffin fishing with Big Daddy and their cousins. Everyone caught 2 trout.

 reeling one in!

 what a cutie!!

 dinner!!

 One of Avery's catches

and one of Griffin's fish

Baby Shower

 We were lucky enough to have Hannah and Landon join us in the mountains this year. They live in Utah so they don't normally make it to the mountains and we don't get to see them very often.  AND, since they are expecting their first baby in January, we had a little mini baby shower while we were all together. It was wonderful to be able to celebrate with them!

 Baby Girl McBrayer is due to arrive on January 19 - Landon's birthday!!

 Ann, Merritt, Hannah, Haley, LeeAnn

Only with my brothers could you get away with a  Baby Bottle Beer chugging contest!!

 Loving all the baby goodies!

 Thanks for the story Uncle Doons!

Camden, using yarn to guess the size of Hannah's belly

This little man took a long nap so he was the only kiddo to get to enjoy the ice cream sundae bar!

McBrayer Mountain Trip 2012

 We officially kicked off fall last weekend with our annual McBrayer Mountain Trip. We moved to a new location this year because the Tabor House in Nantahala Village became a spa and the smaller cabins became infested with mice!!  It was really nice to have all of the Charleen/Mike kids in one big house. Made naps and bedtime much easier!

We added a few new traditions this year as well. We roasted weenies on the fire pit for lunch one day and the big kids went trout fishing one afternoon.  And the adults spent nights outside by the fire pit, enjoying conversation and the sound of a babbling creek!

 Saeran (peyton/ann's 2nd) and Graham enjoying their suckers in Cherokee

 Ayla (preston's 2nd), Saeran, Avery, Addison (peyton's1st), Griffin, Graham, Clayton (haley's 1st), Kale (preston's 1st), and Caris (peyton's 3rd)

 Mommy and Carsyn (almost 6 months)

Avery and Addie

 our new "big house" - it has a little shallow creek out back; pet turkey and chickens out front; a huge playroom upstairs; a fire pit on one side...

 Hannah and Landon were able to join us this year. We hadn't seen them in almost a year - way too long - so we loved getting to spend some time with them.

 roasting marshmallows to make smores

  

 Graham and Daddy

 Family Photo

Nina and Big Daddy's arms are overflowing!  And this is after Kale and Ayla left!!

Kackleberry Farms

We made our second hour long drive out to Kackleberry Farms today - and thankfully, no rain today!  It was a beautiful fall day and a perfect day to spend outside. The kids loved it - we stayed for about 3.5 hours - the older 2 would have stayed longer but Graham was meltdown city!  And Carsyn just hung out, in true fourth child style!

 this sign is the back of the restrooms...and it apparently stunk because the boys wouldn't unplug their noses for me to get a picture!

 Graham was not fond of jumping on the "haystack" by himself so brent had to assist.

 in addition to the "four wheeler and tractors," this was grahams favorite thing...you pumped water to wash your rubber duck down the pipe and into a water trough...

 our only attempt to get a picture of all the kids...flop!

 loving this furry little bunny!

 not quite sure of the furry little bunny!

 the see-saw had tractor seats and steering wheels at each end!

 daddy and graham, crammed into their cow!  the cows form a train and are pulled by a four wheeler...I think this was the highlight of Grahams day!

 watching the pigs race

 playing in the corn pit...just imagine griffin rolling, flopping, throwing, etc...sorry to everyone else there!

 baby girl took a nap while Daddy and the others had a hay ride

the hayride

There was tons of other stuff that we did...rode dune buggy things, zip line, pony rides, big slides...but I had to put up the camera in effort to keep up with everyone!!  They all wanted to go in different directions!

Seeds

Brent loves sunflower seeds and always gets a bag or 2 to eat on road trips...occasionally the big kids ask for a few and he gives them some...Today, out of no where, Griffin asked if I would stop at a gas station and get him some sunflower seeds!  So I did and he started eating them right away. When Brent got home from work, Griffin brought his seeds and spit cup to Brent and the two of them went to town!

Getting a lesson from Daddy

 

 Griffin concentrates really hard, attempting to eat the seeds like daddy (without using his fingers to pull them apart)