Black Friday!!!

OK, I promise that I'm not one of the millions of Americans who seemingly have decided to skip right on over Thanksgiving...I just forgot to take any pictures!

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving at my grandparents house, I just don't have any photos to document it.

Thanksgiving night, in keeping with tradition, my Mom, T and myself, along with my aunt and cousins, headed for a slumber party at the Holiday Inn in Colorado Springs. 

No shopping for us on Thanksgiving night, just a good, fun girl's night!

Then, for no other reason than we like to, we got up and went to Target at 5AM.

After a couple of hours of shopping, we met my Grandparents and Great-Aunt for breakfast.
Shhhhh....don't tell GW that baby Titus got to come on girls day!

Early afternoon, John Wayne and GW came and met up with us.
We headed to Harding Nursery to visit Santa and to get our tree.

I am so in love with this adorable little tree we picked out.
It is absolutely perfect for the trailerhood.

So, Santa visit 2014...
T rocked it.
Her and Santa had quite the in-depth conversation while John Wayne and I worked to convince GW that it would be ok to even stand next to Santa.

Nope, he wasn't having it.
But he sure does look cute in this photo by himself.

So, the whole fam jumped in for a photo with Santa.

And, GW posed for another one by himself.

This is our second year to visit Santa at Harding Nursery and I'm deeming it tradition!

So excited to kick off Christmas season 2014!!!

NYC and DC!!!

I just took an amazing trip for work!

I was part of a group of 30 Farm Credit ambassadors from around the country.

We've been part of this program for the past nine months - learning about Farm Credit funding and policy issues - and the capstone was an amazing trip to New York City and Washington DC.

I flew into NYC on a Sunday afternoon.

This was the only free time I was going to have the entire trip.

I ventured out and headed to the Rockefeller Center, where I had dinner right next to the skating rink.

 

My after dinner treat, was my favorite festive drink - a white chocolate peppermint mocha.

Starbucks, in Rockefeller Center!

 

 

The highlight of my trip was visiting Radio City Music Hall to see their Christmas Spectacular.

And spectacular it was!

I brought a DVD of the show back and the Little Lady LOVED it.

I would love to take her and Gaga on a girl's weekend getaway in a couple of years to go see it.

 

So, NYC, by myself.
I can honestly say, I was not scared at all.
There were people everywhere - shopping, going to dinner, headed to shows - it was not scary.
But...my mom and John Wayne were pretty sure that I was going to get knifed...

I had promised them that I would take a cab, rather than walk by myself, everywhere I went.
Well, that just did not make sense.
So I ended up telling them that I walked to dinner.
It was still light out and I was still alive, so they were ok with this.
I mean really, what other option did they have.
But they made me swear that I would cab it back to the hotel after the show.

Well, the show got out and I really wish I would have walked the several blocks back to the hotel and called them when I was safely in my room.
Instead, I made good on my promise.
I hopped in one of the pedi-cabs lined up outside of Radio City.
I knew that they were expensive from past experience in Denver, but oh well, I was doing this for my Mom and my husband.
I saw on the side of another cab $4/minute...so I estimated that it would take about 10 minutes to get back to my hotel.
Forty dollars, stupid, but if that makes them happy, whatever.

Well, imagine my surprise when upon arriving back at the hotel, my total was $90!!!
It took 12 minutes, so two more minutes than I was planning on...no big deal, but the cab I was in was $6.99 a minute.
I wanted to puke.
So, John Wayne owes my $90.

Back to the trip...we spent two days in NYC, visiting our funding corporation and Bank of America, one of the banks that sells our bonds.

Highlight {insert sarcasm} walking 10 {long} blocks in the POURING rain, in heels to the subway.
Right then I knew that NYC is not for me, if I was at home, I'd have been in my car.

On Tuesday afternoon, we rode the train from NYC down to DC.
I covered five states in about the same amount of time that it takes me to drive from Wild Horse to Denver.

We spent Wednesday on the Hill meeting with our Congressmen.
I loved this part of the trip.
Honestly, it's probably a good thing that I never had the opportunity to visit DC in high school, or I probably would have ended up one of those poor staffers.

So, check out the Capitol.
They refurbishing it.
Guess they didn't get the memo that I was coming to town and that I'd like a good picture in front of it!

Myself and several others got to meet with Cory Gardner, Senator-Elect from rural eastern Colorado.
Awesome nice guy!

Oh, the glasses you ask???
Well, I was the youngest on the trip.
And the only one with an "assistant" instead of a "senior" in front of my vice president title.
So, I was feeling a little, um, inferior nervous.
So, the glasses were my attempt at gaining credibility.
Turns out I love my Warby Parkers and I do look smart.

This trip had a jam packed agenda, with 8AM start times everyday ending with dinner speakers each night.
That didn't leave any room for sight seeing, but we did get to see the Washington Monument from the parking lot of the United States Department of Agriculture when we visited there.
I have another meeting in DC in 2016, so I am already planning on extra time and taking John Wayne with me, so we can see the sights.

The Pentagon - from the bus window as we drove by.

So, this truly was an amazing trip and I am so blessed that I was able to go on it.
Farm Credit is awesome for sending me.
John Wayne and my Mom and Dad are awesome for watching the kids so I could go.
It was great, but in the end, I was so ready to be back in Wild Horse, America!

We love our Lady Wildcats!!

We had so much fun cheering our Lady Wildcats on at the State Volleyball Tournament earlier this month!

They played the first match of the tournament, 8AM, so that meant we had to be pulling out of the driveway at 5:30AM!!

I made the littles new KC volleyball shirts.
They had fun sporting them.

The girls won both of their matches on Friday.
So, us and Gaga, stayed Friday night in Denver.
That meant swimming and a pizza party.
Yippee!

Saturday, our mascot even made an appearance!

The ladies ended up losing in the semi-finals to the eventual state champs.

They played a heck of a tournament and we are proud to be Kit Carson Wildcats!

This crazy {perfect} little life of ours!

There is never, never, a dull moment with these two little crazies around!

 

With the busy holiday season quickly approaching, last Saturday I decided that I was going to do some extra cleaning. 

I was back in our master bathroom giving it a good deep cleaning. 

The kids were watching cartoons in the living room.

 

And then this happened.

And I swear that I had been peeking in on them like every five minutes.

But apparently a frat party broke out.

 

There was a mattress in the middle of the floor.

There was an assortment of random sugary cereals everywhere.

And T decided to put make-up on.

Lots of make-up on.  {This picture does not do her mad make-up skills justice!}

 

Mind you, this was the day after Halloween.

And they might have eaten candy for breakfast...



Then I just love this.
The other night, John Wayne and I walked into the door to this.
Future blackmail pictures of our cute little mermaid!

I love our crazy little life! #dangblessed

Trick or Treat!

The Goldings, along with half of America, were none other than, Elsa, Anna and Olaf for Halloween 2014!

Tressie pretty much dictated Halloween this year. "I will be Elsa, Gunner will be Olaf and Mom you will be Anna."  Her Dad would not play her game.

 

I took the day off of work and we put our costumes on first thing in the morning and headed to Lamar to watch our Lady Wildcats in the Regional Volleyball Tournament.

{Regional Champs and on to State!!!}

 

 

We then hustled home, added some warm clothes under Elsa's costume and changed into Olaf costume #2.
Yes, costume #2.
Originally, he was just going to have costume #1 that I made.
Then I saw costume #2 at Wal-Mart and bought it, intending to take one costume back.
Well, I knew a 2-year-old boy in a white costume would not last all day, so that is how GW ended up with two costumes.

It was a little chilly this year, but they had lots of fun and got quite the haul of candy.
Last stop was their favorite stop, the Greats.

 

We spent the rest of the weekend gorging ourselves on chocolate bars and Skittles!