happy 29th birthday Colton!!!

Today is Colton's 29th birthday!! 

He is not a birthday lover. 

But I am. 

So against his request I made him a ice cream cake and we sang to him! 

You can see how much he loved it....

Happy Birthday hunny!!!

thanksgiving on the virginia farm

Every year the Palmers head down to the old Palmer farm. It used to be run by Colton's Dad's Uncle, but when he passed away 10 years ago, his daughter Sarah and her husband Bob took it over.

The large Estate that used to be on the property burned many many years ago. They live in what once was the "servants house" - and have expanded on it a bit.

The joke is none of the animals are quite right. The dog was raised by the cats. The horse thinks he is a cow. The peacocks were raised with chickens.. and so on. Also, most of the animals are rescue animals.....so really its a farm of love :)

   

I made my Grandma's rolls, green bean cassarolle and fruit melba for dessert! We had an awesome spread on the table by 2pm.

I fed the scraps to the chickens....

Then we walked the farm and acres of land before sunset.

   

I learned that horses breath on each other to figure out who the other horse is.... I learned this while I was trying to give the horse a kiss... BIG HUGE nostrils open up and YUP I got a nice wiff of that horse's "scent".

We took the traditional family Christmas Card photo at the farm...  (not sure if this one will make it this year... we are missing Damon! )

Then I tried to get Colton to do a jumping photo with me... "on the count of three jump.. okay? One, two , three, jump!!" ...then this is what i got....

Can you spot the Peacock? 

The whole time I was trying to get a photo of me with a peacock. There were 6 so you think it would be easy! 

Colton followed me around with a camera as I tried to sneak up on them and get in the same frame...with out the giddy dog scaring them away! ... well I finally did it and I turn around to say "did you get that?!" and I find Colton kneeling on the ground petting the cat and saying "gooood kitty gooood kitty". 

So the shot wasn't captured.

But I guess it just goes to show what animal lovers those Palmers are. 

Hope you had a wonderful Thanksgiving weekend, I know we did. I am grateful for the beauty that I live in and the wonderful Family we always have around! 

Happy Thanksgiving weekend :)

our november

Tomorrow is Colton's Birthday - that means November is almost over.. and Colton is gonna be 29!

This month we....

- Met up with Colton's work buddy's and their wives and played some bowling in VA.....

- Went to a Chris Young concert in downtown Silver Spring, MD...... (who is he? He won Nashville star back in 2007 and has been a HUGE success ever since!) 

- THEN.. this last weekend we had our FIRST couples trip! A few weeks back My friend Shannon texted me about a Groupon for "Yogi Bear's Jellystone Park" Cabins. Sounds exciting right? Well they have two little kids 4 and 2 so we thought with kids it could be a fun weekend getaway. After a littler persuading we got the husbands on board too!

Last minute her in-laws offered to come down from Philly and watch the kids... weekend of adults only! 

Well this is what we experienced as we were welcomed to "Jelly Stone Park" in Hagerstown, MD  at 10 PM at night....

CREEPY. Couldn't wait to get into the sketch cabins and see what we had waiting for us in there.

Um, there were NO locks on the doors, as we entered into a dark dark cabin. Colton being the man he is let me go first and stumble around the creepy darkness to find the light.

Once we finally found the light Yogi Bear curtains immediately made us feel at home. The 30 degrees inside did not, so we let the electric heaters warm the place up for the night.  

It was hard to sleep that night.. not sure if it was the electric heaters suffocating us with no fresh air flow all night or, our 2 inch thick plastic mattress, or our excitement as we anxiously awaited the morning time so that we could see the sketch Yogi Bear campground in 40 degree daylight. 

Once the sun was up so were we. We had a nice breakfast on the picnic tables outside before heading to Antitum, a near by battlefield from the Civil War. 

Forrest loves history and learning about all the Civil War adventures so we took advantage of someone else's interest and enjoyed a day full of Civil War history and old battlefields. 

Later in the afternoon we returned back to our "campgrounds" to check out the "amenities". They have Go Carts ( no gas, you have to peddle with your feet), Arcade ( 5 choices of games, all slightly beat up and not working quite right) and goofy golf ( 16 holes of pretty much the same shape green at every hole, oh and all the clubs were children's length.)

We chose goofy golf. (notice the same "T" shape green in every photo...

AND this would be my FAVORITE series of photos that sums up Colton's opinion of the Groupon Coupon Weekend: 

( it was on my camera this way and I can't help but to laugh every time I see it... he just looks sooooo annoyed) We have concluded we are not the "camping" type. 

Hope your November was just as fun...! ( We would not recommend going back to Jelly Stone Park as exciting as these photos may make it look.)