Happy Birthday Kyle!

This is not from this year!

Wishing Kyle a happy birthday today! He is happy that he is able to spend his birthday morning out in the woods bow hunting! He always says it is the best day of the year! lol His birthday and opening day of bow season all in the same day! I plan on making a big breakfast of ham and eggs for him when he gets home. Love ya!

Wordless Wednesdays - Horseback Riding

This is almost Wordless Wednesday! Over Labor Day weekend we took our kids and Kyle's Sister Katy took her 2 younger kids horseback riding! It was the first time for all the kids and myself to go horseback riding. We took an hour long ride with a guide through the woods in Yankee Springs near Hastings. We can't wait to do it again.

Marhea (Katy's youngest) and Hannah

Daddy and his little girl

Brayden

James

Keegan (Katy's son)

Wordless Wednesdays - Emily and the caterpillar

Happy 1st Day of Fall!

I heart fall! So happy it is here.





I heart fall! So happy it is here.

Emily loves flowers!

Snapped these pics yesterday! Emily and I picked some Cosmos out of my flower bed to bring in the house. She kept smelling them and wanted to arrange them in the cup all by herself! I call her Miss. Independent! She is Stubborn but a cutie!

Wordless Wednesdays - Beautiful things in Michigan!

Just some snapshots of some beautiful things found in our great State of Michigan! I love the change of the seasons and all the natural outdoor things our state offers. Sorry this is a little late, blogger was giving me problems loading pictures today!

Tahquamenan Falls in the Upper Pennisula of Michigan!


The sun setting over Lake Michigan. I love Lake Michigan!


Part of the Pictured Rocks near Munising Michigan in the Upper Penninsula. This was taken in winter while we were snowmobiling!

The sun setting over the sand dunes at Silver Lake (Near Lake Michigan)

I won Tickets to see Willie Nelson today!

Okay, I am not the biggest fan of Willie Nelson, but my hubby really likes him! He was pretty excited when I called him to tell him I had won the tickets.

This morning I had the local country radio station on (WITL) while I was cleaning the kitchen and doing dishes. They announced that they were going to give away 5 sets of tickets to see Willie Nelson on the 24th of September. All you had to do was text "WHARTON" to a certain number and you would be entered to win! Well I have unlimited texting on my phone and you could send as many texts as you wanted, so I sent a few! Well I probably sent more than a few, more like 30! So the contest ended today at 2pm and I got a call a few minutes after 2 letting me know I was one of the winners! I am getting 2 4th row seats to see Willie Nelson at the Wharton Center in East Lansing next Thursday and they also are giving me a $50 gift card to Mitchell's Fish Market at the Eastwood Town Center in East Lansing. So now I have a date night with my hubby with a free nice dinner and tickets to a concert, all for free! I love FREE STUFF! I looked up the tickets online and they are going for $55.00 a piece! So I just won a prize package worth $160! This made my day, heck my whole week! I love WITL!

This is the 2nd set of concert tickets I have won from WITL in the past few months. I won 4 tickets to see the up and coming Country Group GLORIANA too! CLICK HERE to read a previous post about that night!

I am sooo looking forward to my date night out with Kyle next Thursday! I will let you all know how it goes next week. Now I am going to look at the menu for Mitchell's Fish house and see what I am going to order. I'm thinking crab legs or shrimp!

What's for Dinner??

So I have been really trying to be more creative in the kitchen! I guess you kind of get in a rut and fall back on the same old foods for dinner. So I have been searching the Internet for some new recipes. I really like $5 dinners. She has some really great and easy recipes. I have tried the Chicken Tezzarini and Broccoli Spaghetti bake. The Tezzarini is a definite keeper, still not sure about the 2nd one. Tonight I am making oven baked chicken. I noticed the recipe on the Bisquick box. Sounded good. I think I will whip up some homemade mashed potatoes to go with it and some green beans.

The only downfall to cooking and trying a new recipe is of course that it won't be a fit for your family. I love hearing about new recipes from people that swear by them. So I would love it you would share a favorite family dinner recipe with me. We will eat pretty much anything! Are there any good sites you go to on a regular basis for new recipes??

I have been really trying to stick to some type of meal plan for the week. Not necessarily making a meal plan for each day, but coming up with enough meals for the week and picking one based on what is going on that evening. It has helped us eat at home more often and of course helped us save money!

Ok, well now I must go start cooking some dinner. Kyle is out goose hunting with his brother Nick and I know they will be starving when they get home. I think Kyle is always starving!

A little bit of this and that

So I have a ton of pictures to upload but we recently switched to another printer so I could print out coupons in just black and not use my good Photo Printer. Now I need Kyle to show me how to switch it over so I can upload my pictures. Maybe later tonight.

So last night I went and got my hair chopped off! Very short for me. My hair was down the the middle of my back, but I was constantly wearing it up in a pony tail because I got tired of dealing with it! My hair grows very fast and is very thick. I had Kyle's sister Katy cut it off. It is above my shoulders and I definitely can't pull it up in a pony tail now! I had her leave the bangs longer so I could pull them up or tuck them behind my ears. I will have to have Kyle take a picture and post it. I am really happy with it. It has been a long time since I went this short, probably over 5 years.

We are heading into a busy time of the year now that school has started. All three of the older children are involved in fall sports. James and Brayden are playing football and Hannah is cheering again! It should be interesting trying to juggle 3 different games on Saturdays at different times and different locations. Won't be able to hit all 3 every Saturday, but will do our best.

I am looking forward to MOPS starting back up again. I have missed my MOPS Mommy Friends. I really look forward to our meetings every other Tuesday. Our first meeting is this coming Tuesday.

Today I took Emily to Toddler Time. This is a free program offered to our community. We had a lot of fun. There was a lot of new people today, due to a write up in the local paper over the weekend. I have a few friends that attend already. It is an hour long program that is geared towards you interacting with your child. Today our theme was all about Apples. There was songs, books and stories about apples. We also did a craft where Emily painted with apples cut in half and dipped in paint! She really liked that but does not like getting her hands dirty so she kept trying to wipe the paint off! Too funny. I plan on going back weekly. It is good for Emily to have that interaction with other kids her age.

I am really looking forward to fall! Fall is my favorite season of the year. I love the feeling in the air, it's crisp and cool. I love wearing jeans and sweatshirts. I love playing in the leaves with the kids. Another activity that I enjoy is hunting. This is probably not to many girls' favorite activity, but I really do enjoy it. It is nice to spend the time out in the woods, it is quiet and you have time to reflect on life, talk to God and just sit for awhile! Sometimes if you get lucky you even get to shoot a deer! Last Christmas Kyle bought me a bow, so this will be my first year out hunting during October for bow season. I have been practicing and Kyle even put a tree stand up in our yard so I could practice shooting from it. I am not a big fan of heights but it gets easier each time I climb it. I enjoy shooting my bow and I am hoping to get a buck with it this year! I love having so many activities that Kyle and I enjoy doing together. We hunt, Kayak, Camp and go Snowmobiling together. He is not just my husband but my best friend.

Well I think I have rambled enough for right now. Hopefully I will be back sometime this weekend with some pictures from the past couple weeks.

Have a great weekend with your families.

Wordless Wednesdays - In honor of our upcoming Autumn Season

Just a few pics I took a couple years ago during fall! I love fall, it is my favorite season! Nothing better than jeans and sweatshirt weather, bonfires, football, cider and doughnuts, pumpkin goo and the beautiful color changing leaves! Oh, and hunting season too!





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Wordless Wednesdays - In honor of Summer coming to an end! Fun at the Beach!