Collier Party of 5

Monday, November 28, 2016

Pumpkin Carving

Oct. 26
After birthday dinner, we had a great evening carving pumpkins!

Ethan- scooping out the goo

Atley wanted a try!

Nora's turn :)

Just some cute pumpkins on the porch!
Nora and Ethan designed their own pumpkins and Ethan carved most of his by himself!

Pumpkins in order... Nora, Jared, Becky, Ethan

A couple of October 26 Birthdays

Nora loves sharing her birthday with her daddy! This year Nora turned 5! A whole hand! How did that happen? She has such sweet spirit! She knows no stranger and will talk to anyone. She has a strong opinion about most things. She loves life and loves people. And I love to watch her learn new things and figure things out on her own. 5 years has definitely gone in a flash! Happy birthday Nora girl! We love you so so much!! And happy birthday Jared! You are the best husband and daddy we could ask for!

Last sleep as a 4 year old

Gifts from under the bed ;)!

One last gift was on the table! (I LOVE Ethan's face in this pic!)

She's one excited girl!!

This is what was in the box. She and I headed to Chicago for a special birthday weekend on Oct. 29.

Birthday donut!

After breakfast, I got to spend the morning with Nora at school.

Singing the good morning song with Callynn

Checking out pumpkin goo

Nora's classmates sang to her :)

Me and my big girl!

Birthday dinner with the birthday buddies!

Monday, November 7, 2016

"Shiplap" Projects

Jared and I have done a couple projects around our house recently. If you haven't heard, shiplap or shiplap type walls are all over the decorating world! So, I decided we would give it a try! And I'm so so happy with the results. We started with the wall behind our kitchen table.

Before

He's so good to me!

Progress!

After!!

I love this leaded window we found!

Before and After!

After we finished the kitchen wall, I found another wall to re-make! Our entryway wall, was next on the list!

Before

Hardworking hubby!

Almost finished :)!

After!

I love this!! And I'm searching for the right bench to go in front.

Salem Weekend

Oct. 22-23
We had a great weekend in Salem when we went to meet baby Burke. Saturday night, my parent's church was having a fall festival, so we went! The weather was amazing and we really had a fun time!

Finley, Ethan, Scout and Nora taking a hay ride!

Pumpkin painting with Atley

Nora going for another hay ride with daddy

Sunday for lunch we went out to Grandma Karen and Grandpa's to celebrate Nora and Jared's birthdays.

I love that they share a birthday!!

Everybody blows out the candles

Grandpa brought out a 22 rifle he had gotten for Ethan (to be kept at his house). Ethan could barely eat his lunch, he was so excited to try it out. He hit the target every shot!

Learning how to load (it's just a single shot)

He even hit the black bullseye, and was so excited about that.

Ethan and Grandpa

Meeting Baby Burke

Oct. 22
We have a new nephew!! Jared's brother, Dustin and wife Amanda are new parents to sweet baby Burke. He was born on October 20, so we made a trip to Salem that weekend to meet him! He is perfect with a ton of hair!!

He's still a baby hog!

She was pretty happy to hold him too.

We needed Dustin in the pic for the Collier boy photo

Getting my snuggle time in :)

Atley checking him out

This was the best I got of the 4 Collier grandkids :)

Camp Out and Girls Night

Oct 15
Ethan had his first Cub Scout campout a few weekends ago. He and Jared went and had a great time. They hiked, made up a skit, ate something made in a dutch oven, slept in a tent and I'm sure some other things :).

Jared, Ethan and a tent!

While the boys were away, we decided to have a girls night! (Zach and Nathan went too, so Liz and Nikki joined our girls night!) Movie and then dinner!

Atley's first movie, and she did great!

Nora, Liz & Atley watching "Storks"

Wednesday, November 2, 2016

Spotlight Student

Oct. 11
Each week in Nora's class a different student to be in the "spotlight". They get a poster to fill out about themselves, they get to bring in pictures to share, they get to do a poster presentation AND get to bring in show and tell (or "showing tell" as Nora calls it) every day that week! The kids really look forward to their turn and Nora got hers a few weeks ago! For her first show and tell, we brought in Max. The kids in her class were so so excited!