*I decorated for Christmas WAY early this year. I'm kind of against putting up Christmas things before Thanksgiving, but I just couldn't help myself. I came home from work one day in early November in a Christmas mood, put on some Christmas music, made some hot chocolate, and busted it out.
I even decorated a little Texas tree for James. I may keep it up all year :)
*Mid-November Jennika and I went to the Nutcracker Market, which was SO fun! Definitely a new holiday tradition for Maggie. The goal is for my mom to be able to go with us next year, she was so jealous! 
We weren't sure what to expect, and couldn't get there until about 1:00pm, but five hours later we each had some goodies and BIG plans for next year! 
*The next weekend Brodie and Jennika came up to hang out because Brodie had a two-day lacrosse tournament right by our house. We got to go to one of the boys' games, which James really enjoyed. Here you can see Lily hiding under his shirt because she was so cold. 
*The Tuesday before Thanksgiving Corbin flew down and drove with us on Wednesday to Alabama. What was supposed to be a 12 hour drive turned into 14 as we kept venturing off to find restraurants that were way further off the beaten path than we thought. Oh well. 
It was so nice to see Grandmama (my dad's mom). I hadn't seen her in over two years and I really missed her! 
I was so excited that I got to learn how to make her famous Chicken & Dumplings for Thanksgiving! They're so easy and they really are the BEST. 
Here's James hanging out with my cousin Ethan. They were so cute together! 
Here's the whole fam at Thanksgiving (well not the whole family, but everyone who was there). 
*On Friday morning we left at 6:00 am to head to Tuscaloosa for the big game. We got there with the perfect amount of time to see and do all that we wanted to before the game started. Right when we got on campus James won these stickers that he and my sister wore all day. I love that he's become quite the Bama fan :)
Lauren's boyfriend Jake won this shirt! Lucky! 
In the background is the President's mansion. I've always loved that house. 
In front of the stadium. It was SO cold that day. If my dress hadn't been so dang cute I would have certainly been wearing jeans and boots! 
In front of the stadium are statues of all the coaches who have lead the Crimson Tide to the national championship. Here we are with Bear Bryant. 
I can't believe we were able to get a picture with Big Al! I was so happy! 
After seeing all the sites on the strip we went to the Paul Bear Bryant museum. Best $2 I ever spent! We watched a movie all about him and learned lots about his life. We also got to see Nick Saban's shirt from the National Championship last year. 
As well as the trophy. Roll Tide!
After all that we went to Wing's where we hung out for a whole 4 1/2 hours and ate and watched the game. The food was AMAZING, and the game was really exciting until the last quarter :( 
After leaving Tuscaloosa we went to Prattville to see my best friend Beth. I hadn't seen her in over two years and it was so fun. She's been renovating her house since the last time I was there and now it's finally finished and I was so happy I got to see how beautiful it is now. 
*After leaving Beth's we drove down to my Mawmaw and Pawpaw's (my mom's parents) where we spent the rest of our weekend. They have a new "vacation" home on the river and we had a lot of fun racing around on the golf carts and eating lots of food. 
The boys played football for a large chunk of the day, and they were all really sore afterwards! 
At night some of the cousins played games with us. And obviously James taught them some magic tricks :) 
Of course, no visit at Mawmaw's would be complete without Mawmaw doing something crazy. So here she is busting out a candie bra! We about died! 
November was a really fun month, and Thanksgiving was one of the best. I hadn't spent Thanksgiving with my family in 6 years, and I'm so thankful James was so willing to go. I'm excited for the rest of this month too - we have a fancy dinner this weekend, James' Christmas retreat for work next week, my company Christmas dinner the next week, and then Christmas in Iowa! All coming soon!
In other news, I finished Wuthering Heights and Animal Farm. I did enjoy Wuthering Heights a lot more than I thought I would. But old school English love stories are a little crazy for me. This one in particular reminded me a lot of Edgar Allan Poe... very dark. Entertaining nonetheless. And Animal Farm is a classic that illustrates all the problems with Stalin and the Soviet Union and that whole mess. Today I got two new books: Vanity Fair and The Picture of Dorian Gray. I'm just shocked at the number of books I haven't read that I apparently MUST before I die. Well at least two down... 98-ish to go! I've also moved up to #25 on the waiting list for The Hunger Games- that's 54 spots in 3 weeks! Ha! So I'm excited to have it soon.
I checked out Wuthering Heights and Animal Farm, both of which are on the list of "100 books to read before you die." I cannot even say how much I love reading and how much I enjoy being in a library. I almost got a little emotional looking at all of the books! It's just fascinating how much you can learn from reading. I'm so grateful to my mother for encouraging (and often forcing) me to read when I was younger as it has become one of my absolute favorite things to do. Hopefully one of my next books will be The Hunger Games, since everyone has raved so much about it. I'm 76 on a waiting list at the library, so hopefully everyone reads it quick! And I'm ALWAYS looking for book suggestions, so please share!
And this is our waiter, EJ. He was SO funny and such a great waiter, I just had to get a pic with him! I'm not exactly sure why he's working at the Cheesecake Factory, he should be playing for the Texans-he's huge! 
